2019 Asian Trip: Day 9 - Ho Chi Minh City to Luang Prabang

Day 9 – Viet Nam to Laos

Today was mostly a travel day. A long travel day due to the fact that there is somehow no non-stop flight from Ho Chi Minh City to Luang Prabang, Laos. There are flights to Luang Prabang from places like Singapore and Bangkok, so it isn’t like this is some small outstation (though, after going through their airport, it kind of is). Because of this, there really wasn’t much to do today.

I did wake up late (again) because of a late night (again), but a fun one. I had to check out of the AirBNB, which required a full re-pack, and got out a few minutes after the supposed 11am check-out. The building I was in let me keep my bags with them, which helped, but in reality I only had time for an early lunch anyway as I was a bit weary of traffic to the airport.

For lunch I went to one of the few restaurants on my list that I had not yet gone to in Cuc Quac Ngon, another beautiful little Vietnamese joint housed in an old house. This wasn’t the sprawling open style like Ngon yesterday, but instead of a fancy, smaller house, with a pond in the middle. The menu was simple, just a few pages of Vietnamese classics.

In the end, I got a chicken & bamboo lime-spiced salad, which was amazingly fresh, and a bit more of that fish sauce taste compared to a similar style Thai salad. My main was a braised beef curry which was excellent. To be honest, it did not seem very Vietnamese either in look or taste, but I imagine that is incorrect and it is, and either way it was far away good enough to not matter.

The food at Cuch was excellent, overall the food in HCMC was among the best I’ve had in Southeast Asia – which is probably one of the most competitive areas for food in the world what with Bangkok, Penang, Singapore and even places like Cambodia, in the area.

I returned back to my hotel for a quick turnaround to the airport. The whole flying part of the day was quite an ordeal, if still enjoyable. Despite my ticket being booked straight through from Ho Chi Minh to Hanoi to Luang Prabang, because it switches from domestic to international, I could not check my bags straight through – or even check-in straight through. I would need to go through baggage claim in Hanoi, change terminals, re-check-in, go through immigration, and all that. I was supposed to have a two-hour layover which would have made all of that fairly straightforward. Instead, a strange 45-min delay in Ho Chi Minh just sitting in the plane, made it more precarious.

The flight itself was fine. Vietnam Airlines flies a lot of widebodies between the two main hubs, so I was able to snag a flight on an A350-900, always a nice little gift. Their interiors and service were fine. The only issu being that they didn’t allow use of their AVOD system until after take-off, so we were left without it during the 45-min delay.

The transfer in Hanoi was fine. They got the bags out quickly, had a slew of shuttle buses to take you between terminals, and check-in, immigration and security was a breeze. It helps I was by far the last person to check-in – the guy at the Lao Airlines counter mentioned that he had kept it open just for me. The flight itself was short, in an ATR-72 (basically a propeller plane, though one of the bigger ones). It was short and sweet, but Lao Airlines still was able to get through a box sandwhich and drinks service.

The only travel hiccup was the lengthy time it took to get out of the Costco-sized Luang Prabang airport. To enter Laos, almost everyone gets a visa on arrival, which has to be paid in USD. They took forever to process these. And then even after you do, there was additional paperwork that was required, and that took a while as well. In the end, it took a while to get through, but at least their airport was air conditioned.

Outside I met the tuk-tuk driver that my AirBNB host had arrangd and we whisked off to the AirBNB. Luang Prabang is a tiny town, fully built on tourism, but from the outside it seemed completely charming, The air is much cooler here than Ho Chi Minh. The roads are wide and fairly ell lit. There wasn’t to much mess. Everything was well built.

The AirBNB was a cute two-story townhouse, with dangerously steep steps that I am already fearful of falling down. The place was really nicely furnished and designed, with a little balcony overlooking Wat Xiengthong (which means I might be awakened by the monks at 4am….). The AirBNB host (a couple from Colombia) assured me that this ‘is the safest place on earth’ allowing me the confidence to go on a nice 15-minute walk down to the main area for dinner.

The main street of Luang Prabang has about 50% of the restaurants and 80% of the shops. There’s a parallel road to it that is on the bank of the Mekong which has some other restaurants more known for views (meaningfless at 9:30pm). And then there’s pockets of other areas that are popular, but the town runs on this main road – a bit like El Calafate in Argentina, if smaller and more rustic.

Dinner was at Tangor Restaurant, a French owned restaurant infusing Laotian spices and sauces with French preparation. I had a ceviche made with Liaotian spices which was very good, if a little too big for an appetizer (an odd complaint, to be fair) and then a masterpiece dish of a well cooked duck breast sliced over a Penang Curry sauce. The sauce was a bit sweeter than Thai Penang Curry, but still excellent. This was one of the best things I’ve had on my trip so far.

I was there basically until the place closed at 11:30pm. Pretty much the entire town shuts down with last call at 11:30pm. The only exception, truly, is ‘The Bowling Alley’, which is somehow able to stay open until 2:30am, and because fo that doubles as the late night hangout more than a normal bowling alley. This was not the night for that. This was the night to enjoy being in this random little slice fo Laos, and rest up for a few days in isolated nature.

2019 Asian Trip: Day 8 - Ho Chi Minh City

Day 8 – Exploring Saigon

For the first time, I actually got a chance to just stroll around Ho Chi Minh a bit. The city is probably best known from a tourism aspect for what is outside the city (Mekong) but there are some hidden gems inside this massive metropolis. Ho Chi Minh City is truly just gigantic in its size, but I’ll give them credit for not having awful traffic like a Bangkok.

I started out with a nice list of spots to hit, ranging from Museums to Pagodas to shops and of course food. The itinerary was packed, but manageable despite a late start caused by another late night the night before.

The first stop was the War Remnants Museum, which was an eye-opening experience. At a high level, I know the general outline of what the Vietnam War was about, why the US was pretty dumb to enter/escalate it. That millions lost their lives. All that makes sense. But being American, and growing up in a country that would, sadly understandably, not expose all of their horrors to school children, I didn’t know the full extent. I still probably don’t, but after visiting the War Remnants Museum, I’m a lot closer.

The museum is three floors, all fairly small. It starts as a fairly routine museum, with the top floor talking about the lead-up to and then the action throughout the war. The second floor, however, had its main exhibit called “War Crimes”, so I knew things would be different, and my God were they. I’ve been to Auschwitz. I’ve been to the killing fields in Cambodia. This was right up there, the staggering photos of horror. The museum did not hold back – to be fair a lot of it was repurposing award winning photojournalism at the time.

The photos were horrific, first of the aptly entitled ‘war crimes’, showing the carnage and destruction of war. Obviously, they’re portrayal is biased on the other side, and dozens of thousands of US troops died as well – a lot of them themselves not wanting or believing in the war – but fair enough. More of them died. The next set of exhibits focused on the Agent Orange chemical attacks that were meant to defoliate the region, but instead also poisoned hundreds of thousands. Again, this was all fairly gruesome, but also very educational and haunting.

Overall, the War Remnants Museum is a must visit. The legacy of the country is how they’ve recovered from that senselessly violent conflict. What was Saigon at the time was rocked. Today, about 35-40 years later, the city is thriving, clean, gaining, living.

My next stop was lunch at Guac Ngon restaurant, a large, open-air house with a giant catalog style menu. It is known for being a very popular high-throughput place, which it most certainly was. They turn tables quick. The place was a machine, but I have to say the food was quite good as well. I got a sampling of three things, a nice chicken, bamboo & cassava soup, a rice paper pork roll dish (basically a pork version of the beef dish I had an Hoa Tuoc) and finally a pork skin spring roll. All three were good, the setting was great, and while Ngon may be a tourist mainstay, it is decidedly not a tourist trap.

After lunch, my tourism was going to get a bit more spiritual, going to three of the city’s most known pagodas. There are dozens scattered throughout HCMC, and these all showed up on various lists and/or had the best ratings on Google.

The first was the Jade Emperor Pagoda, which was probably the least impressive of the three, but the most crowded, the one that seemed the most like an active establishment. There were dozens of people mingling around, going in every direction, bowing before every image of some God or diety. The temple also had a couple pools which featured turtles nad giant catfish which was a nice touch.

The second temple was probably the most grand, the Vinh Nim Pagoda, which had a large courtyard with a giant statue in front, multiple fancy gates and open halls. Large buddha statues emblazoned in gold. It was a truly serene scene, smack dab in the middle of a busy street in Ho Chi Minh. While I guess this is, in theory, no different than churches being randomly strewn about a Rome or Paris, but given how bustling and lively and hectic the streets of Ho Chi Minh area it just seemed more impressive.

The final pagoda was the Xiao Li pagoda, which was at the corner of a street, with a really cute courtyard and open building. It was probably in between the prior two in terms of fanciness, but was probably also the most green of the three, with manicured little trees all over the place. Overall, the pagodas were all beautiful, and I love the extent that Daoists or Buddhists or other religions will go to make these places little perfect slices of spirituality.

After the three pagodas, I went for a quick beer at Pasteur Street Brewery. The beer again was good and the crowd was lively. On the whole, I am very impressed with the craft beer culture in Ho Chi Minh. It probably isn’t to Taipei’s level of the beer itself, as here the craft breweries are all pushing their hangout angle more than the beer. But still, it’s a great place to waste away for a couple hours.

After the beer, I walked down one of Ho Chi Minh’s larger main thoroughfares, the one that ends in the opera house and has a walking drag in the middle. I have to say, Ho Chi Minh City is way more upscale, modern and – to put it bluntly – clean than I was expecting, and what I remember from my brief time here in 2013. It is great to see, but also makes me more sad of how cities in India just pale in comparison, despite some relative comparative advantages (more wealthy people, admittedly more poor also by sheer volume).

My final stop was a gourmet food store named Annam, which was quite fancy, but a bit disappointing as for them ‘gourmet’ food meant mostly stuff imported from other countries – basically their craft beer selection included Rogue Brewing. That was a quick stop, but still a nice one to see such a store in Ho Chi Minh.

After going back for some R&R, and a sad bit of re-packing, I ventured out for dinner at HOME Finest Vietnamese, an upscale restaurant in northern Ho Chi Minh (still just a 20 min uber in peak weekend traffic). The restaurant is gorgeous, another semi-open residence style building. They had a set menu, but it seemed a bit boring, so I went with a few random choices instead which both worked well. The first was a coconut seafood soup, stuffed with large prawns, squid and fish in a delectabale broth, all put inside a mini coconut.

My main was a duck breast cooked in five spices. It was amazing. Overall, I’ve had far too little duck so far in my time in Vietnam as it is one of the staples of Vietnamese cooking as a main. I need this to change.

After dinner, I headed back to The Gin House – the style there is really great, especially with weekend music. Overall, alcohol is cheap in Vietnam, but probably relative to regular food, a bit expensive. Cocktails at The Gin House, all unbelievably concocted, were 200,000 VND (about 8 dollars). The Observatory was walking distance away and was another great time. They had a nice DJ both outside on their semi-rooftop, and inside which a small EDM club. The place is basically 75% westerners, but after talking to quite a few of them, I learned most have re-settled in Vietnam, and weren’t necessarily tourists like me.

On the way back, I stopped at a road-side pho place, which was probably the most rustic meal I had during my time in Ho Chi Minh. The pho was good, the broth a lot better than the normal pho you get in the US. It was a great way to end a busy day in Ho Chi Minh.

As I’ve finished my time in Ho Chi Minh aside from basically a meal tomorrow morning, I think I can confidently say that it will end up in the 20s somewhere on ym list of cities. Ho Chi Minh City is still growing, and in all the right ways (though apparently overcrowding is a concern). The food is fantastic, the energy in the city is great. The tourism is solid. Everything about the city just sings.

2019 Asian Trip: Day 7 - HCMC & The Cu Chi Tunnels

Day 7 – Darkness

Today was an interesting day. Educational, to be sure, as I ventured to the Cu Chi Tunnels. As an American, this was an odd tour to be on because we are the enemy, the villain in the story. There were no other Americans on the tour – though for a long time I thought a pair of German girls were lying about not being American given how they seemed to speak English with an American accent…

Anyway, I know we were the villain. I know it was a war with no purpose. And I also know that seeing these areas, visiting these countries, is part of the healing process. The Cu Chi Tunnel tour is a chance to see the complex, demanding, amazing, tunnel system the Northern Vietnamese Soldiers created to protect their pocket of Southern Vietnam they were holding onto. But it was also a chance to get regaled about the history of Vietnam, why Saigon changed its name (and the complexities still around that decision) and a lot more.

Anyway, I did the minimal tourism work prior to the tour starting at 12:30. Despite calling itself a half-day tour, including travel time, a late start due to a late (but really fun) night the night before, it became a full day tour quite easily.

I got up and took a cab over to the center of old Ho Chi Minh City. First was the old Post Office, a French Style regal old building. Next to it was the Notre Dame Catedral, which sadly was having some work being done. I took a lap of the Independence Palace / Reunification Plaza, a giant, sprawling multi-block area in the heart of the city that was well hidden in greenery. Finally, I took a walk over the my lunch destination, another one of Ho Chi Minh’s more established craft beer emporiums – this one being a two-level, high-ceilinged building called East/West Brewing Company.

To talk openly for a minute, all these places have been generally started by Americans or Europeans. The beer options are quite large, nothing too strange or inventive (that was more done in Taipei), but all of good quality, and high ABV%. The ones I prefer are the ones that have more locals than expats, which East West Brewing was not. It did have decent food however.

After lunch, I walked to the tour office to start the Cu Chi Tunnel tour. It was a group of 24, mostly all Westerners, though again none from America. It is sad how little we travel as a country. There were Germans, Dutch, English, Australians, Russians, and others. Our tourguide Alex set the tone early that it was going to be a fun, but illuminating day. He gave a nice intro of the leadup to the Vietnam War, why Vietnam split into two at the Geneva Convention in 1954. The teardown of Diem’s Southern Vietnam after repeated intervention attempts, the partially CIA-baked coup that led to his assassination and indirectly the Vietnam War.

All of it was informing – I know far less about the Vietnam War than I should. This is what happens growing up in the USA in a public school, and the general sense that History classes in high school basically stop after WWII. The ride out to the tunnels took about 90 minutes with one stop at a art factory. This was a bit more pushy than the ones on the Mekong Delta tour, but watching the step-by-step process of putting the artwork (ceramics, essentially) together was pretty good. The only downside is they didn’t sell coasters.

We finally reached the Cu Chi Tunnels area and the first reaction was just how jungle it all was. High, lush trees. Humidity in the air. I can’t imagine the horrors that took place around these grounds, and also what the American soldiers, largely forced into this ridiculous conflict, must have had to face.

The first stop on the tour was actually a weird one, a shooting range where we can pay to shoot military-grade weapons that were used by the Vietnamese and US armies. I have to say, almost all of us (including me) took that offer. The biggest takeaway is just how staggeringly loud the AK-47 was – ringing through even when wearing the headphones. Without the headphones it was hellaciously loud. The tour guide greatly denied any idea that they played up the noise.

After, we finally went to the tunnels, again in the middle of the jungle. The tunnel tour itself was about 90 minutes through the jungle with a few stops underground. It was amazing to see how small and tight these tunnels were, but still leading into large rooms able to serve meals, hold meetings, perform surgeries, etc. There was also a lot of examples of the Vietnamese ingenuity – such as piles of leaves with small holes where Vietnamese Soldiers could pop out of to sneak on American soldiers, or slits cut into the ground that would pull an American down to a pit laced with spikes dipped in Cuchi Tree poison.

The tunnels themselves are tiring to go through, which of course was the point, as the Vietnamese soldiers are trained for low-ground walking and combat, able to peerlessly go through these tight places. Even going through a couple of them, about 20 metres each, was tiring and exhausting enough that we all gladly took the tours offer of fried cassava root and tea at the end.

Back in the bus, we started a long, traffic-filled, 2.5 hour journey back to Ho Chi Minh. To some degree, having more of the tour take place on a bus than not is not great, but much like the Mekong, this is a rite of passage for visitors to Vietnam. Just wish it was closer to the big city.

Dinner would be another trip in darkness, as I ate at Noir – officially termed Noir: Dining in the Dark. The restaurant has a bit of a gimmick concept where you eat in a pitch black room, and have to use your other senses to really enjoy the food (mostly smell and touch in lieu of sight). What helps is just how well they execute it though. To add another layer of intrigue, the restaurant employs a lot of sensor-disabled people in their waitstaff, including deaf people at the front of the house using sign language, and an all-blind waitstaff to escort you into the pitch-black room and serve you. Now, one couild say this is layered on, but given how little employment opportunities disabled people have in many countries, this truly was beautiful, and just added to the experience.

The meal is served in through courses, an appetizer of four small dishes (two soups and two salads), a main of four plates (mix of things), and three desserts. All are placed in front of you, and you are to use your mind, touch, feel to locate and eat. I can’t overstate how black this room is. I have no idea how one makes a room so black.

What was great was the food I would have paid for even if the lights were on and it was a normal restaurant. The starters was a galangal soup, a miso soup with crab, a prawn salad and a thai beef salad. All really good. The fun of the restaurant is they don’t tell you what you are eating. You basically have to go through blind. At the end they will show you, but the setup almost forces a nice little guessing game. I was fairly good at getting the meats, and could tell if something was Thai flavored, for instance, but had little chance getting more pure flavours. The whole meal was like being in a Top Chef competition.

The mains were also quite good, a fish dish, a red curry duck dish, a nice beef dish and then a salad. My only issue would be they had nothing you could touch or eat with your fingers. They have two menu options, an Eastern menu (what I got) and a Western menu (mostly French inspired) which from the sounds of it from the table next to me had a few finger-food dishes.

The deserts were good as well, one ice-cream, one dragon-fruit panacotta, and one other dish I now forget. Overall, the experience was fantastic. I could do it again. It was a little unnerving at first, but it was such a cool experience, it was so deeply dark (truly, you couldn’t see a thing, and they make you keep all phones or devices that could give off light in a locker), and of course the whole set-up is special with the sensory-disabled waiting staff. Noir was a true highlight.

The night ended quite a bit later after another trek to The Gin House, a brief stop at one of the more mainstream clubs in the city (Republic – okay, but way too much electronica) and then ending the night at The Observatory, which is a very heavy ex-pat hangout but a great time nonetheless. Overall, through two days, I’ve done all the major checklist HCMC items and found them all quite good. Over that, the food has absolutely lived up to expectations. Because of my nature, I’m already feeling a bit sad knowing I have to leave in 36 hours. But more than that sadness, I’m so glad I came back and am not sick this time around.

2019 Asian Trip: Day 6 - Ho Chi Minh City & Mekong Delta

Day 6 – Melting in the Mekong

In some ways, I’m repeating the ill-fated trip to Ho Chi Minh in 2013. The two tours I’ve booked are basically the same tour, through the same tour company (Viator) that I did the prior time. The first of those took up most of today, causing me to wake up at 8:00 (not too bad since I could sleep for a good hour on the tour van). This was the full day Mekong Delta tour, one that is almost like a rite of passage when you visit this part of the world, giving you a good chance to get down and dirty with the locals (villager locals, not the HCMC locals), all the while experiencing some beautiful scenery.

The tour as a whole was great, with the only real glaring downside being the fact it was humid as hell. Apparently this is the ‘cooler’ time of year, but I think it is basically as humid now as it was months ago during their ‘hot’ period. It was so humid. It didn’t ruin the tour, and I do think I sweat more than most people, but my god did it make those brief moments in the tour bus, or the times when a fan was put on, so incredible.

The tour I took was pretty boilerplate of any Mekong Delta tour I believe, and since it was fairly entertaining, it isn’t the worst thing that they are basically selling a commodity at this point. Before I get into each step, I should call out a few specific takeaways. On a positive, this was the least pushy tour I’ve been on in terms of them trying to sell you the random wares we saw being put together. We saw them make coconut candy, and the local bee farm, and what-not, but were never even given that much time to actually shop around. Second, the food was great, but my God couldn’t they have at least done that indoors instead of under a large gazebo-like structure?

Anyway, the tour starts with a long drive out of HCMC to My Tho, the largest built up city in the Mekong Delta (basically a series of islands and areas around the Mekong River, which goes from the Pacific (here) all the way up to China. The drive takes about 90 minutes, give or take, and gives you a great view of the rice fields and fairly developed random rural towns Vietnam has. I’ve been on similar type drives in, say, India, and they don’t compare in the least.

After 100 minutes, we reached My Tho, and went to the My Tho Pagoda (probably not the exact name of the Pagoda, but the closest I can remember), reportedly the oldest pagoda in the area. It was a fairly large space, with more buddhist influences than the pagodas in Taiwan – replete with giant smiling fat buddha statue, and other more buddhist touches. It was a nice little start to the tour, even ifit was a first sign of the heat.

After, we drove a short while through the city of My Tho – a lot more built up than I expected – on the way to the dock to go into our first of many boats for the day. This gave us our first real view of the Mekong River, with a truly not alluring brown color. However, as the guide said, the Brown is due more to the strong silt and soil that runs through the river, enough to provide life to this whole area. It is still clean in a sense, just rich.

The first boat took us to one of two islands we wouild visit – with a trip through tight canals in the middle. The guide explained the map early on of the area, but for whatever reason it didn’t have much lasting power in my mind, and I was very early on lost among the canals.

The first real stop on the trip was to a little village, that had a large open area (roof covered) where a group of the locals played some traditional Vietnamese music, while we sat, drank really nice tea and ate fresh fruit. The sustenance was better than the music, though it wasn’t close with the food including fresh dragonfruit, lingon (a perfect little small berry like thing) and others.

After a short while, we walked past some farmland, and entered into small little sampan boats (essentially canoes), and were spirited down tight canals with lush greenery towards our next destination. I’ve done these tpyes of river canal rides in a few places now, and while I probably wouldn’t call the Mekong Delta the best, I was impressed by how clean everything was (thinking of a comparison point with a certain backwater canal in Kerala). The ride was short, but it was also cool to see how well run these boats were, with ladies on each end paddling effortlessly by tons of other sampans.

The next stop was another island with a few more touristy fares, but again never with the added pressure of buying or tipping. The first was a honey-bee farm. The bees were buzzing everywhere, though the locals assured us time and time again they are used to human interaction and therefore wouldn’t sting. They didn’t, but it was still terribly nerve-wracking. The star of the stop was honey tea, a mix of pollen (odd!), honey, cumquat juice and hot water. It was weird to have so much hot tea but they were all so good.

The next stop was at a coconut factory, where they turn bushels of coconuts into coconut candy – and in that process ship off other parts of the coconut (the husk, the insides, the outsides) to other factories to create objects, mats, charcoal, etc. The process was complex, but again seemingly well run. The locals didn’t mind giving us bits of in-process coconut to sample also, with the gift of fresh coconut water at the end.

The final stop, with a few canal traels mixed in, was lunch at another open air restaurant. The lunch was a variety of random Vietnamese foods, though nothing that is well known (e.g. no Pho). My favorite was either rice paper rolls with Elephant Ear Fish (their name), or a surprisingly sweet bread dish. Overall it was a nice meal. What was even cooler was that area doubled as a strange mini-zoo. There was a large crocodile pit with about two dozen crocodiles – even caught one catching and killing a fish. Next to it was a block with four giant porcupines. I realized at that moment I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen a porcupine. They are huge, they combined a really cute face with truly horrifying spikes, man.

We then took a couple more canals back to our bus and headed back. On the whole, the Mekong Delta is a staple. It is a right of passage in this area. The backwater canals are serene and beautiful. The odd wildlife you run into, including those awesome porcupines. The local stops were all a bit touristy, but were interesting and I really enjoyed not being needled to buy anything. The day was also super well run, the boat always being in the right place, the right size, great picture opportunities, and opportune food breaks like the teas, or coconut water, or others.

Overall, I was glad to reach back to the city, and experience some of the city life as well. My first stop back in the city was the Pasteur Street Brewing Company. Ho Chi Minh has gone through a craft beer revolution recently, and Pasteur Street is one of the forebearers of that. Their tap-room was buzzing – mostly with either Western Tourists or Expats, to be fair, but the beer was good, the crowd was enjoying themselves, and overall it was a great time.

What’s interesting about HCMC was actually more proven by my first post-dinner place, the Gin House, which is that they have incredibly upscale, modern, classy, brilliant drink and dining options, but a lot of the are still hidden by the more hardened exterior. The Gin House was down a small lane that seemed a bit seedy, but the place was still excellent. They had a guest mixologist representing some New Zealand gin company. He had many thoughts on gin and how best to combine it, but most of it flew way over my head. What made sense in the end was how good it all tasted.

Prior to the Gin House was dinner, were I went to Hoa Tuoc. This was a nice reminiscence for me, if anything. It was the one bit of tourism I did do last time, as I had one meal after returning from Da Lat prior to leaving Vietnam for Cambodia. That time I went to Hoa Tuoc, stupidly walking there. I returned years later as it was still very highly reputed. It is still situated in an alley courtyard tucked in behind the Oepra House. It still had an amazing betel wrapped beef paper wrap appetizer. My main was a grilled seabass with fish sauce, cucumber and eggplant.

My last stop was The Observatory, a semi-open rooftop bar/club that plays a bit more relaxed music and has a more laid-back atmosphere than the premium clubs in Ho Chi Minh. Either way, it was very much more my scene than a Canalis Club or something more glitzy. People assured me it wouild be more crowded and more fun later in the weekend, which I intend to check out.

Overall, it was a busy, if still really good first day of true tourism in Ho Chi Minh. There’s quite a bit more to see, and I hope to enjoy every part of it. But for one day, being trapped in the Mekong Delta, taking sampans down small canals, that was bout as good as it would get.

2019 Asian Trip: Day 5 - Flying & Ho Chi Minh City

Day 5 – Travel Tales

I went to Vietnam six years ago. It was the second place that I visited on my Round the World Trip that I took in the Winter/Spring of 2013 – doing that instead of going to college for an 8^th semester. But I went in name only, or more accurately in statistic only, going there long enough in my mid to count it as a country that I’ve visited.

To be fair, I did some degree of tourism there, mostly a couple days in Da Lat, a hillside town growing in touristic value. But I did not see Ho Chi Minh City at all, sitting supine in my bed, catatonic and trying to avoid moving; so thoroughly damaged by a terrible case of food poisoning that I caught on my flight from Johannesburg to Bangkok.

Ever since, I knew I needed to go back to Vietnam at some point. This was that point. That longing belief to go back, to experience what I missed (and judging from the recounting of trips by both y parents and friends, I’ve missed a lot). The fact I could combine it with Taiwan – and also replace Central Vietnam (Hoi An, Hue, etc.) for Laos was all done after deciding this was the time to go back to Ho Chi Minh.

Anyway, with that long ass prelude over, let’s get to the actual transit over to Ho Chi Minh City, and my first night in the place.

I awoke in Taipei, still not really ready to leave. Again, I am fully aware that it was my purposeful doing that led me to have such a short time in Taipei, but I so thoroughly enjoyed it. I was excited however to start the ‘real’ trip in Vietnam, and also to add a new airline – EVA Air – to my growing list of airlines (yes, I track these things). The flight was three hours, with fairly good service and food (a nicely seasoned Chinese beef dish), with a cold beer to accompany it. Nothing really to complain about EVA. If anything, it wouild be to say that Taipei’s main airport is a bit less impressive (read: More American) than the other main Asian airports, such as…. Bangkok.

I’ve now had to transit through Bangkok a lot – including that ill-fated trip to Ho Chi Minh last time. This was the first time I had the combination of a lengthy layover (made longer by EVA Air nicely extending my check-in all the way through – oh the joys of Star Alliance) and status. Bangkok Airport is a cavernous concrete mass with not much character aside from a randomly thrown about pagoda every few hundred meters, but their Royal Silk lounge (of which they have many) was quite good. They had nice thai food (massaman curry, Tom Kha Khai, etc.), nice seating, showers, and all the rest. It was a great way to waste four hours.

**sidebar: I’m transiting in Bangkok because I was supposed to spend a night in Bangkok, having gotten another booking at Gaggan. Of course, chef Gaggan Anand closed his restaurant early after a seemingly fairly ugly falling out with his partners so that 86ed that plan. By then, it was too late / too costly to change, but I did move the flight up from Bangkok to Ho Chi Minh**

After four hours, I was boarding Thai Airways’s beautiful looking Boeing 787-8. A few notes on this – (a) this would be my first time on a 787-8, and would allow me to complete flying on all three variants of the Dreamliner (787-9 with LATAM, 787-10 with Singapore few days prior) and (b) I just love the fact that Asian airlines will so often run widebodies on domestic flights.

This flight was a good 60 minutes, where I mostly slept through pretending to watch Game Night (quite good), but even in that one hour, Thai gave out a meal box (noodles with beef) and a drink service. Before I knew it, we were landing in Ho Chi Minh. I had no idea the airport is so close to downtown, as when we in the final approach, we cleanly passed right through downtown Ho Chi Minh, which also included a beautiful view of the new Financial Tower they have built, a gleaming, beautiful structure that signifies the overall growth of HCMC (as I’m going to call it a lot). The drive to my AirBNB, placed in the ‘Rivergate Residences’, was short. The homestay was seemingly filled with 75% AirBNB guests or expats as everyone seemed to most certainly not be from HCMC. Either way, it is a well located spot, if a bit tough to reach.

I didn’t have too many plans for my first night in HCMC, mainly because I didn’t know what time I would reach. I did make a booking for dinner at Anan, a fairly trendy restaurant (and rooftop bar) which is strangely located down a fairly dingy market street. The restaurant though is clean, and the food was excellent. They have a tasting menu, but it really was just a collection of their normal starter/tapas-sized fare, so I didn’t really see a need to get it. Instead, consumed was four tapas-style starters, and they were all great.

The most interesting was probably either the ‘pho’ roll, a six-piece roll of large noodles, pho beef, sitting in a tiny layer of pho broth. It was a deconstructed Pho, but a great one. What came with it was crab and pomelo salad (pomelo being an excellent fruit to add to any meat), coming inside a crab shell, with a giant cracker to eat it on. Third was probably the weakest dish of the night, a very fresh fish taco with Vietnamese vegentables and seasoning. Finally, the last dish was a grilled piece of beef wrapped in betel leaves, a classic Vietnamese appetizer which was as good as ever. For my first meal in Ho Chi Minh, this was great.

Since I had to get up fairly early the next morning for my Mekong Delta tour, didn’t stay out as late as I probably will be the other days. I wanted to go to one of Ho Chi Minh’s many craft breweries, but they closed well before stated closing time (I’m learning this is commonplace in HCMC). Instead, I went to one of their more reputed Cocktail Bars which was excellent. In that, I walked past the Canalis Club, an upscale nightclub which even from the outside, with its rows of decked out seemingly locals, was damn intimidating. I’ll probably be focusing on the less reputed places…

For a first day in HCMC and Vietnam, this was a great start, with a great meal, and a great after dinner drink, all within a city that is far more clean, upscale and built than I mentally expected. It is only one night, where it luckily wasn’t raining (it was still damn humid, however), but it is off to a great start.

2019 Asian Trip: Day 4 - Yongmingshan Park & Taipei

Day 4 - Making the best out of 'More Time in Taipei'

Today was supposed to be something different. I was supposed to be doing a tour of the Taroko National Park and Gorge, leaving at 5:45. Instead, that tour got cancelled – apparently fewer people had booked it. No idea if that was the reason, but to some degree was relieved. Obviously, I could sleep in a bit more – and the tour wasn’t so well rated (a solid 4.1/5.0 on Viator). I wanted more time to explore Taipei, and I got it.

That said, I did want to get more time with nature, something that would have definitely happened in the Taroko Gorge. Instead, I settled for a closer option – the Yangmingshan National Park. The Park is to the north of Taipei proper, reachable by bus or uber. It is a large, sprawling expanse of mountains and greenery and sulfur (more on that later). It would be the centerpiece of the day. But unlike Taroko Gorge, it wouldn’t take five or six hours to travel there and back.

I should mention, I don’t want to trash on the idea of going to Taroko National Park. I just think it is more diable if you have more time in Taipei (4+ days), and probably you should spend the prior night in Haulien – the city near to it.

Anyway, I woke up in a daze at 9am, without a clear plan of how to fit in Yangmingshan with the other few things I wanted to get out of my sudden ability to use additional time in Taipei. One place I wanted to see was the Confucius Temple, and then also ride the Maokong Gondola (very long cable car over mountains). Between the two, I would go to the park.

The first stop was the Confucius Temple, which was buzzing with life (mostly tour groups of kids) today instead of its serene closed silence from yesterday. It is a massive complex, with the real treasures of its main temple grounds hidden from street view due to a wall and large entry area. In the entrance area there was a nice little pond with a bunch of turtles. Like a lot of turtles – like more in one small confined space than you’ll ever see.

When you do get into the main area, I was taken aback by how serene it was. It was at both times way more understated than the Longshan and Guandu temples from the prior day, but also being a bit more fancy. The metal and wood work was a little bit finer. The place a little more holy. This is the last temple I would see in Taipei, and it was a pretty good one to go out on.

After, I went for the most rustic meal I could have. The Confucius Temple was on the way to the Yangmingshan Park, so I didn’t want to venture too far away. The best option per Google’s ratings that was walking distance was a place called ‘Old Noodle House.’ It actually had a lot of reviews by English speakers, noting how the 90-year old owner spoke English. That was true. The rest was totally unexpected, if still tasty.

The place truly was a hole in the wall, with no menu to speak of. You either got dry noodles or soup noodles. And then you picked little saucers of meat (mostly pork) of unnamed type and taste. I really had no idea what I was picking, harkening back to my days in Japan having Japanese BBQ. In the end, I don’t know what I got. I am pretty sure the owner and what is maybe his great-grandson were amused by my confusion. Not annoyed, just amused, that someone looking like me would venture into this probably 99% local place. There’s probably dozens of places like this, straight hole in the walls with no real name. I’m glad I went to one of them.

After I left for the park, going there by Uber, resigning myself that I would probably need to take the bus back. The first stop was the Yangming park area that gives the overall National Park its name. Here is probably the most publicly known sites in the park, but far from the ebst – particularly the Flower Clock which is as its name would suggest and overall a bit underwhelming. The clean air, lush greenery surrounding you on each side, and intermittent views of the expansive Taiwan forest and peeks at Taipei were fun.

The better site in this area was the Datung Waterfall, which was actually quite impressive. It is about a 15 min walk from the Flower Clock, and has views both from below and eye-level. The steps are a bit treacherous in their wetness, but overall I was quite impressed with the infrastructure and signage of the park.

Somehow, I was able to snag the same Uber driver that brought me here to take me from this part of the park to Xiayoukeng, my next step. There are buses that traverse the park, but they are not too frequent and not direct, so I was quite happy to get the Uber. Though I will say my almost indulgent use of Ubers is probably going to end up more costly than I imagined.

Xiayoukeng is probably the first or second most popular area of the park (the other being the hot springs which I didn’t go to). There is one huge disclaimer that has to be noted, and this gets us back to the Sulphur that was mentioned before. This whole area is apparently built on a Sulphur reserve, and near Xiayoukeng it was at its worst, including a smoking plume of Sulphur appearoing out of the mountain. We had to hike right past it, and it gets truly tough at its worst, though only lasting for five minutes of the 30-minute hike.

The top of Mt. Qixingshan gives a great view of Taipei, and the expansive mountains and greenery between Taipei and you. Taiwan has such interesting topography; most of the island are mountains, with little depressions of cities. You really get a sense of this here, with loads of green surrounding the speck of city and Taipei 101.

After dealing with the Sulphur a second time, I took the bus over to Lengshuikeng, which is more known for the hot springs. They were quite packed which removed whatever limited interest I had in going there. The better part was the 15-min hike up to Menghuan Pond, a nice little slice of almost American Rockies within this remote part of the world.

Finally, I entered the bus back to Taipei. It was actually a quicker ride back than I *expected, though to even get it started I needed a friendly Samaritan to lend me 15 Taiwanese Dollars ($0.50 USD) as you needed exact change. The ride back didn’t reveal much other than a continued realization of how well developed Taiwan is. Even the small towns or outposts we crossed were fairly well developed – no signs of slums.

Once back in Taipei, I headed over to the Maokang Gondola, which is a long cable-car that crosses a few mountains, taking you from ground level near the Taipei Zoo all the way up into the mountains (about 300m up). I decided to do it in reverse, which was probably a good decision because it takes quite a while (about 30 min one-way). It was a beautifully calm ride, though, once aain giving such a great view of hiw lush and green Taipei (and greater Taiwan) is.

After, I went back to main town to check out Zhang Men Brewing, at one of their outposts inside a really fancy mall, The beer was great, the atmosphere even better, a nice mix of locals and ex-pats, a couple of which I got to talking to. Overall, I love the fact that this craft beer culture has exploded everywhere by this point. While the USA has terrible mainstream beer, it is the genesis of this global great explosion. Zhangmen didn’t have any real food, but had surprisingly good fries. To be sure, it was nice to eat American food after a few days, especially when they were made so well.

For dinner (after a brief R&R), I headed out to Addiction Aquatic Development (a clunky name that probably is an odd translation – basically a place for aquatic food addicts), Taipei’s response to a major fish market. There is a fish market building, though one far cleaner than what you would expect, and then a massive, semi-open, food area, with many stalls and counters.

You can get pre-made bento boxes (which reviews rave about) or sushi, or get food in their various dine-in options. The most popular is the sushi bar, which even today, a weekday nearing 9:30pm, was very crowded. The others are the ‘Seafood Bar’, where you can get fresh raw seafood (oysters, crab, prawn), and donburi bowls, among other preparations. There were two cooked food areas, one a hot spot and the other a charcoal grill, which I regret not going to.

That said, I went to the seafood bar and was not disappointed in the least. I had three incredible fresh raw prawns, a miso soup with chunks of tuna in it (completely unexpected) and then the donburi bowl with three preparations of tuna. It was all so good. This is definitely a fancy, upscale place to be sure, but is just such a well designed, well thought out development for, well, aquatic addicts.

After dinner, I had a few stops, first at the rooftop bar in the Breeze Center, a block away from Taipei 101). A few bars have their own section of the rooftop – the one I went to was one of the other locations for Zhangmen, which truly is a great brewery chain in Taipei. The view was stunning. Cool air, bright lights, the former World’s Tallest Building. It was around now I really felt a longing for having to leave Taipei tomorrow. I knew going in I would have limited time, it was a conscious decision (and I really appreciate the fact I listened to my parents and didn’t go to Sydney for what would have literally been two days). Taipei was a great city, a place with a lot to see, an astounding amount of culture to take in, and a great entry point for one day a trip to the Mainland as well.

2019 Asian Trip: Day 3 - Taipei

Day 3: Tourism In Full

It's not like I've never just straight up visited a bunch of sites on a trip in a while. But it had been some time since it was so varied, so numerous, and so solo. I had days like this last Christmas-time in Israel. There are days defined by one incredible tourism event like later in that same trip in Petra, or last year in Egpyt. But this was just wall to wall sightseeing in the purest sense of the word. Going from site to site, the only respite from seeing sites on your feet being the time it takes in Taipei's well air-conditioned uber selection.

It was a hectic day to be sure, my only full day in Taipei as tomorrow I head at 5:45am on a long day-trip tour of Taroko Gorge National Park. Yesterday I saw a bit but mostly imbibed the spirit of Taipei as I tried to avoid sleeping. Today was the day; the day that would to some degree make or break not only my time in Taipei, but far more importantly how high it could get into my favorite cities ranking. More seriously, I wanted to see a lot of the city, and blurrily Googled Map'd a planned itinerary and order that made sense. It was packed. Three different temples, one main museum, one open square and historical monument, and a meal and stop at a craft brewery thrown in. All having to end with enough time for me to have some quick R&R before dinner at MUME at 8:30pm.

Limiting my time was a late start mostly impacted by a still present dreariness. Anyway, I started off at 9:30, leaving to get a street-made Chinese Omelette from a well frequented cart a few blocks from my AirBNB. I didn't really appreciate it at first, but my AirBNB is really well positioned to a whole host of food options. The omelette was nice, with a really great sauce that played up an otherwise normally prepared omelette. Overall, it gave me some sustenance as my day began. 

The first stop was the Lungshan Temple, situated towards the West corner of Taipei. How I know I am not a professional (or even semi-pro) travel writer is I have no actual interesting way of describng this temple, especially when compared to the second temple I visited, other than by saying it was truly spectacular. The paint work and carving work was great, but better was how they weaved greenery in to the atmosphere.

As you entered the main courtyard, past the first of many ornate gates, on either side of you were small ponds, both replete with Koi. One had a few fountains, the other with a (fake, I'm assuming) waterfall. The temple in the middle had all the trappings of buddhist temples, with ornately carved columns, beauitful paintings on woodwork, ceremonial sconces and pots, and intricately designed golden statuettes. Some of the distinctive parts of this one was the use of greenery, and also the inclusion of more traditional Chinese elements (dragons, mostly) - this knowledge having been gained from overhearing one of the guides.

After taking way too many pictures, I exited, picked up my Uber and left for the Dr. Sun Yat Sen Memorial Hall and Gardens. This place is similar to the Chiang Kei-Shek Hall and Gardens I went to yesterday, if a bit less trafficked. What is nice though is it gives a truly awesome view of Taipei 101.

I mentioned it yesterday, but it is still staggering that this building was once the tallest in the world. It clearly is tall, but to be honest, maybe having been around the slightly taller Freedom Tower (I refuse to call it One World Trade) a lot has skewed my perspective. What I do love about Taipei 101 is how much taller it is than anything else in Taipei - similar actually to the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur (the building that was the tallest until Taipei 101 was built). The view of that tower truly showed its regality from the open square.

The Sun-Yat-Sen Memorial Hall itself was a bit more simple than the one for Chiang Kei-Shek, but also a bit more informative, doubling as a mini-musuem of Taiwan's history in teh guise of being a history of his life. That Taipei can have two of these large, giant, open squares deep in teh heard of its city shows again truly how well designed Taipei is, never feeling overcrowded and busy.

From there was lunch, with me slightly delayed after going first to the wrong place as when you put Sun-Yat-Sen Memorial Hall in Google, for some reason it pulls up the wrong place. Anyway, I still reached my intended destination of Yongkan Beef Noodle by 12:15. Sadly, due to a combination of a line when I got there (it is very famous for being a truly reliable beef noodle spot, though from what I've read not necessarily better than others) and the fact they took a strangely long time to serve me. I have a suspicion it was due to me being one of the three foreigners there. I shared a three-person table with a couple who came about a minute after me. They got served first and ate and left before I got my beef noodle soup. The next group came and got served first. Again, I can only speculate. Either way, the food came, and it was very good. It was truly tender beef , and the soup was really tasty without being overly spicy.

After lunch, I was running a bit behind with three different places to check off my list. The next stop was the second temple, which ended up being a weird diverted visited. The palce I wanted to go to was the Confucius Temple, which when I arrived I realized was closed on Monday's (yeah, I should have looked this up). Anyway, right next door was the Dalongdong Temple, which was quite good itself. Weirdly, across the street from that temple was another temple, but that was closed from teh moment. This apparently was a pretty spiritual area.

The Dalongdong temple that I visited was a lot like the Lungshan Temple in its set-up, but slightly different in its style. Instead of great carving, it had better paintings. It also had more open space, as the Lungshang temple tried to pack a whole hell of a lot into a pretty small space. The actual most interior area was a little more ornate as well. Hopefully, I'll get a chance to catch the Confucius Temple tomorrow after my tour ends, but as of now this was a nice little haven deep inside the heart of Taipei.

After the Confucius Temple I went to the one step that had the potential to really mess with my scheduled itinerary, Taipei's National Palace Museum, a sprawling museum showcasing Chinese art from the earliest dynastic days. The collection shares some ties with teh Palace Museum in the Forbidden City in Beijing, though I am a bit unclear on how the connection works.

The museum itself was really nice. I appreciated that it wasn't overbearing, with just as much information as required, with each case inside each exhibit nicely built, without too many objects, vases, plates, manuscripts or the rest. Ostensibly this is an art museum, but in reality it serves as a history museum for dynastic China, but told through usable art - basically no paintings or portraits. It was an interesting decision, one that I enjoyed because seeing jade curios, or perfectly round ceramic vases delicately detailed was a lot better than just seeing some random paintings.

The museum took a long time to complete, though it could have taken longer had I gone for the audioguide. I do regret not getting guides, be it here, or more detrimentally at the temples, as not having a guide really lessens the educational value of those places. I know loosely the story of each temple, and have a truly limited understanding of China's (and more importantly Taiwan's) complicated history. Then again, given I have limited time, it makes sense to wait for a longer trip to the Mainland to flesh that part out more.

After the museum, my tourism portion of the day ended at the one site the furthest out from the heart of the city, the Guandu Temple built near the ocean, onto a cliff. It is a tightly built three-story structure, with little bits of brilliance in all three. It had the familiar: the courtyard, the reliefs, the carvings, the incense pots, the obscenely gold-repleted inner sanctums. But also it had a bunch of teh new: the tunnel leading form the main area, right through the hill behind, leading to a buddha statue in a little alcove with a sea view; or the area in teh back on the hill where you get an amazing view of the temple below it - including a massive frieze - and a second level with even more lavish inner sanctums. This truly was the most unique and to me most beautiful of the temples I saw today, so I was glad I had saved it for last.

Finally heading back to the main area, I went to one of Taipei's other craft breweries that seemed fairly reasonable. This one was called ZhangMen; their central outpost being a small beer bar right int eh center of the city - in fact a couple blocks away from the Din Tai Fung restaurant I had went to yesterday. The beer was good – as was their happy hour deal of 50% off. I quickly decided that I would try to go back at least one more time, this place being a great little find with the perfect atmosphere of awesome beer and an interesting (mostly foreigner) crowd.

For dinner, I got to experience the one true splurgy dinner I will have on this trip. MUME restaurant in Taipei is listed as one of the city’s best, but has a fairly affordable (for Taiwan, for fancy restaurants) tasting menu of seven courses for around $80, not including drinks/tips/etc. The set-up was clean, tidy and modern. My favorite aspects might have been the menu and all cutlery kept in a little drawer built into the table.

The food was excellent. The place displays itself as having a more European cuisine, but the food served was more Asian in ingredients and all locally sourced. I’m usually not one to really care about ‘locally sourced’ ingredients but having that be a distinction in rural American is a lot different than Taiwan in generating excitement.

The courses are a bit hard to fully describe, especially because I am fully aware that this is a very long post so far. The first was a play on a tomato gazpacho featuring prawn. Second was a tuna crudo with daikon radish and some other Asian flavors on top and below. Third was maybe my favorite dish, a wagyu beef tartare with radish, egg, and a tortilla-style cracker to scoop it up with. Fourth was a sourdough bread, baked piping hot, which could be doubled as a scooper for the tartare and the dish to come. The dish to come was a ‘milkfish’ that was braised (didn’t realize you could do that with a fish, but man was it great and soft) with a delicious sauce and further Taiwanese greens. The last main was an ox tongue (way better than any other tongue I’ve had) with mushrooms and a shiitake dashi. The desert was a kaffir lime & coconut dried ice mixed with mango and orange. It was all great. It was all modern. It was all so fresh. MUME was amazing.

After dinner, I finished the night a Wa-Shu, an admittedly Japanese-inspired cocktail bar – though the cocktail makers are quick to confirm they are indeed Taiwanese. They have the normal list of cool cocktails, but the better angle for them is to pick a flavor, or a fruit, or a spice, and they’ll make a cocktail off of that. The coolest was probably a whiskey-based cocktail that came off of the pick of ‘peanut butter’. Apparently, they mix peanut butter and whiskey (a 1:4 ratio), and then seep it through a coffee filter. The result is way better than you would expect.

I had to call it a night relatively early (~1:00am) because I have to get up to catch the start of the Taroko Gorge tour at 5:45 tomorrow – of course, the first three or so hours of the tour will be being on a train. Overall, my impression of Taipei is it is a fabulous tourism city. It is not missing anything you would want. It has a good mass transit system, low traffic, great sites all interspersed with the rest of the city, decent enough food (this is the one area it is probably a bit worse than, say, Bangkok or other East Asian cities). The best positive though might be the weather. Certainly it has its rainy season, but it is less pronounced than other areas, and the non-rainy season is far, far, far more pleasant than the humidity pits of a Singapore or Bangkok. Other than maybe Tokyo, I haven’t been to an East Asian city with this good weather.

On the whole, Taipei has been fantastic so far, and I do hope I can extend that to ‘Taiwan’ being fantastic when I venture out for half a day tomorrow. Very soon I will be on my way to the third world (regardless of how relatively developed Ho Chi Minh or Hanoi are) and heat and humidity and rain and the rest), so I may very quickly long for these days.

2019 Asian Trip: Day 1/2 - Flying & Taipei

Day 1 & 2: The Traveling Roadshow

I have no idea how I got up for my flight. I've still never missed a flight by being too late. Given I take a whole host of ~7AM flights on Mondays, this is somewhat surprising. If there ever was a time to miss a flight, it was going to be this. It would be one of the worst ones to miss - a flight from London to Singapore to Taipei.

Here was the situation. I was in London for my company's annual all-hands meeting which is followed ny the annual company party, one where the listed end time is 3AM, and in reality is generally a few hours after that.

I was already tired having reached London just two days prior to my departure, on one of the most useless red-eyes ever - the good old 6pm flight to London. I didn't sleep much the following night (Thursday Night) in London as I had to help set up for our company's event starting at 7am. So I was already running on probably 10 hours of sleep over two nights when the party would limit it to a 2-hour night. But I made it. I woke up to my alarm that was set for 7:45, a good 90 minutes after I would go to sleep. I zonked out completely in my 90-minute Uber - 90 minutes beacuse of the illogical nature of London's (lack-of) highway system. I somehow made it on the plane, the beautiful Singapore Airline's whale (A380-800), ready to eat the good food Singapore Airlines would serve, even in economy, and try to sleep for as long as possible.

It says a lot about how sleepy and tired I was that I would willingly sleep through most of a Singapore Airlines flight, given how much I revere the airline and their incredible standard of accommodations - easily the most room and most comfortable ride I've ever had in coach. It also says how much I value Singapore Airlines that I wanted to woken up for the meals to interrupt my sleep.

Anyway, the flights were as good as expected, both featuring the usual Singapore Airline's touches like hot towels before every meal, more drink rounds than you would normally have, printed menus and three meat meal options. In the end, I chose the lamb biryani, whihc was great, even if a fairly strange choice for Singapore Airlines, having no real ties to Indian cuisine. It was really well made, however. The breakfast before we landed consistently of an actually good tasting airlplane omelette and sausage, something most airlines (looking at you, UA) so often screw up.

If there is any downside to Singapore, it probably is their movie selection which leans to having a larger international selection than most, but a weaker Hollywood selection. They had a few movies that I hadn't seen anymore, the only one I had any real intention of getting through was Rocketman (surprisingly good) but then also saw Us on my second flight, a four hour journey from Singapore (where I had a tight one hour layover) through to Taipei.

That flight was on the Boeing 787-10, my first trip in that variant of the Dreamliner, the one that focuses on shorter routes. United flies a bunch of them to Europe from Newark, but sadly not to London. Anyway, this flight was good, short, and before I knew it we were descending into Taipei.

For the trip as a whole, Taiwan was a late addition. Due to the work event in London, I knew I could expense my flight from London to some Asian destination, and the real meat of the vacation would be the 10-11 days in Vietnam and Laos to come. I had a few extra days, and after some dalliances with Sydney and Seoul, I settled on Taiwan, allowing me to get a new country, a new area, a first experience at a new culture (with teh mainland still a glaring TBD on my resume) and finally something a bit closer to Vietnam.

First entering Taiwan through its airport, I had no real expectations for the city of Taipei or the country in general. I know very little about it aside from the peculiarities of its government situation. I did not know if it would be closer to Singapore or Phnom Penh on the features and trappings of East Asia, be it the weather, the infrastructure, the way of living, the sites, the cost, and everything else.

Half a day in, I still can't really answer all those questions too well I must admit, but it is more because I don't want to overstate initial expectation. Taipei might be the best mix of Singapore and Phnom Penh (or for a more realistic comparison, Singapore and Bangkok) of any city I've visited in this part of the world.

It has the modernity of Singapore without the oppressive cost, and even less of the oppressive heat. The streets are wide, clean, well manicured, open. There is so little traffic (granted, it was a weekend), though granted the city is smaller in population than most of its East Asian comparables. StillThe culture is still great, with temples all over hte place, and a great main cultural center around the Chian Kai-Shek Memorial Hall which I'll get into more later.

Again, a lot can change. I was truly disappointed with Kuala Lumpur initially only to realize some of its beauty on a better planned, better executed second day. But I don't know if I've ever been more surprised by a city - again part of this is the fact I came in with no expectations. To be clear, not low expectations; I just didn't know wwhat to expect.

Again, the only real tourism I did was take in the lavish Chiang Kei-Shek Memorial, and the grounds around it which included the National Theater and National Concert Hall on either side of 'Democracy Boulevard'. The area had well groomed gardens on either side, with koi ponds and bridges and the like. All of it is really well maintained, gorgeous, and a great example of what civic pride can look like when combined with Asian hospitality.

The main hall itself is stunning, a white rock cube, with an open hall in the middle on the face facing the Democracy Boulevard. Inside is a large iron statue of Chiang Kei-Shek, the father of Taiwan - though someone whose legacy has taken a lot of ups and downs in the past few decades. The whole scene in that square was great because it was such a nice picture of Taipei. That said, places like Phnom Penh had similar cultural centers. What they didn't have though was a same level of infrastructure, cleanliness and 1st world sensibilities everywhere else.

After the cultural center, I went for a late lunch / early dinner at Din Tai Fung, which is actually a chain of really popular soup dumpling + traditional mandarin food restaurants strewn out all over Taipei. It was packed despite me arriving at 3pm. Some of this might be reputation but they had an 80minute wait bit a pretty clean number system where you could get your place in line and come back. This is what actually enabled me to see the Chiang Kai Shek hall.

The food once I finally got in was great, the star being their soup dumplings; so good, so soft, so full of liquid while holding their exterior. After that I had a beef snoodle soup which was about as good as I would have expected. Overall Din Tai Fung was worth the wait because I didn’t have to wait. Either way it’s a Taipei institution.

After this I went to my other tourist opportunity of the day, a hike up Elephant Mountain to see Taipei  at sunset. Now, there’s no reason this is named after elephants, and it isn’t a hike as much as a series of steps but damn if it wasn’t beautiful. There are a few lookouts on the way that all offer nice views of Taipei 101.

Quickly about that building. Other than political initrigue maybe nothing defined Taipei as much as this building that was the worlds tallest from about 2005-2010, replaced by the Burj in Dubai. In reality many buildings have passed it now but all came after the Burj. Taipei oddly doesn’t have that great a skyline so the Taipei 101 sticks out so hilariously in all its beauty.

The view from the top was excellent but I do wish I came a few hours later when the whole city could have been lit up. That’s a task for another day or another visit I guess.after descending I went back to the Airbnb (nice as always) to freshen up.

I didn’t have any huge night plans as I expected to be more tired than inended up being. Dinner was at the Gongguan night market, one of the many night markets that are in Taipei, this one being a bit more food forward than the others. I had various skewer dishes (chicken skin, chicken breast, pork belly), then pork over rice and topped it off with a truly great helping of fried sweet potato balls. The night market lived up to expectations, plus I really appreciated the fact it was less crowded than most.

The end of the night I care to detail was at 23 Public brewing, a great little craft brewery in the heart of Taipei. It is shocking places like this exist but the craft beer revolution is truly everywhere. This place has some great features like a cucumber flavored sour and a lot of great options a probably won’t be my last time at least checking it out.

Overall this was a really great start to Taipei even if it was just ten hours. There’s a lot more to see. Ultimately probably not enough to judge a whole country it the limited time will have to make do.

NFL 2019: Week 3 Power Rankings & The Rest

 Ranking the 0-2 Teams (or 0-1-1)

10.) Miami Dolphins (0-2  =  10-102)
9.) Cincinnati Bengals  (0-2  =  37-62)
8.) New York Giants  (0-2  =  31-63)
7.) New York Jets  (0-2  =
6.) Pittsburgh Steelers  (0-2  =  29-61)
5.) Jacksonville Jaguars  (0-2  =  38-53)
4.) Washington Redskins  (0-2  =  48-63)
3.) Arizona Cardinals  (0-1-1  =  44-50)
2.) Denver Broncos  (0-2  =  30-40)
1.) Carolina Panthers  (0-2  =  41-50)


Ranking the 1-1 Teams

12.) Oakland Raiders  (1-1  =  34-44)
11.) Tampa Bay Buccaneers  (1-1  =  37-45)
10.) Tennessee Titans  (1-1  =  60-32)
9.) New Orleans Saints  (1-1  =  39-55)
8.) Indianapolis Colts  (1-1  =  43-47)
7.)
6.) Atlanta Falcons  (1-1  =  36-48)
5.) Los Angeles Chargers  (1-1  =  40-37)
4.) Chicago Bears  (1-1  =  19-24)
3.) Houston Texans  (1-1  =  41-42)
2.) Minnesota Vikings  (1-1  =  44-33)
1.) Philadelphia Eagles  (1-1  =  52-51)


Ranking the 2-0 Teams (or 1-0-1)

10.) Detroit Lions  (1-0-1  =  40-37)
9.) San Francisco 49ers  (2-0  =  72-34)
8.) Buffalo Bills  (2-0  =  45-30)
7.) Seattle Seahawks  (2-0  =  49-46)
6.) Green Bay Packers  (2-0  =  31-19)
5.) Los Angeles Rams  (2-0  =  57-36)
4.) Baltimore Ravens  (2-0  =  82-27)
3.) Dallas Cowboys  (2-0  =  66-38)
2.) Kansas City Chiefs  (2-0  =  68-36)
1.) New England Patriots  (2-0  =  76-3)


Looking Ahead to Next Week's Games

16.) Miami Dolphins (0-2)  @  Dallas Cowboys (2-0)  (1:00 - FOX)
15.) New York Jets (0-2)  @  New England Patriots (2-0)  (1:00 - CBS)
14.) New York Giants (0-2)  @  Tampa Bay Buccaneers (1-1)  (4:05 - FOX)
13.) Cincinnati Bengals (0-2)  @  Buffalo Bills (2-0)  (1:00 - CBS)
12.) Tennessee Titans (1-1)  @  Jacksonville Jaguars (0-2)  (TNF - NFLN)
11.) Oakland Raiders (1-1)  @  Minnesota Vikings (1-1)  (1:00 - FOX)
10.) Pittsburgh Steelers (0-2)  @  San Francisco 49ers  (2-0)  (4:25 - CBS)
9.) Carolina Panthers (0-2)  @  Arizona Cardinals (0-1-1)  (4:05 - FOX)
8.) New Orleans Saints (1-1)  @  Seattle Seahawks (2-0)  (4:25 - CBS)
7.) Chicago Bears (1-1)  @  Washington Redskins (0-2)  (MNF - ESPN)
6.) Atlanta Falcons (1-1)  @  Indianapolis Colts (1-1)  (1:00 - CBS)
5.) Denver Broncos (0-2)  @  Green Bay Packers (2-0)  (1:00 - FOX)
4.) Detroit Lions (1-0-1)  @  Philadelphia Eagles (1-1)  (1:00 - FOX)
3.) Houston Texans (1-1)  @  Los Angeles Chargers (1-1)  (4:25 - CBS)
2.) Los Angeles Rams (2-0)  @  Cleveland Browns (1-1)  (SNF - NBC)
1.) Baltimore Ravens (2-0)  @  Kansas City Chiefs (2-0)  (1:00 - CBS)

Watching Rafa: Emotionally Drained, Completely Energized

Rafael Nadal won the US Open. His fourth such win, 19th overall major, getting him as close as he's ever been to Roger Federer. He did so in five dramatic sets, coming very close to infamy, being the first person to throw away a two-set lead in a major final in 15 years (Guillermo Coria - at the French Open, the year before a plucky 19-year old would make that his tournament for life). He did so against a player uniquely set up to frustrate Nadal, a player who may well win won of these as soon as next January in Australia. Rafael Nadal did all that, and I watched every second of it, lapping it up with one eye open, both in excitement to see a man I have invested way too much in to do something he's already done so many times, and in fear that he won't. But in the end, that's why we watch.

I can't remember the last time Nadal played a major match that felt quite like this one. Sure, he played a brilliant five set match against Djokovic at Wimbledon last year - but that was against Djokovic. Ever since Nadal and Federer's renaissance in 2017 (and Djokovic's own renaissance the next year), games between two of those three are in their own sphere, with the weight of the GOAT title hanging over every second. This was half that - I mean, Nadal's case grew a lot stronger with a win - but this was against a contender, a regular player. It allowed me to just sit back and watch Nadal play a match where a loss wouldn't directly help his two main rivals, but a win would so god damn much.

Tennis is interesting because while we can marvel at the incredible physicality and artistry and chess playing and everything else purely athletic that goes on within points, what makes it so lasting, so incredible draining, so damn fun, is what happens between them. The roars when a point ends. The emotional stress on the players that permeates through the TV screen like water through a napkin. You can feel it. You can barely believe it. That is what makes this sport great, and it was so good to experience that again.

Sure, had Nadal thrown away the match, to a player every single bit his equal on that day, I wouldn't be writing this. The margins between the emotional pain and strain and gain of a five set classic being a true sports utopia and a bottomless pit of fuzzy-balled despair is slim. But that is the fun, isn't it?

To talk about the actual game for a few minutes, what was so surprising was how from the end of the third set through the early fifth it was clear that for once, Nadal was clearly the more tired player. Medvedev was stronger, faster, more fit at that moment. He was tracking down more balls, making Nadal hit extra shots. Nadal was the one giving up on points, be it drop-shots, ill-advised attempted winners, or just letting balls go by. But then Nadal was called for a time violation (valid) on break point, and it all turned. Suddenly, Rafa had life, Rafa had fight, Rafa had spirit, and we woudl witness the end of a classic.

Rafael Nadal is an experience. For a player so composed and tough, few greats in this sport wear their emotions - specifically nervousness - so openly. That open display of emotions, be it the Vamoses, the obvious signs of pain and anguish at a miss, the worried look he can throw on way too often, all of it, is all so honest, and makes it all the harder but ultimately more rewarding to watch. Nadal showed this so often during the match, no more so than when it was over, him sitting in his chair, visibly breaking down in a way he so rarely has when the stadium played a reel of him winning his nineteen trophies. It mirrored all of us, having the same exact reaction.

Aside from Peyton Manning, there is no athlete I've followed for as long as Rafael Nadal. Given how my passion for sports should at some point start to wane (tough but true), likely I will never follow an athlete with this type of passion for such a long period of time. But that is why thsi means so much. Even the GOAT debates, which I know Nadal himself hates, means so much because I've invested fourteen years. I've invested time watching that capri-wearing, long-haired dynamo turn into a balding but sturdy veteran. And all the while, watching him win, but suffer. But then again, we all got to suffer, and then win, as well.

I have no idea if any of this made sense, but that is kind of the point anyway. Watching Nadal, sitting there in my seat, silent, transfixed starting at a screen, too nervous to move, to speak, to think. Well, if you do all that, you probably won't be too coherent the next day. But in my mind, this all makes sense. Investing a lot of time watching someone you'll never meet do incredible feats you have no earthly ability to comprehend, let alone perform, makes sense. Getting so nervous you would literally snap if the wrong person asks you the slightly wrong question makes sense. It all makes sense, because four hours and fifty-two minutes, when the man finally wins, and drops to the grown in stunned relief, you want to do the same thing so badly, but you can't, because suddenly you feel alive. That is the beauty of tennis, the beauty of Nadal, the beauty of caring too much about tennis, about a player, about a moment. 

Don't Spend Money on Hope

Last year, I bought tickets to watch Federer play Djokovic in their star studded Quarterfinal in last year's US Open. Don't remember it? Well, that's because after I bought the ticket, Federer lost to James Millman, in a truly weird match in sweltering humidity, shanking balls left and right, sweating more than he did on court for all of 2003-2008. He lost. The $150 ticket we bought about five rows from the very top of that cavern that is Ashe stadium now was available for about $60.

It wasn't just me, it was with two friends, all sharing in our collective despair, watching Novak Djokovic surgically tear apart Millman in three easy sets. That night, we decided to double down in a way. We decided to go to the Semifinals next year (this year), where you get both Men's semifinals (and the Men's Double Final). We figured you'll at least get one good match. When the draw came out, there was another chance to see Djokovic vs. Federer. This year? Neither gets through.

In some ways, I can harken back to that old wise saying 'fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me'. In the end, it's not all bad news. With six players left in the draw, Rafael Nadal is the huge favorite to win, it would be his fourth US Open and 19th overall major. But then again, when you spent $250 bucks on tickets ($280 after those damn fees), and you end up with Dimitrov vs. Medvedev, you don't think too clearly.

In the end, it will still be a fun day at the open (god forbid if Nadal loses his QF, though), but you do get the sense that this is meaningful. For the second straight year, Federer lost harrowingly in the US Open, a tired sullen mess of the guy who played so well just a few months earlier. Djokovic now this time is physically ailing - the second time in four years where he may end the season in pain. Overall, maybe we shouldn't count on 30-somethines be peachy clean physically in their mid -to-late-30s.

It's weird because as all three of their incredible careers gets to their respective closes, I've become more protective over Nadal's place in history, so I should be gleeful his two biggest competitors were knocked out, but I'm not. This is a disaster. Very soon these guys won't be playing period. We could have had another amazing Federer vs. Djokovic match, and alas, we're getting Medvedev vs. Dimitrov.

That said, there is some fun in watching Medvedev these days, with him so brilliantly taking on the mantle of the tennis heel at the moment. Slowly, the watfching public is catching on and loving it as well, but watching him so brilliantly take the jeers and turn it into greatness is fun.

But it isn't Fed vs. Djokovic. It isn't worth $250 (or half of that). Tht all said, I'll probably buy those damn semifinal tickets next year as well...