Winter has arrived

The temperature here this morning was 14 when we stopped for coffee on the way to Sonia's office. Coat weather! It does mean tonight will probably also be a little cold - thinking of being out celebrating the new year and watching the fireworks.

Hua Hin Revisited

In answer to Dad's question about Hua Hin, we stayed at the Alila hotel:




To get a better idea of the area, click here to see a larger map.

I have marked the hotel, the Sofitel, the train station, and the clock tower (you will see the list on the left side of the screen in the larger map). You can see why it takes a while to get to the hotel - and most of the trip is around 80-100 km/h.

Sunday

Well we are now back in Hong Kong having avoided the strike at the airport yesterday (the baggage handlers went on strike for about 3 hours in the afternoon).

It is raining gently right now, possibly the first time since we have been back. It is also cold enough that I have been wearing my leather jacket pretty much all day. Still, from experience I know that this will pass fairly quickly and we will be heading back towards the regions of 30+ temperatures.

Only 8 weeks until Paul and Tiffany get married. Time to start thinking about clothes and travel arrangements... And what the weather will be like in Hot Springs? According to the weather websit, there is an historical range of around 15 degrees, so I guess we need to pack at the last minute? Having said that this is what normally happens.

Bangkok was pretty much the same over the last couple of days. On Thursday we went to the dinner buffet after spending most of the day at the pool. I headed to the gym in the late afternoon. On Friday Sonia went to get her fingernails done while I caught up with an ex-colleague for lunch. Then off to the gym in the afternoon, snacks in the exec-lounge, and a room-service pizza for dinner. Not very exciting, I'm afraid.

Saturday we went to the gym before going out to the airport for 4:30pm flights (me on AirAsia, Sonia on Cathay Pacific). Checking in took about 5 minutes for Sonia and about 45 minutes for me (AirAsia are so slow and do not manage their volumes well). Then through immigration quite quickly. Sonia managed to convince the nice Qantas lounge staff that I should be allowed to come in as a guest, so we were able to sit quietly for an hour before boarding.

Today we went shopping for a coat for Sonia - sales are on at the moment. We found a satisfactory coat on a good special at A|X, so that is done. Sonia is deciding whether I need to wrap the coat in Christmas paper and put it under the tree for her to then unwrap. I do not think so (Tim!).

Now we are off home to do the laundry and cook something for dinner.

The way back

We are now on the way back to Bangkok, having checked out of the hotel in Hua Hin. The hotel was very nice, and I am sure we would stay there again. We got a good deal through wotif.com. I managed to get a couple of photos and will upload them later. We have booked a car to get back to Bangkok, having caught the train down. The train was an adventure and we realised why the concierge at the Conrad looked suprised when we asked her help booking the tickets. It was called a diesel railcar, and had three 2nd class carriages. These turned out to be somewhat decrepit, but at least were air-conditioned. The trip took about 30 minutes longer than scheduled... Then onto a taxi to the hotel. I say onto because the taxi was a ute whith a canopy and a couple of bench seats. About a 40 minute ride from the station. So having taken the long way down, we are taking the easy way back. Tonight will be a quiet night, and tomorrow probably spent by the pool. More later.

Hua Hin

Today's update comes to you from the museum cafe at the Sofitel Hotel in Hua Hin. We are not actually staying here but caught the shuttle bus (which turned out to be an E-class Mercedes car) from our hotel into town. We have wandered around town and got pretty hot so stopped here for coffee. When trying to decide where to stay, this hotel was our second choice. Hua Hin town is ok but the centre is fairly full of cheap hotels, junky shops, and thai massage places that look a little shady... Not one of the main destinations for overseas tourists so far but it is apparently growing quite fast. More later.

Quick update

This comes to you from the executive lounge of the Conrad in Bangkok. This is level 29 of the building, with a pretty reasonable view across the city.

Today comprised:

• Breakfast from 8:45 until 10:00, with scrambled eggs on toast, some bacon, and hashbrowns, and toast and coffee
  
• 1.5 hours at the gym attempting to undo the damage from breakfast
• A panini for lunch at the deli downstairs
• A couple of hours working on emails/etc in the Exec lounge
• 30 minutes in a taxi to cover a fairly short distance between the Conrad and the Westin
• A meeting with a Prudential alumni who has set up a recruiting business and who may be able to connect me to a job
• Another 45 minutes in a taxi back to the Conrad

which brings you up to date...

Sonia is on her way back from work, and then we need to figure out what to do for dinner. Will probably be something small, although I am not sure what she has had to eat today so who knows...

And now to the Traffic Report. Traffic has been bad this afternoon and according to an SMS from a regular listener (Sonia) the traffic getting from her office to the hotel is bad...

The forecast for tomorrow?

• Breakfast
  
• Gym
• Sit by the pool
• Lunch
• Dinner
• ???

As you may be able to discern by now, this is a very stressful life. I really do not know how much longer I will be able to put up with the pressure...

Japanese & Christmas

Well we are thinking of starting to review Japanese restaurants in Hong Kong. On Sunday we had lunch at a sushi place in Causeway Bay, called "Sushi One".

It was a bit of a mixed bag, but overall not a place that we will return to. We sat at the counter - there is a mixture of tables and counter seats just like in sushi places in Japan. At the counter there was a travelator going around, but only 2 or three plates on it. Given the size of the restaurant we could probably have taken this as a warning sign and left immediately?

We ordered off the menu, choosing a few nigiri sushi: tuna, broiled salmon, inari, and sea eel. The sea eel was made fresh in the kitchen in the back and was not bad. The salmon was ok, the tuna and inari just mediocre.

We also ordered miso soup, which was alright but made our tongues tingle. You may know that that is not a standard thing to have happen when drinking miso soup. Maybe something a little off?

And some tempura - prawns and soft-shell crab. The tempura was good, probably because it must be made fresh each time. Soft-shell crab is not something that is normal in tempura, but worked quite well.

And I ordered a "spicy tuna" handroll. This turned out to be a tuna roll with a dollop of spicy mayonnaise. Just not right, and did not take good!

So the food was a mixture of mediocre and ok. However it was not helped by the chinese guys behind the counter (not a Japanese chef in the place as far as we could tell) crashing plates down on the counter.

Next time we'll fill you in on a good Japanese restaurant, and another ok sushi place. Not sure if we should start giving them ratings or not. How to judge the quality of the fish when it is smothered in spicy mayonnaise?

We have finally worked out where we will be having Christmas. Sonia flew out to Bangkok this morning, having returned from Hanoi on Saturday afternoon. I fly to Bangkok tomorrow night, and we will be at the Conrad for the rest of the week. Then on Sunday we go to Hua Hin for 3 nights at a beach there, before returning to Bangkok on 24th. So Christmas will be at the Conrad in Bangkok. We fly back to HK on 27th December, and will have New Year here.

Another one from HK Airport

Well, another update is due, I guess.

I am sitting at HK airport, waiting for a flight to KL. I am heading back there to close bank accounts and get admin stuff sorted out. We did not close the bank accounts before we left because we had deposits that we were waiting to receive back, and of course once you are not in the country it gets a bit difficult to sort things out. Hence the trip.

I am flying AirAsia - the cheapie airline. I figured it would be busy checking in (usually too few counters and too many people), but as fate/luck would have it, I arrived with time to spare and found that there were zero people queueing. So straight through, immigration with no queues, and security with no queues. And now sitting at the gate with over one hour to go. Still, better that than racing around.

Sonia is still in Hanoi, and seems to be enjoying it. Muttered something about cute-looking houses (at least I think she was talking about houses and not guys) yesterday. However she is on her guard - apparently one of her workmates warned her that the rats in Hanoi are much healthier (and therefore larger) than those in Bangkok. Something to do with a better diet, I guess?

Cheese

There is an Italian deli about 10 minutes walk from the apartment, on the way to the Mid-levels Escalator. We went in the other night on the way home, thinking to get some cheese and meat for a light dinner. The cheese (selected pretty much at random from the case) was Rutulin. Well worth trying if you can find it. I had never seen it before, but it is a reasonably strong-tasting goat's milk cheese. Apparently it normally has a coating of sesame or herbs, however the one sold here is just raw on the outside. Very nice...

Turducken

This recipe is well worth a read, just for the chuckles. But if anyone can convince Sharon or Paul to attempt one of these, I would seriously consider purchasing an air ticket just to join the meal. It sounds like quite an experience...

An update

Well, sitting in a cafe having just finished lunch, I guess I should put something a little more detailed onto the blog. We will see how much detail I can be bothered writing.

As I mentioned, the apartment here is fine if a little small for two people. We originally expected Sonia to be in Bangkok, so it puts a little strain on things. Luckily the cafes around HK have wireless Internet access, so we are able to spend time sitting/reading/working in Pacific Coffee and other places.

We have been trying to be good food-wise, generally cooking chicken and salad at night. Last night I got some mustard and breadcrumbs and we attempted to cook the chicken breasts with a crust. It seemed to work ok (tasted alright) but was probably not very healthy. This was accompanied by salad (lettuce, tomato, bean sprouts, sugar snap peas, cucumber), and fried mushrooms. Tonight needs to be healthier....

I have been going to a gym most days, usually 1-2 hours each time. The gym is about 15 minutes walk down the hill from the apartment, so that helps on the exercise side as well. The routine at the gym is normally 30 minutes on the bike, aiming to get the pulse up to around 150-160 (no problem at the moment!). Then every second day is a "weights day", so I follow the bike with about 30-40 minutes on the machines. I am trying to get to the point where I can do a full set (15-12-12) of chin-ups. I have a bit to go yet... Finally, I normally finish off with 30-45 minutes walking on the treadmill, aiming to have my pulse around 120-130.

The first week I think I overdid it a little. I found that I was getting a bit tired and requiring less and less resistance to have my pulse at the desired levels. After taking a day off and also reducing the treadmill time a bit, I think this is sorted out. Between leaving the apartment in Tokyo on 31st October and getting into the gym here in the 3rd week in October, my exercise regime was a bit erratic (sometimes at the Conrad in Bangkok, a couple of times on the treadmill at the hotel in HK). I suspect that I was simply too ambitious getting back into a proper routine in HK.

At night we are tending to get a bit bored. TV in HK has many more options than was available in Tokyo, so it is tempting to blob out in front of the TV at night. We need to find ways of getting out and around.

A few times in discussions in Tokyo we commented that it was much easier to meet people in Japan compared to HK. We'd put this down to the higher level of isolation in Japan - language factors and significantly lower proportion of expats. Sure enough, this feels true now that I am in Bangkok and trying to make contacts here. Oh well, just need to find the methods that work in HK.

I mentioned previously that the property market in HK is dropping at the moment. It is not uncommon to walk past a real estate agent shop and see signs where prices have been crossed out and replaced with a lower figure more than once. Reading a couple of online forums, many people are commenting (both landlords and renters) on how things are changing. At this point most people are expecting it to continue sliding until Q2 next year.

Good to hear that Paul has cottoned on to the joys of Eggs Benedict. I need an independent review of the final product, so please feel free to forward me your ratings and I will add him to the list.

We are thinking ahead to what we will do for Christmas. At this stage the favourite is Caprice for Christmas dinner. If you look back to a previous blog entry, you will recall that this is the place where I had veal brains for a main dish. The Christmas menu at Caprice looks very yummy. However we are not sure whether to book at this stage. Sonia's company is disorganised as ever and is unable to confirm which country she will be in at the time. Will it be Thailand (assuming the government gets the terrorists get sorted out), Vietnam, or even UK? Who knows.

This afternoon I have to go and submit a pile of documents to the HK immigration department. This is the supporting documentation for my spouse visa...

Well, I think that is enough for now.

PS: D&S - can you please post some photos of the new house (inside and out).
PPS: Jordan and Kyla - time to update your blogs.

Hong Kong and Thailand

The protestors (People Against Democray) have continued to wreck their havoc in Bangkok. So we are still in Hong Kong.

Back to Island ECC on the weekend, which was good. We met a couple from Buffalo in the US, and I am meeting the husband for lunch tomorrow.

However, the apartment is starting to get a bit small. It is supposed to be around 45 sqm, but I think in reality it is probably less than that. It is a studio, as wide as a queen size bed (!) plus a 2.5 seater couch, plus one foot of extra space. It is as long as the bed plus another six feet. Then on the side we have the bathroom and a corridor kitchen (about 10 feet long and about 4 or 5 feet wide). So for two people it gets a little "close".

We have the apartment for 2 months (mid January) so I think we will probably end up signing up for a longer term in a bigger apartment (not serviced apartment) when this rental finishes. The property market in HK is dropping, both for rentals and purchases, so we should be able to get quite a good deal. We will see...