Journey to East Asia - VIETNAM part 1 in Hanoi

Resently I have spent more than 1 week in Vietnam. The main purpose of going there was to attend one of my good friend's wedding in Vietnam. As we are growing everyday, there are more friends begins their new chapter of life with their partners. I no longer only hear talked about their boy friend..some of them are now referring their partner as their fiancée or husband..time flies!

anywyas..back to the trip in Vietnam. I went to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh..Thank God the Typhoon (Haiyan) did not ruin my trip in Vietnam..although my original trip to Da Nang got cancelled. 

The first impression of Vietnam reminded me of China..especially Fuyang so badly. There were few things that brought me back the memories of China:

1.  I guess perhaps it's because of the sky colour and the development of Hanoi in general. The sky was always in grey colour..not because of cloudy, but i believe it was because of the pollution. A lot of poeple who ride a bike with a mask on, just like the people in China. 

2. I saw lots of houses with few levels and shops along the street. there were only a few really high buildings that I could find. There were a lot of bikes everywhere. Although government tried to draw a line and develop a section of the poeple who ride the bikes, there were no many people obey the rules. At that point, I guess Fuyang is more organised/ structured than Hanoi. At least Fuyang has a clear divided bike section with fences. 

3. When you go for a shopping, the shops in supermarket or in shopping center will ask you to keep your bag in the locker or they will try to put your bag in the bag that they provide for you in seal it. Just like the photo below. That definitely reminds me of Da Run Fa - 大潤發 or Century Mart in Fuyang.

Hanoi does not seems like a really well develop or advance city compare to other cities in the world, however i was surprised the fact that they have a lots of yummy food! I have to say the Pho and the Pork roll definitely taste so different from the one I had in Sydney. It tasted so nice and definitely not something that I have tried before in Sydney! the pho was really addictive. According to my Friend from Vietnam, the Pho and pork roll in Sydney is more similar to the Pho in Saigon. I AGREE! not just the taste but the look as well. 

Pho in Hanoi! Eat it with the white vinegar.  The white bottle in the top left corner of the photo. It only cost 2AUD.. =)

Pork Roll in Hanoi. the local people just used the white recycle paper to wrap to roll as a packaging for the customers.

Apart from pho, have to say the snails in Vietnam was sooo good! 

Yes, the snail place does not look that appealing but it taste good and the one that my friend brought me to..their snails were clean. I could not taste any sands when I ate the snails.  hmm..After the snails, we decided to go to different place to try to special drink in Vietnam.

Taste so delicious! love the combination of the fresh fruits, the jelly and the sweetness.

I guess in Hanoi its all about food and drinks. there is not many big shopping centre.I went to one of the new shopping centre called Royal City and it is a huge shopping centre. What a big contrast between the big shopping centre and the small local shops in street. 

old quarter in Hanoi.

Squat Toilet in China

Every time I get to see a similar sign as above pic when I go to the toilet at work. I always wonder if this friendly reminder is cater for some of staff from China...not quite sure about japan but Squat toilet is still widely used in china.. .During the 7 month in china, i can barely remember how many times i have seen a non squat toilet when I am out in China. I guess I have used/ seen too many squat toilet to the point when I arrived the HK airport, I was shocked to see a non squat toilet. --' i was surprised to see the toilet was popping up/ "on the floor' instead of stick in the floor. -_____________-'

reading the below article definitely reminds some of the experience in china ..--'

http://gochina.about.com/od/tripplanning/ht/How2_Squat.htm
(it is a article trying to teach people how to use the squat toilet)

while i was reading the article, few things got my attention:

1."Pack Tissues. Before you even leave the hotel, make sure you've got portable toilet paper with you. Lots of public restrooms don't provide it. Wet wipes and hand sanitizer are also good to have along as if there's a sink, there may not be any soap, and probably no towels either."

yea really, and i always wonder why there are not many toilets provides tissue in china!? Also it is important to bring the wet wipes and hand sanitizer when using toilet because there were times i just feel so uncomfortable when going inside the toilet. and i hate when there is no soap or paper towers provide after using the toilet. =S

2." Pants Check. I don't want to scare you but some washrooms are rather wet - either from splash effect or the toilet maid (usually there is someone assigned to sit in the washroom and clean it) running amok with her mop. Either way, it's not moisture you want on your new linen trousers. If it's wet, roll them up, especially if you're in line for a squat toilet. If you see other Chinese ladies rolling, then be sure to. They know something you don't."

Definitely agree with the last sentence!

3. "Paper Discard - Not in the Pot! Chinese plumbing in public restrooms generally doesn't handle paper. If you can remember, please put anything other than #1 or #2 in the basket. Try as hard as you can NOT to look at the basket, it's usually open and teeming with things on which you'd rather not lay eyes."

it was a nightmare for me for the first few days i lived in the dorm in the Beijing Language and Cultural University. I did not know that you should not throw the toilet paper inside the toilet until I blocked my own toilet in the first few days. All i did was only pee pee and throw the toilet paper in the toilet and IT BLOCKED!

I went out my room feeling really embarrass and ask for the staff on duty for help. First thing they asked me was "did you throw ANYTHING into the toilet?" 

I said "Yea, toilet paper"

then she said to me "You should throw it into the toilet bin instead.  

I was pretty shocked and wondered how is it possible to block the toilet with a piece of toilet paper!? especially the toilet that I had in my room was a western style toilet. believe me or not, i even went on Google to search if its possible for a piece of toilet paper to block the toilet.

i guess i really didnt learn my lesson until the 2nd time i blocked the toilet AGAIN in the next day. it really took me a long while to get use to throwing the toilet paper in the bin instead of the potty. in the end, i bought a plumber to plumb the toilet myself -_______-' and i learned how to plumb the toilet after few days settling in china. ever since then i learned my lesson.

and yet this is not the hardest  thing, the most annoying thing happen to me in china when I work in housekeeping department for 2 months. When the time i start to clean the hotel room and to clean the bin inside the toilet..it made me sick.. and i start to wonder how do all these housekeepers manage to do all these dirty work!? 

well..i guess its all part of the  learning experience..somehow..

開襠褲 (Open-seated pants)

開襠褲(open-seat pants*)

Looking at the photo reminds me of what I have seen in China...=) Glad that i still remember how to type chinese and the name of that little pants. =PI still remembered when the first time I saw the kids wearing that in Fuyang, China I was pretty curious why would the parents let their kids wearing a pants with a big hole and showing their bump walking along the street. I did not see that many kids wearing those pants when I was in Beijing, however, I saw a lot of kids wearing that when I was working in Fuyang Hangzhou. 

according to my Chinese workmates, parents want their kids wear 開襠褲 because of few reasons:

1. convenience - therefore parents do not need to change the diaper that often. Whenever the kids need to pee pee or poo poo, if they are old enough, they will the parents can just take them to a 'suitable' place to let the kids do their business.
(but it made me sick when I saw a kid just accidentally pee pee in restaurant..--')

2. one of my workmate told me that according to her mum, wearing diaper will make the kids butt wet and red. It is bad for their health therefore wear open-seat pants is better. the natural wind will dry their butt..

3. I have also heard from my other workmate that wearing diaper will cause the kid of having a bad walking posture...they will spread their leg widely while walking..(hm...and i wonder how..)

The beautiful nature

If I did not chose to come to Switzerland for my studies, I would miss out a lot..

One of the things that I enjoyed a lot when I was in Swiss was the beautiful natural environment. Whenever I got so stress and exhausted from the school works, I would just look out from the window and enjoy the beautiful scenery . The photo below is one of my facourite.

View from the Swiss Hotel Management School (Mont-Blanc - Leysin Campus)...clouds at the eye level.

Looking outside from the windows, apart from the alps and the little houses in swiss, you can just see the clouds just a bit below the eye level. I would of never imagine I would live on the same levels as the clouds.

enjoying the scenery while waiting for my friends to finish their cigarettes at Belvedere (SHMS).

View from School

Sydney -- The multicultural place & the variety of FOOD ;)

It has already been 2 weeks since I came back to Sydney..

I have never thought that Sydney is such a multicultural place until I went to live in Swiss and China. Food are one of the things that I miss the most when I was out of Sydney & HK. In Switzerland especially in the area where I live I can mainly eat Cheese, western food restaurants (Eg. Davinda, The Train Station, Top Pub) or the only one Japanese restaurant called (One World, place has no fresh sushimi). Well if I am really desperate in asian food, I could always go to the western food restaurant for some "Chinese/ Japanese food" cooked by European chef. It's Chinese food but it does not taste the same as the local Chinese food. Oh well..guess its because i was in Switzerland..that's why i could not expect much. Even when I caught a train from Leysin to Aigle or Montreux, the food in the Chinese food restaurant just does not taste the same. Moreover, I could not find a vietnamese or a korean restaurant in Swiss.

Chinese Food from the Geneva Chinese Restaurant brought by my classmate =) Picnic in the room..

Chinese Food at a Chinese Restaurant in Aigle, Switzerland

Chinese food provided by my Classmates (MIB students) at Culinary Studio (SHMS)

After I finished my master degree in Swiss, I went to Beijing for a language for 1 month then Hangzhou for a management training internship for 6 months. In comparison with Swiss, China has much more variety restaurants. However, I was surprised the fact that the food in HK restaurant taste different from the local food in HK. while I thought they will have the food ingredients and the chefs, for some unknown reason the HK food in China just did not satisfied me.

The HK style fried noodles in Hangzhou HK restaurant. perhaps its the type of noodle that they used made the difference.

When I arrived HK, I was so happy the fact that I can finally enjoy the local HK food also some other asian food :) However, when I reached to Sydney, I realised that there are some asian food that sells in Australia but not in HK. For example, the Vietnamese Pork Roll and I realised that there's not much middle east food sells in HK tho such as Chicken serve with a bread, veggies and garlic sauce. 

Pork Roll from Cabramatta , Australia

Chicken with delicious Garlic sauce, potato chips, salad and bread ;) Delicious!

Surprisingly a western foreign serve a lot of different kinds of food. Perhaps because Australia is a multicultural place where migrants come from everywhere in the world and some of them just decided to stay in the same suburb which causes they have variety kinds of food.  For example, Strathfield has lots of Korean restaurant because there are a lot of korean living there. Therefore, to attract the local, they have to make the korean food taste like as authentic as possible.

Impression of China

To be honest, I have never thought of working in China before. All I knew about China was just only a red flag with five yellow stars. Apart from the flag, when I thought of China, the following words will pops out from my mine: Dirty, rude, squat toilet, pollution etc...
(to be continue...time to go out..hehe)

A new hobby in China - MASSAGE!!

If someone ask me what do you do in China during your free time. Apart from traveling / sightseeing , I will say GO FOR MASSAGES!

Reasons!? It's because MASSAGE IN CHINA ARE NICE AND CHEAP! =)

Fire Cupping after the foot massages

There are many massaging places in China.

variety of movies are available for you to choose. You can enjoy the movies while having the massage.

40RMB massage includes the following:

- feet into the a bucket of hot water before the massages begins.

- some snacks and tea are provided.

- selection of movies/TV programs are available

- almost an hour of massage including the foot and the body

- Fire cupping for the feet.

So cheap and feels like heaven.  Apart from massages, the massaging places also provides some other services such as fire cupping for the back. I have never done fire cupping before I came to China.  According to the local Chinese, fire cupping is good for the body. I was curious in fire cupping, I end up trying it with my friend. I thought it would be so hurt however it was not as hurt as I thought =

As usual, one of my workmates had a bad back pain therefore we decided to go to massage after work. While I was having the massage, I was wondering..oh dear, I'm leaving China soon. I will no longer enjoy the nice and cheap massage especially in Australia. I wonder how am I going to survive without the massages..=S 

Hong Kong & 古惑仔 (Young and dangerous)

Ever since I came to Hangzhou - Fuyang (杭州富陽市) for work, the local Chinese often like to talk/ ask about Hong Kong to start off the conversation, especially when I first met them.

No matter what kind of people I was chatting with (including the taxi driver, the housekeepers, the bell boys etc.), the similar topics always cane across. I felt like I kept on repeating myself all the time. surprisingly, I found some common things in those conversations. Somehow I found it interesting and yet speechless.  This is how the conservation usually goes.

FY=Fuyanese   M=Myself

FY: 你是哪裡的？你應該不是我們這裡的。 

FY: Where do you come from? I don't think you are the local people here like us.

M: 我是從香港來的，但是我在澳大利亞上學。

M: I came from Hong Kong, however I did my studies in Australia.

FY: 香港來的，香港也就是我們中國的麻。怪不的你的口音跟我們大陸的不一樣。我还以為你是從外國（韓國／日本 etc)來的。不過你的中文还好。因為我聽香港的中文 。。。。。。。。［有客人曾經跟我說最怕聽香港人的中文］

FY: From Hong Kong... Hong Kong is part of China. No wonder your accent is different from the rest of the Chinese in China. I thought you are Japanese or Korean. Your mandarin is not bad, because I heard the people from HK who speaks Mandarin..........

[one of the guests told me that he scares of listening the hong kong people speaking in Mandarin]

The Movie - 古惑仔 (Young and Dangerous) 

FY: 哪你們香港是不是有很多古惑仔？ 我看看電視，甚麼銅鑼灣。。地方治安很亂。 

［还有人跟我說他的親人以前去香港，很亂！有黑社會。还是中國好，富陽好。］

FY: Are there many gangsters staying in HK? I saw it from the television , places like Causeway Bay is a mess. It is not a safe place.

[Some one told me that her relative went to HK before and said HK is a mess. China, Fuyang is a better place to stay]

M: 香港！？古惑仔！？治安很亂！？沒有阿。 我覺得香港很好。很安全阿， 还有很方便！ 你。。是不是看太多電視啦！？

M: Hong Kong? Gangsters? Not a safe place? No! Hong Kong is a really safe and convenient city. I guess you probably watched too much television

When the local said to me where do I come from and HK is part of China, I often feel speechless. It is not because I disagree the fact that HK is not part of China. It's because they asked me "where do you come from?", therefore I should give them a more specific answer consider I am already in China. -_-'. I thought they want to know which part of China do I come from. However, I still think there is a difference between Hong Kong and China. the culture is different.

 well, at least I should be glad that at least some of the Chinese understand my mandarin (with strong HK accent). haha.  

One thing I was surprised the fact that why would they thought HK is not a safe place. I thought when people talk about HK, they should think HK is a shopping paradise instead of a lot of gangsters in HK. Surprised the fact that some of the local think HK is a dangerous place. Perhaps it's because they've never been to HK plus the media influence. 

Funny how while the local chinese does not think HK is a safe place, before I came to work in China I did not think China was a safe place as well. haha. However, my 7 month studying and working in China changed my perception about China. Not everyone places in China are dangerous and of course, not all the places are safe as well. The way the local chinese look at HK is probably similar as some of the HK people look at China.

it's almost the end of the journey....No regret!

I was going through all the photos in my iphone. looking at the photos that i took from Beijing, Inner Mongolia, Da Tong, Hangzhou, Fuyang, Shanghai, Ja Xing..I am so glad with the decision that I made to China. Once again I really have to say "It's A Eye Opening Experience!" it's  something that I believe if you've never travelled, never lived in that place, you will never know.

I started to count how many places I have visited/ lived in and I realized for the past  2 years, I've been to a lot of places without realizing (Switzerland, Milan, Amsterdam and all the other cities where I've been to in China) . I guess I would never thought my 2 years "swiss journey" will end up a interesting and eye opening experience! 

I remember before I left Australia, I was a kinda reluctant to go to Switzerland. The reason I went it's because I hoped it will give me a better a career life and this is why I decided to go. I was happy and settled in Australia. A lot of people were envy the fact that i can go to swiss and thought i must feel so happy and excited about my trip. However, all the uncertainty for the future, leaving my comfort zone..leaving my friends and everything starting all over again gave me an uneasy feeling. Same situation happen again when I decided to come to China. I know deeply in my heart the fact that going to China will strengthen my language skills which will benefit my career, but China did not gave me a good impression base on the travel experiences in the past. I was reluctant to go to Beijing to learn Mandarin. Life is unpredictable. You will never know what will happen next. I thought I will go back to Australia after 1 month mandarin course but guess what!? I ended up found an 6 month internship in china! who would have thought I will end up working in China before I leave Australia. HAHA. again it was because i know it's good for my career this is why I chose to work for the 6 month management training in a resort in china. 

I thought my journey in China will not be as interesting and eye-opening as in Switzerland, but i was wrong! The 1 month staying in the Beijing language university makes me realized the importance of learning chinese as well as the china is becoming more recognized in the world!

My classmates in Mandarin Classes from different parts of the world: Indonesia, Korea, Japan, Chinese who grown up in Japan, Ukraine, Japanese who studies in Canada, Americans, Australian, American Born Chinese and me (Hong Kong who went to Australia & Swiss for studies).

Lots of people from different races, different background, different countries came all the way to china just to learn mandarin. For once, i am proud to be a chinese! =) However, I am shame to be a chinese as well because I am chinese and I still needed to learn chinese with a bunch of foreigners -_____-" sigh. If I did not came to Beijing, I would not travel Da Tong and Inner Mongolia. will never forget the horse riding experience in Inner Mongolia as well as the YUMMEST Lamb BBQ from a bunch a really friendly Chinese from beijing!

Horse riding n Inner Mongolia 

The most delicious barbecue lamb sticks I've ever had in my life SO FAR!! It's a must! If anyone are going to Inner Mongolia.

An interesting experience - Sleeping in the Mongolian Tent with 3 other friends =) 

Da Tong 

If I did not come to Beijing, I would not consider finding a internship in China. I would not end up coming to Hangzhou- Fuyang for work. During my day off i would not end up catching a fast train to Shanghai meeting my friend whom i knew in Swiss as well as catching the train to Jia Xing visiting the Xi Tang Ancient Town. It's a beautiful place! my 2 years of "studying' and "working' experience became a 2 years holidays for me to travel =) I've never though of catching trains traveling to different places until I went to Swiss and China. It's THAT CONVENIENT!

Fast train (高鐵) to everywhere in China 

I always thought plane is the only transportation travel for holiday perhaps because i lived in HK before and if I go to the neighbour countries, eg. Taiwan, japan etc travel by plane is needed. lol. 

Also I never expected I would end up staying in a multi-cultural environment in China. Apart from the beijing language and cultural university, I stayed in the manager dormitory where there's people from Philippines, Japan, India, Pakistani. some of my flat mates speaks mandarin as well =) I've also met the other management trainee from Swiss, Brunei and recently 1 more from Brazil. somehow, they made me realized there's a lot of opportunities opening for you around the world. Do not restricted yourself working in just one city/ one country. go explore the world, the culture, and the working opportunities. you may end up getting/ learning more than you expect!

Housemates / Workmates I've met during my management training in China.  There are people from Philippines, India, Japan, Pakistan, Switzerland, Brunei, Taiwan and me (Hong Kong/ Australia). Some of the foreign workmates speak Chinese as well ;)

I did not know how much I love travel and living in different countries until I went to swiss and china! I know I am not a friend of keep changing environment all the time. I  am not a really outgoing person however, after the uneasy period and once i am 'settle' in the place, i enjoyed my life. I LOVE the TRAVELING AND THE EXPLORING EXPERIENCE.