Chiang Mai - Lanna, elephants, and paradise found

Today is our last full day in Chiang Mai. Tomorrow evening, we pack our bags once again and head into the hustle and bustle of Bangkok. It's been an absolutely amazing last few days. Not only is Chiang Mai lush and green, but I've also learned a lot about the people and culture of Northern Thailand. Some highlights:

The Lanna vs. Thai
Everywhere we go, there is the talk of Lanna people and the Lanna culture. After taking the cultural tour at the resort on the first day, we learned all about these people of Northern Thailand. The Lanna originally ran their own kingdom which was centred around Chiang Mai. They were subsequently threatened by various conquerors and also fell into Burmese rule for a period, which led to the Thai king proposing marriage to the Lanna princess so that the conquerors would be kept at bay and the Burmese pushed out. As a result, Lanna became a part of Thailand, and its people forced to adopt Thai culture and language, as well as the educational system. A big part of this resort's goal is to preserve the Lanna heritage, and educate guests on their culture so that it will not disappear in Thailand.

Elephants
They used to work in the forest for hours on end and were treated poorly. Now various elephant "training" camps have been set up in the area to domesticate elephants to serve as a tourist attraction. Yes, it's still exploitation, but at least it guarantees that the elephants get fed well, and receive all the medical attention that they may need. The elephants at the Chiang Dao training camp that we visited today only work half day -- they start by going into the Ping River for a bath, then do a short demo [will post video shortly] of the work elephants used to do, and then take visitors like us for a 30-minute trek through the forest to a Lisu tribe village. A short rest later, the elephants bring us back to the original camp. Truckloads of food are then brought in for their food at noon (when they stop working), and the elephants are allowed to roam free in the forest after that.

Lush lush lush
And no, I don't mean drinking. Chiang Mai is such a lush place. I've decided that this is definitely one good mock-up for heaven or at least paradise. The Mandarin Oriental Dhara Dhevi is top notch, and I think the best part is that it's a resort that's also steeped with local culture and a desire to preserve the way things were (hence the rice fields on the property, as well as local architecture). It's definitely a great place to visit, and I'll definitely come back (mosquito bites notwithstanding). :-)

There's a lot more I've missed but I'm exhausted so that's all for today! Links to photos here.

Be inspired. Are you a Tigger or an Eeyore?

Watch Dr. Randy Pausch's video of his last lecture at Carnegie Mellon. It will change your life, and make you reflect how you can live it to the fullest. Watch it. Watch the whole thing. It's the best hour you'll spend.

And on to Thailand

This morning we left Hong Kong for the next stop in our trip: Chiang Mai. After a quick 3 hour flight, we spent nearly a third of that time hiking across the entire Suvarnabhumi airport in Hong Kong to get to the domestic transfer area. Can we say, someone build a subway?

Anyway, the news in Asia is dominated by all the terror that's happening in Myanmar. I recently read in a local blog that the junta has now cut off all internet access in that country so it'll be even harder to find out what's really going on there. We'll have to see what the international community will do about all of this. *sigh*

Last thoughts on Hong Kong --
Every time I come back, I feel more and more disengaged from the place. I remember thinking that there was a strong emotional connection each time I visited, but I must admit that I didn't feel the same this time around. The people, the place, and the psyche of it have all changed, and I'm not sure that I would want to ever be there for an extended period of time again. At least not in the short term. It makes me somewhat sad that I've come to this conclusion, especially with all of the family and relatives that I have there. But at the end of the day, I know that blood ties will always run deep, no matter where in the world I may be. You don't need to be in the same place to feel the connection, just as sometimes you could be in the same place and still feel completely disconnected.

And with that, we're out. Sawadee ka, Thailand.

It's sorta like Venice, but not...and other Hong Kong musings

It's been just over a week of my Asia trip. We're only two cities in (Macao, and now Hong Kong), there's one phrase I've already heard over and over again, strangely enough..."It's like Venice [Italy], but not." First, they said that about the Venetian Hotel in Macao, (it's more not, in my opinion), and today my tour guide to Lantau Island said the same thing about Tai O, a small-and-now-defunct fishing village.

Tai O should have been a great place. Located on Lantau Island, the village enjoys a prime spot where the Pearl River meets the South China Sea -- in another words, loads and loads of fish. However, years of aggressive fishing have depleted all the fish stocks and now the fishing village imports all of the fish and seafood that it then dries or cures to sell to tourists and Hong Kong locals (a little known fact -- the importing part). Another unique feature of Tai O is that many of the houses are built on water, hence the comparison to Venice. However, all of the village's fishing glory has disappeared and it's now one of the poorest areas of Hong Kong. Sad. :(

Today I also visited the Tian Tan Buddha -- the largest outdoor seated Buddha in the world. I must say it was extremely serene yet impressive to see this bronze statue halfway up on the hills, surrounded the greenery. The beauty of the whole surrounding environment took my breath away. Link to more pictures

============================

Every time I come to Hong Kong, I'm struck by how different things are, and how fast things change. Hong Kong's probably one of the few places you could visit year after year and notice significant cultural and social changes in that short period. Some thoughts on this trips observations:

It's all about thin...
For women that is. "Slimming" services and companies make up the majority of all popular advertising, promising guaranteed results in ridiculously short time frames and without any effort on your part whatsoever. Most "case studies" show women losing 10-20 pounds (often 20 to 30% of their total body weight) in 14 days, using scary looking space capsule type machines that dehydrate you (literally) and pinch your fat until it falls apart. And no, of course the results don't last. That's how these places suck you in and continue to make money off you.

...and pale.
But only for your skin. While Americans are obsessed with teeth whitening, the Chinese (and Asians in general) are obsessed with skin whitening. Today I walked by a billboard with an ad for some skin whitening product, and noticed that like the teeth whitening chart, this product actually came with a colour strip so you can measure how many shades you've lightened your skin. And here we are fussing about our tans! Craaaaazy!

The flip side of efficiency is laziness
Hong Kong people are crazy efficient. The take-out service of any restaurant is faster than that of McDonald's, and the transportation network puts almost all other international cities to shame. And yet, I suspect that the true reason behind all the efficiency (other than to save money, or to make more of it), is that people here are lazy. Case in point, in one of the MTR (subway) stations, there are 3 exit escalators since there is so much traffic. This is very efficient, except for the fact that everyone only uses 1 of the 3 escalators. The reason? Because you have to round a corner to reach these escalators, and only the one on the right is the fastest and closest one, and walking three extra steps to reach the other 2 would be, well, a waste of steps. Or people are just plain lazy.

We are in China after all
Forget the promise of no change in 50 years by the Chinese government. The reality is, Hong Kong has changed, and we are now in China. Mandarin is now spoken as common as English, and the Mainland Chinese are everyone. Walk into any nice store, and they're usually the ones actually buying something. (The locals will go to look at the latest styles so that they know which fakes to buy.) Go to any restaurant, and the loudest table will be filled with Mandarin conversations, not Cantonese. Today I saw someone empty their nostrils onto the side of the street, China style. (Yes, directly without using a kleenex. It's too gross to even describe.)

Tomorrow's my last full day in Hong Kong for this leg of the trip. Friday we are off to Chiang Mai!! :-)

Raining in Hong Kong on Yom Kippur

I know I'm not Jewish, and Yom Kippur's not really related to the weather, but those were just the two things that came to mind today. I suppose technically it's already Sunday here, but my post time still says Saturday so the Yom Kippur reference still stands!!

What I did yesterday...let's see...had brunch with my uncle yesterday, did some shopping at Landmark, and then met up with Olivia for dinner at Opia. I could have sworn we were in New York the whole time. Dinner was a yummy tasting menu; it's sort of a blur now, but the stand-outs were the oyster shooter (raw oyster, sake, wasabi, something sweet, all with a soba noodle sushi roll chaser), seared foie gras with chocolate mousse (yes chocolate), pear sorbet served with a caviar spoon (meaning it was made of mother of pearl), waygu beef cheek, and pavlova for dessert. The best part of all this is that the restaurant was supposed to be Australian influenced -- that part was lost on us. ;-)

All I did was eat today.

And yes, I feel fat. But a good fat. We got into Hong Kong just before 2pm. After a somewhat convoluted trip to get to our hotel, we ventured out for our first HK "meal" -- iced milk tea and Hong Kong style egg tarts, chicken pies and "pineapple" buns. With our tummies half full, we went out to Stanley to stroll along the water and visit the somewhat famous Stanley Market. There we found this crazy (sketchy) hole-in-the-market noodle joint famous for their fish ball rice noodle soup, all washed down with classic glass bottle of Coke. Mmm...doesn't get much better than that. ;-)

Until of course, you get to Sai Kung and pick your own seafood out of tubs in front of restaurants and have them cook crab, scallops, fresh abalone, and crawfish to your liking. And then for dessert, some cold tofu dessert with red bean soup. Day one in Hong Kong was pretty sweet. And filling. And now I need to go on a diet. Or not. ;-)

The rest of today's pics - link

It's great as long as long as your stay away from the hotel

A little sightseeing around Macao today...

The Venetian Macao sucks

Yes, whine whine whine, complain complain complain. But it's really that bad here. Other than the free wireless internet and the really large (and new rooms), this place has serious issues. Here's the full text of my review that I just posted on TripAdvisor:

I am writing this review bearing in mind that this hotel opened fairly recently and must be still working out the kinks. Even still, this place is so awful (for its price point and supposed hotel class) that I am writing my review while I'm still here. If you are expecting the Las Vegas Venetian quality, forget about it.

My family and I checked in yesterday -- we had booked their "Suite Specials" off their website directly which included breakfast and a dining amenity. When we arrived at around 4pm, our rooms were not ready. We had to wait until almost 5 pm to get our rooms. Then, they messed up our reservations and said that they didn't have any of the package amenities included. My mother had to negotiate with the manager for *AN HOUR* before they acknowledged the package amenities.

There are no active bellmen at this place. At least not obviously so. Like many visitors, we had taken the shuttle bus directly from the ferry pier. The shuttle buses arrive at a completely separate entrance from the main entrance, and when we got off, there was no one to help with luggage. We are traveling for several weeks so we had about 5 pieces of luggage and a golf bag with us, and the staff that were "greeting" the shuttle bus made no attempt at helping us, or calling for any luggage help. When we made it through the check-in line, I proactively asked the front desk if we could get some help with luggage, and their response was: "Uh... we could call for help, but it will probably take a long time." Emphasis on the word "long"...given that we were tired after a 14-hour flight + ferry, we gave up and carried our own luggage...across the entire casino with no baggage carts.

My toilet got clogged this morning. I called for help and no one came for an hour. I had to call again and it took another hour before anyone arrived, even though they said that they would send someone "right away".

The concierge is also hopeless and useless. I went and asked for a local map of Macao and she handed me a casino map. Then when I explained that I was looking for a city map, she said that they didn't have any and that I should go to a store to buy one. When I asked for recommendations on the best place for Portuguese egg tarts (a very popular and common local food), she said she didn't know of any, even though she was supposedly a local Macau resident. I finally got an egg tart recommendation from someone who worked at *jewelry* store in the casino.

Later today, I got locked out of my room because my key just stopped working. I was able to flag down a staff member in the hallway, who then told me that he would go and call security, which is pretty standard procedure at a hotel. I waited for about 5 minutes until he came back, but he then told me that *I* had to go call security myself from the house phone located at the elevator bank. I saw that he had a walkie talkie on him, so I don't understand why I had to call, but I did trudge down the hall anyway. The operator put me through to the front desk, who didn't pick up the phone. I tried again, and this time, they said: "Actually, security is too busy. You should just come down yourself to the front desk." At this point I was fuming. I was dressed in hotel slippers (I had just gone down the hall to get ice), and I had to hike across *the ENTIRE hotel and casino* just to get to the front desk. When I arrived, I immediately asked for the manager, who listened pretty apathetically and then just issued me a new key. I then walked back across the whole casino -- in my slippers.

I think a large part of the problem here is that the staff are extremely undertrained and have poor language skills. Since there is a lot of Mainland China clientele here, a lot of the staff supposedly speak Mandarin, or English or both, while the local language is Cantonese. I personally speak all three languages fluently, and yet none of the staff I have spoken with (except the manager) seems all that fluent in any of the hotel's official languages. It's a frustrating game of multi-lingual charades every time you need to ask for something.

In short, I will never come back to this hotel. Even if they comp me.

Enough said.

Update: They did end up comping us for the second night for all the "inconveniences." While a nice gesture on their part, I'm still not coming back.

It's like Vegas...but not

Just arrived in Macao after taking the "fast ferry" (not that fast) from the Hong Kong Airport and transferring onto the hotel shuttle bus. The next couple of days, we're calling the brand spanking new Venetian Macao home. They all say that Macao is like the Vegas of the East, except gambling revenues are supposedly now exceeding those of Vegas itself.

But in my short 1.5 hours in town, here are some observations on the ways that Macao is NOT like Vegas:

1) Nobody actually spends money here. Except for on gambling. Case in point -- hotels. I took the free shuttle bus from the ferry pier to the hotel, and the entire 30-something person bus was full. Yet there was only *ONE* person who had luggage of any kind. And yep, that person was me. Not one single person on that bus was planning on actually staying at the hotel. They were just there to gamble overnight and then leave in the morning. As an added bonus, the majority of the people on the bus were swearing profusely the entire ride to the hotel.

2) In order to get to my room, I had to walk past the usual slew of restaurants and the casino. At around 8:30pm, there were a grand total of about 2 tables seated at each of the 3 restaurants that I walked by. Just in case you were thinking it's not a busy night at the casino-hotel, the casino floor was packed. So why no diners? Please see point (1).

3) There are no bellmen readily available in the lobby. When checking in, I had to ask the front desk for help with luggage, and their response was: "Oh. If you want help, it's going to take a while." I look around the lobby and there were no luggage carts, no eager bellmen. Nothing? Why? Refer to (1).

4) There's no such thing as recreational activities here. The complimentary "local" shuttle buses only take you to another casino (the Sands), and the concierge don't actually know of any restaurants outside the casino. In fact, their primary job responsibility is to convince you that you should put down $100K in chips and be part of their VIP club. Riiiiiight.

Ok time for a little shuteye. Hopefully I'll see more of the non-gambling side of Macao tomorrow.

All roads lead to Hong Kong...

Or maybe I should say all roads lead from Hong Kong. I just arrived after a surprisingly painless 13 hour United flight. Hanging out in the transit area now, waiting for my "fast ferry" connection to Macao. It's so weird to be back...in Hong Kong that is. It's like everything has changed and nothing has. The smells are the same (not fragrant, in case you were wondering), the people look the same, but the sounds have slightly changed. There's more Mandarin in the air -- and "in the air" as a nice way of saying they are super f-ing loud. Peachy. Now I remember why I don't actually like coming to Asia that much. ;-)

In funnier news, one of the flight attendants asked me about 10 hours into the flight: "I've been meaning to ask you...are you a celebrity?"

To which I responded: "No...have I been rude to you or something?" ;-)

But, but...what will you *do*?

I started my two month vacation / leave / mini-sabbatical today.

The first reaction I've been getting is: "Oh good for you!", like work is somehow bad for me or something. The second most common reaction is, "But what will you do?"

...well, in short. Nothing. I think that's the idea, anyway.

But being me, there's no way that I can actually sit still and do nothing for 2 months. Tomorrow I start a 3.5 week journey to Southeast Asia. The first part of the trip feels like some sort of deja-vu-slash-bad-family-home-videos-replay; I'm going to Hong Kong, Macao, and Thailand with my parents, sans the parental units.. The second part of the trip takes me to Cambodia and Vietnam. To be honest, I feel utterly unprepared and don't really know what to expect. All I know is that I've got malaria pills and enough premethrin-coated clothing to stave off a herd of mosquitoes, and I'm hoping that my Amex card will get me through any other troubles. LOL

In any case, my day one observation is that it's really hard to do *nothing*. Everywhere I turn, there are tasks or projects or little things (or big things) that I can do here and there. Things that I never got around to because, well, I was working. Funny how that I have to take a vacation in order to have time for myself. Does that make me a workaholic? And if so, how will I cope the next two months? Will I go into some nasty withdrawal? We'll see how it goes.

Oh, and blogging. That's one of those "tasks" that I should now have time for now that I'm not working. Not working...I like the sound of that.