Goodnight Saigon

We have been in Vietnam since Monday (and right now, it is Thursday evening). So far - so good! Our first stop was Ho Chi Minh City, which we have learned the locals still call Saigon. To be honest, I thought it would be too crazy for me - and that I wouldn't enjoy it. But, I was totally wrong. Saigon is so interesting... it is it's own beast. I almost can't even explain it. It is crazy but so simple at the same time. It has a certain rhythm to it. The little stores and shops - at least in the backpacker area where we stayed - were so run down and so close the the street. It seems like one monsoon would make the roofs come crashing in! The kids play barefoot on the sidewalk. People have little "restaurants" on the sidewalks and in the streets. Basically, a woman squats on the ground, cooking on little grills - meats and huge vats of rice etc. Then, they set up tiny little plastic stools in the street - smaller than what nursery school kids sit on - and people just sit in the street at eat at the "restaurants."
Its so different from what we know.
Also - we didn't see ONE chain restaurant...no Starbucks. No McDonalds. That was nice.

The motorcycles are EVERYWHERE! It is not uncommon to see families of 3 or 4 on these motorcycles - including little babies! Seriously, I had heard crossing the street in Vietnam was a challenge - but in fact, it's an Olympic sport. Basically, you just have to GO- just charge through...and not worry about the fact that 3 taxis and 20 motorcycles are coming straight for you. You just have to trust that they will drive around you. There is NO such thing as pedestrian right of way! In fact, if they see people - they just beep. Beep beep beep! The horn means something totally different here than it does in the USA. Passing someone on the highway? beep beep! See someone walking on the side of the road as you are driving? Beep beep!

I can't believe that over 3 1/2 weeks have passed by. I am having so much fun - but the whole trip is flying by way too quickly. I think it is perfect that we started out somewhere expensive (Japan) and now are in the cheap areas. Hanging out in Vietnam is SO affordable. We eat lunch for around $3. Beers are around $1. A HUGE bottle of water (1.5 liters) is usually around $0.30. The largest bill they have here is 100,000 dong which is equal to about $6. We are millionaires! One night, we decided to go all out to a fancy restaurant. We had three main courses, beers, tea, dessert...the whole thing was $26. Total. Amazing.

One day, we took a ($10) day trip into the Mekong Delta. We had a tour guide who took us on numerous boat rides, to candy factories, a honey making and bee-keeping farm, on a horse drawn buggy (if you can call it that), through little villages... it was really neat. As always, we met some really interesting people traveling - this time from Japan, Germany, Seattle, and Taiwan.

Since we have been in city after city on this trip - we have been looking forward to getting back to nature. This morning we hopped on a quick flight north to Da Lat. The ride from the airport to the hotel was absolutely breathtaking. Talk about LUSH green trees, fields, and mountains. this is where most of the delicious Vietnamese coffee comes from as well. Amazing. We were so happy - this was exactly what we needed. Or so we thought. Unfortunately - we aren't as remote as we thought we would be. We took this amazing ride through the green areas in the middle of nowhere - then went over the top of one mountain - and suddenly this city appears! It was like Brigadoon!

Our hotel is in this city. It's disappointing, but apparently - there isn't really anywhere to stay that isn't in the city of Da Lat. So...tomorrow - I'm facing my fears and going on a guided MOTORCYCLE tour around the mountains and to go hike, see waterfalls etc. I will not be driving the motorcycle. We have hired one of the famous "Easy Riders" to tour us around. I'm nervous but quite excited. This is one of those once in a life-time experiences that I felt I had to do. Right? Right.

So far my favorite thing about Vietnam has been the people. They have been warm and wonderful. We stayed at a place called the Saigon Mini Hotel - and the staff couldn't have been more wonderful. I would recommend anyone to stay there.

I am at the point where I have been away from home for so long, that I start thinking about anything that I will change when I get back. "When I get back to real life, i'm going to eat better." "When I get back to real life, I am going to take a class or two." It is true, though, that traveling has made me want to learn again. Maybe I'll take an adult ed class or something.

One difficult experience i had in Vietnam was my exploration of the War Remnants Museum. I went by myself. And, yes I knew it wouldn't be pleasant. And this might sound extreme - but I felt like I was the daughter of a Nazi...walking around a Holocaust museum. The exhibits were horrifying. America sounded like the worst place - with the worst people - in the world... I couldn't even look at a lot of the stuff on Agent Orange etc. I started to enjoy the exhibit more, however, in the exhibits about worldwide opposition to the Vietnam War. It showed protesters in Australia with "USA out of Vietnam NOW" posters. And, European countries with similar displays. I kept looking for the Americans...where is our voice? Where are our protesters? Finally, i found it - a section where you saw the brave men and women who protested the war. Photos of people burning draft cards; an article about a fighter pilot who refused to fly etc etc. I finally felt ok.

My favorite part of the museum was an exhibit all about the photographers recording the war, who lost their lives while doing so. Their photography was amazing and so much more special knowing their personal stories.

We will hopefully post pictures of all of this soon. Tucker's camera is facing some serious technical difficulties but we are making do with mine for the time being.

More updates to come. Wish me luck on my motorcycle!? omg.

More on Shanghai...and a taste of Hong Kong nightlife!

Hello readers!

I find out every day more and more people who have been keeping up with our travels on our blog – so thanks!

We safely arrived in Hong Kong on Thursday afternoon, after the train ride from hell. It was a 20 hour train from Shanghai and I won’t get into details, but it was awful. Also, I ate something bad on the train – and ended up with a stomach bug for 24 hours. Luckily, we are staying with my friend Rachel “Patch” Adams in HK, so I had a comfortable place to be very, very ill. And, I am now recovered! Phew.

The rest of our trip in Shanghai was much better than that first day. If you take a trip there, I would recommend staying away from the touristy areas like the walk from People’s Square to The Bund. That is where we experienced all the craziness and people trying to scam us…everywhere else we went was just fine. We really loved the French Concession area and Taikang Lu area (which is a cute little maze of artsy shops and streets and restaurants where we bought cool communist propaganda stuff.) Also, on that Monday night, we at an amazing restaurant! “Lost Heaven” is the name of the place. It was in the French Concession and was probably our best meal yet on the entire trip so far! The food was from the Yunnan province and was very fresh- and the spices they used were so different than what we are used to. Although I stuck to TsingDao - the Chinese beer – this was the night Matt got patriotic and switched to Bud.

In any case, I would highly recommend Lost Heaven to anyone going to Shanghai.

One night in Shanghai, we went out with some of our friends from the ferry (see picture above). Kevin lives in Shanghai and took us to some really cool clubs which, even on a Tues. night, were pretty bumpin'. Yes, I said bumpin.

Since we have been in Hong Kong, we haven’t done too much (since I was really sick), but Patch and her friend Andy did show us around the bars in Central and took us to a great Peking Duck restaurant. Hong Kong is off the hook as far as nightlife goes. I have never seen so many cool bars all in a row! It was crazier than New Orleans – I’m telling you. It’s strange though, because the area they mainly hang out in is all ex-pats so you see very few Chinese people. That is definitely a change from everywhere else we have visited in Asia. Granted, we probably need to get out of the “Central” area and see a bit more of this city. Hopefully, we will do that today.

Of what I have seen so far, Hong Kong is a very, very cool city – a very clean city – and most people speak English. It is quite different from our other China experiences. We did expect the difference – but not this great of a difference!

Tomorrow, Patch has rented a junk boat for her birthday. About 15 of her friends will all be onboard and it will be a little food and booze cruise going around to 3 different beaches! The weather here has been great…so I’m really looking forward to it!

After that, we are off to Vietnam… we haven’t planned that leg of our trip AT ALL so we have a lot of work to do today.

- Miss you all -

PS Our RSS reader is only displaying some of our photo albums in the right nav. If you'd like to see all the photos, you can just go to: http://picasaweb.google.com/matt.d.tucker/

Toto, we're not in Japan anymore

In comedy, we often reinforce stereotypes...such as, blonds are dumb, Jews are cheap...or, of course - all Asians are the same. Well, fear not my Asian friends - you will NEVER hear us say that ever, ever again. Thus far, our experiences in China vs. Japan have been polar opposites.

First off, let me start on how we got here: The Osaka-Shanghai 2 day ferry! Ya know what? It was way better than we thought it would be. This, however, has nothing to do with the ferry really - and everything to do with the awesome travelers we befriended while on board. When we were first getting onto the ferry, we experienced the first difference between the Chinese and the Japanese... the Japanese patiently line up and wait for everything. Everything! The escalator, the subway...anything. There is always a perfectly patient LINE. While waiting to get on the boat to China, however, there was a lot of pushing, cutting, and just general disregard for other people trying to get on the boat around us. Once we got on the boat, #2 difference - help and hospitality. Tucker and I were split up immediately and put in different rooms - he in first class and me in standard. We paid the same amount and should have been in the same room but no one explained or offered to help or anything. It just 'was.'

In any case, the trip began. The views from the ship were beautiful. We were soon wondering what the HECK we were going to do to kill 48 hours on a boat. There was only so many rounds of Rummy 500 that we could play. Sooner or later, we met other travelers and had people to eat dinner and do karaoke with! The Karaoke was a blast. It was so different from how it is in the States. People REALLY appreciate good Karaoke singing. The "audience" claps in the middle of the song - like they are at a rock concert. I felt like a star! :)

The Karaoke ended at 10:30pm - and we didn't know what was left to do! A girl (from NJ!) said "go outside! The sky is beautiful and someone is playing guitar!" Soon enough, we were up on the deck of the boat - staring at one of the most star-filled, clear, and beautiful skies I have seen in a long time. The guitar playing continued and in a moment, you had people from the US, China, UK, Australia, Ireland, Poland etc all belting out the same Radiohead songs... It was such an awesome moment. You realize how simple things can be...and how music seriously unifies us all. It was truly amazing. (Videos of Karaoke are in the Traveling to Shanghai album.)

Some of the friends we met on the boat are Americans now living in China. THANK GOD we met them because they took us to lunch and to buy our train tickets when we first arrived in Shanghai. Their Mandarin really came in handy. (Also, they were hi-larious.) It is definitely much harder here to get around without speaking the language - AND the language is much harder to pick up or "fake."

It is Monday evening, and we just got back to our hostel after our first day exploring Shanghai. If I'm being completely honest - it wasn't the greatest sight-seeing experience I've ever had. First off, I'm feeling paranoid here. I mean... communism in general makes me paranoid! Second, our friends had warned us of tourist scams - and they were spot on. Person after person tried to scam us with the same offers over and over again. (Where are you from? Are you a student? We are travelers too! Want to go to this tea ceremony with us?) I felt very uncomfortable and was very glad I had Tucker there with me for safety!

Besides paranoia about scams, and pushing away people trying to sell us things - I am a tad paranoid about what we can consume here! Don't drink the water; check the bottled water to make sure it hasn't been tampered. Don't eat dairy because babies are dying. Don't eat fruits and veggies because they are washed in the water! Don't eat food from stalls. Ahhh!

Also, its just really dirty here. And it's not just in comparison to Japan. I mean, you can see and FEEL the pollution in the air. Also, you can be in the nicest area - and suddenly a terrible smell just hits and its so off-putting you have to cover your face with your shirt. People push. People spit. A LOT. There is a lot of smoking and spitting. Its definitely different from the past two weeks. :)

That being said, I don't want it to sound like things are terrible. We did have a good time today. Although I'm so skeptical about trusting ANYONE because of our experiences, we did meet one helpful man - so that was nice. Also, we walked around and took a bunch of photos, and had a lot of laughs. We went to the Yuayuan Gardens - and it was full of plants and rocks and temples. The signs throughout called the rock formations "Rockery." We had lots of laughs at making a mockery of the rockery...not gonna lie.

By Popular Demand...Monkeys!

During the day of exploration Rachel wrote about in her post below, I hiked to the top of a mountain and checked out some sweet monkeys!

From Kyoto

This is the cool little buddhist lamp / arch thingy at the start of the monkey path. Note to self: learn something...anything about buddhism.

From Kyoto

The path wound it's way up a little mountain. It was a beautiful, sunny day in Kyoto and the way the trees filtered the light made the hike simply sublime. Note to self: refrain from using the word "sublime" in the future.

From Kyoto

Ooo...monkey trash barrel...I must be getting close.

From Kyoto

Ok, right about here is when I started getting worried that a monkey was gonna jump out of a tree onto me head and take a big dump.

From Kyoto

Oh, I guess if children are unafraid of these guys, I'll be fine.

From Kyoto

Made it! This monkey is like way into photo ops. Notice that I'm keeping my distance at this point. I don't trust these guys. They look kinda funny.

From Kyoto

You could see all of Kyoto from up here. Oh yeah, and a bunch of damn dirty apes.

From Kyoto

These guys look like they're just chillin in the shade but I can tell that they are really thinking about how delicious I look.

From Kyoto

OK, so little tip when taking pictures of baby monkeys. Don't. Stay away from the babies. I spent a good five minutes right up in this guys grill snapping pictures until his mommy came out of nowhere and made a very aggressive demonstration with her rather large teeth about a foot from my face.

From Kyoto

It was at about this point that I decided to take my leave of Monkey Town. Granted I did hang around for another 2 or 3 minutes just so they didn't think I was a total pussy.

From Kyoto

Nothing to do with monkeys. I just like the picture.

OK kids...more updates later. We just got off a boat and are now in CHINA! We have a lot to fill you in on, dear reader. Stay tuned.

Kyoto catch up and US politics!

Kyoto was interesting. I wish we had more time there – 3 days was definitely not enough. But, at least we got a taste. The regular city itself is nothing special, but once you get into any of the old streets and areas – you finally see the architecture that you picture in your head when you think “Japan.” It’s beautiful. My favorite street was Poncho-cho dori. It is a teeny old street right along the water – with just restaurant after restaurant. Really pretty. We took a lot of photos and you can see them through the Kyoto link on the right!

Tucker and I split up on Wed. and did our own city tours. He went to see monkeys! I went to the Silver Temple (Ginka ku) and walked around the beautiful gardens. See pic. They had maybe 15 different types/colors of moss. The grounds were SO beautiful and well kept. I walked around…and I had my music on…I was almost moved to tears. It was amazing. After that, I did a little shopping in GION ( got myself a pretty purse and belt!) and then headed to an Onsen to soak in a natural hot spring.

We went out both nights in Kyoto with our friend, Eva, from Germany – who we had originally met at our hostel in Fuji – then met up with again in Kyoto! One of the bars we went to was a super funky cave-like place with a live DJ, and a woman painting a huge canvas while the music played. It was very indie.. Very cool. :)

We are currently in Osaka – which is nothing to write home about. Unless you like to write home about a city like Springfield. We actually had booked a place online for Osaka – which looked ok on the internet. We got there, checked into our room , – and 20 minutes later, we had checked out! Although we would have only been staying there for the night – it was disgusting and the more we sat there, the more we realized we wouldn’t be able to handle it. It was a Japanese style hotel – tatami floors, no beds…but it was DIRTY and gross. We didn’t want to touch the floor – much less the blankets or pillows.
Now, we are at a swank place downtown. Seriously – it’s the nicest hotel ever! We decided we just couldn’t live in filth the night before we were going to live on a boat for 2 days! We figured we’d splurge.

I am starting to get excited for the next leg of the trip: China! My fears are 1. The people not being as nice and helpful as they are here and 2. The language is tough! As I write this, Tucker is sitting next to me trying to talk in the “tonal” language of Mandarin. It is hi-larious! Apparently, 1 word can have 20 different meanings depending on the TONE! We have been spoiled by Japanese – its way easy compared to other Asian languages!

As always, rachel’s random thoughts…
- (Thanks to Ayako), we learned that you never pour your own sake – you always must have a friend pour it for you.

- As much as we are far away from home, we have been reading the paper and catching up on the political and economic situation regularly. In fact, being here – where the economy is also affected…and being surrounded by people from all over the world – I feel almost MORE informed than I would at home. We watched most of the debate last week on the internet. We want to watch the Palin/Biden debate but we don’t know if we will get it on the boat or not. We shall see.

- Palin REALLY got schooled in that Couric interview, EH!? She looked terribly unprepared. I thought it was hysterical.

- Tucker and I often ask other travelers their thoughts on America and – more so – on Americans. ( I didn't want to get spotted eating McDonalds for fear that people would think, that is "what all Americans do!") One girl we spoke to (from Germany) was surprised to hear that many of us (MOST of us - sorry Dad!) don’t support Bush. Granted, she was young and perhaps not up to date on all things political, but she said that she always assumed USA and Bush go hand in hand. We had to explain Blue states and Red states…and that we didn’t um…technically vote for him.

Hey Asgard crew! We did Karaoke in Japan! It was very different from our usual Wed. nights – but we went out with 9 people from all over the world, sang our hearts out, and had so much fun! So, even though I wasn’t there on Wed. in Cambridge, I was representing in Fuji! In this picture, Tuck and I show Japan JUST how to rock out the Justin Timberlake. Can you say, bring sexy back? Yea, that's right. We did just that.

Quick note: Please be careful about what you write in the “comments” area while we are in China! I don’t know how regulated things get…so I figure,better safe than sorry! I don’t want us to lose internet access… or have to trade in Tucker to the authorities. I mean, I don’t want to travel alone while he takes the heat for YOUR comments thank-you-very-much. ;)

Shana Tova and Happy New year everyone!
Love Raero

Fujisan! Fujisan!

We did it! We finally saw Mt. Fuji yesterday. It was spectacular. We took a bus up to 5th station at 3000 meters. There are a series of 10 stations along the route ascending Fuji. We think 5th station is about 700 meters from the summit.



The bus ride up was hair raising. But at some point, we turned a bend and had a great view down the side of the mountain and, for the first time, realized we were above the clouds. Not long after, we looked up and were finally able to see the summit of Fuji for the first time. It was beautiful.



It was damn cold at the 5th station but we had a great view and took loads of photos. We stayed for about an hour, had a cup of coffee and then boarded the bus back down.

When we arrived back at the bus stop, I looked in the direction of Fuji, and there it was! It was the first time we had seen it from the ground. Our stay at Fuji had been plagued by clouds and fog. But now, there it was towering over us. It was only visible for about half an hour.



This has been the highlight of the trip for me so far. I am really regretting not having the chance to climb to the summit however. After having been up there, we could have done it yesterday but just didn't have our act together in time. We are considering extending our stay in Japan so perhaps I will have another shot.

Mmm...mountains

Tokyo has been our home for the past four days...and we were definitely bummed and tentative about leaving. But, now we are in Kawaguchiko - which is where Mt. Fuji is located...and we both agree its an amazing and welcomed change. When we were in Tokyo, we were in a hotel - just the two of us. This was a great first step into a new country. But, now we are at this awesome hostel called K's House. Its really fun to interact with and meet new people - esepecially other travelers. Also, I have to say - this is the nicest, and cleanest hostel I've ever been to. We got here in late afternoon, went to the grocery store...cooked up a big meal in the hostel's kitchen...and now have been chatting, drinking beers, and playing cards with some of our new friends.

Mainly though - we are just in awe of how absolutely beautiful it is here. We left the bright lights, big city - for a teeny mountain town. Its definitely a striking change - but its also a lot more me (especially since this time of year, i would normally be in Killington anyway!)

We are surrounded on all sides by mountains. The train ride from Tokyo was absolutely awesome... Tucker probably took 100 photos of the mountains before we even got off the train.
The weather isn't the greatest. Its very foggy and cold. And, in fact we are strongly discouraged to climb the mountain at this time of year. However, we are still praying the clouds clear up so we can at least really SEE the mountain. ALL the mountains here are beautiful...but we came to see Mt. Fuji. So, hopefully - we get to do just that.