In the lap of luxury...

We debated whether we'd tell about Easter or not, we didn't want to rub it in, given Oz turned on some generally shite weather - but then we thought you'd want to live vicariously (we hope!!)

4 days in Phuket in pure luxury, aka, The Banyan Tree (http://www.banyantree.com/ in case you want to research). We're very lucky, as you guys know we've done a lot of travel off the back of EY staying in lovely hotels, and some pretty awesome packages on our own, but this one takes it to a new level. If you're going to do luxury, we recommend this....

Your own villa, with courtyard containing spa or pool or spa & pool depending on your budget, outdoor bath, sun beds, eating area etc.Inside the usual luxury to be expected in Thailand, but also little touches that made it personal, the staff took notice of what you were doing in the room, and tidied accordingly and never intrusive.

Phuket itself we can't actually speak for, we didn't visit the town, we did visit the beach where the Banyan Tree is! We know that sounds rubbish, but it's that kind of place - we wanted relaxation, blue skies, white sand, hot weather and somewhere to swim, read our books, and sleep and it was every bit of that!We did do a side trip, I feel it is inappropriate to spend all your time in a resort, so insisted we visit Phi Phi islands for a day trip. We got really good weather, nice and calm for the hour speed boat ride between the two. As all good Asian tours require, you must be taken to a number of places you would never have gone voluntarily. This tour included seeing where big name stars and movie cameras turned up to wreak havoc on a beautiful little known piece of paradise. First up, a James Bond movie was filmed here... (I didn't pay enough attention to catch which one). A stunning spot, if we hadn't been accompanied by another 20 odd tourist boats!




The other was where "The Beach" of Leonardo diCaprio variety was filmed (didn't bother to photograph). In comparison to the other beaches we were let off to swim at, this had been truly trashed. It was really unfortunate - we gather that the local population make something out of tourist coming to see it, but it was polluted with lots of stinky boat fumes, really stirred up so more a murky brown than the crystal clear blue water we saw elsewhere. Thankfully, they didn't leave us there very long! But once we'd completed our compulsory famous spots tour we got into some really good snorkelling, a fabulous picnic lunch on Bamboo Island, followed by some even better snorkelling! A really good day for sun, sand, swimming, cool fish and forgetting what you do for a living!!
(we’re pretty sure its not professional photographer... but we did have a great time!) After that there really were only sunsets on the beach.... body surfing..... and a bit of chick watching..... to complete a pretty perfect holiday - only next time we'd go for 5 days (and maybe without the boss - Liz & Glenn had bought the same package - Liz being my boss - luckily we like them!)

The Great Haggis Hunt

The following is a short post about our recent trip to the UK and the great Haggis hunt that ensued. It features several culinary delights for you and, for a change, these weird gastronomical wonders aren't of Asian origin…

Backgound: before heading off on my first trip to the UK the other week, I was given 2 missions by fellow gweilos from work, craving particular food stuffs they haven't been able to get their mittens on in Hong Kong.

The 2 missions were:

1) Hunt down and return a fist full of Yorkies chocolates for Trudge , my work supervisor

2) Hunt down and return some tinned haggis for Fothers, my Scottish colleague - yes, "tinned" is no telegraphic typo!

The first was a no-brainer - especially given we were spending time in the lovely city of York itself.

The second one, we had some problems with. Not being sure about the Scots reputation for humour, I originally took this request with a grain of salt, thinking it's just as likely that my colleagues was having a lend of me.

After checking several supermarkets, food establishments and even with a couple "alleged" locals for the whereabouts of this illusive preserved product, I was beginning to believe it might just be a request of shits and giggles for my Mac-work mate.

We'd all but given up, when we found ourselves wandering through the "new" town, down Rose lane, and stumble upon this little fellow in a window:

Surely the site of half-elk, half-man mannequin wearing a kilt could only be seen as some sort of Scottish sign – a mystical guide on a hunt for food enlightenment perhaps?

With the faintest scent that we might be on the right trail, we pressed on down Rose lane with more hurried gate. Upon seeing the T junction marking the end of Rose lane, it appeared that the trail may have slipped us past but there, at the end, something glistened to us – it was an all-night supermarket!

Was this to be the hideout of the haggis cans?

Trying to get my head inside that of a native's, I thought, "If I couldn't sleep and needed some haggis, where would I go… to the all night supermarket for tinned haggis of course!"

So into the supermarket the hunt continued, scouring each isle with that careful and detailed approach which would make the Taliban quiver in their caves. Up and back, down and across we hunted. Our prey was not complying. It was not revealing itself.

The hunt party rendezvoused in a seemingly non-descript isle for a strategic consultation and reassessment of the hunt's happenings to date but seemingly was just that. For with my peripheries, I spotted a SPAM can!

Surely, if we were going to find sheep stomach and offal in a can anywhere, it was going to be in this isle. Near this glorious Monty Python meat by-product. Then, just a few labels away, we saw something else that hinted our hunt was on target:

It was can of Lunch Tongue, mmmm, Lunch Tongue!

[Not to be confused with dinner tongue of course… no, no, that would be just plain silly.]

With the heat of hunt reaching boiling point, we cast our eyes to the neighbouring item and there, in all of it's air-tight goodness, our prey revealed itself:

To top off the hunt, as if the find was not enough on it's own, there was something else to make this even more special.

What could be better then haggis in a can, you ask? Why, 30% extra Haggis free of course!

P.S. Have you ever wondered what one wears under a kilt?

Check out Elk-man for the answer!

From cold to colder.....

Kung Hei Fat Choi! May your year of the rat be healthy, wealthy and prosperous! We started our's by visiting the Mother Country. With a week's holiday, cheap flights and a mere 13 hours of flying time we felt that it was too good to refuse a trip to the UK. Landing in dawn twilight at Gatwick, we navigated (rather successfully we think) the maze that is the ticketing and transport of English rail that was of course until we hit the Tube.... Track work brought us slightly undone, however, we felt it probably gave Fran & Greg an opportunity to be slight more awake for our arrival at such an unreasonable hour on their weekend!! We had a lovely time with two of them, and truly appreciated their hospitality (thank you once again!). As well as seeing the joys of living in London, we felt that we should do the tourist sites to some extent. We walked through all sorts of historical sites, did the Original bus tour, jumping on and off where we wanted and generally played the part of a good tourist!!

From the snap viewing of key tourist attractions it was jump on a train to Edinburgh (in case London wasn't cold enough) to spend a couple of days exploring a city neither of us been to. We both thoroughly enjoy the relaxed pace of the train through green fields (really green, hurt your eyes kind of English green, Australian's don't quite understand green) tidy with little hedge rows, and little houses - very quaint, and beautiful.Edinburgh was stunning! A very easy place to see because it was so compact, and so very cold (no snow though, apparently that was the week before). The history was spectacular, the accents fabulous, the pubs refreshingly warm, and the beer.... (we now understand why the Brits drink it warm, it wards off chills) Sam introduced Trent to Haggis (while I chuckled to myself) only for both of us to pleasantly surprised - Trent's now a fan, and I'd contemplate eating more than the mouthful I had! Again many thanks to Sam for showing the tempting culinary pleasures found in Scotland.......the deep fried mars bar was great if you didn't eat the batter (slightly fishy - not sure if my heart or arteries will agree with me..... let it also be known that Sam merely helped us find them, but did recommend against partaking)!

Again, we took the snappy version of seeing the tourist delights of Edinburgh, while applying the legendary tight pursed approach of the Scots, and while we made an exception of paying to get into the Castle, there was no way they were conning me out of £9 to see Palace Hollyrood.... Besides by that time we were freezing in our open top bus on a drizzly Edinburgh day so the 9 quid was better spent on steak & ale pie and beer!

Our second day was lovely, rain had cleared but it was still pretty cold (as you can see). We decided that we should climb the Sir Walter Scott monument because we could, and because they were 15 mins off closing we got in for free! The views from the 3 levels of viewing decks were spectacular and confirmed for both us what a delightful city it is!!
Even if the last one was a bit of a squeeze and required some careful manoeuvers to negotiate!!
Sir Walter Scott monument....
So from Edinburgh it was onto another city high on tourist's agendas - Newcastle! Ok so we're stretching it a bit here. However, Paula & Andy do happen to live in Newcastle, and it's on the same train line and we thought it would be nice to pop in. They kindly showed us the lovely side of the city (yes it does exist, they've done a lot of work, and it looks to be reshaping itself quite nicely) and we had a great night with them! Thanks again for letting us stay!

From there it was onto York, a city that many have raved about, and others remember from school excursions.... not sure my Year 9 excursion to Sydney as the same ring about it. Either way, York was stunning with Trent declaring it the most historical town he'd been to yet. We walked about half the wall before I got hungry. We had asked for advice on the best places to see at the tourist info centre with less than 48 hours to do it. We were told "the wall, the York Minster, the Jorvik centre and the shambles". And we guess 3 out of 4 wasn't too bad! The wall was very interesting, and quite impressive that so much has remained intact for so long. The Shambles was a quaint street that would have fitted in perfectly in Harry Potter (photo below). The York Minster was sensational, so that leaves the Jorvik centre...... Tourist trap couldn't describe it more aptly - you literally couldn't get out without going through the entire "time machine" and slow moving ride which took you through 967 AD York...... although interesting from a historical perspective, the "I'm not a small child" sense had a pretty strong effect on feeling like we'd been taken for a ride.... literally and metaphorically! However, we did escape, and York's other tourist attractions more than made up for it!The York Minster is a seriously stunning cathedral! The chapter and undercroft were quite amazing (although also had this obsession with time travel) some truly amazing pieces, and was fascinating to see how the 3 places of worship on this site were interlinked and what remained of their history! Inside the actual cathedral, the stain glass work was amazing, truly beautiful. They were performing restoration work on one end of the building which was interesting to see in action. We decide the climb the 287 steps to the top of the tower, and like the Sir Walter Scott monument it afforded fabulous views of the cathedral and the whole of York!


We also enjoyed the mason's sense of humour - how nice of him to include Prince Charles as part of this church.
Anyway, from York it was back on the train to London again, where we again enjoyed the vast expanses of green land (something you don't get a whole lot in HK). A Friday night in London can only be spent one way, it had to be a curry in Brick Lane. We caught up with Paul and his fellow MacBank mates and entered the world of bartering for your dinner, and witnessed haggling that could only have been trained in Asia! A good night had by all. Saturday was a relaxed affair, a bit of shopping, a quiet coffee with Sarah & Fran before we packed up and headed home.
We counted our lucky stars, the gods were obviously shining on us - we had 8 days in the UK, it only rained 1 day, and otherwise, it had been blue skies, not too windy, and although very cold by HK/Aussie standards, no where near what it can turn on from what everyone told us! The Year of the Rat has begun well!
It was fabulous to catch up with everyone! Thank you all for your generosity, good advice and generally make our holiday all that bit more special! See you all again soon.

Brrrrr, it's cold!!!

Hi all, just a quick word to say, it's farking freezing here!!!

In case you've been living on the other side of the planet and don'tknow what I'm talking about, China's having it's coldest winter in over50 years! Check out some of these mainland pictures of the cold - quite interesting.


To complicate matters, next week is Chinese New Year. This is similar to Christmas for Westerners, we're everyone makes the pilgrimage back to their parents place to spend the time with family. Only thing is, there's a couple hundred million people all trying to do this at the same time and the roads, rail and airports are closed by snow and ice!

Needless to say, even though we're not getting snow, those of us in Southern China are also finding it a little too cool. There are some exceptions of course.

A special compliment goes out to Matt, who lives in the flat below us. I complained to him earlier this week that our floor was freezing cold and I asked when he was going to buy a heater. Without a skipping a beat, Matt replied "Don't worry mate. Being installed shortly. Should be ready to be switched on in July"! Something tells me I'm not going to need my floor heated when summer arrives and it's 35 degrees with 95% humidity! :-(

Anyway, Nik and I have decided Honkers is too cold for us ATM, so we're escaping somewhere warmer for the week. That's right, we're flying to London tonight and then heading up to Edinburgh - we've be told it's quite pleasant up there this time of year... for Scotland! ;-)

Happy Chinese New Year everybody!

PS It was good to catch up with many of you over Christmas / New Year but sorry we didn't get to see all of you - time really just flew while we were there. Special thanks to mum, dad, K-B, sis, Anke, Frouke, Kyrs and Stegs for giving us a place to nod-off while we're were down-under. Hopefully we'll see you again soon - here or there!

(Almost) Birthday Blog...

Well if you have been checking this blog with any type of regularity, you would have noticed that frequency of posts has dropped off quite remarkably over the last few months. If you ask Nik why that is, she would probably say it's my fault. Why, you might ask? That might, possibly, could, potentially be because I said that I wanted to do the next post. Apparently I was going to dedicate it to me turning 30. Instead however, I'm going to dedicate it to me justifying why it's taken me almost 4 months to post the entry. So here goes, the case for the defence....So back in August, when I probably should have knocked up the words for the blog, I was too busy enjoying turning 30 - it only happens once in your life, you know... except if you count turning 60 as actually turning 30 for the 2nd time but that's another story.Mind you, it wasn't completely selfish of me to not make an addition to our cyber journal in August. For what ever reason that's only known by a select group of mums, dads and god, there were about 1000 other expats celebrating birthdays in August here in Hong Kong. So I had to do my part for the community and help them all celebrate (see exhibit A, right: ex-pat's gather to celebrate multiple birthdays at Discovery Bay).

Between those gatherings and work, there was no time in August to work on the blog.

August defended.

Speaking of work, that brings on September. When I came to Hong Kong, I had no job, no house and was planning on being an international man of leisure for a while. That only lasted a couple weeks before I decided that would bore me senseless and I ended up scoring a job working as a Program Manager at Getronics. Whilst I found this experience in the global IT outsourcing industry extremely valuable, I can't say the company was in particularly great shape. My opinionated comparisons to the RMS Titantic were substantiated after a few months, when the head office in the Netherlands (isn't that weird) decided it couldn't make the greater China operation work and decided to sell a majority stake of the business to a mainland Chinese firm. No reflection on the management credentials of the new company but this organisational shift wasn't aligned with my personal strategic plan, so I started looking for a new job.

Looking for a job in Hong Kong the second time was a little more drawn out than the first time round. The second time round, I already had a job, was starting to understand the local market much better and could afford to be choosy. The last point proved to be quite an asset. When I contacted the recruiter to advise them that I was back on the market, they suggested I might be a good fit for Macquarie Bank. This looked like it was going to be a great opportunity to get my foot in the door of the Finance industry but there didn't seem to be any bites on the bait. Several weeks went past and just when I thought I would need to look for another opportunity, the recruiter came out of left field with an offer to join their team as a consultant!

This was a pretty hard decision to make. The recruitment firm seem to have some great people working for them and it appeared like it would be fun place to work (with a nice little expense account too mind you) but in the end I just wasn't quite ready to make such a major career change. I kindly turned down the offer and reconciled myself to starting again.

However, no sooner had I passed on the offer to sell human capital, then Macquarie said they wanted to interview me afterall. A couple of interviews and psycho-metric test later, I was offered employment at the Millionaires Factory (but only as a 2nd assistant orange peeler - so no requests to borrow money, ok?).Then it was time to give my 4 weeks notice and I thought, what better way to celebrate this milestone but to have a holiday? For a change, I used my powers of persuasion for good and somehow managed to convince my former employer to let me have a few days off. I put them to good use by jumping on DragonAir and meeting up with Nikki, who was in Beijing delivering a conference. The rest of that week you've already read about, as the sneaky post below reveals but I would like to second Nik's opinion: Beijing is definitely worth visiting and, if the government does manage to tidy the place up for the Olympics, then I'm sure it'll be absolutely spectacular to see. So September was otherwise occupied with more very pressing life matters.

September defended.

October was the next cab off the rank and it not only marked the last week at Getronics but it also marked the arrival of one of my best mates from high school, Will, and, and his fiancé, Bec. In 1993, Will and I weren’t that different. Almost all of our lives were spent at Farrer but since then our lives have taken remarkably different paths. He went off to Quebec on exchange for 12 months, came back speaking French, studied International Studies to head off to France, then came back to Sydney before settling earlier this year in Gunnedah, close to the Family farm. Where our lives are now, I’m not sure they could be further apart but there’s a part of me that is jealous and we still keep regular contact. I do have to point out that he is just a big kid at heart, hence why there's a picture of us at HK Disney Land. The rest of October also came and went without a blog post for good reason. Not only did I start my new job at Macquarie, hence trying to focus on making a good impression, but it was also when mum and dad arrived for a 10 day stay. Some might say those 2 events wouldn't necessarily be complimentary (but not those wanting caramel pie on Christmas day). However, somehow I managed to juggle both of these events reasonably successfully - at least mum and dad are still talking to me and MacBank haven't shown me the door!

The olds seemed to really enjoy their trip. I'm not sure what their biggest highlight was, although mum was kind of fond of the authentic Hong Kong Mexican nachos and fajitas we had at El Taco Loco, but for me it was probably Dad rolling out of bed on the second night. You'd think that sleeping in a bed that was bounded by walls on 3 sides, that you'd have a 75% less chance of rolling out of bed then you would have normally. You’d think that, wouldn’t you? But somehow the numbers came up and Dad managed to do it. He can't win Lotto but he can occasionally beat the odds. The second highlight of their trip for me was listening to mum sternly ask Dad why he was laying in the bedroom doorway with the doona in the middle of the night...

I know it was a long way from Tamworth for them to come and, while I'm quite sure they'd never want to live here, I reckon they just might be willing to have a second crack at visiting the city of the fragrant harbour. Heck, I might even be able to convince them to venture across the border to the mainland next time.

October defended.

Now what excuse can I use for November... ah, that's right, that's when my sister came to visit. Hmm, I better choose my words carefully here... she came, she saw, she had a good time and jumped back on the plane to Australia. Well, there was a little more to it than that but Vanessa was on her way back from a whirl-wind business trip in Europe and I was trying to catch up from playing tour guide and starting my new job. Her week here was probably a little more sedate but that’s just what the doctored was ordering for us both.

November was also the month that I made my first (albeit brief) trip to Thailand. Nik was down there for a couple weeks with work and I decided to pop down for a weekend to have a look around Bangkok. Although I didn't get to see a lot, I did like what I saw. The place kinda reminded me of Vietnam, just maybe 5-10 years ahead. There seemed to be much urbanisation going on and a lot of major transport infrastructure being built... oh and it was hot like Vietnam too. Darn glad we weren't there during summer, especially while visiting the world famous Chatuchak market. If wasn't for the fact that Hong Kong temps have finally dropped to the low 20s, I think I might forget what it was like to head outside and not perspire like a human sprinkler. I’ll save the juicy details about Bangkok to Nik in another post.

November defended.

That brings us to December and I find myself all out of excuses not to post an entry in the blog. So, here it is, as promised - the (almost) birthday blog!

Finally, just before I go, I thought I'd let you both know that Nik and I are both heading back down-under over Christmas / New Years. The current plan is to fly in on Sat 22 and head up the New England to spend a few days with the Golden Guitar. Nik's then going to cut across Thunderbolt's Way to spend a couple of xmas days with her fam. Then we'll both be back in Sydney just before NYE, hoping to catch with whoever hasn't buggered off somewhere else. We'll both be working in Sydney from 7-11 January before jumping back on the flying Kangaroo to Honkers. If you're going be around Sydney during this period, make sure you let us know and we'll see what we can do about catching up.

Merry Christmas everybody!

Beijing

Just one phrase - Beijing is awesome! Fabulous people, great fun - the Wall, the Summer Palace, Forbidden city, what more do I need to say......

(I had written a much fuller and stupendous blog, but it crashed when I tried to change the font, so now I'm going to give you the much more edited version.)

People - great, friendly, no attitude, loved Beijing because they were delightful to deal with. Taxi drivers, hotel staff, hawkers - a simple Ni Hao (Nee how - hello) and you got a big smile, and no where near the hassle you get elsewhere.

Space - having been in HK for way too long (Trent & I were well overdue for a holiday) the parks, the streets, the lack of highrise was just fantastic - 2 favourite places - Great Wall and Summer Palace.....

October is the month to go - no sand storms, no stinking heatwaves, no freezing winters - just perfect 24 degree days, and fresh evenings. Perfect.

It's typhoon season!!

Well this week has been exciting, we've had 2 storm warnings, first one on Wednesday, and today a much better one! Today we got the No. 8 signal which means we all got to go home!! Yah! The excitement about being able to go home early created quite a spark around the office, while the bus lines were something else. A HK specialty is the line for the bus, no one pushes to the front to get on, everyone lines up in an orderly way, even when there's a typhoon warning, and even when the whole of HK is trying to empty at the same time!

Anyway thought you guys might enjoy some contrasting photos from K Town - first one is from last week when the US navy was in town, second is this afternoon from our living room.


And in case anyone is worried, the warning signals actually only tell you how close the storm is to HK, not how strong the storm is, although I'm not going to argue with a number 10, nor a day off! Today's storm is packing massive winds of 63 km/hr!! hehehe!
The warnings stand as No. 1 being a standby warning the storm is within 200 kms of HK, No. 3 being a strong wind warning and within 100 km, No. 8 being a gale or storm warning is within 50 kms, and the big kahuna No. 10 being you're going to get very wet and probably blown away warning aka a hurricane warning and its going straight through Honkers. Don't ask me what happened to 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, or 8 - there is a 9 but its really just an extension of 8 and everyone holds out for the 10 to really say something serious is going on!!