Birdsong, Waterfalls & Construction

I've been here over a year now and the constant contrasts in this city still amaze and delight me.

I got myself up and out this morning for a walk. I walked from our apartment, straight out the back door and onto Wan Chai Gap Road, which is possibly the steepest hill I have ever chosen to walk up. More than once. From there I was instantly among others, mainly locals, out for their morning constitutional. It seems to be a very social thing with the old folk. I take my hat off to them too because I didn't see them looking out of breath or out of sorts at all, they were just pacing themselves, clearly they do this often. Daily is my guess.

It was 9am and the air was still pleasantly cool...and the birds were singing. That rather took me by surprise, I have to say! I'm afraid I can't tell you what sort of bird I heard although I did see it perched up in the tree and stopped to listen to it's beautiful song (a perfect opportunity to catch my breath) and in the background I could also hear the rushing water from what's left of the nearby waterfall. It's pretty dry here now so there isn't much to see but I could hear the falling water and the beautiful birdsong and I almost forgot where I was. What a way to start the day. Why don't I do this every morning?

As I made my way further up the hill towards Bowen Road which is another footpath but this time a completely flat one, which winds around the mountain side towards Central, I was welcomed by the national sound of Hong Kong. Drilling! :-) They have been doing construction work on the hillside and along the footpath for months now. I am still not clear exactly what is going on other than it appears to be maintenance of sorts. Repair work...but it is serious whatever it is. Maybe it's falling down...or they are simply taking preventative measures. I'm not sure, but I don't think we will be here to see the end result, there is no way it will be finished within the next 6 weeks.

From this point I quickened my pace and after about 45 minutes of brisk walking (passing more construction along the way) I found myself in Hong Kong Park...and of course I had to seek out my Favourite Place as it has been a while since I visited. Yes, as always, my bench was free and I happily sat down, closed my eyes and took in the Nature that surrounded me. All other sounds drowned out by the falling water. Time to take some long deep breaths.

I stayed a while but the park was starting to get busy, so I decided to retrace my steps homeward bound. The tourists were out with their cameras and there were numerous classes of school children...little ones...practicing their english on me as they ran by me, giggling. Teachers not having to do too much to keep them in orderly fashion either, which was nice to see.

I couldn't help but compare this walk to one that I take from Home...Ottawa Home. I barely meet a soul and pass numerous beautiful houses with perfectly manicured front gardens, very flat, even pathways...oh so civilised. Worlds Apart and yet both beautiful in their own way.

More Temples and Buddhas in Bangkok

I've never thought of Bangkok as a place on My List, but when you're presented with an opportunity to visit a new place, in a beautiful country, that you may not get another chance to visit, it seems rather rude to refuse! So, I flew in for the weekend to meet my husband once his business duties were over for the week. Given the fact that I hadn't seen him in 2 weeks, we were ideally looking for a bit of down time, a place to relax for a few days rather than to jump on every tour available. On balance though, it feels quite wrong to go to any place and not sample a bit of the local flavour and culture, so we did what we had to do and arranged a half day tour to take us to just a few of the top sights listed in our Lonely Planet Encounter Guide. I love these guides, they have proved so reliable in this last year. When you have a limited amount of time in a new city they are ideal, drawing your attention to the Must See bits in very few words - perfect for the last-minute traveller who is also a bit of a slow although experienced, packer!

So what did the wonderful Encounter recommend we do in Bangkok? Well, it said not to miss The Grand Palace or the Reclining Buddha. I'd have to agree. Maybe there were other "unmissable" sights that we missed, but the great thing is that I'll never know. I am happy with what I saw...and was impressed, big time, with the Reclining Buddha. I have a bit of a "thing" for buddhas lately and I have to admit, I have seen a lot of buddhas in the past year, so to see something so unique that literally takes your breath away, really has to be noted as Impressive.

The gold plated Reclining Buddha is 46 metres long and 15 metres high and is designed to illustrate the passing of the Buddha into nirvana. The feet and the eyes are engraved with mother of pearl, which you can see on the first picture. You can also get some perspective on his vastness on this last picture where you should just about be able to make out a human figure by his feet!

Hand painted walls within the Grand Palace

The Grand Palace complex was established in 1782 and consists of the royal residence and throne halls along with a number of government offices and the Temple of the Emerald Buddha - where photos were not permitted...but we did see Him and rather special He was too.

Beautiful, ornate architecture...

Ongoing renovations in front of our eyes...

So that concludes our short cultural expedition in Bangkok...the rest of our time was spent relaxing by the pool and in the spa, in true Chapman fashion :-)

Riding the Tram

Today I rode the Tram. I had the time. I had the patience. It was a nice day and not too hot. And...my destination was directly on the tram route.

I confess it's not my favourite mode of transport here but if you're not in a rush, and feel you can cope with a bit of a bumpy ride, lots of road noise and plenty of squishing, then it can be fun...just another experience to be had really.

As I jumped on I was pleased to see an empty space on the bench which I filled and promptly turned my gaze out of the window; partly to observe the bustling Sunday activity and partly to keep track of where we were going as I didn't want to miss my stop. All of a sudden I felt a sharp finger poking my arm...several times in fact....I look around, a little old lady is still poking me and babbling away in (I assume!) cantonese...I don't know a word I'm ashamed to say (oh, apart from how to say my address in case the taxi driver doesn't speak english!) but I got the gist from all the poking that she wanted me to budge up..make space, so that she could sit down. For the first time it didn't feel rude to me...I must be getting acclimated at last!

It must be time to go home soon!

The Elusive Beijing

Finally, I can tick Beijing off my List. I was beginning to think I'd never make it after several failed attempts (in the form of cancelled trips) but with just 2 months left on the Asia Clock, I did it. Alan of course has been here many times, but much to my delight was working hard every single time and hadn't seen ANY sights yet, so that gave me permission to organise a couple of tours in which we were escorted around our chosen sights of Beijing...ensuring we didn't waste our valuable 2 days in this fascinating city. We don't usually do the Tour thing, we go it alone and make our own way...we're a bit slow...we both enjoy photography and like to go at our own pace but on this occasion there was simply too much to see and too little time, and then there's also the language thing, so we needed some help and if the photography suffered for that, well then, so be it.

Our first stop was the Great Wall. But I've covered that already...and as it happens I think we did go just a little too slowly for our guide but thankfully she was professional and very accommodating and just smiled sweetly...and kept walking, in the hope that we'd just follow I imagine.

On our second day we did a whistle-stop tour of some amazing sights: The Forbidden City, The Temple of Heaven, Tian'anmen Square and Summer Palace. It was quite a full day with a lot of walking and I was very glad I dressed my feet for comfort rather than style.

The Forbidden City was HUGE. It was the Chinese Imperial Palace from the Ming Dynasty to the end of Qing Dynasty and is right in the centre of the city. For almost 500 years, it served as the home of emperors and their households, as well as the ceremonial and political centre of Chinese government.

I'm getting used to the style now... in the beginning it felt so unique and so different to anything I'd seen before but I've seen a lot of temples now... and there are similarities. Bit like churches I guess. However, what was noticeably different from many of the temples I've seen around Hong Kong, was the amount of space here. Vast open areas and courtyards. Huge temples to accommodate huge numbers of people. So vast that I really didn't have a lens on my camera to really do it justice!

Taken at The Forbidden City...couldn't do the place justice, so I went for detail instead.

Probably one of the most well known and the largest city square in the world; Tian'anmen Square, named after Tian'anmen Gate which means Gate of Heavenly Peace, which is the gateway to the Forbidden City.

The Temple of Heaven. For me this was a unique temple, with no roof, so that people could pray directly to the heavens, apparently for good weather...or whatever kind of weather it was they needed....

And the Temple of Heaven where they prayed for a good harvest.

Some Temple of Heaven detail.....

And finally...an old fashioned tea house in the guise of a marble boat at Summer Palace. Sounds ideal to me...my kind of boat...just somewhere to sit and sip your afternoon tea and admire the views over Kunming lake. Nice.

The aptly named... Great Wall of China

So Great that it deserves it's own entry. It could have been named the Awe-inspiring Wall of China and I for one would not have questioned it. It's one of those attractions that everyone has heard of but I suspect relatively few ever get to see. I certainly never thought I'd be lucky enough to walk on it and on a blue-sky day in October too! Our guide informed us that up until a few days before it had been very foggy for some time too, so we felt doubly lucky!

The Wall is the longest man made structure in the world, and some say it can be seen from Space, although I can't verify that either way. It was built in segments by varying dynasties to protect China's northern boundary and what survives today is mainly the stone and brick bits predominantly from the Ming dynasty.

It's truly fascinating to me to imagine how on earth they managed to build this wall. We walked such a small piece of it...it apparently stretches for over 30,000 miles! Bending and weaving as it does and makes it's way up and over, down and round the mountains. Incredible. Did I mention it was totally awe-inspiring? Many died during construction too...that unfortunately doesn't surprise me so much given the terrain, it must have been a pretty tough job.

All the tourist information I'd read in advance of our trip had me worried that walking the wall would feel a bit like walking in central Hong Kong during the lunch break, but we left our hotel at 7am, travelled north through some interesting villages and were on the wall by 9am and to have some sections with views like this, was most rewarding.

Quite beautiful and an experience never to be forgotten!

The Life of a Travelling Spouse

It’s an odd existence I lead these days. Enviable at times, by some. And at times, rightly so, it can be great. It can be fun. But it’s still odd. Like right now, I’m in Beijing, China. Sitting in a hotel lounge catching up with email and other stuff while Alan is up in the hotel room, on a call. He is always on calls, or so it seems to me. He travels so much and then when he is close, physically, he is seldom with me. Work. The sacrifices some of us make for it, for whatever reasons.

I often think that it’s a jolly good thing that I was an only child until the age of 9 and as such, am well accustomed to amusing myself and making my own entertainment. I’m comfortable with my own company. At times maybe too comfortable and I need to nudge myself to reconnect with the outer world. This evening though, I thought I’d catch up on some blogging, clearly. Feels like a perfect time to do so.

I tried to log on to my Blog account but no...it seems I can’t. I'm in China. I knew that Facebook was banned here, but Blogger too? Well...that’s just too much! It makes me wonder how I would have coped had we been sent to mainland China rather than Hong Kong...which was a distinct possibility at the time. I guess I never would have started the blog and I would be none the wiser but no Facebook either as a medium to share? I would have felt so very disconnected from my friends and family! How would that have felt? Hard to predict, but not good I sense. More than odd. These days, many people thrive on Facebook and other social media networks and many of those people have the majority of their friends and family virtually on their doorstep. I suddenly feel quite uncomfortable. But why? Why should this make so much difference? Go back 5 years perhaps and this would not have been a consideration. If we chose to leave our home country then we could rely on phones, email, MSN and Skype...and I did, the first time around. But now I have new technology addictions and I wonder how I’d cope without them. Well...thankfully I didn’t have to, so all I can say is Thank You Hong Kong for allowing me to connect and to share in ways I should never take for granted!