'Merry Christmas' In Different Languages

Christmas is celebrated the world over and people exchange gifts and wishes too.
We present you a list of how to wish to your friends, neighbors, colleagues and
loved ones, 'Merry Christmas' or 'Happy New Year' or both in more than 100
languages!

Afrikaans Gesëende Kersfees
Afrikander Een Plesierige Kerfees
African/ Eritrean/ Tigrinja Rehus-Beal-Ledeats
Albanian Gezur Krislinjden
Arabic: Idah Saidan Wa Sanah Jadidah
Argentine: Feliz Navidad
Armenian: Shenoraavor Nor Dari yev Pari Gaghand
Azeri: Tezze Iliniz Yahsi Olsun
Bahasa Malaysia: Selamat Hari Natal
Basque: Zorionak eta Urte Berri On!
Bengali: Shuvo Naba Barsha
Bohemian: Vesele Vanoce
Brazilian: Boas Festas e Feliz Ano Novo
Breton: Nedeleg laouen na bloavezh mat
Bulgarian: Tchestita Koleda; Tchestito Rojdestvo Hristovo
Catalan: Bon Nadal i un Bon Any Nou!
Chile: Feliz Navidad
Chinese: (Cantonese) Gun Tso Sun Tan'Gung Haw Sun
Chinese: (Mandarin) Kung His Hsin Nien bing Chu Shen Tan
Choctaw: Yukpa, Nitak Hollo Chito
Columbia: Feliz Navidad y Próspero Año Nuevo
Cornish: Nadelik looan na looan blethen noweth
Corsian: Pace e salute
Crazanian: Rot Yikji Dol La Roo
Cree: Mitho Makosi Kesikansi
Croatian: Sretan Bozic
Czech: Prejeme Vam Vesele Vanoce a stastny Novy Rok
Danish: Glædelig Jul
Duri: Christmas-e- Shoma Mobarak
Dutch: Vrolijk Kerstfeest en een Gelukkig Nieuwjaar! or Zalig Kerstfeast
English: Merry Christmas
Eskimo: (inupik) Jutdlime pivdluarit ukiortame pivdluaritlo!
Esperanto: Gajan Kristnaskon
Estonian: Ruumsaid juulup|hi
Faeroese: Gledhilig jol og eydnurikt nyggjar!
Farsi: Cristmas-e-shoma mobarak bashad
Finnish: Hyvaa joulua
Flemish: Zalig Kerstfeest en Gelukkig nieuw jaar
French: Joyeux Noel
Frisian: Noflike Krystdagen en in protte Lok en Seine yn it Nije Jier!
Galician: Bo Nada
Gaelic: Nollaig chridheil agus Bliadhna mhath ùr!
German: Froehliche Weihnachten
Greek: Kala Christouyenna!
Hausa: Barka da Kirsimatikuma Barka da Sabuwar Shekara!
Hawaiian: Mele Kalikimaka
Hebrew: Mo'adim Lesimkha. Chena tova
Hindi: Shub Naya Baras
Hausa: Barka da Kirsimatikuma Barka da Sabuwar Shekara!
Hawaian: Mele Kalikimaka ame Hauoli Makahiki Hou!
Hungarian: Kellemes Karacsonyi unnepeket
Icelandic: Gledileg Jol
Indonesian: Selamat Hari Natal
Iraqi: Idah Saidan Wa Sanah Jadidah
Irish: Nollaig Shona Dhuit or Nodlaig mhaith chugnat
Iroquois: Ojenyunyat Sungwiyadeson honungradon nagwutut. Ojenyunyat osrasay.
Italian: Buone Feste Natalizie
Japanese: Shinnen omedeto. Kurisumasu Omedeto
Jiberish: Mithag Crithagsigathmithags
Korean: Sung Tan Chuk Ha
Latin: Natale hilare et Annum Faustum!
Latvian: Prieci'gus Ziemsve'tkus un Laimi'gu Jauno Gadu!
Lausitzian: Wjesole hody a strowe nowe leto
Lettish: Priecigus Ziemassvetkus
Lithuanian: Linksmu Kaledu
Low Saxon: Heughliche Winachten un 'n moi Nijaar
Macedonian: Sreken Bozhik
Maltese: IL-Milied It-tajjeb
Manx: Nollick ghennal as blein vie noa
Maori: Meri Kirihimete
Marathi: Shub Naya Varsh
Navajo: Merry Keshmish
Norwegian: God Jul or Gledelig Jul
Occitan: Pulit nadal e bona annado
Papiamento: Bon Pasco
Papua New Guinea: Bikpela hamamas blong dispela Krismas na Nupela yia i go long
yu
Pennsylvania German: En frehlicher Grischtdaag un en hallich Nei Yaahr!
Peru: Feliz Navidad y un Venturoso Año Nuevo
Philipines: Maligayan Pasko!
Polish: Wesolych Swiat Bozego Narodzenia or Boze Narodzenie
Portuguese: Feliz Natal
Pushto: Christmas Aao Ne-way Kaal Mo Mobarak Sha
Rapa-Nui (Easter Island): Mata-Ki-Te-Rangi. Te-Pito-O-Te-Henua
Rhetian: Bellas festas da nadal e bun onn
Romanche (sursilvan dialect): Legreivlas fiastas da Nadal e bien niev onn!
Rumanian: Sarbatori vesele
Russian: Pozdrevlyayu s prazdnikom Rozhdestva is Novim Godom
Sami: Buorrit Juovllat
Samoan: La Maunia Le Kilisimasi Ma Le Tausaga Fou
Sardinian: Bonu nadale e prosperu annu nou
Serbian: Hristos se rodi
Slovakian: Sretan Bozic or Vesele vianoce
Sami: Buorrit Juovllat
Samoan: La Maunia Le Kilisimasi Ma Le Tausaga Fou
Scots Gaelic: Nollaig chridheil huibh
Serb-Croatian: Sretam Bozic. Vesela Nova Godina
Serbian: Hristos se rodi.
Singhalese: Subha nath thalak Vewa. Subha Aluth Awrudhak Vewa
Slovak: Vesele Vianoce. A stastlivy Novy Rok
Slovene: Vesele Bozicne. Screcno Novo Leto
Spanish: Feliz Navidad
Swedish: God Jul and (Och) Ett Gott Nytt År
Tagalog: Maligayamg Pasko. Masaganang Bagong Taon
Tami: Nathar Puthu Varuda Valthukkal
Trukeese: (Micronesian) Neekiriisimas annim oo iyer seefe feyiyeech!
Thai: Sawadee Pee Mai
Turkish: Noeliniz Ve Yeni Yiliniz Kutlu Olsun
Ukrainian: Srozhdestvom Kristovym
Urdu: Naya Saal Mubarak Ho
Vietnamese: Chung Mung Giang Sinh
Welsh: Nadolig Llawen
Yugoslavian: Cestitamo Bozic
Yoruba: E ku odun, e ku iye'dun!

2009 SE Asia trip short videos posted

I just posted a cross sample of short videos that I created during my trip to
Singapore, Cambodia and Vietnam.

Singapore - videos show samples of the Christmas decorations lining Orchard and
Scott Roads in the heart of the main shopping area of Singapore.

Cambodia - videos show samples from the opening banquet for the Carter Mekong
River Project in Cambodia and from the closing celebration banquet held at the
construction site after we completed the 21 homes.

Vietnam - videos show an example of the traffic at the Opera House intersection
and an 8:40 minute movie of slides.

Hope you enjoy them.

They are posted on my YouTube account

Go to YouTube
then search for

alaniscre8ng

and choose whichever video you want to view.

Thanks for virtually tagging along and special thanks to you who wrote to me
while I was traveling.

Best wishes for a very Happy Complete Holiday Season from the US Thanksgiving to
the Chinese New Year.

Wandering Alan
http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com
for samples of photos from the complete trip

Tuesday - Wandering Around Ho Chi Minh Once More

Once again I was awake around 4:30 and first thing I did was continue the photo
downloading from the night before.  During this trip downloading has been a very
slow process.  Not sure why.

I had no major plans for the day.  Typically I usually only spend 3 days in a
city or location and during those 3 days I can usually experience most of what I
seek.  This time I had a 4th and possibly another 1/2 day because my flight was
not until 3:15 pm.

While the photos were downloading I checked the itinerary for my return flights
on Wednesday and immediately discovered my memory was wrong.  Yes I had a flight
at 3:15 pm but that was the second flight in the day, the one from Tokyo's
Norita Airport to Atlanta's Hartsfield.

Ooops?!

My first flight, my flight from Ho Chi Minh to Tokyo was leaving at 6:00 am. 
Suddenly I realized I didn't have still another 1/2 day to wander around Ho Chi
Minh City.  I would have to leave my hotel by about 3 am to between my 27 hour
return trip to Athens.

Bummer!

Then I laid out a basic comfortable, lazy, slow moving paced day for my last
day.

I would 'FLOW' across through the busy morning traffic to the river side of the
road to the ferry boat and ride it to the other side to SEE WHAT'S ON THE OTHER
SIDE of the river.  From my hotel room window on the 6th floor for the past 4
days it had looked very old and industrial on the other side, an island in the
river.

First I went down to the hotel restaurant to have some breakfast, perhaps even
the $20 buffet, decadence.  Looking at the TO ORDER menu I decided it would cost
me as much to enjoy a cross sampling from the various buffets than to have a
simple ordered plate from the menu.

Once again I chose a mix of fruits, some dim sum, some veggies, a slice of
French Toast and a Belgian waffle, then order two eggs sunny side up before
sitting down for my first plate of choices.

I had been directed to a table for two in between two other tables for two.  A
man in his 50s to my right and a young man in his 20s maybe 30s.

I finding it interesting, annoying, painful, frustrating how few westerners
recognize, nod to, smile at, greet each other when they are in foreign
countries.  In my mind I often play various scenarios for why this too seems to
be true.  They hate realizing they are not the only "Foreigners" visiting the
country.  They don't want to be recognized.  and other possible scenarios.

Still I often nod my head, say hello, smile to see what response I might get.

On very rare occasions I receive friendly, human responses.

After a second plate with samplings of Asian delights and a mix of small
portions of varied fruits I ventured off to FLOW ACROSS, THROUGH the traffic to
board the Ferry Boat.

Back to the Ferry Boat excursion.

The ticket process was extremely simple.  Walk up to a man sitting on a tiny
stool with a book of tickets in his hand.  Give him 1000 Vietnamese Dong,
equivalent to 1/18 of a US dollar or 2+cents.  Walk along the gangway and onto
the boat and up to the top deck.

Below me was the main hull that quickly filled with nearly 100 to 125 motorbikes
with 1, 2, 3, 4 passengers on each, each carrying varying loads from just people
to packages to giant loads of bamboo, piles of fresh newspapers, etc.

Within a moment or two the ferry boat pulled away from the dock and traveled
across the river in between passing barges and other boats passing along the
Saigon River in both directions.

Once the ferry boat arrived at the other side the gate opened on the main level
and the flood of motorbikes streamed off onto the show and along the very narrow
street leading to the village, lined with shops and stalls on either side
selling many, many different things.

Everywhere you go selling, selling, selling wares, food and drinks of all kinds.

Oh if my digestive and intestinal system were not so sterile in its needs
tasting Cambodia and Vietnam might have been so much fun.

The sights, sounds, smells, tastes, textures were fabulous to experience.

Two young Japanese girls (20s or 30s), every day type not the classic beautiful
stereotypic images, just normal human beings, were walking ahead of me as we
strolled down the very long entrance road with its various side streets leading
off in the other directions.  I guessed they were tourists, perhaps even
wanderers like me on a short adventure to...

"the other side of the Saigon River"

that morning.

Every so often there were vacant spots between shops and stalls and short 2
story buildings where rubble lay.  Just rubble: broken brick, block, glass,
window.  Much like mini-bomb sites.

Next to a tiny restaurant with its tiny plastic chairs were lots filled with
strewn rubble and debris.

A barbershop consisted of a piece of tent material strung between poles and a
wall and a barber chair among strewn rubble.

A tiny restaurant here, a tiny restaurant there.  A tiny general merchandise
shop here, a tiny merchandise shop there.

My SANTA CLAUS beard and non-Vietnamese stature and look drew looks often and
the usual "what to ride sir" calls from men standing next to their motorbikes. 
I clearly was asked that 200 to 300 times it seemed over the 5 days I was in Ho
Chi Minh and another 100 to 150 in Phnom Penh and maybe 50 or so times in
Singapore.

I walked along the narrow road that was barely paved from about 3/4 to 1 mile
around a bend to the left passing a Hindu temple and a Buddhist Temple among the
various lots of strewn rubble before deciding to return to the dock to return to
the extreme wealth of Ho Chi Minh City on the other side of the Saigon River.

Boarded the ferry boat once again to return to the other side at the base of
towering Marriott Hotel and the other 5 star hotels that are scattered along the
city side of the Saigon River.

Once on the other side I decided I would have a slow stroll along some of the
boulevards while I let my mind wander and then would impulsively do what came to
mind.

I was partially in search of a true Vietnamese restaurant for my last dinner. 
Something traditional, perhaps classy, like Ed recommended that I do that would
be French-Vietnamese in style.

During the previous 4 days I had passed by several but could not remember
specifically where they were so I decided I would search until I find one.

Shortly after turning onto one of the minor boulevards behind my hotel and away
from the river I found the VIETNAMES HOUSE.  Went up to the posted menu near the
entrance and saw that they had a variety of PRE-SET MENUS for one, two, three,
four, plus a standard menu.

I looked over the 3 or 4 PRE-SET MENUS FOR ONE and decided on one that would
cost 250,000 Vietnamese Dong or approximately $14. That decision out of the way
off I wandered to the Opera House and the Interior Games exhibit once again just
walking letting my mind float.

After strolling past the exhibit towards the giant boulevard at the other end,
parallel to the minor one I had just walked down I decided to hail a taxi and go
to CHINA TOWN.  I would be successful and see China Town after my failure the
night before.

First the taxi driver had no idea what I was saying when I said CHINA TOWN.  I
should have told him to stop and gotten out.  I didn't.  Ooops!

I took out my dependable little hotel provided map that showed only District 1
and had a tiny arrow and the words China Town written in the bottom corner
pointing off the map.

Through pointing at the buildings we were passing, the park in front of us, the
central park and then pointing at the map I attempted to guide the
non-understanding taxi driver to CHINA TOWN.

I got us as far as the hotel where I had stopped to ask for directions in the
night before and found the same bellman and asked him to explain to the driver
where I wanted to go.

ASSUMING that he had off we went.

It is too painful to drag this explanation out any longer about the next 20 to
30 minutes in extremely dense traffic with a pleasant young taxi driver who did
not have a clue, nor did his passenger.

We did find a couple Chinese looking buildings, signs, shops and stalls but no
famous Chinese Gate welcoming us to CHINA TOWN like you find in San Francisco,
Washington DC and other cities around the world.

So I just got his attention and said let's go to the History Museum which was
completely in the other direction beyond where he first picked me up.

Then his extreme cautious nature, totally unnatural for a taxi driver anywhere
let alone in Ho Chi Minh City slowly, ever so slowly go us through traffic jam
after traffic jam.  I probably breathed 5 lives worth of carbon monoxide during
that trip.

Finally we got back to the Cultural Park.  He had no idea where I really wanted
him to go.  The Cultural Park, huge Central Park type park in the middle of the
city was at least two miles from the zoo and the history museum where I had
shown him to take me to on the map.

Their taxi meters only show 3 digits of the fare and their money is almost
always in 6 digits.  I didn't have enough in dong to cover what his meter seemed
to indicate and only a few US singles and then 20s.

I recall it said 135 which made no sense.  If it was 135,000 that meant $7.5. 
If it meant 1,350,000 it meant $75 which was totally unrealistic. So I gave him
a US $20 and tried to get him to give me the correct change.

Now that's definitely a laugh.

He finally held out to me some folded dong bills.  I took them.  Gave him my $20
and chalked it off to experience and the fact that fairly he probably had earned
it with all the driving I had had him do trying to get me to whatever and
wherever CHINA TOWN really is in Ho Chi Minh and changed that request to the
Museum which he had no idea where it was or what it was.

Later while going through the dong bills I had in my wallet during dinner I
realized I probably ended up ahead some how by mistake because I found a 500,000
dong note which I didn't remember having.  500,000 dong is worth about $28.  I
had ended up ahead not behind.

Without any words or sounds of anger I simply left him and walked to the road
that leads to the zoo and my destination: the History Museum.

Once again at the ticket window for the Zoo and I thought for the Museum was the
young woman vendor with here dozen or two English words giving me directions.

"Pay inside museum not here.  Remember when come out" meaning buy something from
me again like I had the day before when I finally gave in and bought a bottle of
ice cold water from her just to get her to go away.

The museum is a beautiful and large Chinese design building.  It contains many
collections of arts and crafts from private collections donated by many
citizens.  It was built (actually looks much older than the signs imply) to
honor the 30 years of independence since 1975.

Among the photos display and honoring the opening and dedication of the museum
is a photo of President Bush signing a document with Vietnamese officials
surrounding him.

I wandered through the museum in my usual wandering manner, going in the
opposite of varied directions from room to room, gallery to gallery.  Inside one
of the gallery I saw two young American women sitting near the entrance to a
special theater set up to show their famous WATER PUPPET SHOW but they said they
will not show it unless we have 7 people attend.  I tried to tease with them
that how about one of them stay put and watch our things while we go find the
needed four other people.  That went over like a lead balloon.

Off I wandered.

The collection represents the entire history of Vietnam from 1000 years of war
lords to 1000 years of occupation by China to 30 years of occupation of Japan to
30 years of occupation by France to the 10 year war with  America.  No mention
that we were part of a UN force not simply the US military.  They remember it as
the 10 Year War with the US.

The building is a beautiful building with a couple floors of varied size
galleries and halls, courtyards, shops, stores selling arts and crafts and
tourist items.

I did buy a mask to add to my global mask collection.

After enjoying the museum for about an hour I walked back towards the Vietnam
House to have my dinner and in route purchased another sausage roll and an apple
tart for my breakfast for the next morning.

The Vietnam House was a beautifully traditionally decorated high quality
restaurant.  The PRE-SET MENU I chose consisted of...

1. seafood salad....delicious
2. pan fried shrimps and green rice raviolis
3. grilled pork in lemon grass
4. stewed fish in clay pot
5. sauteed morning glory in garlic
6. seafood soup
7. mixed fruits

Only a part of the course called stewed fish in clay pot was spicy and easily
the fruit eliminated the impact of the spice.

Everything was wonderful to look at and to eat.

Only twice in all my walks along the streets, roads, boulevards did odd things
happen.

One time a fellow stopped me claiming he had seen me at the immigration desk
recently.  He kept apologizing for asking me so many questions.  Then after he
asked me where I was from he mentioned that his sister was going to be moving to
work in a hospital in Georgia.

He didn't know the name or the name of the town.  Hmmmm?

Then he apologized again and asked if I would like to meet his sister.  Hmmmm?

Off I went leaving his smiling face behind.

Another fellow said hello claiming he was from Malaysia.  I volunteered that I
had been in Kuala Lumpur and P-K in 2001.  We chatted for a moment or two and
then I told him I had an appointment and off I went leaving his smiling face
behind.

As I mentioned I was asked hundreds of times nearly everywhere I went if I
wanted to ride on that person's motorbike.  Some of the guys I passed several
times and not always on the same corners.

Throughout the days as I passed by various corners like the ones near the
location of the beautiful Opera House and the Continental Hotel across the
street to the left, a giant high-rise modern hotel to the right and directly in
front across the extremely wide street area was the little park with the exhibit
about the 2009 Interior Sports Games the vendors changed from tourist items to
food to drinks to sunglasses to the last timed huge flat displays of Christmas
Cards.

The same was true surrounding the block that the Cathedral sits on.  I must have
passed the cathedral 6 to 8 times during the 4 1/2 days I saw varying groups of
tourists, tour busses, art students drawing the cathedral or painting the
various buildings that surround the cathedral and the central post office which
is located across one of the side streets.

In the central lobby of the Central Post Office is a decorated Christmas tree.

Sporadically throughout Ho Chi Minh City I found a smattering of Christmas trees
and decorations and lights calling attention to Christmas and Happy New Years

Nothing like the decorations on steroids I had seen in Singapore two weeks
before.

2:30 Wednesday morning the phone rang with my wake up call.  I had possibly been
asleep for an hour or two.

Within 10 minutes I was downstairs with my packed luggage checking out.

Then off in my taxi to the airport.

When I landed in Ho Chi Minh City I got a taxi through a taxi and info desk for
$14 which turned out to be very fair considering how far we had to travel and
the time it took through all the rush hour traffic and the millions of
motorbikes.

The middle of the night streets of Ho Chi Minh, many I had walked along several
times in the previous 4 1/2 days were nearly completely empty.  We passed a few
delivery people on their motorbikes.  I guy must have been carrying 1500 copies
of a newspaper in stacked piles on the back, front and on his lap.

Occasionally we passed small groups of people together sitting at the side of
the roads or in the petrol stations we passed.

We arrived at the airport in about 15 minutes.  The inside of the airport looked
empty reminding me of when Chad had driven me to Heathrow last summer in the
middle of the night.

Once again the 3 digit number on the taxi meter made no sense and I was still
temporarily confused by the value of the 500,000 VND bill.  I handed him a US$20
expecting to get change.

Instead I got a smile.

$20, $14...oh the hell with it.  I loaded up my luggage on a cart and rolled
away through a mass of people standing outside the departures entrance.  Not
sure if we were suppose to just stand there waiting for the two guards to
welcome or let us in I ventured forth to ask and neither one of them flinched as
I walked by them so I just strolled right into the building leaving the hundred
of so people standing outside for whatever reasons they were standing in the
dark of the night in front of the entrance.

To my right were a few open counters.  They weren't for NWA or Delta so I went
to the left and sure enough I immediately found the NWA and Delta Counter and
was immediately approached by a smiling man in one of those dark green with red
things on his shoulders uniforms asking me my destination.  Once I said Tokyo he
guided me to the first hand-check security check point.  He searched my to be
checked luggage by hand and then pointed me towards the check-in counter.

The process was smooth, effortless and quick.

The place was closed except for a few check in counters and the handcheck
security point and then the first security check for carry ons followed by the
passport check point and then the customs checkpoint.

All that went smoothly and quickly with little to no effort.

Once on the other side of security, the destination all of us travelers seek
nowadays as quickly as possible was the duty free and exclusive, expensive
jewelry, clothing, shoes and other products stores and the hallways leading to
the various gates.

I was the second person to arrive at the gate and it was then maybe 3:30 and
some very old John Wayne movie with the sound very low was playing on a giant LG
flat screen tv.

I will stop and leave out the rest.

Then it was a 6 hour flight to Tokyo with about a 90 minute wait until my 11 1/2
flight from Tokyo Norita to Atlanta Hartsfield through the dark.

We left at 3:15 pm from Tokyo and arrived in Atlanta at 1:15 pm.

My shortest long flight prior had been from Seoul, Korea in 2004 when we left
Seoul at 10:30 am and arrive in Atlanta at 11:15 am, a 45 minute flight.

This flight was a NEGATIVE TWO HOUR flight.  We arrived two hours before we
left.

What made the long flights even longer this time were.

On the way to Singapore...being stuck with a middle seat in the bulkhead row
underneath a large LG screen tv watching the only available programming.

On the way to Atlanta from Tokyo being stuck in a window seat in row 59 with
only the large LG screen tv watching the only available programming:

United, NWA and Delta provided very poor, very poor entertainment.

The good thing about the flight on NWA and Delta coming home was the large
amount of leg room compared to the next to not existing leg room on the United
flights to Singapore.


Another good thing about the Tokyo/Atlanta flight was the food was quite tasty.

A fantastic 3 weeks all together filled with so many different experiences,
sights, tastes, smells, sounds, textures, people and feelings.

From extreme wealth to extreme poverty

From strangers who remained strangers to people who became friends, like family,
as we built a home, 21 homes....not houses for 21 families who had been living
in a garbage dump before.

Thanks for virtually, electronically wandering with me.  Hope your enjoy the
many photos on my SMUG MUG and my Facebook page.  Within a few days I will post
a sampling of the videos I took on my YouTube account that I will create for
wanderingalan.

Wandering Alan/Dad
alan@...
http://www.cre8ng.com
http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com

last paragraph of Monday's Adventures

Across the side street I was crossing to make it easier in pieces instead of
trying to work my way completely across 8 to 10 lanes of vehicles all rushing in
multiple directions...

I saw a group of young women, 20ish, possibly 30ish all in bold black tops and
orange slacks moving across the street I was about to cross alone....except they
were doing it as a solid mass.  I had never seen that done before.

It surprised the various cyclists and drivers and forced some of them to
actually stop, which they very seldom do at all unless one of those rare traffic
lights turns red.

It was odd and funny to see the MOB TECHNIQUE.  It was disruptive, yet it got
all 30 to 40 of them across the street in the same time.

I followed them through the park and asked one of them what is the group that
was indicated on the backs of the tops.

WorldChallenge.com

All I got was that there are several groups who under that name competing in
different countries.  I going to look it up on the internet to find out more.

Then I left them eventually at the absolutely worst intersection I have seen
since arriving here at the absolutely worst or busiest, densest traffic time.  8
to 10 lanes crossing each other with traffic lights that ATTEMPT to control the
chaos.

In the middle of the intersection of all 16 lanes I saw total bedlam between
each light change.  Another thing I notice today as I walked long distances on
roads that tend to have several traffic lights, right-hand turners do not stop
or even hesitate even on the red.  Damn near go hit a couple times until I
realized that NOT ALL DRIVERS PAY HEED TO THE TRAFFIC LIGHTS.

Finding China Town was a loss.

I had walked about 3/4 of a mile thinking it was over a mile I stopped in at a
hotel to ask how much further.  The check-in people just said "KEEP GOING".  The
doorman said quietly about 7 kms.

I gave up.  Maybe I will take a taxi to that area tomorrow as an adventure.

Now I have taken a soaking bath and written this message while my day's photos
have downloaded to my iPhoto file for editing and loading to my SMUG MUG and/or
FACEBOOK accounts for you to see.

Best wishes to all of you,

Tomorrow perhaps new adventures. perhaps simply a quieter day of riding across
the Saigon River on one of the ferry boats.

Wandering Alan

Monday from Sun Up to Sun Down on the Streets Wandering

I left my room this morning with the simple plan of CROSSING THE STREET TO THE
RIVER SIDE OF THE STREET.  Like the armadillo, possum and chicken I just wanted
to see if I could get to the other side without too much fear or needing to
change my underwear soon afterward.

For about an hour I had been watching the scene below.  People were playing
badmitton, doing Tai Chi, walking, stretching, walking in various patterns
through the potted trees.  The potted trees turned out to be highly sculptured
ficus trees that can grow 100 ft into the air and 150 to 200 feet in diameter. 
Instead those below me on one of the plaza areas adjacent to the river are from
6 to 8 feet tall in large pots with clumps of leaves instead of the giant masses
I have seen so many times before.

I had a sketchy plan to just cross the street successfully without harm or
fright, walk a little, watch the badmitton games up close, then return to take a
taxi to the location far along to the left on the river where a series of giant
towers, apparently pricey, modern, condominium apartment buildings are being
built.

Once I got across the street I changed my plan and continued on with the intent
to see if I could actually walk in a modest amount of time, perhaps an hour to
where the towers seem to be located along the river far towards the horizon to
the left of my room window.

Along the walkway, into the street often to get around hundreds of motorbikes
stored at 90 degrees with the street and often slightly hanging into the street,
or to avoid instant shops set up to sell newspapers, magazines, sunglasses,
food, drinks, etc.

Some of the stretches were covered with large ceramic tile panels.  Some with
just dirt.  Some with a mixture of everything you could imagine.

Constantly I was watching behind me and in front of me to avoid the, literally,
millions of moving motorbikes, some cars, a smattering of busses and trucks.

Every once in awhile I would see an elderly person, 70s or 80s, seemingly frail
simply flow directly across the 6 to 8 to 10 lanes of traffic wherever they
wanted to cross.

Similar to buildings I have seen over the past 30 years in Europe, the Middle
East, Eastern Europe, very old parts of England like Stratford many to most of
the older buildings and some of the more recently built, actually in most cases,
refinishing or refurbishing are 10 to 12 to at most 15 feet wide.

The odd thing is that most are 3 to 4 sometime 5 or 6 stories/levels tall.  Here
I have quite often seen short blocks of these individual buildings built right
next to each other with one of them sandwiched in the middle that towers to 8 to
10 to 12 stories far above its adjacent neighbors.  I can not wildly imagine any
of the building departments or officials I ever worked with in Michigan, Florida
or Georgia would ever have allowed such construction.  Planning Commissions,
Beautification Committees would be losing sleep over the inconsistency of
designs, sizes, heights, colors, materials.

It is whatever you want to build here.

But this morning I have seen only what I have seen in Middle Ages
construction...

buildings resembling the Leaning Tower of Pisa, except in this case they are
leaning against their neighboring buildings like dominoes waiting to topple and
crash to the ground.

After walking what was probably about 2 1/2 to 3 miles the road turned to the
right at a heavy road construction project in the middle of the road that will
turn it into a superhighway in width and construction.  Just around the corner I
could see my destination towers not far away, perhaps 1/4 to 1/2 mile on the
other side of the road.  Unfortunately the only way to get to them was through
the construction site and I decided to pass on that adventure.

As I approach the even tighter turn to the right the road was shooting off far
away from my destination and was entering a limited access superhighway.

So after having developed some degree of PEDESTRIAN SKILLS ALA HOCHIMINH STYLE I
turned around and headed back to a spot where the road had narrowed into 2 lanes
on either side with a large blocked off area in the middle.  It made sense I
could easily cross more safely there and then head back towards the District 1
part of the city.

Before reaching the 90 to 120 degree turn in the road I had passed high over
small houses below and a small river or big stream with houses built right at
the water's edge.  The houses were built of leftover materials and corrugated
metal.  As I looked over the edge of the railing I to take photos of the
neighborhood below the road I saw that a road in the area that was 90 degrees to
the highway I was on about 30 feet above it was flooded and the residents were
zipping along it in and out on the motorcycles.

Descriptions, still images, even videos with sound of the street scenes of the
millions of motorbikes and other scattered vehicles on these various roads can
not match the experience of seeing it and walking through it at 90 degrees.

On the way out I had seen a very large pre=school behind cartoon image decorated
security walls.  During my return walk I was able to photograph many of the
images.

I have seen much smaller versions of this school and similar ones ever since my
taxi left the airport to take me to my hotel.

Obviously there are elementary, middle and high schools or their equivalents
because I have often seen groups of students those various ages on the street
and in several of the parks.  I just haven't actually seen a school building or
have not noticed one except for the nursery and pre-school schools.

As I walked along a different route back towards my hotel I decided to look for
a place to eat a breakfast or early lunch at a modest price.  Still trying to
balance out the extremely expensive brunch at the Marriott because it was
Sunday.

I saw a PHO=24, 24 hour Japanese noodle shop.  based upon experience with
similar places I ventured inside to see what they had to offer.

Soup with chicken and vegetables and a plate of spring rolls and a bottle water.

That was 50,000 VD or about $3.  I certainly could handle that.

It was hot and very good.  Definitely not spicy.

Off on the road again heading back to my hotel.

Having just eaten and feeling fine I decided to head back to the MARKET to buy a
cloth and perhaps one or two other small things representing Vietnam in my house
of "many travels" and to possibly use in my workshops to decorate my work table
as I have been doing for nearly 30 years now.

When I passed by the People's Committee Building there were police and military
mostly surrounding it.  No weapons.  Just lots of those communist looking medium
green uniforms with red epelets (spelling).

I crossed the street to avoid the flock of police and herd of military
folk.....all men.

Then onto the market to actually explore each row in search of the scarf,
fabric, dress, weaving section. I guessed from my mostly straight through look
yesterday afternoon that the market was logically organized much like most large
markets are, much more organized by product or service than any US Mall I have
visited where shoe stores, clothing stores and others are scattered throughout
the mall.

After passing the giant section focused on food and eating or dining I found the
exact type of cloth I wanted.  Onward, happy with my quick and very reasonably
priced weaving, I trudged.  In a short distance some beautiful colors caught my
attention again.  I spotted a beautiful blue pillow cover.  I have bought
several before and have used them for various designs items in my house or as
gifts as finished pillows.

Now I buy only one representing the new country.

I would love to bring many back but it is no longer of value to me and I would
rather spend what money I do accumulate to travel to more new countries than
fill up my house with more TRAVEL STUFF.

As I left the MARKET I saw a park area to the right across the huge traffic
circle and chose to go for a stroll.

I found teenagers once again competing at unusual games and sports.  I saw
people walking, jogging, running, ballroom dancing, playing kick badmitton
similar to US hacky sack and just resting and sitting with a friend or two.  The
park reminded me of the wonderful parks in Warsaw that I saw and experience for
hours in 2003.

After walking the full length of the newly found park and back I headed to my
hotel room to rest and possibly change clothes following a new route using my
intuition and sense of direction. All that training and experience with
architecture comes in handy once in awhile.

The weather here has been much milder than I expected and especially much milder
than it was in Phnom Penh last week.

After composing yesterday Wandering Alan message, showering and resting some I
ventured out to find

1. water puppet museum or show location
2. a particular street where my traveling friend, virtual and real, Ed Wiseman,
who was station in Viet Nam years ago , recommended that I might have shoes
custom made to fit while I wait.  That sounded intriguing
3. go to the Hindu Temple located past the part I had found this morning

The conceierge showed me that the watere puppet is located in the People's Park
I was in yesterday and has two shows.  One at 6 and one at 8.  So instead I
headed the other direction, a new direction to go to the National Zoo and
History Museum.

Once I arrive a street vendor helped me see the ticket booth and told me that
the museum was closed.

Of course it was closed.  IT'S MONDAY.  Museums are closed on Mondays around the
world.

Any way I ventured into the zoo paying the wildly obsorbent fee of 8000 VD which
equals about 40 to 45 cents.

At first impression the zoo seemed run down and to be missing most of the
typical animals.  I had followed a sign that pointed to Giraffe instead of the
one that pointed towards Animal Events.

The end with the poor lonely giraffe is located is the part of the zoo that is
not operating temporarily and is much like a small scale amusement park for
young age children.  I did find some deer, atelope and other similar animals in
areas but nothing else.  The enclosures and cages were mostly empty or looked
abandoned.

Eventually while walking through the wonderful shade of the giant trees,
designed and laid out much like communist parks and zoos in Russia, Ukraine and
other Eastern Block countries I found the elephants, rhino, hippo, tiger, many
monkees, great numbers of beautiful birds I have never seen before.

The zoo is actually very pretty in the currently maintained section with many
areas of beautiful flowers and evergreen arrangements, along with lakes, ponds,
streams, waterfalls and planned forests of huge trees reaching 60 to 70 or more
feet into the area.

It was a great experience.

Next on my list was the Hindu Temple which I decided because it was only 3:30 I
could easily get to and then head back to my hotel and to my Vietnamese
restaurant meal for dinner.

The Hindu Temple is located beyond the Market in the area I had already been in
twice in two days.  I decided to walk a slightly different route to see what new
sights I could see.

I found it easily and tried to photograph the outside main entrance with its
multi-colored elaborate carvings. Unfortunately the light gray sky keeps killing
my shots of darker images against the sky.  So I tried a variety of camera
settings.  Think I got a couple that capture the beauty of all the carvings.

Then I approached the entrance to see what might be their policy about
non-Hindus entering.  Some do.  Some don't.

I was nearly dragged inside and had a package of 4 scent sticks and a flower
petal bracelet shoved into my hands by a smiling 40 to 50ish man and a younger
man.  I indicated about taking my shoes off and they sluffed that action off. 
That seemed odd.  I never enter a persons' home or house of worship without
looking to see if shoes need to be removed based upon my traveling.

I wandered all around the path that circle the sacred center of the temple
photographing or at least attempting to the various images of many gods.

When I got outside another man shouted to someone, turned out to be the man who
shoved the package of incense sticks into my hand as he guided me in the temple.
He was now expected to be paid.

No English

Could not understand his voice or words at all.

I took out a 10,000 VD bill, worth about 75 cents knowing that was too low. 
Than took out a 20,000 VD bill.  Then he emphatically said, very clearly 200,000
VD and I said very clearly and emphatically, ABSOLUTELY NOT.

That would be about $12.  That was rediculous to me as a price for 4 incense
sticks and a flower bud bracelet.

Finally I got him to accept 50,000, slightly less that $3.

Had I known what he had expected before he shoved them into my hand and pushed
me inside the temple I could have worked out a price agreeable or simply had
walked on with whatever exterior shots I may have gotten already.

Call me a frugal person, but it was how it was done that the amount.  I would
have gladly given him $5 but not $12 for 7 minutes of walking around his small
temple.

Then my last destination was China Town.  I had discovered in small letters the
name China Town and a small arrow on my trusty map earlier and decided if I
reached the temple and completed looking at it by about 4 I would search for
China Town.

I never thought of there being a China Town in Vietname.  Go figure.

First I had to cross through the park I wound in the morning and walk the length
of it to get to the edge of my map and the street location indicated on the map.

As I worked my way around the streets at EXTREME RUSH HOUR.  Each road 6 to 8
lanes wide completely full of motorbikes and vehicles heading in all directions.

So I searched for the sections of the roads that are broken into parallel pieces
of 2 or 3 lanes each to make it easier and safer to cross at RUSH HOUR

Wandering on Sunday in Hochiminh City

Spent most of the day in blocks of time wandering around the central section of
Hochiminh City with a Hoc Chi Minh City Map provided by the Renaissance
Riverside Hotel Saigon.  The maps shows where 12 sights are located.

As I wandered in search of the sites to see in District 1 I also tested my
abilities and guts/nerve in crossing streets during the continual flow of
millions of motorcycles and motorbikes, cars, trucks, busses.  Every so often
you see elderly people, older women carrying heavy loads of fruit crossing
through the flow as if it wasn't even there.

During my first outing I chose Opera House.  Along the way I found a KFC
shopping center with a mini children's amusement park inside it.  As I travel
the streets I capture many of the unusual sites with my camera to add to my
memories.

Across from the Opera House is narrow park located in the middle of the divided
boulevard.  On display are large photographs describing the 2009 Asia Indoor
Games held in Ho Chi Minh City earlier this year.  Included in the games are
physical games: badmitton, volleyball: hit and toss and board games of various
types.  From what I could figure out from the large exterior photo display is
that most to all of the Southeast Asia countries have children compete in the
Indoor Games.

I returned to my room to rest and to go visit the pool on the 21st pool and to
schedule a Shiatsu massage for later in the afternoon.  Never have had one of
those before.

Then I went to the Chinese Restaurant on the 2nd floor of the hotel for a buffet
lunch that I understood was being advertised at 1,800,000 VD or about $10.  It
was an all you can eat with 50 to 60 items on a menu to choose from.  I chose a
mix of 6 items from dim sum to a noodles dish to a soup to a shrimp dish and two
desserts: mango pudding and fresh fruit dish.

It was all served one item at a time.  Please see the photos.  Wonderful
service.

Then I asked for the bill and discovered that the modest rate was for Daily not
weekends.

Ooops!  There went my usual budget for the whole day of food in one delicious
very enjoyable meal.

The slight breakfast I had had earlier while I was out was a sausage roll, which
cost about $1.50.

I was annoyed that I hadn't read the signs correctly and mad at myself but not
about the meal or the money.  I will simply eat simply a couple other meals to
offset the unexpected expense.

Then off a roaming/wandering again.

Destinations during second outing:

Tao Dan Culture Park
Ben Thanh Market
HCMC's People Committee Building and giant boulevard dividing park
Notre Dame Cathedral of Saigon
General Post Office

The park is gigantic.

It has playgrounds for young children.  They were each filled with happy,
screaming children playing.  It has gardens of varying sizes. It has:

volleyball courts (pass, hit, kick...all 3 types)
amusement park for young children under reconstruction
walkways of many sizes through expansive landscaping
a very large concrete sculpture garden with a few hundred individual pieces
displayed
a temple made to scale using tiny red clay bricks
a temple

I came across teams of teenagers all wearing their respective teams or schools'
colors playing some unique games that were taking place in stations along the
walkways.

One station involved competing members of two teams blowing up balloons until
they break.

They all seem to be having great fun in all their various unique looking
competitions.

The market reminded me of markets in Turkey, Korea, Taiwan, Costa Rica and other
countries.  It consists of hundreds of stalls jam packed with merchandise of
many types.  The entire market is sectioned off logically much like the famous
Egyptian Market in Istanbul.  I didn't find the large wall map showing the
layout in several languages until this morning when I returned to the market a
second time with the plan to buy one piece of fabric, maybe two to add to my
growing collection from around the globe.

The Parliament Building is located behind very high walls and not accessible
from the street I passed it on.  Plus there were signs everywhere saying..."NO
CAMERAS".  So I continued on to find the Cathedral.

Along the street I found a very large, 2 or 3 stories, fun looking school for
young children with cartoon graphics covering all the walls surrounding it.

In route to Cathedral I passed by the end of the boulevard park that runs for
blocks to the People's Committee Building and a very large bronze statue of Ho
Chi Minh with a young child listening to his wisdom.

The Cathedral sites at the end of a large urban park.  From the outside it looks
fine.  Inside it is in okay shape but never was very elaborately decorated
except for its small stain glass windows running along either side of the nave
to the alter area.

Then I challenged myself to find my hotel without using the map.

Viola

I am getting familiar with DISTRICT 1 or just plain lucky in finding my hotel
when I need to.

Back to rest, swim a little and then to have my first Shiatzu massage.

The massuese did not walk on my back but certainly did apply strong pressure for
such a small person.  It was very relaxing and not as strangely different from
other massages I have experienced.

Then to rest again.

The sky is light but covered with gray clouds most of the time.  I am imagining
it is mostly smog much like I have seen in Los Angeles and Mexico City.

Downloading photos is taking much longer than usual, partly because I am taking
a lot of videos in order to capture the realness of living in a city of
constantly moving masses of motorcycles and other vehicles.

Off to have a Thai dinner.

The conceirge (spelling) gave me directions to one only a few blocks away.

It's name LAC, which means LOST.

The bar and dining area are located on the second floor at the top of two
parallel sets of stairs, much like a divided boulevard stair.

I was greeted by several friendly faced employees in traditional dress for
Thailand.

I thought they were going to escort or direct me to the next level up much like
in other Asian cities.  Instead I was directed to a low table and lounge area at
the front window in the bar area.

It turns out I was the only customers so far that evening.  Even so I got great
service.

Ordered Pud Thai, my usual due to the spicy nature of Thai food, and some
coconut milk and lime chicken soup.

Unfortunately I didn't request no spice to be added to the soup.  The
ingredients of the soup: chicken and vegetables were not spicy, yet the soup
was.  The Pud Thai was similar to what I have had often in the US, Singapore,
other countries and even in Bangkok, Thailand.  So far the versions I have
enjoyed the most have been in Thai restaurants in the US.

Oh well!

Then I chose to wander in search of a small dessert and to see more of the night
life on a Sunday evening.  In the boulevard park across from the Opera House
there were hundreds of families with young children enjoying time together in
the evening.  There were a few vendors selling balloons, toys, desserts and
candies.

On one of the boulevards I have walked a couple times before I found a giant
department store and decided to venture it to explore.  As far as I could see on
the ground floor were mostly glass cases filled with jewelry of many types. 
Also there were displays of exercise equipment.  Exercise seems to be very
popular here in various forms.

Feeling a little self-conscious about photographing I decided to leave the store
for the street in service of a dessert place.

Every shop, hotel, restaurant has security people at their doorsteps or
immediately around the outside.  Usually the security people also graticiously
open doors for customers.

Then I found an ANGEL IN US COFFEE shop.  One of a large chain and went in to
buy an apple tarte for later in my room.  In the back of that STARBUCKS WANNABE
is a MCDONALD'S WANNABEE....I have seen the name in other Asian countries.  It
serves hamburgers, chicken sandwiches, french fries, etc.

Neither are really wannabee's but rather have been created based upon
characteristics of the US BRAND NAMES.

Then I was often to return to my hotel and test my STREET CROSSING WHIILE
REMAINING ALIVE SKILLS without GREAT AMOUNTS OF FEAR.

I succeeded.

The tarte was delicious.

Tomorrow, Monday will be filled with other adventures on and off the map.

Wandering Alan

sample photos from Singapore Cambodia House Vietnam have been posted on my SMUG
MUG website

http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com

Hope you enjoy the images.

Off to capture more now in Hochiminh City.

Best wishes for a great Saturday or Sunday wherever you are, doing whatever you
choose to do.

Wandering Alan/Dad

Sunday in Hochiminh City, Vietnam

Saturday was a quiet day, a day for traveling.

I was both eager and anxious about coming to Vietnam.

In 1966 I went through the draft physicals for possible induction into the
military for the Viet Nam War.  Fortunately my birth defect kept me out.

In 2009 I am traveling to Hochiminh (former Saigon) because I chose to.

Woke up between 4 and 4:30 again in my Imperial Garden and Villa room 714. 
Began organizing to pack with the intention of lightening my load as much as
possible by leaving all construction clothes and possibly my boots.

Often when I cross borders they make a big deal about people having spent time
in farm areas or in the countryside.  I decided I could get by for the next 4
days with my sandals and dress shoes.  So I gifted my boots.

Around 5:30 I went down to say some goodbyes to people who were going out to the
Work Site for the special celebration with President Carter and Cambodian
officials and many other visitors.  There was not enough time for me to do that
because of my 12:40 flight to VN.

I had spent over an hour the night before trying to reconfirm my flight and to
print out my boarding pass with no success.

I tried again in the morning.  Still no success.

Several times on Friday I was told by different people that I was scheduled for
a 10:00 pick up for the drive to the airport.  It didn't seem like enough time
after having ridden in busses through the daily traffic thruout the week.

After a simple bowl of corn flakes, it least that is what they looked and tasted
like, I ventured back to my room to complete my packing and repacking process.

My pull behind was stuffed to aching so I finally decided not to leave my dirt
covered backpack and use it too and take my chances at the entry point in VN.

The driver arrived, a couple from San Francisco who I had not met yet, who
worked on house 13 across from my house 14 and I got into our car and off we
went through the streets of Phnom Penh.  Thought we were going to take the save
route once again but soon the driver turned to the left and off we went through
previously unseen parts of Phnom Penh.  We were driving along a divided
boulevard when suddenly our driver turned left and then right onto the other
side of the road driving directly at the oncoming drivers.

Within a short distance I realized why.  Our side of the road was blocked by a
giant crane on a truck that was being used to take down the top portions of a
giant tree that was being removed.  Soon he turned back again to the right side
and off we went.

Imagine American drivers doing something like that.

No horns.

No yelling, screaming, waving hands.  Simply allowing him to drive the wrong way
in order to drive the right way a block over.

We got to the airport smoothly and quickly.

The entrance area was filled with people waiting for arriving passengers. Had to
weave my way through them with my luggage to get to the departure entrance.

Inside there was very few airline counters.
I found the VN one.
I was waved up by a smiling employee

Within less than the time to take 2 or 3 breaths I had my boarding pass and was
on my way to the boarding gates area up an escalator.

Then we went through the security screening.  No shoe removal.  No computer
unpacking.

Hmmm?

upstairs I found two different Dufry (Duty Free) shops.  One for Khmer Crafts
and one for liquor, perfume, candy, etc.

Between them was the food area with one food counter and several tables.

I went into the Khmer Crafts shop to look around.  Some beautiful things with
very high tourist prices.  Because I hadn't look far enough the previous Sunday
I had not found these types of crafts in Phnom Penh.

After scanning all of the crafts I went out to sit in the food area and possibly
get some lunch.

Got myself a ham and cheese croissant sandwich and a bottle of water.  No more
Coke or Pepsi, which I had been drinking during lunch all week to help keep my
stomach settled down.

As I went to sit down two of the women I had met as other Volunteers arrived and
I joined them.  We shared some funny stories from the week.

Time passed and off we went to our respective gates.  There are only 6 thru 10
in the section of the airport.

When Karen and the other volunteer sat down they had Dairy Queen Blizzards.  All
of us had noticed the giant plastic Dairy Queen cone outside the airport
building.

As my plane was boarding I decided to enjoy a little americana ala Cambodia and
bought a small chocolate chip Blizzard.  Sure enough the young woman employee
made it just like they use to at any US DQ and immediately turned the cup upside
down to show me how thick it was.

The flight was only 40 minutes.  I chose an aisle seat because I prefer to be
able to get in, up and out easily.  I have had too many experiences with being
jammed in by people while I was sitting in a window seat.

As we approached Hochiminh all that could be seen was rice fields in all
directions to the horizon with an occaissional hill popping out of the water.

We landed and we walked, walked, walked to get to the passport check area.  Like
most airports it was a very large space.

Each line moved slowly while smoothly.  Some 2 to 3 year old Asian boys were
challenging their mothers by running around playing or wandering off just to
tease their mothers.  One mother was laughing though frustrated by her stubborn
2 year old who would not mind her.  I think she may have been Japanese.  Another
mother was not smiling and was very firm in commanding her 3 or 4 year old son
to stand at specific spots next to her.

Universally children act so much alike it seems.

I got to the agent's counter and I showed him the letter of introduction I had
gotten over the internet.  He smiled and gestured far off to the corner way over
on the other end of the great hall.

I had skipped past Go and had to start over.

The office window was for ARRIVAL VISAS.

I met an English couple, another American and a Frenchman all having to go
through the additional process steps.

First hand over our passports.

Second fill out another form.

Third give them one of the required photos.  I had had 8 made at FedEx before
leaving to cover all three countries and only needed on in VN.  They took our
pictures on sight in Cambodia entering and leaving.

Fourth....sit and wait and wait and wait until the Commandant came to review and
sign our visas.

The English couple were flying out on a domestic flight and needed to pick up
their bags to recheck in.

I was concerned about what had happened to my bags.  The young woman behind the
window in here green military looking uniform smiled and said they would be
fine.

Finally the young woman waved towards me and handed my by passport back.

In the shuffle and confusion I had put the ENTRY card into the sheet protector
that I had other documents in and back into my computer bag.

When I got to the Passport Check gate the second time the young woman, also in a
green uniform, firmly, without a smile asked for my ENTRY card.  Confused I went
back to the ARRIVAL VISA counter.  In a moment or two it dawned on me what I had
probably done with it and quickly found.

Back to the Passport Check Gate one more time with all the proper documents this
time.

As I was watching the uniformed woman doing all her checking, stamping,
initially I noticed the book she was reading.

It was about Santa Claus.

When she finished in an effort to see her smile I pointed at her book and then
at my face and beard saying Santa Claus.  After 3 tries I believe she understood
my message and smile a little.

Some times when some people smile you can not be sure if it is a true smile or
just gas pains.

Off to the baggage area.

There at conveyor Number 1 were my two bags just sitting completely alone on the
floor.

Then out through the Nothing to Declare check point where I had to pass through
all my bags one more time.

Out in the arrival hall I looked first for an ATM and possible information
counter.

Saw both when a smiling young man in a white shirt and tie waved me over.  It
was also a taxi stand.  I checked the price....$14.  I decided it was worth it
for sure instead of having to going outside and hunt for a taxi who might not
speak English.

It was truly worth $14 to know I had a taxi who knew exactly where to take me.

Off we went.

As we drove out of the airport parking area the driver pointed at some modern
buildings at the intersection saying my employer.  It turned out to be an
Airport Services company.  He drove taxi on the weekend as a second job I
guessed.

He knew very little English and I know zero Vietnamese, at least so far.

Through the city streets we drove and drove and drove.  I had no sense of how
far the airport is located away from the Saigon River where my Marriot
Renaissance River Hotel was.

I had looked at a small map of the downtown area of Hochiminh during week and
recalled a giant park, an opera house, a cathedral and museums.

The roads are 60% filled with motorbikes and motorcycles along with a mix of
trucks, cars and busses.  They seem to have more traffic lights than I had seen
in Phnom Penh.  They drive in all directions seemingly without incident, blowing
horns (except occaisionally) or any accidents.

When we did have to stop from traffic lights the motorbikes and motorcycles all
weave their wave to the front of the pack, hundreds of them just like I saw in
2001 in Kuala Lumpur and then in Taipei and just recently in Phnom Penh.

We passed the cathedral, the opera house, the giant park and reached my hotel.

When I checked in with my son's Marriot Family Rate I asked about a riverview
room.  That was $10 more.  I agreed.  None were available.  The smiling very
gracious clerk said we do have a corner room that is $20 more per night on the
river side.

I agreed.

I would spoil myself.

My room is huge, twice the size of the house I helped build in 5 days in
Cambodia all beautiful decorated and finished.

Complete broadband interent at $12 or 250,000 VD per day for 24 hours.  I
decided to spoil myself at least today so I could upload photos to my SMUG MUG
website to share with you.

http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com

After setting up room and watching some of the original Christopher Superman
movie I ventured onto on the streets along the Saigon River.

The traffic is solid, continuously moving and the only way to get across a
street is to simply walk out into it.  That is scary on the 4 to 8 lane wide
main road between my hotel and the river side area.  So I stayed with crossing
narrow streets for practice.

There are little to zero street lights, just the lights of the vehicle
headlights to break the jet blackness of the night.

I asked a check in person about a Chinese restaurant.  Didn't understand her
directions.  I tried to find it but gave up and went back to ask about small
restaurants.  They have a mix of restaurants in the hotel on the ground floor,
first floor and the 21st floor but I didn't want to spend that much nor eat that
much.

I also asked about an ATM.  She walked me to the entrance of the hotel and
outside and pointed to the ATM and then gestured around the corner to where I
would find small restaurants.

Off to the ATM.  The exchange rate of nearly 18,000 was a little confusing.  The
first time I probably paid more in the use rate than I withdrew.  Quickly
figured that out and took out my notebook to check my calculation and then
withdrew closer to $100 worth to last for the next day or two while wandering. 
I have US as a backup, which they generally accept.

Then I walked a couple streets with no real success and headed back to the
Mushroom soup restaurant located in the same building as the ATM machine.

Inside it is one continuous counter with stools that looks like a maze with a
constantly moving conveyor system with small dishes with small portions of food
on it moving throughout the complete maze and back to the kitchen and back out
once again.  It is like eating at production line in a factory.

None of the host-like men in their white shirts and ties spoke much English and
I speak no Japanese.  The restaurant style I had seen in Kuala Lampur in 2001
and in Japan in 2003 and other times.

The host who tried to help me said I could choose from 4 soups.  I asked which
is not spicy. He suggested the mushroom.  I began taking down dishes with their
plastic bubble tops off the passing conveyor belt and then they delivered a
quart size silver soup bucket and slipped it into the hole in the countertop in
front of me and turned on the gas dial located in front of me near my waist.

Cook your own to suit.

Aha I understood.  Or at least I thought I did.

A couple of the other waiters, apparently with less title tried to help when I
started selecting things including some portions of crab leg.

I proceeded to drop carrots, califlower, brocholi, lettuce, bok chow and noodles
into my pot to heat up.

It ended up tasting great.

After asking 6 or 7 times I still do not know how it is priced: by item chosen,
so many items for so much, etc.

It ended up costing about $8.

Off I went to wander along what I thought would be the easier streets.

Turned several corners while keeping in mind where my hotel was located behind
me.

Passed a western looking couple, the husband taking a photo of his wife/lady
friend.  I offered to take their picture together.  They were sitting on two
small plastic chairs on the side walk in front of a tiny coffee, candy shop
behind the row of parked motorbikes and cycles.

They turned out to sound Aussie so instead of saying the wrong country I asked
them where they were from.

Perth.

I spent 4 wonderful days in Perth in 2001.  So we chatted some about Australia
and the various places I have been able to visit in their beautiful country.

Then I asked them if they knew of where I might find a small grocery in the
area.  He tried to give me directions that was about a 15 minute walk away.  I
wasn't up for wandering through the dark, crossing those traffic packed streets
looking.  I would wait until this morning when I can easily stake out the area
of a mile to two radius.

Instead I continued on and found a divided boulevard, equally flowing with
steady, thick, dense, noisy traffic with shops along both sides.  I ventured to
the right in search of a small snack shop or grocery.  Shortly opposite I saw a
Starbucks wanabee and decided I would use the very few traffic light corners to
get over there.

Once inside it was obvious what I thought it was.  I ordered a piece of
chocolate cheesecake and a sausage pie and a strawberry smoothie trusting they
might be safe.

this morning I have visited my toilet a few times but nothing like last week and
I definitely had eaten something wrong for my system.

Then with my conquest complete I ventured back to my luxurious hotel suite to
call it a day.

The sky is completely covered over with gray clouds this morning.

The road below is getting busy again.  The traffic from the ferry boat that
docks just across the street began delivering people about 5 am now it is 7:30
and the road has continually flowing streams of motorbikes and motorcycles.  Not
thick but steady.

Soon I will wander off for my first day in Hochiminh City.

Wandering Alan/Dad

Day 5 and the Celebration

The 5th day began as the others.  Up by 5.  Off to breakfast.  Gather for our
respective busses around 6 or 6:15 and then on the road out to the site in
Qudong 90 km from Phnom Penh.

Life was in full tilt as we road along the roads we had traveled 8 times before,
morning and night each day.

As soon as the busses arrived we all headed to our houses to finish details and
clean up the sites around them and put away all the tools, scaffolding and to
return the unused blocks and materials to the storage areas behind the homes.

Janae, an employee of the US Embassy who had volunteered on Thursday was back to
help again.  She and I along with another volunteer from another house focused
on moving our blocks to the storage area.  That took over an hour with all our
various trips.  While Janae pushed the wheelbarrow around our row of houses I
ducked through to the back between the houses and was moving pieces of scaffolds
to the area they were being pilled.

Every house team was doing similar things: final painting, last minute roof or
gutter attachment, hanging of shutters, cleaning.

Then onto to hacking up and bagging the mortar droppings from 4 days of placing
blocks 25 courses high.

After lunch some of our team arranged with a tuk tuk driver to take 6 of us to
the Buddhist temple on the neighby high hill/short mountain.  We road along a
mix of dirt roads through the extensive village we had only passed through each
day as we arrived and departed our worksite.

The monuments or temple/ not sure of the term are located over 500 steps up into
the sky far above the village below.  The views continued to change as we
reached various stopping, resting, breathing spots up the many, many steps.  The
views became more vast as we climbed.

There were monkees in the jungle landscape that covers the mountain and the
ornately carved ballastrades and railings reaching out to play with the humans
climbing by.

At the very top all visitors must take off their shoes and hats.  Off came my
very dirty boots, my construction helmit that had saved my skull from being
cracked many times during the week and my JCH4H Project ball cap.

Along the way, all the way two young local boys about 12 were our "guides"
continually practicing their English on us.

It definitely did not seem like 500 steps.  With many stops it was a breeze. 
Besides two of our nurses, my house teammates were coincidentally with me all
the way checking to make sure I was find with the climb.  Actually it was easy.

The 360 degrees of views of the vast area surrounding the base of the mountain
need to be enjoyed.  Below are the endless rice fields, temple buildings the one
time palace from generations ago before the French came to Cambodia, various
temples, the far stretching bamboo and thatch hut village, fish ponds and our JC
H4H Mekong Work Project in the far distance.

The carvings of elephants, flowers, mysterious animals and decorations were
fabulous.

Also the cool winds were a bonus treat.

After a full walk around we easily strolled down the 500 steps to our tuk tuk
and back to the site to do any last minute work.

The celebration began under the dining tents around 3:30 with speeches, dances,
songs dedicated to all the volunteers, a song by one of their popular singers
and his partner.  They performed a rap like song the most famous of the two
created just for the event based upon his experiences throughout the week
working as one of the local volunteers.

Then each team returned to their respective houses with the owners to begin the
special ceremonies: ribbon cutting, sharing of our feelings and learnings as a
total team, a family.

Our team created a special key ceremony where we and the skiled workers and
local volunteers on our team lined up interspersed and passed the key from one
to the other until it was finally passed to our home owners.

Then the ribbon cutting done by the husband and our team leader Neale.

Outside in the joint area between all the houses all the 21 teams joined in
front of their houses for the Blessing.

The owners were each given a live bird and we each were given a handful of small
flower buds.

As they officially walked in and out of their "HOME" for the various first time
they released the live birds, each set of home owners in sequence and each
respective build team showered them in flowers.

Releasing the birds is a symbol for releasing all the past negatives.

Showering of flowers symbolized the beautiful future in store for them.

Then on back to the tent for the "official"speeches, dinner, dancing, a clown, a
Maori Warrior Welcome Dance done by most of the Kiwi Men with their shirts off.

Great food.  Many served courses.  No BOXED meals as our lunches had been.

The tables were decorated, creatively and beautifully.

soup, salad, fish, veggies, seafood, fruit cup

Finally the ceremony ended with many handshakes, gracious head bows and some
hugs and many tears.

Back aboard the bus for my last ride to the hotel.

Hopefully all my photos and videos shot during our very fast bus rides will help
share the scenes and the life we saw each day.

Some of the Gen X and Y members met up again and went out.  I chose to attempt
to download photos and rest one more time.

In about 3 hours my ride to the airport will arrive and then off to Hochiminh
City for my final 4 days in Asia and then home on Wednesday when I will leave
Hochiminh at 3:30 pm and arrive in Atlanta at 1:30, two hours before I left.

Hmmmm?!

Wandering Alan

4th Day Building 21 Houses

21 teams of volunteers from several countries and many different Cambodia
organizations and the US Consultate have now worked 3 days in a row, each
building their assigned house along with the owners who will received their
completed homes on Friday afternoon.

Once again we were up between 5 and 5:30 to get ready once again to have
breakfast and then board our busses to ride out to the construction site.

The site is near a previous palace and government seat before Phnom Penh.

Once again I was fetching mortar, bricks, patching joint lines all to help the
rest of my team.

Truly am experiencing the most concentrated physical work I have in many years
and that was when I was working on my own yard for one or two days in a row on
an occasional weekend.

The site is surrounded by vast rice fields with sporadic coconut palms for as
far as you can see in 3 directions.  In the fourth direction is the palace on a
hill and the village or villages surrounding it.

We worked an extra hour last night to get all 21 houses to a particular stage of
completion.  Today the trusses go up and the roofs, along with some painting.

Tomorrow the details and clean up.

Last night each group ate dinner at their respective hotels and all went to bed
soon after eating.  Work does truly tire you out.

Seeing life as it is lived here is an eye-opener and interesting.

Well off to have another breakfast since I have gotten well again and then off
to ride to work.

You may be commuting to your job today, so am I.

Best wishes from Wandering Alan

Through the Countryside to Work

Awake around 5 to have some breakfast after not eating much at dinner the night
before to get ready to leave for a day of working at 6:30 on our caravan of huge
busses.

We road through much of Phnom Penh seeing the morning life on the roads of
thousands of motorcycles, motorbikes, a few cars and some unusual motorized
carts I had never seen before.  The look like the hull of a row boat attached to
a 4 wheel frame pulled by a motor cycle engine.  The passenger section in the
boat consists of 1 x 6 boards attached in parallel rows where the passengers
sit, about 12 to 15.  They are open busses.

We passed several factories where we saw hundreds to thousands of people
arriving at work.

Along the route we passed many types of houses from mansion types, 4 and 5
stories high with the top floor roofed yet open and the ground floor open
without walls to bamboo houses on stilts 8 to 12 feet above the ground.

We passed many temples and a few mosques and several Cambodia Peoples Party
buildings, almost as many as we would have MacDonald's in the US.

I have not seen any US franchises so far here.

We arrived at the housing worksite and dispersed to our respective houses 1 to
21 and began the second day of building the block/brick walls of locally made
bricks.  The teams had successfully laid about 10 to 12 courses on Monday and
the goal for the second day was to reach the tops of the walls at 23 courses.

It was steady work throughout the day with one break in the morning and one
break in the afternoon and lunch under a huge tent on the site.  All the food
was catered in.  Our lunches were in large boxes provided by the restaurant we
had dinner at on Monday evening.

I learned I have much to learn with laying brick.  So I focused on fetching
bricks, mortar, filling in joint courses to make them flush . clean up and other
errands helping those who were effectively laying the brick courses.

4:30 came after a long day in the sun and we began our return trip through the
countryside with the children in the small village near the site running out to
wave, smile, laugh with hug happy faces as our caravan of busses road by

In front of the various factories were large numbers of people sitting at tables
eating their dinners on break I guess.

The streets were even more filled with people and the various open areas were
filled with people, friends with friends, lovers with lovers just sitting in the
dark.

The only lights we saw were from inside the stores or homes.  None on the
street.  A rare occasional advertising or neon sign on large restaurants or
shoppes.

Now off to have breakfast again and off to put up trusses and the roofs on our
21 homes.

Wandering Alan

Living a long time Dream that has turned into...

Some people call the life dreams.  Some call them items on their WISH LIST or
their BUCKET LIST.

Yesterday I wandered around about a 3 to 4 mile area of Phnom Penh from the
location of my Imperial Garden and Villa Hotel complex along the Mekong River
where it merges with two other seemingly equally wide rides in front of the
hotel, located at the water's end of one of the massively wide boulevards in
this part of Phnom Penh.

After resting in my room for a couple hours I ventured out to see if I might
meet some more of the volunteers.  One I met, Mike from Colorado was having a
meal.  He had been at the build sites all day and they were not prepared with
meals so he was starving.

We talked about where we each live and do and our particularly different
attachments and work with H4H.  He has been to Mexico, India, Cambodia before a
few times, Vietnam, and other countries.  Me I have volunteered in Athens,
Georgia sporadically about 12 to 15 years ago.

He mentioned he was going out to look for the large supermarket that is suppose
to be nearby.  I hadn't found it during my 4 hour wanderings and also wanted to
go.  So we wandered off and found immediately at the end of the main drive
through the Imperial Garden and Villa Development across a huge boulevard that I
had walked on two days in row already and not noticed the roof top sign for the
PENCIL SUPERMARKET....a commerical plaza much like many in many other Asian
cities and countries from Turkey to Japan.

We pushed our cart around picking up water, juices, drinks, snacks and then
walked back to the hotel.

The opening banquet started around 6 and ended between 8 and 8:30.

They had the room tables marked with the house projects we had been assigned. 
At the table sat the family whose home Team 14, the team I am on will build this
week.  Though they could not speak English we were able to communicate through
smiles, head nods and other body language.  The wife/mother was holding their 4
month old baby boy and their 4 year boy was with his grandmother at another
table.  He kept returning to our table to get his parents'attention and
eventually showed he was bored and tired and wanted to go home

Sound familiar parents?

Coincidentally two of the men I had met since arriving: Larry from Arizona and
Neale from Toronoto, initially from Australia sat at my table and Neale who told
me at breakfast that he usually is a TEAM CAPTAIN buy would not be this time had
been asked to fill in for someone who could not come.

The usual official speeches from dignitaries from Cambodia, the US ambassador
and a video from Jimmy Carter we were treated to on-going traditional music by a
band of about 8 men and some great traditional dancing by women and men in
fantastic traditional costumes.

After about 45 min to an hour of opening speeches we were let loose on the
various food buffets both inside and outside of the banquet room.

The other two volunteers at our Table 14 were Soryl, woman who has worked on 4
other projects, from Montreal, and a woman, a nurse from the west coast, who was
originally from Australia who married an American man years ago.

The table discussion varied and was fun.

Much eating.

Around 8:15 I said goodbye because I was tired and we had to get up at 5 am.
  Living a long time Dream that turned into a nightmare last night.

I abruptly woke up at 12:30 and run to the bathroom.

Since 12:30 am this morning I have been deathly ill with diarhia and throwing
up.   Something I ate on the street or during the opening banquet had attacked
my intestines and stomach.

I have been fantasing, then dreaming then making happen this opportunity to work
on a Jimmy Carter Project.

After 12 to 15 years of dreaming I couldn't work on the first day because I was
too sick.

As my system has slowly corrected itself with the help of Imodien, Tums and a
helluva lot of water, just rest and a little tv watching.  I am only screemish
now.  I have stop exiting fluids and small pieces of food from both ends of my
body.

After studying WHAT's Good About It? Then I look at my passions and purposes for
why I am alive.  If whatever happens hasn't destroyed any of those.  I move on.

SHIT HAPPENS

I can guarantee you that after the last 12+ hours of staying in my Imperial
Garden & Villa Hotel room.

I am in Phnom Penh with the Jimmy Carter Cambodian Habitat for Humanity Project
this week.  I wouldn't want to be anywhere else in the world right now.

My plan is to continue to rest and join my team in the morning and continue to
take it easy while helping to build our home.

I had a bought of Cholera in 1977 which makes this a joke.

This is not a joke, just frustrating that I let down the team and the family
whose house we will build this week.

Best wishes,

Wandering Alan, who hopefully will not wander to his bathroom as much tonight.

Last day in Singapore, First day in Phnom Penh

Yesterday morning I got up early once again.  No email in my room.  So I went
downstairs to the office and used theirs.  Then I returned to my room to pack
for my 1:00 pm departure to the Changi Airport heading to Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

I chose after another fine, complete range breakfast, to wander in a new
direction and photograph all I could see and find.

The day before I had seen a sign that said River Road which intrigued me if it
led to the river.  So. I walked that road and eventually found the river close
to where I had been wandering the day before.  This time I walked along the
river heading towards the famous Boat Quay and beyond with no real plan except
to return between 11 and 12 to change clothes and rest before my 1:00 pm taxi
ride to the airport.

As I wandered along the edge of the Singapore River I saw the SINGAPORE FLYER in
the far distance and decided I would treat myself to another ride on the tallest
ferris wheel in the world, or at least they claim it is in Singapore.  The EYE
in London may be taller.

Along the way I passed the famous auditorium that was first described to me as
FLY EYES.  The design is very similar to the Asian fruit darian that is much
like a porcupine on the outside or a dangerous pineapple, it smells terrible,
yet the fruit is very sweet.

As I walked along the edge of the river near the Escaplade (Auditorium, Theater,
complex) I saw the preparations for the giant dinner to be held for the
dignitaries in Singapore for APEC, including President Obama who is flying in
from Tokyo to Singapore and then onto China.

A tremendous amount of design, style, class and money has been put into the
preparations for APEC and it showed around the Esplanade.

Eventually I got to a point where I was told to leave because I shouldn't have
been there.

So off to the side of the road away from the River heading to the base of the
giant FLYER to see Singapore once again from 165 meters in the air.

From the top Singapore seems to stretch forever towards the horzion for most of
180 degrees below you.

The financial district and the convention district are filled with giant towers
all screaming, look at me, look at me, ain't I beautiful.  Beyond those
complexes are a mix of others that are hotels and extremely expensive condos
high-rises.  Surrounding and beyond all those are thousands of HDB - Housing
Development Board built buildings financed by the government and sold to
citizens to make a profit for future investment and development.

After I completed the cycle ride I headed back through the streets and tunnels
to the City Hall MRT Station for my last MRT ride to Somerset and my hotel one
last time.

I got to the Changi Airport in plenty of time and wandered through it, buying
one more book with the remains of my Singaporean cash and finding a sushi
restaurant and a cookie stand before heading to my F59 gate and my Silk Air
flight to Phnom Penh.

Smooth, comfortable flight with inflight comedy movies and a small, a little
spicy chicken meal.

At the entrance hall I walked by the visa counter with its dozen or so uniform
dressed employees/officials, not realizing that that was STOP ONE.

I had suddenly realized once I got inside gate area for F59 that I had packed
the extra visa photos I had had taken at FedEx for Cambodia and Vietnam in my
CHECKED luggage.  I had decided to lighten my load and gamble that my luggage
would arrive in Phnom Penh.

When I mildy paniced and went up to the check in counter to ask what I might do
without a photo.

I was told "no problem"they will take it at the Phnom Penh airport as part of
the prcoess.

As I worked my way into the visa, customs, duty check points I was sent back not
for the photo but for the visa that I had missed and hadn't paid the required
$20 as an American passport holder.  Canadian holders don't have to pay
anything.

hmmmm?

Just past the duty free check were friendly faces: Cambodian and western
(apparently) wearing bright green Habitat for Humanity t-shirts.  It was great
to see the shirts and their happy faces. The one I heard speak I called an
Aussie, turned out to be a Kiwi who teased me about that.

There were 3 of us arriving on the same flight.  One Aussie now living in
Toronto, Canada, one Aussie still living in Perth and me from Athens, Georgia.

Off we road to our hotel the many miles through the vast stretches of Phnom Penh
through the slowly darkening skies.

It was Saturday night and the streets were filled.  I mean FILLED with some
cars, a few trucks, some busses, and thousands of motorbikes and push bikes. 
Everybody flowing together of both sides of the road and sometimes people were
going the opposite direction on the other sides of the road.  Also others were
blending at 90 degrees to cross the road.

I don't recall ever seeing a standard 3 color stop, caution, go traffic light or
as you call then in South Africa (Ena and others), no robots.

Eventually we arrived at the Imperial Garden Hotel after having passed under
several Jimmy Carter Habitat for Humanity banners welcoming all the volunteers
and announcing the various projects.

Our hotel is at the edge of the spot where the Mekong and two other wide rivers
flow into each other and out to the sea to the south.

After getting situated in my room I chance met up with Neale from Toronto again
who was off to find something to eat in town.  He has worked on a previous JCH4H
project here.  So I tagged along.

We passed the official King's Palace and found one of his favorite street cafes
and settled in for pizza, drinks and lots of conversation.

After we returned we went to our rooms.  I turned on my tv and watched an
episode of PSCYH, funny detective show I have watched maybe once or twice since
it first came on a few years ago.

Then it was time for sleep.

At breakfast time around 8 I approached the vast buffet, made some selections
and was about to set up outside next to the pool and instead decided to
introduce myself to another JC Project volunteer.  Larry from Arizona.  We had a
great talk about what brought us here to this particular project.

Then I said goodbye and ended up connecting with Chad and eventually his sister
Sue who both went to school at UGA.  Chad worked on both of JC's presidential
campaigns and Sue works for H4H International now in Atlanta.

Our plan was to wander together including finding a way to get to the KILLING
FIELDS.  I had thought about going there it was not high on my list.  What has
been high on my list is the famous temple site Amwar Wat (spelling?).  Shortly
after walking away from the hotel I sensed that their way of wandering would not
coincide with mine and they were interested in different things.  Plus they were
moving far too fast for my photographing pace.

So I said goodbye and said I would see them later or at the dinner tonight at
the huge palatial hotel next to our spreading 2 and 3 story villa clusters that
spread for blocks much like a FLorida condo development.

Instead I walked across the giantly wide street/blvd towards what I thought was
a 5 star hotel and mall.  Instead it turned out to be a casino and hotel. 
Photoed a little and continued on to photo the Buddhist looking temple right
next door.  It turned out to be a Buddhist University.

Then though I hadn't brought back up batteries I chose to contine walking for
awhile and then would go get another set of batteries.

I ended up wandering along different very wide boulevards photographing street
scenes, people, temples after temples, monuments, side street scenes, houses,
gates, doorways, etc.

One of my minor goals was to find a grocery store to buy some extra water
bottles, juices, etc., which I never found.

Along the way I saw a young traveler who was walking along one of the hug
thoroughfares as I was flipping his water"/drink bottle onto every bench he
passed.  I found that intersting and decided to follow him to find out the story
before his bottle flipping.

A couple times he did as some children passed him and the found it great fun.

When I finally caught up to him to ask the story...

"I find it fun to do it so I do it and keep doing it."

He is a civil engineering student from Lithuania who is taking a year off to
travel and decide what he wants to do with his life.  He's thinking about
getting a job in Cambodia teaching English.

Every person has many stories, if we only take time to ask for them and truly
listen.

It is now about 1:00 pm and I am going to work on my photos and rest for awhile.

Tah Tah from Tuk Tuk land....the motorscooter type taxis that are everywhere as
dense as flies and gants.

Wandering Alan

Sleeping at odd times in Singapore

It is 4:19 am here and I have been up since about 3:30 after falling asleep last
night around 6:30 or 7 after a long day of "wandering".

My day started with working on my computer and the internet when I could get
access.  This beautiful hotel has an airport or provider system that doesn't
work completely or thoroughly in my room on the 9th floor all the time.

I came down to ask the front desk and the clerk simply invited me to work on
their office computer, which I have been doing ever since I came down, answering
and sending emails.

Around 9:15 my young businessman friend arrived to pick me up to go to breakfast
with him and one of his business colleagues. Joshua and his parents have been my
very kind hosts during two separate visits to Singapore by inviting me to stay
in their beautiful home in the Bedok area of Singapore on the eastern end of the
island country.

We drove into the central part of Singapore City to a beautiful hotel and met up
with Stanley to meet.  Because it was after 9:30 it turned out they had already
had their breakfast at their respective homes but I had "breakfast meeting" in
my head and had not taken the time to have my daily "complimentary breakfast" at
my own hotel.

The buffet at the hotel that we had our meeting stretched along one wall of the
dining area for several meters in a wave form curving in and out along the long
wall.  Opposite the wave were a couple islands of food.  Meats, seafood, salads,
porridges, pancakes, eggs, cheeses, pastries, fruit....the list goes on and on.

Hotels here pride themselves and compete in the depth, breath and expansiveness
of their "breakfast buffets".

The one I had was definitely not complimentary from the hotel.  We were not
guests.  Stanley kindly paid for my small feast.

Stanley has been successful banker and investment agent/broker who has been
given a wonderful golden parachute and choosing to go into human development as
a coach with young people in helping them explore how to prepare and plan their
professional and personal lives.

Joshua connected us because he believed that my experience and thoughts might be
helpful to Stanley.

We had great fun talking about what he has done, what he is doing, and what is
he wanting to do. Sometimes my 49 years of work and study and experiences with
47 different jobs in 8 different professions is considered valuable to other
people.

It was fun meeting another very intelligent and creative young Singaporean.  In
Stanley's case he sounds British.  He was educated in Britain at Oxford and
Cambridge prior to returning to Singapore to work in the banking and investment
fields about 15 years ago.

After we completed our "breakfast" meeting Joshua drove me towards the Orchard
Road MRT station so that I could begin my wandering for the day, first to Little
India to explore.

As we drove along one of the heavily rain forest landscaped, greenspace areas I
spotted a Hindu temple I had never seen before and asked him to stop and let me
off to begin my wandering.

Almost everywhere in Singapore there are sights: human-made or natural,
controlled by humans; that are fun to see.

Off I walked, click, click, click went the sound of my camera capturing what my
eyes were being treated to in all directions.

I wasn't sure where I really was except I could see some very tall buildings in
the distance in different directions which narrowed down the possibilities of
where I was.

I was wandering, exploring, having an adventure on a sunny morning.  Actually it
looked like rain would happen at any time.  It is the rainy season here.

Click, click, click.

I continued on my adventure in search of an MRT station in route to Little India
and wherever else I would wander during the last quiet day here in Singapore.

Eventually I turned one corner and there in the distance was the Sun Tel tower
screaming into the sky far above.  I suddenly knew where I was.  I was a couple
blocks from my hotel, which I had not realized.

So I returned to my hotel, to rested and to cool down.

Within a few moments the skies opened up into a downpour of heavy rain darkening
the sky to a deep gray.  The rain lasted for at least an hour or two.  During
that time I wrote and tried to find something to watch on my television or my
computer through the internet.

Finally I changed clothes and off I went by foot and MRT to Little India to
explore.  Little India is located off the Northeast Line, the purple line and
the Somerset and Orchard Road Stations are on the north south line, the red
line. They are connected at the Dolby Ghaut intersection that I have used
several times this week in route to different destinations.  China Town is also
along the Purple Line in the opposite direction from the Dobly Ghaut
intersection.

There is a very large, multi-level Market connected to the MRT station where you
can by groceries of many kinds, clothing, electronics, and seems like almost
anything.  Surrounding that massive building are street after street of the
classic Victorian 3 to 4 story buildings with shops and restaurants on the
ground floors all painted in multi- or different colors and designs.

Diversity, variety are the constant or consistent features and factors
throughout most of Singapore.

Because it was still continously raining I decided not to explore the streets of
Little India and instead find another destination after walking around the
Market click, click, clicking as I walked sample images of the market.

Once I got inside the MRT I decided I would go to Clarke Quay (key) where I have
been many times before.  It is a very modern commercial area in contrast to
Little India or Chinatown plus it is located along both sides of the Singapore
River that weaves through the city and country.

Once I got to the surface from the MRT station I saw that it was still raining,
slightly.  It was going to be a full day of rain for sure.  The sun would not be
seen that day.

I wandered through a mix of commercial and restaurant areas on both sides of the
Singapore River.  Many memories I being there at Clarke Quay before flashed
through my mind as I wandered.

Finally I lost interest in being there and decided to return to the MRT station
and head to another destination and to find a less expensive source of lunch.

Clarke Quay is very trendy and very expensive.  Many to most of the resaurants
have outside eating ares along the river's edge, some even on boats moored at
the river's edge.  All were empty except for the random stray person having a
late lunch or mid-afternoon beverage.

I crossed back over the long bridge in search of a FOOD COURT, a more modest
source of my lunch not knowing if there might even be one in the bowels of one
of the continous row of commercial centers that form the giant continous wall
along boths sides of the river.

I remembered seeing a Subway and a Burger King and I did have a little craving
for a hamburger but I dislike both of those two fast food chains nowadays.

As I entered the high-rise building that I had seen the Subway and BK in I saw a
sign that pointed towards CENTRAL MARKET.  Hmmm?  That seemed  like what I was
craving and in search of.  Off I went following the signs not really knowing
where I was going or what the CENTRAL MARKET really would be.

After a mixture of stairs and escalators I began finding small shops and
restaurants along a narrow hallway and then suddenly the hallway opened and
there were a small collection of Japanese food stalls and shops.  I chose one
and had some Terriyaki and vegetables.

Finishing my meal I wandered off in search of a sweat or pastry strolling down
the various small, short ceilinged hallways and found a wonderful muffin shop. 
There was a donut shop that sold a vast variety of "donut seeds", tiny, 1 1/2 to
2 inch diameter decorated donuts.  Others sold drinks.  Others candies of many
types.

Eventually my drive became to move on, to find the MRT and go to another
destination.

I was feeling tired and decided to return to my hotel to rest,find out if I had
any messages, internet, download photos.

After downloading my day's photos to my SmugMug account I laid down to rest and
watch episodes of the Daily Show (John Stewart) and the Colbert Report, the only
dvds I have been able to access that will stream easily on my computer or will
not give me a message...

"the dvd you are seeking is not available in your region"

The next thing I knew I was waking up at 9 pm.  Rolled over and went back to
sleep until 3 am this morning.

Another day of WANDERING IN SINGAPORE complete.

Now to pack and prepare to fly to Phnom Phen this afternoon.

Got my boarding pass printed out yesterday afternoon after confirming my flight.

Not sure how much access to the internet I will have during the next week in
Cambodia.

I am confident that the 5-star hotel in Ho Chi Ming City will have access.

So you may not receive my next message for over a week and I'll have lots of
photos of the building project I will have worked on.

Best wishes to you,

to see my most recent posted photos go to...

http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com

Wandering Alan on the move once again

Working and Wandering with Friends in Singapore

Hello again my virtual traveling friends and family members.

Tuesday and Wednesday I did my two-day, all-day, workshop: BROKEN CRAYONS based
upon my book: BROKEN CRAYONS: Break Your Crayons and Draw Outside the Lines. 
The SIM - Singapore Institute for Management has been promoting it two times a
year for the past couple years and successfully sold it now twice and this week
was the second time.

The venue for the workshop was the Singapore Marriott at the corner of Orchard
and Scott Roads in the heart of the most commercial part of Singapore (hmm?
somewhat redundant statement...so much of Singapore is focused on
commercializing).

After working all day on Tuesday with my group I returned to my hotel a short
distance from the Marriott, actually about 1 to 1 1/2 miles to rest and mentally
regroup before being picked up by my friend, poet and fellow creativity
professor, writer and consultant: Kirpal Singh for dinner.  Since we met in 2003
our lives have coincided at several conferences in the US and Singapore and we
have corresponded on a mostly regular basis.

Kirpal even included a mention about me in his book published in 2003 not long
after we first met.

6 Turbans and 6 Hats

After having eaten at a mixture of Asian meals at FOOD COURTS, hotels,
restaurants and take away places Kirpal suggested we try an AMERICAN restaurant
called Dan Ryan's.  I gather the name comes from Chicago.

We had great fun catching up on each other's lives and discussing issues
important to both us and to us separately.

When I first began traveling internationally in 1977 I mostly kept to myself
everywhere I went around the globe.  Then in 2001 when I planned my first trip
completely around the globe I began reaching out to everyone I knew or had ever
met in the various countries and asked if we might get together for a drink or
small meal.

This change has grown to make my traveling far richer and much more fun.

Now if I could start doing the same thing in Athens whenever I return.  Ha ha!

I am not only a consultant because I am a minimum of 50 miles from home I am
also a friend from 50 or more miles away from home it seems.

Wednesday morning I was back at the Marriott after a taxi ride from my hotel
through the busy streets of the Orchard and Scott Roads area of Singapore.

At lunchtime my friend of the past 10 years, Henry Tio, came to join me and my
group.  Henry has been a professor and consultant of creative thinking and
problem solving for several years.  He teaches in the largest creativity program
I am aware of in the world at his school Nee Ang Polytechnical University.  Now
all entering freshmen are required to take the creativity courses that up to 20
different colleagues of Henry's teach.

Henry is one of those wonderful people who is always smiling, laughing and
ALWAYS finds the Positive in every situation and person.

He arrived about 11:30 while I was having the participants work with the
creative thinking tool/technique/process titled: Brain Writing and various
versions of it.  He started out by observing them inside the room and when I led
them outside onto the balcony/hallway outside our room so they could experience
the process in a different environment and from a different perspective.

At lunch he spoke with some of the students at our large table set aside for our
group.  After lunch I invited him to tell about what he does and the program at
Nee Ang.

After the program was completed around 5 my American Ex-Pat now Singaporean
friend from Minneapolis, Michael Podolinsky, who was teaching in the room next
to me for SIM also that day joined me for our pre-arranged dinner.

We got on the MRT very near the Marriott and road to the Newton Circle station
and walked to a large open food court that Michael often eats at.

Michael and I met in the US years ago through our joint membership and
involvement in the National Speakers Association and began to deepen our
friendship in 2005 when he had moved permanently to Singapore with his
Singaporean wife and their 3 children and we were both attending and presenting
at the first-ever International Federation of Professional Speakers Conference
held at the Copthorne Hotel along the Singapore River.  Ever since then we have
gotten together for dinner and/or drinks each time we have both been in
Singapore.

Our dinner was great fun.

Thursday morning I was again on my own to wander up to 11:00 when I had
scheduled a meeting with the current president of the Asian Speakers Association
at my hotel.

By 8:30 I was on the streets after another mixed Complimentary Breakfast in the
restaurant connected to the hotel to wander the length of Orchard Road.  I have
done that walk years ago and wanted to do it this time to capture the street
environment as much as I could visually and to get some exercise at the same
time.

When you go to the older, classical, Victorian era, English colonial era parts
of Singapore you see masses or rows or streets after streets or rows of the
typical 3 or 4 story buildings all 20 to 25 feet wide all with the same original
Victorian architectural detailing and designs.

The basic plan of all of them matches what is found around the world at that
time...

1st floor commerical
2nd floor professional or residential
3rd and if 4th floor residential.

During my various trips here and especially walking Orchard and Scott Roads I
have seen very much the same plan on a much larger scale in 6 to 8 to possibly
40 to 60 story buildings.

The first two or three floors are predominantly commercial.  The next few floors
are professional and all the floors above whether 2 or 3 or 40 or more floors
are residential, housing, or hotels (housing)

One other difference with the high-rise structures is that there is also 2 to 4
sub-terranean levels that all typically all connected along the same side of the
respective streets with tunnels connecting to the buildings on the other side of
the streets and all those connecting to the MRT stations.

All like one gigantic MALL that never seems to quit.  And it isn't quitting
because they keep building more of them or tearing down older, more out of date,
shorter ones and replacing them with much more modern or the absolutely most
modern versions of even bigger ones.

When you look at the photos see if you can see all the different, seemingly
separate Plazas, Malls, Complexes and all the other creative names they use for
them.

Around 10 I returned to my hotel room once again.  My shirt was totally soaking
wet.  So I relaxed, cooled down and changed clothes as I had expected I would
need to do.

At 11 Nishant Kasibhatla, originally from India, now from Singapore, a memory
expert and speaker arrived so that we could meet.

As I mentioned he is this year's president of ASA.

We had great fun while opening a friendship that may last for years to decades.

A little after 12 we walked to the Somerset MRT station so that I could travel
to my pre-arranged lunch time, afternoon and dinner
meeting/gathering with two long time friends/colleagues and a mutual American
Ex-Pat friend.

Lee Say Keng, Dilip Mukerja and Doug O'Loughlin and I had a great time talking,
sharing, challenging thoughts and ideas at Say Keng's apartment near the
Lakeside MRT station far to the western part of Singapore far from the central
Orchard Road area.

Each of us does workshops on overlapping topics and each of us have strong
opinions and are highly creative and not shy about sharing and challenging at
the same time.

Around 7:30 we walked over to the same food court that Say Keng and I had had a
light lunch around 1:30 a few hours before.

Both meals Say Keng chose courses for me or us and we shared them in the nearly
full open food court.

Everyone of the initially built by the government complexes have their own
separate food courts with mixtures of food depending upon the pre-dominant
culture that lives their: Chinese, Malay, Muslim, Indian, etc.  They also have
their own recreation areas for the children and parks for both children and
adults along with much green area surrounding the high-rise towers ranging from
6 to 8 or 10 to 12 or 15 to 20+ stories.

Beyond those complexes are many privately developed complexes that are usually
much more expensive and more more architecturally elaborate.

After dinner Dilip was going to drive me back to the Lakeside MRT so I could
return to my hotel.  Instead he kindly drove me all the way into Singapore City
right to the front door of my hotel.

We said good night and Dilip drove off with me forgetting to give him the money
we had previously agreed to for the new books of his I asked for.

I tried for the next hour to 90 minutes to contact him via email or at least to
get access to his phone number so I could call and make arrangements to give him
the money.

Alas the internet service in my portion of the hotel was not functioning until
this morning after I work up.

A beautiful, fun-filled and adventuresome day was darkened by my blunder.

Now it is 7:39 Friday morning and I will be joining my Singaporean friend of
several years who I first met in South Africa.  After we met he and his
wonderful parents, wife and children had me as their guests during two of my
visits when they opened their joint home to me.

The days of both those weeks were fabulous.

I began Uncle Alan to Joshua's beautiful son and daughter and an adopted son or
friend to his parents and brother.

Today Jonathan is introducing me to one of his long-time friends because he is
interested in doing similar work to what I have done for the past nearly 30
years.

This afternoon my plan had been to go to Batam, Indonesia to spend time with
Eldi who I met when I went there the first time just to experience a flavor of a
small island in the far western part of Indonesia.  Eldi, his 10 year old
daughter and 5 year old son and I met by accident in the Duty-Free Mall
connected to the docks of Batam when I was taking some photos of the interior of
the Mall.

Eldi with his children came out of the store they were in and said hello to me. 
We spoke briefly and he then offered to show me around his city, Batam and we
went to his home outside the city where we sat and talked some more over some
cool juice before he had to go pick up his wife from work and the two of them
returned me to my ferry boat.  Since then we have corresponded via the internet.

The plan was for all four of them and I to get together but alas after all of
what I have been doing this week I need the afternoon to slow down, repack and
prepare for my week in Cambodia as a volunteer with the Habitat for Humanity
Project I was selected for along with 100 to 150 other volunteers from around
the world.

So I may go off to Little India and perhaps one or two other areas to wander and
take my time after my breakfast with Joshua and his friend Stanley.

Best wishes,

Wandering Alan still in Singapore one more day

APEC delegates, President Obama and other world leaders may be filling Singapore
this week,  I am just wandering in it.

In preparation for my two day workshop that starts today here my plans for my
Wanderings in Singapore involved obtaining some last minute materials sparked by
seeing the venue where I will be doing my session.

Once again woke up in the dark and wrote the previous message until the sun rose
behind a heavy, heavy totally gray blanket of rain clouds.

The loss of the sunrise was replaced by the wonderful bird songs and calls that
I could hear as I looked over my right shoulder towards the horizon miles away
from my 9th floor hotel room.

My plan for the day loosely consisted of...

1. have another wonderful breakfast, small exploratory tasty portions
2. find the art and school supplies stores, shops, stalls to purchased paper,
crayons, balloons and perhaps some fun objects or toys
3. connect with Henry and Tania to arrange times to meet face to face
4. go to Little India
5. explore
6. have dinner with Rob and Clare

You see I live a PLANNED LIFE.  Everything and day is "planned" just some to
many times I PLAN IT AFTER I DO IT or it is DONE TO ME!

After eating another delicious breakfast: chicken sausage (a must for me), fruit
bread, fried egg, beans (good for the system and tasty too), mashed potatoes,
slice of ham and a fruit bowl of pineapple, papaya, prunes and white fruit
(turned out to be melon, which I do not like the taste of...did try it not
knowing what it was)...I was off to begin my day.

Walked along Devonshire Road once again to the Somerset SMRT station once again.
Down the escalators, along the walkways to the entrance turnstyles to the the
train platform heading towards the City Hall interchange.

From their I would find BEACH street and begin walking to find the CONCOURSE
complex where there are shops that Suzanna Ramos recommended I look for. Sue is
a great Singaporean friend, who is in Texas with husband Hector working on their
own doctorates in creativity.

I remembered some of what I saw on Beach Road stretching from the Padang park
area in the central part of Singapore City and within a couple blocks I passed
the world renown, Raffles Hotel, built during the Victorian Era of England and
Singapore.  Also I noticed that the street I would also possible need to go to
was one of the streets that the Raffles Hotel is located along: Bras Basah.  I
was in.  I had myself oriented.  I had a plan, as George Prepard (Spelling) use
to always say in every episode of THE A TEAM, and "I love it when a plan comes
together."

In about 15 to 20 minutes of walking at a comfortable pace along Beach Road I
looked up to the right across the road and saw the unique tower I learned years
ago is named the CONCOURSE.  I had been there before to buy supplies for a
previous workshop upon Suzanna's earlier recommendation.

My plan was working. Yeah.

I climbed up the very steep steps up to the bridge over Beach Road and down the
steps on the other side and over to the Concourse Tower and inside looking for
the lower two floors of shops.

It didn't look familiar.

I looked for an information counter and saw one in the distance on the other
side of the building.  When I approached and asked, "Where can I find the shops
area?" the security employee said,

"sorry sir those were torn down two years ago."

Ooops! My plan wasn't coming together.

Off to Bras Basah Road for my second attempt, Suzanna's backup plan.

I stopped to pick up a warm tasty muffin and notice the woman next to me was
holding a drawing and ask her where she knew there might be an art supply and/or
a school supply store.  She of course said "at the Bras Basah Complex.

I was disappointed by not frustrated.  It was time for Plan B.

While walking along Beach Road I had been looking up and own the various side
streets to see what I could see possibly on my return route.  The side streets
were lined with traditional blocks of the classic 2 and 3 story Victorian Style
architecture in many colors and many new face lifts or designs, plus I saw a
large mosque that looked intriguing.

I would simply use my trip as an adventure, an exploration, a source of exercise
in my ever continuing plan to trim down and strengthen my health every day.

Click, click, click, I took many photos of the Victorian buildings which tend to
fascinate me until I once again found the street that grandely leads to the
entrance of the large mosque.

Not knowing how much time my "initial, though already modified plan" might take
I didn't go inside to see the mosque, simply took some photos to remember it
with and continued onward to North Bridge Road which I knew parallels Beach Road
and serves as another edge road of the entire block size Raffles Hotel and my
next destination, the Bras Bashar Complex.

Because Singapore is always building, rebuilding, adding, replacing, improving,
refinishing itself there are always new, highly modern buildings to see and many
beautifully to ho-hum refurbished buildings to see and photograph.

In a short while I was back at Bras Basah Road.

Alas after walking up and back a few blocks I couldn't find the building or
shops I was seeking.

I decided I would return to my hotel room and "re-plan".

I retraced my MRT movements and returned to the comfort of my hotel room in the
low clouds.  The weather still looked like potential rain at any time.

After many attempts to reach Henry Tio who had left a message both by phone
calls and emails I did some more www searching for art and school supplies
stores in Singapore and worked up another tentative plan and rewrote to many of
my Singapore friends to explain about the "no longer standing Concourse shops"
and my not being able to find the Bras Basah Complex on Bras Basah road.

About an hour later I changed my sweat drenched clothes and left on another
adventure determined to find my supplies if not at the Bras Basah Complex at
shops along Orchard Road.

After asking several people for tips and directions, you see I do not suffer
from the MOSES SYNDROME any longer.  I will stop and ask for directions, I found
the Bras Basah Complex along North Bridge a block away from the street with the
same name.

I had walked by it earlier not knowing I had.

It turned out to be a commercial complex of small to medium to large shops I had
visited a few times before not knowing its name.

Got the colored paper and crayons.  No balloons. No props or toys.

Off to Orchard Road to try to find the address I had found on the www.

Wandering along Orchard Road looking for an address is a challenge.  No address
numbers are posted on the buildings and many employees have no "foggy idea" what
the address of the buildings they work in are.

Eventually I went back to the LUCKY PLAZA complex and entered it in search of
balloons and some lunch possibly once again if it was not overly crowded like
yesterday afternoon.

Once again after asking the Information/Security Guard person I ventured
upstairs in search of balloon store.

After several non-successes one of the shop owners gave me the location I needed
and viola I had a bag of balloons and a source of possible props, objects, toys
but after looking at what they had decided I would not do that and just return
to my hotel.

Down Orchard Road again photographing Christmas Display after Christmas Display
heading once again back to my hotel.

When I rounded the corner in the last stretch I noticed another huge commercial
complex with a huge, high ceiling lobby with several restaurants or stalls that
sell food and decided to stop for lunch before I walked that last kilometer or
two back to the Orchard Grand Court Hotel, my home du joir in Singapore.

When I returned to the surface level I saw that it was raining.

IT WAS POURING DOWN!   Thousands of people in all directions were hiding in
protection out of the torrential rain that was coming down.

After watching a few people venture into it as the rain slowed some I took out
my red plastic rain poncho and my mini-collapsible umbrella, rearranged the
contents of my back pack, my successfully FOUND supplies, took off my sandals,
rolled up my pant legs and ventured out into the slowing down rain.

Back at my hotel room again I took off my second set of now mostly totally rain
drenched clothes and decided to rest and regroup before I would take a taxi to
meet up with Rob and Clare (Welch and English friends who are colleagues of a
mutual colleague Ken who lives in Melbourne, Australia) at the Picotin
restaurant they had chosen for the night's meal.

I decided I would lay down and watch some tv, after no success accessing FREE
DVDS on my laptop I turned on the hotel room's tv and watched an Episode of an
American CSI type program.

Next thing I knew I woke up and its was 6:38 and I immediately got dressed and
ventured out to find a taxi.  Slowly, every so slowly we moved through the
dense, gridlock traffic and found the Picotin restaurant, the sight of a famous
horse racing track and center.

Had a good tasting meal and lots of laughs with my friends after which they
drove me back through the not so heavily dense roads and once again another day
of adventure had ended.

Everything I do is planned.

Just some times I plan it after I do it, or it is done to me.

Off to work now.

Best wishes,

Wandering Alan beginning his 3rd day in Singapore.

Singapore is to be seen, smelled, tasted, heard & felt

I have been very fortunate to have been to Singapore now 8 times starting with
twice in 2001, 2003, 2004, twice in 2005, 2008 and now in 2009.

Sunday began, actually Saturday didn't really end for me trip trip.

I managed to rest though sleep very little during the 31 hour journey from my
home in Athens to my hotel in Singapore.

After trying to rest and get some sleep I finally gave up Sunday and wrote my
second message that explained many of the events and details of the journey
here.

Around 8 I went down for my first COMPLIMENTARY BREAKFAST.  I have enjoyed
eating breakfasts in Singapore because there are always so many, many varieties
of things available: variety of cooked eggs, meats: bacons, sausages; fish,
soups, breads, fruits, pastries and the list goes on.  The most complete
breakfasts I saw were in Sri Lanka and in Kuala Lumpur.

Here in Singapore it is like a badge of honor, an ongoing competition among the
hotels from the 1 star to the 5 star to provide a COMPLIMENTARY BREAKFAST.

Actually I have grown to prefer to eat such a complete breakfast every 2nd or
3rd day.

Being of Scottish and English thanks to my parents I tend to be CHEAP and always
want to get my MONEY'S WORTH and eat.

Yesterday I chose to focus on using a small plate and tasting the various items
I chose instead of treating eating as a COMPETITION--Eat All You Can Event.

My breakfast as you can see in my photos included:

First Course

scrambled eggs...some of the best tasting I have ever had
one small slice of what was called French Toast...it was tasty
2 chicken sausages...one of my favorite Asia foods
beans (ala the English breakfast style)
a small piece of what was called "Butter Cake"

Second Course

Dried Mango one piece
papaya 3 small pieces
one orange wedge
2 pieces of Jack Fruit
and a couple pieces of
Ranbutan w/ pineapples...didn't see the pineapple may have been the juice only

In the background of the restaurant that the hotel has an arrangement with the
music was all dated American, including Michael Jackson.

The restaurant was mostly empty when I entered it and began to fill in as I ate.

Asians representing different countries, a couple Scandinavians, 1 American
looking fellow, 2 or 3 Indians

After breakfast I made phone calls to connect with some of my Singaporean
friends to work up the details for when we would meet during the week.

My communication tools are:

1. word of mouth
2. hotel employees looking out for me
3. hotel phone
4. the internet

When I reached Rob Devine by phone he invited to join him and some of his ex-Pat
cronies (Brits, Aussies, South Africans and a rare American) at the 62nd
SINGAPORE CRICKET CLUB's INTERNATIONAL RUGBY SEVENS on the open field called The
Padang, which is a giant area with the Cricket Club's building on it and the
stands and temporary Rugby field setup on it.  It is located across St. Andrews
Road from the church by the same name hidden behind its very old trees.

I have watched Rugby with friends, colleagues and hosts in New Zealand,
Australia, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, England and have gone to a match in Cardiff,
Wales.  I understand some of it and enjoy watching the rough and challenging
game.

The argument about it being rougher than American Football got old a long time
ago.  I merely say to any Rugby or Soccer/Football outside the US fan who puts
US Football down is..

"Have you ever played it with 11 200 to 400 pound men in heavy equipment trying
to kill you just because you have the funny shaped ball in your hands?"

All 3 sports are demanding and take great skill, knowledge and experience to
play well.  They simply are different.  I have grown to accept that general
point of view instead of taking sides.

I found Rob in the stands and watched a couple hours with him asking him
probably tiring questions about the game as it was happening.

He actually was explaining what was happening on purpose for my benefit
actually.

He coaches young boys teams and his 11 year old son, Cai, is a very good player
and has played since he was 4 or 5.

The SEVENS as they are caused consist of pairs of teams of only 7 players each
playing two halves of 7 minutes each.  There are 4 levels of quality of
teams/divisions.

It was clear which were the much better teams.  The teams sort themselves out
into the levels by their earlier play.

At the Half-Way point in the tournament on Sunday young boys' teams from
Singapore played 4 minute 1/2 games ranging from 5 and under, 7 or 8 and under,
11 and under and don't think any older boys teams played.

The key is the "and under" part of the name.  A 5 year old if good enough can
play with much older boys.  I found that concept very interesting.

Watching two "mobs" (10 to 12 and sometimes more) little 4 or 5 year olds
running up and down the part of the field they were given to play on was a
"trip" in itself.

It was obvious that even the youngest had already learned to work more as team
members and not SUPER STARS.  The game is a game of team strategies involving
running, kicking, passing, and tackling.

For the youngest boys a tackle or "touch" looks similar to American Touch
Football.  The older boys begin to actually tackle.

After a couple hours I said goodbye and headed off to Orchard Road to explore.

Orchard Road is one of the most known shopping streets in Singapore.  Of course
keep in mind every street in Singapore seems to be a "shopping street".  There
are shopping centers inside of shopping centers inside of shopping centers. 
They range from the long time traditional "stahl" type market to the very modern
and expensive and elaborate MALL types too including one of the newest completed
since I was here in the Spring of 2008:

Ion Mall.

All along Orchard and Scott Boulevard and typically most streets there are
continuous 3 to 5 to 8 to 10 or more stories high commercial centers that link
to each other at many different levels below and above line and they in turn
links with all the SMRT stations (Singapore Mass Rapid Transit).

When I came the third time it was also in November and I was immediately take
back by the extensive amount of Christmas and Holiday decoration that is done in
the commercial areas, especially along Scott and Orchard.  This year's is the
most fabulous and elaborate continous display of decorations I have ever seen in
any city in the world.  During the first holiday time I came I also was shown
and then went back to spend time in the Malay and primarily Muslim/Islamic area
along Changi Road at the eastern end of the country where they decorate for New
Year's.  Their colors are predominantly blue, yellow, gold and white.  The
generic commercial areas are red, yellow, gold and touches of many other colors.

After walking through the extremely dense Sunday afternoon crowds of shoppers,
friends, family members spending time with each other, tourists, ex-pats and
early arriving APEC - Asian Pacific Economic Council (not sure of last word)
delegates.

I have never seen the streets here as full as I saw them yesterday.

After photographing some of the high-lighted areas at the intersection of
Orchard and Scott Blvd I went searching for the "regular people" food court that
I had eaten at several times in the past in lieu of expensive, tourist or 5 C
Singaporean spots.

5 Cs....stand for the most important 5 things to young upwardly mobile
Singaporeans of Generation X, Y and Millenium

cash
credit card
condo
car
clothes

They seem to be highly focused on obtaining and owning as much or many of each
of these things as early as possible.

Shop until you drop is for beginners in Singapore.

Singapore because of its focus on keeping it safe prevents crossing of streets
at the street level in most busy areas.  Though I have been here often I still
do not recall where all the underground passageways are.

I searched and searched from the location of the famous intersection with the
Singapore Marriott and the famous TANG's multi-multi-department store towards
the area where my hotel is located.

After walking and searching for awhile I found the entrance to the underground
passageway that lead back under Orchard to the highly dense 5 level commercial
center with the traditional basic and custom food types from most of Asia tucked
in the center of the first level.

I have eaten there at breakfast, lunch and dinner often but NEVER have I seen it
as packed as it was yesterday at 2:00 pm.  Thousands of people, mostly Malay,
Indonesian, Cambodian and Vietnamese I am guessing rather than Chinese, Japanese
or Korean or any Euroeans or Americans other than only single me.

I walked the exterior of the seating are looking at the food items in all the
various stall until I found one and went back to it to get a bowl of dumpling
soup.  Then the challenge was to work through the extremely packed, very tightly
laid out collection of tables until I found an empty seat that the people
already sitting there were willing to share with me.

Actually the seats by custom are open to whomever wants to sit and eat.

Because the soup was very hot I took my time eating eat one blown Asian soup
full at a time.  Then using the scoop-like spoon I picked up the 8 or so
dumplings and ate them, hot but cooler than initially.

Then I left the dense dining/food court and ventured out to the highly dense
continuous waves of people on the streets outside heading to my hotel to change,
check emails and contact the facilities manager at the Marriott to check out my
training/meeting room for Tuesday and Wednesday's program.

Back on the MRT to cut down on the crowds and the heat above ground.  When I got
out of the train area of course I was back into the dense continuously moving
waves of people heading in all directions that were possible...all underground
30 or more feet below the dense crowds on the surface level above.

The Marriott is a very tall hotel right at the corner of Orchard Road and Scott
Boulevard with a giant lobby also filled with Holiday and Christmas decorations.

After "Stan" had opened the room and we talked about my requests for the room I
ventured back to the SMRT station to head to the Harbour to check out
information for my possible trip over to Batam, Indonesia on Friday.  I went
there a few years ago and accidentally met a very friendly young, high tech
businessman and his two children.  He drove me around the town and took me to
their small home.  Small yet he still had a gardener and a multi-purpose
maid/nanny.

Eldi and I have corresponded by email every since then.

Yesterday would have been the best time for me to go for him, his wife and
children but I had several other things plus jet lag and possibly sleep to deal
with.

It is now 4:59 am and still I have had only 2 or 3 hours sleep since arriving
here.

Though I have been here several times I still forget some of the easy things
like that Marina Bay is not where the Harbour is.  No Harbourfront is where the
ferry boats and cruise liners dock.  By mistake after leaving the Marriott I
road the wrong MRT lines to Marina Bay to find out I meant to be at
Harbourfront.  Too tired.  Not thinking clearly.  A little stressed perhaps
because of the crowds.

I retraced my steps and went to the Harbourfront and made it all the way to the
3 level where the sales counters of the 4 ferry boat companies are that service
Indonesia and Singapore.  Got the prices from the 3 that go to Batam and their
boat schedules.

Will make that decision later in the week.

I wandered around the giant commercial complex, 4 or 5 levels high, called
Harbourfront with its restaurants, shops, stalls and makeshift stalls in the
larger open areas and its 2 or 3 different levels or areas of FOOD COURTS.

I often wonder if any Singaporean really eats at home.

Years ago I was the guest of my late friend Sng Tong Hai (he passed away early
this Spring or last Winter in the beginning of the year) and his wife Theresa. 
They use to come to the creativity conference I was involved with for 30 years
and Tong Hai stayed at my home in Athens for a couple nights a couple years.  We
did eat out most of our meals but Theresa and her maid, treated more like a
close friend or sister made some of the meals, especially the birthday feast we
had for Tong Hai's 60th birthday.

When I got back to the Harbourfront SMRT or MRT station I decided to go spend
time at China Town.  I usually find it fun and my initial plans had been changed
to Tuesday evening a few hours earlier while I was at the Rugby Sevens.

There is a China Town and a Little India and a Malay Area in Singapore where you
find many culturally focused items from A to Z and especially food of all types
all day long it seems.

As you exist the China Town MRT Station exit you have 3 or 4 bridges you can
travel over to the other side.  Both sides are filled with commercial centers,
food courts.  On the MRT side is mostly for locals.  On the other side is the
famous China History street with its hundreds of stalls on top of each other
selling mostly to tourists.

After wandering up and back the Tourist street I continued away from the MRT in
search of a "locals, family, regulars restaurant.  I wanted something different.
I didn't want to be surrounded by tourists or ex-pats, just locals enjoying a
true Chinese meal while enjoying watching them together.

I first found a huge Indian Buddhist Center/Temple under reconstruction that one
long wall of it actually founds one side of that end of the main Chinese
traditional shopping street.  In fact I teased an Indian woman about the
building being in the wrong location.  "This should be in Little India".  The
center is huge with so much highly painted multi-colored sculptures of people
and cows at the entrance and scattered along the top of the walls surrounding
the complex.

When I crossed another street parallel to the main road that I crossed from the
MRT station to better photograph the Temple I saw a uniquely designed, painted
pale green, Muslim Center in the opposite direction.  It turns out that China
Town is quite integrated after all.

Slowly, peacefully I strolled looking for the family style, real, locals,
regulars restaurant and finally found it on one of the two non-pedestrian
streets that run parallel with the famous tourist walking stall lined street.

Inside was a large dining room with huge circular tables set up for 8 to 12 or
more.

I was only me needing a table for one.

After looking at the photo menu near the entrance I decided I would try it. 
None of the meals on the menu resembled any I have seen in any Chinese
restaurant I have eaten in in Europe, the US, Australia, New Zealand, the UK nor
even the unique (to me) food I found in Taiwan.

I figured I would find something.

A man in his 50s, a host, one of the partners.  I never did figure that out. 
Just extremely welcoming and friendly.

Almost instantaneously they wove me towards the middle near the cash register
where they was one table for two.  They quickly converted it to a table for one.

Only a couple of the tables has patrons yet.  It was only 5:30 or so.

I looked over the 50 or 60 large postage stamp size photos over and over trying
to select a couple things that I could and wanted to eat.  After explaining to
the friendly host that I can not eat onions, peppers or cucumbers and don't
really like hot spice he recommended a particular chicken with nuts in a brown
sauce and I added some Spring Rolls and a bowl of steamed rice and Chinese Tea
and water.

Quickly over the next 30 minutes or so while I ate and watched they other
guests/patrons eating and having fun with each other the restaurant filled
completely everyone of the large set tables once twice three times over the hour
or more I was there.

Not sure what type of nuts they were.  When I asked one of the serving women she
said "Chinese".  Except for a few most of them seemed extremely hard and I
didn't even try to bite into them.

The Spring rolls were tasty and so was the chicken and the rice was extremely
fresh along with the tea.

Mission/goal/desire accomplished.

Then I ventured back to Orchard Road to see all the decorations in dark of the
night.

What I thought had been crowded conditions from 10 until about 4 when I ventured
off to find the Harbour had by 7:30 ish become even more dense on the surface
street level and the various below ground levels and the numerous tunnels that
help people transfer across the busy busy, heavily trafficed streets above.

All the decorations even as beautiful and fun there were in the sunlight were
even more beautiful and creative in the dark with all their internal or external
lights.

Everywhere I looked to take shots there were people with cameras of every
imaginery size, shape and type taking photos of the lights or their friends or
relatives with the decorations.  Camera phones were being held up and aimed in
all directions.  Some of the more "professional" or at least in their minds
"more professional" were even using tri-pods and setting up in the middle of the
street in the middle of the one section where pedestrians can cross Scott Blvd.

It was truly insane.

I was asked by a few couples to take their photo with all the background.

I even captured some of the scene using the video function of my recently
purchased Fuji camera.

I will post some of those on my newly created YouTube account: alaniscre8ng
later today when I deliberately take some more this evening with more intension
of what I want to capture.

A day full of sights, tastes, scents, textures, feelings, sounds and millions of
people enjoying their Sunday afternoon and evening off.

Remember to go to my

http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com

account to see what I have been describing in full color.
It is now 5:32 am.  Still dark.  I am still not really tired enough to fall
asleep this Monday morning.


Best wishes.

Wandering Alan
alan@...
http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com
http://www.cre8ng.com

"Beam Me Up Scotty" (see some new photos at http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com)

Oh but were international travel, or any travel, as easy as it was for the
members of the Star Trek crew.

Getting to Singapore this time.

I got up on Friday at 4:00 am.

After having breakfast, getting ready,  final repacking adjustments, loading me
care and driving across Athens-Clarke County, I arrived at the Athens Airport
around 5:15 am

My flight to Atlanta left around 6:30 am or so, I had thought it left at 6:10. 
Had a great chat, catching up with Chief Jack Lumpkin who is back working at the
police face at our airport among his top officers who take turns with the extra
job.  Also back were two of the TSA agents I had grown use to seeing and talking
with before boarding at the Athens Airport from 9/11 until Mid-West folded their
Athens tent and left the city without an airline service for awhile.

Last Spring Pacific Wings, a Hawaiian owned airline, won the contract for
serving between Athens and Atlanta and Macon and Atlanta.  Because I hadn't seen
the value to flying to Atlanta the past year I had been driving into the Atlanta
Airport breaking my travel paradigm that had lasted for over 20 years.  In
September to save the time, frustration of driving to Atlanta, parking, paying
for parking and going through the security process in Atlanta I finally used
Georgia Skies (the name of the Georgia service).

The strange thing was that GS flew to Atlanta in 30 minutes but then landed at
the part of the airport for smaller planes.  Then they take their customers by
van to the main South Terminal departure entrance where they the customers would
have to then check in with the airline they were flying with to their
destination.

The young counter person said in September that by October GS would finally have
a gate at Atlanta-Hartsfield and simplify the process.

Well Friday, November 6th they had a gate. Which also meant that they had TSA
presence at the Athens Airport again.

The flight in the 9 seater plane had 7 passengers and was extremely smooth all
the way with its nearly 360 degree views through large windows of the earth
below with its Fall colors showing through the slowly sun rising as we
approached Atlanta.

It was fun figuring out where we were flying after we left Athens and flew west
and slightly north towards Atlanta until we got to a spot over I-85 and headed
due west past 75 and the western side of I-285 and back in for a eastward
direction landing at Hartsfield avoiding the disturb air currents left behind by
the giant airplanes that had landed just before us.

We landed much like planes land at many European, Asian and Central American
Airports, out on a tarmac away from the enclosed gates with their large gangways
that stretch out to connect with the arriving or departing airplanes.

Our plane was far too small to use one of the gangways.

Instead like it the many of the other non-US airports they used a bus to pick us
up and take us to the base of a flight of stairs.  At the top of the stairs was
Gate E-37.

From that point, furthest from either the North or South Terminals and the check
in counter for United Airlines I walked the entire length of that half of the E
Gates to the central spine where the TRAIN runs between all the Gates from A to
E plus T and then onto the baggage claim and ticket counters.

I didn't miss my morning walks on Friday or Saturday and knew I wouldn't be
because I knew I would have a lot of walking to do at the various airports I
would be traveling in and out of all the way to Singapore.

Now that Georgia Skies has gate privileges it can now check backs all the way
through to your final destination, thus eliminating the need to schlep bags to
be checked the entire length of the airport system from Gate E-37 to the UA
check-in counter.

Though it was a long trek it helped to give me something to do and kept me awake
during the time I had to kill between my first two flights.

My flight to Chicago left around 9:50 am and was uneventful.

Until we got in the east-west corridor from Lake Michigan over Chicago to
O-Hare.  Suddenly our plane began bouncing violently unlike anything I have
experienced before on any large commercial flight.  My seatmate in the middle
seat next to me had both commented about the smoothness of our entire flight.

We spoke too soon.

What had happened was that we had crossed the air path of a large plane that
have passed just before us.

A small plane would have been turned 360 degrees sideways in the same situation.
Instead our pilot road it out only shaking up the 250 or so of us for a few
moments that seemed much, much longer.

We had arrived about 10 minutes early even though we had actually had a stall at
Hartsfield getting to the take-off runway.

My concern was now where would my gate be for my flight to Tokyo and would my
one checked bag get loaded in the overlap time.

UA didn't have its act together in a variety of ways during this trip.  One was
they did not have connecting flight gate info.  Two was there was no one at the
gate exist to tell passengers that info.  Three there was do tv screen
displaying all the gates for departing flights.

The gate area was familiar from previous trips and crowded with passengers as
usual.  I worked my way through many Asia or Asian-American travelers to reach
the person at the next gate to ask where my gate might be located.

With her beautiful smile she said, "right here."

I made to my connecting flight.

Next question, would my one bag be as fortunate.

Within 10 or 15 minutes we were boarding and I found my "middle seat", the seats
most travelers hate unless they are traveling with other people.

My original trip finalized initially a couple weeks ago after I returned from
South Africa included a 4 day trip to New Dehli, India.  But due to some
mistakes and oversights on my side and my new contact in India I was unable to
obtain a visa in reasonable enough time, (requires mailing passport or taking it
personally to a consulate office, the one designated for Georgia is located in
Houston, Texas. So I had to cancel the great, all- aisle seat, tickets to India
and then onto Singapore just over a week before I was to leave.

When I had looked at my new itinerary to Asia I hadn't noticed that two of the
flights now involved MIDDLE SEATS.

12 hours of riding in a MIDDLE SEAT from Chicago to Tokyo.  6 hours of riding in
a MIDDLE SEAT from Tokyo to Singapore.

At least I changed my first one to the Economy Plus section (supposedly with
more leg room, and previous ones I have flown in across the Atlanta have had
more leg room).  The negative was it was to a BULKHEAD SEAT with both good and
bad points.

Good points:

1. no one in front of you who will plop their seat in your lap throughout most
of the trip.

2. a little more leg room (it seems that way)

3. you get served first and therefore are able to ask for whatever you want from
their selection without being told "We're out of that!"

Bad points

1. extra leg room was minimal

2. arm rests are extra wide and anchored down

3. you stare at the bulkhead throughout the trip

4. in that old airplane you have to stare up at an uncomfortable angle to watch
the flat screen tv.

I will stop.

The other good points were that I got to know my fellow seatmate to my left, an
American teacher who has lived and worked in Okinawa for several years.  We had
some great chats about movies and travel destinations during the trip when we
weren't trying to sleep.

My flight from Chicago to Narita in Tokyo, Japan
took off at 17:30 (5:30 pm) Saturday

I have flown in and out of Tokyo a few times and remember that they handle the
confusion of dealing with PASS-THRU passengers very efficiently.  Once again
they did on Saturday afternoon.  The TSA/SECURITY location was located right
near our landing gate and very near our various departing gates.

Of course the fact that they are only inspecting our carry on items that had
been inspected before we boarded in Chicago and have only been on the airplane
with us for the past 12 hours tends me to think it is oxymoronic or totally
unnecessary.

Aha Gate 31 looked familiar from other trips to Singapore and to Taipei and
there was the duty-free shop and the sushi bar where I had eaten before.  And
the take US currency with a decent exchange rate.

My last, 4th flight of the trip arrived at Changi at 12:10 am Sunday

total flying time 30 + 2 1/2 hrs + 12 + 6 = about 21 hours
total travel experience 31 hours approx

Changi Airport Terminal that I arrived in is huge with gigantic spaces and very
friendly employees all smiling and willing to help you at any step of the
process.

After walking the usual long distance from the landing gate to the great hall
leading to an even greater in size hall down a long flight of escalators that
was bigger than several football fields I saw the welcoming customs station and
the gigantic banner welcoming all the delegates and visitors arriving this week
for APEX (some big international gathering that will include President Obama on
Wednesday, who will stay at the Shangrilai Hotel, where I have had only a
dessert once years ago when I stayed at the extremely modest Regional Language
Education Center located next door.  The past 3 or 4 presidents have all stayed
at the Shangrilai (spelling?)

No long lines.  The process went smooth and quick.

Then off to baggage claim to hopefully fetch my one checked pull behind bag.

Even from a long distance I could see the red bag among the mostly black bags
and walked around the baggage conveyor system and looked at the very first red
bag and sure enough IT WAS MINE.   Simple things please me some times.

As I traveled towards the NOTHING TO DECLARE, THINGS TO DECLARE exits I stopped
to pick up some Singapore maps to use while I am here this week.

We got to the final inspection station, once again we have had no opportunity
since leaving Narita Airport 6 hours before to add anything subversive to our
checked luggage or carried on items but still we had to put them through another
x-ray machine.

No we didn't need to take out our laptops or take off our shoes or show the 1
quart clear bags with the 2 or 3 oz bottles of liquids we had carried onto the
plane.

As I was reloading myself: backpack on my shoulder, computer bag over my
shoulder, camera strap around my neck I started LOOKING FOR MY PASSPORT with the
new 3-month visa stub  (obtained in minutes in the country I was traveling to)
in EVERY POCKET in my travel vest.

I COULD NOT FIND IT.

The very friendly security guard reminded me to check ALL MY POCKETS SLOWLY ONE
AT A TIME ONE MORE TIME.  Just as I was nervously, frustratingly going through
ALL MY POCKETS one more time a young security agent came up behind us saying:

"MR. BLACK THIS DROPPED ON THE FLOOR BACK THERE!"

My ass had been saved again and I was just starting my trip to Southeast Asia
and in a country I had been to 7 other times before in the past 8 years.

Urgh!

The both said to me: "You have been traveling for a long time.  You are probably
tired."  It was their friendliness, kindness, thoughtfulness that eased my pain
and helped me not beat the $%^& out of myself.

Instead it will become a small piece of a travel story just like it has in this
missive.

Next step was to get some money out of an ATM machine and then to exchange some
British pound notes left over from last year and a 5 Euro note leftover from a
trip in the distant past

Then off to get my taxi to my hotel at 1:00 am in the morning after 31 hours of
traveling.

The Singapore system once again is extremely efficient and easy to follow.  I
even was able to help a confused looking American as we were entering the
process.  He needed to know if taxi drivers accepted CREDIT CARDS , based upon
experience I assured him EVERYONE IN SINGAPORE ACCEPTS CREDIT CARDS.  You use
your own imagination for what that might mean.  Ha ha

Actually only those who deal with visitors, travelers, tourists do.  The food
stalls that the typical visitors, travelers, tourists, at least first-timers,
never fine, seek out or eat at do not BUT NEARLY EVERYONE ELSE DOES IN
SINGAPORE.

The ride in from the Changi (shang hee) International Airport located in the
extreme southeastern part of Singapore to Orchard Road near my hotel is almost
all highway.  Singapore is busy 24 hrs 7 days 52 weeks of the year it seems from
my experiences here.

Once in the famous Orchard Road area, including the pretty young evening
businesswomen standing on the accepted corners in easy to find.  My hotel the
Orchard Grand Court is located on a short side street adjacent to the highly
CHRISTMAS DECORATED boulevards of Orchard, Robert Road and Scott Blvd.

I arrived smoothly and without a hitch with minor discomforts during my flights
and my almost disaster of dropping my passport and new visa in moments after
receiving it with its required stamp.

After going through 50+ emails I had a craving for some food and went down to
the lobby to ask where I might find a take out food place at 2:20 am there time.

The experience was felling like the Bill Murray move, LOST IN TRANSLATION, of a
few years ago.

The check-in clerk and the bellman both shook their heads but then the clerk
asked if you only want NOODLES, a package of prepared noodles that you only need
to add hot water to, you can go around the block to a 24/7
gas-station/convenience store.  Off I went.  And it a few months I had figured
out how to boil water by making sure all the necessary buttons and switches for
the electricity were pushed.

Now it is 6:25 am.

I tried to sleep after watching a FREE DVD of a Frasier episode on a website I
found by accident earlier this year when I was in Sarasota on another tirp.

But I gave up just laying there around 5:25 and began writing this travel
message.  Hope you found enjoyable enough to read all the way to this point
without saying to yourself.

"WHY TH E #$%^& am I reading all this.

By the way on the way back to the US through the magic of travel and our global
time system I gain back the 12 hours we lost flying over the Pacific Dateline.

In two weeks I will leave Ho Chi Minh City at 3:15 pm on November 25th and
arrive in Atlanta at 1:15 (2 hours before I left)....ha ha

What made these flights less enjoyable were the fact that I changed my flight
plans to Singapore last week and ended up with 2 middle seats out of the 4
flights and one was a bulkhead in Economy Plus that I paid extra for.

United's planes are old and do not have the every seat tvs...big bummer

Next time I bring my own food, reserve my seats much, much earlier when possible
if I have to fly United to save money.

Business and First Class are still way too expensive for me.

I am back earning my points on USAIR so I can use them for upgrades next year
and hopefully to South Africa finally after 12 years.

The sky has not begun the sunrise show yet.  Oh a very slight show of pale
whitish yellow on the clouds at the horizon far in the distance to the east.

Best wishes to you.

Wandering Alan
alan@...

I am now at the Changi Airport in Singapore.

Will write more later.

Wandering Alan

"Leaving on a Jet Plane, Leaving on a Jet Plane once again"

Thank you Peter, Paul and Mary for the lead in.

I woke up at 4 am this morning to leave for my 6:10 am flight from Athens'
Airport to Atlanta Hartsfield.

Now I am sitting at Gate T-13 waiting for my 9:48 am flight to Chicago.

Then onto to Tokyo and finally to Singapore arriving at 12:20 am on Sunday
morning their time.  They are 12 hours ahead of the US East Coast.

Will lose 12 hours when we pass over the dateline in the Pacific Ocean.

The good thing is that I get it back coming the other wau.

When I leave Ho Chi Minh City on November 25th at 3:15 pm I will arrive in
Atlanta at 1:15 pm, 2 hours before I left (technically that is).

The 9 seater plane that flies between Athens and Atlanta has many windows and
provides a nearly 360 degree panoramic view of the earth below.

Most of the way we flew over a gold, yellow, orange, red and green Fall blanket
of trees.

The many new housing neighborhoods look like giant zippers from above.  The
houses are so close to together in many of them neighbors could shake hands with
each other without leaving their homes.

Off to board.

Wandering Alaq
alan@...

OK, so Alan will be packing and readying for the off. I will be
travelling in my mind (like Win Wenger's image streaming) except that
Alan will add in the for-real bits. It will be interesting to see how
the technology stacks up - enabling Alan to keep in touch with us. Just
how many transmitter and receiver stations are there where Alan is going?

Best,
Mark

2009 South African Trip - Day 6 to 10 October 4th thru 9th

After the 4th Creativity in Education Conference began my whole focus was on
doing my sessions, meeting with people during break and meal times and this year
"officially photographing" the entire conference and the 15th ACRE - African
Creativity Conference.

No physical traveling.  All virtual traveling through people and ideas.

Klein Kariba is a beautiful spa resort with hot baths and pool surrounded by
mountains.

One morning Ken Wall (Australia), Wayne Morris (New Zealand), Joe Miguez (US)
and I climbed to the ridge of the mountain that faces Warmbad in the distance
for exercise.  Due to our commitments at the conferences we did not continue
onward.

I hope you will enjoy the photos that depict many of the activities that take
place during the two conferences.

next year I will be traveling in addition to participating and presenting at the
two conferences and have much more to share.

In November if everything works out with my airplane tickets I will be going to

New Dehli, India
Singapore, Singapore
Phenom Phen, Cambodia
Saigon/Ho Chi Mingh, Viet Nam

to do workshops and to be a volunteer with the Jimmy Carter Habitat for Humanity
Cambodia Project.

Then I should have more travel adventures to share with you and all of the other
virtual traveling members of Wandering Alan's Travel Group.

Best wishes,


Wandering Alan
http://www.cre8ng.com
alan@...

to see growing number of photo albums go to

http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com

2009 South African Trip - Day 5 October 3rd

Once again I woke up early and ventured up the mountain, this time alone.  I saw
my friend Ken Wall who had already been up part of the way and wasn't interested
in climbing the entire way.

In the past Ena's faithful dog, Honey, used to walk/climb up the mountain with
me each time.

This year one of her new dogs, Chomsky, traveled up with me and appeared to be
serving as my guided and protector as much larger Honey had in the past.

You can see the trip in photos at

http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com

On Saturday during the shorter trip I managed not to fall, not even once.

Not so during the Sunday morning climb.  Minor falls, slips, slides.

The terrain ranges from 30 to 45 degrees and higher in some spots all the way
up.

No animals this time on the mountain other than Chomsky and me.  Lots of
droppings evidence that they had been there recently but no animals like the
Springbok and Kudus I had seen and surprised during last year's climb.

Once back down I packed, showered and then had breakfast.

Then it was off to Klein Kariba to begin the 4th Creativity in Education
Conference along with Kobus, Kim, Tony, Kanes and I.

Klein Kariba is a beautiful oasis located west of Warmbad surrounded by
mountains with its various natural and human-made hot baths and pools and
camping areas plus cabins and lodges.

I was once again assigned to number 35, a one bedroom unit on the first floor
right next to the conference rooms where I would be presenting during both
conferences.

After arriving Kim and I ventured through the very creative welcoming maze that
Annalie Botha's education major students from TUKS - Tswhance University had
created along this year's 1960s theme.  Once again their creativity blew us
away.

In the evening we opened the 4th Conference with me doing Audience Warm Ups
followed by a very enthusiastic musician and a keynote speaker, all followed by
dinner in the giant tent followed by talking and dancing into the wee hours of
the morning.

2009 South African Trip - Day 4 October 2nd

I woke up around 5:30 or 6 and walked out to the lappa to look for who would be
willing to walk up the mountain with me.

There was Joe Miguez, his first trip to South Africa.  Joe and I met at CPSI -
Creative Problem Solving Institute in 1988 and have been friends ever since.  We
have presented at creativity conferences in several US cities plus in England,
Turkey and Singapore.

Joe and I went walking up the travel behind the lappa heading up to the
developmental house Ronnie built a couple years ago to promote the Neethling
Development above and surrounding the conference center.

From there we ventured up the first hillside in direction of the mountain.

After reaching the top of the first hill I recommended that we make a loop back
to the area below via the development road.  We found a fork in the road that I
had never seen before and followed it down.  I knew from all my previous visits
that the road would lead back to the main loop road that serves all the
properties in that area of the Bushveld east of Warmbad.

Surprisingly the road passed through a development that I recalled having seen
from the mountain top that I knew as Kobus' neighbor's property.  We wound
through it past their swimming pool and sleeping quarters and finally reached
their split entrance at the road that I had passed many times on the road while
walking or bicycling in the past.

Because we were walking a route I wasn't completely familiar with Joe continued
to tease me about  not really knowing where we were at the time.  I knew in
principle even though we were on a route I had never been on before until we
reached the main road.

As I pointed in the distance along the main road Joe continued to tease about
"sure that is where we are going".

Eventually we returned to the main entrance to the Neethling Place and back to
the lappa and pool area we had left about an hour before to find several people
up having breakfast.

Once we reached the table where Kobus, Nico and Ena were sitting we discovered
we had actually trespassed on their "NEW" neighbor's property and were luck that
we were not shot at by his guards.  Also we discovered that the NEW neighbor is
currently serving prison time along with several other colleagues for TREASON.

Ooops!

After breakfast, Kobus, Kim, Tony, Ed and I drove into Warmbad for our
scheduled, annual massages and hopefully spa/bath treatments.  The others would
follow us in the KFC van for theirs and to visit the flea/crafts market and
Warmbad for the morning.

In the afternoon some of the people went on a game ride.  This year was the
first time I haven't gone on one of the game rides.  I chose to rest instead and
work on the internet.

Around 6 pm once again people gathered and the singing began once again.

Around 8 pm we ventured up to the Zulu Huts, used in the movie WHEN THE GODS
WENT CRAZY years ago where we would have our Braai that Ronnie and his staff
were preparing for us.  More singing, eating, talking, fun.

Afterward we moved inside the larger hut that has been converted into a bar for
more laughter and singing.

The evening ended around midnight to 2.

2009 South African Trip - Day 3 October 1st

My workshop for CSIR was fun and a success.  The dinner that evening was also
great fun.

Bright and early on Friday, October 1st I internetted for a few hours having
woken up around 4 am and not being able to sleep again.  The sun rose outside my
balcony window around 5 or 5:30 and I took some photos while enjoying the slowly
brightening sky.

Around 6:30 I went down for my first FULL-ENGLISH Breakfast at 314 on Clarke:
eggs, bangers, bacon (ham slices), beans, toast and herbal tea of my choose
along with cereal and orange juice.

314 is luxurious yet small with only 6 guest suites.  My friends Ed and Kim were
two of the other guests that night along with a South Africa regular at 314.

Around 7 I ventured off for a short walk to familiarize myself with the area
taking photos of houses, gates, entries, gardens and street scenes.

When I returned Ed and Kim had awoken and were having breakfast.  Kobus stopped
by on his way to a morning meeting to tell us he would pick us up at 11:30 to
take us to his house before traveling to Warmbad/Bela Bela (which means hot
hot...water) to spend the weekend at The Neethling Place, his conference center
in the bushveld 90 kms from Pretoria to the northeast.

I then went out for another walk venturing in other directions viewing,
photographing, enjoying the feeling of "being home" once again in Pretoria.

Once Kobus, Kim, Ed and I arrived in Warmbad we headed for our usual spot for
lunch: Greenfield's a tradition that Ed, Kobus and I have had for a few years.

Some rituals and traditions are fun.

We arrived at The Neethling Place before the KFC rented bus/van filled with most
of the other presenters from last night's welcoming dinner and those who had
arrived in the morning from Pretoria via Johannesburg from the US and Europe.

The Neethling Place continues to become more and more beautiful thanks to the
loving care of Ena and Ronnie and the staff: the gardens are great, the views
spectacular, the facilities from the sleeping rooms to the bar to the lappa with
its pool to the training center are wonderful.

Friday we would rest for the afternoon after lunch.

A little cricket and/or rugby watching on the tv.  Walks.  Lounging around the
lappa, pool, bar.

Around 6 people began gathering around the bar and soon after the SINGING began
once again using song books with the lyrics.

8:30 Ronnie and the staff served up our first main meal with its 3 or 4 meat
courses along with salads and vegetables.

More singing after dinner and talking late into the evening.

2009 South African Trip

I left from Athens on September 29th using Georgia Wings Airline for the first
time from Athens since Mid-West Air went out of business in the Spring of 2008.

Their plane(s) is a/are 9 seater(s) with wrap around glass.  Flying in their
plane is like flying in a fish bowl.  The wrap around views are great.

The flight was fairly smooth most of the way except when we approached the giant
Hartsfield Atlanta Airport with all its busy air traffic.  GWA lands at a small
terminal away from the main terminal and they then van their passengers to the
main terminal near the Delta curbside drop off.

The flight to Johannesburg from Atlanta was bumpy and the plane swayed back and
forth most of the way causing me to be nervous much of the time.  The plane is a
brand new 777 and the rear section of the plane seemed to be constantly swaying.
Bummer.

When Ed (my Southern Africa traveling and long time creativity friend from Ohio)
and I landed there was Suzette waiting for us. She is the driver for hire that
we have used for several years.  Seeing her big smile was a welcome home.

After arriving at our B&B for the next couple days, 314 on Clarke we unpacked
and got ready to have dinner with our South African friend Francois Cloetze. 
Francois has also booked training programs for me the past few years.

314 on Clarke is a beautiful 5-star B&B.  Excellent accommodations, food and
service located near the Brooklyn Mall and our friend Kobus Neethling.

I woke up in the morning on the 30th to a bright sunny sky out my window onto my
balcony high above the trees.

Then after a little quick breakfast Francois and I were off to CSIR where I was
doing a day-long workshop: BROKEN CRAYONS for 21 scientists, technicians and
support staff at their beautiful training facilities: KNOWLEDGE COMMONS.

That evening Ed and I joined several of our international friends for the
welcoming dinner that Kobus and Inge had planned for us at a new Italian
restaurant in the Brooklyn area of Pretoria/Tswhane.

It was great to meet up with so many friends once again.

Great food, Good drink.  Wonderful friends.

Hello virtual traveling friends.

I have posted several albums of photos on my new SMUG MUG website.

You can find them at

http://wanderingalan.smugmug.com

I will be writing up short journal messages to go along with the photos over the
next week from my first arrival on September 30 until when I left on October 9
to return home.

Best wishes to you,


Alan

Plans sometimes become difficult to fill

When I left for South Africa on Tuesday, September 29th my plan was to write
messages daily or every other day to describe what I/we was/were doing each in
Pretoria, at the Neethling Place and at Klein Kariba during both the 4th
Creativity in Education and the 15th African Creativity Conferences.

While at my B&B, 314 on Clarke Road i/we had access to the internet yet I was
working or walking those two days with a dinner gathering of most of the
international speakers for the upcoming conferences.

While at the Neethling Place we had internet and www access while we relaxed,
went into town for our annual spa massages had our various meals together.

During the days at Klein Kariba there was no email access except through my SA
friend Eva and I only using her 3G computer service to review emails that needed
to be responded to immediately.

As I edit my nearly 2800 images I will compose messages and begin sending them
this week.

I have been traveling to SA yearly since 1998 I have been

on many game rides,
gone to see Nbele villages,
craters,
anthropological digs with the oldest skeleton ever found,
gone to the top of Table Top Mountain in Cape Town
toured Cape Town
Robben Island (Mandela's prison for 17 years)
along the "Garden Route"
traveled to Petersburg in the northeast and to Devil's Kloof
Kruger Park
St. Lucia
Swaziland
Durban
Hermanus to see whales jump
Nizner
several mountain ranges in the east, north and south
camping in the Red Kalahara Desert northwest of Kimberly (diamond mines)
Zimbabwe and Victoria Fallsew
Chobe Reserve to see thousands of animals in Botswana
stood on the shore of Namibia
walked into Zambia
gone to Alpine Heath, 5 star spa
gone to Goudini, 5 star spa
Lesotho
Drakkenberg Mountains
and many other sights,
including zoos, museums, galleries, etc.

This time I zipped over, worked with 21 scientists, engineers, technicians and
support staff at CSIR, SA nation wide science center

walked some more streets of Pretoria

no malls, flea markets, crafts markets, animal preserves

instead fun with friends, past, present and pfuture

The only animals I saw were dassies, a couple monkeys, 2 dogs (Ena's), several
guiena hens, ducks

climbed the Neethling Mountains twice, once to show Joe Migeuz the views and
once to reach the top on my own, with Chomsky, one of Ena's dogs.

Other than that it was friends, friends, friends, and peace and quiet resting in
between meals and parties.

Wandering Alan

in November off to Singapore, Cambodia, possibly Viet Nam and Laos and India

Marching to Pretoria or at least flying and driving to Pretoria

Today I left Athens, Georgia on Georgia (Pacific) Wings Airline service from
Athens to Atlanta.

There were only two passengers, Denise a dancer and UGA professor of dance, who
was on her way to Madison, Wisconsin to perform and me, heading to South Africa
to perform slightly differently and maybe do some dancing in the evenings during
the two conferences I am going to present at.

The Georgia Wings plane had full size, almost, windows all around and Denise and
I were sitting in the back of the plane to help balance the pilot and co-pilot
in the front of the plane.  The check-in counter person even asked me if my
weight was what my driver's license claims.  It tis.

The views from the prop plane were fantastic.  It did get a little bumpy and
scary once in awhile and especially as we taxied into land at the private plane
portion of Hartsfield Airport in Atlanta.

My long time creativity/CPSI/African travel partner, Ed and I met up at our Gate
E-10 at the Atlanta Airport with about 3 or 4 hours until our boarding time.  We
caught up on our respective lives and friends and passed the time away.

The flight on the new 777 Delta plane was bumpy most of the way with the plane
jutting side to side and sometimes up and down.  Always spooky to me when a
giant plane bounces around 35,000 to 40,000 feet in the air over the ocean.

While waiting to fly to Cape Town, South Africa from Miami on my first or second
trip the plane take-off time was bumped up 4 hours to avoid a hurricane heading
towards Miami.  The emergency cut off time was set for 2:00 pm that day.  We
took-off at 1:50 and ended up flying over the hurricane far below us.

Except for the bumpyness nothing eventful during the 14 hour, non-stop flight,
to Johannesburg.  They kept announcing that our flight was completely full....

bummer....no opportunity to lie down across 2, 3 or 4 middle section seats to
sleep this trip.

The seat next to me. was actually empty. separating me from a Zimbabean woman
who works in medical services.  We talked a few times during the flight.

As I moved through the Visa, Customs check points and to the luggage carrosel
times moved smoothly.  Talked to a group of about a dozen men, all huge in all
dimensions, asked them if they were going shooting or hunting.

They said yes but for oil.  They were going over to search for oil for a couple
governments in southern Africa.

Often my planes have been 1/2 full with missionaires going to Africa to save
people.

After I got my roll behind bag and was walking towards the NOTHING TO DECLARE
exit I heard my name along with another passenger's name tell us to report to
the Delta Baggage Service Counter.  I thought that was odd but went to find out
what they wanted.

Turned out that somehow my name had gotten on a list of 'LEFT BEHIND LUGGAGE'

Fortunately not mine this time.

Off I went out into the new single, GRANDE WELCOMING ARRIVAL HALL at the new
International Airport.

As soon as I exited there was the smiling face of Suzette Ahlers, our arranged
driver, who helps us most years get from place to place in between Johannesburg
and Pretoria.  Ed followed awhile later because his checked bag was one of the
last on the carrosel.

After checking into our B&B 314 on Clark Street, we showered and our friend
Francois Coetze arrived to take us out to dinner to a favorite restaurant.

We had a mix of tapas courses added to my sushimi and sushi items and a basic
lettuce and tomato salad.

Lots of catching of news in our lives and attempts to solve the world's problems
and a couple hours later Francois returned us to our B&B for the night.

Tomorrow I am doing an all-day workshop for CSIR, government sponsored research
organization.  In the evening a group of us from different countries who have
come to be part of our mutual friend Kobus Neehtling's two annual creativity
conferences will get together for our "glad to be back" dinner party.

Home again in my other home country.

Best wishes,

Willingly, Wondering, Wandering Alan in Pretoria for a couple days.

Leaving on a Jet Plane, Leaving on a Jet Plane

Tomorrow afternoon I fly for the first time on the new airline that flies now
from Athens, Georgia to Atlanta.  In Atlanta I will board a Delta/SAA airplane
for Johannesburg, South Africa once again as I have each years starting in 1998.

Just repacked because I have found out that their weather is predicted colder
and wetter than usual.

Lots of computer and camera equipment packed too.

Hope you enjoy the messages I send during the next twelve days.

Wandering Alan
alan@...

I will post photos on this website as I shoot and edit them along the way.