pictures....

the beautiful town of Arima Oensen, where the hot spring was that I went to (just outside of Kobe)
Japanese Lanterns
For Dani

pictures pictures pictures

beautiful reflections of some of Tokyo's skyline the pondthat's Paula from Mexico and me at our hostel. She is awesome and I hope to see her again!
yumm, a new FRAVOR-can't wait to try it :)

pictures galore

yummm sushi! the freshest tuna I have ever tasted, it was soooo delicious!
traditional Japan vs. modern culture- this guy had piercings all over the place but he and his wife and daughter were dressed in traditional japanese costumes for their visit to this temple in Tokyo.
a deer in the Nara Park- it was so beautiful and peaceful, as opposed to the thousands that were running around and nudging for food from the tourists!
the hugest buddha statue I have ever seen in the largest wooden structure in the world- pretty amazing!
Wherever we went in Nara park we were approached by Japanese students who were on a field trip. They had to practice asking us questions in English, including 'can we talk?', 'can i take a picture?' etc... very cute! That is Stefan behind them- he is over 6 ft tall and towered over them and me!

Tokyo, Day 2

I'm sitting here in my hostel at 11 pm in the lounge, trading travel stories and hearing about the lives of a scottish guy, and irish guy, and a girl from Seattle-surrounded by the UN of international travellers socializing, laughing, catching up on email, and reading the International Herald Tribune, trying to find out whats going on in the world. Hostel life has been really interesting, and I have enjoyed each hostel I've stayed in more and more. It is so easy to meet people and connect with other travellers from all over the place, and hearing all of their stories has been great.

Today I joined Nuria to go to a nearby Shrine/Temple in the neighboorhood where my hostel is. There is a large shopping arcade leading up to it selling all sorts of Japanese souveniers. (I haven't bought much on my trip yet- I have NO space and don't want to carry around crap for another 3 weeks. If I see anything that is different and that I really want, I will buy it and ship it home though. I am definitely looking forward to shopping in Thailand and Vietnam!) Anyways, after that, we met up with Paula at the sushi restaurant from yesterday- it was so delicious that we had to go back. Paula brough Brian who she met at the hostel, and it was the first time he'd ever eaten sushi, even after travelling in Japan for a month! It was a great meal. From there we went to a nearby park, with a beautiful pond in the middle reflecting some of the skyscrapers around it. After that, as the sun was setting we went to a place called Roppongi Hills- a mall of sorts, which has an observation floor on the 57th floor and a very cool multimedia video exhibit. The view was amazing and it was a great way to see how immensely huge Tokyo is! Paula and Nuria had already been there, so they shopped while Brian and I went up. They both left tonight, Nuria to go back to Spain and Paula to Kyoto.

Tomorrow I hope to check out the Imperial Palace and the Tokyo Museum of Photography, and hopefully tomorrow night I'll be able to see some crazy Japanese kids out celebrating Halloween.

On Wednesday I am going to Nikko- a town about 2 hours away by train, in the mountains. It's a really popular place to go for Japanese tourists to see the autumn leaves changing, and I look forward to getting out of the city and seeing some Japanese nature!

a quick update from tokyo

I am borrowing someone's computer at the hostel i'm staying at in Tokyo, so I thought I'd do a quick update while I'm not paying for internet!

I woke up bright and early at 5 this morning to take a taxi to the airport shuttle so I could catch my 7:45 am flight from Osaka to Tokyo. It was a quick flight and I was at the airport in Tokyo by 9. I had great directions to my hostel and made it with no train problems for once (the system is still as confusing, but I am learning how to handle it!) I checked into my hostel and put my luggage in my room, but my bed wasn't ready yet, so i relaxed in the hostel lobby and did some Japan reading, trying to figure out my plan for the next few days. I went back up to my room and met 2 of the girls that are staying here- Nuria from Spain and Paula from Monterrey, Mexico. They invited me to come out with them for the afternoon, and we went to a park that is close to the 'harajuku' area, where teenagers dress in crazy ways-gothic and rainbow colors. I thought maybe it was just in honor of halloween, but it seems its a way of life here! We trekked to the area close to the major fish market, which is closed at night (I will go back very early in the morning to see the action). Nuria had been to a delicious sushi restaurant there, and we went there for dinner. Each piece of Sushi (just fish and rice) was 80 yen- about 50 cents! It was absolutely delicious and fresh from the market. I was a bit afraid after my last sushi experience in osaka where I got very sick afterwards, but this was great sushi and I loved every bite!

We are all exhausted and came back to the hostel to hang out and chat with some of the employees. It seems like a great hostel and I:m looking forward to spending the next few days here.

more from Tokyo soon!

Japan sights....

The last few days I have stayed in Osaka, taking day trips to various cities in the area by train. The place I am staying is a guesthouse of sorts, run by a Taiwanese landlady. She has a few people that live there, and then rents out rooms in 2 different apartments. It has been really convenient, as it is a few blocks from the subway and in walking distance to a major shopping and restaurant area.

Two days ago I went to a city called Nara, about 45 minutes away by train. Nara is mostly made up of a huge park, which has many beautiful temples and shrines. It also has the largest wooden structure in the world- which was quite a sight to see! Inside that structure was the hugest buddha statue I have seen! I will try to post some pictures, but they definitely won't do its size justice. It was incredible. The other main attraction in Nara's park is that there are about 1000 free-roaming tame deer! They just wander around and come up to tourists, hoping for food (they sell biscuits that you can feed them all over the park).

Yesterday I ventured a bit farther to Kobe, home of Kobe beef, and not much else! The landlady told me about an 'oensen', or hotspring, that is a bit out of Kobe but worth visiting. Visiting hotsprings in Japan is a very popular thing to do, they are all over the country, and the industry has apparently developed a lot in the last few years, so there are huge spa complexes and hotels based around these Oensen. This one that I went to, Arima Oensen, is in a tiny village about 45 minutes outside of Kobe. The town was very quaint with winding roads and tiny restaurants and shops, most selling the famous waffle-like wafers made with water from the springs. Delicious! The hot spring experience was interesting, one I will definitely not forget, and not sure that I will repeat! You are not allowed to wear anything in the hot springs, so I experienced this along with 20 or so naked old japanese women! Definitely a different experience for me. Luckily there were 'instructions' in English, so I knew the proper steps to go through before actually getting into the hot spring.

Today I stayed in Osaka, and made my plane reservations to leave for Tokyo tomorrow morning. I would have liked to go up to the North of Japan, but it was very expensive and I would have been limited on time there before meeting up with Chloe in Tokyo. I booked myself into a hostel, and I hope to just do some day trips from there before meeting up with Chloe and staying at her brother's apartment towards the end of the week. It will be nice to have a travel companion for the next few weeks, and i'm really excited to move on to Vietnam, as all of the travellers that I have met on this trip can't say enough great things about it.

Thats all folks! More from Tokyo!

had to add some more!

I couldn't resist adding these few, definitely a good example of a funny part of chinese culture. The young children here, below what we would consider potty training age wear pants that have a slit in the back- making it easy for them to squat on the street and go to the bathroom wherever they want! This particular child is being helped and is just peeing into the air!

I found this sculpture outside one of the subway stations in Beijing and though it was funny too!

The last photo is of one of the many beautiful temples that we saw yesterday in Kyoto. It is called the Kinkakuji Temple- Temple of the Golden Pavillion. The top two floors are covered in gold!

captions for the photos below

sorry-forgot to add captions for the pix!

The first and second pix are both taken in the summer palace in Beijing. The colors there were just amazing, and in some parts they had just touched up the paint so it was nice and vivid!

The last pic is of the famous Terracotta Warriors outside of Xi'an. They are still being excavated and they are finding more and more pieces of destroyed warriors, horses and carts. There are 3 different sections that they are still digging in. (they built this museum and shelter even though this is still going on.) There are many more that are still buried, that they think are painted, and they don:t want to uncover them and have the paint fade or flake off, so they are waiting for some new technology to help them preserve them)

a few days back.....

I apologize for not updating this sooner- the past week has been a whirlwind of travelling and I either havent had internet access or haven't really had a chance to sit down for an extended period of time and do a good update.

So i'll start again last week in Beijing!

The day after the great wall we all woke up feeling just a bit sore from our hiking! We decided to do some shopping, as Emma and Meg wanted to buy some fabric and possibly get some clothing made. We went to the Silk Street Market, which is a 7 story building full of everything you could possibly want to buy- from shoes to electronics to fabric and tailor shops, to your average chinese souvenier shops full of Mao Ze Dong watches, majong sets, postcards, chopsticks, and "chops". A chop is a hand carved name stamp, which every chinese citizen needs for official records, banks, legal documents etc. Many people even have more than one and use different ones for different purposes. Since I still have a month of travelling ahead of me and have really been limiting myself on buying stuff that i:m going to have to carry around, buying a chop with my name on it was a great way to get something uniquely Chinese that I will actually be able to use (I even stamped my postcards with it! All that shopping made us hungry and we decided to get some lunch in the market:s food court. Unfortunately my lunch didnt agree with me and I decided to head back to the hostel to rest. I napped and was feeling better when I woke up so, and decided to join the group at an amazing restaurant that Cathy at the Hostel recommended to us. It was a trendy restaurant full of young chinese groups, with beautiful photography and woodwork throughout. Although i stuck to a simple bland meal for fear that my stomach couldn't handle it, I did have a taste of the others famous Beijing Duck, and it was pretty good!

The next day, Meg and Dennis left early in the morning, and Emma and I decided to go to the beautiful Summer Palace for the day. Teresa, one of the girls that came to the Great Wall with us, and Sunny who works in the hostel decided to join us. It was about a 45 minute bus ride to west Beijing. The Summer Palace was the empress Cixi's own playground that she built for herself to escape the heat of the Forbidden City . It is a huge piece of land, with a enormous manmade lake, and many gorgeous, traditional Chinese buildings and temples, and even buildings for visiting important people to hang out in when they were visiting, filled with the gifts of furniture and decorative art that she was given for her birthday. Cixi seemed like quite the diva and she used a ton of the money that should have gone towards the poor Chinese public to build these gardens for herself. I made my way back to the hostel all alone on the scary bus system, as Emma left early to go get a fitting of the shirt she was having made, and Teresa and Sunny wanted to walk all the way around the lake, which I was just too exhausted to do after walking and hiking all over the palace. Emma and I met an Australian girl for dinner that she knows through a friend, who lives in Beijing. She took us to a great quaint little restaurant with food from the Yunan province of China. Delicious!

Friday was my last day in Beijing, and I decided to sleep in, pack up, and I went back to the Silk Market with Emma to pick up her shirt and do a little more shopping. I returned to the hostel to meet up with a group of brits who were going to the train station at the same time as me, and the hostel had arranged for their driver to take us to the train station. My train to Xi'an was at 7:30, a little earlier than I would have liked as it is a 13 hour ride and its much easier to take a later train when you really feel like you should be sleeping. The train ride was much bumpier than my last one, and made stops along the way, which isn't too great when you are sleeping and are jolted awake by the train coming to a stop. I made it with a few hours of sleep, and took a taxi to my hotel in Xi'an, which luckily was only 5 minutes away from the train station.

When I arrived, I was told about a tour leaving shortly that made a few stops in addition to the Terracotta Army Museum, which is the main reason most people even go to Xian. I put my bags in my room and hopped on the minivan with the driver Mr. Lee and my guide for the day, Frankie. We picked up 4 others(all foreign business men from California, Mexico, and Spain). We went to the Big Goose Pagoda in Xian, which is so named because a long time ago the monks that lived there were meat eaters (most are vegetarian), and had run out of meat, so one of them prayed to the gods and asked why they didn:t have anything to eat, and a big dead goose fell from the sky for them to eat. Thats the story anyway! After that we went to a factory where replicas of the Terracotta Soldiers are made in all shapes and sizes. We then went to some famous hotsprings, although didn:t get a chance to actually bath in them- only washed our hands! It would have been great to be able to enjoy the hot springs after all the walking I had been doing! Eventually we made it to the massive Terracotta Army museum. The terracotta army was discovered by a farmer digging a well in the 1950's (i think around then), and took many years to unearth this massive lifesize army of terracotta (clay) soldiers, horses, carts, and weapons. They are still digging and uncovering more and more broken pieces of this huge archaeological discovery. That was it for our tour and we returned for Xian where I crashed at my hotel! On Sunday I spent the day having a nice western-style breakfast, and then setting out to see a few famous sights in Xian- the Bell Tower and the Drum Tower. After that I discovered the muslim area of town, which was filled with amazing smells and sights throughout a few streets of outdoor vendors, markets, and great faces. There is quite a large chinese-muslim population concentrated in this one area.

After all this, I had a flight booked to Shenzhen, which is a city in the south of China, bordering Hong Kong. It was much cheaper to fly there and then take a bus over the border to Hong Kong. I'm still perplexed that there is still such a separation between mainland China and Hong Kong. I had to go through customs, they drive on the opposite side of the road from China, and they have their own currency, even though they are now officially part of China. My flight from Hong Kong was at 1:20 in the afternoon, with a stopover in Taipei, Taiwan. I arrived in Osaka-Kansai International airport- at 7:30 on Monday evening.

After having my luggage thouroughly searched at customs (annoying!) , I made my way to the tourist information desk to find out about a place to stay, as the hotel I wanted was booked up. I met a nice married couple there- Stefan from Germany and Yvonne from Taiwan. They live in Taiwan and both speak eachothers languages fluently, which is amazing! They told me they were staying at a bed and breakfast type hotel run by a Taiwanese woman, and invited me to join them there. It took us 3 hours from the airport to get there- after taking a zillion different trains, attempting to figure out this confusing system here in Osaka (they have 3 different private train lines in addition to a subway). After finally getting off the subway at the right stop, and trying to find the exit (there were 18 different exits!), we lugged our luggage up and down hundreds of stairs -the stations are definitely not meant for travellers! We called the owner of the hotel and she came and met us at the station- we would have never found it on our own! At this point we were starving and wanted something to eat, so we set out but realized we were really in a business area and everything had closed! We ended up eating instant ramen noodles at tables inside a convenient store- welcome to Japan! (After being in 4 countries in one day including Hong Kong, anything was fine with me!)

Yesterday was spent in Kyoto, about 45 minutes away from Osaka exploring some of the MANY temples that are there.

I will try my best to upload photos, as I now have quite a collection and would love to share some!!

for now,
kp

photos from Beijing

Here are a few of the good ones from the last few days...

me on the Great Wall!
on the way down
a view from one of the guard towers
a Beijing trashcan!
Emma, Dennis, and Meg at the Old Beijing Noodle King restaurant, enjoying a well deserved, delicious meal!

today I climbed the great wall of china!

My time in Beijing so far has been great- I met some Australians at the train station in Shanghai who were staying at my hostel, and since we were put in the same room, I have been hanging out with them. My first day here was spent mostly sleeping and wandering around the area around the hostel, which is situated in a historical "hutong" (neighboorhood) pretty close to the Forbiodden City, nearby to some very quaint lakes. That night we went to a few of the bars/restaurants that line the lake- varying from a reggae bar to a traditional tea house where I received a souvenier of our visit from the proprietor, a lovely woman with perfect english skills. She gave us a calligraphy of the symbols for luck and fortune, which I am keeping and will scan copies to the rest of the group.

Yesterday we got a late start on our plans to see Tiennamen's Square and the Forbidden City, and we got to part of it as it was closing, so I'll have to go back another day to see more. After that we wandered around forever trying to find the "Old Beijing Noodle King" restaurant that was highlighted in my guidebook and seemed very close to where we were. After walking for 45 minutes and not finding it, we finally got in a cab which drove us the rest of the way but turned the wrong way down the street assuming that we wanted to go to the malls and restauarnts that were there. We walked for another 10 minutes and finally found it, and it was worth the wait! The waiters shout to eachother as customers walk in the door of this huge restaurant, and we only spotted one other table of westerners, so we knew we were in a good spot. The food was delicious and we were all happy that we had stuck it out after a long day of walking around the city. We came back to the hostel to finalize our plans for our outing today to the great wall and went to sleep on the early side to prepare for our early wake up time and big adventure to see and climb the wall!

The alarm went off at 6 am today, and by 7:00 6 of us had gathered in the lobby of the hostel(me, the 3 Australians-Dennis, Meg, and Emma, a Brit who arrived yesterday named Wayne, and a Chinese girl named Teresa who was visiting from another province). We hired the driver from the hostel for the day to drive us in their van from Beijing to two points at the wall abut 3 hrs away- one for the more adventurous 4 (not me!) and then to another point called Simatai which is a bit easier, where Meg and I got off. We planned to all meet at 3:00 at the entrance to Simatai, and cheated a bit by taking the Cable Car and then a scary mini train car up the mountain, closer to the actual entrance to the wall. It looked like quite a hike and we weren't so sure we could handle it! We still had a steep hike up a hill and some stairs to get onto the wall. The view from up there was incredible, it is in a lush, green area of mountains and farms surrounding it on all sides. We were "assisted" for a bit by a chinese couple who had badges on from the Wall with their pictures, and they kind of just led us along for a while before pulling out their bags of goods (tshirts, postcards, and books) and giving us a sob story about themselves. I felt bad and gave them 20 rmb (only about $3) and Meg was twisted into buying a "I climbed the Great Wall" tshirt. We carried on walking for about 3 hours or so before making our way down the mountain, feeling very accomplished! The others met us at the bottom, and we made our way back to the waiting car and I think all of us passed out! Next thing we knew we were back at the hostel. Here is a link to see some information about the section that we visited:
http://www.travelchinaguide.com/china_great_wall/scene/beijing/simatai.htm

All in all, it was an amazing experience and most likely a once-in- a- lifetime one, so it was very exciting to be there.

We are heading out for dinner now to a traditional chinese hotpot restaurant-should be yummy, its getting pretty chilly out!

-kp

photo time!

Here are a few pix from the last few days:

The things they manage to tote around on bicycles/tricycles is amazing!

Simone and I met this man in Old Town Shanghai a few nights ago, and then I saw him again when I went back to Yu Yuan Garden. He is 88 years old and besides a little slurring from missing teeth, his english is pretty good. When I took this picture he was telling stories about how the garden was built.(i think he had charged some tourists 50rmb for a tour!)

My cabin on the overnight train from Shanghai to Beijing!

Inside the Yu Yuan Garden in Shanghai

on a train to beijing...

8:15 pm- 10/14/06 - get ready for a LONG update :)

I am writing this entry by hand, sitting on my surprisingly comfortable bed on the overnight train from Shanghai to Beijing, (and now typing it from my hostel, so excuse the messed up tenses). The train departed at 7:28 pm and will arrive in Beijing around 7:30 am. I thought I had lucked out with my own cabin (4 bunk beds), but as the train was pulling away from the station a sweaty chinese man came into the cabin! He must have been running late. (i think he just took a picture of me on his camera phone!)

Anyways, listening to Ray LaMontagne is drowning out the sound of the chinese radio station that is on the speakers in the cabin, and we are on our way our of shanghai!

Shanghai was an interesting experience to say the least, and hearing many people say that "it's not real china" scares me for the what lies ahead in Beijing and Xian! For being such an industrial, international city with every store from KFC to Coffee Bean to Louis Vuitton, there is really a lack of english! Even the menus at McDonalds is only in Chinese, and they don't exactly serve the same normal american food as at home. I walked past KFC today and saw Shrimp Tempura on the menu!

On my first full day in Shanghai I was completely overwhelmed with everything- although they say that the city is a grid, it didn't seem that way, and the maps that I had sucked! I just wandered around and then went to check into the hostel where I'd be staying for the rest of my time in Shanghai. When i was waiting to check in I met a Danish couple, Jannie and Mads who were also staying there. After checking in I took a taxi to the Jade Buddha temple, and realized that it was so close I could have walked but the map didn't make it seem that way! It was really beautiful, the highlight was the huge white jade Buddha statue, which is guarded by 1000 small buddha statues. It is extremely rare to have a pure piece of jade that is all white, and they don't even let you take pictures of it. After I left there I walked around a bit to get a feel for the area I was staying in, and found myself in a beautiful park with groomed mazes of shrubs and some very cool sculptures. I walked further into the park because I heard Britney Spears playing over a loud speaker and saw a big crowd of people gathered in what looked to be an amphitheater. I think it was some sort of talent showcase, complete with amazing young acrobats, dancers, singers, and a guy dancing with a lasso. It definitely made me laugh! After going to get my luggage from the other hotel to bring it to the hostel, I was absolutely exhausted and planned to take a nap and go out for dinner, but ended up crashing for the night! The rock hard bed took some getting used to (my bed on the train is softer!).

I woke up refreshed the next day and ran into the Danish couple in the lobby. We decided to go check out a market on the other side of the river. It was full of a lot of junk, and copies of everything imaginable- even golf clubs! MY big purchase was a mini tripod for my camera. After this, I had made plans with my friend Simone to meet at the Shanghai Museum. We went for coffee with her boyfriend and then he left to go study, and we went to the museum, then to the Old Town area of the city to see the Yu Yuan gardens. After walking through the touristy but pretty area around the gardens, we got to the gate as it was closing! We continued walking around and went in search of dinner, ending up at the same japanese ramen restaurant on the buzzing Nanjing Lu Road(which is partly a closed off pedestrian mall with tons of stores), which I had already been to- but at least knew that they had english on the menu and i could order something decent. It was really nice seeing Simone and catching up on the past 5 years. After I left her I walked back up Nanjing lu Road towards my hostel where I knew I could catch a bus to drop me outside- it was almost 2 miles I think!

Exhausted from the last few days, I took it easy the next day. Woke up late, organized my train ticket to Beijing through my hostel- luckily i didn't have to go buy it myself, i heard it was a nightmare! I went to check out the Shanghai Urban Planning museum where they have huge architechtural models of the city and what they plan it to look like in 2010 when they host the world expo. There was also a very different modern art exhibit from Italy there. Afterwards, I walked through People's Square and saw some of the outdoor portion of the MoCA museum and the Shanghai Art museum, both which had some nice sculptures, then headed back to the hostel to get ready for Shabbat in Shanghai! It was a 20 minute cab ride to a totally different part of the city to get to the Shanghai Jewish Center. I sat down in services next to a lady from Redondo Beach, and noticed tons of young people there from all over the world. In the middle of services we went upstairs to the Sukkah for a little kiddush of salads and wine-there were at least 125 ppl there, and then back to the shul for the rest of the service and dancing for Simchat Torah, which was the highlight! Dinner was delicious, definitely the best and the most food i'd eaten all week and it was greatly appreciated!(It has been really difficult to find restaurants with English menus where I know that I'm not going to be served pork something) I sat next to an NYU student who is studying there for the semester and got to reminisce about ny a bit and hear what life in shanghai is like for an american. After dinner I moved to another table to talk to some canadian and french guys, and ended up going out with them to a friend's party afterwards. It was amazing to see this totally different part of life in Shanghai- a very large group of young foreigners livning and working there and really loving it!

This morning I slept in, packed up, and checked out of my room and stored my bags for the day. In the lobby I met a young Israeli couple and an interesting guy from LA who had been there for a month doing geneology research about an old Jewish woman in San Francisco to trace her roots back to the Jewish community of Shanghai. I decided to go back to the Yu Yuan gardens since i didn't get to see them the last time, and on his advice took the bus all the way there. It took a while but it went through some interesting neighboorhoods that i hadn't seen before.

Public transportation is SO cheap there- the bus is either 1rmb or 2rmb, depending on whether it has air conditioning, and the subway is around 4rmb. ($1=7.9rmb!) Cabs start at 11rmb and their meters move really slowly.

I had plans to meet Jannie back at the hostel before I left to get some good advice for Vietnam, as she has been a few times. On my way back I found a tiny family run restaurant a few doors down from the hostel that the American guy said was good and had an english menu. It was delicious and a great meal to eat right before I boarded the overnight train!

And then it was time to say farewell to Shanghai! The train station was a little less overwhelming than I expected and had a really nice waiting area, and the train was bright, clean, and looked brand new. I spoke to some Aussies in the station and they are staying at my hostel too- in my room, which is quite a funny coincidence considering how big this city is!

thats it for now-i'm ready to figure out Beijing now!

pictures to come soon!

it sure ain't chinatown in nyc!

Peekaboo! Lanterns on the Glutton's Bay promenade hanging for the Chinese Mooncake/Lantern Festival that was taking place.
The Mosque at the end of the pedestrian mall where my hostel was. It is the largest mosque in Singapore and we were woken up every morning at 5 am to the loudest call to prayer! If that doesn't get you going in the morning I don't know what will!
Sleepy Sam's Hostel where I stayed for 3 nights. It was located in the Arab quarter between Arab Street and Baghdad Street! yikes! It was great though, very clean and centrally located.
Richard and Hayley, travellers from the UK who I met at Sleepy Sam's, enjoying the street food from the perfectly named "Glutton's Bay" .

Hello from Shanghai! I haven't been able to update for the last few days, so i'll back track a bit.

I left Singapore by bus for a 5 hour ride to Kuala Lumpur, where I was staying for just one night. After finally finding my hotel (the Novotel, not the Nova Hotel or the Novatel Hotel! I forgot to write down the address before I left Singapore, and the bus dumped me in the middle of Kuala Lumpur's Chinatown. A nice bellman at another hotel tried his hardest to help me find the address, but came up with those other two and not the actual one I was staying at.) I finally found a Starbucks, and a very nice aussie who happened to be sitting there with her laptop waiting for her tour group she was leading to arrive looked up the correct address for me, I hopped in a cab to the correct hotel. The few days of heat and humidity in singapore, combined with the incredible haze in the air due to fires in Indonesia must have tired me out. I crashed when I arrived at the hotel, and woke up a few hours later and set out to find some dinner and figure out where I was. The hotel was around the corner from the Petronas Towers, headquarters of the Petronas Oil Company, and one of the main tourist attractions in KL- also the tallest twin towers in the world. They are very impressive. I found dinner in the mall attached after wandering around for a while.

The next day I made my way back there, hoping to go up to the viewing level close to the top, despite the thick haze again. CLOSED ON MONDAYS! :(

That seemed to be all I could have done in the short time I had left before I had to head to the airport, so I wandered around the mall again, amazed at how western everything was (it could definitely hold its own against South Coast Plaza!)

I checked out of the hotel, caught the monorail to the Central Train Station and then another monorail straight to the airport for my flight to Hong Kong.

I spent the night at an airport hotel near the hong kong airport and woke up early to have breakfast and do some research about getting to Shanghai. I ended up booking a (expensive :( ) flight at the airport, as it seemed to be the only option.

After a quick 2 hour flight and an almost equally long taxi ride into the city- here I am!

I am planning on meeting up with my friend Simone tomorrow- a girl I met in my Hebrew class a the University of Haifa. Should be nice to reconnect after 5 years. She is in town visiting her boyfriend who is studying Chinese here.

Thats all for now- it's almost midnight and I should get some sleep.

Until next time!

singapore slingin'

Hello from Singapore!

I'm leaving early tomorrow morning, but thought I'd do a quick update to catch up on the last few days before I go to sleep.

Singapore has been nice, though nothing too overly exciting- i think it was a good entry to Asia, but very very western/european. It's the cleanest city I've ever been in- no smell, no trash, even the money is clean! I haven't shopped at all here although its a shoppers paradise- I didn't want to carry more crap around for 7 weeks than I already have! The best thing here is the street food- there are street hawkers and streets full of all different cuisines being cooked in carts - i'm staying in the arab quarter on the same street as the biggest mosque in singapore. Interesting because it is Ramadan, so during the day it is pretty quiet and at night everyone fills the street to eat after fasting. There's also little india and chinatown with great food and great people watching. I'm here at apparently a good time-there are 3 different festivals(Chinese Mooncake/Lantern Festival, Ramadan/Muslim Festival and a Hindu Festival) coinciding for the first time ever, so there are tons of lights and decorations up for each one! I took a free night tour that went to each area to see all the lights and decorations which was cool.

Starting back at the beginning of Singapore- I met a guy named Richard from the UK outside my hostel on my first morning here who had also just arrived- we decided to go to the Botanical Gardens together and ended up shlepping all over the city afterwards- we got lunch in a random mall food court recommended by someone on the street, then walked around Orchard Road, famous for its shopping. There are no lack of malls here, and it seems like even when you're trying to avoid one you are sent through from the street on a walkway to get somewhere else. When we got back I met a girl named Hayley also from the UK who had just checked in and invited her to join us for the night. We hopped on the free tour bus again and they dropped us off close to an area called Glutton's Bay, which is along a really nice Esplanade with a beautiful concert hall and area displaying art. We ate dinner outside there and then walked along the water admiring all the Chinese families out celebrating the festival with lanterns, sparklers, and candles. From there we walked to the other side of the River to the Clarke Quay/Riverwalk area for a drink at a brewery. We barely made the last MRT (subway) back at midnight to our hostel to crash. I decided to stay an extra day in Singapore, as I heard there wasn't too much to do in Kuala Lumpur and figured it would be nice to hang out with these great people I met for one more day.

*they are shutting down the internet at the hostel, so I'll continue this post in the morning for day 3 of Singapore. Tomorrow its off to Kuala Lumpur just for the night, then one night in an airport hotel in hong kong and then figuring out my china trip! I'll try to post a few pictures in the morning as well.

Goodnight!
-KP

ps- please leave comments and remember to tell me who you are leaving the comment!! :)

I've arrived!

Safe and sound in Singapore- I knew I'd feel right at home when the first thing I saw in the airport was a Coffee Bean :) My trip was as smooth as could be (but LONG)!

Just checked into my hostel and I'm off to see some sights!

-kp

and i'm off!

welcome to my blog!

I leave on my big Asian Adventure tomorrow night, and I can't wait!

Here's my itinerary as it stands now. All my flights are booked, although I have no plans while I'm in China besides trying to meet up with a friend in Shanghai. Once we get to Vietnam we're on our own to plan the next 2 weeks in order to get to Thailand for our flight out of Bangkok.

-Singapore, Malaysia (2 days)
-Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (2 days)
-Hong Kong-China (2 weeks)
(all that on my own! )
-Japan (2 weeks)- meeting up with Chloe in Tokyo at the end of the 2 weeks
-Vietnam
-Cambodia
-Thailand
-back to Hong Kong for 2 more days.

I'll be home the night before Thanksgiving!

I hope to keep this as up to date as possible-so check back every few days for updates!

xoxo
kp