Christmas Dinner

Posted on 25 December 2008 by christao408

When people get married, they have to find a way to handle holidays with their two respective families. Do they try to combine into a single, large celebration? Or do they find a way to juggle the two families’ celebrations?

In the case of my sister and brother-in-law, they have opted for the latter approach. Holidays are alternated. Thanksgiving was with my side of the family this year and Christmas Day will be with my brother-in-law’s family. Because of that arrangement, we had our official Christmas Dinner on Christmas Eve.

We will do another Christmas Dinner, a more casual one, at my grandmother’s house on Thursday.

Before I tell you about dinner, though, we were met at the airport Tuesday evening by my sister, two nieces and mother, left. It was dark already and very cold, but they braved the thirty-minute drive to the airport to be there as we walked off the plane.

What a nice way to be welcomed to the chilly midwest!

After an easy dinner we put the girls to bed and then discussed the Christmas Eve menu. My mother and sister had planned it out and done the shopping, so I volunteered to cook. The menu:

A leg of pastured lamb my parents had brought over form a butcher in Indiana, roasted in a rosemary-garlic rub
A grilled pork tenderloin in a mustard and honey marinade
Traditional mashed potatoes
Roasted carrots with a light maple syrup glaze
Leafed Brussels sprouts with bacon
San Francisco sourdough bread
For dessert, “The Next Best Thing to Robert Redford”, a refrigerated dessert that combines the best of chocolate pudding, whipped cream, and cream cheese.

It was a pretty easy menu, which left time during the day for all sorts of fun. First off, it snowed about an inch last night. Not a significant amount, but enough to go outside and do a little sledding.

Above: Me, Ava and Emily in the front yard. I have some fun video from that but no time tonight to edit it. Look for it in a future posting.

In the afternoon, we completed the “gingerbread” house project. Which more accurately would be the graham cracker house project. Something about my nieces’ personalities could be interpreted from their decorating styles:

After that fun project, at which copious amounts of sugar were ingested, I started preparing the dinner in earnest. My brother-in-law took care of the grilled pork loin, but everything else was in my hands. Here’s a look at the results:

From top left, clockwise: the lamb, pork, sourdough bread, mashed potatoes, carrots and Brussels sprouts.

The dinner turned out very tasty, a nice simple meal. The lamb is a different breed than the one sold most commonly. It has a tamer taste and was very enjoyable. The pork was really moist.

The Brussels sprouts were my favorite. I think taking the time to core them and pull the leaves apart really makes a big difference, making them sweeter. Usually, when they are served whole, I find them a little bitter. It is a bit of extra work, but worth it.

Sadly, I have no pictures of the Next Best Thing to Robert Redford. My apologies. But it was tasty.

After dinner, we headed to church for Christmas Eve service. It was at a United Methodist church, the one my grandparents and sister and brother-in-law attend, the same one my parents were married at, the same one where I was baptized.

One observation, though: is it just me, or are protestant churches especially gifted at making upbeat hymns celebrating joyous occasions such as the birth of their savior, sound mournful?

We returned home and the girls helped set out some snacks for Santa Claus: spiced nuts and cream puffs with eggnog to drink. Strange, huh? Here’s a short video in which I capture the discussion about this choice:

Happy holidays to you and yours!

And Christmas Arrives

Posted on 25 December 2008 by christao408

First off, to those Christian members of my audience, Merry Christmas to you and yours. It is actually just a few minutes before midnight on Christmas Eve here in Kansas City, but since my Xanga account is set for Bangkok Standard Time, it shows that it is already Christmas Day.

Second, many thanks to all of you who expressed concern for Tawn’s battle with his jet lag. I’m glad to say that he’s much better now than he was. Your kind thoughts no doubt helped speed his recovery.

We used much of Monday for Tawn’s recovery. Sadly, this meant that we had to cancel some of our plans. We felt very bad about that, but ultimately on a trip like this one, health has to be the first consideration. The entire trip could wash out if one or both of us became seriously ill.

By Monday evening Tawn was feeling well enough for us to keep our dinner appointment with my aunt, uncle and cousins. Of course, family is a priority in our life and so we made the trek over to the east bay for a very enjoyable dinner.

Before leaving, we had breakfast at Squat and Gobble, a small chain of creperies. Thanks to Jordan for letting us know that they actually open for breakfast. I had always thought that the location, which is just a block or two away from Anita’s, was just open for lunch and dinner. We had another nice American style breakfast, something that just is never the same in Khrungthep.

Left, buttermilk waffle with berries and maple syrup. Right, poached eggs and hollandaise sauce on English muffins, with home fries.

We headed to SFO for our noon flight on Midwest Airlines, the only airline that offers a nonstop flight from SFO to Kansas City. The airline, which like many of its peers has suffered some tough times, is still a favorite of mine. They offer a “premium economy” product, friendly service, and good value for the money. I’m the kind of traveler who will spend a little bit extra for greater comfort and convenience. My days of suffering in a cramped middle seat in the far back of a sardine can are over.

We managed to arrive just a few minutes before the check-in counter (which is handled by American) opened. Once the counter opened, the agent informed us that because of weather in the midwest, the inbound flight was about forty minutes delayed. Thankfully, this report was accurate and the delayed departure time didn’t slip at all.

This delay gave us time to enjoy SFO’s good selection of food – at least the good selection that is in the North Terminal. Of course, no trip to San Francisco is complete without some clam chowder, so we stopped at Boudin’s for a bowl of soup served in a hollowed-out sourdough round.

Too much bread, to be honest. Tasty, but an insane amount of bread. The chowder was pretty good, though. Frankly, I think the best chowder is served from the large vats at Fisherman’s Wharf late in the evening when there is just a little bit left and it has been simmering all day long. So tasty then. But this was a reasonable substitute.

Before leaving San Francisco, I’ll share a Christmas sight that I saw while walking in the Castro.

Yes, a merry gay Christmas to you, too.

Jet Lag Hits Tawn, Who Turns the Other Cheek

Posted on 23 December 2008 by christao408

It is amazing how jet lag affects people differently. On my first night here I took a sleeping pill, slept fairly well through the night, and have largely been able to function on a normal schedule ever since. Sure, I’ve woken up a few times in the night and have had to wait twenty or thirty minutes to fall back asleep, but other than that I’ve had no ill effects.

Tawn, on the other hand, has had a hard time adjusting – both to the new time zone as well as the hectic schedule-a-go-go that we’ve been running. By Sunday afternoon he was starting to hit some rough patches and my Monday morning, he was dragging. We called off several appointments on Monday and he used the time to rest. The symptoms, which seemed almost like a cold, abated enough by late afternoon that we were able to get over to my aunt and uncle’s for dinner.

Hopefully, he’ll be fully back to speed soon because we travel to Kansas City on Tuesday.

A few more bits and pieces of our schedule:

Saturday morning we went to the Ferry Building for brunch at Boulette’s Larder, one of my favorite places to eat. Truth be told, the food (which was very high quality) didn’t wow me as much as previously, although the Christmas Spice beignets were spectacular. Good ambience and company, though, as we were joined by Stuart, who was in from Bangkok, and his local friend Rupert.

Not sure why I managed to crop the beignets differently from the rest of the food pictures… But from upper left clockwise: Christmas Spice beignets, poaches eggs on polenta with braised beef, seafood platter with smoked salmon, grilled tuna and crab cakes, and sweet Maine shrimp scramble with arugula.

Afterwards we explored the Ferry Building for a bit, finding some interesting items:

Grow your own oyster mushrooms. A sawdust block impregnated with the fungus that produces oyster mushrooms. Will grow several pounds of mushrooms over a few weeks if properly maintained. The gift that you can’t live without!

A bakery – the first I’ve seen – that makes French macarons without food coloring! Yes, the lemon ones (not pictured) look like most of the other flavors and chocolate is the only flavor you can identify by sight, but I really like that they aren’t so artificially colored. Plus, they use a coarser almond flour that really gives the confections a chewier texture.

Heading back to the Embarcadero, we received a message from Anita that most of the high school gang was gathering for dim sum at Rincon Center. This was only two blocks away so we stopped by but didn’t eat anything. Since our plates were empty, our “nephews” – Devin, Maximo and Joaquin – decided we would be fun to play with.

Below, Maximo smiles sweetly while his brother manages to almost tip over two tea cups.

Above, Uncle Tawn with Joaquin, Devin and “Ultra Man” Maximo at Rincon Center.

After a few hours of visiting, we returned home and Tawn was ready for a much-needed nap. Lalima had thoughtfully arranged tickets for the San Francisco Ballet’s production of The Nutcracker. The definitive North American production (SF Ballet introduced it to the continent in 1944), it was magical and a perfect holiday treat.

Food and Shopping

Posted on 20 December 2008 by christao408

Our trip thus far – the first thirty-six hours – has been fun, mostly a mixture of food and shopping. After arriving Thursday evening and eating dinner with Anita, we had a good first night’s sleep. We left mid-morning in brisk weather and walked to Tartine, the excellent cafe at 18th and Guerrero. Finding it with a line out the door, we turned around and walked back to Market Street, eating instead at the seventy-year old greasy spoon grill, It’s Tops.

This place is excellent. I’m not sure why – they claim it is their grill – but the buttermilk pancakes have an amazing flavor.

Two eggs, scrambled, with links and hotcakes. Tawn went for an avocado omelet with home fries and buttered toast. We had all the calories one needs for a day in a single meal.

Afterwards, we headed to Discount Builders’ Supply to shop for cabinet knobs for our fireplace. Lots of choices but nothing that caught out attention.

Continuing down Mission Street we ended up at Union Square with a short list of things to locate.

One of these was the Mario Batalli signature line of dutch ovens, available at Crate and Barrel. They were selling the 4-quart model in lime green, a color they seem to be trying to clear out of inventory, for 30 dollars off the normal $89.95 price. Considering that cast enamel dutch ovens go for $170 or more in Thailand, this seems like a good value.

Right: Tawn in front of a flower stand near Macy’s Union Square. I used to be very impressed with the flower stands in San Francisco but after seeing the flower shops in Bangkok, I’m not as “wowed” these days.

Below, Tawn in front of the Westin St. Francis Hotel.

After completing some errands we returned to Anita’s for a mid-afternoon rest. Later in the afternoon we caught CalTrain down to San Mateo, where we had dinner at Ryan and Sabrina’s, a chance to see their newly remodeled kitchen. Left to right: Chris, Tawn, Sabrina and Ryan.

Left, Ryan and Sabrina take a dish of tofu off the stove.

It was really nice to enjoy a home-cooked meal. Tawn and I were saying earlier in the day that we hoped our time in SF wasn’t just one restaurant meal after another. As much as we enjoy the restaurants here, too many meals out means too many additional kilograms on the waist.

Here’s the elegant meal we enjoyed:

The food was as tasty as it was beautiful and we had a really nice visit with Ryan and Sabrina. As jet lag started to take its toll, Ryan drove us back to SF. We arrived back only to find a trio of other house guests getting ready to head out to meet Anita for some event. We were too tired to join and instead headed to bed.

Buriram Part 2 and More

Posted on 19 November 2008 by christao408

Let me go back into the details about our trip to Burriram province, with our friend Trish.

We went up to this province about five hours to the northeast of Khrungthep, to locate sources of silk for Trish’s new custom-made dress business. Many of Thailand’s provinces are known for their silk, but the Nakhon Ratchasima (aka Korat) and Buriram provinces are known for their high quality and simpler styles. Provinces in the north of the country have more decorative styles of weaving.

While there, we visited several silk shops and a factory, we had a brief visit with some of Tawn’s relatives, and we went to see some ancient Khmer ruins. Here are the details:

Silk, Silk Everywhere

After visiting a few different retail silk shops, Tawn was able to get hold of one of his cousins, who recommended a particular silk factory located in Pak Thong Chai (see map above) with whom she’s worked before. Tawn called the factory, which was not far away, and one of the employees met us at the silk shops to guide us there.

Located a kilometer back from the main road in a nondescript and unmarked set of warehouses, the factory was much different from what I had expected. I shot a lot of video footage and will find the time to edit it in the next week or so, but in the meantime let me share some photos with you.

The owner walked us through the entire production process and was happy to have me take photos.

Raw silk hanging in hoops before being dyed.

The silk is manually dyed, relying on the skill of the workers to match a particular shade.

A row of drying silk that has been dyed a brilliant turquoise blue.

Trish and Tawn watch the dying process.

Custom made screens used to print patterns on the silk, hence the term silk-screening.

Dyed threads are wound onto spools.

The looms, which are automated but require the constant attention of workers.

The factory manager explains the process to Trish and Tawn.

These heated rollers finish the silk, making it smoother to the touch.

Finally, sample batches of silk for Trish to sort through.

Here’s a video that runs down the process.

We spent three hours at the factory that first day, learning about silk, looking at different colors and patterns, and finally making clear what it was we were looking for.

By the time we left for Buriram, the sun was already setting.

Buriram

Saturday morning we started with an early breakfast at a restaurant owned by one of Tawn’s cousins. A typical Thai restaurant, there were shelves and shelves filled with kitchy collectables, below. Trish had her first authentic Thai breakfast, various gap khao (“with rice”) dishes including some fried fish, a curried fish mousse and mixed vegetables.

Our tour guide, a friend of Tawn’s cousin, met us at the restaurant. She is a retired primary school English teacher, so spoke English well enough to comfortably make corny jokes.

Our destination was Phnom Rung Historical Park, located just 30 km shy of the Cambodian border south of the main city of Buriram. This Khmer style Hindu temple dates back to the 10th century and is one of the best-preserved examples of Khmer architecture in Thailand.

We stand at the far end of the promenade, a quarter-mile long processional walkway that connects the lower stairway with the main temple complex.

Standing in front of the main temple complex and the second naga bridge. You see two of the four pools of water that represent the four oceans and the raised platform represents the bridge between the human realm (between the four oceans) and the heavenly realm, where the temple is.

The amount of symbolism in the construction of the Hindu temples was amazing. This is the main tower, or prang. It is covered with depictions of gods, humans, hermits, snakes, dragons and all of manner of beings. Our tour guide spent about ninety minutes giving us the run-down on this temple and afterwards explained that she had exhausted maybe only ten percent of her knowledge about the temple.

To give you an example of the sort of knowledge she had to share, she explained that this detail (it shows an area about the width of two hands) showed two hermits reading copies of Playboy magazine. One of the hermits, she said, was obviously not wearing any underwear.

Can you see which one doesn’t have any underwear? (Answer at the end of the post.) This was the type of humor we enjoyed all morning.

The construction of the temple was amazing. It is made out of sandstone and instead of carving blocks then putting them into place, they instead stacked all the blocks (which were not always regular sizes) and then carved away to reveal the detail they wanted.

In this picture, you can where the blocks were carved to make the steps. The block in the center top of the picture has many different faces as it was carved to be part of two separate steps as well as the adjacent wall. This made the construction all the more difficult.

Detail of the principle prang. This temple was primarily devoted to Shiva, one of the supreme dieties of the Hindu religion. Shiva is depicted in the center of this panel. Remember that with the way the temple was constructed, this was just a solid stack of limestone blocks. The artisans had to chisel away to make all the ornamentation. Because of that, mistakes could not be undone as there was no practical way to remove a block and replace it. I think that makes the detail all the more amazing.

Like most historical sights, there is a lot to digest and after a few hours, a break is needed. Since we had only a limited time in the province that weekend, we wrapped things up and dropped our guide off in the main town of Buriram just after noon.

Back in Town

After a quick bite of bami moo daeng – egg noodles with barbeque pork – we stopped by a local coffee shop for a latte. So far we had consumed only Nescafe, which isn’t real coffee even though it seems to be the national coffee drink of Thailand.

We found a “real” coffee shop that had espresso machines, but when we asked for lattes the young lady said they couldn’t do lattes as they didn’t carry fresh milk. Strangely, though, they offered cappuccinos. Tawn inquired how they made cappuccino with no milk and she pulled out a pitcher of sweetened condensed milk.

Really wanting my afternoon latte (which my Italian cousin will no doubt shake her head at, as espresso drinks with milk are strictly for the mornings, right?), I asked whether we could comandeer her espresso machine. Like most Thai employees, she was a bit overwhelmed by the confrontation but didn’t say no.

Next door was a pharmacy that had a refrigerator of bottled drinks, including individual cartons of milk. I bought two, poured them into a glass measuring cup, and started frothing the milk while she pulled espresso from another machine.

Thankfully, I do have some training on this. Back in the days when I managed movie theatres, we had cafes that featured Starbucks equipment and coffee. As such, we had access to expert training and so I learned how to froth milk like nobody’s business. I’m all about the velvety foam.

Ten minutes later, we had a trio of nearly perfect lattes. Along the way, Tawn had kept imploring the young lady to pay attention so she could learn how to do this, but she didn’t seem to want anything to do with our milk steaming.

As we left, she was no doubt glad that we were out of her shop. We tipped her well though and I walked away with the cocky satisfaction of someone who has brought civilization to the natives. Ah, the espresso drinker’s burden.

We stopped at one final silk shop after lunch. While Tawn and Trish ooh’d and aah’d over the beautiful textiles, I was busy watching a pair of city maintenance workers install a new street light.

It was pretty amazing. They pulled up in a pickup truck, a pair of lights in the back. A bamboo ladder was leaned against the concrete electrical pole and a young man climbed up. He slid a mounting onto the pole, fastened it into place, and then his coworker climbed up the ladder and handed the light fixture to him.

It took a few minutes for him to slip it into place, strip the wires and push them into one of the passing power lines. Try as he might, though, the light wouldn’t illuminate.

Thankfully, they had a second lamp in the truck, so he unfastened the lamp and changed it out. We left before the second lamp was installed, so I wonder if he had any success. One thing that caught my attention, though, was just how little in the way of safety equipment they had. No helmet, no protective gear, and he wore only flip-flops on his feet.

Occupational safety and health administration? Nope.

Uncle’s House

We stopped by Tawn’s grandfather’s house. Tawn’s father is the ninth of twelve children and the old family compound is now owned by his oldest uncle, the fourth child.

After years of hearing Tawn tell stories about his childhood visits to stay with his grandparents, it was fascinating to finally see the place. Tawn’s uncle and several cousins graciously welcomed us and we sat around a table, eating mooncakes and drinking water and visiting.

The most fascinating thing on the wall: a picture taken at the funeral of Tawn’s grandmother. It was a panoramic portrait of the more than three hundred family members who gathered at her cremation. Tawn and one of his cousins went into the monkhood for a day to earn merit for their grandmother. Tawn’s the one on the left.

Tawn, who was maybe 13 at the time, doesn’t look too happy about his new haircut. This was the only time Tawn has been a novice in the Buddhist monkhood.

Speaking of teenagers, Tawn has a second cousin, Toy, a fifteen-year old who will be going to the US as an exchange student next August. We visited with him, giving him a chance to practice his English. Tawn suggested that we could coordinate a trip to the US while he is there so that he has the opportunity to visit other parts of the country besides the one where his host family is located. He has not been assigned a specific location yet.

In the evening, after a few hours of relaxing at the hotel, we met another of Tawn’s cousins, Mee, for dinner at his restaurant. Mee has visited us in Bangkok before and it was very nice to see him again. His restaurant serves Thai food with slightly modern twists and everything was delicious.

The “Aunty” in the restaurant’s sign refers to Mee’s mother, not to Mee!

Birthday Burger

Sunday was my birthday. We started the morning with a quick hotel breakfast and then stopped at another coffee shop (this one had milk) for lattes before hitting the road.

Next door to the coffee shop/bakery is a bookstore. Just inside the door of the coffee shop is a sign. If reads, “Full stomach already, but is your brain full? Books and journals, please go this direction.” Quite clever.

We stopped back by the silk factory for another two and a half hours. The owner had arranged for us to peruse a broad range of colors and we finally made some purchases. Unfortunately, after returning to Khrunthep, Trish discovered that some of the silks were not two-ply as we had been told, but only one-play. Tawn is working with the factory owner to fix that.

Our final stop on the way in was Chokchai Farms, Thailand’s largest cattle operation. There was a huge crowd as people went on farm tours, ate at the steak house, and bought ice cream. We decided to stop for a steak burger to celebrate my birthday.

The burgers were pretty tasty, although they had way too much mayonaise on them, which seems to be a Thai thing. Trish claims this was the first burger she has had in fifteen years. Glad we were able to knock her off the wagon.

Video of the experience.

Afterwards, we had some ice cream, bought some snacks, and I tried to milk a huge cow. Look at its expression!

We returned to Khrungthep a bit after sunset, pretty exhausted after our weekend up in the northeast.

Answer: The hermit on the left is blowing in the breeze.

Border Run to Singapore

Posted on 13 October 2008 by christao408

Hot on the heels of Bruce’s departure, I did a one-day border run to Singapore. The type of visa I have for Thailand (despite being a one-year visa) rather inexplicably requires that I exit and re-enter the country once every ninety days. For no other purpose, it seems, than to ensure that the immigration officers have employment, seeing as how other types of visa allow holders to just check in every ninety days at the immigration office off Sathorn Road.

Accepting things as they are – a very Thai trait, if I do say so myself – I booked a one day trip to Singapore as a change of pace from the usual all-day van trips to Cambodia. At least with Singapore there would be something interesting to see at the other end of the trip.

Keeping costs low, I flew Air Asia, the “Southwest Airlines of Southeast Asia”. The outbound flight was on time and the return was only thirty minutes late – some sort of a record for Air Asia. Both flights were pretty full although on the return flight I managed an empty middle seat between me and the lady sitting at the window.

It was a fun day for flying with good views of both Suvarnabhumi (left) and Changi (right) airports.

Arriving in Singapore at about 10:30, I spent an hour exploring the newest terminal (Terminal 3), which is really a beautiful facility with lots of light, water and plants to make it comfortable. I also wanted to see the new Airbus A380. There were two of them, but always with several layers of glass between me and them. No opportunities for a clear view or a good picture.

I did, however, get a picture of this rather gaudily painted Air Asia jet:

When I passed through the deserted immigration hall in Terminal 3, the officer was a little confused at how I had wound up so far away from my arrival gate (which was in Terminal 1). When I explained that I had come over to see the new airplane, he promptly gave me his advice for the best view – outside the secured area and on the fourth floor. Unfortunately, the planes were still parked outside the line of sight from the otherwise nice viewing gallery.

Taking the clean and efficient train into town, I met with Otto at Vivo City, the largest mall in Singapore. You certainly can’t avoid malls when you visit there, and we had a very nice visit with lunch at a food court and then a stop for coffee.

Below – Indonesian style lunch with fried chicken and rice, along with a few pieces of Chinese dim sum.

Late afternoon I headed a few stations away to the Chinatown area. After a little exploring, I met with Suyoung, a former colleague from the SF Int’l Asian American Film Festival and the Hamptons International Film Festival. Along with a friend of hers, we had a lovely dinner at a small Italian restaurant called Spizza. Really good thin-crust pizza and a pine nut torte that was the perfect end to the evening. As I told Suyoung, Tawn and I really should do more weekend trips to Singapore. It is so nearby and there are lots of good restaurants to explore.

With an easy taxi ride I was back at Changi International in time for my return flight home, even with a little time to spare for duty free shopping.

With my return, I’m “locked in” to Thailand and will not be able to leave again until my return trip to the United States in December, when I’ll apply for another one-year visa.

Bruce’s Visit – Part 2

Posted on 10 October 2008 by christao408

To recap the bulk of the rest of Bruce’s visit, we had a very busy several days as I played tour guide and tried to show him several different slices of our life in the kingdom:

Floating Market

After the year and a half of volunteering as an English teacher at Bangkhonthiinai village, I became very familiar with Samut Songkhram province – Thailand’s smallest – and especially the weekend nighttime floating market in the town of Amphawa. My debt of gratitude to Ajarn Yai, the former director of the school, is deep as she has been a gracious host anytime I have guests to bring to the floating market.

Ajarn Yai arranged and paid for a canal and river tour in the late afternoon, following a route that took us several kilometers down the Mae Khlong River and then cutting back through the smaller canals until we returned to the market area in Amphawa.

It was a fascinating opportunity to show Bruce “life by the water” – a fixture of central Thailand and an important cultural touchstone as so many references in language (and even driving habits!) can be traced back to Thais’ relationship with bodies of water.

Since Ajarn Yai insisted on paying for the boat ride, Tawn and I insisted on paying for dinner afterwards at a riverside restaurant. Not without a big fight, though: “I’m your big sister!” she protested, pointing to Thai custom that the puu yai – senior person – pay for dinner.

As I’ve explained to her several times, I can’t let her pay every time we have a guest in town; that’s not fair to her. Of course, “fair” is a very different concept in my mind than in hers. For Ajarn Yai, “fair” will be when we finally take her to the United States for a visit.

Road Trip – Ayuthaya

Long before Bruce arrived, we had discussed a road trip to Thailand’s wine country – Nakhon Ratchasimaa province, also known as Korat. Yes, we do have a small wine industry and as we found out, they produce some decent wine.

We started out in Ayuthaya, the second capital of the Kingdom of Siam. Located about ninety minutes north of Khrungthep, the city is full of ruins including a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Our first stop was Wat Yai Chai Mongkhon, above and right, on the south side of the city. Quieter than many of the other temples, it was famous as a place for meditation and still houses a large community of monks and nuns. The large chedi or stupa is still intact and you can climb it for quite a view.

After lunch and a stop at the Ayuthaya Historical Study Center, a decent museum that helps put the ancient city into context, complete with scale models of how the city looked before it was ransacked by the Burmese in 1767, we headed to see some of the ruins.

In the 17th Century, the city had a million inhabitants and strong trade relations with the Dutch, Portuguese, English, French, Chinese and Japanese. Many Western visitors remarked how illustrious the city was, with the temples and many palace buildings decorated in the same fashion in which Khrungthep’s Grand Palace is.

Back out into the warm pre-thunderstorm afternoon, we visited Wat Phra Si Sanphet, once the largest temple in Ayuthaya. This is the famous one with a trio of large chedis still standing in a row down the center of the park. The surrounding walls have tumbled down, whether a result of the Burmese cannon fire or just a matter of time and weather.

There were surprisingly few visitors and Bruce was able to film a lot of video footage on his new camera while Ken and I tried to remain in the shade of the magnolia trees. Afterwards, we stopped at a nearby market to watch the making of roti sai mai – a dessert popular among the Thai Muslim population with thin pandan leaf flavored crepes are stuffed with spun palm sugar – and, of course, to eat some.

Our last stop in Ayuthaya was the elephant kraal. North of the city, this is where the wild elephants were herded so ones could be selected for use in battle.

Today, it is where the elephants that visitors ride at the historical park are housed, bathed and fed. Run by a pair of farang women, there is a program where guests can stay several days in cottages and learn more about the elephants while helping out with the chores.

We arrived at feeding time, with a pair of elephants unloading pickup trucks full of grass and bringing it to the other elephants. For the most part, it looks like the grass is ground up before being served to the elephants, using a cement mixer as a gigantic food processor. The elephants that were doing the heavy lifting occasionally snagged a few blades as a snack, having to be urged back to work by their mahouts, or guides.

A baby elephant gets a shower while playing around and trying to drink the water.

Road Trip – Pak Chong

We continued to the northeast of Ayuthaya about two hours, arriving in the small town of Pak Chong shortly after dark. Pak Chong is the first city you reach in Nakhon Ratchasimaa province and serves as the gateway to Khao Yai National Park, Thailand’s oldest and second largest. Pak Chong at sunrise:

We found a relatively new tourist class hotel. It was clean and the beds were comfortable, so for 700 baht a night (about US$20) it seemed like a pretty good deal. This far outside of the big cities, I think our options are limited. The receptionist suggested a really nice restaurants that is located on the banks of a small river. Decorated along the lines of a Cracker Barrel restaurant, the restaurant served pretty good northeastern Thai food, although the grilled chicken was a bit tough.

Khao Yai National Park

Tuesday morning we started out early and drove the hour up to Khao Yai National Park. We were afforded gorgeous views and lots of lush foliage.

From a view point looking north back towards Pak Chong.

There is a lot of wildlife in the park, including a herd of 200-300 wild elephants. While we didn’t see any elephants, we did encounter several other animals including a few monkeys and deer.

At one stop, there is a salt lick that “Friends of the Park” – a volunteer organization – created so that animals would have a place to eat their minerals in good view of the road. The salt lick is shown above and below is the accompanying warning sight at the viewing point.

It reads, “Do not walk to the Salt Lick – you smell bad to wildlife.” Ain’t that the truth?

After stopping at the interpretive center we decided to take a short walk behind the center to see a waterfall. Our information was bad and we ended up taking the long way around.

Imagine, if you will, that the interpretive center was at noon on a clock face. We started walking along the trail, only to eventually discover that the waterfall was at the eleven o’clock position, which we could have easily accessed if we had walked the opposite direction!

The trail was overgrown and in places, completely veered off into uncharted territory. Along the way, we discovered a bit more of the local fauna than we wanted to: leeches. Here’s a view of the leeches we acquired and the larger ones we managed to avoid.

Mostly small but those things really have a strong grip. One burrowed through my sock and was pretty firmly attached to my leg. Five days later, I still have a purple welt from where its mouth was.

The further we went, the more precarious the trail became. To be certain, the forest there is beautiful and cool, but if we hadn’t heard the sound of a waterfall in the distance, I think we would have turned back.

We arrived at the waterfall and were terribly underwhelmed. There are probably several in the park that were much more spectacular, because this one was more of a large rapids than anything else. As waterfalls go, I think the Erawan Falls in Kanchanaburi province are much nicer, especially as I didn’t encounter any leeches there.

Sadly, Bruce was the most affected by nature, suffering at least a dozen leech bites and having to pull them from between his toes. Let this be a lesson to all of us: no shorts and sandals when you are in a national park. On our way in to the park, we saw several truckloads of tourists who had these leg warmer type of padding around their legs, even though they had long pants on. I thought perhaps they were protection for snake bites but realize now that they were designed to keep leeches off you.

Tough way to learn the lesson but glad we know that for next time.

After Bruce had had enough of nature we headed down the mountain to search out a pair of wineries. They were pretty easily found and, sure enough, as you get up into that region and drive down some of the two-lane roads, you could easily imagine that you are in Sonoma County, the Barossa Valley, or another wine producing region.

Above, vineyards at PB Winery. The higher-end shiraz was pretty decent, albeit pricey. The lower-end shiraz had the bouquet of molasses and was so young as to be nearly illegal. The drive is pretty, though, and it was interesting to see what this nascent wine region is producing.

By this point in the afternoon, we were hitting some rain and decided to make one last stop before heading back to the Big Mango. Our destination was Chokchai Farms, a large cattle and dairy operation near Pak Chong.

Left, traditional “old west” farm architecture amongst the tropical foliage.

Chokchai is the most modern and productive cattle operation in Thailand and ostensibly their cows get a lot of opportunity to pasture, although I wasn’t able to take the farm tour thanks to the monsoon rains that arrived. Instead, we hunkered up in the Chokchai Steakhouse and enjoyed a good steak lunch with inexplicably overcooked vegetables. Really, they were aiming for Midwestern US cuisine with frozen carrots and green beans that had been boiled to death. Only the steamed cabbage and daikon radish were fresh.

We returned to Khrungthep around rush hour, leaving unexplored many other parts of Nakhon Ratchasimaa province that I’ll have to return to in the future. In particular, the capital city of Korat, about which I’ve heard good things, deserves some exploration.

Singing in the Shower at Alila

Posted on 23 September 2008 by christao408

After several weeks of particularly intense work in both our jobs, Tawn and I decided to take a weekend break in nearby Cha-Am. At a travel expo held at Central World Plaza a few months ago, we purchased a voucher for two nights at Alila, one of the newest luxury resorts in Thailand, at a great price.

Two hours south of Khrungthep, Alila is tucked away down a quiet road. The architecture of the seventy-room resort is modern with clean lines, sparse furnishings, and a lot of peace and quiet.

The six buildings are laid out surrounding a center complex that houses a restaurant, a spa, one of two swimming pools, a bar and a library. The complex is topped by a second restaurant that floats amidst a huge reflecting pool.

The walls of the complex are lined with steel cages containing rocks, making for a stark and dramatic visual, while the complex is flanked by footpaths that lead to the beach and a row of trees that contrast the hard and soft sides of nature.

The minimalist design is unfussy and extends to the rooms, which are spacious with very high ceilings and lots of light. They are also very high-tech with an Apple iTV in each room, loaded with your choice of movies and music – they actually contact you before your stay and ask for your preferences of genres.

Despite the stark design, there are many cozy touches: tea candles, incense burners, an essential oil diffuser, and several light settings from “welcome” to “intimate” so you can set the desired mood.

The highlight has to be the bathroom, with its large windows, stand-alone bathtub, and the shower, which is situated in the middle of the room, in the open, with water that falls from the ceiling like an April storm. We wanted to take some pictures to convey the fun nature of the shower and thankfully there were some umbrellas located near the front door.

After settling into the hotel, we headed to “Red” (the pool-side bar) for the complimentary afternoon tea. It was crowded so the hostess suggested that we might light to take our tea in the adjacent library. Shortly after the tea arrived, the hostess returned and said that a table had opened up and asked whether we would like to move.

After an early dinner of Thai food at “Clouds”, the open-air restaurant that overlooks the reflecting pool, we called it a night and tried to catch up on all the sleep we’ve missed out on over the past few weeks.

We woke up bright and early in the morning, ready to attend the one-hour yoga class taught around the heated pool in the sanctuary-like spa. It was a good workout and stimulated our appetites for breakfast.

Left, the stairway from the downstairs restaurant to the upstairs “Clouds”.

The misty, cool weather of our evening arrival had given way to a sunny and warm morning. There was a stiff ocean breeze, though, so the heat was tolerable.

Breakfast was a buffet, as it seems is normally the case at almost every hotel and resort in Thailand. The selection of food – Thai, Chinese, and Western – was extensive and the quality was very good. It turns out that the chef is a farang and one result of this is that the quality of the baked goods is very high. The croissants were magnificent and Tawn had sandwiches twice during our stay, just to enjoy the really good bread.

After our late breakfast – and a suitable period of waiting – I enjoyed the pool area for a swim. The water was very warm, so I didn’t swim that long, but the design of the area is very relaxing and peaceful.

We spent part of our day relaxing in the room watching some movies and reading. Then, when the sun had moved a bit more to the west, we went to the beach and enjoyed the sand and water. It started to mist lightly, which added a rainbow to our beach view.

We returned to the room for a mid-afternoon snack and another movie. This was a deconstructed caesar salad and a bowl of wild mushroom soup. Very tasty.

As sunset neared, we returned upstairs to Clouds, taking a sofa on the marble-clad deck to watch the water and sip some cocktails and share a club sandwich.

As the sun lowered towards the mountains that separate this narrow stretch of Thailand from Burma, they back-lit the dark clouds of the afternoon thunderstorm that approached us but mercifully swung to the north of us.

The mosquitos, which had largely been absent the night before, were out and several sprays of a lemongrass solution didn’t dissuade them so we headed indoors for dinner. One very nice thing was that the restaurants didn’t charge a corkage fee and we had brought two bottles with us to enjoy over the weekend.

From top left, clockwise: Mashed potatoes, breadsticks, T-bone steak with onion relish, a pair of fish sandwiches.

For dessert, we enjoyed a fresh fruit sabayon with crushed pistachio nuts on top, and a “floating island” with fresh berries on a vanilla pudding.

On our way back to the room, Tawn considered a late night dip in the pool. Thankfully, I was able to talk him out of it.

Here’s a video recap of the weekend:

We really enjoyed our stay at Alila and it reinforced that we should do more of these weekend getaways, as it makes for a wonderful mental break from our busy lives.

Artificially Induced Jet Lag

Posted on 24 August 2008 by christao408

If you had asked me on Wednesday or Thursday, I would have told you that I was finally over my jet lag. My sleeping hours were back to normal, I didn’t need an unusually long afternoon siesta, and my appetite had returned.

But then somewhere in the past thirty-six hours or so, I’ve managed to re-introduce jet lag into my life.

It started Friday night, when I had hour-long conference calls with the United States scheduled for 10:00 pm, 1:00 am and 3:00 am. I should say, I had the calls scheduled for me, as I wouldn’t have voluntarily scheduled such late calls on a Friday night.

The first one I stayed up for, trying to spend a low-key hour or two before the call so I was still alert. Then I went to sleep at 11:00 for about ninety minutes, waking up in time for the 1:00 call. Second call went well but by this point I was dragging. Finally, about 2:20 I chatted with my manager on MSN messenger and, upon hearing that I was planning on staying up for another call, insisted that it would be recorded and I could review it later.

So I finally went to sleep at about 2:40 Saturday morning.

Of course, I woke up by 8:00 because I’m just not made for sleeping in. Something about the muted glow of sunlight from the curtains just turns on my internal clock. Saturday was chock full of errands including a trip to the stone store to buy new marble tiles for the bathroom shower, which has to be redone. (More on that in the future.)

The jet lag would have worked itself out had it been a single night, but Tehlin – a university classmate – her husband Chris and their two children were scheduled to arrive from Hong Kong at midnight Saturday. Of course I wanted to be there to pick them up. Arriving in a strange city late at night is tough, especially when you have two young children with you.

Because of the category nine typhoon in Hong Kong, their flight was delayed. The first delay was to a 2:00 am arrival and the second was to 4:00. Tehlin messaged me each time to keep me informed. Between the messages, I slept in fits and spurts from 11:00 until 3:00.

Tawn was a good sport and accompanied me to the airport. The good news about 4:00 am arrivals is that there isn’t any line at immigration! Tehlin and Chris were out very shortly after landing, their two very sleepy children in tow. By the time we arrived at their hotel along the river, it was 5:00.

Since we were up and since we were in the heart of the old city, Tawn suggested we go to the flower market. This is the wholesale district for flowers, which are abundant and relatively inexpensive. The market stretches for about five blocks, trickles off down side streets and is interspersed with some fresh vegetable markets. (Never sure where they put the edible blossoms: flower market or vegetable market.)

We browsed several blocks before finding three large bunches of flowers including some orchids, some carnations, and something I’ve never seen before. Tawn doesn’t even know their name in Thai. We just call them “pretty”. The total cost was less than US$15 for all the flowers.

Some pictures. Below, Tawn waits for his first bunch of flowers to be wrapped. This is in the section of the market with stores that sell arrangements to hotels, embassies and the like.

Below, an elderly lady makes garlands, used at temples and spirit houses throughout the city to pay respects to whichever local deity, teacher, or other respected figure you choose to honor. One whole section of the market has stall after stall of these yellow flowers, which I think are marigolds. (Maybe? Tawn says they are an Indian flower but doesn’t know their English name. Dok dao duang in Thai, literally “shining star”.)

One of the ladies selling orchids just piles her flowers on tables, halfway burying a telephone line junction box. If your phone doesn’t work in this district, it may be due to moisture from the flowers. Bunches of these purple orchids are about US$1 each.

It was getting close to six and we decided to get something in our stomachs before returning home. You’d be amazed the number of small restaurants and street vendors who are selling food at this hour, but when you look at the number of people who work throughout the night here in the City of Angels, maybe you wouldn’t be so surprised after all.

Adjacent to Sam Yan Market, near Chulalongkorn University on Phayathai Road just around the corner from Rama IV Road, is a forty year-old institution that serves just one thing: jok.

Also known as congee, jok (pronounced “joke”) is rice that is boiled in stock until it is thick and creamy. Some farang compare it distastefully with oatmeal, but I like oatmeal so it is no surprise that I find jok to be something of a comfort food.

Jok Sam Yan, as the restaurant is known, is popular with taxi drivers, university students, police officers, and all the other types who keep odd hours.

The open air restaurant was full and we ordered two bowls of jok muu sai kai – jok with pork and egg. The secret to their jok is the pork, which is marinated in sweet soy sauce and mixed with ground toasted rice. It is so good that you can buy it in bulk by the kilogram to take home and use in your own soups, stir fries, and dishes of spaghetti and meatballs.

Garnished with some fresh spring onion, shreds of ginger and – if you want – fried Chinese croutons, the jok is filling, warm, soothing and very tasty. A great way to end the night or start the morning, depending on how you are living your life.

In my case, I was a bit unsure which I was doing.

In other news…

So I managed to get an entry featured on Xanga’s front page. After watching Kari, Zakiah, Steve and Sandelion’s front page fame, I was enjoying life in obscurity. It is really weird to be receiving “friend” requests from totally unknown people. I’ll visit their sites first just to see what they write about and a bit about who they are.

It is also funny because I notice that of the several thousand people who have read that one entry, very few took the time to look at any of the adjacent entries. When you read a featured entry, do you ever ready anything else the author writes? Maybe I’m just strange that way, but if the entry is any good at all, I read other entries on the author’s blog because I’m curious if that entry is representative of the type of things he or she normally writes.

Anyhow, welcome to those of you who are new readers and thanks to the longer term readers for recommending the entry in the first place.

There is a Chiang Mai based coffee chain called Wawee Coffee. It is a small chain, locally owned and it serves really tasty coffee, much better and a bit more reasonably priced than the big green mermaid. Their shops are also really beautiful.

They just opened their first Khrungthep branch near the Ari BTS station, literally a sixty-second walk from the station exit, in a beautifully restored 1950s-era house.

This is going to be my new place to bring my laptop and work. Isn’t it cute?

Progress was made on using up the rest of the chicken stock. With two extra zucchini hanging around from the risotto, I decided to make zucchini and potato soup for lunch.

First I cooked the sliced zucchini in a pan with onions, shallots and garlic. Spices included tumeric, curry powder, cardamom and cumin, lending a bit of an Indian flavor.

Then I boiled the diced potatoes in the chicken stock until tender. I added the zucchini and heated them through, then brought out the Kitchen Aid immersion blender and made quick work of the soup. Two minutes later, I had a smooth soup. I added about a half-cup of buttermilk to give it a tangy edge and a little bit of creamy richness and then corrected for the flavor.

Let me just tell you, I love my immersion blender. What a quick and easy way to make a healthful meal.

Okay, just received the word from Tehlin that they are up. It is about 11:30 am Sunday morning, so they were able to get five hours or so of sleep. I’ll go get them in a bit and we’ll see some palaces and temples.

Eighteen Hours in Taipei

Posted on 15 August 2008 by christao408

As my trip in Los Angeles wound to a close, I found myself increasingly under the weather. By mid-afternoon Saturday I felt some aches in my shoulder and neck and popped an ibuprofen tablet to keep down a mild fever.

Whether because of a bug I had acquired or simply running around too much and not sleeping enough along the way, I was hitting that dreaded obstacle to fun travel: being sick.

After returning from dinner in Culver City, I took a light weight sleeping pill and settled in for a good night’s rest.

Zombie much?

Sunday morning, some nine hours later, I could barely pull myself out of bed and shower. I felt like a zombie, like there was a layer of cement covering my body. Bill had agreed to join me for brunch with Gary and William in Venice Beach and I didn’t want to miss another opportunity to visit with them, so I forced myself to get up. But I was so tired that not only did I doze in the car as Bill drove to the west side, I could barely function over brunch, speaking very little, not eating much, and not taking any pictures – shocking!

Embarrassed by the awful impression I made (especially as I was just meeting Gary’s brother for the first time – “Hi, this is my friend Chris, he’s a zombie.”), but too tired at the moment to care much, I spent another couple of hours sleeping in the afternoon before catching my flight back to the Bay Area. And then I slept on the flight to the Bay Area.

Returning to Life

By the time I arrived in Oakland I was starting to feel human again – a little bit – and had dinner with Paul and Anita. We ate at Chow, a long time establishment at the corner of Church and Market Streets, that has been “around the corner” from most of the places I’ve lived in San Francisco, although not quite all of them.

I made the amazing discovery that eating some dinner, overcoming the lack of appetite I felt, actually improved things for me and I started to function more normally. After a very pleasant meal and good visiting, I returned to Anita’s to finish packing and take another two-hour nap before calling a taxi at 11 pm.

My flight from San Francisco to Taipei, which left at 1:40 am, actually was quite smooth. Originally seated in an aisle seat in the center seating section, I switched to a window seat so that a husband and wife could sit together. Normally, I don’t like to be stuck in window seats on long flights in economy class, because I can’t easily get out to stretch my legs or use the facilities. This time, however, it was fine because the lady on the aisle was about one-third my size. Teeny-tiny. Very easy to climb over even when she was asleep and everyone reclined their seat.

To top it off, I slept for about six hours of the twelve-hour flight. God bless Tylenol PM, protector saint of the jet setter.

Once again, EVA is to be commended for very good service in their “Elite” – premium economy – class. The food was tasty, portions generous, response to call buttons prompt, etc. Perhaps I should sell sponsorships? “EVA Airways is the official transpacific airline of this blog.” What could I get for that?

Loooooong Transit in Taipei

The flight arrived nearly an hour early into Taipei – about 4:45 am! This gave me about eighteen hours, a long layover I had intentionally scheduled so I would have an opportunity to explore the city. Thankfully, my friend Jay was in town and had time to meet for lunch.

Knowing that it was much too early to try to head into the city – the busses weren’t even running plus there wasn’t anything to do at that hour – I proceeded through security to the departure level and checked into the transit hotel. I love transit hotels. The ability to freshen up and even take a nap makes a long trip so much more pleasant.

I booked a room for five hours and was able to get almost four hours of sleep, although a on-and-off fever had me throwing the covers off then pulling them back on throughout the morning.

At 10:00, after showering, shaving and getting a cup of coffee from Starbucks, I retraced my route back through security (“Oh, I need to go to the transit desk, please.”) and then proceeded to immigration where I threw everyone off. It seems that there is a bank of early morning arrivals into the airport and then nothing for several hours, so immigration was literally closed. Nobody at any desk.

An officer came over to her station and waved me through, and a few other officers came over, curious where this random foreigner arrived from. Looking at my arrival information, the officer took several minutes to mentally process why, if I had been on a flight that arrived five hours ago, I was just passing through immigration now.

After explaining that I had been at the hotel, sleeping, she stamped my passport and then accidentally stamped my onwards boarding pass with the arrivals stamp. Whoops! That is meant to be stamped with the departure stamp when I leave Taiwan. So she grabbed her “void” stamp and tried to undo the damage, which would cause confusion later that day when I headed through the outbound immigration line.

Customs was equally empty, with a lady officer having to set down her breakfast and jog over to my line, only to wave me through without a second glance.

After storing my roll-aboard bag at the bag check (left hand side of the terminal as you exit), I bought my bus ticket into the city and headed on my way. Below, the view from the bus as I catch my first glimpse of Taipei 101, currently the world’s tallest building.

[As a side note about how one’s English degenerates after living overseas, it took me about a minute to decide how to spell “glimpse”, above. I couldn’t remember the “e” a the end and was sounding it out and spelling it different ways before I finally looked at a dictionary. Sad, sad, sad…]

Lunchtime

By the time I made it into central Taipei, a good 45-minute ride from the airport, it was nearly lunchtime. Jay met me in the lobby of the Shangri-La hotel, where I had frittered away a few minutes reading the Sunday NY Times, which I had carried for the past thirty hours and not made much progress on.

Jay’s a friend from San Francisco who moved to Taipei to start Portico Media, what originally was an animation company but now does production, distribution and a wide range of other media-related tasks.

It has been seven or eight years since we first met through the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival. If I recall, Jay worked as an intern with the festival’s former director and there was some screening at the Castro Theatre in which we were both involved.

Anyhow, it is good to know nice people all around the world. Especially nice people with good taste in food! Jay took me to Yongkang Street, in the western end of the city, where we ate at the well-regarded Yong-Kang Beef Noodle Shop, left.

The neighborhood is a web of small streets mostly filled with small buildings, a very walkable neighborhood that reminded me a bit of New York’s Chinatown, but cleaner. Along the way we passed so many good-looking restaurants and I instantly regretted having but one day to give to this city.

Beef Noodles & c.

Yong-Kang Beef Noddle Shop is a compact, clean but not fancy two-story restaurant. We found room on the second floor and set about perusing the menu, which is limited to about fifteen key dishes, many of which we had the opportunity to try:

Working from the top row, across and down: Seaweed with garlic, steamed hog spareribs, cucumber with acorn jelly, the famous spicy beef noodle soup with soy sauce broth, spicy Schezhuan style pork dumplings, stacks of the hot spareribs steaming away in the downstairs kitchen.

The food was really good and I regretted that, as there were only two of us, we left some food on our plates. The beef noodle soup is made of very tender stewed meat with lots of gelatinous fat and connective tissue. Sometimes this is a little hard for me to get used to, as this is what I learned to leave on the plate when I was growing up, but you realize just how delicious it is, you realize you have to enjoy it!

Of course there was time for some dessert at Ice Monster (below), a local chain that serves various fruits, beans and jellies over shaved ice.

We shared a triple serving of fruit: mango, strawberry and kiwi topped with a scoop of mango ice cream. Oh, that was good!

Below, we get a photographer (you see him shooting two pictures above) to take a picture of us.

About Taipei

Since Jay had to go back to work, he put me in a taxi headed to the National Palace Museum on the north side of town. Along the way, I was a little surprised to see less traffic and far fewer scooters than I had expected. My vision of Taipei has been formed by the movies of just a few directors. Most notably, Tsai Ming-Liang and Edward Yang. From these films, I built the image in my mind of a Taipei that was perpetually polluted, crowded, and a teeming hornet’s nest of scooters.

While there were a lot of scooters, it wasn’t nearly as bad as I had expected. In fact, given that the city has much more land to work with, it was less crowded and less vertical than, say, Hong Kong. To top it off, there was a monsoon working its way up from Hong Kong so the winds were very strong, making for beautifully clear skies and a very pleasant afternoon, despite the 34-degree temperature.

Below, one of many dogs I saw riding on scooters. How does he not fall off?

The front of the National Palace Museum and below that, the view looking at the entry garden. The museum has one of the largest collection of Chinese artifacts in the world, which were moved from Beijing by the nationalists during the Chinese civil war. While controversy surrounds many aspects of the museum’s existence, much as the China-Taiwan question is a live wire that sparks many conflicts, the museum has an excellent collection that is very well presented. On a future visit I will have to give it more time, as I didn’t want to spend my entire afternoon indoors on this trip.

From the museum, I caught the bus down the hill to the nearest MRT station. The transit system in Taipei is extensive and fairly easy to navigate. There are signs and announcements in English, including “next destination” signs inside the buses. You have to watch, though, as the English flashes by pretty quickly!

The MRT system is likewise easy to use and I found may way back into the heart of the city with no difficulties. Below, my train arrives. In the main stations, there are safety gates along the edge of the track. At smaller stations, it is open.

There were two things I still wanted to do: visit the observation deck at Taipei 101 and then also take the Maokong Gondola from the Taipei Zoo station. Somewhat along the lines of the Nong Ping 360 gondola that has opened in Hong Kong, the Maokong Gondola is an extensive line, built into the MRT system, that takes you up a series of hills and mountains to a temple from which you get a good view of the larger Taipei area.

The engineering of the system is fascinating as at one point the gondola line has to drop below a large number of high-tension power lines. The view is less spectacular than, say, from Victoria Peak in Hong Kong, but is still very nice.

Below: Sunset as seen from one of the gondola cars. Note that you can see Taipei 101 in the photo, which looks roughly northwest.

By the time I descended the gondola, the sun was tucking into the western horizon, ready for bed. Knowing that the airport was quite a ride away, I didn’t want to risk being delayed by going to the top of Taipei 101, which was a good thirty minutes away from the Taipei Zoo station where I picked up the gondola.

I called Jay to report my whereabouts, lest he feel responsible for having lost a visitor to the sprawling Taiwanese capital, and we agreed to meet for a quick dinner near his office. We headed out to a night market, a familiar site in Chinese cities around the world. Once again, we had some really tasty food to eat.

Above: Various meats and veggies are added to hot broth to make a satisfying soup. Below: A fresh oyster omelet is prepared for us.

Above: Our oyster omelet and zoh geng or meat noodle stew with pork sausage. Tasty, unfussy food for the market shopper.

Even though it was a Tuesday night, there were plenty of shoppers looking for bargains, below.

By this point, it was pushing 8:30 and I had an 11:05 flight. Not wanting to risk heavy traffic, we headed back to the Shangri-La Hotel and five minutes later I was on a bus to the airport. Many thanks to Jay for taking time out of his busy day to ensure I had a proper introduction to Taipei food. I’m going to pack Tawn up and head back one of these days soon to get some more.

Conclusion

The trip to the airport was smooth. I reclaimed my checked bag about thirty minutes late, but the lady didn’t charge me anything extra. Outbound immigration was a little confused why my boarding pass was stamped with an entry stamp and then subsequently voided. After a brief explanation, the officer added an exit stamp to the mess and I was on my way. Just enough time to shower and change at the transit hotel so my final flight would be made in comfort.

Eighteen hours doesn’t seem to be enough time to explore a city, but I found a lot to enjoy about Taipei and look forward to a trip back. It is much less intense than Hong Kong, a city I love, and that is a positive thing. Not everywhere needs to be so vertical and intense.

The flight back to Khrungthep was smooth and I enjoyed a long conversation with an American-born Thai from Arizona who was flying in to visit relatives and explore business opportunities. With the number of times this young man called me “sir”, I assumed he had served in the military at some point. Turns out to just be good manners on his part combined with a touch of looking middle-aged on my part.

christao408

The adventures of an expat American who moved to Bangkok for his husband.

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