Sunday, January 3, 2010

Hong Kong to the Philippines


We spent our New Years recovering on the lovely island of Lamma (Hong Kong). Kim and Tom took great care of us while we were getting over our last small illnesses from Nepal ( Took us to check luggage, took us to our hotel, translate and bargained for us, took us to a 6 course meal, then dropped us fat and happy in our new neighborhood for the night). We were also able to meet up with Paula (our San Fransisco saviour). She was in Hong Kong for a week, so it worked out wonderfully (Her boyfriend, Jack, is from Hong Kong so we could follow him on tour). We had a big splurge in Hong Kong and purchased a small lap top computer. So this is our first blog written on our new notebook. We should be able to now to put lots of pictures up.

Lucky for us that we were able to recover our tummies because the Philippines is full of great FOOD!!! We were very fortunate to have a friend, Christian, pick us up from the airport (we were over an hour late )! Rob worked with Christian when we lived in Yakima, WA (whenever Leah left me that summer Chris and I would head out on adventures to Seattle, and wine tastings ). Christian took us to a wonderful restaurant where you first go to the market and pick out what seafood you would like to eat . ( So FRESH, it makes you think of the Little Mermaid when you order crab. This time he didn't escape the chef) We had crab, tuna, prawns, some other fish, and seaweed (tasting like little pallups of freshness not fishy) then watermelon and mango for dessert ( you tell them how to cook it, they cook, and they clean ). So wonderful. After our large lunch we piled into the car and drove to a volcanic creator. It was in the middle of this large lake. Very cool looking and very majestic since it was a bit cloudy. On our way back to Manila from the creator we were in a big traffic jam. The cause we found out was just drivers not following rules (not as bad as Nepal, but here there were cops doing the same thing). The road had 2 lanes going each way. Well, some drivers decided to use a third lane, the oncoming traffics passing lane (hey they weren't using it). So we had 3 lanes and they had 1 lane. Later, as we inched along the oncoming traffic had 3 lanes and we had to scrunch into one lane (this is total Karma). The big yellow line means nothing. And yes there were police but they were just as bad and used whatever lane they pleased. So a few hours of stop go was created just by a crazy bottleneck, that the people created themselves (like shooting yourself in the foot and blaming the guy walking by). But we were able to use to the time to catch up with Christian (Poor guy has to go back to work in 2-3 days ). So all was good.

Our next plan is to get down to a small island south of here and start learning to kite board!! (Rob needs to work on his tan lest his beauty diminish)


The wreckage after our first Philippeno meal. Thanks Christian!
Meeting up with Paula and Jack in Hong Kong


Our wonderful going away lunch with Kim and Tom, Thank you! (we had Peking Duck!)



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