Return Trip

26/27x2 122016

The last day of our resort stay, we had elected for the late checkout, which included lunch. We hung out till the 1400 boat was to take us back to the ferry terminal. We settled our bill, and sat down for lunch. after eating the main portion of the lunch, and while our dessert was being prepared, one of the staff approached us apologizing for having forgotten to include an item on our bill.

They claimed that we had to pay for the lunch. We said we didnt have any documentation telling us that and we thusly refused to pay. At this point we were pretty disappointed with the Telunas Resort.

http://www.telunasresorts.com/

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g1778353-d7155295-Reviews-Telunas_Resorts_Telunas_Private_Island-Sugi_Island_Riau_Archipelago_Riau_Islands_Prov.html

We were staying in the Private Island portion, because it wasnt the Family Friendly portion.

According to the website we were supposed to be getting 2 course lunches and 3 course dinners every day.

As seen on the website, they cater to couples and young families.

No where on the website does it state late checkout incurs an extra fee.

The website does not accurately portray our experience.

The entire thing was no where near the romantic/private getaway the website would lead you to believe it is. So we were pretty upset before they tried to tack on the extra lunch. That was the thing that turned it from a disappointment to outright discontent.

Anyways, the long boat got us to the ferry terminal, we got on a ferry that got is to Singapore.

Customs in Singapore took well over an hour and a half.

We hopped a cab to the airport, got through security fantastically easily (there was no security at the front, you can get into the airport with a boarding pass and an ID, no metal detectors no wands, just walk right in, the real security happens immediately prior to getting on the plane). Inside security we hung out in one of the lounges for a little while prior to our 6 hour flight to Shanghai.

Did i mention the flight was scheduled for 2300? This was the start of a very long day, if you are keeping track we left our resort at 1400, got on a plane at 2300 and showed up in Shanghai at 0400.

The airport was barely open, we got through customs there quick, and waited at ticketing as there was no one from American to issue us a ticket. After a few hours of waiting I spoke to another One World partner, and he recommended we print our own passes from the business center to get through security.

Thats exactly what we did, and then proceeded to hang out in lounges until our flight at 1820. Which was a solid 12.5 hours.

we landed in Dallas at 1720 the same day. as in we left in the evening of the 27th and landed an hour earlier, on the 27th.

Then cleared US customs, got our plane to Chicago, got picked up by a friend and our dog (Sicily was in the airport, she certainly wasnt allowed, but no one stopped her), and went home.

With all the timezone changes, our travel started on Monday, and went through Tuesday, and then went through most of Tuesday again. Totalling about 41 hours of travel time.

Glad to be home.

Not so much of an Escape

25122016

Even Merrier Christmas!

We woke up to another sunny morning, and headed to the breakfast buffet, no made-to-order this time, only the mediocre buffet.

After breakfast we lounged in our villa to watch more American Horror Story.

Then lunch was once again the buffet. And we started to feel disappointed. The Telunas website had indicated there would be 2 course lunches, and 3 course dinners every day alongside the breakfast buffet. This meal change coincided with a number of other families showing up with many children.

We were expecting a private, mostly adult, getaway. Hanging out on the beach, eating good food, and chillin on a beach were our prime expectations. Of the 15 villas here, 3 (including us) are couples, the rest are families with in most cases more than one child.

So our experience was different from what we were expecting. We decided to go kayaking around the island and discuss how we were going to address this situation.

After the kayaking, we went back to our villa and finalized our plan of attack for addressing this issue.

We decided to talk to a manager, and check out the website, see what it is actually printed on the website to see if we had built up unreasonable expectations.

It turns out the website didnt entirely mislead us, we focused on the adult centric activities, reading what we wanted to, and we figured this place would be able to accommodate both the children and the children-avoiders.

So we spoke to the manager to tell him what we were expecting and made some suggestions on how to make it better for future guests like us. He seemed genuinely grateful to hear the suggestions and understood where we were coming from with our expectations. He offered us one of the private dinners so that we can get away from the kids for a little while.

Unfortunately the weather didnt agree with our plans. It started drizzling, and the wind started blowing. So we took our dinner in the normal area. The food was good, back to the A La Cart Menu.

After dinner we went back to the villa to watch more AHS and go to sleep.

Christmas Abroad

24122016

Merry Christmas

We woke up shortly after the sun, our very open villa wasnt going to prevent that. We went for breakfast, a buffet with made to order eggs benedict, french toast a local Indonesean Breakfast (a chicken and rice dish of some kind).

The french toast was excellent and Laura was satisfied with the eggs benedict, the rest of the buffet was acceptable as well.

After breakfast we went for a walk around the island. The private island portion of the resort is very small, we walked around the whole thing in about 45 minutes.

We returned to the villa to chill out some more before lunch. Lunch was another excellent meal, a curry chicken with the standard rice and stir fried veggies.

After lunch we caught the boat over to the Beach Resort portion of the resort. This side is much more family friendly, clearly less expensive, expansive beach, and solely buffet dining. We were glad to have chosen the Private Island side. After some hanging out in a hammock (literally).

After returning to our side of the water, we nabbed some scissors to wrap our White Elephant gifts for the exchange later in the evening (we bought some fancy chocolate and tea). And noting that a few more families showed up over the course of the day. Returning for dinner with our gifts in hand, dinner had been changed from the A La Carte meal we had hoped for, to a Buffet. The buffet was ok, it included turkey, so it is kinda Christmasy.

After dinner was story time for all the kids (of which there was a good number) so laura and i took our wine down to the pool to watch the water.

We then went up for the actual gift exchange, I had number 1. I selected a diary, as the nite progressed, laura won a card game, and while children chose our gifts, the parents of said children were pretty stoked to get fancy chocolate and tea.

After the exchange we went back to our villa to finish the wine and figure out how to watch more AHS. (The best way was to connect my phone to my tablet via bluetooth and send it).

After a couple episodes we turned in for our second night.

Tropical Escape

23122016

We woke up finished packing and checked out of our hotel. Starting our journey to Indonesia. We took the subway to the harborfront, the same place our cruise ship dropped us off.

We had a few minutes so we got some snacks at the 7-11. We had to go through customs to get out of Singapore, the line for which was quick and easy. We made our way onto th ferry. It really was just a big boat with a bunch of seats, it had air conditioning which is really the only amenity i needed.

after about 45 minutes we arrived in Sekupang Indonesia. Right after customs we were greeted by staff from our Telunas Resort. A handful of other guests of the hotel were also arriving. I noticed that they had children, and hoped they were going to stay at the Beach Resort side of the resort, rather than the Private Island side. After all of us gathered, they piled our bags in the van, and we walked a few hundred meters to the little pier that had the longboat to get us to the islands.

They gave us our bags to carry the last bit down the pier, then we handed the bag off once again as they piled the luggage onto the longboat, we then climbed in, and it took us the 90 minutes to get to the resort area.

we climbed off the longboat, and received our welcome drink, a fruity green thing that neither of us could identify, and sat down for lunch.

The lunch was fantastic, a grilled mackerel with rice and stir fried vegetables. I was very excited about the foods we were going to be eating over these next few days.

After lunch we made our way to our private villa, which is great

We enjoyed the villa and the views until dinner time, and this meal was even better. I had a stir fried chicken with rice and vegetables, and laura had a butter lemon salmon with the same sides. My chicken was so good, I felt bad that i had that meal, and laura had to settle on the one that was also good, but not as good.

After dinner we went back to our villa to watch some of the stashed TVs we had. Unfortunately we found our tablet had been damaged.

Damnit, it survived 10 weeks of our travelling, but it gets cracked in the last 3 days, the three days that we wanted it the most.

We got through one episode of season 5 American Horror Story, and the internal hardware damage kicked in and rendered it impossible to watch the rest of them.

We were able to watch Inside Out, the pixar movie. This film turned out to be much better than we expected. Afterwards we went to sleep, enjoying the sounds of the waves and bats (the bats are cool with us, cause they eat all the flying bugs).

User Error, not a Technical Error

22122016

Laura and I decided to forego the early morning activity our cruise friends had suggested, mainly to sleep more.

After waking up we decided to do a little shopping for ourselves before meeting up with one of Laura’s co-workers for drinks.

Laura’s company has offices all over the world, and infrequently brought them all to Chicago for their big events. As such Laura has made friends with people all over, to include this lady Kelise.

Laura emailed her weeks ago when we first left for our trip, giving her a heads up that we are headed to her part of the world, to good responses, and we would check in later. Then shot a message out before we started the cruise, warning that we would have no internet on the boat, Kalise was still eager to show us around some.

When we got to Singapore laura reached out again, to no response, and checked in frequently, until finally on our last full day, Laura realized she had been emailing the wrong email. So we finally got in touch with her, and she invited us to a happy hour at a hotel downtown.

So after wandering around and shopping some for ourselves, it started raining and we made our way to the hotel. Luckily, much like the rest of the enormous malls over here, we were able to walk quite a while without ever going outside.

We got a little turned around, showed up only 10 minutes late, and sat down to drink and chat with Kalise and her husband. The bar had snacks, to include free steak sandwiches. After a few hours of hanging out.

After the happy hour we went to Little India to take in the sights and get food.

Little India was pretty crazy, i imagine its what India is like. Still really hot, full of people speaking a language we dont understand, seeing script that we cant read and smelling somethings delicious, and others not so much.

We were looking for WiFi, to contact our cruise friends, only finding it in the Mustafa Market (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Centre).

They were already done eating and heading home, so we decided on a restaurant.

We chose an indian restaurant, because it had been mentioned in a blog somewheres, and it did not disappoint. The food was great and the staff was great, we started with some beers, and our waiter suggested we get something (which we didnt hear between the accent and the noise) as it goes good with beer, and it was great, it was basically Indian Nachos. Other than that we got a few dishes that were fantastic, their Gobi Manchurian was excellent, and has cemented Gobi Manchurian as one of my favorite foods, Spinach and Mint Tandoori Chicken, and then finally a yogurt sauce chicken dish.

After stuffing our faces we went home to begin preparing for the move to our resort time.

Food Heaven

21122016

We woke up at a decent time by our standards, but too late for our older Aussie friends, they had woken up plenty early to attend the Singapore Zoo. Having missed the zoo, we decided to hit up the South Ridges (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Ridges). The South Ridges are essentially a series of interconnected parks, taking you through 10km of Singapore. We got there via the subway and a walk through the Science Park area, which is like an industrial park, but for tech development. The first park was Kent park, which had a little museum ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reflections_at_Bukit_Chandu ) to commemorate the services of the Malay Soldiers during WWII, the Malay Soldiers led a heroic last stand defending the town of Singapore from the Japanese.

This led us to the Canopy walk, which is wandering through big hills and a few above ground walkways.

From here we hit the HortPark, which is a big Horticultural Park where there are gardens and learning, clearly geared towards teaching kids about plants. At this point in the day it was getting pretty warm, as in 95 degrees with 80 percent humidity. It was hot.

We left HortPark via the bridge over Alexandra Street, leading directly to the really tall above ground walkways. I dont remember what this part of the chain was called, but it was really cool. Walking at or above the tree tops was neat, Singapore, despite being a huge city, still has these green spots to escape to, I think that is a really important part of cities of the future.

The next link in the parks was The Waves, and it was the most spectacular.

After skipping breakfast, and walking a good 7km through near hundred degree temperatures, we were hungry. The first place we decided to stop at appeared to be a mall on the non-live google maps (we dont have service, though Singapore is totally cool with google), when we got there it seemed to be a rec center. We got some ice cream, and while enjoying my coffee/oreo ice cream i noticed there were pictures of soldiers all over the place.

Turns out this is a rec center for soldiers and their families, like the AAFES (army and air force exchange services) back home. Except way better. It kicks the shit out of all the exchanges ive been to in the US.

Now that we had enough food (and internet) in us to make a good decision on what to eat next. We settled on another food court in a mall. So we hopped on the bus, which took us directly to the necessary mall.

This was the downtown shopping area, Orchard Street. It was alot like the shopping arcades elsewhere in Asia, except, it was really hot. It was actually more like China than Japan/Korea/Hong Kong, because the malls were planned out by the city government, and they take up inside and outside space, unlike in Japan where half the mall is actually underground.

The food court had another wide selection of food, between the two of us we got three plates, some juices all for less than 25USD. From here we struggled to communicate with our friends and set up a meeting place.

We found them in the lobby of one of the malls, they were doing their own chasing of camera stuff, i guess that was their thing. So we wandered around the mall area, and ultimately it was decided to check out a certain outdoor food court that had the Chilicrab the Aussies had been wylin about.

The walk was a little longer than they were anticipating, it was prolly 1.2km away, i thought nothing of making that trek, i neglected to take into account that members of our party were missing their original joints (Maurine had both knees replaced, and everyone was over 60…). We finally got there, got a few beers, laura and i had already ate, so the beers were pretty much enough to keep us going. Laura went off to grab some fresh fruit to share with the table, and we chatted until it was “late”. We all went to the train station, and split our separate ways to go home.

Upon getting back to our hotel, laura and i fiddled around with the internets and watched a shitty harry-potter-knock-off movie before falling asleep.

stupid timezones

19122016

Last day on the boat, and it was a full day at sea. We woke up late, because sleeping is great.

I wanted to sleep in more, Laura was hungry, she went to get breakfast, and read on the deck.

We met back up and hung out in the cabin, but our cabin steward knocked on the door to turn over the room. We told him to come back in an hour, around 1300, and went back to laying down.

The steward then came back 15 minutes later, and we elected to just leave the room so they could do their thing.

We went to play scrabble up in the library to waste some time.

Getting hungry we went up to the pool area to get burgers from the grill, neither of us were feeling that great. I think i was fighting a bit of a cold and laura was having a bout of seasickness. We met Ray, our friend from trivia, who has been travelling for much of the last 10 years, told a long round about story about his time cruising on a Yugoslav freighter and how to beat seasickness.

After eating, Laura and i tried to sleep off the ill feelings.

After the nap, we went to talk about a future cruise, because they provide incentives for early bookings. We put a minimal-fully-refundable deposit on a cruise in the future, namely to lockdown some of those incentives. So as of right now, we are going on a cruise to the Baltic in August of 2018.

This brought us to our scheduled dinner time with our Aussie friends, unfortunately we couldnt quite remember if we HAD indeed been invited. We thought we would be sitting with them at 1730, we rolled up to the host at the dining room at 1725 asking if the table was set for 4 or 6 plates. The host said “yeah but we dont seat people upstairs after 1830” we kept saying “yeah yeah, but is there 4 or 6 seats?”

Finally the host just walked us upstairs.

Our Aussie friends were just finishing their meal.

We forgot the time change…

It was actually 1825. THATS why the host kept saying “not after six-thirty” and why our steward came back after 15 minutes, not an hour…

We were pretty embarrassed. Our friends understood, they teased us a little, but didnt feel bad about us skipping out on dinner.

So we waited around for our last game of trivia, after a terrible showing of trivia, we went to dinner.

We were seated just the two of us. We ate our food, and went upstairs for some happy hours, chatted with our favourite bartender, played some music trivia, and headed to our cabin to pack.

Back at our room, we packed up, and turned in for our last night in the cabin.

Much Nature. Also tropical rainstorms is no joke

18122016

Asia, Cruise, Thailand

Last excursion of the cruise, last stop in Thailand, breakfast was again the buffet, so nothing new. We hurried down to the embarkation deck to take the tender to the port.

Koh Sumui was the stop for the day, this is one of those tropical paradise spots that attracts apparently Russians and Australians. The primary activity was a hike up the mountain to swim in a mountain stream. The itinerary even mentioned it was VERY STRENUOUS, but apparently some of the other tourists didnt take the itinerary seriously.

But ill get to that.

Once the tender got us to the pier, our group was broken into 4 micro-buses, each with their own guide, so really it was basically a ten person private tour. We were taken to a seafood market, that wasnt all that interesting after all the markets we have been through, but as i said, the primary activity was the hike.

So after the market we get up to the base of the mountain, got some fish food, and fed the fish in front of a Buddhist temple, to prove we were good people.

Laura and i actually saved most of our fish food to share with the various dogs in the area, especially the puppy.



So the river in which the fish were was the mouth of the river which we would eventually be swimming in up the mountain. It seemed to be moving very quickly.

Turns out overnight, it had stormed pretty hard, which as you can imagine swells up the riverbanks pretty significantly. We started walking up the mountain, crossing the first of many streams that were much larger than normal, and people started complaining. A lady asked 5 minutes into the walk “how far are we? how much longer?” the guide nearly laughed and said; we're not even one quarter of the way up.

It was very very strenuous, the hike would have been hard on a normal day, the rains made it a little dangerous. Laura and I got ahead of the main group and joined a sporty older couple from Seattle Area (we spoke to them some about moving there). The itinerary said a 30 minute walk, it took us a little over an hour.

When we got up to the top we saw the waterfall, and it was beautiful, but violent. The pool that we were supposed to swim in would probably have killed us if we had gotten in. When a guide made it up to us, he suggested we swim in one of the lower areas.

So we climbed back down, found a spot and disrobed to hop in the fresh mountain spring.

Firstly the water was very cold, it took a little while to get used to. As you eased into the chill water, you felt ALL THE LITTLE FISHIES NIP AT YOUR FEET.


That was weird, some people pay for this treatment, i certainly wouldnt. Luckily the water was moving so quickly, as soon as you got a few feet from the shore the fish couldnt handle the current.

We swam around some, didnt die, and then went back down the mountain.

Getting back down the mountain, after collecting up all the people that couldnt make it up we made our way to lunch. Lunch was at a restaurant near the pier where we are a more local meal than we had yet have, and it was unsurprisingly one of the better meals we had.

After lunch we had a few minutes to wander around the little town some, Laura bought some more elephant pants (loose fitting inexpensive cotton pants), and we made our way back to the tender.

The boat brought us back to our bigger boat, for more trivia and another dinner with our Aussie friends, before going to sleep, ready for our last full day on the ship.

100 Year old Market

17122016

Another early day for fighting Bangkok traffic. Ate the buffet, Laura has been eating Eggs Benedict nearly every day, and i've been rotating through sausage patty sammitches, and yogurt/granola.

This tour was not actually taking us into Bangkok, but to Klong Suan area. The tour guide was great. Her English was very good, and she knew lots of things about Thailand, and Bangkok and local social/cultural nuances.

We took another river tour, this on smaller boats through smaller canals

We saw more of the “local” life here, people fishing, and living on the river/canals.

We were taken to a market that was built up on stilts over the water.



We wandered around, and took pictures of the cats that were around. This market was big enough to absorb 40-some Western Tourists, so it was more comfortable than the time in Cambodia. We walked around and saw all the ware, paying extra attention to the foods. We were hesitant to eat anything on account of our soft-american tummies.

The bus picked us up right outside the market, and took us to a temple deeper in the city.

this was a really cool temple the Wat Sathon Wararam Worawihan (wiki link), full of people making devotions to whatever buddhist incarnation they needed to to get whatever ends they needed. And around the temple were all the shops selling the specific offerings for said devotions, be it eggs, flowers, incense, or trinkets.

After the temple we were taken to a Spa Resort outside the city for lunch. The food was pretty good, the guide warned us that Thai food was very hot, though we didnt find it to be too hot. We should have learned to temper our hopes, these guides are used to dealing with white-bre(a)d westerners, not spice chasing twentysomethings.

Again we were all about the WiFi in the hotel lobby.

The bus then took us back to the boat relatively early, as the next port was a ways away.

We were back in time for the various Trivia games, attended the Gala night in the Dining Room with our new Australian freinds. The food and company was great.

After dinner we played more trivia with said australians, stuck around to chat more with a third couple (these ones American) before going to bed.

Hungry FIsh

16122016

We landed in port very early in the morning, we felt the directional thrusters on the boat particularly violently this morning.

Ate the normal breakfast buffet, and made our way to the bus. Unfortunately the port the boat landed in Laem Chabang, is actually well outside of Bangkok, as in its over 100km away, plus Bangkok is notorious for its terrible traffic. So the way in the city took us a little over 2 hours. The little countryside we saw looked much like the Vietnamese and Cambodian countryside, various rivers and canals, rice paddies etc. However the city of Bangkok was clearly much larger the previously visited SE Asian cities.

Our tourguide on the bus wasn't so great, he didnt dispense is knowledge overly freely, and he was easily distracted by some of the people asking stupid questions (like the rules around driving a goddamn scooter).

When the bus finally got into the city it dropped us off at a pier for our river cruise. The boat was pretty big, easily fit all of us (25-30ish). The boat then took us along the river, (wiki link here), we saw various temples and government buildings.

At one point we stopped to feed the fish. Traditionally, people will feed animals, particularly around temples to show their generosity and generally illustrate that they are a good person.

The boat then took us over to one of the fancy hotels on the river for lunch. The food was overall pretty good, they had some good traditional Thai foods. Honestly we were more interested in the WiFi in the hotel lobby than the food.

We piled back on the bus, it drove us through the Chinatown of Bangkok. Which after being in ACTUAL China, wasnt all that amazing. They did seem to have way more Sharkfin soup places than we saw in actual China.

We then disgorged from the bus to visit the flowermarket. This was another not so great stop, it took us about 25 minutes to get there, they walked us through it taking about 15 minutes, and then spent another 35 minutes driving to the next stop.

I struggle to appreciate the reasons for taking us to the flowermarket, none of us can buy anything, as we are prohibited from bringing fresh fruits/vegetables/flowers back on the boat, and we are hurried through too quickly to have a snack or chat with anyone.

We then went to the Marble Temple (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wat_Benchamabophit).

Other than how pretty the temple grounds were, we didnt get much. As i said the guide didnt explain all that much. So read the wiki

Then we had the coup de gras of the day, the wonderful time in the Gem Market. This was the most egregious waste of our time on the trip (and as i am writing this well after getting off the boat, the ENTIRE trip).

The tour hurried us through the actual historical/cultural sites to ensure we had enough time in the Gem Market. This was one of the tourist traps where things are overpriced, the staff are overly pushy and the lights overly bright.

This place didnt even have the informational pitch like the lacquer shop and the pearl stop earlier in the trip.

After no one really purchased anything, we were hurried back on the bus to sit in 3 hours of traffic to get back to the boat.

Our bus was actually late, and we forced the boat to stay in port an extra few minutes.

Having missed trivia, we simply went to dinner, ate the tasty food, and went to bed.

Farm visits, Market Walks, and temples all sprinkled with Voyeurism

15122016

Asia, Cruise, Cambodia

Very early morning, we were in fact awake before the buffet. The port was actually a few hours away from the things we were going to see. We were near Sihanoukville, which is I guess a major city in Cambodia, I honestly know very little about Cambodia beyond the involvement of the US during the Vietnam war, and the post war Khmer Rouge atrocities.

The civil war (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambodian_Civil_War) started in the 1967 and ended in 1975, but then the Khmer Rouge did all kinds of awful shit for another 4 years (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambodian_genocide) but things didn't actually get better until Pol Pot died in 1998 and the Khmer Rouge really gave up.

The civil war, the genocide, the Khmer Rouge insurgency, all had a deep impact on the country, and it really shows. Cambodia, at least this part that we were in is by far the poorest area i have ever been in.

The first stop immediately made me uncomfortable. We stopped at a pepper plantation, which in itself isn't what unsettled me, it was the presence of the locals. Our tour guide was very knowledgeable, if curtailed a little by the language barrier. The tour bus, and 3 other tour buses rolled up to this small family owned peppercorn farm. Our guide explained how the peppercorn plants can produce 4-6kg of pepper (per year i think, i tried asking the guide but he didn't explain it directly).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_pepper

they dry them in the sun to make the black pepper, they boil them which essentially peels them, and then sundry them to make the red ones, and they use them fresh for cooking as green peppers.

What fucked me up about the experience was the farm family, or what i was led to believe was the family, they had a little girl probably 3 years old, that immediately a dozen people from the tour (read that as rich old white people) dropped to a knee and started snapping pictures of her.

Im certain the family gave some kind of consent to let us onto the farm, and expected these things to happen, and (I hope the tour agency paid them something for giving us access) a few tourists purchased bags of peppercorns (but we aren't allowed to bring agricultural products on the ship, nonetheless onto planes back to most Western countries...) to compensate them. But it felt very much like a spectacle.

The next stop was even worse.

They took us to a traditional fishing village. The village had a population of probably 500, and the tour agency dumped off 75ish tourists (again, rich old white people). This town can't just absorb that many people, especially when they are trying to go about their normal lives. The tour guide pointed out “how they live”. It felt very much like a zoo, and i think it was exacerbated by the people we were with. At one point a lady with a huge lens fancy camera (like a $2500 rig) was taking pictures of people without really asking them, and the particular instance that put a foul taste in my mouth about this lady, and honestly embarrassed me, was her pictures of a little girl.

She started taking pictures when the little girl realized she was being photoed she started bawling, and the camera-lady made a “did I do that?” gesture, and still snapped a few pics of the crying child.

It made me feel really shitty for being there.

We walked around for about 10 minutes, generally getting in people's way, and the the tour guides corralled us back onto the bus to gawk at the locals elsewhere.

That elsewhere was a market. The market was pretty neat, a covered market full of food stuff and flowers and bread and clothing and random shit. But again, it wasn't the kind of place 3 tour buses of westerners can just roll up to.

The guide began walking us around, but laura and i split off and walked our own circuit of the market and met back up with them.

It all felt very voyeuristic.

The bus then took us to lunch.

Lunch was good, allegedly traditional to Cambodia (allegedly because i have never had Cambodian cuisine, and have no internet to check it). The thing i liked the most was the stirfried fresh peppercorns and squid. Everything else was akin to the stuff served elsewhere in Southeast Asia, shrimp fried fish, a soup etc.

After lunch we began heading back to the port, as this was a quick stop for the cruise. The tourguide had a copy of The Killing Fields (wiki link here) for us to watch, which if you havent seen it is really good.

On the way home we stopped at a Buddhist temple complex.

This part was cool, and a pretty classic third world experience. There were little kids all over the place, they didn't seem to be looking to do anything nefarious, but i was immediately suspicious of them. While going into the temple one is expected to remove their shoes, out of respect, and for hygiene. And as you take your shoes off the little kids offer to hold your shoes for you.

Im not about to give a bunch of little shifty eyed kids the advantage here…

We say a lady open her wallet presumably to give some money to a beggar girl, and immediately get swarmed by other kids. I don't think she actually got robbed, she just wasn't intending to give out so much money,

After this we got back on the bus for the final few minutes back to the bus,

The guide had a lot to say, but given my lack of prior knowledge, his imperfect english (i don't blame him for this, he certainly had a grasp of english good enough to be an adequate tour guide, just not an excellent guide), and other tourists asking stupid questions (there is always that guy {especially on a trip with this demographic breakdown} that did not hear or wasn't listening to the previous statement made by the guide), i dont have that much history to sneak in.

The guide remembered what it was like under the Khmer Rouge. The endemic fear, and paranoia, the unseen violence. I wish I could have engaged him some more about this stuff, but our time in Cambodia was very short.

winner's bubbly

14122016



Woke up at a respectable time, Laura went to the gym to be healthy, I slept a little extra. We then headed to the dining room for lunch.

The dining room lunches are pretty great, 3 courses, plenty flavors, I had a grilled veggie pesto wrap, and Laura had a tuna poke tostada.

After lunch we went to trivia, a little too late, so we didn't have a team, just laura and I, we didn't do so hot, but we got a respectable 7/15.

From trivia we went to the auditorium thing, to listen to the Captains Brief. The captain sits on the stage and lets people ask questions for about 35 minutes. I got to ask one of my burning questions…

“How many of the passengers take ‘their last cruise into the sunset’? And what are the procedures when that does happen?”

He skirted the first question, but did explain that the procedures vary on the country they are docking in. Some countries require you to disembark the remains, and send it home, others do not allow you to disembark the remains and you leave it on board. But there is a morgue, so its all good, as long as the ship has power, it can stay on here forever.

Immediately after the captains brief was the Filipino Cultural Show. The staff on the boat are made up of predominantly Filipino and Indonesian, so the former get together and put on a little number to introduce the passengers to their culture. There were a few traditional dances and some singing, it was pretty neat. The whole show was directed and planned by the crew themselves, in fact the director is our second favorite bartender.

After this we went to meet some new friends for dinner. We have befriended two australian couples, mostly through trivia, but also just running into each other. They invited us to dinner to help them drink a bottle of champagne that they had.

This was also one of the Gala nights, where the dining room is more formal, and has more food, it is 4 courses instead of the normal 3. We ate the food and drank the bubbly and generally chatted, before going down for MORE trivia.

And we WON, not only did we win, but this was a good day to win, not only did we win a free bottle of Champagne, we also won some gold bracelets from the jewelry shop onboard. It was pretty great.

After trivia we played more scrabble, and then headed off to bed for the extra early morning before our day in Cambodia.

Like Istanbul, or New York

13122016


The night didn't go entirely well, as i mentioned yesterday there were vendors on the dock outside the ship, selling mostly tourist trash, but also beer, and water. And our fears were realized, albeit to a limited extent. The ice water the beer had been chilling in wasn't clean, and it upset our stomachs over night. Both of us had a minor fever and aches, neither of us had any violent episodes, just mild discomfort while sleeping. We will be more careful of street beers in the the future.

Last excursion in Vietnam, bus tour through Ho Chi Minh City (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saigon). The boat is docked in Phu My, again in a commercial port, the bus took about 80 minutes to get into the city to our first stop. The tour guide was very knowledgeable and very animated. Our first stop was the President’s Palace, now called the Unification Palace or some such (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independence_Palace).

This building was built by the US in the 1960s, to help prop up the South Vietnamese Government, this is also the the iconic building that the North Vietnamese Army captured by rolling Soviet and Chinese made tanks through the gate (actual tanks pictured below, they weren't fully de-milled, i am pretty sure with fresh fuel and some grease they could roll). And the footage of NVA soldiers waving the flag on a porch took place here as well (picture of location and FROM location below)

The compound had been the seat of the South Vietnamese Government with reception and banquet halls, offices and map rooms.

It also had an underground bunker complex.

it appears the Communist Government maintained much of the compound as it was when they captured it, and it has been beautifully maintained.

There was was sign that told the story of a true patriot that infiltrated the South Vietnamese Air Force and then revealed his allegiance to the liberation movement by actually bombing the Presidential Palace while on mission to bomb the the NVA across the border.

The tourguide hurried us along, but lectured through the whole thing, certainly providing insight that we wouldn't have gotten on our own.

We then went to a Lacquer and Wood handicraft shop. This was the part of the excursion that i think the tour companies in Vietnam are required to push to tourists. Vietnam is famous, actually much of Southeast Asia is famous for wood products, with all the Jungles they have ample supply of very high quality wood, and a history of working with wood. All this culminates in pretty nice pieces of art. Ultimately Laura and I were more entertained by the shop cat than the presentation.

We were then whisked off to lunch at a fancy hotel. It was a large buffet, many of the tours from our boat converged here for the lunch. While it was a buffet, which immediately brings to mind less than stellar food, it was satisfactory. Nothing was particularly interesting, but everything we ate was more than “ok” the pork short ribs were particularly tasty.

Over the course of lunch we made friends with an older Romanian couple; that settled in Los Angeles in the 1970s. They were very interesting, they have the passion and enthusiasm of a “Latin” peoples, but have a pinch of Russian in their language. They, like many of the other people on the boat were very entertained by our youth.

After lunch we were scheduled to go to the tallest building in the city, and do some upscale shopping. However the weather was shit, the rain has followed us south, and to my surprise all the other people on the bus elected to skip that part all together and get some more bus touring in. The guide drove us around downtown, pointing out statues and monuments and major buildings. We stopped for a moment at the Central Post Office (wikilink) and Notre Dame Cathedral (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notre-Dame_Cathedral_Basilica_of_Saigon).

The post office was big, and obviously a post office, had some touristy junk shops too. We peeked in, and then went back across the street to the Cathedral. As you can see in the pictures it is pretty boring, which in itself is noteworthy. i have never seen a Catholic Cathedral so bland.

It was built by the French, in 1880. I presume the wars and communist government have not been kind to the place, but it was almost completely bare inside.

We then got back on the bus to go to the Historical Museum (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museum_of_Vietnamese_History) or shop in the immediate area. We followed the guide through the museum. We only got a cursory walk through as we are forever short on time on these tours. The guide started us in Stone Age times, apparently Vietnam was one of the first places settled by modern humans with artifacts dating back 300,000 years. The guide then walked us into the Bronze Age, and then the Chinese domination, and then the Mongol Domination, and then the Chams, and paid particular attention to the Hindu art left by the Cham peoples.

We were then brought back to the bus for our 90 minute drive back to the boat.

This tour didn't feel nearly as forced as the last one, there was really only the one “gift shop” that we were obligated to visit, though this one had a bit more technical explanation as to what goes into all these lacquered products. It helps that all the people on the boat were down to skip the bullshit and wander about museums.

Once back on the boat we ate at the special barbecue around the pool. It was Asian themed, I had a stir fried noodle thing, Laura had the various meats, and we both had a bunch of the steam buns.

We then hit up the trivia in the bar, this has been a regular thing for us, we have met cool people, and i have found my near endless supply of random knowledge to be useful.

We played scrabble, another regular activity for us on the boat. And then hit the evening happy hour, drinking some mojitos. After the drinks, we went back to our cabin for sleeps, ready for our next lazy sea day.