November 07, 2010

Southeast Asia & China 2008-09

As predicted, I ended up abandoning this blog. Now that I have settled into a routine, perhaps I will post more regularly. One would hope so anyway.

While I am enjoying my time back in Canada and getting the opportunity to spend time with friends and family, life is a bit mundane compared to what I was up to last year. The itch to travel is getting more and more persistent, something I'm trying to suppress as I attempt to be a Grown Up. I have visions of working on an organic farm in France, taking cooking lessons in the countryside of Italy or travelling through India on its rickety train network. Of course, I would be eating my way through these countries because aside from sightseeing, the best part of travelling is gorging on delicious food.

Instead of succumbing to my urges, I've been looking through my travel photos of Southeast and East Asia. I skimmed through the pictures when I first arrived home but haven't touched them since. It's an awful habit of mine - I take a crapload of pictures and then discard them to the side afterwards.

Here is a small sample of some of my favourite places that I visited.

Sapa, Vietnam


Sapa is located north of Hanoi, above sea level and surrounded by beautiful mountains. There is a large ethnic minority population and I did a two day trek with several ladies from a Black H'mong village. I can't even describe how breathtaking it was to walk through the terraced rice field - a green so vibrant it's almost blinding.






Koh Tao, Thailand



I have fond memories of Koh Tao because I received my PADI Open Water Diver certification on the island. The day was spent out on the water and in the evening, I would watch the sunset and eat a delicious seafood dinner on the beach. My friends and I ended up staying on Koh Tao for one whole week (which is quite long in travel time, as sad as that sounds) because we loved it so much.






Angkor Wat, Cambodia



Angkor Wat is a must do for anyone visiting Southeast Asia. Not visiting Angkor Wat is the equivalent of not going inside the Coliseum or the Forum while in Rome. Who in their right mind would do that? (Oh wait, that would be me. That's my biggest regret of my Europe trip, though it does give me the excuse to go back to Italy and do things right.)






Sandakan, Malaysia



I went for the orangutans (my favourite animal of all time) but ended up seeing other primates as well. In fact, I've seen more than enough monkeys to last me a lifetime. I could put together an album solely dedicated to the monkeys I saw in Asia if I wanted to.






Great Wall of China, China



I stayed with my friend Lili when I was in Beijing and she had a friend who knew someone that did private trips to the Wild Great Wall, aka a non-restored and non-touristy section of the Great Wall. On the way to this portion of the wall, we passed by several huge signs that said "no visitors allowed" or something of the like and our driver paid off two different people who were guarding the "entrance". Parts of the wall were crumbling and I was convinced I was going to slip and break my neck because it snowed the previous day and everything was slippery as heck, but it was worth it. Having the view of the Great Wall for miles and miles with no one else around (minus our driver and his buddy) = priceless.



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