Home Again Home Again

Our 3 weeks went by way too fast and we were at the airport waiting to board our plane back to China. How did we know that we were heading to China?
Lets see: No ability to wait in line to board, just a mad rush once they started boarding. We are pushing the girls in their strollers out to the plane and we have people literally running past us to get on the plane. We have decided this is their survival mode that they must be in and is just part of their culture, still highly annoying. And then once we are in the air, despite the signs and announcements about no smoking on board or in the bathrooms, you will smell cigarettes at least 3 times. Even though the seatbelt sign stays on until you reach the gate, immediately after landing you will have several people standing and retrieving their stuff. We knew we were definitely going back home!

The best part about the flight was as we are about to land, the flight attendant made an announcement about the plane needing to be disinfected. They would shortly be coming through spraying disinfectant and that you may choose to cover your head while this is done. Come on, I am sure that worked….right? I can understand wanting to disinfect the plane after leaving China, but going into China….Anyways our friend in Hangzhou said this is a requirement by the city to land at their airport. We just laughed! (Unfortunately we only have a video of this and no pictures, and because of the firewalls here, I am too dumb to post it....)

We spent the night with our friends and the girls played with their two buddies. Our friends had also just returned home from Southeast Asia and we visited and swapped stories until too late into the night. We woke up and caught the fast train to Shanghai and were thankful to have safely arrived home! Tomorrow Tim and Adayla go back to school, I go to the doctor, and we are happy to be right back into our daily routine!

One last night in KL

We flew back into KL from the island and decided to spend the night then try to make connections to make it all the way back to China. Anyways, I found a cute little bed and breakfast that was close to the airport and we spent the night there.

The owners happened to be a retired US marine and his wife, a local Malaysian, he had met stationed in KL over 20 years ago. They retired a few years ago, bought a gigantic house, and have 4 rooms they rent out. They even had a pool, so we were able to get a few more hours of sun in before heading back north! :)

But the best part was the Indian food we ate that night! They lived in a gated community and so we walked to a nearby shopping center. This place was amazing! We stuffed our faces full the things I don't even remember the names, except the Naan bread! YUMMY! Josie is a converted Indian food lover, she said the first thing she will be finding in Shanghai is an Indian restuarant

We slept with tummys that we way to full, then bright and early the next morning we were headed home......

Conversation with two Iraqis in KL

While we were in the park by the Petronas Towers letting the kids play, two young men came over and asked if they could take a picture with Adayla. We've become used to the requests, and so we said yes. The one guy immediately started towards Adayla and she started to move away. So he moved faster towards her, causing Adayla to start running away and cry. He kept on chasing her, so finally I (Tim) had to pick up Adayla to calm her down and they got their pictures.
They asked us where we were from and we told them. They smiled and asked us to guess where they were from. I had no idea - they told us they were from Iraq. Both of them spoke English very well and said they had experience working with the British and US militaries in Iraq.
The ladies went off to go play some more, but I stayed with these guys for a very interesting conversation. Obviously we discussed the war, but I only told them that my occupation is a graduate student studying in China
While not detailing the entire conversation (30 minutes), I do want to share a couple of things they said...
They both had very favorable opinions of the United States and the US military. They were grateful to be freed from Saddam Hussein, but were weary of the lack of security currently plaguing the country. Despite the difficulties, they are still grateful that the US led the invasion which resulted in the disposal of Hussein's regime.
They were also impressed with how much I knew about the war and surrounding issues. Again, I'm a graduate student and I keep up with the news.
The thing that they said that hit me the most was this: "The United States is the greatest country on the Earth. There is nothing that the US can't do. So the fact that Iraq hasn't stabilized isn't because the US can't do it, it's because the US doesn't want to do it." They had an attitude that the longer the situation is destabilized, the longer the US can justify high military spending to make businesses rich.
I wish it were that simple, that there was nothing that the US can't do. But one thing is true, the US isn't demonstrating that it wants to stabilize Iraq. Setting a deadline to pull out our troops like one of the American political parties is advocating is not helpful. A pullout would only lead to a collapse of what has been built thus far, and progress has been made.
Unfortunately our actions in Iraq have been a military success, but a diplomatic and economic failure to this point. I'm not going to expand on that point any further.
I just wanted to point out that two Iraqis that I spoke with are grateful that the Americans came to their country and they have hope for a better country and a better life that they did not have before the invasion in 2003.

Langkawi Island Tour

We found ourselves a taxi for the day to explore the island. Langkawi is comprised of 99 islands and very mountainous. They built a cable car that will take you to the top of one of the highest peaks. You have some amazing views of the whole area. Plus many golden eagles make their home around the islands and we were lucky enough to see some soaring above the trees.

Josie and Morgan going up up up.....

A view from the top

Once you get to the top there is a "bridge to nowhere" that connects two peaks for breath-taking views!

Tim paid about fifty cents to hold this eagle, once again from a "professionally trained" animal handler! Tim said the eagle had quite a grip on him, and he thought (after the eagle was holding his arm) that the eagle could easily tear him apart!

Next stop...hike up to a waterfall and then go for a swim. The girls didn't really care for playing in the water, but Tim LOVED it. Maybe modeling around waterfalls is a possible career for the future???? ; )
Tim found a rotted-out coconut and thought it made for quite a picture! Perhaps the next cover of Sports Illustrated's swimsuit issue?

This is a banana tree on the way down from the waterfall. I find it fun to discover some of the tropical fruits naturally growing in these areas.

Last we stopped at eagle square, built right on the water close to the main city of Langkawi. Adayla wanted to be an eagle!

I guess we should tell you that Langkawi means "brown eagle." They are proud of the many eagles that still fly free around the island. They're beautiful!

To end it with a cold refreshing ice cream cone.....nothing better tasting than SWEET CORN ice cream, right Tim??? Look closely and you can see the kernels in the ice cream! New sights, new sounds, new tastes...

Langkawi

We hopped on our favorite airline, AirAsia, for the last leg of our trip to the northwest Malaysian island of Langkawi. We arrived just in time to get the girls down for bed. Josie and I headed out while Tim stayed in the room. Quite a different place from the bustling island of Phuket, this place was desolate, and seemed almost scary at night. There were a few open air restaurants and a couple of convenience stores across the street, all with very few people in them for only 9:00 at night.

As the following picture shows, it's just our hotel and lots of natural beauty.

We found Langkawi to have a charm all of its own. It was a very relaxing, get-away-from-everything beach island. It was very laid back. Fortunately, it had very good food.

The restaurants did have frozen fruit drinks, but more like with snow cone flavoring than the fresh fruit of Thailand. Of course the girls still enjoyed them!

Have we ever mentioned Tally likes rice. She is the crazy rice eater. The other day she was in the middle of her hamburger and heard the word rice. She put her burger down and started looking for her favorite food!

We hit the beach the next morning, to find a peaceful area to play in the water and sand. The hotel is on right on the beach, but has a very nice pool too. We were quite surprised at how many people opt to just hang out at the pool. We established our own routine, in the morning go play on the beach, go eat lunch, Tally takes a nap with one person in the room with her, and then the others head to the pool. How relaxing to play in the sun, I almost had the thought maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to live someone warm until we spent one day touring the island. If you aren’t in your swimming suit in the water, it is too dang hot! So never mind that thought (Tim's still working on Morgan on that point).

We came home with a bag full of shells, both girls loved gathering them. Thankfully Tally liked to gather them and then throw them back in the ocean.

Here are a few pics of the little swimmers. Tally was very brave (another word for crazy?) around the pool. She had no fear. We could go under the water with her and she would come back up and giggle. She would get to the edge of the pool and just jump in. We tried to install some fear by letting her bob for a few seconds....nope once she was rescued she just laughed and giggled with water dripping off her. So we just always had to be ready for her to just jump in.

Adayla was much more cautious, but really loved her floating swimming suit. We loved it too, since we didn't have to carry her the whole time! She would swim and kick all day (and of course sleep really well at night). We couldn't help but share her pics of "Daddy's little Swimmer." She would go and go and Tim taught her to say, "water get out of my way" and she would kick and swim!

I must add a picture of the pool bum Josie. She would just hang out on the side of the pool for hours! The water was warm and the sun was bright. She is now one tan girl! She was very helpful the whole time, but she was still able to sneak in quite of bit of relaxation!

So if you are looking for a party head to Phuket Thailand and if you are looking for quiet time with just you and a few others on the beach head to Langkawi Malaysia.

Two more pictures from the beach/hotel. Langkawai has a diverse vacationing crowd, with lots of Germans (go figure, they're everywhere) and other Northern Europeans, Asians, and Middle Easterners. Langkawi is a popular spot for vacationing honeymooners from Saudi Arabia.

It was eye-catching to see someone on the beach wearing a full black abaya (robe) and face veil. It was even more eye-catching to see a lady wearing this on a jet ski. We show these pictures to share a glimpse of how different cultures enjoy the same things. Even though we may be different in some ways, we have so many things in common in other ways. All part of this Olmsted Scholarship, to see and experience so many different cultures.

Chips and Salsa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today was a fantastic day here in Kuala Lumpur and I mean FABULOUS! Josie was checking out the restaurants in the phonebook and noticed a Chilis. She asked me if I liked Chilis and while it really is not my favorite, I did remember that I liked their chips and salsa. I called and they had it on their menu….many American chain restaurants' menus are completely different than back in the States. The Chilis is perfectly located in the beautiful Petronas Towers, and I downed two baskets of chips and salsas by myself!!! It had been 7 months since having restaurant style chips and salsa! So we had to go back the next day, too, for a few more baskets!

Adayla ate a hotdog at Chilis and coincidentally, if you notice the TV in the background, you will see Takeru Kobayashi eating hot dogs in the disgusting American Hot Dog Eating Contest.... perhaps Adayla may be competing in a few years.

Side note on food across Asia….I just don’t understand why Chinese food in Shanghai is just not good. Occasionally, you can find a decent meal, but don’t count on it. But Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore all had yummy street food and any restaurant you could find a tasty meal. I'm not talking about Chilis, but just some of the local delights! So I feel so spoiled on this vacation.

Kuala Lumpur and the Batu Caves

Upon arriving in Kuala Lumpur we weren't exactly sure what to expect, but were very impressed with what we found. Malaysia is officially a Muslim nation, the first I had ever been to (obviously Tim is not writing this one with all of his time in various Middle Eastern countries!). Because the culture is so different from what I am used to, I didn't know what I would find. We found the Malaysians to be a nice and friendly people. Kuala Lumpur is clean and modern. The people were smilely, helpful, and very welcoming. Malaysia is a multicultural society that is tolerant of different religions, so we felt very comfortable being here.

The first day we checked out the Batu Caves, actually a cave that consists of three caves, formed by the massive limestone natural formations. The most impressive and largest of the three caves is the Temple Cave, which has 272 steps to climb to the top. Inside the cave there is a Hindu temple and so all around there are various Hindu works of art.

The steps leading to the Batu Caves are in the middle of the picture.

The girls at the bottom of those 272 steps.....


The scariest part of those 272 steps are the wild monkeys begging for food. We actually saw one hiss and show all its teeth, enough for us to keep our distance!


Adayla really did make it all the way up by herself, but Tally had a little help from her dad!


The next day we headed for the Petronas Towers, what used to be the tallest buildings in the world. Beneath the towers in at attached 6-story mall with all sorts of places to shop and eat - where we at at Chilis as previously mentioned. We even found a Auntie Anne's Pretzel shop! The whole area surrounding the towers was beautiful with fountains, a little swimming area for the kiddies and the biggest park we had ever seen. After taking pictures, we let the girls enjoy the playground for quite awhile.

Navigating the streets of Kuala Lumpur with two strollers is kinda fun!

The Petronas Towers passed the Sears Tower in Chicago in 1996 to become the worlds' tallest towers. They were passed up in 2003 by Taipei 101 in Taiwan that Tim visited back in October. Even so they may not be the tallest any more, we think they're the most beautiful!

Adayla with her Chinese friends at the towers.

Adayla with her Indian friends at the towers. This group of guys saw the Chinese couple taking pictures with her and wanted to do the same. So they took turns to take pictures with her. We really need to start charging money!

Enjoying the swings in the shadows of the Petronas Towers. We loved this area.

Our last day we made it to the National Mosque and the bird park. Tim picked up some brochures on the Islamic faith and read about some interesting things. They allow visitors inside at certain times of the day. Girls must cover everything but their faces and guys are allowed to wear their regular clothes as long as they aren't in shorts.

I think Adayla and Tally do make cute little Muslims.

Josie does too!

The bird park enclosed all sorts of beautiful birds, but the best part was feeding the ostriches. Tally wouldn't even try, but she was content watching them. Adayla attempted, but on her very first attempt an ostrich bit her thumb and so she was done! In light of Bird Flu in Asia, was it that smart to go to the bird park?? Oh well...

The Orient Express... nope

We had originally planned to take an overnight train from Bangkok to Kuala Lumpur until Tim read that due to the current unrest and civil war with extremist-Islamic terrorist activities going on in Southern Thailand, military personnel were restricted from doing so... probably a good thing!! But we did get a train ride in with a 6-hour train ride from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur. We loaded up and we were on our way!

The posters at the train station in Singapore (as seen behind Adayla), call this the Eastern & Oriental Express, "the most exotic train journey in the world." Not so sure about that, but it was definitely cheap and a fun way to see some beautiful countryside. This train is not to be confused with the legendary Orient Express, which ran from Paris to Istanbul.

Mom - Don't you think Adayla's backpack that she is loading is so cute?! Little Grandma brought it out for Tally for Christmas. Once Adayla knew we would be getting on an airplane, she insisted that we take it. Tally was quite excited to take the bag with us too! Tally got lots of cute looks from passers-by in the airports as she pulled her bag along behind Mommy & Daddy.

BAD IDEA....for 3 weeks the girls fought over it. Next time, though it is quite cute, the bag will be staying in Shanghai!!

Just passing through the Malaysian countryside was beautiful! We were in a tropical jungle and then would come upon a small town and then back into the banana and coconut trees.

The joys of peeing directly on the train tracks! But when you see toilets like this one, you dehydrate your kids so that they won't have to use these! At least this toilet had a picture to demonstrate its proper use.

This wasn't one of the train stops, but the train slowed down as we passed through this village.

Happily and safely we arrived in KL! We have the escalators with all our stuff down to a science!

Meeting up with Fellow Olmsted Scholars

We heard that there was a fellow Olmsted family from Beijing hanging out in Singapore. His wife was a week ahead of me in pregnancy and had complications during their vacation. Because it was highly unlikely that the baby would be born after 36 weeks, they decided to stay in Singapore and deliver where medical care is excellent. So we went to their temporary apartment and then out to eat. It was refreshing to visit with fellow Americans doing the same thing in Beijing that we are in Shanghai who, similar to us, also had 2 small kids and one on they way. Talk about turning heads when we went out to eat - they're used to seeing foreign businessmen, but now two foreign families with four small kids and two pregnant women!

Singapore

The Merlion is the symbol of Singapore - half lion, half mermaid, to symbolize the name of the country, Singapore, which means "lion city" and the importance of the ocean in its business development. Here Tim & the girls do their best Merlion impression.

A star is born. This is Tally's favorite pose!

In a cable car crossing into Sentosa, Singapore's vacation island.

Adayla has been costing us this trip, now that she's a "big girl"

At a Chinese New Year's (Spring Festival) celebration

In front of a Hindu Temple in Little India that we went in. No, that's not an American flag in the top-right corner of the picture. Tim really liked the Coke machine in the temple.

Shopping for jewelry in Little India.

In front of the "World's Largest Fountain," the Fountain of Wealth. Unfortunately it wasn't working when we were there - does that mean that our wealth has dried up?

Who needs Western Union? These folks at a Chinese Buddhist temple are burning "spirit money" so that their ancestors can use it in the afterlife.

A Lion Dance that we watched in a mall.

The girls somehow eating durian ice cream - yuck! They wouldn't let Tim throw it away.

The Singapore skyline in the background

Before San Antonio's Riverwalk, there was Singapore. This is a wonderful place to eat!

This is a beautiful country!! If anybody wants to visit Asia, without leaving all the comforts of western life, Singapore is the place to come!

Chinatown? Check. Little India? Check. Tropical paradise 50 miles from the equator? Can get around only speaking English? Great food? Check. Check. Check.

Singapore’s history basically started in 1819 when a British Admiral landed on the island looking for a new shipping port to compete against the Dutch ports in the area. When Sir Raffles landed on the island, there were “1,000 people and 10,000 tigers.” That quickly changed as the British colonized the island and brought in workers from India, China and Malaysia to keep up with the explosive growth that the island experienced. Admiral Raffles realized the importance of keeping their cultures strong, so he established Chinatown and Little India. These areas are now only three subways stops apart, but we thought they were a world apart by the stark contrast in neighborhoods. It was funny to see when we got on the subway in Chinatown, everybody was Chinese. Then when we got off at the Little India station, everybody was Indian!

The official language in Singapore is English, but in various accents. If the Brits had only been able to colonize the entire world, we wouldn’t have to worry about learning foreign languages! Chinese is also widely spoken and Malay is spoken to a lesser extent. As expected, we heard quite a bit of Hindi in Little India, but outside of there we really haven’t seen many Indians.

Singapore is an “extremely” clean and orderly country, with emphasis on “extreme.” Heavy fines are imposed for doing things such as spitting, chewing gum or eating on public property. Obviously littering is also a fine. You must cross the street at a crosswalk if you are within 75 meters of a crosswalk and cars must stop for pedestrians. There are also fines for not flushing a toilet after using it. The fines may seem silly, but the result is a clean and orderly country. It is so nice that everything here is clean. It is so nice not to worry about somebody not stopping for you when you cross the street – they all do it.

Singapore still draws its wealth from shipping and business. It boasts Asia’s highest per capita income. Singapore’s favorite pastimes are shopping and food, and both are phenomenal. Huge, modern high-end shopping malls are everywhere. While the shopping is pricey, the food is cheap – and great! There is such a variety wherever we’ve gone. It’s so nice…

The funny thing is that Singapore is more “Chinese” than Shanghai is. Singapore really celebrates Chinese New Year, and doesn’t turn it into another sales promotion as Shanghai has done. The country basically shut down for three days for Chinese New Year. We also saw three traditional Lion Dances around town today, something that just they just don’t do in Shanghai any more (thanks to Mao Zedong for killing culture and tradition in China). We arrived on the third day of Chinese New Year, thinking nothing of it since Shanghai wasn’t shutting down for the holiday. We were surprised when we went to Chinatown to find that it was more like a ghost town. So that’s why we took the metro from Chinatown to Little India, figuring the Indians probably could care less about Chinese New Year, and we were right, all the shops there were open.

Today, day 2 here, we went to one of the really nice malls on Orchard Road to get Josie set up on a wireless network for her school studies and then the rest of us left and wandered around the city. The food court there was awesome. Did I mention the food here is great?

Then I ordered this ice cream smoothie with a local fruit, durian. I had no idea what a durian was, but it was advertised in various places we went, so I figure it’s not immersion if I order cookie dough ice cream all the time. Morgan is less daring - she only tries things after I've tried them (call me Mikey from Life cereal). This one bit me, however. This smoothie tasted like strong raw onions. I took one big mouthful and almost gagged. Then I took a second bite to see if it really was that bad. It was. The girls wanted some of my ice cream, but I just wanted to throw it away. They begged, so I gave it to them. They actually ate it. I’m still wincing as I think about that thing – yuck! Morgan just about beat me for letting her try it. I think it helps make the ice cream she likes that much sweeter. After all, you have to taste the bitter to know the sweet, right?