Welcome! (A short introduction)

This summer (2013) I visited 7 countries in Asia (China (+Tibet), Japan, Taiwan, Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand). Rather than a public blog I sent emails to anyone who requested them. Each mail had a few pictures taken with my low quality ipod camera. I decided to re-publish all my messages in online blog form (with only a few minor edits). The ipod doesn't always rotate the pictures properly and I just copied and pasted into these posts, I'll fix them when I have the time.

Also I uploaded them in reverse order compared to a regular blog so you can just scroll through them rather than reading through it all backwards.

Through China I met up with my sister, dad, uncle, and in Japan my cousin, aunt, and uncle. The rest of the trip was solo, meeting people as I go.

Enjoy!

Brendan

Greetings!

Greetings friends and welcome to the Brendan Ferguson Asia (BFA) update. I'm on the bus to the airport right now! I'll be in shanghai in about 17 hours give or take. I'll be joined by my dad, sister, and uncle starting April 7, and the plan initially is shanghai, hangzhou, Beijing, tibet (pending our visas are approved), chengdu, chongqing and then fly to Hiroshima Japan. That's all for now!

Arrival

Made it to china just fine. I've been awake almost 27 hours now (minus a semi-conscious scattered hour on the flight) but I'm running good off adrenaline and excitement! Its my fault though for going straight to nanjing instead of shanghai. Wifi here seems to be more scarce than last time, or maybe my iPod is just outdated...

I had to order my train ticket to nanjing from the Chinese speaking teller(i wrongly thought the automated tellers would work but they need to see a passport). I was able to ask questions with ease and and and..... Understand the answers! I think my light practice over the past years has helped (I went through units 2 and 3 of the pimsleur audio program)

The pic is from the massive shanghai hongqiao railway waiting area. Oh and I will never get tired of riding the 430 km/hr maglev train from the airport. I wonder how many birds get vaporized from that train every year.

Changzhou

Today I tried to go to xixigu, it's a video game theme park(think world of Warcraft and Starcraft) in changzhou(a city a couple hours from shanghai) but the day didn't quite work out. I got the train ticket from nanjing quite late, for 1:30 pm, and then didn't realize the woman gave me a ticket for the nanjing railway station, instead of the nanjing south railway station where I was at the time. I noticed 40 minutes before it left, which is exactly the time it took to take the metro to the other station, but not through security and to the platform. So I missed it and changed to the next train and arrived in changzhou about 3:30. Not knowing what bus would take me to xixigu I went for a taxi, but there was a long line and a woman convinced me to pay her ~$20 to drive there. In the car there were three university students who asked where I was going, then told me it was too late, since xixigu closed at 5 and it was 4. So they invited me to see their school, and took me out for dinner!

They showed me around and took me to a market and rode the bus with me back to the train station. Maybe it's only cause I'm a funny looking tall guy, but many Chinese people leave a very good impression on me with their helpfulness and generosity.

I've also been enjoying some of the local chip flavors....

Hangzhou

Today we went to hangzhou and saw most of the famous west lake (西湖). It was a beautiful cloudless day and it really showed off why this is one of the most beautiful places in china. The lake filled with small boats and forest covered mountains in the background is the perfect place to sit and drink longjin tea, which we did. 

There weren't too many tourists, and since its spring there were lots of flowers and most areas smelled kinda like incense.In other news, our Tibet permit was finally approved! We arrive April 16th!

Wuzhen and Shanghai

Today we went to wuzhen(pictured), an ancient town 2 hours from shanghai. We saw a bed museum and wine distillery. It was quite touristy, with many chinese tour groups, and I found out I'm not the only popular one. Amy and dad got asked for pictures as much as I did.

Yesterday we went up the orient pearl tower in shanghai, and to yu garden. Randomly, we found our touring relatives from Winnipeg in the garden! The ones we weren't planning on meeting for another 2 days. So we went to dinner and hopped on their tour bus for wuzhen today. 

I think I'm getting sick, lets hope it's not the bird flu.

Nanjing to Beijing

Yesterday we took the high speed train from shanghai to nanjing, then looked around xuanwu lake and Confucius temple. Then took the overnight train to Beijing. So many power plants on the way! Energy hungry china.

In Beijing so far we have seen Tiananmen Square, forbidden city, and that hill behind forbidden city where the emperor of the Ming dynasty hung himself when Beijing was invaded.

New chip flavors we have seen and/or tried-

Cucumber

Spicy hotpot

Little tomato

Garden tomato

Italian tomato

Tomato

Prawns

Cheesy lobster

Oreo flavors -

Grape/peach

Blueberry/raspberry

Birthday cake

Green tea ice cream

 Thats all for now! Pictured is a statue in xuanwu lake.

Leaving Beijing for Tibet

We gotta head to the train in about 10 mins here. It's the 2 day train ride called the qinghai railway. Highest in the world at 5000m at one point. They have oxygen for each passenger. No Internet till we arrive in Lhasa about 50 hours from now.

This morning we got Beijing duck and went to beihai park for a nice walk through the shops. Also got a bunch of instant noodles, milk tea, fruit, and other stuff for this long train ride. Must practice breathing for the elevation.

Enroute to Tibet

Got another 5 hours or so on the train, but we have seen a lot so far. The first train stopped in xining where we had 3 hours to look around. That was bizarre. On the one side of the river there was endless apartments being built, but no one had moved in. The street lights were there but not activated. They had a massive stadium, but it wasn't quite finished. It was like a ghost town with construction workers. And when I say endless apartments I estimate enough housing for at least 500,000 people. There were probably more high rises under construction than there are high rises in Edmonton.

Anyway we got some fresh noodles close to the train station and got on the Lhasa  train. It was dark when we got on so we just went to sleep. Waking up we were greeted by the tundra wasteland that seemed to go on endlessly. Just rock based wind barriers next to the train tracks, the occasional road and power lines. As I'm writing this we are passing a lot of yak and sheep farms.

The train got up to 5000 m elevation. They began pumping oxygen into our carriage but some of them don't have oxygen. Luckily the train has oxygen outlets for everyone, so lots of people are hooked up with tubes. One small girl in the adjacent carriage almost passed out but the doctor got her sorted out.

Oh and my bag of Cheetos I got in Beijing swelled up and exploded from the change in air pressure. (In a boring way, it happened at night and none spilled out)

Anyway assuming I get reliable Internet in Lhasa you'll get this when we arrive.

Pictures:

Xining construction

Xining stadium

Train messages provided by pacman

Tibetan plateau

Tsonag Lake

Lhasa

Check out the picture captions ->

This is the Potala palace, the home for many of the Dalai Lamas. It's massive and really beautiful. Approaching the palace we noticed lots of Tibetan people walking around it. Many older people walking clockwise while rotating the handheld prayer wheels. 

It was a long climb, about 150m putting our elevation close to 3700m. Amy remains positive.

Lots of cats and dogs here. Even in temples and restaurants.

The jokhang temple. Many Dalai Lama tombs are here. The largest, the 5th Dalai Lama, his tomb has 3700kg of solid gold (no pictures allowed inside though)

There is a large military presence here. Leaving our hotel in the morning we saw guys like this, but they had riot gear and automatic weapons and shotguns in addition to the long beating sticks. Technically I wasn't allowed to take this picture....

The Roof of the World

Dushdeley! (Tibetan for hello, spelled how I think it sounds)

Stunning beauty throughout the 2 day car ride to Everest. Lots of high mountain passes and being short of breath.

Tibetan prayer flags at one of the high passes. I don't remember which, they were 4500m to 5200m. The 5 colours of flags represent the 5 elements: 

yellow - water

Blue - sky

White - clouds

Red - fire

Green - earth

Staring out the window was enough for the ride. Beautiful mountains, rivers, lakes. Often there was nothing but the road and power lines. We passed through lots of small villages too. It was like going back in time to an agricultural society. Small plots of land were often being plowed by yaks, and our van was frequently delayed by herds of small goats or sheep on the road, or the occasional donkey. 

The last 100km to Everest base camp was on a very bumpy road, it took 4 hours and lots of switchbacks but we made it in the evening. In this photo you can see Everest surrounded by light clouds. 8844.43m which is about 3900m higher than where this picture was taken. We stayed in a surprisingly comfortable tent, in a small 'tent city' where tents claimed to be hotels. Each tent had a stove powered by yak dung which warmed it up pretty good. Except they stopped fueling at night, so it was around -10 at 4 am and the provided blankets kept slipping off. I also had an issue where just before I dozed off to sleep I was woken up really short of breath, like I was drowning, so I hyperventilate for a minute and am fully awake. I guess 4900m is too high for me, it was a somewhat sleepless night.

A number of yak at EBC. They are often used to carry people's gear. There was a lot of serious climbers there that had been there for a while acclimatizing.

Qomolangma is the Tibetan name for Everest. It was pretty cold that day, and unfortunately it was cloudy, otherwise a nice view of Everest would be behind me. You can see the stairway on the small hill behind me, we climbed that after. At my normal pace I was completely out of breath, like I had just ran 100m at full speed. I got a lot more respect for the difficulty of climbing Everest now.

Other things: Tibet has a strong military presence with lots of checkpoints. A few serious military ones where we had to get out of the van and present our passports. And our guide printed off about 20 copies of our permit to hand out to the checkpoints. It really feels like an occupied country, maybe because it is.  

Tibet was a land of contrasts, there are monasteries full of gold and precious stones, but they are surrounded by poor villages (at least they appear poor). There are these stunning landscapes and view but a gutter full of garbage next to the highway. I also found out the life expectancy in Tibet is 80. 80! It's surprising after the first glance of their society but it actually makes sense. Lots of natural food like vegetables, physical work everyday outdoors, lots of walking. Almost every day the elderly will walk counterclockwise around a religious site 1 or 3 times, so sometimes 3-4 hours of walking with their beads and prayer wheels. Our guide's grandmother is 108 years old right now!

It seems like china is pushing a lot of development on Tibet, but I think they are happy with their primitive way of life, maybe happier than people in the west. But no, I will not be moving to Tibet.

Chengdu

I remember now why I like chengdu so much. Compared to shanghai, and a lesser extend Beijing, I can walk down a shopping street without getting constantly harassed to buy junk. People stare less, people are friendly and excited to talk to me. The streets are wide and clean (mostly), and the food is delicious. See below

The first day we had ma po tofu (bottom), yu xiang qie zi(fish smelling eggplant, right), and gong bao ji ding (kungpao chicken, left). Besides being incredibly spicy, it was incredibly delicious. Actually my friend Marko who studies in chengdu tells me the food is protected similar to how UNESCO world heritage sites are.

A walk down the pedestrian shopping street is full of people on a Monday afternoon, and only 1 person tried to sell me bags and watches on the street! (Compared to at least a dozen in nanjing street in shanghai)

Pandas at the research center! Breakfast bamboo.

A very relaxing walk down kuai alley (I think it's kuai? the English name was wide narrow, my memory of names of places in chengdu is really bad). 

Hey I look the same!

We also went to a tea shop where seemingly everyone was elderly and playing mahjong. And walking around the people's park we encountered a group of people playing badminton, upon watching they invited us to join!

Didn't feel any aftershocks from the earthquake, and when you get this we will be in chongqing. That's all for now!

Chongqing

Chongqing, another massive city you've never heard of polulation ~28 million). An interesting place to explore, as you can see with the images. Hmm, they may or may not be upside down

This is the recreational shopping and food place next to where we stayed, they called it a cave because it is built right into the cliff side. Touristy, but neat.

There was a cableway over the Yangtze River. 5 yuan (~90 cents) for 1 way and spectacular views, although it was a bit hazy. We also rode a giant escalator, I don't recall the actual size, but it cost 2 yuan and took just over 2 minutes at a higher than normal speed.

Monorail public transit instead of trains! Well, only 2 out of 6 lines were monorails so far. "In summary, mono means one, and rail means rail"

In the hongya cave where we stayed, they had a pirate theme. This dog had a chain leading from its mouth, suggesting it used to have a key. Any of you who have ridden pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland will recognize that. Another unlicensed ripoff!

Why hello Barack.

Well that almost does it for china. Tonight we have one short night in shanghai, then leaving for Hiroshima in the morning! Time to break out the Japanese lessons. Konichiwa, sayonara, arigato.

Hiroshima

Konichiwa! We arrived in Japan fine, except for that China said goodbye to me with some sort of bad food. I've been nauseous with a bad stomach ache on and off for the past 2 days, and hardly eaten. Feeling much better now though.

Starting on the second day since I didn't leave the hostel on the first, we went to the Hiroshima peace park. This is now one of the protected structures that survived the atomic blast in 1945, known as the atomic bomb dome. The museum was pretty shocking as it had pictures and accounts from people who lived through it. But they didn't cast blame on America, they just advocated a nuclear free world. Also the mayor of Hiroshima writes a letter to the leader of every country that conducts tests of, or relating to atomic weapons. The latest one was written March 3, 2013 to Obama. I don't recall exactly what kind of test it was. There was also one sent to Kim Jong Un for North Korea's long range missile test. But the surprising (or maybe not so surprising) part was that out of the last 10 or so letters, 9 went to Obama.

Hiroshima otherwise is beautiful. There are about 1,000,000 people so it's not too busy. And the first thing I noticed was how clean everything is! It's a shock coming from china. Seems like all the roads and cars are spotless! Also it seems like everything is miniaturized and cute. Cars are smaller, buildings are smaller. Or maybe I'm just still a giant. The next thing I noticed was how friendly and helpful people are. Especially police and guards. They all said hello when we walk by, and if we are looking at a public map a guard would come over immediately and try to help.

Ahh the futuristic toilets. Some play flushing sounds, some have music, most have heated seats(that would be nice in Canada), most have bidets, and the thing that made the most sense was the spout on top. So you can wash your hands with the water that fills the tank. That saves so much water!!!

Today we went to miyajima, an island close to Hiroshima that is famous for this gateway, deer, rice scoops, maple trees, and it's mountain. It was a nice hike and a nice day.

You can get really close to the deer. They like food.

Here's a good one: in Australia, I had a Japanese roommate, Ikuko, that I lived with maybe 6 months. Today I saw her in miyajima! I didn't tell her I was coming to Japan, I didn't plan on seeing her, I didn't know where she even lived in Japan. And Japan has roughly 100 million people. and i randomly walked up to the same ice cream stand as she did in miyajima! She is the only Japanese person i know in Japan right now. Mind. Blown.

I think these updates are getting longer. Anyway, tomorrow we head to Kyoto to meet our cousin Allison. Sayonara!

Kyoto

It's been 2 nights in Kyoto, and now 1 night in Osaka.

A garage with an automated car sorter! The lift plugs your car into an open spot and retrieves it when you want.

We went to the geisha area. Saw a show with geisha dancing (although I think these are apprentice), tea ceremony, flower arranging and puppet play. Outside in the streets of this area it felt like  hunting. There were people with cameras everywhere waiting for geisha to walk by on their way to appointments.

Night fire dancers 

Temple that I already forgot the name of

Same temple.

Other technology things: a refrigerator door that opens from either side. conveyer belt sushi with a touchscreen to order food, which then beeps when it arrives on the conveyer. It also had a slot for disposing of plates. When the subway is approaching, it plays a short tune that sounds a lot like a legend of Zelda medley. Oh and of course vending machines everywhere, some even give heated drinks in plastic bottles, that's different. Tallyhoe!

Osaka

We had only one evening and night in Osaka before heading to Joetsu to meet my cousin Allison, but we saw a lot of neat stuff in that evening.

We went for the Osaka version of okonomiyaki, which is like a cabbage pancake with bits of seafood. It's a lot better than it sounds. 

The menu at "America". "We didn't come all the way to Japan to eat at americatown"

A climbing wall attached to an elevator such that it rises up as you climb. It was closed for the night though.

One of the giant billboards in the main shopping area. The place was like Times Square.

So I walked into a place labeled SEGA, like the video game system, not knowing what to expect. The first floor was entirely claw games, or similar, the second floor was the gambling floor, with games Ive never played like pachinko. It was also neat seeing Mario betting games that looked something like Mario party, again, I watched a guy play and had no idea what was going on.  But the thing that made coming in worthwhile was the urinal game! I knew these existed and finally found one! (Sorry for the inappropriate nature, but I must explain) basically you keep the stream on the target and it gets more and more windy for the weather reporter(?), and at the end you get a distance(?) in meters. Well, not understanding it didn't detract from my excitement. In the same washroom I also noticed the toilet lid raise up automatically as I went by. The fun never takes a break at SEGA! (unless you're a girl :P)

Joetsu and Nagano

Arrived at Allison's cozy place in joetsu just fine, and last night we went to an onsen (aka naked hot springs & public bath). That was definitely a unique experience that I don't expect to take off in North America anytime soon. The hot springs were very nice though, I have no regrets about doing it.

Went for a nice walk in the outskirts of Nagano on the way to the monkey onsen. Complete with geyser! Well, I think it was a geyser.

Warm bath for monkeys.

Walking through Nagano Amy got interviewed by NBC (Nagano Broadcasting Corporation)

Here is a unique souvenir, squid ink tomato pasta sauce. It tastes strongly like tomato with a hint of squid.

Nagano.

And with that, Amy and dad's trip with me is pretty much over. Tomorrow they go to Tokyo and I go to Matsumoto. And the following day they fly home. Today also marks the 1 month point of my trip. I will be meeting the other traveling Fergusons again in Matsumoto though. That's just over 1/3 finished, and in some ways the trip is just getting started.