kuala lumpur was next...a fantastic city...(well, mostly, but that comes a little later)...the capital of the country, in some ways very similar to singapore...but unlike singapore, which felt rather sterile at times, kuala lumpur has plenty of soul, and feels very lived in...i loved it...sure, it isn't as clean and orderly as singapore, but it's still a LOT cleaner than just about any other big city i've seen...it has great public transportation, plenty to see and do, lots of shopping, (including plenty that i'll never be able to afford unless i start playing and winming the lottery!) and fantastic food...it's also a great city for simply wandering aimlessly...
kuala lumpur is perhaps best known for the petronas towers...when they were built, they were the tallest buildings in the world...(and they take pains to point out that they are still the tallest twin towers in the world)...491 meters tall i think? 89 floors...there is a double decker skybridge connecting the towers at floors 41 and 42, this is as high as tourists are allowed to go...each day, 1400 lucky people get to go up to the skybridge...for free!!! the not so fun part is that you have to queue up at 0830 (preferably earlier) in order to snag one of the tickets...the ticket then tells you when you get to come back to actually go up the elevator...i got one for much later in the afternoon, then got on a bus and went to some hindu caves...(which were HUGE, but not otherwise impressive...only 272 steps - each of which is numbered - to get to the mouth of the first cave!)...when i got back to the towers for my trip up to the skybridge, i had to wait until my specific time was called...we were all herded into a theatre, given 3D glasses (which made everyone slightly dizzy/nauseous) and shown a video that basically promoted petronas, and tried to show what a great company it is...it's the malaysian national oil and gas company...after that, we put our bags through the x-ray machine, walked through the metal detector, and got on the elevator that whisked us up to the 41st floor...fast...everyone had to pop their ears a couple times...we only got to be in the skybridge for about 5 minutes...then another quick ride down, and they sent our little group into the exhibition room...the exhibition room shows a few of the physics behind building the towers, and shows how tall they are compared to other tall buildings in the world...there is also a little spot where a machine measures you, and tells you how tall you are against various buildings in the world...i'm 1/267th the size of the sears tower in chicago:)...
one day i took a day trip from KL, and took the transit train to putrajaya...it's a planned city, about 23km away, the administrative city of malaysia...most of malaysia's government ministries now have their offices in putrajaya...wide boulevards, pretty flowers, huge buildings, sidewalks everywhere...none of the buildings look alike, but somehow they all go with each other...i was there on a friday, and as i walked past the mosque, it was just before time for noon prayers...friday noon prayers are the one time of the week where muslims are required (by islam) to pray at the mosque...(the other 34 prayers a week can be done anywhere)...there were people streaming toward the mosque...after i got back to KL that day, i ended up at the national mosque...built in the 60s i think...since i'm non muslim, i was given a purple robe with a hood to wear before i could go in...and even with the robe, i wasn't allowed in the main prayer room, though i did get to look in...i love how mosques are always so open, so airy...there were a number of pamphlets available, in a number of different languages...titles included eating in islam, dress in islam, prayer in islam, sex in islam, becoming a muslim, and who is Allah? interesting reading...the one called dress in islam seemed to attack the west, but the others were all just giving information...
another day i took a day trip to two smaller towns...one is called shah alam, its the state capital of selangor, which surrounds KL...the state mosque in shah alam is called the blue mosque, and is the biggest mosque in southeast asia...it can hold 24000 people...the guy who showed me around (i was again given a robe, with a headscarf) said that during friday noon prayers, it's about 80% full...klang was the second town i visited that day, it had an art deco inspired mosque, but not a lot else...it was nice to wander around a town that hardly sees any tourists...
now, onto the not so nice part of KL...one of the nights there, i decided to go to a performance at the national theatre...when i booked the ticket, they asked if i understood bahasa malaysia, and i said no...they said that wouldn't be a problem, that it was more a musical than a play...they said there would be lots of singing and dancing, and that i'd enjoy the costumes...i did enjoy the costumes, they were bright, and intricate...there wasn't nearly the amount of singing and dancing that i expected, but it was still fun...anywho, i walked home...i got about 20 minutes away from home when i was mugged...i suppose it was really an attempted mugging, since they didn't get anything from me, and i wasn't injured...two guys did it...the whole thing only took 5-10 seconds, but i've never felt that invaded...NEVER...what made it worse was that there was a group accross the street, laughing and cat calling while it was happening...i don't understand why anyone would think that behaviour acceptable...it's wrong...their hands went under my skirt, and up my front...off in the distance i could see two foreign guys who realized what was happening and started to run toward me (the group accross the street and the foreign guys running were things i apparently registered, w/out actually realizing they were happening until later) but they didn't get close enough in time...after it was over, i kept walking down the street, really shaken up...the foreign guys asked if i was okay, and i ignored them, i was so freaked out...(when i got back to the hostel, i realized i had been very rude)...anywho, it took another 20 minutes of walking to get back to my hostel, during which i had an asthma attack...it sucked...2 chocolate bars and an ice cream didn't help the asthma, or make me feel any better in general...that night there was another girl in my dorm room, and for the first time ever, i was glad to be sharing...needless to say, i didn't sleep well, not much at all...since then, i've avoided single local guys like the plague...i've also made every possible effort to be inside by the time the sun goes down...
23 June 2009
18 June 2009
malaysia 1
crossing the border from singapore into malaysia was EASY...hop on a bus, it drops you off at singaporean emigration...grab your stuff, go through the line and get stamped out of singapore...hop back on another bus, this one drops you off at malaysian immigration...grab your stuff, go through the line and get stamped into malaysia...the huge immigration and quarantine building is connected by sky walkways to several streets in johor bahru...no need to take a taxi or bus or anything else to get into town close to the hotels...
accomodation in johor is expensive...compared to the rest of malaysia anywho...i found a hotel, had a cup of chai, and started walking...malaysia is the first mostly islamic country in which i've traveled, so women are generally dressed pretty conservatively...well, compared to the west anywho...headscarves are the norm, though by islamic standards malaysia is pretty relaxed...the headscarves go with jeans and long sleeve shirts...i wandered around and saw several mosques, all very different from each other...johor is a big city, just like singapore...i think it wants to be singapore, just on the other side of the border, but it's not quite there...it does howeva have several large malls, including the all important coffee bean and tea leafs outlets...hee hee...
from johor i went to mersing...i had hoped to book an island tour from mersing, but when i got there, i found several things had closed, including two of the budget hotels listed in the book...also closed was the company that ran the tour i wanted to take...oh well...i walked around town like always...i found a mosque that overlooked much of the town and enjoyed the sunset from up there...mersing isn't particularly picturesque, but sunsets from any height are always nice...finding the bus station in mersing wasn't so easy...when i arrived in town, the bus dropped me off in the center of town, so i didn't know where the bus station was...when i looked at the map, it seemed easy enough to find, so i walked to that location, and found nothing but sand...walking back through town i asked a few people, and they pointed in all directions...of the four people i asked, they pointed in all four directions...not very helpful, eh? i kept walking, in hopes that i would somehow stumble upon the bus station...i ended up meeting a guy named stefan, from switzerland, who was also looking for the station, so we walked together...he's from bern, and on 3 weeks of his annual 6 weeks of leave...we finally found it, woo hoo...it turned out we both wanted to go to kuantan, so i figured i'd see him again the next day...but when i got to the bus station the next day.........
all the buses to kuantan were full...how does that happen? i don't know...anywho, the guys at the ticket window told me to go to another town, then take two local buses after that, and i'd get to kuantan, albeit through a much longer route...i opened up the guidebook and found that one of the towns he suggested along the way actually sounded all right, so i decided to make that my destination for the day instead...pekan used to be a royal town, way back when...so there are a few more mosques, and a few istanas...(where royals lived, i think...though i'm not sure)...it's a peaceful town now, not much going on...no big malls, no big buildings in general...a polo club at which prince charles (i think?) is supposed to have played, once upon a time...
from pekan i finally ended up in kuantan...it's a city, much like johor...i enjoyed just walking around, soaking up the atmosphere...there is one major mosque in the middle of town, quite pretty...it overlooks the playing fields (malaysia is soccer CRAZY) which are kept in immaculate condition...i had one of my best meals ever, served on a GIANT banana leaf, which i ate with my hands...being a foreigner, they put a silverware holder on my table, but when i looked around and saw no one else using silverware, i figured i didn't need to either...so i used my hands...my right hand anywho...(in muslim countries your left hand is for dirty tasks, like wiping your bum, putting on your shoes, etc...your right hand is for eating, receiving money/gifts, etc...mixing tasks with the wrong hand is quite an insult...thank goodness i've had the right handed habit since moving to korea)...i can eat with my hand, but of course i'm quite messy, hee hee...it's fun though, and i look forward to doing it again...
accomodation in johor is expensive...compared to the rest of malaysia anywho...i found a hotel, had a cup of chai, and started walking...malaysia is the first mostly islamic country in which i've traveled, so women are generally dressed pretty conservatively...well, compared to the west anywho...headscarves are the norm, though by islamic standards malaysia is pretty relaxed...the headscarves go with jeans and long sleeve shirts...i wandered around and saw several mosques, all very different from each other...johor is a big city, just like singapore...i think it wants to be singapore, just on the other side of the border, but it's not quite there...it does howeva have several large malls, including the all important coffee bean and tea leafs outlets...hee hee...
from johor i went to mersing...i had hoped to book an island tour from mersing, but when i got there, i found several things had closed, including two of the budget hotels listed in the book...also closed was the company that ran the tour i wanted to take...oh well...i walked around town like always...i found a mosque that overlooked much of the town and enjoyed the sunset from up there...mersing isn't particularly picturesque, but sunsets from any height are always nice...finding the bus station in mersing wasn't so easy...when i arrived in town, the bus dropped me off in the center of town, so i didn't know where the bus station was...when i looked at the map, it seemed easy enough to find, so i walked to that location, and found nothing but sand...walking back through town i asked a few people, and they pointed in all directions...of the four people i asked, they pointed in all four directions...not very helpful, eh? i kept walking, in hopes that i would somehow stumble upon the bus station...i ended up meeting a guy named stefan, from switzerland, who was also looking for the station, so we walked together...he's from bern, and on 3 weeks of his annual 6 weeks of leave...we finally found it, woo hoo...it turned out we both wanted to go to kuantan, so i figured i'd see him again the next day...but when i got to the bus station the next day.........
all the buses to kuantan were full...how does that happen? i don't know...anywho, the guys at the ticket window told me to go to another town, then take two local buses after that, and i'd get to kuantan, albeit through a much longer route...i opened up the guidebook and found that one of the towns he suggested along the way actually sounded all right, so i decided to make that my destination for the day instead...pekan used to be a royal town, way back when...so there are a few more mosques, and a few istanas...(where royals lived, i think...though i'm not sure)...it's a peaceful town now, not much going on...no big malls, no big buildings in general...a polo club at which prince charles (i think?) is supposed to have played, once upon a time...
from pekan i finally ended up in kuantan...it's a city, much like johor...i enjoyed just walking around, soaking up the atmosphere...there is one major mosque in the middle of town, quite pretty...it overlooks the playing fields (malaysia is soccer CRAZY) which are kept in immaculate condition...i had one of my best meals ever, served on a GIANT banana leaf, which i ate with my hands...being a foreigner, they put a silverware holder on my table, but when i looked around and saw no one else using silverware, i figured i didn't need to either...so i used my hands...my right hand anywho...(in muslim countries your left hand is for dirty tasks, like wiping your bum, putting on your shoes, etc...your right hand is for eating, receiving money/gifts, etc...mixing tasks with the wrong hand is quite an insult...thank goodness i've had the right handed habit since moving to korea)...i can eat with my hand, but of course i'm quite messy, hee hee...it's fun though, and i look forward to doing it again...
from kuantan i took a cross peninsular bus to melaka (malacca)...melaka used to be an important port city in southeast asia, and its still easy to see evidence of the british and dutch...the portuguese left behind their egg tarts, and the chinese are still there...(my hostel was right in the middle of chinatown)...melaka is perhaps one of the most multicultural cities in malaysia, because of it's origins...within 5 minutes of walking from my hostel, i could see a mosque, a hindu temple, a buddhist temple, and a church...not bad, eh? melaka is one of the biggest stops on the tourist trail, so there were tons of tourists...i never really felt like i got away from them...even walking a lot, which normally gets me somewhere, didn't do any good... one of the days i was there i heard someone speaking in a strong american accent...(a slow southern drawl)...it was hard to ignore, because it was loud...anywho, out of curiosity, i asked where she was from...north carolina...and get this, she is currently an ESL teacher in korea...she was traveling with a filipino who currently works in graphic design in singapore...anywho, the three of us ended up spending the rest of the day together, mostly just wandering around...at dinnertime (well, it was just drinking, there was no food:) a canadian joined us, he was in melaka on business...at one point, ingrid (the north carolinian) got up and sang with the guy who was playing the guitar...she may be loud while speaking, but she's even better while singing...an amazing voice...strong, confident, and very much in tune...she brought the house down...i ended up getting back to my hostel a whole lot later than i had planned, but it was just one of those days that was perfect...i was sad that they were leaving the next day... there is a little india section of melaka, but it's not all that great...the food wasn't nearly as good as i had hoped...of course, it probably didn't help that while i was eating my dinner one night the waiter kept trying to strike up a conversation with me...(while i had food in my mouth!! my parents taught me manners so i kept making him wait for a response:)...it felt awkward, and i was only too happy to finish eating, pay, and leave...
11 June 2009
singapore
singapore has got to be the cleanest, most orderly big city. EVER. We arrived late in the evening, but were able to catch the last train into town. In finding a hostel, we again got lucky, and got the last two beds at the first place we tried...which is awesome, because wandering around the city with all our stuff in the middle of the night would not have been fun, no matter how safe the city is supposed to be...
singapore is a city state, measuring about 40km one way, and 25km the other way...it's only been completely independent since the mid 60s...before that it was part of malaysia for a few years, and before that it was a british colony...it's just barely north of the equator, so the temperature stays pretty steady all year...and it's humid...it's connected to malaysia by two causeways, over the johor straits...on the other side of the city are the singapore straights...
it's independent, but it's not a free society...the laws are pretty strict...no jaywalking...no littering...no eating/drinking on public transit...for each of those three, the fine is S$500...if you're caught with drugs, you're going to be in jail for a LONG time...if you're caught trafficking drugs, it's a mandatory death sentence...and they DO carry it out...anywho, because the laws are so strict, everything is very orderly and clean...there are trash cans on the streets, so you don't even have to carry anything for very long...
the standard of living is quite high in singapore...the average income is about the same as in the states...and i don't think there is much homelessness or poverty at all...in a lot of ways, singapore reminds me of seoul...but cleaner, and people aren't nearly as rude...since singapore doesn't really have it's own culture, there are lots of foreigners...LOTS...it's the only place in this entire trip that i wasn't stared at just for being a foreign female...i was ignored, which is great!! fabulous, relatively cheap public transport, HUGE apartment buildings, glitzy stores...and there are coffee beans everywhere...there is a lot more english spoken here (locals call it singlish) and people are really helpful in general...
because public transport is so good, people don't walk very much...of course, that doesn't stop either one of us...the sidewalks are great, they're everywhere...little india was probably my favourite section of the city, just because i enjoyed the real india so much...little india actually has a fairly significant indian population, so there are tons of restaurants, stores selling everything you don't need, stores selling indian sweets, a few temples, etc...even a grocery store where i was able to get more chai masala...YUM...i surprised a guy in one restaurant by knowing the hindi name for a couple curries, hee hee...i love indian food, and i've missed it...i haven't been eating it in other places we've been, because it doesn't seem authentic...the other places we've seen it have all been restaurants, geared toward tourists...this is the first place we've been where we've been around a lot of indians, (who are mostly here on 2 yr contracts, or came on those contracts and stayed) so the food is geared toward them more than anything...i found places to eat where there weren't any tourists, but the places were packed with indians...that tells me it's good...it's fun to eat with my hands, it always surprises people...why use a spoon and fork if the locals don't use them?
my biggest day of walking included seeing temples, mosques, cathedrals, a couple parks, and more...each day was a long walking day though, since it's so easy to walk everywhere...the sidewalks i mentioned earlier are actually walkable...you don't have to walk around stores spilling onto the sidewalk, or around motorbikes or cars parked on the sidewalk, as in other countries...
i also got to see a WWII allied war cemetary (over 24,000 memorialized there, none of them american,) a huge monastery, the philatelic museum, chinatown, and the esplanade, in view of a giant ferris wheel...(i think the ride to go around it once is 30mins+?)...i believe the ferris wheel is supposed to be the biggest in the world? on the esplanade is the merlion, which is supposed to be the sign of singapore...i have no idea how they came up with this...the merlion is a combination of a lion and a fish...???????, right???...one day i saw the largest fountain in the world...it's close to suntec city, one of the malls/big buildings/offices in the city...legend has it that if you walk around the fountain clockwise three times with your hand in the water, you are guaranteed good luck...i did the walk, so we'll see about my luck, eh?
one day i went out to sentosa island, off the southern tip of "mainland" singapore...it was originally used to defend singapore, but now there is only one historical anything left on the island, a fort used for defence of the colony...the reason i went to see sentosa was to see the fort that was last used in the defense of the island during WWII...(a lousy defense, the guns were pointed the wrong way)...they've turned the fort into a pretty good interpretive center...you can see a couple of the large guns used, and they've got sound bites of what actually happened when the japanese invaded...good explanations of pictures, etc...i ended up getting distracted, and didn't see as much as i planned, but i had a great time anywho...its easy to get to the island, you can go by public transport, and it's cheap...of course, while it's cheap to get to the island, being on the island isn't cheap...the rest of the island is a resort...there are lots of things to do, most with high prices...riding one of those wheelie things where you are standing up and you just push the handle forward, going up a tower, watching the dolphin show, etc...there are several beaches, none of which are all that...i walked on one of them, and was stunned by the awful quality of the sand...if you're going to build a beach, why not build a good one, eh?
singapore is by far the most expensive place we've traveled, but we both liked it...it does howeva seem quite sterile...b/c of all the laws about littering, and whatnot, there isn't anything that makes the area feel lived in...no street stalls of yummy food...no street instrumentalists...no graffiti (sp?)...it was convenient, and super easy though...
singapore is a city state, measuring about 40km one way, and 25km the other way...it's only been completely independent since the mid 60s...before that it was part of malaysia for a few years, and before that it was a british colony...it's just barely north of the equator, so the temperature stays pretty steady all year...and it's humid...it's connected to malaysia by two causeways, over the johor straits...on the other side of the city are the singapore straights...
it's independent, but it's not a free society...the laws are pretty strict...no jaywalking...no littering...no eating/drinking on public transit...for each of those three, the fine is S$500...if you're caught with drugs, you're going to be in jail for a LONG time...if you're caught trafficking drugs, it's a mandatory death sentence...and they DO carry it out...anywho, because the laws are so strict, everything is very orderly and clean...there are trash cans on the streets, so you don't even have to carry anything for very long...
the standard of living is quite high in singapore...the average income is about the same as in the states...and i don't think there is much homelessness or poverty at all...in a lot of ways, singapore reminds me of seoul...but cleaner, and people aren't nearly as rude...since singapore doesn't really have it's own culture, there are lots of foreigners...LOTS...it's the only place in this entire trip that i wasn't stared at just for being a foreign female...i was ignored, which is great!! fabulous, relatively cheap public transport, HUGE apartment buildings, glitzy stores...and there are coffee beans everywhere...there is a lot more english spoken here (locals call it singlish) and people are really helpful in general...
because public transport is so good, people don't walk very much...of course, that doesn't stop either one of us...the sidewalks are great, they're everywhere...little india was probably my favourite section of the city, just because i enjoyed the real india so much...little india actually has a fairly significant indian population, so there are tons of restaurants, stores selling everything you don't need, stores selling indian sweets, a few temples, etc...even a grocery store where i was able to get more chai masala...YUM...i surprised a guy in one restaurant by knowing the hindi name for a couple curries, hee hee...i love indian food, and i've missed it...i haven't been eating it in other places we've been, because it doesn't seem authentic...the other places we've seen it have all been restaurants, geared toward tourists...this is the first place we've been where we've been around a lot of indians, (who are mostly here on 2 yr contracts, or came on those contracts and stayed) so the food is geared toward them more than anything...i found places to eat where there weren't any tourists, but the places were packed with indians...that tells me it's good...it's fun to eat with my hands, it always surprises people...why use a spoon and fork if the locals don't use them?
my biggest day of walking included seeing temples, mosques, cathedrals, a couple parks, and more...each day was a long walking day though, since it's so easy to walk everywhere...the sidewalks i mentioned earlier are actually walkable...you don't have to walk around stores spilling onto the sidewalk, or around motorbikes or cars parked on the sidewalk, as in other countries...
i also got to see a WWII allied war cemetary (over 24,000 memorialized there, none of them american,) a huge monastery, the philatelic museum, chinatown, and the esplanade, in view of a giant ferris wheel...(i think the ride to go around it once is 30mins+?)...i believe the ferris wheel is supposed to be the biggest in the world? on the esplanade is the merlion, which is supposed to be the sign of singapore...i have no idea how they came up with this...the merlion is a combination of a lion and a fish...???????, right???...one day i saw the largest fountain in the world...it's close to suntec city, one of the malls/big buildings/offices in the city...legend has it that if you walk around the fountain clockwise three times with your hand in the water, you are guaranteed good luck...i did the walk, so we'll see about my luck, eh?
one day i went out to sentosa island, off the southern tip of "mainland" singapore...it was originally used to defend singapore, but now there is only one historical anything left on the island, a fort used for defence of the colony...the reason i went to see sentosa was to see the fort that was last used in the defense of the island during WWII...(a lousy defense, the guns were pointed the wrong way)...they've turned the fort into a pretty good interpretive center...you can see a couple of the large guns used, and they've got sound bites of what actually happened when the japanese invaded...good explanations of pictures, etc...i ended up getting distracted, and didn't see as much as i planned, but i had a great time anywho...its easy to get to the island, you can go by public transport, and it's cheap...of course, while it's cheap to get to the island, being on the island isn't cheap...the rest of the island is a resort...there are lots of things to do, most with high prices...riding one of those wheelie things where you are standing up and you just push the handle forward, going up a tower, watching the dolphin show, etc...there are several beaches, none of which are all that...i walked on one of them, and was stunned by the awful quality of the sand...if you're going to build a beach, why not build a good one, eh?
singapore is by far the most expensive place we've traveled, but we both liked it...it does howeva seem quite sterile...b/c of all the laws about littering, and whatnot, there isn't anything that makes the area feel lived in...no street stalls of yummy food...no street instrumentalists...no graffiti (sp?)...it was convenient, and super easy though...
07 June 2009
the visayas
after seeing the gorgeous northern part of the philippines, we decided to go south...we took a ferry from manila to cebu, a measly 25.5 hours spent on board...we slept in a giant dorm room...i think i counted about 144 beds in there? there was supposed to be air conditioning, but it wasn't working hard enough, and everyone was hot...even i was hot, and i'm usually comfortable long after everyone else is warm...our tickets included breakfast, lunch and dinner in the cafeteria, so for each meal we got in line and waited...it took about 2.5 hours for them to serve everyone for each meal...breakfast was scrambled egss, tuna, and rice...lunch = chicken and rice...dinner = squid, and, you guessed it, rice...i didn't like the squid at all...oh well...
we arrived in cebu after midnight...neither one of us likes arriving anywhere that late, but we didn't have a choice...we found a taxi who would use a meter, then went to a hotel...
the guidebook describes cebu as being divided into two sections...uptown and downtown...uptown is more monied, cleaner, has more of the REALLY BIG MALLS, etc...downtown is poorer, dirtier, and seedier...BUT we both liked downtown better...there were many more people on the streets, lots more people smiling, and we could see people actually living...by contrast, even though uptown was supposed to be safer, it also felt more sterile...there weren't nearly as many people out and about...cebu doesn't have a lot to see, but it is worth nothing that it was on the island of cebu that magellan first landed in the 1500s...there is a cross in cebu called magellans cross...supposedly somewhere in that cross is a splinter of the cross raised by magellan (well, not him exactly, more likely by his underlings) when he first arrived...magellan himself didn't last long, he died not long after arriving in a battle with a tribal leader named lapu lapu...which only put off spanish colonialization by 100 yrs or so, but at least it's something...lapu lapu is now one of many filipino national heroes...layna and i both enjoyed just walking around the city, particularly downtown...layna found a supermarket that had a make your own salad section, both of us went a little crazy...there aren't a whole lot of fresh vegetables available in the phils, so it was a real treat for us...(most filipinos wouldn't agree)...
from cebu we took another ferry to the island of bohol, the city of tagbilaran...bohol is known for two things...(which are both promoted tirelessly by the department of tourism)...tarsiers and the chocolate hills...tarsiers are one of the world's oldest and smallest primates...they split from the genetic line that would eventually make humans about 45 million years ago...(how do they figure these things out?)...anywho, they are sometimes called the worlds smallest monkey, but they're not monkeys at all...they do look a little like monkeys though...and owls...and gremlins...and ET...they fit in the palm of your hand, but they can also jump 5m...their eyes are 150x bigger than human eyes, relative to body size...their heads can rotate 180 degrees in either direction, just like owls...their eyes are bigger than their brain and stomach!! all in all, they're super cute...they hunt nocturnally, but we saw them during daylight and they were plenty awake...not moving much, but they were awake...
despite what my sister told me 5 yrs ago, i was hoping things had changed...i was hoping the chocolate hills would turn out to actually be made of chocolate...but i was disappointed...the name comes from the way the vegetation supposedly turns brown from the sun during the dry season, but we saw them when everything was green...in all the postcards and other pictures i've seen, they're always green...so why the name? i don't know...i think it's false marketing...UNFAIR!!! anywho, at the chocolate hills complex (which consisted of two viewing platforms, around 10 souvenir shops, and a hotel) we climbed up and saw a bunch of hills...i don't remember how many there are in all, but they're all nearly the same shape...some are bigger than others, but otherwise they're all similar...it isnt known for sure how the hills came to be...right now geologists think coral deposits have been pushed up from underneath the island...personally, i enjoyed the bus ride to and from the hills more than the hills themselves...
from tagbilaran we took another ferry to dumaguete...it's a university town, pretty laid back...it's on the island of negros, which is another visayan island...negros is full of pretty beaches, mountains, etc...lots of outdoor stuff to do...but we didn't have time to do any of it, so we just enjoyed the town, wandering around like we normally do...it was in dumaguete that i received a marriage proposal, a profession of love, AND a declaration of my beauty all in the same day...but not from the same guy!!! gotta love this country:)
from dumaguete we took ferries all the way back to manila, where we stayed for 36 hours before moving on to singapore...when we got off the ferry in manila we thought we'd take a taxi to a hotel because it was raining and we had all our stuff...but none of the taxis would use their meter, and instead were suggesting prices at least 10x what the meter would have been...one driver even tried to justify it by saying it would take an hour or two to get to our hotel...later, we both said that if we had taken his taxi, we would've made him drive around for over an hour, just because!! the one full day we had in manila both of us walked around, not doing a whole lot of anything...the whole day it kept raining, which wasn't fun...i hate rain...not only was it raining, but most of the time it was raining sideways!!! ugh...but after putting on a very very very cheap poncho, i decided to suck it up and just go...so the rainy part ended up being kinda fun...walking through flooded streets, walking into a fountain to take a couple pictures, etc...hee hee...
i wish we could've stayed longer in the philippines, but several things were stopping us...one, the visa you receive on arrival is only 21 days...which isn't very long, considering there are 7000+ islands making up the country!! it takes a long time to get from place to place, so 21 days doesn't really allow you to see much...not nearly as much as you think you'll be able to see...and we don't fly when we're in a country...second, we didn't have more time, just cause there are other countries we want to see...sometimes we wish this trip was longer, sometimes we're both ready for it to be done...
we arrived in cebu after midnight...neither one of us likes arriving anywhere that late, but we didn't have a choice...we found a taxi who would use a meter, then went to a hotel...
the guidebook describes cebu as being divided into two sections...uptown and downtown...uptown is more monied, cleaner, has more of the REALLY BIG MALLS, etc...downtown is poorer, dirtier, and seedier...BUT we both liked downtown better...there were many more people on the streets, lots more people smiling, and we could see people actually living...by contrast, even though uptown was supposed to be safer, it also felt more sterile...there weren't nearly as many people out and about...cebu doesn't have a lot to see, but it is worth nothing that it was on the island of cebu that magellan first landed in the 1500s...there is a cross in cebu called magellans cross...supposedly somewhere in that cross is a splinter of the cross raised by magellan (well, not him exactly, more likely by his underlings) when he first arrived...magellan himself didn't last long, he died not long after arriving in a battle with a tribal leader named lapu lapu...which only put off spanish colonialization by 100 yrs or so, but at least it's something...lapu lapu is now one of many filipino national heroes...layna and i both enjoyed just walking around the city, particularly downtown...layna found a supermarket that had a make your own salad section, both of us went a little crazy...there aren't a whole lot of fresh vegetables available in the phils, so it was a real treat for us...(most filipinos wouldn't agree)...
from cebu we took another ferry to the island of bohol, the city of tagbilaran...bohol is known for two things...(which are both promoted tirelessly by the department of tourism)...tarsiers and the chocolate hills...tarsiers are one of the world's oldest and smallest primates...they split from the genetic line that would eventually make humans about 45 million years ago...(how do they figure these things out?)...anywho, they are sometimes called the worlds smallest monkey, but they're not monkeys at all...they do look a little like monkeys though...and owls...and gremlins...and ET...they fit in the palm of your hand, but they can also jump 5m...their eyes are 150x bigger than human eyes, relative to body size...their heads can rotate 180 degrees in either direction, just like owls...their eyes are bigger than their brain and stomach!! all in all, they're super cute...they hunt nocturnally, but we saw them during daylight and they were plenty awake...not moving much, but they were awake...
despite what my sister told me 5 yrs ago, i was hoping things had changed...i was hoping the chocolate hills would turn out to actually be made of chocolate...but i was disappointed...the name comes from the way the vegetation supposedly turns brown from the sun during the dry season, but we saw them when everything was green...in all the postcards and other pictures i've seen, they're always green...so why the name? i don't know...i think it's false marketing...UNFAIR!!! anywho, at the chocolate hills complex (which consisted of two viewing platforms, around 10 souvenir shops, and a hotel) we climbed up and saw a bunch of hills...i don't remember how many there are in all, but they're all nearly the same shape...some are bigger than others, but otherwise they're all similar...it isnt known for sure how the hills came to be...right now geologists think coral deposits have been pushed up from underneath the island...personally, i enjoyed the bus ride to and from the hills more than the hills themselves...
from tagbilaran we took another ferry to dumaguete...it's a university town, pretty laid back...it's on the island of negros, which is another visayan island...negros is full of pretty beaches, mountains, etc...lots of outdoor stuff to do...but we didn't have time to do any of it, so we just enjoyed the town, wandering around like we normally do...it was in dumaguete that i received a marriage proposal, a profession of love, AND a declaration of my beauty all in the same day...but not from the same guy!!! gotta love this country:)
from dumaguete we took ferries all the way back to manila, where we stayed for 36 hours before moving on to singapore...when we got off the ferry in manila we thought we'd take a taxi to a hotel because it was raining and we had all our stuff...but none of the taxis would use their meter, and instead were suggesting prices at least 10x what the meter would have been...one driver even tried to justify it by saying it would take an hour or two to get to our hotel...later, we both said that if we had taken his taxi, we would've made him drive around for over an hour, just because!! the one full day we had in manila both of us walked around, not doing a whole lot of anything...the whole day it kept raining, which wasn't fun...i hate rain...not only was it raining, but most of the time it was raining sideways!!! ugh...but after putting on a very very very cheap poncho, i decided to suck it up and just go...so the rainy part ended up being kinda fun...walking through flooded streets, walking into a fountain to take a couple pictures, etc...hee hee...
i wish we could've stayed longer in the philippines, but several things were stopping us...one, the visa you receive on arrival is only 21 days...which isn't very long, considering there are 7000+ islands making up the country!! it takes a long time to get from place to place, so 21 days doesn't really allow you to see much...not nearly as much as you think you'll be able to see...and we don't fly when we're in a country...second, we didn't have more time, just cause there are other countries we want to see...sometimes we wish this trip was longer, sometimes we're both ready for it to be done...
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