X'mas Party, the Netherlands

On the 15th of December, we had a company Christmas party. Every year, I was alone at the party as I’ve had a long distance relationship. BUT this year, both Josh and I were invited to the party with a nice treat from my company so that Josh could travel without any cost on us. Besides, I was suggested to take a week off while Josh was in town. What a treat! I had the best Christmas gift even before the Christmas day! Plus, to avoid “drink and drive”, we all stayed at the hotel where we had the dinner; no worries about drinking a lot and partying hard! (Ok, some people had too much! It showed the next morning at the breakfast.) Anyways, this party was awesome, and I may stay in the Netherlands forever…!

By the way, about the dress code; we were supposed to dress up, but I did not expect the guys to wear tuxedos (of course, with a bow tie)! That is “dress up”! I’ve seen guys in tuxedos before, but it was at Casino Night or in movies. It seems when Dutch people have formal dinner party, they dress up REALLY well. I actually really liked it though. At the end of a year, having a nice meal in formal clothes is really nice. My British boss and Josh (American) were in regular suites. I suppose this is something very Dutch?

Paris, France

On the 5th and 6th of December, I went to Paris. On the way back, I stopped by this souvenir shop, and the first thing that caught my eyes was Foie Gras. (Ok, the first thing that caught my noise was cheese. (me no like cheese.) I’ve never bought this expensive canned food before.
I have eaten foie gras in a restaurant, but I’ve never bought one to cook. I was really hesitating if I should get it or not because I had no idea how foie gras was packed in the small can or how to cook it myself. But I told myself that if I didn’t get it now, I would have never bought it. Or I probably would spend as much time to determine whether to buy one or not. There is always a first time with everything, so there I go. I bought that one expensive canned food.
I actually got to taste one; raw foie gras (or just as is from a can) on a piece of bread. Ok. This is not my favorite way to eat this thingy. I can really imagine or feel the liver with my tongue.

When Josh came in town, we open the can. We both were very excited but at the same time very nervous. We didn’t know what to expect. When we opened the can, there is this yellow gelatin thing on top of the foie gras; not that beautiful thing to look at, especially on something we are about to eat.

Josh had a little piece as is from the can on bread, but no second bite. That tells you something. I sautéed 1cm-thick foie gras slices with salt and pepper. Ohhh…this was so good! After sautéing the second half, I added red wine into the pan to make sauce. It came out to be good as well! Overall, it was fantastic! I think I’ll get it again the next time!

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Finally, I came home to Amsterdam. After I parked my car coming from the airport, it was about 8am, and here is the view of Amsterdam at 8am. I totally forgot about the mornings in Europe (Northern). It's dark!
Oh man, I miss Asia!

Manila, Philippine

I came to Manila, Philippines. It is a trip from November 27th rough December 1st.

After being occupied by Spain, Philippine was occupied by the United States, so their cultures are not like typical Asian. Their original religion was Islam but now most of the people are Catholic. According to my colleague, Philippines are pretty much religious. Also, Manila is an international city, so everybody can speak very good English. I don’t think it is limited to Manila, but the entire Philippines. Therefore, those jobs which were relocated to India are nowadays come into Philippines. Philippine’s English has American accent, so call centers prefer to employee Philippines than Indians because of the Indian accent. It seems Indians immigrate to Philippines nowadays. Depends on jobs, some of them are from Britten, so there are schools that teach British accent in Philippines. I respect their seriousness in their work.

On the way from the airport, Manila looked more like Jakarta. But the next morning, Manila was different in daylight. It is much more developed than Jakarta. I haven’t seen any other areas of Philippines, but I don’t think this country can qualify for the third world. Their shopping malls are as big or even bigger than Americans and very fancy. Their Christmas decorations are everywhere. I think it is as much as the ones in New York City.

However, I can see some of the Third World sides; for example, children staying outside until late, many skinny street dogs, terrible traffic jams and ignore traffic lines on the streets, the programming of traffic lights is not efficient enough, coffee at work is instant one, it is not allowed to flush toilet paper in the restrooms and so on.

Usually, the hotels in those cities are excellent compared to the price you pay, plus something like massages are relatively good price, too. That’s my best luxury.
I’m not sure about Filipino food. The first night, to celebrate that I was in Philippines, I ordered Filipino food. I had two bites, and I couldn’t eat the rest. The menu said it was rice noodles with seafood. I thought the rice noodles were like Vietnamese or Chinese, but Filipino ones were thicker and clear and rubbery. However, the Filipino restaurant that I was brought to the last night was very good. Maybe it is depending on the meals.

Speaking of hotels (or anywhere else), I realized that in Asia or at least in Philippines and Indonesia, people call your name with “Mr” or “Ms”. Also, when they say something, they attach “sir” or “ma’am” in every sentence. It is amazing. I can see that they are showing the respect, but I’m not better than them. I guess being customers is something to do with that…? In Japan, we say customers are God. They may have the same attitude, perhaps. But listen to this. The first morning, when I left my room, I saw a housekeeper in the hall way about 5 doors down. When I passed by him, he goes “Good Morning, Ms. Nakazawa.” I was very surprised the fact that he knew who I was. Remember, he could not see my room number from where he was! But I think he had a list of guests, so he could check it up before I passed him. Okay, understandable. The next morning, I saw him again and passed by each other. He again goes “Good morning, Ms. Nakazawa” with full smile on his face! Amazing! He didn’t even have anything in his hands. Services are excellent anywhere in Asia! Loving it!

The second night, I was brought to a crab restaurant. The food was fantastic, and this is one of the dishes. It is 1.5 kg crab! And that is the only crabs they had, so we had no choice but left with a good one! This was cooked in Szechuan style, so I guess it was not Filipino food.

The work I did in Manila was training. The company I worked with created this banner for the week. It is about 2m x 50cm standing on the floor in front of the building entrance and in the training room. Ok, my last name is misspelled (bottom), but I felt like I became a star! This was the first time to see my name on a banner, so it was pretty cool. They even gave it to me for souvenir, but not sure what to use it for or when. Usually, we accept only maybe up to eight attendees in training course, but this time there were max 35! That’s a lot of people. And we were in this amphitheater room, so I totally felt like a professor. Besides, I had to use a microphone; the heavy duty, real microphone, not a pin-microphone. I hadn’t held that kind of microphone for 15 years since Karaoke century in Japan. Actually, I sounded good, so I kept talking for the whole three days! I even did standup comedy for 30 minutes (seriously)!

I am not sure if there are Philippines traditional sightseeing places, but when I asked my coworkers, she told me about shopping malls. They are not sightseeing places to me! Anyways, I did not get to see any traditional Philippines this time. Manila started being developed about 10 years ago, but most buildings started creating the skyscraper for the past few years. It is amazing how big the city is and built in such a short period. And more and more new buildings are being built as of now. The next time, I would love to see country side of Philippines.

Bali, Indonesia III

Even though I like visiting sightseeing places, what I enjoy the most from any trips is to look out of window from a car. I can see the actual local life styles; no fancied up for tourists, but what's actually local people are facing every day. It sometimes could be the struggle to survive day by day depends on the country.

When I saw this scene above from the car, the picture was so cute; a little girl grabbing her father on the scooter enjoying the ride. When our car was passing them, I realized that there was another little boy in the front of the fater (left). Now, that’s not cute anymore. That’s a dangerous scene.

I also saw many kids riding scooters with their friends. They look like 10 years old. It is incredible. I asked the tour guide if kids were allowed to ride scooters. He says not when police is around. Amazing! They are not even teenagers!

In Bali, even though most of the businesses are related to tourists, there are others, too. Harvesting rice is a major one. Balinese harvest rice three times a year. It is incredible, but it makes sense because it is hot all the time. What I was curious to know was that in one field, the rice is ready to be cropped (already brown), but the other area has just planted rice (green).

In Japan, we always have a season to crop rice; that is fall. However, where it is hot all year long like Bali, then when is the season for anything? I understand that the temperature doesn’t change much in Bali, but there are two seasons; dry and rainy seasons. I wonder how this applies to the harvests. Do pineapples grow better in dry weather than rainy? I’m not sure. What I know is that their fruits are fantastic!

These are some areas that are famous for stone carvings. When we passed by, there are so many stones shaped like Buddha, elephants, naked ladies, monkeys, you name it. It seems like they are mostly religion related though. They are made out of different stones. Some of them look very old, but probably it’s something to do with the color of stones. Brown ones make them look very old.

Guess what these are. These are mangos. I’d never seen mango trees. It was cool. I didn’t even think about mangos being on the tree. When I think about it, it makes sense though. They are like apples. This is what happens when shopping fruits or vegetables from super markets all our lives. We forget the fundamentals or don't even think about it. (Is it only me?)

Cows in the back of a track. Cows are very expensive in Bali, (or maybe anywhere else) and they cost about 1,000 USD each. Now, that's expensive considering their standard living costs (average annual salary - 800USD). According to the guide, those cows are sold to become food or to grow bigger to be sold later on for a higher price.

The difference between Indian cows and Balinese is that Balinese ones are in good shape and mostly, they are tied to something like a tree where as Indian cows are walking everywhere like human being and very skinny like you can see the bones. Speaking of animals, I also so many bird cages on the streets or hanging out of roof. I thought these were for little pet birds, but actually they were for chicken! They could be roosters.

For upcoming festival, each house had some decoration in front of their gate. It is a long bamboo standing, and the top is bent. The top edge part of the bamboo is representing rich people. By having the bamboo bent, it symbolizes that rich people are looking after poors. Also, there is an umbrella opened and tied to the bamboo. It is a symbol of moon. There are two different colors of umbrella; yellow or white. They are symbolized for women and men. A few of the houses have both color umbrellas, but most of them have only one, yellow or white. When we were going through this town, I saw one side of the street having yellow umbrellas, and the other side with white. They were very beautiful together.

I enjoyed my one and a half days of Bali experience. I would love to come back again at least for a week. Next time, instead of having very busy schedules, I would stay in a hotel for a few days relaxing having no plans. I would go down to the beach any time I want, and take massage whenever I feel like. The rest of the time, I would go out to explore more Bali! It would be fantastic if I could bring my parents.

Bali, I will be back!

Bali, Indonesia II

I'm not sure where to start. There are so many things that I would like to write about. Okay, let me start from when I arrived at the airport in Bali.

When I arrived in Bali, I wanted to get some cash. There were no ATMs around, so I walked up to exchange service counter. There were about 5 of them lined up next to each other. As soon as clerks see me walking towards them everybody starts screaming “come here come here!!” what a competition. I thought exchange counters are more like banks. Yeah, they are competitive, but they don’t really show it. Besides, usually there is only one exchange service at one location or at least you don see them side by side. I picked the counter where the lady approached me first because I realized that they all have the same exchange rate. I felt guilty for the rest of them. What a competitive place.

The second day, I took a day tour. I was expecting a bunch of people waiting for the same tour guide at the hotel lobby. It turned out that I got a dedicated guide for myself, but not only that, I also got my own driver! When we, the guide, the driver and me, got in the car, I was a bit reluctant to be honest thinking “they could just drive off not bringing me back to the hotel.” As soon as I saw other tourists having their own guides at sightseeing locations, I felt relieved. It seems it is not so common to have a tour group with a bus, but rather having a private guide with a private driver with a regular car, in my case, Civic.

My first destination was the second biggest temple in Bali called Taman Ayun built in 17th century. The picture above is the gate of the temple, and the picture on the left is inside the palace. Those buildings are called Meru, shrines. They were so beautiful standing right up in the blue sky! According to the tour guide, mountains are admired as holly or God by Balinese, so Meru shrines have a shape of cones because they symbolize mountains.

Tourists cannot go inside the palace because it is holly, but there is a path going around the temple palace to see what’s inside.

	People were getting ready for a big celebration that happens once every fifty years. Lots of people, both women and men, were working together.
	Another group of women were preparing lunch for the workers. These are made out of rice. I would call them rice balls, but they are not balls. Remember, scones symbolize mountains, so rice balls for workers also shape like scones!

The second location was called Tanah Lot, a temple in the ocean. This was pretty cool. You can walk to the temple during the day (low tide) if you are ready to wet your butt (just kidding but close to that). This was pretty cool to see it right there, but also from the cliff where I took this picture from.

The opposite from where I was standing, there was more shrines. These shrines are even more beautiful during the sunset. Imagine their figures shaped clearly in black of the orange background!

The good thing about having your own tour guide and driver is that you get to decide what you want to see. Another location with the tour package was to go to something called “Monkey Forest.” Okay, I’ve seen lots of monkeys in Japan, and they even attack you if you have food. I’m not a big fan of that. I asked the tour guide if Balinese enjoy something like that. He said no, but tourists like it. So I asked him to take me to somewhere else. Then, he brought me to very tourist beach called Kuta. It was beautiful with lots of surfers both tourists and locals. They are really tanned to black almost. Amazing! This is the place the bombing happened in 2002 at a very popular night club. Kuta is really different from any other Bali areas I think. It’s like Miami; there are lots of shops and restaurants on a street. You can’t tell you are in third world country. That part of the island is something else. It was good to see the place, but I will stick with Nusa Dua where I stayed. (I think the tour guide said it means “two islands”)

Indonesian lunch at the end of the tour.

I was supposed to come back around 4pm, but somehow, I was back to the hotel at 2:30. So I got extra time to go down to the beach! After going into the water for a few minutes, I was laying down at the beach relaxing. It was very relaxing. I needed it!

By the way, about the tour guide, I think I kinda got ripped off. He was very nice and all that, but at each location, he tells me about the place in three sentences or so, and then says “take pictures”. After I take pictures, we walk to the next location where he again says “this is a great location to take pictures. Go ahead” and he waits. I wanted to know more history or culture about the place. I think 70$ was too much for that guide. Does this sound like I got ripped off?

Bali, Indonesia

Bali!! I arrived in the evening of the 25th of November and left early morning on the 27th; the total of 1.5 day weekend trip. And the special part of this trip is… it’s for leisure, not for work!

I have been to Jakarta, but this is the first time for me in Bali. Compared to Jakarta, Bali is much more developed. It is not so crowded and has very nice atmospheres including people. According to my tour guide, Bali’s economy totally relies on tourists. Without tourist, there is almost no job in Bali. 90% of people work for business some what related to tourists. Therefore, after year 2002 and 2005, Bali was really really quiet for a long time. Finally, the economy has been coming back he says. I thought that tourist related business is only hotels, but like actual sightseeing locations (temples etc), taxis, airlines and more are heavily related. I did not realize.

The picture looks like sunset, but actually it is 5:30 in the morning. The pink before the sun rises.

This is after the sunrise. It is mooi (beautiful)!

Sydney, Australia II

The last morning in Sydney, I decided to take a walk in the neighborhood of my hotel. It was a beautiful day again. The sun was shining and it was perfect temperature. Everybody is in a short sleeves and a pair of short pants. Because it was Saturday, there was a market right out of the hotel; there were not so much of interesting stuff, but mainly for tourists.

The picture is a view of Sydney downtown from the harbor. Lots of people use these ferries for their commutes. Some people takes this ferry for thirty minutes from Manley or some come from about ten minutes away. Anyhow, there are so many destinations, so the port is always busy. It is almost impossible to take a picture of Opera House without a ferry in it. That’s how often they go back and forth.

On the way to the Opera house, I saw Aborigine street performers. I am not sure if I should called those two guys performers because in front of them, there was a chair. And when tourists come by, they let him/her sit on the chair, and his/her friend takes a picture while those performers take a pose like any cheesy characters. I rather tip the guy playing music right next to them with a traditional music instrument; it looks like a long branch with a whole. It makes interesting sound. My colleague in NL has one in the office. It was funny to see bunch of those at the market as I always wonder what it was. Anyways, those Aborigines stand out on the street, not because they are among white people but because they are almost naked and put some white stuff on their faces, hair and bodies. I wanted to take a picture of them, too but they were just too scary.

What surprised me when I walk on the street in Sydney is a fly. They fly around you even if you don’t have any food. I thought it was only me, but it happens all the time. It reminded me of India, but flies didn’t come to me.

The bridge. Okay, I do not know why this bridge is famous. Perhaps, I should look it up on Wikipedia. I actually had this kind of bridge in my neighborhood in New York, but my bridge was not famous at all. I wonder…

The postcards with Kangaroos on them are exactly the same ones that I bought ten years ago when I was here. It was shocking to see the same cards again, so I had to get them. I even forgot about those until I saw them. I guess the design of postcards don’t change for at least ten years. The boomerang is a gift from my client. I usually don’t buy any local items when I travel, but because I’m all the way to Australia, I was thinking about getting something, so I was very excited to get one as a gift. Aborigines were catching kangaroos with this by hitting in their heads. If they miss, the boomerang comes back to where you stand. It’s a well designed item which should be awarded for some kind of prize.

On the way to the airport, this taxi driver talked a lot. As soon as I told him that I was Japanese, he started talking his Japanese experiences when he was there a couple years ago. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the conversations with a taxi driver as long as it is not 6 in the morning. When I think about it, the driver on the way from the airport a few days ago also was talking a lot! This guy was talking to me even in Japanese about when he was living there for six years as a student. Anyways, I don’t think it is only taxi drivers that I met but Australians in general are very friendly. Because it is so much fun to listen to their accent, I let them talk as much as they want.

Bye-bye, Sydney!

Sydney, Australia

Sydney! 24hour trip from Amsterdam. The first flight took 12 hours to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and then another 8 hour flight to Sydney. Including the layover time, it was a 24hour trip. If I count the time difference, it took a day and a half. I arrived on the 21st of November, and I am going to leave on the 25th in the morning. It is only three day (actual) trip, but I’m happy to be here!

The hotel I am staying at is located the opposite side from Opera House. I love seeing this view on the way to work every morning. Of course, it is almost summer in Australia. It is very strange. It was 38 degree (100F) yesterday, and the air condition in the building was not properly working, so we were sweating at work. It seems January is the mid summer here.

The decorations are already Christmassy (no Thanksgiving here) everywhere, and it is hilarious to see people walking by in short sleeves and short pants. I love it! Since I was a child, I was very curious about this country having the opposite seasons compared to our standard ones. To actually be in the situation is pretty cool, especially, this Christmas season; “Santa clause on a surf board” kind.

Today, when I went to Starbucks, my latte came in a red Christmas cup. But once I step outside, it’s totally summer; a gorgeous sunny day. It is hard to describe, but you would feel something is not right.

I’ve been to Australia ten years ago. Sydney was one of the cities that I visited. I was still a student, and I had no English speaking ability. So, now that I speak English, I can enjoy the stay here like for the first time. It is certainly a totally different feeling to be here. Especially, to be able to hear Australian accent is a bonus for me now. It is an interesting accent. To me, it sounds more like British accent, but Australians don’t think so, or at least that’s what the people who I work with claim. When I told this person that I’d been here ten years ago, he goes “so you must have been eye-t.” I had no idea what he just said. I was going through my “translation” dictionary between Australian-American English and realized that he meant “eight (8)”. Oh man, it is hard! Anyways, I answered, “No, I was four back then.”

The first night, I was taken to this Australian BBQ place. They have a grill outside, so you pick meat or fish from showcase, and then place it on the grill by yourself. It is totally up to you how you want to cook it. There is a cheat guide by the grill that describes how long you should leave the meat on the grill depending on how you like it. It was something that is new to me, and I really enjoyed being around the grill with people chatting while my steak is cooking! Of course, guys started talking about their home BBQ grills even after we sat down to enjoy our lovely steaks.

Ljubljana, Slovenia II

I decided to go home earlier than originally planned. I was going to stay an extra day here, but because of off season, I realized that the tours are not running anymore. I could still go on my own taking a buss to different tourist places, but I’d rather go home and relax before the next long trip.

Last night, I went to this restaurant where they server Slovenian traditional food. I was not sure what to order, so I let the waiter pick one for me. He recommended the deer steak. Ok. I haven’t had a deer dish before, so why not. I ordered. Hm… the dish was great with cherry sauce with lots of cherries. But I felt bad or sorry for deer. I have no problem having beef steaks, but deer steaks. When I think about it, deer is much cuter than a cow. They are totally different animals, just the way they are input in my brain. Sorry cows, you are not that cute but tasty.

the atomosphere in Ljubljana is similar to Italy. I’ve been to Austria only once, but Ljubljana has similar architecture to Austria (Ok, I’ve been to only Salzburg). It makes sense though because Slovenia is right next to Italy and Austria. At night, the walk along the river is pretty nice with lights. It kind of reminded me of Amsterdam, but the difference is that Amsterdam has orange or yellowish lights where as in Ljubljana has white lights; Small difference, but it does make some difference as a whole.

A chandelier hanging down from sky in the middle of a square. It lights up at night, too. It’s pretty neat!

One of the things I liked about Slovenia is the people. They treat guests very formally. I cannot speak for the service in restaurants, but certainly at work, I got treated very well. For example, I was asked often if I wanted another cup of coffee. I think it’s pretty nice.

Bye-bye Slovenia. I don’t think I will be back other than for work.

Ljubljana, Slovenia

I came to a country called Slovenia. Okay, I admit. I didn’t even know the existence of this country. I am here from November 12th through the 19th. Slovenia became independent from Yugoslavia in 1991. It is located in the Northeast of Italy with a population of 2 million people. It is not many, but they have their own language, Slovenian. It is amazing that they can go to Venice by car in one hour or so. I was pretty excited when I heard that people go for shopping on the weekend to Italy! It sounds fantastic!

Currently, their local currency is Toler (SIT), but as of January 2007, they will start using Euros. And it seems there are going to be only two months to keep both currencies after January 1st. It is kind of amazing that people lose the “money” they’ve lived with in only a couple of months! I cannot imagine losing Japanese Yen like that! I lived with it! Anyhow, it seems there are coins with Toler, but people don’t use them. So most of the machines like ATM or vending machines are not made for coins, only for paper bills. However, Euros are full of coins, so there are major changes in those machines right now. Also, all the savings in bank accounts will be automatically converted to Euros over night. That’s serious programming. I would not want to be responsible for that! Anyways, I always thought that converting local currency to Euros are quite convenient, but I didn’t even think about all the troubles that come with it!

Tonight, I went out for dinner by myself for the first time in months. There had been many trips, but it seems I did not go out for dinner on my own. I didn’t even realize it until tonight. It has been a little different from when I was in the united states making trips. When I travel now, I usually have someone with me or the people who I work with take me out for dinner. Probably that is because I go abroad, usually pretty far away. So, it was a bit lonely to have dinner by myself tonight. I’m used to be alone, but certainly it is much better if I have someone to have conversation with over meal; especially when I go out to eat.

Family Day

Family Day; an event from work held on the 11th of Nov. All of my colleagues were invited with their family. All together, we were more than thirty people, including 15+ kids. It was like a zoo to be honest.
We got together at noon, and we had Middle Eastern lunch. And then, we went to this place where we had a two hour workshop for African music (picture).

Kids were also learning how to use this African music instrument.

After the music workshop, there was this African dance lesson. It was supposed to be for kids only, but somehow, we all ended up dancing together. This picture was taken by my colleague who did NOT join for the dancing part, but contributing to the music part (yeah, right). This picture makes us look like we are doing Tai Chi, doesn’t it? It actually looks pretty funny. But this African dance was very fast beat, and we all were sweating in the end, or at least I was.

At the end of the day, we went out for Ethiopian dinner. The food was pretty interesting. It came out in a very large plate for about four people’s food. The way to eat it is that you take a piece of the pancake, and take some of the "stuff" and eat it by hand. (We didn't know what they were.) This pancakes were too sour that most people didn’t like that much. We ended up stealing kids’ meals which were French fries, nuggets and some other fried stuff. So the food was not people's favorite. I don’t think I will go there again either.

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Red Light District.

When my colleague from Sweden came to visit, I took him to the Red Light District. I took this picture then. For the people who are not familiar with this, I would call it “a prostitute vending machine.” You walk around to pick the best suitable for your needs, and you negotiate with the girl by the door and then disappear into the room. That’s when the curtain on the door is shut so you know the girl is busy “working.” Amazing.

As you can see, there is a group of guys staring at the lady in the shopping window. It looks so sad, doesn’t it? But just like any women to be exact. We do browse shopping, touch but no buy (that easily).

Philadelphia, US

Philly cheese steak.

The trip to the US was from the 21st of October until the 29th for 9days. I was in Philadelphia for 5 days, but I got to “see” Philadelphia only for a day. Josh had a conference in DC, so we got together in Philly on the weekend. We went to touristy places, and at the end of the day, we had to hit this Philly cheese steak place on South street! Okay, it was supposed to be the best in Philly, but I did not think it was that special. In other words, it was not as good as I expected. It was good, but not as good to meet my high expectations.

Other than cheese steak, I did jogging with my colleagues to Art Museum 6:30 in the morning one day. We jogged up on the stairs and looked down the view of Philadelphia! Some guys were screaming like Rocky! That was pretty cool.

New York, US

A trip to New York City. Actually, I had a conference in Philadelphia, but I became a tour guide for my colleagues and client in NYC on the weekend. It was one day trip from Philadelphia, and I put in lots of sites in the plan, so everyone was very tired at the end of the day. But hey, how often do we get to come to NYC?

This was the first time back to the states after I left for Amsterdam in April. What surprised me was that I actually like Amsterdam better than New York! I certainly miss NY, no doubt about that, but I did not feel like I was back home. I guess Amsterdam is my home now, especially when I smell Marijuana in my neighborhood after a long trip, that's when I feel I'm home nowadays. It's scary.

Malmo, Sweden

From Oct 9th through the 13th, I went to Lund, Sweden. Usually, I spend all nights in Lund, but this time, I asked my colleague to take me to Malmo for dinner. Malmo is a much bigger city than Lund. It is a beautiful city with beautiful buildings. But, I actually like Lund better. It is a very quiet small city (town?) and there are many of very cute houses and buildings. I really like the unique atmosphere that Lund has.

Hong Kong, China III

Breakfast at the airport. Although I really enjoyed the dinner from Chinese restaurant the night before, I guess I didn’t have enough yet. When I arrived at the airport around 8 in the morning, the first thing it caught my eyes was this Chinese breakfast. There were many different kinds of “traditional Chinese breakfast” in the menu, and here is what I picked. The one of the left is I would call it, rice soup. I think they had it named as “conegee”. Basically, it is soup that has rice in it. The soup could be made out of chicken flavor with ginger. It was really good. The one on the right is so they called “beef wrapped in rice sheet”. It is like dumpling skin wrapping grounded beef inside and steamed. It comes with sweet soysauce. It is good. I usually have this at Dim Sum. It’s good to recognize something that I know of. Their menu was totally bzar. I had a hard time ordering breakfast because I don’t recognize most of the namings even though it has English description. Oh, I asked for Xiaolongbao, but they didn’t have it yet. I guess it was still too early for that. At least I tried.

One of the things I learned on this trip is that there is no tax in Hong Kong. That’s why lots of tourists come for shopping! … but what about social security? I asked about it, and the answer was “No.” Well, if they don’t pay tax, I guess it is normal that there is no social security. But something doesn’t sound good to me. When I really thought about it, I realized that those waiters and waitresses in restaurants look like they are in twenty’s. After ordering meals, usually old ladies bring out the dishes from kitchen. They don’t really speak to customers. If there is no pension, there is no income at all, so if you do not have children, then you have to work for the income on your own, no matter how old you are. That kind of made me think. The people who really enjoy about no tax are only tourists in the end?

Another thing that I learned is that there are two kinds of Indonesians in Indonesia; Chinese-Indonesian and Indonesian-Indonesian. Heidi belongs to the first. This conversation started out of nothing. In Indonesia, I remember people eat with a folk and a spoon almost all the time. But when we were in Chinese restaurant, I realized that she uses chopsticks very well, so I asked her who taught her how to use them. She said, “my mom. She’s Chinese.” I was like… “what???” Heidi’s parents are Chinese born in Indonesia. They are 5th or 6th Chinese generation in Indonesia. Since Heidi was a child, her mother told her not to marry Indonesian-Indonesian, and she says it is pretty normal in her country. With Indonesian-Indonesian, the same thing happens. They are not told not to marry a Chinese-Indonesian.

Chinese-Indonesians are usually Christian or Buddhist. Indonesian-Indonesians are usually Moslem. The interesting thing is that the government is not allowing a couple to get married from different religions. Heidi says this rule came out when the government found out that the ratio of Christianity had been increasing. Because the government supports Islam, they are trying to keep the ratio as is or more. Therefore, they are not allowing different religious people to get married. Therefore, most likely, Chinese-Indonesians will carry Chinese-Indonesian children in the future and the same with Indonesian-Indonesians. They won’t come across each other. I personally think that because of this culture (separate themselves from each other), the gap between rich and poor won’t be smaller, or it’ll take a long time to get it small. Usually Chinese-Indonesians own business and therefore rich where as Indonesian-Indonesians are the other way around.

I was born in Japan, and I was raised in such a culture that I believed it was “standard”. And I had this idea that it is standard in any other countries, but after thirty years of my life, I realize it is not the case.

I learn something on every trip.

Hong Kong, China II

Heidi and I were looking for MTR (Hong Kong Subway) station, so as soon as we saw this sign, we went down the stairs, no question. Guess what? We did not find the entrance to the subway. We were so confused, and went back and forth make sure that there is no subway station. Finally we realized that this “subway” means “underground path”. So, this was just a path to go across the avenue underneath the ground. Great. How confusing! The actual subway station was about a few blocks away from here. No street sign to it.

Can you see this? (Click on the image for the larger view.) This is the scaffolding made out of bamboo! I thought this was so Asian and very old style. At least, I haven’t seen this in Japan. I wonder if Japan used to use bamboos for scaffolding as well. Heidi from Indonesia says that this is normal in Indonesia. She says bamboo is very strong. I can understand that, but they use bamboo for even higher than 10 stories buildings! I would not want to get up there!

There are so many people in Hong Kong. I realized this when I was here last time, but oh man! People are everywhere! And what’s irritating is that they walk slow! To me, so slow. I’m used to Osaka and New York pace, so I cannot walk behind slow walkers… When there are so many slow walkers on the street, you know how it is like. Oh man!

The last night in Hong Kong, I enjoyed Chinese food. Heidi suggested for Korean food, but I had to say NO! The one in the front is steamed sticky rice with pork. This is really sticky, and this was so good! The one in the back is fried boney chicken with lots of chili. Okay, we are the one ordered this, but what are we supposed to eat? There are more chilies than chicken on the plate! It was good though. Oh boy. Heidi was eating the whole chili here and there. I just couldn’t watch. It’s just painful when I think about putting that in my mouth. But I guess Indonesians are used to hot food. She says that if she doesn’t have spicy food at least once a day, she doesn’t feel like she had a meal. Well, that’s why we ordered this dish. Of course, I again ordered Xiaolongbao. I am in love with this thing!

This time, I arrived on the 30th of September until today, 5th of October; the total of 5 day stay in Hong Kong. I really enjoyed the trip again. I am going home this morning departing at 10:30am to Amsterdam. I am not looking forward to the 12hour flight, but I am to go home. Next time, I would like to go to Shanghai or Beijing for some change!
The picture is day-time Hong Kong.