Travel Update: Hiroshima

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Genbaku Dome and Clear Skies

On our second full day in Japan, we put our JR passes to good use and took a day trip to Hiroshima. Now, the most common question that I get about Hiroshima is “how do you say ‘Hiroshima’?” It may surprise you to find out that one does not need to actually visit Hiroshima to answer this question – there are resources one can consult. Still, in case you’re curious, it is roughly pronounced “Hee-roe-shee-mah” (not “Heer-aw-shim-ah”).

Now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk about what we did that day.

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Travel Update: Osaka

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Billiken

I have a confession to make: This post does not begin in Osaka. It begins in Tokyo. If that concerns you, do not fret; I will get to Osaka soon enough.

We flew in to Tokyo’s Haneda International Airport on an evening flight via Beijing. Haneda was more-or-less like every other airport that we’ve passed through these last two months. The biggest difference was that there was less English than we were had encountered in Chinese airports, which was a little surprising. Oh, and also the airport bathrooms came with educational diagrams and required a technical degree to operate.

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Travel Update: Kowloon

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Hong Kong Skyline

After our whirlwind weekend in Singapore, we decided to take it easy with a trip to Kowloon. Like Lantau, Kowloon is part of the Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong, but is not on Hong Kong island. Kowloon is actually on the mainland, just north of Hong Kong island and right across the border from the city of Shenzhen.

We took the MTR to the ferry docks, which entailed a quick stop at the International Finance Center (or “IFC” to the locals). IFC is Hong Kong’s premier luxury brands destination, which normally is not the sort of tagline that is likely to draw me in. One of the luxury brands that they play host to, however, is Apple. The store there is brand-new, and I had to drop by for some repairs on my Mac.

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Travel Update: Lantau Island

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Lantau Island

This week we mostly kicked back and relaxed in Hong Kong itself. Aside from generally getting to know our neighborhood, Amelia and I went to Lantau Island with some friends from school. Kat was in Malaysia for the weekend, so she was stuck in Kuala Lumpur with adorable monkeys and elephants (and Patrick, another friend from school) instead of hanging out with us. She won’t make that mistake again, I’m sure.

Lantau Island is like the Buddhist Rio de Janeiro, insofar as it has a gigantic statue of Buddha. Being as I know almost nothing else about Rio de Janeiro (aside from being reasonably certain that it is not in Hong Kong), I’m afraid I won’t be able to expand on that analogy for you. Instead of telling you how Lantau island is like or unlike Rio de Janeiro, from this point on I will just have to tell you what Lantau Island is like and let you take it from there.

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Travel Update: Hong Kong, Week 2 and Macau

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Droplets in Macau

[Editor's Note: My computer was out of commission for a while, so I am even further behind on the blog. It's back in working order now, so there will be new posts, but I'll be in Japan for the next few weeks, so they might take a while.]

The Chinese know how to kick off a school semester – with a holiday in the second week of classes. And don’t say “What about Labour Day?” – I mean a real holiday, with celebrations and traditions and history. This week we celebrated the Mid-Autumn Festival (or Moon Festival), one of the three big seasonal festivals in Chinese culture. It’s a pretty big deal here – it’s like an amalgamation of Valentine’s Day, New Year’s Eve and Thanksgiving, except that it has floating lanterns.

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Travel Update: Hong Kong, Week 1

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Journey Into the Future

We’ve now been in Hong Kong for a week (well, a week and a half), and it is treating us well. It has been a period of gradual adaptation and has featured markedly less adventure than the preceding weeks. But that doesn’t mean that there has been no adventure. We’ve been to Disneyland and mountaintops and all manner of local tomfoolery.

And I’ll get to those things. But our time in Hong Kong began with school, and so too will this update.

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