Penang

When mum and dad were over just after Chinese New Year we headed over to Penang for a long weekend. The capital of the island, Georgetown, had the feeling that little had changed in the last couple of hundred years. The pictures and photos in the history museum seemed very familiar. As well as enjoying a colonial afternoon tea lifestyle, we headed out to a national park and ended up on a secluded beach worthy of a postcard.

Breakfast was fetched every morning by the guy who ran the B&B, Charlie. At times, it was a little tricky to distinguish between breakfast food and dinner food - noodles seem to be the order of the day anytime!

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CNY

Just noticed that my last post before today was December, which means I didn't cover Chinese New Year in Thailand. Apart from experiencing some of the world's most unreliable trains, we had a great time - elephants being a particular highlight (including bathing them in the river and feeding them).

We visited the old capital of Thailand and Eve had her first experience of street food (I've been trying to convince her of its benefits for some while) - a rampaging success. The concept seemed to be to create a sandwich-like dish with lettuce for bread and a fish filling. Delicious.

We met an American student that same night who had won a USD20,000 scholarship. The terms of the scholarship required her to travel the world - with one catch: she had to do it alone.

After that, we headed north on a (much delayed) sleeper train. Thanks to Eve's negotiating skills, we got a free upgrade to the jacuzzi suite. We breakfasted every morning down by the waterwheel.

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Offsite

I was over in Shanghai last weekend for the bi-annual Asia disputes offsite. I do wonder how so much lovely old colonial architecture managed to survive the Cultural Revolution. The Bund gives the impression that it looks as it did 100+ years ago. The French Concession is equally as striking. We had dinner at the Old British Consulate, which was like something straight out of a film.

The main highlight was eating a soup dumpling the size of my hand.

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Taipei

We went to Taiwan for a weekend back in March. Taipei was great - it's got a lot of the things Hong Kong hasn't, which makes for a fun weekend - little alleys to explore, some old buildings actually still standing and hot springs! The hot springs we went to were of the public swimming pool ilk. Rammed to the gills, you had to try to find a few square inches to yourself. The pools came in three varieties: nicely hot, very hot bath and scalding. I lasted about 2 minutes in the scalding one (followed by the near compulsory cold dip), but some guys looked like they were settling in for a while.

The food is nothing short of exceptional. You could go anywhere and know the food would be great (although you may have to like stinky tofu).

Contrasted with Hong Kong's skyscrapers, Taipei only has one tall building of note - Taipei 101 (no prizes for guessing how many floors it has). It's genius is that you really see the traditional Chinese architecture in the way it's been put together. They've also got a big coin on each side for a bit of prosperity.

Sounds like Taiwan had a pretty nasty government post war. Another example of Western political expediency propping up a less than ideal regime.

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It's been a while

I looked back over some old blog posts and - given that I couldn't remember some of the stuff I'd written - it occurred to me that I need to get back into it!

We went for a hike up in the new territories today. Macaques everywhere! Sadly, people feed them which means that they are a little less frightened of humans than they should be. Despite signs everywhere warning people about fines if you feed wild animals, they carry on regardless.

We also came across some old army tunnels from the second world war. To make the soldiers feel at home, different parts of the network had very familiar names e.g. Oxford Street, Regent Street. We even saw a sign to the Stand Palace Hotel!

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Cheung Chau

It had been some time since we'd booked the work Junk (i.e. boat), so we headed out a couple of weeks back to Cheung Chau (Long Island). I'd been once before - about 6 years ago. Little had changed: there's still a huge number of fishing boats in the harbour and cycle rickshaws on land. Although I did see one thing unknown to the island in 2005: a car. There was a tiny little police run around, but it seems of limited use on an island where the streets are steep and narrow. They've also got public baths in the truest sense of the word.

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Lights

The proliferation of Christmas lights is starting to become overwhelming. From our living room you can see a mass of different colours flashing. Flashing lights are not unheard of here with the nightly Symphony of Lights, but the Christmas lights achieve a whole new level. Sadly photos can't quite capture it. Across the harbour in Kowloon, there's a particularly fine collection of hypnotic colours. With Chinese New Year at the end of January, we may be treated to them for some weeks to come.

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