Breakfast and out for a 9 o'clock pick up for another day temple site-seeing. Again, they do kind of merge together, especially since today's offerings were less impressive than yesterday's. There was one that was a little overgrown, and a companion temple to the Tomb Raider temple. Thi was relatively quiet, so had more atmosphere, though wasn't as overgown. There was one which was originally a large complex of fountains (including ornately carved heads of various epcies as water spouts), and another we remember was the very old Hindu temple in brick which had elephants at each corner of the outer walls, guarding the building. Probably might have trouble if invaders came riding mice-drawn chariots. I shall add more detail later once I correlate pictures and the guidebook
Lunch was at the same tourist trap place as yesterday, and fairly unremarkable.
We were back quite early as we had done enough templing by 3ish, so Tee got an early finish. He did offer us the chance to go to the Angkor Wat Museum in town, but this didn't seem to be a good deal as the temple pass (which gives you three days' acess from seven) costs $20 each, whilst the museum (which, according to the guidebook) has little to show, though quite well presented and costs $12 each. We headed back and just vegged by the pool for a couple of hours.
Thi evening we were in town in time for dinner at 7:30 locally at a place called Soup Dragon which serves good Vietnamese food. but also has a large screen to watch football on as Newcastle's first home game of the season versus Aston Villa. So we had good beer, good food and the spectacle of the Toon disassembling the Brummies 6-0. What a truly magnificent start to the evening. We wandered further for a couple of more drinks including bars called Angkor What? Banana Leaf and the Warehouse. Then it was back to bed for a fairly early night as we were off the next day to Battambang by boat for apickup at 6am!
Showing posts with label Travel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Travel. Show all posts
Sunday, 29 August 2010
Saturday, 28 August 2010
More temples than you can shake a stick at
(edited to correct the timeline. The bamboo train was a couple of days later)
Our first full day in Cambodia. Breakfast was OK: buffet with eggs cooked to your request. We had arranged a tuk-tuk the night before and met our driver for three days whose name was Tee. He was to take us around the temples,
We headed off to our first temple. This was within the massive complex of Angkor Thom, which is utterly massive. The whole area is bigger than downtown Siem Reap. The first one was Bayon with its enigmatic smiling heads on each pinnacle. The temples of Angkor Thom, Angkor Wat and the others in the large area around Siem Reap date variously from the 9th century to the 11th, essentially when we in Britain were worrying which shade of wode was going to be in this season. The temple at Bayor was amospheric, despite there being a fair number of tourists around, and the amount of detail carved into the roack from which they were made is stunning, even now almost a millenium later. We saw more structures within Angkor Thom including the Terrace of the Elephants and the Terrace of the Leper King before moving onto another couple of temples. We managed to fit lunch into this at some tourist trap restaurant that our driver took us to, no doubt receiving some kickback, but this is normal for this part of the world, especially in areas so popular with tourists.
The temples through the day did kind of merge into one, and I can add further details when I upload pictures and cross refer with the guidebook. It's not that the temples didn't all have their own distintive haracteristics, but it's that there were so many. One temple that does stick in the memory is the one that featured in Tomb Raider, with its buildings and walls infiltrated by roots from big rainforest trees which look like rivulets of liquid rolling over the sandstone more than vegetation
Our final destination of the day was the wonderful Angkor Wat. This temple you cannot forget for many reasons. It's the building that's synonymous with Cambodia. Indeed, so proud are they of it that they actually have it on their national flag. It's also the largest religious structure in the world. It was heaving, as might be expected, but we had a good look around. The bas reliefs are stunning, with scenes from Hindu mythology (the Ramayana and Mahabarat) and local legend. This runs round the outside of the inner wall, further inside there are the famous towers to look at, and you can climb up and into the higher central one. Like a lot of these things, pictures speak louder than words and we do have some pictures to upload. However, our main camera ran out of power as we arrived here and we aren't able to upload pictures from the other camera as it's an Olympus which have a non-standard sized memory card so we have to wait until later to do those.
We got Mr Tee (pity the fool who didn't get to see Angkor Wat today) to drive us back. We were in desperate need of a shower and change of clothes. It had been a very hot day, and we had been climbing up and down pyramid-like temples (all that shape to represent Mt Meru again important from Hindu myhtology), drenched in sunblock (factor 50, of course), and DEET, caked in dust from the crumbling roads. A dip in the pool was fantastic.
That evening we headed out again to sample the delights of Pub St. We ate Khmer again, this time having the local delicacy of fish amok (not a haddock riot, but fish cooked in spicy coconut milk and served in banana leaves). We also watched some live football beamed over from the UK. Globalisation has a lot of downsides, but sometimes the global village is a good place to be living. Well it is if you are a privileged Western European at any rate
Our first full day in Cambodia. Breakfast was OK: buffet with eggs cooked to your request. We had arranged a tuk-tuk the night before and met our driver for three days whose name was Tee. He was to take us around the temples,
We headed off to our first temple. This was within the massive complex of Angkor Thom, which is utterly massive. The whole area is bigger than downtown Siem Reap. The first one was Bayon with its enigmatic smiling heads on each pinnacle. The temples of Angkor Thom, Angkor Wat and the others in the large area around Siem Reap date variously from the 9th century to the 11th, essentially when we in Britain were worrying which shade of wode was going to be in this season. The temple at Bayor was amospheric, despite there being a fair number of tourists around, and the amount of detail carved into the roack from which they were made is stunning, even now almost a millenium later. We saw more structures within Angkor Thom including the Terrace of the Elephants and the Terrace of the Leper King before moving onto another couple of temples. We managed to fit lunch into this at some tourist trap restaurant that our driver took us to, no doubt receiving some kickback, but this is normal for this part of the world, especially in areas so popular with tourists.
The temples through the day did kind of merge into one, and I can add further details when I upload pictures and cross refer with the guidebook. It's not that the temples didn't all have their own distintive haracteristics, but it's that there were so many. One temple that does stick in the memory is the one that featured in Tomb Raider, with its buildings and walls infiltrated by roots from big rainforest trees which look like rivulets of liquid rolling over the sandstone more than vegetation
Our final destination of the day was the wonderful Angkor Wat. This temple you cannot forget for many reasons. It's the building that's synonymous with Cambodia. Indeed, so proud are they of it that they actually have it on their national flag. It's also the largest religious structure in the world. It was heaving, as might be expected, but we had a good look around. The bas reliefs are stunning, with scenes from Hindu mythology (the Ramayana and Mahabarat) and local legend. This runs round the outside of the inner wall, further inside there are the famous towers to look at, and you can climb up and into the higher central one. Like a lot of these things, pictures speak louder than words and we do have some pictures to upload. However, our main camera ran out of power as we arrived here and we aren't able to upload pictures from the other camera as it's an Olympus which have a non-standard sized memory card so we have to wait until later to do those.
We got Mr Tee (pity the fool who didn't get to see Angkor Wat today) to drive us back. We were in desperate need of a shower and change of clothes. It had been a very hot day, and we had been climbing up and down pyramid-like temples (all that shape to represent Mt Meru again important from Hindu myhtology), drenched in sunblock (factor 50, of course), and DEET, caked in dust from the crumbling roads. A dip in the pool was fantastic.
That evening we headed out again to sample the delights of Pub St. We ate Khmer again, this time having the local delicacy of fish amok (not a haddock riot, but fish cooked in spicy coconut milk and served in banana leaves). We also watched some live football beamed over from the UK. Globalisation has a lot of downsides, but sometimes the global village is a good place to be living. Well it is if you are a privileged Western European at any rate
Wednesday, 18 August 2010
Fast and Loose
Day 4 Equatorial Hotel, Melaka
(updated with photos)
Today we were off to stay in Kuala Terranganu, a town on the NE coast of the peninsular which is handy for the beach. On the other hand, it's also a very strict Muslim state so we were aware that we might have trouble obtaining food before sundown or in getting hold of the odd beer at all. We did have a few possible options though. More waffles for breakfast before packing up, checking out and getting in a taxi to Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) for our short internal flight up the KT. The taxi driver was a friendly chap, explaining that his family were from India. He didn't drive too fast but did ride up the arse of cars in front.
We reached KLIA in one piece and tried to check in, even though we were about 4 hours early for the flight. Jane insisted as she worked out it could take 3 hours to get to the airport and we needed to be there 2 hours in advance or more. Say what you like about her, but she does err on the side of neurosis. Anyway, there was some issue with names on the tickets or something so we waited 20 minutes for checking in. The girl doing it was a trainee so that probably didn't help.
We had lots of time to kill so wandered about, ate a burger again (there isn't much in the way of eating in the domestic terminal), this time at Burger King to our shame.
The flight was ridiculously short as we were in the air less than half an hour, during which time the crew managed to serve up peanuts and juice (pink guava. Yum!).
We landed and got a cab to our hotel. The place we were staying was the Hotel Continental which was a rather tired looking place and had signs all over the place saying how much the stuff in your room costs "if you wantd to buy it" and how they would prosecute for nicking stuff (really, a threadbare, ragged towel wasn't the most tempting booty). It could be a great hotel if they tarted it up.
Heading out to explore we wandered past where they was a Ramadan bazar cooking all sorts of fantastic food, though we weren't hungry. The idea is that the people buy the food, then take it home and eat it after sunset. We wandered further into Chinatown here we found places to buy beer. Bless Chinese communities the world over for providing places to drink, whatever the predominant local attitude to alcholo is. They also serve Guinness Extra wherever you find them, so you can always have that taste of not-quite-but-not-far-off home. We stuck to the local nectar that is Tiger. The Chinatown is very atmospheric with drab shophouses and its own arch.
Chinese arch
Chinatown, Kuala Terangganu
The Town Mosque
Kuala Terangganu
Making satay at the Ramadan Bazar
Kuala Terangganu
Not wanting to be rude or disrespectful we went over to the grassy area by the water front and waited, along with lots of locals and joined them eating when they broke their fast at about 7:30. This was the sort of thing that makes holidays memorable, even though we hadn't been fasting ourselves, it was a shared experience that we will always remember.
Sunset falls
That evening we wandered over to a Chinese owned fish estaurant and had steamed grouper with fried rice and vegetables (containing meat, prawns and squid). Way too much food for the two of us (especially having been porkerly early on with the fast breaking). This lot with a couple of large bottles of Tiger came to about £15.
After this there wasn't a great deal to do so we just went back to the hotel and played cards while drinking out duty free vodka with some coke we had bought earlier. Then we went to bed
(updated with photos)
Today we were off to stay in Kuala Terranganu, a town on the NE coast of the peninsular which is handy for the beach. On the other hand, it's also a very strict Muslim state so we were aware that we might have trouble obtaining food before sundown or in getting hold of the odd beer at all. We did have a few possible options though. More waffles for breakfast before packing up, checking out and getting in a taxi to Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) for our short internal flight up the KT. The taxi driver was a friendly chap, explaining that his family were from India. He didn't drive too fast but did ride up the arse of cars in front.
We reached KLIA in one piece and tried to check in, even though we were about 4 hours early for the flight. Jane insisted as she worked out it could take 3 hours to get to the airport and we needed to be there 2 hours in advance or more. Say what you like about her, but she does err on the side of neurosis. Anyway, there was some issue with names on the tickets or something so we waited 20 minutes for checking in. The girl doing it was a trainee so that probably didn't help.
We had lots of time to kill so wandered about, ate a burger again (there isn't much in the way of eating in the domestic terminal), this time at Burger King to our shame.
The flight was ridiculously short as we were in the air less than half an hour, during which time the crew managed to serve up peanuts and juice (pink guava. Yum!).
We landed and got a cab to our hotel. The place we were staying was the Hotel Continental which was a rather tired looking place and had signs all over the place saying how much the stuff in your room costs "if you wantd to buy it" and how they would prosecute for nicking stuff (really, a threadbare, ragged towel wasn't the most tempting booty). It could be a great hotel if they tarted it up.
Heading out to explore we wandered past where they was a Ramadan bazar cooking all sorts of fantastic food, though we weren't hungry. The idea is that the people buy the food, then take it home and eat it after sunset. We wandered further into Chinatown here we found places to buy beer. Bless Chinese communities the world over for providing places to drink, whatever the predominant local attitude to alcholo is. They also serve Guinness Extra wherever you find them, so you can always have that taste of not-quite-but-not-far-off home. We stuck to the local nectar that is Tiger. The Chinatown is very atmospheric with drab shophouses and its own arch.
Chinese archChinatown, Kuala Terangganu
Wandering back into the town we came upon a well known traveller's cafe called Ping Anchorage (sic) which also has a travel agents on ground level. Again we could slake out thirst with fermented hop juice. Walking back we passed the local mosque which is very impressive, and walked back thro9ugh the bazar. By this time it was approaching fast-breaking time, and this food was just too good to pass by so we bought chicken biriyani, BBQ chicken wings and beef murtabak
The Town MosqueKuala Terangganu
Making satay at the Ramadan BazarKuala Terangganu
Not wanting to be rude or disrespectful we went over to the grassy area by the water front and waited, along with lots of locals and joined them eating when they broke their fast at about 7:30. This was the sort of thing that makes holidays memorable, even though we hadn't been fasting ourselves, it was a shared experience that we will always remember.
Sunset fallsPreparing to join the locals breaking their fast as the sunsets in Kuala Terangganu
That evening we wandered over to a Chinese owned fish estaurant and had steamed grouper with fried rice and vegetables (containing meat, prawns and squid). Way too much food for the two of us (especially having been porkerly early on with the fast breaking). This lot with a couple of large bottles of Tiger came to about £15.
After this there wasn't a great deal to do so we just went back to the hotel and played cards while drinking out duty free vodka with some coke we had bought earlier. Then we went to bed
Get it on, bang a gong
Day 3, Equatorial Hotel, Melaka
(revised and updated with pictures)
Up with the lark again, if the lark had been out drinking until gone 1am and needed to get up to get his breakfast before they stopped serving the buffet at 10:30am. More of the same food except this time I had discovered the waffles. Fresh waffles prepared before your eyes with plenty of butter and maple syrup. Oh, yes. Food of the gods.
Today’s itinerary was to explore more of Melaka town starting with a Chinese cemetery which we managed to reach despite the horrendous traffic (where the hell was everyone going on a Saturday?). This isn't as morbid as it sounds as it is beautifully peaceful, contrasting with the aforementioned traffic, not to mention the fact that it was noteworthy for being the largest Chineses cemetery outside of the People’s Repulic. Wandering through here we came out at the Melaka River, near a preserved Malay village or Kampung called Kampung Morten. If the name doesn't sound particularly exotic, that is because the name is from the last British Governer of Melaka before Malaysia gained independence.
The main house is called Villa Sentosa which means House of Peace. Strangely enough, in Singapore, the former British naval base on an island to the south of the city, where the Brits signed the surrender to the Japanese in WWII is also called Sentosa, and is now a buzzing resort complete with casinos, so I wonder which meaning of the word "peace" this was in WWII or now. Another family arrived just as we did and we were then met by an elderly Malay man called Mr Abdul Rahim Haji Hashim who owned the house and had converted it into a living museum. He proceeded to show the six of use from room to room, each one soaked in history about Malaysia, the Kampung and his family for several generations. There were artifacts from over the last hundred years including old cameras, old versions of the Koran and many pictures of his family and ancestors. There were pictures of when the king of Malaysia had visited, as well as various other dignitaries from all over the world. We saw his guest books going back many years with entries by all sorts of people from all over, and even included an endorsement from Winston Churchill himself. The tour ended when we were invited to bang an ancient gong to bring good luck.
Tranquility in a Chinese Cemetery
Colourful mushrooms growing on a log in the cemetery.
There's more than a little "On Ilkley Moor Bah 'tat" about this
Kampung Morten, with Vila Sentosa proudly decorated in the Malaysian flag.
Merdeka is the name of their National Day
King and Queeen for a day.
Sitting on bridal thrones in Villa Sentosa, Kampung Morten
Gong with the wind. Banged for good luck, this gong is ancient. Whether whether it works or not, it seems not to have done Mr Hashim and the other residents of Kampung Morten any harm.
After this we headed along the river via a new boardwalk, walking past mudskippers, kingfishers and monitor lizards. This wound its way back into town, apart from one place where the area was dug up forsome new road or other. We went back along the river in Chinatown and stopped at a place called Riverine for food. This was wonderful. I had a delicious spicy laksa washed down with Tiger. It was full of all sorts of stuff like prawns, boiled egg, beansprouts. It’s also very yellow so stains like hell, but the splatters you may get from loudly slurping the noodles (when in Rome..) is worth it.
A monitor lizard
Seen en route from Kampung Morten to Melaka town
Back to the hotel for a swim, a freshen up then out to paint the town merah as they say in Malaysia. We went past a kung fu expert whose party trick is jabbing his index finger into a coconut. He took ages to go about actually doing it so we couldn’t be arsed to stay and watch for another 30 minutes since it culminated in some sale spiel for some miracle oil and we were hungry. However, here is a Youtube link of him doing his stuff. We instead went inland to get something to drink, going back to the Eleven bar from the previous evening for a Tiger. This allowed me to watch some of the football, though I had a bit of an alimentary attack, but survived relatively unscathed.
Being tourists, the next thing we did was go and get a boat cruise along the river. This was fun as all the other passebgers were Malay teenagers who whooped and hollered at every other boat passing and at a lot of people we passed too. We went back along the route we had walked earlier in the day past the Malay village, then back again. The waterfront of Melaka is undergoing a lot of deveopment and it will be a popular destination when it's finished, though it might also tarnish the soul of the town in the process if it's not managed well.
Villa Sentosa at Kampung Morten as seen from river cruise at night
We headed back for more drinks, and had been thinking of grabbing some food, but I wasn't feeling that well up for it, so we just stuck to beer instead. Ahh, the curative properties of Tiger. We stopped off at a couple more places before we weent home. Being in a particularly tourist frame of mind we got a ride back on a trishaw, or cycle rickshaw to the hotel. This is a fun way to travel, even if you do feel a little guilty for the poor man having to pedal you the distance home. Still it's a living for him and keeps him fit. Not sure I'd fancy doing it during Ramadan though when you can't eat or drink during the hours of daylight, especially in this climate.
Melaka by pedal power at night
Our cyle-rickshaw driver slogging away to our hotel while we reclined and took photos. I can defintely see the appeal of being a colonial master
Our driver for the night
Note how gaudily decked out the trishaw is. This was by no means especially heavily decorated compared to others
Sad but true ,, ended the day with a McDonalds burger, because we were hungry and my stomach was still playing Twister, and this sort of near-digested pap is just the sort of thing an ailing gut can deal with. Then it was to bed.
Monday, 16 August 2010
Noodles to Hitler in one day abroad
Day two
A view up Heeren St, Melaka. Note the Chinese style shophouses
Up with the lark. Well, up in time from breakfast at least (not sure they have larks in Malaysia anyway). Breakfast was a massive buffet with the full complement of cooked (no pork, but chicken sausages and ham, not as bad as they sound, and eggs prepared at the egg station to your liking), continental, pastries and of course the Asian selection. You ain’t never been to the Far East if you never had fried noodles for brekkie. I have so far drawn the line at the congee porridge though.
Full up and ready to go, we retraced our route from the last night to take in some of the sights
The first place we came to was St Paul’s Church which has been used by St Francis Xavier to do some miracles, and his body was kept here for a bit and you can see what was his tomb The church occupies an imposing position on a hill overlooking the river and out to sea, and is reached by going on a long slog up a flight of steps after entering through a gate at ground level for. This is called Porta de Santiago which was part of the original town fortress the Portuguese built which was almost destroyed by the Dutch until Stamford Raffles (the one that founded Singapore and gives his name to the most famous hotel there where the Singapore Sling was created) got them to stop. Parts of the old fort and town wall are excavated all around this area. 
Jane at St Paul's Church, Melaka
Walking up into Chinatown and the atmosphere you could feel the previous night was no less for the daylight. The shophouses and narrow streets are incredibly evocative, especially those that are preserved in their authentic state. You can easily imagine what it was like in the early part of the 20th Century or earlier when Melaka was a vital port on the way to the Spice Islands. We came across one shophouse that had been restored to its traditional state as part of a heritage project. It’s simply called 8 Heeren St (see the Dutch history with that name), after its address, and wandering round this it was incredible to think that these places weren’t being snapped up to convert to houses as they would make great modern homes. Talking to the chap who was oversaw the project, and he said they have something like 100 of these places on the go to restore them to their original setup, but it isn’t cheap. They have grants from various sources including the US Embassy and Ford, but it amounts to something like £500,000 just for the restoration. Many more are gutted to convert into modern shops, or are demolished, but it’s good to know that there is someone fighting to maintain the heritage of this historic area.
A view up Heeren St, Melaka. Note the Chinese style shophousesWe went out from here and wandered a bit more, coming across Eng Choon Association, an incredibly well preserved guild house and Chinese temple, with gilt decoration and dragons carved in to the roof and supporting pillars. The amount of work involved in this is amazing, with the columns carved in stone with the most intricate detail. We stopped for another drink at the Geographer’s Cafe before wandering onto Temple Street, as this road is known due to the fact that it has the oldest Chinese Temple, oldest Mosque and the oldest Hindu temple in Malaysia all harmoniously co-existing side-by-side. There were several other Chinese temples and shrines and a Buddhist temple also. The oldest Chinese temple is called Cheng Hoon Teng and built in honour of the Kuan Yin, the Chinese Goddess of Mercy . This was in much better taste than a lot of Chinese temples as it wasn’t really gaudy, but mostly in dark wood and gilt. It dates from 1646 and is still in use as a place of worship.
The Eng Choon Asociation door on Heeren St
Interior of the Cheng Hoon Association complete with dragons on roof
Carved pillar inside Cheng Hoon Assoc
Heng Choon Temple
Detail on roof of Heng Choon Temple
The mosque is called Masjid Kampung Hulu and different to most mosques you see as it was designed in the style of a Balinese temple, and the minaret built in the style of Sumatran mosques, with a tiered design (so the plaque said anyway, as I’m not really much of an authority on Islamic architecture). The Buddhist temple was a fairly modern build and pretty large. It was very peaceful wandering around the statues of legendary monks in various poses, though the significance of these was largely lost on me sadly, but I could see how people could be moved to meditate in this environment.
Masjid Kampung Hulu Mosque
Next on our route we went through Chinatown and to an Indian foodhall called Selvam for some curry which was staggeringly good. This was a banana leaf restaurant where you have no plates, just a large piece of palm foliage to eat off, and no cutlery. The food was rice and vegetable curries, plus dahl which is dolloped onto the leaf , then another man came round to give you rice, and another came to ask if we wanted chicken or mutton, so we opted for chicken which was again curried. It was, as I said, excellent and tasted all the better for eating with fingers. Not that Jane did, she asked for a fork. I on the other hand looked like I’d been snogging a peat bog by the time I’d finished. Of course, the locals are much more adept at this way of eating than I am, but they still provide wash basins which is a good thing or else people would be thinking I’d had an accident with cheap toilet paper if I tried to shake their hands.
We then stopped at a place for a drink called the Discovery Cafe which is very much a backpacker hangout, but the cafe itself has some character despite this, with the bar open to the road but festooned with all sorts of memorabilia like old typewriters, records etc. We enjoyed a beer here to wash down our curry before heading back to our hotel to take advantage of the swimming pool before the rain came.
After a dip, just in time before the rain reached us, and by rain I mean RAIN, complete with thunder and lightning, we went back to our room before we came down to the drink reception we had gone to on the first day for another couple of beers and some food. I then insisted I get to the gym to try out the dance class that was advertised. Big mistake as it was a essentially line dancing, so I did some work on the treadmill instead. I mean where was the street dance attitude? All the finely tuned moves I’d learnt over the last couple of years to hot joints from the street? They wouldn’t go down to the instructor and the two local ladies who were the attendees of his class. Their loss.
Friday night is one of the major nights out in Melaka, where Jonker’s Walk, the area on which the Georapher’s Cafe is situated, becomes a thronging night market. We wandered around this before settling to have a drink in a bar called Ringo’s opposite the Geographer’s to watch the world go by, and listen to Ringo himself (not the drummer, or if it was he has changed an awful lot since his peace and love speech telling pople not to send him stuf for signing) murder a few Beatles numbers. The set up at these bars is odd in that the staff seem to be employed by the beer companies rather than the bars. There was an army of scantily clad girls in outfits from Tiger or Carlsberg serving the beer of that brand. Not that I was complaining as they certainly beat the barmaid at the King’s Arms, on a purely professional level obviously. We headed further up the same street and alighted at another bar called Eleven where we had yet more beer and some food. The speciality of this place is Portuguese-cum-Asian and again was rather good. The prawns in sambal was sphincter quiveringly tasty . As the evening went on it turned into a bit of a pub crawl as we returned to the Discovery where they had a band on , wandered back towards the hotel and to a bar nearby, called Friends Cafe and finally had one at the place belonging to the hotel making it to bed for 1ish.
On last thing. When we were coming back to the hotel to use the bar I spotted a cat that was the spitting image of Adolf Hitler. This meant I spent 10 minutes chasing it around a car park to get a picture. It's not brilliant (it as 1am, I was drunk and I don't think Hitler cat wanted to be photographed), but here it is. I already sent it to the website catsthatlooklikehitler.com so hopefully they'll post it there
Wednesday, 11 August 2010
Day 1. Manchester Airport
Day 1 Manchester Airport
Mosquito bites: 0
And we’re off. Last minute packing of a few bits, securing the luggage, calling a cab,checking the train information online to see if there were any delays on the train line over the Pennines. An earlier train had been delayed 40 mins between Leeds and Dewsbury which was a bit worrying, but it as only that particular train so we were OK. The taxi and I was a bit worried that we wouldn’t be able to get our backpacks into the boot since it as largely occupied by a large bass (by which I mean the deep registering sound, not the fish) speaker unit. Pretty dumb idea if you want to use your car as a taxi to be honest. Generally speaking, a Toyota Avensis is not really a great car to go impressing the chicks in with the bass pumping, especially if it’s in the livery of Bridge Cars Private Hire of Horbury.
We arrived at Dewsbury Station with about 20 minutes to spare. The train arrived well on time and was quitr busy, in contrast to the one 5 minutes earlier which was going to Manchester Victoria and was dead, though it was stopping at every lamp post en route according to the display. My God it’s gloomy when you get towards Manchester. Certainly living up to its rep. No different to when Ilived here though. A guy had the loudest headphones ever in the seat in front of us. I mean, I could hear the song, give you the artist and hear the artist’s manager counting hs money in the background, it was that clear. Still he turned it off later on so we didn’t have to endure it for the full trip.
Manchester Airport is one of my favourites. Big enough to have plenty of shops to keep you amused, but not too posh. Manchester doesn’t really do posh. Where some airports have shops selling caviar, Manchester has a tripe shop. Well, they prefer to call it a Manchester United shop, but you know what I mean.
We were in T1, so no chance to go to my favourite pre-flight watering hole of the Bar de Voyageures where I have drank many a 6am Grolsch (hey, I’m on holiday, why not?).
We checked in rapidly thanks to the joys of online checking in, but weren’t upgraded. How could they not do that, the two visions in linen that we are? Yes, linen, the perfect holiday fabric. I was wearing long trousers and everything. Anyway, since we weren’t upgraded I vowed to eat my food very loudly as a protest, lip-smacking after every single mouthful and pestering the crew for top-ups, extra impact as it's Ramadan.
Security was a breeze, though I still managed to get pulled out and searched. I say searched, it was one of those bodyscanner things. There are people I’m not married to in this airport where I type this that have seen an image of my penis.
Terminal 1 has had a bit of a revamp though and it is quite flash looking now. We stopped to enjoy our sandwiches. Yes being the peasants we are we brought our own food to eat in the airport (and here’s me hoping for an upgrade).We did have a long time between breakfast and the first meal we got on the flight. I had a pint to wash it down though.
OK, I'm uploading this at Dubai, and I just had an experience at Costa Coffee that I need to rant about. See next post!
Mosquito bites: 0
And we’re off. Last minute packing of a few bits, securing the luggage, calling a cab,checking the train information online to see if there were any delays on the train line over the Pennines. An earlier train had been delayed 40 mins between Leeds and Dewsbury which was a bit worrying, but it as only that particular train so we were OK. The taxi and I was a bit worried that we wouldn’t be able to get our backpacks into the boot since it as largely occupied by a large bass (by which I mean the deep registering sound, not the fish) speaker unit. Pretty dumb idea if you want to use your car as a taxi to be honest. Generally speaking, a Toyota Avensis is not really a great car to go impressing the chicks in with the bass pumping, especially if it’s in the livery of Bridge Cars Private Hire of Horbury.
We arrived at Dewsbury Station with about 20 minutes to spare. The train arrived well on time and was quitr busy, in contrast to the one 5 minutes earlier which was going to Manchester Victoria and was dead, though it was stopping at every lamp post en route according to the display. My God it’s gloomy when you get towards Manchester. Certainly living up to its rep. No different to when Ilived here though. A guy had the loudest headphones ever in the seat in front of us. I mean, I could hear the song, give you the artist and hear the artist’s manager counting hs money in the background, it was that clear. Still he turned it off later on so we didn’t have to endure it for the full trip.
Manchester Airport is one of my favourites. Big enough to have plenty of shops to keep you amused, but not too posh. Manchester doesn’t really do posh. Where some airports have shops selling caviar, Manchester has a tripe shop. Well, they prefer to call it a Manchester United shop, but you know what I mean.
We were in T1, so no chance to go to my favourite pre-flight watering hole of the Bar de Voyageures where I have drank many a 6am Grolsch (hey, I’m on holiday, why not?).
We checked in rapidly thanks to the joys of online checking in, but weren’t upgraded. How could they not do that, the two visions in linen that we are? Yes, linen, the perfect holiday fabric. I was wearing long trousers and everything. Anyway, since we weren’t upgraded I vowed to eat my food very loudly as a protest, lip-smacking after every single mouthful and pestering the crew for top-ups, extra impact as it's Ramadan.
Security was a breeze, though I still managed to get pulled out and searched. I say searched, it was one of those bodyscanner things. There are people I’m not married to in this airport where I type this that have seen an image of my penis.
Terminal 1 has had a bit of a revamp though and it is quite flash looking now. We stopped to enjoy our sandwiches. Yes being the peasants we are we brought our own food to eat in the airport (and here’s me hoping for an upgrade).We did have a long time between breakfast and the first meal we got on the flight. I had a pint to wash it down though.
OK, I'm uploading this at Dubai, and I just had an experience at Costa Coffee that I need to rant about. See next post!
Sunday, 8 August 2010
Day -3. More prep and musings on British life
It's the home straight. Three days before we fly, two days before I officialy go on holiday from work at 5:30pm on Tuesday. All the main tasks are sorted: getting a haircut (yes, both of us), having the car serviced and MOT'd, buying a couple more useful gadgets like an MP3 speaker. So now it's just the packing to worry about. That, and preparing for what we will be missing and what makes coming home worthwhile.
Football is something that is a consideration when we are away. The Championship officially began this weekend, and the Premiership season opener, the Community Shield, was on today. This was previously called the Charity Shield, but I suppose, given that the charities probably had less to spend at the point of need than the collected players earnt that week, it's probably a bit of a misnomer. Saying that, the philanthropic trust that is McDonalds were crowing, by way of advertising hordings, about how many coaches that had been installed for youth and grassroots football. I'l bear that in mind that next time I get a Big Mac whilst musing over how shit we were at the World Cup thanks to the intervention of the American obesity merchants.
One of the things about this sort of holiday is how you get to a place and think it's idyllic (apart from the massive poverty, healthcare problems and deprivation of the local populace, obviously), and you think how cool it would be to live there. As an expat, obviously. I mean, I'm not stupid, you do want to maintain a living standard close to that to which you are accustomed. Anyway, the point is, you know that it's pie in the sky (not much call for Clinical Biochemists in Batambang, Cambodia, where the healthcare system is pretty strained), so it helps to keep a sense of what you are looking forward to when you get home.
Reasons to come home:
British beer
The football (at a sensible time)
Television
Sunday roasts
Of course, dark, bitter beer isn't really missed when it's 37 deg outside and you need something ice-cold and wet; when you can get the football easier than ever online, with Satuday games on telly at 10-11pm, so when you're at the pub; when you have Youtube for any programmes you miss; and the fact that they do actually roast meats in a lot of countries. Really, though, without the dour British weather and the shortening day as we lurch towards winter to make all those things feel better, they are worthless. Obviously.
Two gym days left, following a step class this morning I managed to drag Jane to Huddersfield Total Fitness. That's her last activity before we go, that's for sure. Me, I don't want to hammer things, but I do want to do a couple of sessions. It is what I do, after all.
Anyway, we had our last Sunday roast, which was a fantastic piece of lamb with new spuds, broccolli and roasted butternut squash, as well as home-made mint sauce. It was something wonderful, something you don't get in SE Asia. Meh, who am I kidding? There's nothing we are going to miss from our Brit life being away, be it for 3 weeks or 3 years. There is so much to love about British life, but there are as many compensations for living elsewhere.
Next post wil probably be made en route to SE Asia, at the airport (though never say never) which, as far as I am concerned, is when we really are ON HOLIDAY!
Football is something that is a consideration when we are away. The Championship officially began this weekend, and the Premiership season opener, the Community Shield, was on today. This was previously called the Charity Shield, but I suppose, given that the charities probably had less to spend at the point of need than the collected players earnt that week, it's probably a bit of a misnomer. Saying that, the philanthropic trust that is McDonalds were crowing, by way of advertising hordings, about how many coaches that had been installed for youth and grassroots football. I'l bear that in mind that next time I get a Big Mac whilst musing over how shit we were at the World Cup thanks to the intervention of the American obesity merchants.
One of the things about this sort of holiday is how you get to a place and think it's idyllic (apart from the massive poverty, healthcare problems and deprivation of the local populace, obviously), and you think how cool it would be to live there. As an expat, obviously. I mean, I'm not stupid, you do want to maintain a living standard close to that to which you are accustomed. Anyway, the point is, you know that it's pie in the sky (not much call for Clinical Biochemists in Batambang, Cambodia, where the healthcare system is pretty strained), so it helps to keep a sense of what you are looking forward to when you get home.
Reasons to come home:
British beer
The football (at a sensible time)
Television
Sunday roasts
Of course, dark, bitter beer isn't really missed when it's 37 deg outside and you need something ice-cold and wet; when you can get the football easier than ever online, with Satuday games on telly at 10-11pm, so when you're at the pub; when you have Youtube for any programmes you miss; and the fact that they do actually roast meats in a lot of countries. Really, though, without the dour British weather and the shortening day as we lurch towards winter to make all those things feel better, they are worthless. Obviously.
Two gym days left, following a step class this morning I managed to drag Jane to Huddersfield Total Fitness. That's her last activity before we go, that's for sure. Me, I don't want to hammer things, but I do want to do a couple of sessions. It is what I do, after all.
Anyway, we had our last Sunday roast, which was a fantastic piece of lamb with new spuds, broccolli and roasted butternut squash, as well as home-made mint sauce. It was something wonderful, something you don't get in SE Asia. Meh, who am I kidding? There's nothing we are going to miss from our Brit life being away, be it for 3 weeks or 3 years. There is so much to love about British life, but there are as many compensations for living elsewhere.
Next post wil probably be made en route to SE Asia, at the airport (though never say never) which, as far as I am concerned, is when we really are ON HOLIDAY!
Sunday, 25 July 2010
Day -8, just over a week to go
PROLOGUE
Location: Horbury, W Yorkshire
No, we aren't off just yet, but it will be soon. All of our accomodation is booked, as are all our internal flights, as well as our long haul flights (naturally, since our holidays are usually based on wherever we get a flight to). Jane is responsible for itinerary whereas I'm in charge of logisitics. We are up to date on jabs, have malaria meds which we probably don't actually need. I will try to ease off on the travel nerdism, especially about equipment, but it is something I like about planning a trip. A lot of the fun of the buildup is getting the stuff together you need to take but I can become a bore on the subject. I mean, I'm not sure anyone really wants to know about our new camera with a huge zoom (Panasonic tz7), or that the new shoes I bought were Nike Alvord VIIs which are trail running shoes, even if I did want something that was good for some light jungle trekking, but light enough for some jogging or even aerobics which they are suppsed to do al fresco by the Mekong in Cambodia. Yes, I do have a hankering to do some aerobics in foreign climes, especially after seeing an outdoor class underway in Laos a couple of trips back that I missed out on taking part in.
Anyway, there's little else to do now, but wait and get our stuff together before we start packing. There's mundane things like haircuts and getting the car in for its annual service and MOT. We have a spare weekend to go after two when we were playing host to both our parents (don't get me wrong it was fun as any excuse for a meal at a decent restaurant is always welcome). There's a lot of lists to make: what to pack - which has sublists of things like toiletries and documentation, lists of thing to do in the house, like watering plants. Fact is, this is just marking time until the holiday actually starts. We aren't likely to forget anything major, and the act of packing takes little more than half an hour, but the fights have been booked for 7 months, so it's not unreasonable to be pretty excited by the impending adventure.
We have to bear a few things in mind already. We travel on the first day of Ramadan, which might be considered not the wisest time to visit a Muslim country, but they have a significant Chinese community where we will be able to eat any time, no to mention get booze. One of our previous trips we spent a day in Kota Bahru in the NE coast of the peninsular which is a pretty devout area, and it was only in the Chinese cafes there that you could get a beer so it's not unprecendented. As well as this, the fact that people eat in the evening following a day of fasting means that the evening meal takes on a special significance so there are some fantastic places to enjoy Ramadan evening banquets. Still, it does mean that bacon will be pretty scarce on the Malaysian part of the holiday.
Jane has looked up the entertainment for our outgoing flights which became available online at the begining of the month. I see this as cheating, like peeking at your Christmas presents on 23rd december, though she did tell me they have Shutter Island and Iron Man 2 which I'm happy to hear. I'm surprised she hasn't looked up the food, or the names of the air cabin crew. I don't call them anything, I just press a button to get their attention and order a bloody mary (the only time I ever drink a bloody mary is on a long haul flight, don't know why).
OK, enough already. This is just a preamble, and I may post one or two more in the next week, and I know it's a bit dull because I haven't done anything or have any pics to display, but please stick with it.
Location: Horbury, W Yorkshire
No, we aren't off just yet, but it will be soon. All of our accomodation is booked, as are all our internal flights, as well as our long haul flights (naturally, since our holidays are usually based on wherever we get a flight to). Jane is responsible for itinerary whereas I'm in charge of logisitics. We are up to date on jabs, have malaria meds which we probably don't actually need. I will try to ease off on the travel nerdism, especially about equipment, but it is something I like about planning a trip. A lot of the fun of the buildup is getting the stuff together you need to take but I can become a bore on the subject. I mean, I'm not sure anyone really wants to know about our new camera with a huge zoom (Panasonic tz7), or that the new shoes I bought were Nike Alvord VIIs which are trail running shoes, even if I did want something that was good for some light jungle trekking, but light enough for some jogging or even aerobics which they are suppsed to do al fresco by the Mekong in Cambodia. Yes, I do have a hankering to do some aerobics in foreign climes, especially after seeing an outdoor class underway in Laos a couple of trips back that I missed out on taking part in.
Anyway, there's little else to do now, but wait and get our stuff together before we start packing. There's mundane things like haircuts and getting the car in for its annual service and MOT. We have a spare weekend to go after two when we were playing host to both our parents (don't get me wrong it was fun as any excuse for a meal at a decent restaurant is always welcome). There's a lot of lists to make: what to pack - which has sublists of things like toiletries and documentation, lists of thing to do in the house, like watering plants. Fact is, this is just marking time until the holiday actually starts. We aren't likely to forget anything major, and the act of packing takes little more than half an hour, but the fights have been booked for 7 months, so it's not unreasonable to be pretty excited by the impending adventure.
We have to bear a few things in mind already. We travel on the first day of Ramadan, which might be considered not the wisest time to visit a Muslim country, but they have a significant Chinese community where we will be able to eat any time, no to mention get booze. One of our previous trips we spent a day in Kota Bahru in the NE coast of the peninsular which is a pretty devout area, and it was only in the Chinese cafes there that you could get a beer so it's not unprecendented. As well as this, the fact that people eat in the evening following a day of fasting means that the evening meal takes on a special significance so there are some fantastic places to enjoy Ramadan evening banquets. Still, it does mean that bacon will be pretty scarce on the Malaysian part of the holiday.
Jane has looked up the entertainment for our outgoing flights which became available online at the begining of the month. I see this as cheating, like peeking at your Christmas presents on 23rd december, though she did tell me they have Shutter Island and Iron Man 2 which I'm happy to hear. I'm surprised she hasn't looked up the food, or the names of the air cabin crew. I don't call them anything, I just press a button to get their attention and order a bloody mary (the only time I ever drink a bloody mary is on a long haul flight, don't know why).
OK, enough already. This is just a preamble, and I may post one or two more in the next week, and I know it's a bit dull because I haven't done anything or have any pics to display, but please stick with it.
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