2008 – Taipei, Taiwan
I was really looking forward to going to Taipei. The city itself seemed interesting a lot, but I had a few good friends from university who live there, and they said they’d take me out whenever I could go. So with local friends, strong history and cultural knowledge, and with comparably fewer foreigners than other countries in the region, it ticked all my boxes as a place to go. Just a pity I knew nothing about what I actually wanted to do there in my spare time.
In terms of work, I had a great time. My hotel was a short trip to the office, meaning I spent minimal time in traffic. On a sidenote – the hotel Landis in Taipei is amazing. Great service, comfy beds and a lobby set well in the 1950’s give it a charming feel. Highly recommended. Back at work, the people were always more than pleasant hosts, who took me out to a variety of lunches and dinners through the week. One day they even brought some local delicacies in – which included various organs from various animals that were dried, cooked and/or smoked. I don’t normally do organs, but they actually tasted pretty OK. I did find it weird though working with people who were eating duck beaks.
A blue break dancing street performer.
On my last day of work Taiwan was taking on China in the baseball. It was near impossible to get the group to concentrate on the task at hand, with each of them – even the ladies – checking online regularly as the latest update on the game. Even the girls here like baseball?? But this wasn’t the worst of it. China has never taken any interest in baseball – the only reason they qualified is that they were the host nation. But for the first time ever, the Chinese beat Taiwan fair and square in the game. Taiwan was distraught – how can they lose to a country that doesn’t care about baseball? And worst still.. losing to China!? I may as well have just gone home – everyone was acting like they were all told that their parents were getting a divorce. They couldn’t concentrate, slouched in their chairs, stared out the windows. They’d been cut, deeply. I dared not to joke about it.
Taipei is clean, has parkland, generally law abiding citizens, but still retains a feeling of unpredictability and energy. The people are well dressed, trendy, friendly and polite. You can drive for 30 minutes from the centre of Taipei, and you’ll be in forests. If I was to elect for a city to live in Asia apart from Bangkok, Taipei is on the top of my list.. but I still wouldn’t watch baseball. I just hope the loud talking mainland package tourists who are threatening to cross the straight in mass don’t detract from its charm.
2007 – Manila, Philippines
Manila is another city which it’s reputation proceeds it, as a place with high levels of violent crime and a seedy nightlife. I was travelling alone again, and didn’t want to chance it, so spent my evenings and nights in the impressive shopping centres of Makati, the upper class district of Manila. Like in KL, my work was located 1 ½ hours drive outside of the city, so my mornings and evenings were spent sprawled in the back seat of a Toyota, driven by my cheerful and endlessly polite driver. He was so nice, but like many in his country, very poor. He was so happy to be taking his only daughter for her birthday to Jollibee’s (a Pinoy burger chain), but on the day after her birthday, was distraught when a security guard accused him of damaging a security badge – for which he’d have to pay 200 peso (around 6 dollars) to repair. From what I could tell, the security guard was being a jerk.
The city of Manila is huge, containing many very visible slums, but some parts also retain a Spanish feel in the pinks and yellow paints used. Once out of Manila, is where the Philippines gets interesting. It is lush, and you feel like your on a tropical island.. hey, guess what, you are! Palm trees, green fields, rolling hills is what you’re in for, while still sucking in the horrid traffic in and out of Manila.
Amazing view from a restaurant in Tagatay
The office canteen was good – rice normally sided with some form of fish, and some form of vegetables. But hardly anything to blog about. What was the most fun though was the canteen. It was dominated by the wall mounted television, with a number speakers set around the room, and turned up to 11. On it was the daily television program Wowowee – a gameshow where the audience must dance to daggy music first be shortlisted, and then dance again while singing the programs theme song – those deemed to dance and sing good enough then made it to being a contestant. I didn’t watch the show much past here, but watching the mothers and grandmothers of the Philippines gush and groove in the way they do on this show was enough. It was a little embarrassing, but their enthusiasm made it really entertaining at the same time. I was later told by another foreigner that the Pinoy’s have a love of dancing embedded in their DNA.
It’s a bit sad that all I have to report about the Philippines is shopping centres, rolling hills, my drive to and from work, and daytime gameshow TV, but that’s all my working schedule really allowed for. Again, the people were lovely, and everything a bit easier as English is widely spoken. Also, as the Philippines is off the mainland of Asia, it means you don’t get the same backpackers crossing in to get a new stamp in their passport – only those who really want to go here make the flight. In that lies the beauty, fewer tourists, a more undiscovered feel, while the widespread use of English makes it easier to get around.
2007 – Shanghai, China
Before the trip Shanghai wasn’t all that high on my want-to-see trip – I had to do a bit of reading up before I even knew what to expect. Colder than I’d been in a long time in South-East Asia, I finally got to don a jacket on my way to and from work.
By the time I visited China I was travelling alone for work, and was rather confident with myself in visiting foreign cities. I found out the location of work was across the road from the Jin Mao building which is right near a train station. OK, no problem, and forgetting all contact details of the office I was visiting in China, departed on the train. Needless to say I underestimated Shanghai, and got thoroughly lost. The Jin Mao building is set on a massive road of 6 to 8 lanes, which you cannot just cross. Without contact details, I couldn’t call anyone in the office to help. I used the last of my phone credit by SMS’ing my cousin with a distress message asking for help, instead of my co-worker with the same name. After an ill-advised taxi ride to the wrong end of the street, I was able to find a building receptionist who cared little enough about her job (I think she was happy for the break) who was willing to let me use her computer to check my mail, and use her phone for a distress call. Finally, and almost after leaving my work documents with the receptionist, I arrived 45 minutes late for the training session I was supposed to initiate a little red faced. I wasn’t going to underestimate Shanghai again.
The clearest view on this weekend was that of the floating billboard.
The walk to the office wasn’t the only fun bit of the trip. The public transport is fast and efficient in Shanghai, but immensely crowded. Just getting on and off the trains was like working your way through a rugby scrum, and I found the best way to make sure you get out was start making your way to the exit at the station before. I even watched a fight break out between two suited businessmen when one thought the other shoved him a bit hard. For the 8 days I worked it was fun to go through this – just because I’d never shoved people around quite as much as this. Though after a few months, I’m sure the novelty would wear out.
Just as fun and frustrating at the same time was catching a taxi. Never was competition so fierce and unregulated. Want to catch a taxi? Just look for someone waiting to catch a taxi, then walk 10 metres up the street before them. This sort of behaviour would get you beaten up in Melbourne, but everyone seems to do it in Shanghai. Or if you’re lucky enough to be near a taxi that’s letting a passenger out, the best option is to get into the taxi before the passenger has finished paying the fair before someone else does. Never have I had a chance to act like such a bastard to other human beings, and to be honest it was a liberating feeling. Acting with chivalry and politeness would have had me left clutching my bags on the side of the road at midnight, taxi-less.
The juxtapositions (I haven’t forgotten all my large english words yet!) between development and tradition seem everywhere in Shanghai, and is a city that I feel is best observed as you walk around the back streets. You can go bypass the luxury hotels, walk around a corner, and grab some amazing roti bread with spinach cooked on a 44 gallon drum. Or just watch the teams of people quietly getting about their business on their simple bicycles, while the highways are filled with cars moving at a walking pace. It’s a really an amazing city.
2006 – Detroit, USA
I wasn’t as excited when I was told I would be sent to Detroit and Chicago for a few weeks. I mean, it was cool, however the United States just wasn’t exotic. Plus it’s full of those annoying Americans who all think the US is at the centre of the world. Man I was really, really wrong.
Americans in America are extremely hospitable, friendly, and fall over themselves the help you out. However they did always seemed to think I was British. Always asking what I was doing, and how I liked the place, I never had a lunch time alone where the hosts wouldn’t offer to take me to another American institution. Coney Island, Appleby’s, cheeseburger joints, all were covered off (and probably a few more). Sure, they weren’t all fine dining experiences, but they all tasted OK and it was fun just to see what they were all about.
The near lifeless streets of Detroit city. Apologies for the crummy picture quality.
There seemed to be so many people who are just funny – I’m not sure if they were trying to be or not. Like a guy who walks into a Subway and when observing the menu, sees fit to tell everyone around him who’ll listen just how hungry he is. Or the fully grown man who’s listening to his MP3 player who just decides to start rapping along to Jay-Z, and with an emphatic “Wooh” jumps on his skateboard and pushes quickly through the crowd. Or the guy standing next to me also watching the rapping skateboarder, observing “Man, that guy is crazy”, and then turns to me and asks for a dollar.
I don’t know if I like America for all the right reasons, but it’s a hellova lot of fun. So many Australians look only to Europe or Asia when planning their travels, and ignore the entirely new experience they can have in the US. By ignoring the yanks, you’re the one who misses out, not them.
2006 – Hanoi, Vietnam
I’ve never been to Europe before, but Hanoi made me feel that maybe somehow I was actually there. Wide streets lined with trees, a lack of skyscrapers, instead with two and three story colonial era buildings in their place along the centre of town. Maybe I was actually in Europe? Ummm, no. There’s bazillions of motorbikes and scooters, people sitting at fragrant roadside noodle shops on tiny stools (what’s up with that anyway??) and most buildings look like they need a coat of paint. But this is the charm for me, you have an amazing mix of two continents in the one city. Europe but with the Europeans replaced by Vietnamese.
From a working perspective, the office I was in had a culture that I originally disliked, but now can fully appreciate as the best way. 5pm, everyone leaves. When it’s a birthday, they get a cake and everyone goes down for a chat for half an hour on a Friday afternoon. This is not lazy and inefficient, it’s fun and preserves a quality of life for the staff members I haven’t afforded myself for a while.
Fire on Hanoi streets, I guess some from of tradition. Or maybe just vandalism.
Another bonus for me that we were staying in the Hotel Nikko – a Japanese international hotel chain. Something about going from sleeping in a kimono, to travelling to work each morning in a tide of scooters along roads lined with buildings of French architecture really appealed to me. Where else can you do this?
Friends who have visited Hanoi nearly always complain of the persistent and interfering touts, which put them off from visiting Hanoi (and Vietnam) again. It’s a pity, as Hanoi was such a refreshing location for me – so different to all other cities in South-East Asia I’ve had the pleasure to visit.
RSS - Posts