Xin's Europe Trip

The Reader's Digest Version: Italy-France-Croatia

2007-07-19T00:07:00.000+10:00

Okay this has to be quick, it seems that as I travel more I get less and less time to update on what's been happening. But here is a quick rundown of everything I did between Cinque Terre and getting to Greece.

-Hired car to drive from Florence (where I went to 'The Mall' and bought an expensive handbag, no it wasn't Gucci)
-Drove to Nice where I saw Monaco, the home of Grace Kelly
-Went scuba diving in Nice which was absolutely amazing
-Visited the eagle's nest style village of Eze which was just shrouded the whole time in clouds so much so that you thought you had left the human realm entirely
-Drove 11 hours from Nice to Naples to visit Pompeii where I took a picture with Caecilius' house (yes of Caecilius est pater fame, and if you don't know what I'm talking about you obviously never learnt Latin)
-Spent time in Dubrovnik, pretty but not so exciting
-Spent time in Korcula which was like Dubrovnik but far more amazing, we went sea kayaking and found perfect little coves and swam (sort of) in crystal clear waters...
-Took a boat back to Pescara where we spent another day lounging on the beach before taking the plane out to Greece

Okay I realise that that was super hurried but at least everyone knows I'm still alive now :p
I'll write more later.

The Floating City of Venice

2007-07-01T04:28:00.001+10:00

Venice is a beautiful canal city. And when I say beautiful, I really, really mean beautiful.

Now of course it's super touristy but it doesn't really detract from how enchanting the city truly is. To get to Venice (which is actually an island made up of over 100 mini islands) you take the train across the bridge and the train seems to sit so low in the water that you imagine the water to be almost lapping at the tracks. The sea stretches out as far as the eye can see and the surface is dotted with miniature islands as well as windsurfers and kite boarders. Then you get your first glimpse of the creamy red and pink buildings of Venice old town and it really feels like you're arriving somewhere enchanted.

If you ever head to Venice make sure you get up really early in the morning just as the sun is rising. There is not a tourist in sight at this hour - the only movement is the moored boats bobbing up and down in the water and the only sound is the morning chorus sung by the birds. If you're lucky you'll smell the bakers abaking and if you have a keen nose you can follow it all the way to a little hole in the wall cafe where the croissants are just layers of melt in your mouth pastry enclosing a warm heart of marmalade...

Savour if because when Venice comes alive at about 9:30am the tourists outnumber the pigeons (which, believe me, is no small feat) and all the souvenir stores open their doors allowing the beautiful coloured handicrafts (papier mache masks, gorgeous Venetian glasses) to spill out into the narrow alleyways. That's the wonderful thing about Venice, even though you're bound to get lost going from point A to point B walking doesn't feel like a chore because you take so many shopping detours to admire the gorgeous stores.

Oh and I want to mention that I did take a gondola in Venice! And I didn't pay a small fortune for it! Instead of bobbing up and down getting motion sick and having to pay 70 euros for that misery I took a 'traghetto' to cross the Grand Canal in Venice which provided 5 minutes of gondola pleasure for only 50 cents per person! I'm mighty proud of myself. :p

But at the end of the day it's so sad to leave Venice... as those pinky old town buildings faded into the distance I couldn't help thinking that I'd left something truly magic behind. But, as I always say, it provides the perfect excuse to return soon! :p

This is how excited I was...

2007-06-26T06:02:00.000+10:00

...to get to the front of the bloody line to see Michaelangelo's 'David' at the Galleria dell 'Accademia in Florence.

Blooming hell, in Florence you have to line up for everything. To see 'David' we were in a queue for almost 3 hours in the sun, standing. I finished an entire book. Not happy Jan. Johnny and I actually developed a rotating shift system whereby we would each get to sit for 15 minutes in the shade while the other person lined up against the sunned on wall. It was pretty bad.

Plus right at the front of the queue some guy who pretended he only spoke French and didn't understand the rules tried to cut in. I led the lynch mob to kick him out of the queue. Eventually he backed out although he tried to cut in a bit further down the queue. So I did the civil service of informing the people he tried in front of that there was a queue jumper on the loose. They lynched him too. I did the triumph dance when he left, defeated. Muahahahaha!!!

Okay I spent the whole post talking about lining up because it wasn't worth it. The statute is pretty damn good but the rest of the gallery is pretty crap and just seeing David is not worth lining up for 3 hours AND paying 10 euros for no matter what anyone says. I'm glad I did it this one time, but I will definitely not be repeating this epic feat any time soon...

For those of you after photos I have uploaded new photos in my Album (look for 'Italy').

Or here is a link to the Facebook album:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=12125&l=85aa2&id=709057418

It Leans! It Leans!

2007-06-26T05:52:00.000+10:00

Okay I know it's the Leaning Tower of Pisa but really, I was really suprised by how much it actually... well... leans.

To be honest, there isn't really much that Pisa has got going for it apart from this tower. Sure it's on this beautiful square that the locals call 'Campo dei Miracoli' ('Field of Miracles') full of other leaning buildings (personally I think it earned the moniker because it's a miracle that any structure is standing on that damned field at all) but there's really nothing else in town (no matter how many 'Pisa, More than just the Leaning Tower!' brochures they hand out).

Also, I should mention angrily that they charge a whooping 15 euro to ascend the tower and make you wait over an hour (we waited something like 80 minutes) before allowing you up there. Luckily we made good use of the time by taking as many of these stupid 'With the Leaning Tower' pictures as we could.

Oh, plus we got endless amusement out of the fact that you're not actually allowed on the grass so every once in a while the security guard would come out with a whistle to chase everybody off but after 2 minutes people would resiliently get back onto the grass (if once you fail...)...

Eventually they just turned the sprinkler system on :p

Roma, non basta una vita...

2007-06-25T04:57:00.000+10:00

Rome, a lifetime is not enough.
That's what they say, and it's pretty damn true. Although I've left Rome I'm still feeling a little overwhelmed by the plethora of sights there.

I crammed as much as I could into the three and a half days that I was there - I ran through the museum in the Vatican (oohed and aahed at the Laocoon and berated Johnny when he complained that he didn't 'get' classical sculpture), marvelled at the beauty of St Peter's Basillica, sweltered under the relentless Roman sun while I took at tour of the old Roman Forum, covered my shoulders while visiting countless churches, sat on the Spanish Steps which are no longer populated with beautiful people hoping to be picked as artists' models but rather surrounded by endless glitzy and over-airconditioned designer outlets, ate Italian food (which is not nearly as good as good ol' Papa Gino's on Lygon) and took a bus ride out along the Appian Way (not as glamourous as it sounds) to visit the old Christian catacombs (called the Callisto Catacombs if you're reading this Lil!) to see the history and old burial site of St Cecylia. It was pretty full on.

But my favourite, favourite part of Rome, which most people miss out on, is just wandering around the back roads around the Trastevere area which has the coolest little bric a brac stores and themed stores (one completely devoted to maps and time!) and cheap Italian restaurants. At night a bunch of stalls and neat bars come out along the Tiber river and you can spend ages enjoying the sight of the lights dancing on the fast moving water. The best part is when I was there, a big group of marimba players had lined themselves up one after the other equidistant along the water edge, each spotlighted and playing together a symphony of chimes and tinkles that was pure magic...

When in Bavaria...

2007-06-19T03:58:00.000+10:00

... you do what the Bavarians do. That is you drink beer. By the LITRE...

I haven't done much in Munich. I took a walking tour of the city and watched the Glockenspiel (the famous chiming clock which isn't doing much chiming because the bells are being cleaned so you kind of just stand there for 10 minutes straining your neck to watch the figures in the clock move around rather surreally), saw the place where the Munich Beer Hall Putsch happened (and the place where Hitler's bodyguard took 11 shots to save his life, there's a road block post there) and then just sat in the beer gardens and watched Johnny drink. I took some sips of the stuff but considering I don't like it much I let Johnny do most of the drinking.

Now this all makes Munich sound a little boring. It's not true. Munich is a gorgeous city, rebuilt to look the way it did before 80% was destroyed in WWII and there are heaps of galleries, palaces and stuff to check out. But since we can do all that in any European city Johnny has just decreed that we spend all our time in the beer gardens.

If you haven't check out my lastest photos:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=11372&l=7e5da&id=709057418

The Crazy King Ludwig II

2007-06-19T03:46:00.000+10:00

...built the Schloss Neushwanstein just outside the small town of Füssen in Germany (on the border with Austria).

Now Füssen itself is a charming town with its cute little Altstadt (old town) all nestled into the most magnificent mountains. It truly does look like a town at the start of the Romantische Strasse (Romantic Road in Germany) should.

But the tourists don't come in droves to see the town. They come for the aforementioned castle which is built by the mad king Ludwig II and is apparently the inspiration for that famous white Disney castle icon.

It's easy to see how the castle could be inspirational, the exterior of the castle gleaming perfectly creamy white really does look magical, especially when it is settled so charmingly atop spectacular mountain forests.

The interior is something of an exercise in what can happen if you allow someone who is really that side of loopy with a penchant for swans and Wagner an unlimited interior design budget. It's a little wonder that the king died in 'mysterious circumstances' and construction work on the castle ceased immediately upon his death.

It has come to my attention that my FastAlbum isn't working.

If you're keen to check out my latest photos follow the link below instead:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=11372&l=7e5da&id=709057418

The Hills Are Alive, With The Sound of Music...

2007-06-19T03:02:00.000+10:00

It's true. In Salzburg the hills are always singing. Mainly because every day there are at least 4 odd 'The Sound of Music' tours ranging through the hills blasting those epic Rogers and Hammerstein's songs at an unreasonably high volume all the while encourage a bus load of tourists to sing along completely out of tune.

Yes, I did take one of these tours. Yes I did sing along. And yes, I did do cheesy poses next to all the film locations. Did you expect anything else?!? I love The Sound of Music!

But aside from the kitschy tours, Salzburg really is a place to make you want to sing. The Alps and the natural beauty of the place is almost unbelievably heart-wrenching. One amazing experience was visiting the world's largest ice caves just outside of Salzburg. They give you old fashioned oil lanterns and you spend a hour trawling through the cave with a guide seeing the most amazing natural ice formations... wow...

For Xin's newest trip photos go to:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=11372&l=7e5da&id=709057418

Hungry in Hungary!

2007-06-18T06:45:00.000+10:00

Okay, I realise that was so far that side of cheesy but I can't help it.
Johnny and I made so many hungry/Hungary jokes in Budapest that it is now thoroughly ingrained into my conciousness.
Not that this gorgeous city is anything to shake a stick at - there is an absolute wealth of things to do, it's unassuming grandeur and sheer 'fun-ness' has allowed it to vault into one of my favourite cities of all time.
I could write so much here but I'll just settle for a 'Top 3 Budapest' in the vein of all iconic travel writing.
1. The thermal baths! Okay, so they are little more than overglorified swimming pools like the ones that they have at home but they are housed in such elegant buildings and the water is supposedly sooooo good for you so I'm not complaining. Plus after travelling for so long, relaxing in the 30 degree pools and then steaming in a sauna before plunging into cold water was just the ticket for my tired muscle. Mmm... chilled and relaxed Xin...
2. Buda Castle - the whole hill actually. It's incredibly beautiful. The palace houses the national art collection (which lacks famous faces but makes up for it with some utterly dreamy paintings which you can spend all day sinking into) and underneath the whole complex a damp, dank, utterly fake but utterly fun labrinyth lurks. They play atmospheric music to make the fainthearted jump and have tunnels with no light to truly shake even the most courageous soul. Plus they have the beautiful white Fisherman's Bastion and the beautifully painted Matthias Church (which is currently home to the Hungarian crown, that is to say the oldest crown in Europe) so Xin is a happy, happy tourist today.
3. The best 'gem' of a hostel. It is called the Vamhaz House and it is located at the top of a long, winding staircase that looks like it could be used for a serious James Bond chase sequence you get to a tiny but charming hostel where the staff have the best advice in the world and the internet and breakfast is free!!!

It's places like Budapest that make travelling (more!) worthwhile... :p

PS: To everyone who hasn't heard, CONGRATULATIONS TO CHIAN AND CC WHO ARE NOW OFFICIALLY ENGAGED!!!

...But the dancing was a lamentable mess!

2007-06-14T05:57:00.000+10:00

Yes it's true, Vienna remains Vienna even as the years go by and the big glassy buildings go up. There is something so quintessentially Viennese about this city that nothing can destroy. Mozart and Strauss rule supreme here and you can feel so classy just by ducking into one of the elegant coffee shops and sipping on a latte (or Viennese coffee if you're feeling particularly touristy! :p)

There is so much to do in Vienna that it's easy to feel overwhelmed. Almost every building is beautiful enough to be a 'tourist' sight.

But personally I think it's worth pointing out two highlights.

First the Hofburg (the royal palace in the city) houses some extraordinary state apartments as well as the Sissi museum! For those of you who don't know Sissi, obviously you didn't get to watch that delightful Romy Schneider movie when you were little. (For the unenlightened, she's a famous Hapsburg empress who's beauty and tragic life have made her famous.)

The second is the incredible gallery at Belvedere which is another palace housing an exquisitely eclectic collection of art, the centrepiece of which was The Kiss by Gustav Klimt (see picture). Not all the paintings were famous but there is something beautiful and special in each and every painting to appreciate.

On another note I let Johnny talk me into seeing a kitchsy touristy performance of Mozart and Strauss instead of catching a performance at the Staadtopera and although the band had a phenomenally cute Audrey Tatou lookalike it wasn't enough to save the more than average male singer and the worst ballet dancers I have ever seen (they probably couldn't even make it into the corps de ballet of the Australian Ballet, a true lamentable mess...). The performance was also spoiled by people who kept skipping into better seats than they paid for, the entire crowd who got up to leave before the orchestra had left and people watching the entire performance through their video camera. (I know, I'm a ballet snob but I can't help it...)

But all in all Vienna is such a beautiful city, it's the kind of grandeur and beauty that you hear in the music of Mozart and Strauss, it really is a song in life.

Prague? What Prague?

2007-06-11T05:05:00.000+10:00

My apologies to Christine and everyone else who raved about Prague. But seriously, everyone who loved Prague must not have been to Cesky Krumlov.

Cesky Krumlov is everything I thought Prague should have been. It is an utterly gorgeous little town nestled into the Czech mountains with a castle that looks like it belongs above the clouds and the Vltava meandering idly through.

It was utterly beautiful.

We only had one full day in Cesky Krumlov (due to aforementioned bus crisis) but we made the most of it! We got up at 7am in the morning and rode horses through the wheat fields and forests. Then we had a mini picnic morning tea by the banks of the Vltava before hiring a inflatable raft and boating down from Vetrini back to Cesky Krumlov (the boat hire company drove us to Vetrini). I even navigated down 4 rapids created by dams which gave me a micro (VERY micro) taste of white water rafting but really was more like going down a water slide. And then we ran around the castle before running for a bus and running to a train connection that (after quite some drama) got us to Vienna. *Sigh* Tired, but very happy. It was worth all the trouble to get there and away. (Ask me for my "oh my god Czech public transportation rant sometime, it's too long to put here)

Ooh... I should add at this point that Cesky Krumlov is cheap. I had two very, very yummy and very, very satisfying Czech meals and added together they didn't even equate to the cost of one very average Czech meal in Prague. In one restaurant we even had the privilege of an elderly gentleman jamming away merry tunes on a piano and some locals singing along with maracas in hand.

Plus there are infinitely less tourists to jostle against in Cesky Krumlov... always a plus!

Czech it Out!

2007-06-08T19:12:00.000+10:00

Okay I saw that on a touristy souvenir t-shirt here in Prague and couldn't resist using the horrible homophone myself!

Prague is a smallish city teeming with tourists. They come by the busload and inevitably wander around with their cameras following a tour guide brandishing a kitschy umbrella or long-stemmed plastic flower. It's hard to get a quiet moment anywhere. And all the prices are overinflated due to the presence of the tourists.

Given that you would think that nobody could possibly like this city. But they do. I certainly do.
There is something so charming in the air - I love browsing through all the puppet shops, the stalls of artisans of the famous Charles Bridge, taking in the view up at Prague Castle or even just sitting by the bank of the river and watching the sun go down.

I walked for hours from one side of the city to the other just ducking into the cute little stores and marvelling at the beautiful buildings here (although I have to say that 'world famous' astronomical clock was a little disappointing).

We also took a little day trip with a couple of gorgeous Canadian girls to a little town 70km out of Prague in Kutna Hora. This town, while not very exciting in and of itself, is remarkable for its Ossuary which is a church with all the decorations made out of human bone. It is estimated that the bones of approximately 40,000 people were used in making giant bone chalices, bone chandeliers and bone pyramids. It was a macabre but surreal experience. The cleaned and whitewashed bones did not really resemble pieces which had once been part of living, breathing people. But still, wandering the church and the small cemetary on its grounds really gave you a sense of your own mortality.

Now if you're wondering why I'm writing a blog in the middle of a beautiful day in Prague the answer is NEVER, EVER, EVER under ANY condition stay at The Golden Sickle hostel in Prague. It is one of the WORST hostels I have EVER, EVER stayed at. The receptionist is constantly hung over and/or high and has a habit of just disappearing and abusing the guests. So this morning when there was a queue of three groups waiting to check out she decided to go buy milk and disappear for 45 minutes causing us to miss our bus to Cesky Krumlov. EVIL, EVIL woman. GAH!!!!

We're Going to Ibiza...

2007-06-03T01:35:00.001+10:00

Ibiza is nothing at all like I expected. Okay, so I really kind of expected it to be like a Vengaboys video clip with the Vengabus coming and everybody jumping in true cartoonish, endless party style. But although I'm sure that's what Ibiza is like to a lot of travellers (the bar district in San Antonio is ALWAYS pumping at night) this is not all that Ibiza is about.

So here, officially, is "Xin's Guide to Travelling Through Ibiza".

First of all you must always sleep in. It's true, you'll need the energy if you want to party through to early morning.

Then you drive (or scooter, whatever takes your fancy) around till you find a perfect little beach. Then you siesta for the rest of the day. It is unlikely that you will get any of the 40 odd beaches in Ibiza to yourself, so you'll just have to content yourself to sharing sand space with the topless and sometimes naked sun worshippers.

Then, about 40 minutes before sundown head to Cafe Del Mar (yes, the same Cafe Del Mar of endless CD's of ambient music fame). The location of Cafe Del Mar supposedly gives the most beautiful view of sundown in Ibiza. I don't think the tourist brochures were hyperbolising in this case - the Cafe Del Mar sunset was truly perfect. (And yes, the music accompaniment that made this lounge famous really was just right) It was so good that Johnny and I didn't even take any pictures. No photo could do this sunset true justice.

Then hit the bars in San Antonio for some cheap drinks and rowdy British pub fun. (I say British because there are so many Brits in Ibiza that I actually thought I was back in London for a bit) This is the prelude to the main event...

...which is hitting one of the big, famous clubs in Ibiza. Space, Eden, Pacha, take your pick. We went to Pacha mainly because it was a Tuesday night and basically no other big clubs were open this close to the start of the season. Pacha was nothing like what I expected. It looks more like a super modern, ultra chic lounge than a crazy techno party. (Personally I think it's just famous because it has cherries on its logo and cherries are sexy fruit...) Party till at least 4am in the morning. You've done well if the sun is coming up when you leave.

Crash into bed, repeat daily cycle till bored or death (whichever comes first). :p

Ole! It's Barcelona!

2007-06-02T02:55:00.000+10:00

Barcelona is a kooky city that Alice and all her friends from Wonderland would feel right at home in.

I site, for your consideration, exhibit A - the photo to your left of Xin in front of La Sagrada Familia. This crazy building would probably look normal under the influence of strong, hallucinogenic mushrooms. It was begun by Gaudi in 1882 and is still under constant construction today. One facade (the only part completed by Gaudi in his lifetime) looks like a normal gothic cathedral overgrown with wax shrubbery and then maliciously melted. The other side is suprisingly sleek adorned with countless scenes from the Passion of Christ in ultra-modern sculpture. I'm not even going to start to describe the inside (partially because a lot of it is obscured by scaffolding erected to facilitate the constant building works). To conclude I would like to point out that the soaring spires are topped by giant vibrantly coloured fruits in glass. Nuff said...

Even this though does not compare to the heady smelting pot of activity that is La Rambla (one of the busiest strips in Barcelona). The wide street seems tiny as a multitude of tourists jostle for space whilst gawking at vendors selling everything from tiny hamsters to dragonfruit and coconut smoothies, street performers (human statues stand side by side with contact jugglers and people sitting on papier mache toilets) and street artists creating either photo-realistic portraits or grotesque carictures.

And you can't really escape the craziness by ducking into a church or garden like you can with other cities since the most famous of these are created by Gaudi and are as likely as not to make your head spin harder.

But even so I think you can't help but love Barcelona. The city and all its citizen (and even the tourists!) have so much energy! It's kind of like being caught up in a giant whirlwind, you can't control it, it makes no sense but since the ride is so much fun you sort of just have to go along with a big grin on your face!

It's Siesta Time!

2007-05-23T23:08:00.000+10:00

Madrid is a city that only siestas, it never sleeps.

Even on a Tuesday night the clubs and bars are buzzing with the flocks of people out to party. Last night Johnny and I hit a Cuban themed bar in Madrid with awesome live music, super strong mojitos and waitresses dressed in cute checked outfits. A Tuesday night, and all the seats were taken!

But it's not just the nightlife that keeps tourists flocking to Madrid. The galleries here are damned big. Yesterday we visited Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza which is a collection of art that really goes from alpha to omega, I think the only gallery I've seen so far which was bigger was the National Gallery in London. At the end of four exhausting hours Johnny and I only managed to make it out in one piece by using each other as crutches...

I haven´t said many good things about Johnny since he joined me on this trip but I must take a moment to commend his good driving in Europe. (Yes, I did say good) The streets in the cities in Europe were clearly built by people who have never, ever heard of a car let alone seen one. It is an intense rabbit warren of one way streets that people park any which way on (sometimes you have to do a three point turn just to get around the corners!) and the problem is exacerbated by the fact that parking inspectors don't work on weekends! :p Johnny has done very well to get as safely around Lisbon and Madrid, although I still have a snigger at him every time he stalls the manual car (which happens on average seven or eight times a day!)

Anyway, I'm now going to hit a museum and have a siesta before I head out to experience more of Madrid's crazy nightlife tonight! :p

Time is My Worst Enemy

2007-05-20T09:19:00.000+10:00

It´s true. Two weeks is just not enough time to enjoy all that Spain and Portugal have to offer.

Portugal is such a beautiful country. It´s very similar to Australia in a lot of ways, gorgeous beaches, long scenic drives, there was even a moment today in the car between Lagos and Lisbon when I wound down the window and could actually smell the eucalypt... really, really homesick.

But I have to say, I have yet to find a beach in Australia that has a lick on these Portugese beaches. At Lagos, the beaches are framed by gorgeous rock formations so there is actually shade all over the beach. Plus heaps of people use the rocks are a natural diving board - it´s scary watching the people take the plunge but I swear, if I could swim, I would jump off a 30m high rock too. (I bet mum is glad that I can´t swim so I sit safely on the beach and look pretty). Another beach in Sinas was similarly beautiful - when the sun is shining on the water, the sand literally looks like gold. No I´m serious, it shines, I was tempted to grab a handful and take it home.

But now I have to sign off this very short entry, as I said, time IS my most horrible enemy and Johnny is nagging for a turn on the computer. :p

Crossing the Straits of Gibralter

2007-05-17T21:59:00.000+10:00

Wow, what a difference a mere 15km strip of water makes.

Spain, despite its proximity to Morocco is as different from it as night is to day.
In what was really the blink of an eye (or for myself 30 minutes of severe motion sickness) all the houses changed from dusty red to Mediterrean white and instead of snake charmers you have spontaneous bursts of flamenco song!

Andalucia in the south of Spain really is the most stereotypically and quintessentially Spanish place in Spain (which is probably to say that it is the most Spanish place in the entire world). I love it here, the beautiful seaside towns where you can sit on a castle ruin, eat ice cream and see the coast of Africa (that´s Tarifa, the southernmost point of Europe), see the most beautiful Spanish valley with endless groves of grapes and olive trees from above (that´s Rondo, with it´s incredibly engineered bridge built of ye olde, no not in the 80´s like that Honkie buddah) and finally Seville that´s the most bizarre mix of opposites I will ever know.

The weird diametric oppositions in Seville is exemplified in its key attractions - the cathedral (the biggest in area in the world) and the Reales Alcazares palaces which are in part built by the Moors (so typically Islamic) but you turn a corner and it´s suddenly high Gothic or gorgeous little Spanish orange gardens. Decidedly weird but you really can´t help falling in love with it.

Oh and the best thing about Spain - hot showers, after four days of cold showers in Morocco, a long hot shower was just the ticket.

(And yes, I will put up photos soon mum, I promise, but these old computers don´t support my USB key.)

In the Great Red Land

2007-05-13T05:03:00.000+10:00

I preface this entry by saying that I don't know if this is an Arabic or French keyboard but it's crazy. I will have to upload a photo of it sometime just to share the utter bizarreness of it all...

Morocco is an amazing country - every moment is an assault on every sense. The first I saw of this country was Marrakesh from the sky is an endless stretch of red, that orangey, pinky, utterly earthy red dotted with the dark green of olive groves, cactii and palms. The first thing I heard on getting to the Marrakesh medina square was the song of the snake charmers and the endless call of hundreds of vendors beckoning you to sample their wares. The first thing I tasted was the spicy dish called tagine (served in a oddly comical conical pot) all mopped up with the excellent bread here. And I can't even begin to describe the exotic mix of smells in Morocco - a hundred different spices frankinsence, myrhh and others I couldn't even begin to name. But the thing that completely overwhelms you is the endless desert heat beating down.

If you close your eyes and just try to cram every single stereotype the name 'Morocoo' evokes, add in a few thousand tourists and a few hundred locals ripping off the tourists then you've got a pretty damn good idea of what Marrakesh is like. It's definitely not Europe and I'n definitely not in Kansas anymore...

But I'm actually now in Casablanca which is more like a city sitting on the precipice of modernisation. It's pretty much what any relatively poor neighbourhood in Shanghai would look like but with mosques. Although it's not as quintessentially 'Moroccan' as Marrakesh I almost like it more as the people here are infinitely more charming. It's a treat simplyto have a chat to the locals at the hotel and the markets - although if one more person cajoles me with calls of 'Japan! Japan!'...

(Photos to come when I find an internet cafe with USB access...)

How Did Medieval Princesses Get to Their Castles?!?

2007-05-07T21:20:00.000+10:00

No, that's not a rhetorical or hypothetical question.

You see for the past few days Johnny and I have been crusing up the Rhine between Koblenz and Mainz. It's really, really beautiful. And just to make it more interesting we have been staying at the German hostels (Deutscher Jugenherberge - see Timo, I am putting the German you taught me to good use, many a time has Wo ist die jugenherberge? come in handy!) which are dramatically situated in hilltop fortresses and cliffs. The view is absolutely AMAZING and getting to explore old fortresses and ruined castles at sunset is an absolute treat. However getting up to them is an absolute b***** (especially when you have giant packs!), which really for me, begs the question of how the princesses of ye olde days got to these great hunks of rock on top of the cliffs! My theory is that they were carried up by the knights in shining armour but alas, Johnny refuses to be my knight in shining armour! {Insert angry and tired expression here}

(And if you're reading this Shao, Lil - I did not see any Rhine maidens, very sad)

Before Germany we also went through Belgium and Luxembourg.

Belgium should really be called Beerdom - they have the most incredible selection of beers I have EVER seen ... the menu at the youth hostel along was 26 beers long. Apparently there is a place in Brussels that has a beer menu 7000 beers strong, but I'm not sure if that's just a fanciful rumour. I even finished THREE entire beers in one night in Bruges (which is much nicer than Brussels in my not so humble opinion) but I figure that doesn't really disturb my girly drink inclinings as they were peach, raspberry and cherry flavoured respectively... mmm... uber sweet beer that doesn't taste like beer...

Oh yes and I did get chocolates in Belgium. The photo is from St Hubert's gallery in Brussels which has some of the most amazing chocolate displays I have ever seen. The chocolates were yum :p

As for Luxembourgh, I really thought Luxembourg would be cool, but it's not, really. They have some interesting casemates (fort tunnels in the hill) but otherwise it's sufficient just to wave at it as you go past on the train. (Just don't blink at the crucial moment because you might miss it!)

(Oh and Meike don't worry, Johnny and I have eaten enough currywurst for you, Timo and everyone else at Fudan put together, we're thoroughly addicted!

Oh and Shuggles, yes it's true, I ate 3 boxes of Cini Minis in 2 weeks in Berlin :p I have been craving it since Beijing so had to overeat my fill when I got to Germany! :p We shop at Aldi for everything except the Cini Minis :p

I'm really going to suffer when I go back to Australia... must have more German food!)

PS: I'm sorry I've been slack with my entries but it's hard to upload photos and write entries when you're on the road, especially when I have to spend so much time looking after and arguing with Johnny :p I promise I will have lots more photos uploaded sometime (probably when I get back to Berlin) It's probably a good thing, I think the reason you guys had so much trouble accessing my album is because you exceeded all the bandwidth!

The Beautiful Canal City of ... Amsterdam?

2007-04-28T05:09:00.000+10:00

Did you know that Amsterdam is a canal city? I certainly didn't. When I think of Amsterdam I think of a seedy place where people just smoke all day. 'Central' Amsterdam (certainly in the Red Light District near the Central Station) certainly tries its darnest to live up to this seedy reputation.

However although this area may be Amsterdam's geographical centre it is certainly not its heart. If you ever visit make sure you head out of this area for a stroll along its many canals just to enjoy the feel of being somewhere where the buildings soar above you on either side and the leaves float down with every breeze and you can just feel like you're somewhere hopeless and romantically European. Or head out to the markets to pick up a second hand book or a few bulbs at the numerous markets around the place. (Dad, I really, really wanted to buy you some Dutch tulip bulbs but I don't think I can get them past customs in Australia :( So Sad :( )

It's also gorgeous heading out of Amsterdam. We took a day trip out to Leiden (the birthplace of Rembrant) and the Keukenhof Tulip Gardens. Oh my gosh - these places are so idyllic and serene, you can't help but want to sit down and just wile away the day doing nothing but polishing off a coffee or an ice-cream. Leiden has real authentic Dutch windmills! And on the way there on the train you can see heaps of real Dutch cows! (Mooo!!!) I love Holland windmills, cows, clogs and milkmaids! (Yes, I finally succumbed to the tourish craze and bought a porcelain cow)

But you know something else, everyone here is crazily multi-lingual! The tulip seller spoke at least 5 languages, the milkmaids speak at least 4 and all the tour guides speak like 10. It's crazy! I wish I could speak even 1 more language!

On a darker note though recently I have started thinking about starting a 'reverse' travel guide where you list all the REALLY, REALLY BAD places that you encounter when you travel. At the top of my list would be 'The Best of Holland Excursions' which basically encapsulates everything that is quintessentially bad about tour groups in one single 4 hour tour. They basically took us from one gift shop to another and in between stopped for moments where you can take photos of 'Dutch' things like windmills for 3 seconds from the bus parking lot before getting back on the bus. We went through these gorgeous little fishing villages but didn't get to do anything besides follow our tour guide from one side to the other all the while desperately trying to get just one photo without another person in it (note tried and FAILED)... grr... I hate the tour group.

(Oh and dad, I haven't seen any houses with mini doors :( Very sad...)

Ich Liebe Knut!

2007-04-22T23:54:00.000+10:00

For those of you who aren't familiar with Knut, he is the most adorable little polar bear in Germany!

He was abandoned by his mother but adopted by the zookeeper at Berlin Zoo as well as the general Berlin populace with great zeal. But it's easy to see why - just look at how adorable he is!!!

He is only on display for about 2 hours a day and people start queuing more than an hour in advance just to get a 10 minute glimpse of him! Only very young children and very old decript folks are allowed close to the enclosure to see him personally but we stood far away craning our necks for just a glimpse. It was worth it though just to see him tottering after his keeper and rolling around and wrestling... awww.... happy Xin :p

I have just been informed that Knut may be a girl. So just change all the preceding words to 'she', I'm too lazy to.

In the Shadow of the Berlin Wall

2007-04-21T01:05:00.000+10:00

If your first glances of Berlin are of the brand spanking new Hauptbahnhof (main train station) and Potsdamer Platz (with its glitzy Sony Centre) you could be forgiven for thinking that Berlin is nothing more than a temple to the uber-modern chic way of life. However scratch this facade just a little and you begin to see a city that is still living in the shadow of a past that is too terrible to remember and too horrid to forget.

I took a walk along the Berlin Wall yesterday and though it was so easy for me to skip from one side to another in true touristy fashion the emotive outpourings in the form of political wall murals are testament to the repression and blood that once coloured life in Berlin. Reading about all the ostensibly mad plans concocted for people to go from East Germany to West you really get a sense of the human spirit and the desire just to live free.

On a completely different note, I love the sausage here. I can see why it is so famous. I love the currywurst and the bratwurst, I don´t know if it is the meat or the sauce or what but it´s uber, uber yummy.

I Love Copenhagen (But I Hate my #%:@#* Suitcase!)

2007-04-21T00:56:00.000+10:00

Okay Christine, I admit it, you were right. After one day with my suitcase in Copenhagen I was ready to throw it in a canal. It's too big, it's too heavy, it doesn't fit in lockers AND no one helps you up the stairs (the staff just laugh at you and tell you there was actually a lift AFTER you get to the top). I'm sure everyone who was privy to my crazy suitcase dilemma is having a bit of a chuckle now.

But luckily I only had to cart it around for my last day and all I did was visit an art museum. (I actually had 3 attractions lined up but gave up because the gallery was awesome and because my suitcase was such a cumbersome dead weight I only visited the gallery.) The art gallery in question is the NY Carlsberg Glytotek (yes, it's founded by the same guy who made the beer) and it houses a magnificent collection on ancient sculpture, French/Danish sculpture and French Impressionist art. The glytotek itself is a beautiful piece of architecture adjorned by soaring colonnades, lavishly decorated ceilings and an a lush indoor Mediterranean 'Winter Garden' populated by both modern and classical sculptures. You are stopped by the elegant nlines of the stairwells and the perfectly lined doorways creating the illusion of infinite reflection as much by the emotive statues.

But I think having awesome collections housed in simply elegant buildings is trademarkly Danish (no Chian, I don't mean in the legal sense, I'm not an intellectual property law expert like yourself). I also visited the Statens Museum for Kunst which is also a beautiful building with a stately old wing as well as a modern wing with the most gorgeously pristine lines and floor to ceiling windows offering panoramic garden views.

I suppose sometime soon I will get used to museum buildings being art as much as the art they house but not yet... not yet...

Besides the cool museums and galleries (yes Lilian, I saw more Runestones), Copenhagen has much to love. It has a glorious cafe culture and when the weather is fine the Danes head out in droves to the public squares or gardens or just they just sit by the canal to soak up sun. Mmm... ice cream and hot dogs...

And yes mum, I saw 'The Little Mermaid'. It's pretty, it's bronze, it's small, it's in a totally awesome location. It is on the seaside of this beautiful park and frankly although I wasn't very interested in her (sorry Mr Edvard Erikson) I loved sitting by the seaside with my little bag of sugar coated almonds watching the people and the sea. The best thing about the water in Copenhagen is that it has a life of its own. I think it's because it's so windy here but the water chops and churns in every-which-way and it looks more like a restless animal than a body of liquid.

All in all I can see why Mary Donaldson moved here... (It's not to become royalty, it's just the prettiness of the whole country! Although I'm sure that being royalty has its perks, she's already featured on Danish coins AND the royal treasury has a huge stock of alcohol from the 1600's!)
Currently on the train from Denmark to Germany. Here the train drives onto the ferry for the crossing just like the cars! Which gives you a chance to walk, hang out on the sun deck, have an ice-cream and (if the fancy takes you) pick up a slab of tax-free beer. :p

Sunshine + Ice Cream = Happy Xin!

2007-04-10T21:18:00.000+10:00

So after Dublin I headed to the west of Irelands to Galway and the Aran Islands.

I've surmised from these experiences that I need a car - very, very badly.

First reason is that buses in Ireland are really, really bad. And when I say really bad, I mean really bad. I mean much worse than buses in Australia. The bus from Dublin to Galway is supposed to take 3 hours and 40 minutes. It actually took as 5 hours. Partially because the Easter weekend traffic was really bad but more because I had a shitty bus driver who actually got lost and had to ask one of the passengers for directions!!! And even when we were running late he actually stopped by the side of the road and took his time eating a sandwich. Majorly traumatic experience.

The second reason is that I won't have to take all these stupid day tours whenever I want to make a day trip out of a major city. Although these short day tours are not as bad as the ones in China (they don't take you to random stupid factories that charge ridiculous prices for everything and just dump you there for hours) it's still way too much time wasted waiting on other people and doing things that I don't want to do but not getting enough time doinng the things I really want to do.

For example when we got to the AMAZING Cliffs of Moher we only got an hour! An hour! Which is just criminal really because we managed to get to them when there was no mist (a rare event indeed for these cliffs) so we got a crystal clear view and I had no time to do a proper clifftop walk or enjoy the sunshine. Not happy Jan.

Thirdly I just miss driving... zoom, zoom...

But I shouldn't complain because I have been getting the most spectacular weather in Ireland - it's been completely amazing sunshine and not a drop of rain (which is unbelievably good fortune considering what a bad rep Ireland's weather has got).

Plus I visiting the Aran Islands just off the coast near Galway has been such a highlight. Taking the ferry across an opaque blue sapphire sea that reflected the sunlight to create such a jewel, getting lost when riding my bike around to end up as the most desolate cliffs and ruined fort I have seen thus far, it looked like time (and more importantly the tourists) just forgot this place and sitting there almost completely along it is easy to see how time and modernisation could have just complete passed these islands by.

I just want to add that I'm proud that I can still ride a bike after all these years - although everyone who has heard my handlebars round the wrong way story will laugh when I say that I actually did it again! *Blush*

But Galway in general was just awesome. Although I was in the worst hostel ever (the hot water stopped one night and their whole attitude was 'Well it doesn't really affect us so we don't care' and didn't even try to make it up to the residents), for the record it was called Barnacles, the people there were just a great bunch. For our last night there we headed out to the crazy pubs there and made a very big night of it. You may be pleased to discover that I found a beer I liked! Hoegarrden! (I'm sure that's not spelt right) But it actually tastes kind of bubblegummy ... mmm... sweet tooth... :p

And then I flew to Cardiff, Wales. Which was fine, not terribly interesting apart from the crazy decorated buildings there. I think the Welsh must really just go crazy because that Cardiff Castle is something else! Every room has a 'theme' but is just so crammed full of decoration that you can't help but think that the interior designer must have been blind. It may be something to do with the fact that the Castle was never owned by royalty so they did not feel the need to be bound by things such as good taste. Luckily they are architecturally and aesthetically redeemed by their Sennedd (or parliament house) which is one of the few parliament houses I have been to that is actually elegantly simple and functional. Oh and if you ever go to Cardiff, remember that you need exact change for the buses. This is the single more annoying thing in the world especially on Easter Sunday when nothing is open for you to get change!!!

In Case You Had Your Doubts...

2007-04-04T04:25:00.000+10:00

I'm definitely not Irish.

How do I know this you ask? How can I be sure when 6 million people in the world are in some way Irish? Well the answer is very simple folks - I hate Guinness.

That's right, it's not only that I have a mild distaste for the stuff, or that it makes me bloated, Guinness is just decidedly dreadful. It's bitter, it's weird and there's just nothing good I can say about it. I don't understand for the life of me why people part with hard earned cash to subject themselves to this truly awful beverage.

I refer to the diagram above.

Now Diagram A shows how much of my pint of Guinness I had before I got sick of it.

Diagram B shows how much I had before I finally gave up. You see, even all the free alcohol in the drink couldn't induce me to finish it. Gah.

Actually the whole Guinness Storehouse experience was kind of bizarre. The dim lighting and the weird placement of odd bits of antiquated machinery everywhere gave a very unsettling 'Alice in Wonderland' kind of feeling and I half expected a crazed Oompa Loompa to ambush me at any given moment. Have you ever seen that episode of Futurama where Fry and Leyla go to the factory of that drink and they put on a weird front where they take them down the river and behind the scenes it was just a huge monster producing excrement? Well if you've seen that episode you may understand the creepy feeling I got going through the Storehouse.

Not that it was all bad - the bar where they 'treat' you to the pint of Guinness included in your entry fee has absolutely awesome views of Dublin city. And (as Forrest Gump would say) that's all I have to say about that.

Today I visited Newgrange which is a neolithic passage burial mound just out of Dublin. It is the only properly excavated mound in the area open to the public despite the fact that there are some 40 odd such passage burial mounds in the area. It was actually quite an impressive experience. Much better than Stonehenge. Because it is actually an enclosed structure they let you in in very small groups and simulate for you the light show that occurs only at dawn on the winter solstice when a shaft of light pierces the passage. (In neolithic times this would have been the only time in the entire year that the light penetrates the inner chamber of the tomb) And thinking that this incredible structure was made 5000 odd years ago is just mind-boggling. Personally I think this is much more impressive than Stonehenge (and Newgrange predates Stonehenge by around 1000 years) because the tour allows a much more intimate connection to develop between you and the structure. Plus it helps that because you never heard of the place before you don't expect it to be impressive.

But apart from the actual mound the scenery was just amazing. You can see so far into the distance not necessarily because it's on a high hill but just due to the lay of the land.

The Leprechauns Made Me Do It!

2007-04-02T06:14:00.000+10:00

I've learned quite a lot about the jolly Irish since I got here:

1. A brief history of the Irish struggle for independence from the British which has ripped apart Belfast for the last 30 odd years. (I did a political walking tour along Falls Rd in Belfast)

2. That everything cool in Dublin happens after the sun goes down. (And in the morning apparently everyone has a hangover so nothing happens till about 10am)

3. That the Dublin tourish office is the most unhelpful place in the entire world unless you want to buy something. Instead of giving you information they would rather just sell you a crappy 2 euro guide.

4. Nothing made in China lasts. Okay, while that strictly has nothing to do with the Irish I'm just pissed off because the glasses I got in China broke on the ferry crossing to Ireland.

5. Motion sickness baaaad... Okay, so that also has nothing to do with the Irish but I was so awfully motion sick on the ferry to Ireland, I spent most of the time banging my head against the table wanted to die (although apparently that uses up 150 calories an hour so maybe I'm a good deal skinnier now... but whatever...)

6. You can blame anything on the leprechauns here! :p (Or at least that's what the sign on the hostel wall tells me)

So as you can see (or maybe you can't but it's true!) I've been doing a lot since my last entry. And so I blame fatigue for the disjointed nature of this entry.

While I don't want to bore everyone with the tedious details there are two highlights worth
mentioning.

Firstly a trip up to the Giant's Causeway. For those of you who have never heard of it see the picture. Although the actual Giant's Causeway is not as romantically inspiring as I would have imagined (although the photographers do indeed love it and are out there in droves with tripods and lenses bigger than their heads) the scenery there is utterly stunning. People travel hundreds of leagues there just to be utterly enthralled by the cliff top walk which delivers some of the most awe-inspiring views (especially the Chinese tourists who point and ooh and aah because they have never seen the ocean before). However I loved these beaches less because they were uniquely breathtaking and more because they just reminded me of home. It made me realise how lucky we are to have such incredible scenery on our doorstep just a stone's throw away. I mean I reckon the Great Ocean Road is just one of the best journeys you will ever make (unless you happen to be on it when some drunken pirate is playing chicken with the other crazy driver... I name no names...). But what I'm trying to say is that going there made me really nostalgic and homesick and I just miss all you guys at home so much!

But if you ever do head up the Irish east cost (which is amazing in its own right) make sure you stop off at Carrick Island which can be reached by the crickety Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge and just sit for a few minutes to enjoy some solitude and the incredible views and wildlife you get there. I even saw a dolphin!!! Yay!

Secondly Irish dancers are amazing. Makes me sad I never saw Riverdance. But the stamina and the energy required to keep jumping and tapping away like that just astounds me. I went and saw a short performance at the Arlington Pub here in Darlington and was just delighted by
these incredibly rhythmic and powerful dancers. You have to see it for yourself sometime! (And no, seeing Leo Di Caprio in Titanic does NOT count!)

Alright I'm going to go out and get a (half-)pint of something (I can't finish a pint of anything!!! It's pathetic and un-Irish I know!). But if I can't get up tomorrow I'm going to blame it on the leprechauns.

HAMISH!!!!

2007-03-28T03:59:00.000+10:00

Yesterday I took a tour up to Inverness and the Scottish Highlands. Yes, I admit it, I did join one of those accursed tour groups that I keep griping about but it was just far more economic to do it this way.

I was sadly plagued by all the problems associated with tour groups - I didn't get to spend half as long as I wanted at the places I wanted (1 hour at Urquhart Castle is definitely not enough) and just got jerked from place to place on a coach.

Never the less there are some important advantages associated with taking the tour group.

Firstly and most importantly I got to see Hamish (one of Scotland's most important citizens in my opinion). Now Hamish reinforced my love for all that is bovine and I felt like I could just wuffle him all day! He's so shaggy and fat and just adorable! (You can see a picture of me with him above) All ye hail Highland cows!

Secondly I had a tour guide who, throughout the trip, gave us random interesting facts about Scotland (and all those who know me will know how much I love random interesting facts). For example, I now know that the Loch Ness holds so much water that if you were to drown the entire population of the world thrice over in it the bodies would still not break the surface of the water (macabre but true). I also know that a lot of whisky is lost to evaporation in the maturing process and the Scottish call this evaporated whisky the 'angel's portion'. Now the idea of a whole bunch of tipsy/drunk angels tottering about Scottish skies I find particularly hilarious so I had a good guffaw in the coach at that one.

The Highlands themselves are definitely worth seeing. Majestic, carpeted with heather and groomed by the biting winds it feels utterly desolate but utterly beautiful at the same time. A eerie feeling that is exemplified by the ruins of Urquhart castle situated precipitously on the shores of Loch Ness. Visit it if you get the chance. Leave more than an hour so you can explore every nook and cranny and still have time to sit and find some inspiration in the area that looks so pristine and serene now but definitely wouldn't have been all those hundreds of years ago.

Today I visited Glasgow which is modern, industrial, not as touristy as Edinburgh but home to a lot of contemporary art galleries. Now the best part of Glasgow is that its patron saint is ... *drum roll please*... SAINT MUNGO!!! (GO MUNGO!) That's right, its patron saint is him who gave the name to my school house! I went and visited the St Mungo Cathedral and the St Mungo Museum of Religious Life and Art and had a chat to the guides on hand about the remarkable life of St Mungo (whose real name apparently was Kentigern) and all the miracles he performed. :p

PS: Just so you all know the lack of internet access here means that often I am posting 2 entries at the same time (so do scroll down if you're interested, or just at work with nothing better to do!)

Two Plain Pies and an Onion One as Well

2007-03-28T03:12:00.000+10:00

Oh my gosh! I totally love Edinburgh! I want to be Scottish! And poo to anyone who says that England and Scotland are really one country as they must either:

(a) Be lying; or
(b) They never actually visited England and Scotland.

The cool Scottish folk here make their English brethren seem dreadfully dull and dumpy. (No offence to anyone English) After the long drawn, bleak faces of London it's so incredibly lovely to be greeted by great big Scottish smiles and warm welcomes wherever you go. Oh and yesterday there were people wandering around in kilts! Yes that's right! Even though it's crazily cold here people still worn their traditional get up and wandered around bare legs and all! (I was informed that was actually just because there was a Scottish football match on but it was still so much fun to see!) I sat in a bar till the wee hours of the morning yesterday with Alex (a California roomie of mine in the Edinburgh hostel) and two Scottish guys (and a South African) who were trying to teach us to talk like true Scots. Apparently the phrase to master is 'Two plain pies and an onion one as well'. But I admit defeat because to me it just sounds like 'Ta pley pays anda ling-a-ning-a-long'. However they did give Alex a Scottish scarf and I a Scottish flag for my efforts!

Oh and the topography of the land here is just so unique. Edinburgh is set into really hilly land so the streets here are decidedly bizarre. Some of the streets (called Closes) really look more like private house accesses than public roadway. They are either a claustrophobic gully created by the tall buildings on either side or just a steep and narrow flight of steps. The most amazing thing is that these Closes don't just exist above ground but also underground and (for a small fee) you can descend into the subterranean maze (with a dressed up guide) and have a glimpse at how bleak it must have been to live in this warren in medieval times.

Today I also climbed Arthur's Seat. No, not the one of the Mornington Pennisula but the big 250m peak that would formed by a volcano in the heart of Edinburgh. It was a tough climb, and no I'm not just saying that because I'm fragile. The road up is very steep and the wind is so blustery it feels as if it might sweep you right off the hill. I also took a wrong turn at one point and ended up facing the choice of backtracking a good 10 minutes or trying to scale a 60ºb incline. I chose the incline and had to do the climb on all fours. It made me feel like I was in the Highlands. At this point I thought about the true Scot who would be making the climb in a kilt and decided that the Scottish are truly mad. And then I saw a bunch of young laddies (I think they were Spanish) run up the craggy hill screaming 'WILLIAM WALLACE!' at the top of their lung (undoubtably the only Scot they actually know of) and promptly realised that no, it's all homo sapiens that are crazy.

Oh and it has come to my attention that my blog template is a little funny, so if you can't see a link in the top left hand corner that says PHOTO GALLERY in big letters scroll down the page and you should see it near the bottom. :p

Now is the Winter of Discontent...

2007-03-25T05:09:00.000+10:00

When I first arrived in York I admit I was rather irate. It was cold again and it seemed that everywhere I went I was forced to pay outrageous sums of money to go to crappy attractions. Alright I'll begin by telling you the exchange rate from pounds to AUD is approximately 2.5 so you can get an idea of why I was going crazy.

For example the York Castle Museum cost me £5 and can only be described as a waste of time. Well actually if you want a proper rundown it is basically a museum dedicated to the mundane - mainly housework. So the only reason I didn't run outside immediately is because I paid £5 to get in.

Clifford's Tower also charges an outrageous £2.50 or something like that for entry into a broken rubble on top of a hill. Whatever!

However I started to come around after I visted the York Minister which is apparently the biggest Gothic Cathedral in Northern Europe. It has the most AMAZING stained glass windows I have ever seen. Apparently preserved because Cromwell's general in the Reformation was some dude actually from York so sheltered it from the bash happy soldiers and the like. Although getting into the Minister (and the Undercroft) cost me something like £6 it was definitely worth the admission price - especially when you find out that the poor Minister is actually close to falling into ruin and the cost of maintaining it for 30 seconds is £2.50. If you are an avid fan of history like me DO NOT miss the tour of the Undercroft. It comes with a free audio tour that spews really interesting fact at you and you get to see all these really fascinating foundations and the like.

But never despair! There are also some awesome free attractions in York. The Art Museum is free (if tiny) and best of all the Association of Voluntary Guides in York gives a free guided walking tour at 10:15am every day. A guide who (voluntarily, obviously) gives up their free time will take you around the city for about 2 hours regaling you with stories from York's history (and given the historic nature of the city, believe me there are plenty of tales) and pointing out these fascinating little nooks and crannies that you would never have noticed had you gone pottering around independently.

I also enjoyed sitting on the bridge in the morning and watching the crazy pigeons circle overhead in aimless loops. I like to think that maybe some young bright spark bird one day just decided that his diet of overprocessed white bread (fed to him by obese tourists) was making him horizontally ample and thus he needed to reverse this hideous problem by flying around in endless and pointless circles. Soon this body image conscious trend caught on and now all these birds of a feather flock together every morning for this daily flight to battle the bulge.

Now for those well versed in Shakespeare you may have noticed that I've again borrowed from Richard III for a headline (note I didn't say quoted because I can't really remember the exact wording of the quote). Now this is not due to any particular love for that particular monarch but it just chances that there is a tiny museum in York (in one of the guard towers on the wall) that puts poor Richard III on trial for the murder of the two princes in the Tower. (You know, Richard's 2 little nephew princes that he locked up in the Tower of London) They actually have an appallingly bad mannequin of Richard III in a witness box and you can listen to an audio recording of his 'cross-examination'. Now the lawyer in me was most upset by the fact that the defence were actually allowed to cross-examine their own witness and I was most tempted to jump up with 'Objection your honour! Leading the witness!' but alas I did not think that an audio recording would respond too well to that kind of excited interaction! :p

Anyway, I am now on a train from York to Edinburgh. I am SO impressed by the long distance trains here in England. Not only do they have power sockets in the wall so you can charge your electrical appliances, but they also have WIRELESS INTERNET in the carriages. Okay so I can't get on it right now because I'm too poor to pay but goodness I'm still majorly impressed!

Treading Softly in the Steps of Shakespeare

2007-03-25T04:43:00.000+10:00

I'm currently on the train from Birmingham to York with the most awesome ticket inspector ever who is today annoucing himself to the commuters with "Tickets, passes and excuses please!" :p

But I've spent the last couple of days in Shakespeare country - Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwick and the like. I must admit it hasn't really been educational - although Stratford-upon-Avon (that's Shakespeare's home town) has become something of a Shakespeare factory I found myself curiously uninformed about the great bard as I shuffled through his birth home, his daughter's home and his granddaughter's home along with about a million other tourists. I mean sure old Tudor style houses are cool but I really fail to see how they really evoke any memory of Shakespeare (although they have tried uber hard by placing Complete Works and quills etc on every other table).

However one thing I did in Stratford-upon-Avon which no visitor should be allowed to miss is catch a performance by the Royal Shakespeare Company. It's really, really good. I saw Coriolanus, which is obviously not one of Shakespeare's better known works as I had never heard of it before (despite owning a complete works). And it's pretty clear WHY it's not really one of his masterpieces - the characters are all fairly one dimensional and the play lacks the really eloquent and insightful dialogue that marks so many of his greater plays. However I personally found the performance excellent. The thespians, particularly a couple of the older ones, were masters at treading the boards and kept me enthralled for the full three hours. I also had no trouble understanding the dialogue despite it being in ye olde English which I always think is the mark of a really great Shakespeare performance. I'm so addicted now, I think I will try and go catch The Tempest in London when I get back there AND try and see the performance of King Lear with Ian McKellan in the titular role. (Ian McKellan may be better known to you as Gandalf, Magneto or Leigh Teabing)

I should also note that in Stratford-upon-Avon I indulged by staying in B&B accomodation rather than hostelling it (mainly because I didn't want to walk 2 miles out to the nearest hostel at 10pm in the evening). Now have you ever seen that episode of Gilmore Girls where Lorelai and Rory accidentally end up in a B&B and spend the whole time skulking around for fear of being drawn into chit chat with the oldies? Well I didn't think B&B's like that existed in the real world. But they do! The lady who owned the B&B I stayed at, Carlton's, would basically lurk in the dining room (which you had to pass on your way out) and then ambush you as you exited for chit chat. Now she was really nice, and I don't mind chit chat so stayinbg there was actually quite nice for me. Plus the HUGE English breakfast that I was served the next morning made me really rather forgiving.

Now Warwick doesn't have much except a giant castle. Now I personally think this castle would have been ABSOLUTELY AWESOME if I had have been 15 years younger. The kiddies there were so cute and having an awesome time dressing up in plastic suits of armour and waving plastic weapons and, when bored of that, sliding across the overwaxed floors on their tummies. They also have these actors dressed in period costumes reprimanding you whenever you tried to treat them like they came from the 21st century. Although I found the whole castle experience a little kitschy I did love the grounds which offered a perfect retreat from the hubbub of tourism in the main castle. A personal highlight was the Peacock Garden which contained live peacocks as well as shrubs pruned to look more like peacocks but in actuality look more like seals.

oh I also visited Birmingham, and no offence Anna, but it's pretty boring tourist country there!

Oh My Aching Feet...

2007-03-17T08:45:00.000+11:00

Well the reason I haven't really posted in my blog for a few days is that I am madly in love. Yes, that's right, I'm completely infatuated with the British Museum.

I realise now that my initial estimate of 9 hours to get through the Brit Museum was a complete and utter gross underestimate. I have now spent more than 21 hours in there and I could still go back (I won't, I will restrain myself but I could)!

It's totally amazing to see the metopes from the Parthenon that I did my Year 12 Classics catalogue on as well as the frieze from the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus itself! I was so excited to see that famous bust of Perikles (I went by and said hi and told him I would one day actually finish Thuycidides' History) and that vase with Achilles slaying Penthiseleia... wow... I'm such a happy camper.

I realise that to most people my rant would make them think the British Museum is actually incredibly borin, but I don't care, I love it soooooo much with every fibre of my being! (Except for my feet which are complaining after having stood for 21 hours...)

I've uploaded a picture of the Rosetta Stone. For those of you that don't know the Rosetta Stone was the key to deciphering Egyptian heiroglyphics. If you look carefully you can see me in the reflection in the glass in front of the Stone taking the picture! :p

Alright, I have to go massage my aching feet now...

But It's Just a Bunch of Rocks...???

2007-03-13T19:33:00.000+11:00

Stonehenge gets my vote as the most underwhelming attraction I've been to so far. Quite frankly unless you want to know some random information via the audio tour you can definitely skimp on the entry fee and just take photos through the fence. Frankly I expected so much more from a monumental engineering wonder that has inspired hundreds of writers and been the subject of so much speculation and debate.

Maybe if I took off all my clothes and ran around Stonehenge naked it might provoke more interest...

...or maybe if there simply weren't constant buses disgorging loads of ignorant tourists onto the site. If I hear one more person call Stonehenge one of the 7 Wonders of the Ancient World... grr...

However I don't think my trip out to Salisbury to see Stonehenge was wasted at all.
St Mary's Cathedral at Salisbury is simply awesome. Not only are the walls decorated with a multitude of statues of saints '(all unique) but there are also the Grotesque heads contorted in the most anguished expressions I've ever seen (see picture gallery). Luckily I delight in such things. I was also privileged enough to be there when the local school children's choir was performing so I got to see all this to a soundtrack of delightfully cherubic voices. (For those of you wondering, that was NOT sarcastic) Oh, and Salisbury Cathedral also has the most well preserved copy of the Magna Carta existing. That was pretty exciting - I was all "this is the beginning of the rule of law". Ahhh, my HPL lecturer would be proud... :p (For the unenlightened, ie non-Melbourne Law students, HPL = History & Philosophy of Law, you learn about Mabo and the rule of law in it)

I also stopped by Old Sarum on the way back to Salisbury from Stonehenge. Old Sarum is the ruins of a castle built by William the Conquerer. These battered stone walls are set atop a huge hill in the most tranquil and lush English countryside imaginable. And, because to the unimaginative person a bunch of rocks which don't even make a wall are indescribably boring, the place was largely devoid of snap-happy tourists so I got to sit in peace atop a ruined wall surrounded by nothing but endless green and sunshine and the occassional bird chirp and write in my journal and ponder what will become of OUR modern metropolises (is that the correct plural? Maybe metropolii?) after we are all returned to dust... ahh, such is bliss...

(PS: The reason that my photo looks stretched and pixelated is because I tried to increase its size to make the rocks look more impressive but apparently eblogger doesn't like that :p - maybe I should switch to LiveJournal to make Lil happy... :p)

What's the Matter with English Weather?

2007-03-11T09:43:00.000+11:00

London is such a majestically beautiful city.

I got my first glimpse of London from the air as I was flying in from Scandinavia. After the wee bite sized Scandinavian capitals I simply couldn't believe what a sprawling metropolis this city looked like from the air.

It was no different after I landed. Everything in London - every single brick in Trafalgar Square to every blade of perfectly manicured grass in Kensington gardens to every intricately carved coffin in Westminster Abbey oozes the prestige and power that London has enjoyed throughout history.

There is SO MUCH to do in London. I've had 3 really full days in London and I think I would need AT LEAST 3 more to just get around to all the MAJOR sights! It's crazy!

So far the highlights have been:

Watching Les Miserables at the West End. The first time I have ever seen a standing ovation. I stood up at the end of the curtain call just because I wanted to see the curtain call and couldn't over all the standing people. :p

Trafalgar Square
I love this place! It's just so big and busy! You can stand at the entry of the National Gallery (which has just an incredible collection of art, although the audio guide is crap and there are actually mistakes in the explanations - hmmm...) and just overlook the whole square and watch the people feed (or scare) the pigeons depending on their personality bent, enjoy a quiet moment by the beautiful fountains or climb all over the lions at the base of Nelson's Column to try and get the best touristy photo. Plus the whole space is just really well designed and executed so it's just good.

The Parks
Kensington Park and Hyde Park are just beautiful spaces to go walk your dog or feed the birds or just while some hours away doing nothing. It's also awesome for people watching.

St Paul's
Climbing up something like 800 steps to the Golden Gallery (basically the pinnacle of the cathedral) to get the most spectacular view of the city. Too bad buying the London Pass meant that I was super short on time so had to run the whole thing. I think it's a sign of the times that I wasn't even really out of breath after the climb. But oh my aching legs...

Also see the photo gallery for some highlights of my trip through Madame Tussauds.

Note that Westminster Abbey and Buckingham Palace didn't make the list. The overwhelming sea of tourists put me off. Okay, I realise that I myself am actually contributing to the tourist traffic but I somehow consider myself superior to all of them. I will tell you the logic behind this when I figure it out. Maybe cause I wasn't blocking off the entire view to the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. Maybe that was because I couldn't get close enough to the fence to block the view... hmmm...

Oh and the British Museum isn't on that list either because I haven't been. Methinks the standard opening hours of 8 hours is just not going to be enough for me. I'm waiting for one of those days when they have extended opening hours! :p Yes Xin is crazy... :p

Oh yea and I went up to Oxford today. And was once again hit by my curse of always going somewhere when the one attraction I actually want to see is closed. I went to Oxford to see the dining room where they film the Hogwarts Hall for Harry Potter but that was closed. Poo. Nevertheless Oxford is such a beautiful city. I love all the Grotesque decorations on the buildings (noticed I capitalised Grotesque to signify that I was referring to the artistic/decorative/architectural style not using the word in the sense that the decorations are ugly). Now have lots of photos of funny looking creatures making faces (basically that's the layman's definition of what Grotesque style is :p).

So I want to finish this entry by raving about what awesome weather I've been getting in UK (touch wood). It's only rained once when I was actually inside Westminster Abbey so it didn't even matter and apart from that I have been getting spectacularly sunny skies! Yay! :p

A Mattress! A Mattress! My Kingdom for a Mattress!

2007-03-06T22:23:00.000+11:00

Err yes, I realise the fact that I couldn't find a monosyllabic synonym for mattress means that the above quote is no longer in iambic pentametre but pray forgive :p

Anyway for the past few days I stayed with Mary and Darren who are on exchange in Oslo. Oh and I got to sleep on a really comfy mattress - hence the title of this post; apparently Mairs and Darren had poked all the mattresses on offer to make sure I got the comfy-est one :p)

I should inform that my last post on this blog was actually much delayed - for the last 5 days or so I have actually been in Norway rather than Sweden but have been rather slack with updating my blog. There is a reason for this - I have been hanging with Mairs and Darren. See the crux of the matter is that when you're travelling alone, you return home (wherever that may be) at the end of the day and there's not really anyone you can chat to so I tend to just do all the administrative stuff. However when you're hanging out with friends you laugh and talk and things like blog updating just tends to fall by the wayside.

Although I want to add that this in no way reflects on how boring/good Norway is - Norway is an AMAZING country.

Oslo is not as dreamy and romantic as Stockholm but it has a lot of attractions on offer - the National Gallery which has famous paintings like Munch's 'The Scream' and 'Madonna' (neither of which I saw because the Munch room in the National Gallery was under renovation - grrrr!!! Damn wintertime renovations!!! For the same reason I missed out on seeing Rodin's 'The Thinker' in Finland) as well as really well preserved Viking boats and the like. Vikings are a big part of culture in Scandinavia - it's cool, yah. :p The Nobel Peace centre is there as well. It's a very moving experience; not to mention THE most technologically advanced monument/museum/attraction I've been to so far. They have this hall with all the photos of the Nobel Peace Prize laureates on display on the screens and when you move in front of them the screens change and give you information about their achievements.

Oh and the three of us also went up to Bergen for the weekend. I took a tour around the Norwegian fjords (the tour is called Norway in a Nutshell) which was just so incredible. I took a train from Bergen to Voss, then a bus from Voss to Gudvagen, a boat through the fjord to Flam, then the famous Flam to Myrdal railway (which is incredibly steep and an absolute feat of turn of the century engineering because it goes through 20 tunnels of which 18 were dug without machine aid) and then another train from Myrdal back to Bergen.

The scenery was just so beautiful - the person who invented the word 'breathtaking' must have seen these fjords because that's exactly what they were. These steep hills that frame crystal clear waters were crowned with clouds and just shrouded in snow. There were also all these tremendous waterfalls that had actually frozen over and then been covered with snow. The most curious thing is that the icicles were not clear but a gorgeous shade of Tiffany's blue. Every moment from every angle looked like something from either paradise or a tourist brochure... wow... you have to see it for yourself...

Oh yea, I should add that I tried to go cross-country skiing in Oslo... hmm... how can I describe this experience... Imagine something you have failed at really badly - then multiply that failure by about 100 times, I think you now have an idea of how badly I failed at cross country skiing. I don't think the word 'hopeless' truly encapsulates how truly bad I was at this particular activity. But I blame Mary's non-waxed skiis, yes I do... :p

Anyway now I am in London - will update on that soon! :p

Sigtuna Good, Sn-rain Baaaaaaad

2007-03-05T09:25:00.000+11:00

Sigtuna is a little town in Sweden. It's actually the oldest town in all of Sweden. I took a day trip with a couple of other girls in my hostel out to this cute and quaint little pocket of Sweden on Sunday.

Easily my favourite part of Sigtuna is a little coffee shop in a building from the 1700's. It is absolutely tiny and just the coziest place you will ever have a hot chocolate. The roof seems almost to be buckling under the weight of so many years and the lintels of the doors are so low that I hit my head going in AND going out. (A very Xin-esque thing to do)

Sigtuna, despite being so small that you can walk from one end to the other in the space of about 5 minutes, has its own museum displaying Viking artefacts unearthed at the Sigtuna locale. Whilst this exhibition was of only passing interest my companions and I got endless amusement out of the fact that the museum was housing a temporary exhibition of manga art - mainly just stills from Dragonball Z! :p

I left Sigtuna and Stockholmn via overnight bus to Gothenburg, a city in sort of the west of Sweden that is only a few hours from Oslo. Gothenbury is where I first encountered the phenomenon of 'snrain'. Note that the word 'snrain' itself is a Xinnism and it means snow that is so liquid it is practically rain. Snrain is bad, very bad. You can almost walk through it without an umbrella but doing so causes great discomfort. It also has none of the magic of snow - when it falls on the ground it just creates slush rather than fluffy goodness.

While this snrain definitely put a damper of Gothenburg the city was saved in my eyes by the plethora of amazing churches. Each church was so remarkably different from the others that even though I did a whirlwind tour of 7 churches in 2 days I am still not 'churched out' and am ready to see even more churches!

I'm current in Oslo staying with Mary and Darren who are kind enough to share their dorm (not to mention random food) with me. :p

PS: The photo you see is of Xin and Leah (Korean-Canadian chick I met in my Stockholm hostel) outside the Sigtuna town hall. The town hall is tiny! I don't think it could even fit a school class in it. It does evoke images of Stars Hollow small town life though which definitely gives it bonus points. (For those of you who don't know Stars Hollow please go back and re-educate yourself by watching some more Gilmore Girls episodes... :p)

Snowflakes that Stay on my Nose and Eyelashes...

2007-02-24T18:35:00.000+11:00

Sweden is just beautiful.

I cruised into Stockholm on the Isabella (that's a big cruise boat operated by the Viking Line) and I was in love with this city even before I'd hopped off the boat. We came into Stockholm in the wee hours of the early morning and seeing the beautiful lights of the city through a curtain of falling snow was just magic...

Stockholm itself is like THE city for museums so I'm pretty much in heaven right now. They have like 50 museums in this city - they have to produce a separate tourist guide just for all the museums!

My favourite so far though is easily the Vasamuseet which is a museum dedicated to the 17th century warship The Vasa which sank in 20 minutes on its maiden voyage. The centerpiece of this museum is the magnificent warship itself which sank in in the 1628 and then lay on the seabed for 333 years before it was finally brought to the surface in 1 piece. You have to see it to believe it - that is one truly BIG BOAT.

Oh and note that the blistering snow here doesn't bother me so much. It's positively balmy compared to Helsinki (-5 rather than -20) and the snow is so beautiful. It floats down to sit gently on your face and it just makes everything seem magical...

Oh the photo you see above is from the Storykan (I don't think I've spelt that right), a cathedral in Gamla Stan (the old town) near the Royal Palace. It's extremely opulent without losing any of its spirituality as a church. I think the cathedral really typifies all the good bits of Stockholm - it is just extremely functional but in a way where the aesthetics of the architecture contributes to and complements the functionality. That's Swedish design for you.

Oh and please don't yell and scream if you don't get lots of photos from now on. My camera has just been damaged beyond economic repair. Oops...

Hei! (That's Hi in Finnish!)

2007-02-20T04:52:00.000+11:00

For those of you that don't know (like Xin before today) the capital of Finland is Helsinki and that is where I am. Finland itself is the home of Santa and Nokia phones.

There are a number of things one immediately notices as decidedly odd here.

Firstly Helsinki is a really small capital - at least in terms of the sights. I haven't really had to hop onto public transport to get anywhere, you can just walk. A decided change from the vastness of Shanghai.

Secondly there are pokie machines in convenience stores!!! So here, when people nip down to the corner shop or supermarket for a bottle of milk they also stop to play the slots. I have this theory that it's because gambling raises intense emotions (eg guilt, happiness, despair) and so if they gamble before they leave the supermarket then they are in such a weird emotional state that they can't notice how freaking cold it is outside!!!

Thirdly there is a disproportionally high percentage of red vehicles. I don't know if this is a subconcious tip of the hat to Santa and his particular mode of transportation but from the air the combination of red cars, roofs and the white snow really makes it look like Santa's 'hood here.
Last but definitely not leastly it's soooooooooo COLD here!!!! Yesterday it was approximately -14 degrees celcius. And it's not just cold it's also windy!!! So when you go out, even if you have rugged up completely you face still feels like it's being sandblasted.My sightseeing here has been largely a refinement of the warm shop shuffle developed in Beijing (see earlier post for details) only more acute. I spent extra time in boring museum (yes there is such a thing even to crazy museum people like me) and galleries than any outdoor activity.

Anyway Helsinki is a very beautiful city. I got up early yesterday to go to the island fortress of Suomenlinna. Taking the ferry across was just magic - the boat cuts a swathe through the frozen Gulf of Finland churning up chucks of ice and I got to watch the sun paint the sky a beautiful pink hue. The fortress itself is amazing - it feels so stoically lonely - especially when you did what I did and sat in a battlement next to a huge cannon to watch the sun rise. (Actually I mainly did this to get out of the cold for a good 15 minutes but no one has to know that... :p)
Easily my favourite part of Helsinki though is the churches. They are absolutely stunning and so solemn in their majesty (note the Stone Wall chuch, which is basically a church cut into the rock face so that all the walls are natural, is excepted from this description as it feels more like a cool auditorium than a church).

Anyway now I am going to catch a train to Turku and then a boat to Stockholm! :p

Top 10 Things I Learned in Yunnan

2007-02-05T17:31:00.000+11:00

Well lovely peoples, I am now back in Shanghai and kicking back for a few weeks before I leave for Europe.

But at this moment in time I would like to share with you some life lessons learned while I was travelling around Yunnan.

10. Never buy sunglasses that don't sit properly on the top of your head. Invariably you will be wearing a turtleneck which means that you won't be able to hang it on your clothes, and invariably you will put them down somewhere, forget to pick them up again and lose them... grr...

9. I can walk!!! Yes I can!!! And I can walk up and down stairs without falling over!!! I did 15km in one day!!! Up and down mountains! With super precarious little itty bitty steps in sheer cliff faces! Without falling! Go Xin! :p

8. I love dogs! Which is a good thing because everyone in Yunnan has a dog basically. They're everywhere, and super cute. I played with the puppy dog sellers on the street in Kunming (and went home hoping that the parents had been well treated and that someone will give them a good home) and the big golden retrievers in Dali... so cute!!! Actually people in Yunnan are dog crazy, I think there is a higher proportion of people with dogs in Yunnan then there are in Australia!

7. Yaks are awesome - not only are they uber fluffy and cute but I love yak milk butter tea (not as awful as it sounds initially I swear) and seeing them wander... soooo cute... Note this is not just my affinity with cows kicking in... I think...
Oh and a further note on the yaks in Yunnan, there ain't no yaks on the Yak Plateau. Or apparently they are only there in summer. I only saw one on the Yak Plateau, and the poor thing looked like it was stuck on the boardwalk. I didn't want to approach it though since one of its lesser cousins down the slope looked like it wanted to charge me and I didn't know if this particular yak would be likewise hostile.

6. Duck! Here comes a busload of tour group tourists!
I really, really, REALLY hate tour group people. I somehow consider myself a superior tourist because I am not in a tour group... I laugh and jeer when the bus drives off to take them to a crappy factory to buy 'silk' doonas at overinflated prices... muhahahah!!!

5. Firecrackers are irresitable to men... we stopped off in a little town on the way to Lijiang for lunch. Johnny saw a firecracker seller on the side of the street and went crazy - "Xin don't you know how awesome this is?!? These firecrackers explode underwater! We could get them, explode them in the river and eat the fish that die!" - yea whatever! I want to report that he wasted 2.5yuan buying these stupid firecrackers and never set them off because we had no time. They were eventually just dumped in a bin at Kunming airport.

4. The first that simple farm people learn when there is an influx of tourists is how to rip these tourist off. Johnny didn't bargain with the apparently 'simple' people on the Yak Plateau selling him tea (again despite my protestations) and paid 25yuan and 10yuan for bags of tea which back in Lijiang cost us 5yuan and 3yuan per bag respectively. Then Johnny developed his great economic theory of loss minimisation which is that he should buy more tea at the cheaper price because it means that it minimises the amount that he was ripped off by at the first place when you average it all out. But of course he can't even take all this tea that he now has back to Australia because of Australian customs regulations...

3. When travelling with companions there are only two governments that work. A strong democracy or a strong dictatorship. A democracy doesn't work if you have a dictator in the group. If you have people who are adverse to dictatorships when you actually have a dictator people argue. Johnny is a dictator, I hate dictators. We argued. A lot.

2. Don't let the people who rip you off and try to con you convince you that everyone is bad... Some of the best times I had was hanging out with the locals. A highlight was taking the last chairlift down from the Yak Plateau with the local ethnic lift operators in the chair behind us singing an ethnic tune for us to pass the time.

1. Travelling is one of the most exhausting things in the world but worth all the money and energy that you must expend. You see things that are indescribable and to which all the photos and all the stories in the world do no justice. You meet cool people and you learn cool things. Travelling really changes you. A cliche but one that is really tried and true...

I'm really looking forward to the rest of my trip... :p

Escape to Warmer Weather

2007-01-26T21:34:00.000+11:00

Guess where Xin is right now?
What's that you say? You can't?

Well as the title of the piece suggests Xin has made a hasty exit from windy and cold Shanghai to the warmer climates of Yunnan in the south of China.

Literally translated Yunnan means "Cloud South", if you want a more poetic translation it would probably be Southern Cloud. The area lives up to its more poetic name. It's beautiful here. Here the landscape is backed by mountains and shrouded by the most crisp and beautiful green I have ever seen... (it makes me proud to be a Mungo-ite :p)

It's very hilly here so I've spent a lot of time clambering up and down mountains.

For example yesterday I visited the Western Mountain just outside of Kunming (the capital of Yunnan. They have the most AMAZING temples I have ever seen there. Sarah, if you're reading this you seriously missed out!!! These temples top anything I've seen in Beijing or other parts of China. I saw three in one day in one area but they were all so different. One had been fairly recently renovated and it had the most intricate statues on the walls inside - there were over 50 statues on the walls depicting various deities crossing a river. Another was in the process of being renovated and it was fascinating to watch the workmen finish columns and screens in the traditional way not to mention getting to see a temple that's not glitzy and glammed up and crammed with tourists. The most amazing temple though was the one at the Dragon Gate - it is literally carved out of the sheer cliff face. Some monk spent 14 years just carving these little grottos and statues in the grottos to make the most incredible temple ever. Too bad it was crammed with loud and obnoxious tourists and my poor little achey legs are still complaining about the steep climbs.

The day before that I visited the Stone Forest a little way out of Kunming. The most notable thing about the Stone Forest is that they have the best toilet I've ever been to in my entire life. No it's not just because I hate the other squat toilets in China which don't even have doors on the cubicles (yuck) - this toilet had a TV in every single cubicle as well as little shower heads you can clean your bottom with after you've finished as well as minature toilets for children to use!!! I've been so spoilt by one usage of this toilet that I can't go back to squat toilets - it's terrible! :p But apart from this one amazing toilet that I've rambled on about the Stone Forest is made up of amazing Karst rock formations. All you people who are used to klutzy-Xin will be amazing to hear that I completed a super precarious climb right to the top of the stone forest to get a fantastic view over the canopy.

I should also mention that I spent last night at Anning which is famous for its hot springs. We stayed at the Japanese style hot spring hotel thingie and it was justifiably luxurious and relaxing. I got in plenty of R&R not only relaxing in the private outdoor hot spring attached to my hotel room but also in the milk water hot tub and the hot tub filled with rose essence and rose petals. Mmmm.... Xin is a happy camper.

For those of you interested I am currently in Dali trying to figure out what to do next because as usual Johnny has given no thought to our itinenary after dragging me here... grr... and I will have to do all the research because apparently reading about gremlins on planes (that is the headline for the news article he is reading) is more important than figuring out what to do next in our short time here. Grr... I'm signing out to do some research...

Hangin' Out in Shanghai

2007-01-20T14:45:00.000+11:00

After Hong Kong we flew back from Shen Zhen to Shanghai.

Now I want to say this first and foremost. I'm Shanghainese, so I love Shanghai. However I am happy to report that Sarah and I love Shanghai together!

For example we spent an entire day in the Shanghai museum - yes we got in at 11:00am in the morning, left for a 30 mins lunch break and went back in to hang out till it closed at 5:00pm in the afternoon. No we're not crazy - it's an awesome museum.

We went shopping in Qi Pu Road for super cheap clothes and bought a whole bunch of skirts, socks and tops for less than $100AUD between us - CRAZY!

We also went to do some 'cultural' walks down Duo Lun Road (with its nifty bronze sculptures of intellectual type revolutionaries - think Montmarte without the prostitutes), Jing An Temple (which we didn't go into because we couldn't figure out if it was old enough to be worth seeing :p) as well as around the old French Concession area and the Bund.

We lined up for Nanxiang Dumplings (which are well worth the 40 minute wait) and bargained for chopsticks at the Yu Gardens. Not that the chopsticks really required much bargaining on our part, that basically involved a lady chasing us down the street gradually lowering the price from 220yuan to 40yuan :p

We went fake shopping near the old Xiangyang market which only hardened my resolve never to buy fakes again - Xin's poor thighs were not made to withstand going up and down dilapitated stairs whose steepness is a challenge to the will of the weary fake hunter... You can take me back to Hong Kong and the boutiques for those goods thank you very much...

We also spent the last night going to Zapatas (the crazy Mexican style RnB club with the free margaritas for ladies :p), Beni's Bar (Johnny's favourite bar in all of Shanghai) and Windows (with the RnB and the 10yuan shooters)... mmm...

Oh and we also went to Zhou Zhuan which is like a 'Chinese Venice' - or as the ad put is 'the No. 1 Water Town in China'. Whatever. There's a photo of Sarah there in my Trip Photos gallery (look to your left). It's decidedly pretty and all the old architecture from the ye China of old is absolutely fascinating but the vendors and hawkers on every street and corner definitely detract from the experience. Especially when you go with a tour group and they dump you in some stupid silk factory making overpriced goods for 30 mins when you just want to go home...

Okay I'm tired and going to sleep now, just running through the list of what we did in 10 days is making me exhausted. In the meantime, cause I know you miss me so much you can peruse the photos that I uploaded to the web - and no complaints about the quality, do you know how HARD it is to upload photos here on dial up, especially when there has been an earthquake in Taiwan stuffing up all the internet connections?!?

From Hong Kong (and Shen Zhen) With Love

2007-01-12T12:55:00.000+11:00

Well I escaped from the freezing cold weather in Beijing - to the relative warmth of Hong Kong and Shen Zhen.

For those of you that don't know, Shen Zhen is a little town on the border of Hong Kong that literally sprang up overnight when it became a special economic zone about 20 odd years ago. It's huge... it's crazy!!! There's not a lot of history or culture to bask in there (as there is in Beijing) but there is a lot of shopping and R&R to be had. I basically spent my time there wandering around markets and getting manicures and pedicures. I am proud to report that I now have uber cute pink toenails (and cuticles that don't scream washer woman) :p

There are also awesome theme parks in Shen Zhen which, as the Lonely Planet describes, are "naff in the extreme" :p But still so much fun to gawk at. If you look at the photo top left in here you will see Window to the World which basically has minatures of random monuments of the world including the Eiffel Tower, the Great Wall of China and yes, even the Sydney Opera House. I think the funniest thing though is Sarah and I standing in front of the gate discussing whether the really bad copy of a statue was Babylonian or Persian before finally deciding it is early Byzantine... so sad and so Xin and Sarah. :p

The other cool theme park in Shen Zhen is Happy Valley which is rather like Dreamworld or Movieland on the Gold Coast but bigger - waaaaay bigger than both. It has giant water slides, 4D adventures and most importantly BUMPER CARS!!!! Xin loves her bumper cars... she even loves waiting in the queue for bumper cars because she can make fun of the girls who can't drive bumper cars - phhbt, women can't drive! :p But yes... top right photo you will see Sarah and Xin sitting on cute bronze cows at Happy Valley (Xin likes cows). My vote for the best ride there is the Typhoon - I cannot describe it to you other than it is simply a giant tsunami (ask to watch my video when I get back).

Hong Kong itself I've very indifferent to. Which is strange, cause I suppose it really is a shopper's paradise. Hong Kong is basically one big shopping mall. Anywhere you go is shopping. When we went to see the giant buddah on Lantou island (see photo bottom left) we found a street of tourist stores and the 700th 7-eleven opened in Hong Kong as well as a factory outlet shopping complex! :p When I went to the peak to get a bird's eye view of HK city I came down with a pair of shoes... I think I dislike it mainly because as a crazy shopaholic I can't get anywhere in the city because I have to keep dropping into the boutiques (I think there are more Gucci's in HK then there are in the entire Southern Hemisphere - I think there are more Gucci's then 7-elevens, very scary...)

I think I will like HK more when I marry well and have nothing better to do then spend my husband's money. And note that this is not me being stupid and vain, the fortune teller on Temple St told me that I would marry well :p (she also told me that I would live to be 87 and that I would donate lots of my husband's money to charity :p)

Further on the subject of fortune telling on Temple Street - Xin and Sarah are bitterly disappointed that none of the fortune teller's had those prophetic birds that the travel guide described so vividly. So sad :(Oh the last photo in the four spread above is of Sarah and I in the park in HK on Hollywood Road. That park and the area around it is one of the last vestiges of 'old' Hong Kong - ie not crazy shopping malls EVERYWHERE. It has some beautiful streets, antique stores and markets as well as a very interesting Sun Yat Sen historical walk. (You can see real places where people was murdered...)

Well that was my random trip around Shen Zhen and HK.

I realise that was really random and probably nonsensical but I'm attempting to watch Gilmore Girls and write at the same time - I think the randomness of the show is rubbing off on my writing. :p But I think my photos should make up for the lack of entries recently :p

In other news Xin's mobile was stolen by an evil, evil person. May the curse of a thousand badnesses be on them. Grrr....

Greetings from Beijing!

2006-12-31T01:49:00.000+11:00

Firstly I must apologise for my very poor form in updating my blog. This been very slack.

But in my defence, and anyone who has ever travelled will understand this I am sure, travelling is super hard work! It's very hard to pull those few minutes out to check your email and update your blog. But that said I should have been better and I'm sorry. However I have been checking my email (that's a relatively quick thing to do) and I want to thank everyone who messaged me and sent me email greetings. I love you all! *Huggles*

I will try and upload some photos when I get back to Shanghai so that you can have a look.

Anyway I am currently in Beijing living it up with Sarah, Johnny and Johnny's friends from university Ruba and Grace.

There's probably no point in going through a blow by blow account of our adventures suffice to say that it has been SUPER, SUPER fun. :p

There are however, a few things worth mentioning.

Firstly it is FREEZING here in Beijing. We've been rugged up in all thermals and the like constantly but it has simply not been warm enough. We can only spend a couple of hours outdoors before our toes lose feeling and we have to hide indoors again. We then spend the next hour moving from one warm place to another. I have yet to come up with a catchy name for this behaviour - I was thinking the warm walk or the warm swarm. I am open to suggestions.

Also the best club in Beijing in Mix. It is located opposite a club called Viks near the Worker's Stadium. It is justifiably awesome. The DJ's there churn a constant fantastic stream of RnB and they have bartenders that juggle (Yay! Xin loves juggling!) and breathe fire and set the bar on fire. The pyromaniac in me is so happy. Plus the DJ is open to requests and the staff are super friendly :p It's just soooooo fantastic in general. The drinks are a bit on the pricey side but I would still highly recommend. We went there last night, and when we came out it was SNOWING, for the first time this winter. It was the perfect end to a fantastic night... *happy sigh*

Also the cold does have an upside. The snow here is just incredible. I woke up this morning and the whole world was covered in a magic blanket of white. Plus the flakes here are super soft for some reason. It is nothing like the snow in Australia. When the snowflakes fall from the sky and rest on you they are actually shaped like all the pretty stylized flakes you see in pictures. It's so incredibly beautiful...

And may I also just add that there is nothing better than trekking over some of the most amazing monuments in the world (Forbidden City, Great Wall etc.) with a whole bunch of friends.

Xin is happy. But she'll have to cut this short as she is also super sleepy and needs her sleepies. So goodbye ... I promise I'll write again soon, hopefully.

Ice Rink?!? Awesome!!!

2006-12-19T14:25:00.000+11:00

Yesterday I went ice skating!!! I didn't even know there was an ice rink in Shanghai!

Now some of you may recall the last time I went ice skating, it was a long time ago, I think first or second year. Remember, I organised a giant ice skating party, took a roll call and marched everyone to my local ice skating rink??? What no you don't remember? What you purged the awful memory from your mind? Well pish posh! You may still remember Jaci looking at Andrew for the longest time skating in his phat pants before finally asking - "Xin, why is Andrew wearing his sleeping bag?"

But anyway yesterday I went skating with Johnny and Jessie and I rediscovered, wonder of wonders, I LIKE ice-skating. Now for those of you that know me this will probably come as a shock. I KNOW it's physical exertion, I KNOW it's exercise, I KNOW I can't do it wearing high heels and I KNOW I am the most uncoordinated person in the history of the world - yet I still like ice skating. I love it - I love it all the more because Johnny absolutely sucks at it. So while I am gliding around the rink (yes I do glide! I didn't fall flat on my face once! yes, ice skating is easier than going up stairs!) I get to watch Johnny trying to skate and falling flat on his face = endless amusement.

Jessie took photos and video so watch this space - they will be coming soon!!!

Guess Who Has Short Hair?

2006-12-15T20:21:00.000+11:00

That's right, for the first time in over 10 years Xin has short hair! (see photo) Wow...
And the greatest thing about China is that the wash, cut and blow only cost me $2.50AUD (and it wasn't even the cheapest place on the street!! Oh gar!)

I actually didn't want my hair that short but I think the guy cutting my hair was egged on by his mates saying things like "Don't be so cold hearted", "Don't cut her hair short", "It was so much better before when it was long" - I understand that saying things like this to any male is pretty much like waving a red flag in front of a bull - rather akin to Ewan's "I dare you..." approach to getting things done :p Oh well it will grow - and I kind of like it. The only two things annoying about it is that my hair no longer keeps my ears and neck warm and one particular strand of hair on the right side of my head that is too short to tuck behind the ear but just long enough to fall into all my food - grr.

Apart from hair though everything is well here - I have managed to catch a cold but I'm hoping this means that I will be immune to all other kinds of diseases for the next 8 months because I'll have anti-bodies. (Hey don't you say anything to crush my optimism!)

Also on the wow super cheap side of things I finished House of Dead 4 for only $3.00AUD - awesome!!! And I want to say that I did improve throughout the game. My accuracy went from 0% (no that's not a typo, there is nothing meant to be in front of that 0) to almost 60%. I'm so proud of myself.

Err, I realise that was just a super long boring rant but hey at least I attached a photo which should be some source of excitement for at least 2 seconds. :p

Of AAARGH, PANG and YEAH!

2006-12-11T12:54:00.000+11:00

I believe that aside from the neutral emotive position there are three key states of being.

AAARGH! This is a state of intensive frustration and annoyance - frequently felt when people cut in front of Xin on the freeway and then proceeds to drive really, really slowly - AAARGH. In these situations I am, of course, forced to tailgate, but I digress.

I had plenty of AAAARGH moments yesterday on my journey between Melbourneand Shanghai. The first was when mum used the beeping intercom system to wake me up at 4:00am after only 4 hours of sleep. I don't think she understood the concept that I thought I explained clearly - please wake me up at 4:00am because I don't want to be jarred by the alarm. So waking me up with a loud and obnoxious intercom system sort of defeated the purpose... hmm...

The second AAAARGH moment occurred when I got to Melbourne airport. Some silly Qantas staff member harried me constantly as I waited in the check in queue. "You know you're only allowed 25kg of check in luggage", "Are you sure your cabin luggage is cabin luggage size?", "I think we had better try and get it in the cabin luggage frame checker", "You know it must weigh only 7kg right", "Let's weigh your hand luggage" - phbbt, no wonder planes are so expensive and airlines are not performing well. It's not the fuel crisis it's the stupid money wasted on pointless employees!!!

Luckily my flights went relatively well - nothing to really AAARGH about until I arrived in Shanghai and queued to get through customs. And when I say queue I really mean queue - I don't think anyone has really experienced queuing until they queue for something in China. However the fact that I had to queue is not really cause for AAARGH but what really made me got AAAARGH is the fact that they had 4 queues for foreigners and 2 queues for DIPLOMATS... am I really to accept that 1/3 of all foreigners going into China on any given flight are diplomats?!? It maketh no sense!!! GRRR... and to make matters worse I was queuing behind some guy that was really sloooooooow to move up the queue when it actually did progress (GAH! I am not one for patience) but I also had 3 really, really drunk guys behind me talking obnoxiously about how much their wives love them... hmm.... now having sampled how truly bad the scotch and dry on the flight was I am not really sure how they got THAT pissed but I suppose unlimited quantities of alcohol will do it for some people... I don't think I have ever been so relieved to clear customs!!!

YEAH! is pretty self explanatory - and the best example I can give of a YEAH! moment actually happened yesterday. I saw a taxi being fined by the police as I was driving to the airport - HELL YEAH!!!

I had only one other YEAH! moment yesterday and it happened as I left Pudong airport in Shanghai. It's not cold enough here to require thermal underwear yet!!! YAY!!! *Does the happy dance* Of course it will get colder soon and will DEFINITELY be freezing when I get to Beijing but for now I am content with what I can count as a small blessing! :p

PANG is a state where there is a super tug on the heartstrings. You feel it most acutely in the twist in your gut and the cold in your heart.

I had one super, super PANG moment yesterday when I kissed Rufus (my gorgeous teddy bear) goodbye and looked around my room to realise that I would not be back here for 8 months. I left the room exactly as I would have if I was going to be back tomorrow - clothes strewn everywhere, bed awkwardly made but as I turned off the light and closed the door the fact that I really was NOT going to be back any time soon really hit me - I was really sad.

I'm really going to miss Melbourne and all my gorgeous friends there...

(not that that's going to stop me from having a ball here! :p)

I'm Leaving on a Jet Plane ...

2006-12-07T20:12:00.000+11:00

on Sunday!

Wow! That's soon.

Thanks to everyone who came to my happy pool party on Saturday! *Huggles*
I had a great time :p
Poo to all the people who had lame excuses like "I'm afraid of pools" and "I don't go out to the suburbs" - you know who you are!

Anyway, I suppose here is the time to make some introspective comments about how it feels to be leaving the country for a rather long time. However I find that I am suffering from a distinctive lack of excitement. At the moment I am more excited by the fact that the fact I am leaving is a fantastic excuse to catch up with fantastic friends I never see because everyone is super, super busy all the time! So in the next 2 days that I will be in Australia for I will be doing more of that. My time is super booked at the moment but if you drop me a line I promise that I will try and make some time to at least grab a cup of coffee with you! You know how to find me!!! :p

PS: To all the people who asked - I'm sorry I didn't end up buying a pink suitcase. I bought a boring brown Antler suitcase - light, soft (thank you person who I think is Ross) and practical. Soooo disappointing, I know. But blame Johnny and all the other people who told me that buying a pink suitcase would be equivalent to putting up a giant pink neon sign asking guys to take me home to do naughty things with! I will have to see whether this decision was truly wise - I will keep you all posted. :p

The Great Suitcase Dilemma

2006-10-08T16:07:00.000+10:00

Okay, I know I've had this conversation with everyone but I do believe that when travelling your gear is of the utmost importance!

So it is with this in mind that I ask the vital question - what suitcase should I take?!?

Mind you, it wasn't always this simple, no, in fact, initially I was in a position where I was not even sure I could take a suitcase. I was informed by persons that a suitcase would be difficult to handle when travelling alone and thus I should just take a backpack. But bad, bad repressed memories from year 9 that I can only describe as 'Outward Bound' started surfacing. The image of me lying on my back/backpack held down by the weight while four limbs flailed helpless towards the sky flashed like a sequence you see just before you die.

So I decided a backpack was out.

And then I decided that the best course of action to take would be to get a bright pink suitcase. (To match my blog, and everything else I own, of course) A bright pink suitcase would do wonders for my 'damsel in distress' routine at the airport. And no brazen thief was try to make off with the suitcase because it would be as plain as day that the bright pink suitcase did not in fact belong to him. This was a totally brilliant plan. However, while relating my said brilliant plan to a pal while walking home one day I was laughed at by total strangers walking behind me leading me to question this choice.

So now, not only am I plan-less but I still have not decided what suitcase I want. Although I have narrowed the choice to two options:

I could go with the sturdy suitcase with four wheels that swivels oh so nicely - except that it is heavy and is also a shade of rotting orange. On the other hand I could go with the lighter, more mundanely-coloured and decidedly less expensive suitcase.

I open the floor for any comments you might have about this. Try not to be mean. And keep in mind that I do have to buy it before December.