A short guide to what I have been doing when too lazy to blog properly:
Taiwan - Saw Geoff, is his usual slow self. Taipei is a bit average, but the country as a whole is pretty beautiful. Lucky me got stuck by a typhoon. People excellent, very generous and friendly. A great contrast to travelling in much of Asia.
HK - Not a lot to say, except go there. It is an excellent place, clean, modern, everything works wonderfully, some good sights and a surprising amount of unspoilt countryside. But if you're staying in a dorm room try to avoid one with a Frenchman in it. Our Frenchman vomited on himself, the floor and the guy in the bed next to him.....he was so traumatized he left the hostel at 4am and slept rough for two days.
Macau - Do you like gambling?
Bangkok - Its usual sordid self.
Vientiane, Laos - Quiet town by day, insanely cheap party central by night. Was gonna be here one night, now on our third, hopefully pick ourselves up tomorrow to finally make it out. Did you know that it is illegal for foreigners to sleep with Lao girls? Weird.
Sunday 28 September 2008
Wednesday 10 September 2008
Long time
Hmmm....lot of things happened in three weeks, where to start? Well, did some travelling in Korea.
Busan: Nice hostel, but first night I am the only guest. So June, the owner takes me out to meet his friends for dinner. Turns out his friend is a music manager for hotel/club acts. He brings over cheap Bulgarians and even cheaper Filipinos and works them for months at a time. He makes money, they also do, everyone is happy. Anyway, we're going to see a five girl all sister Filipino band perform. Turns out three are unbeleivably fit, the other two are average - not bad all the same. Bit more worrying is their father's control over them. He is definitely in charge and has decided their name should be, bizarrely to my ears, 'The Daughters.' - in line with this, every so often they shout out in unison 'we are the daughters!' The sisters, or the family, fine, but I find the daughters odd. When their dad is not in charge, one of the Bulgarians is trying to instruct them. 'you come to me, i make it better, do what I say, come to me, i make it better' - its friendly enough, but weirdly Soviet. Also, all the Bulgarian men are big, or look just like Dimitar Berbatov. Bulgarian women are blonde with their hair pulled back really tightly.
Later, we go to dinner, where we meet a friend of Boris (a Bulgarian who very much resembles Berbatov) - this is Mr Cho from the Tourism Board. He pays for our food and makes us drink lots of soju, whilst shouting 'this is Korean style' a lot. He then insists we go to a norabang, where we meet a short man from the Korean Broadcasting System and a few of his scallys. Mr Cho then proceeds to make us drink beer from a plate, which is also 'Korean style' apparently. Being Korea, he is the elder and is therefore in charge as long as he pays for EVERYTHING. I dont mind, I dont like to pay for things. Rest of evening spent observing Mr Cho as he tries to molest all the girls in the room in a comical fashion, interspersed by bouts of table dancing on his behalf (presumably this is also 'Korean style'). In what is presumably meant to be a Korean style, he also insists on tying his tie around my head as a bandana.
Next day I had dog stew - pretty good, and I didnt feel at all bad about it. Also a source of interest to the locals, who all came to say goodbye when I left the restaurant. Then, continuing in the amusement vein I headed to a local shoe shop to buy some laces to replace my rather broken ones - only problem was, mutual incomprehension meant they thought I wanted to buy new shoes. I kept on saying no, and pointing to my laces, which they took as a cue to shove different types of shoes into my face. Becoming rather farcical, I tried to leave, but found my exit blocked by members of the family, all incredibly keen to show me new shoes I didnt want. Eventually, new laces were produced, resulting in much hysterical laughter from the family when they finally realized that was what I wanted. Furthermore, I was forced to pose for a picture of me and my new laces, and offered wine. On the plus side, I got them for free, which was nice of them.
Gyeongju: Rather dingy hostel run by a man who would shout 'hellllloooooo' everytime you walked past reception. Lots of temples, burial grounds, that sorta thing. Also found myself a minor celebrity with the hordes of schoolchildren who are sent to this place. Lots of kids going 'hello, how are you,' fine, but I found all the requests for me to pose with them for pictures a bit bizarrre. Have they not seen a white guy before?? Rather spookily, everywhere I went I kept seeing these two girls - we didn't speak but I definitely recognized them and they recognized me, at the tourist attractions, even on the street. Thought that was the end of it, but no, they then turned up that evening at my hostel as I was chatting to a Japanese guy. Turns out they were also Japanese and we all hung around that evening together. There was lots of talk about fate etc - turns out they were living in Seoul learning Korean - which I rudely shattered by informing them I was going on Sunday, to much disappointment.
Another random thing - some bloke came came up to me when I was relxing in the burial mounds park. When a man comes up to you in a park, that can be a worrying sign, but this is Korea, so anything could be on his mind. Turns out he is a teacher from a school in Seoul, and do I want to work in his school. I say no, I can't. He says 'you work in my school, give me your email address.' I repeat that it is actually impossible for me to do this, given commitments in England. But still, 'you work in my school, give me email address to give to my boss.' After a few rounds of this I realize it is not working, so I give him my email address and agree to work in his school. I'm pretty sure that wasn't a binding contract, right?
Busan: Nice hostel, but first night I am the only guest. So June, the owner takes me out to meet his friends for dinner. Turns out his friend is a music manager for hotel/club acts. He brings over cheap Bulgarians and even cheaper Filipinos and works them for months at a time. He makes money, they also do, everyone is happy. Anyway, we're going to see a five girl all sister Filipino band perform. Turns out three are unbeleivably fit, the other two are average - not bad all the same. Bit more worrying is their father's control over them. He is definitely in charge and has decided their name should be, bizarrely to my ears, 'The Daughters.' - in line with this, every so often they shout out in unison 'we are the daughters!' The sisters, or the family, fine, but I find the daughters odd. When their dad is not in charge, one of the Bulgarians is trying to instruct them. 'you come to me, i make it better, do what I say, come to me, i make it better' - its friendly enough, but weirdly Soviet. Also, all the Bulgarian men are big, or look just like Dimitar Berbatov. Bulgarian women are blonde with their hair pulled back really tightly.
Later, we go to dinner, where we meet a friend of Boris (a Bulgarian who very much resembles Berbatov) - this is Mr Cho from the Tourism Board. He pays for our food and makes us drink lots of soju, whilst shouting 'this is Korean style' a lot. He then insists we go to a norabang, where we meet a short man from the Korean Broadcasting System and a few of his scallys. Mr Cho then proceeds to make us drink beer from a plate, which is also 'Korean style' apparently. Being Korea, he is the elder and is therefore in charge as long as he pays for EVERYTHING. I dont mind, I dont like to pay for things. Rest of evening spent observing Mr Cho as he tries to molest all the girls in the room in a comical fashion, interspersed by bouts of table dancing on his behalf (presumably this is also 'Korean style'). In what is presumably meant to be a Korean style, he also insists on tying his tie around my head as a bandana.
Next day I had dog stew - pretty good, and I didnt feel at all bad about it. Also a source of interest to the locals, who all came to say goodbye when I left the restaurant. Then, continuing in the amusement vein I headed to a local shoe shop to buy some laces to replace my rather broken ones - only problem was, mutual incomprehension meant they thought I wanted to buy new shoes. I kept on saying no, and pointing to my laces, which they took as a cue to shove different types of shoes into my face. Becoming rather farcical, I tried to leave, but found my exit blocked by members of the family, all incredibly keen to show me new shoes I didnt want. Eventually, new laces were produced, resulting in much hysterical laughter from the family when they finally realized that was what I wanted. Furthermore, I was forced to pose for a picture of me and my new laces, and offered wine. On the plus side, I got them for free, which was nice of them.
Gyeongju: Rather dingy hostel run by a man who would shout 'hellllloooooo' everytime you walked past reception. Lots of temples, burial grounds, that sorta thing. Also found myself a minor celebrity with the hordes of schoolchildren who are sent to this place. Lots of kids going 'hello, how are you,' fine, but I found all the requests for me to pose with them for pictures a bit bizarrre. Have they not seen a white guy before?? Rather spookily, everywhere I went I kept seeing these two girls - we didn't speak but I definitely recognized them and they recognized me, at the tourist attractions, even on the street. Thought that was the end of it, but no, they then turned up that evening at my hostel as I was chatting to a Japanese guy. Turns out they were also Japanese and we all hung around that evening together. There was lots of talk about fate etc - turns out they were living in Seoul learning Korean - which I rudely shattered by informing them I was going on Sunday, to much disappointment.
Another random thing - some bloke came came up to me when I was relxing in the burial mounds park. When a man comes up to you in a park, that can be a worrying sign, but this is Korea, so anything could be on his mind. Turns out he is a teacher from a school in Seoul, and do I want to work in his school. I say no, I can't. He says 'you work in my school, give me your email address.' I repeat that it is actually impossible for me to do this, given commitments in England. But still, 'you work in my school, give me email address to give to my boss.' After a few rounds of this I realize it is not working, so I give him my email address and agree to work in his school. I'm pretty sure that wasn't a binding contract, right?
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