tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84518407313664189722026-04-22T16:04:02.218-07:00Adventures around the worldMarcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.comBlogger84125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-42668337073856011842014-07-20T19:55:00.000-07:002014-07-29T14:21:48.921-07:00

 Sydney Harbour Bridge The Veteran A milestone had passed without me knowing. I was up late in my dorm room at Bounce Hostel (highly recommended), and talking with Justin, a backpacker from Canada. Like most Canadian travelers I've met, he was a cool, laidback person. "When was your first trip?" he asked. "2004," I answered. "I studied abroad in England, then backpacked around Europe

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-23808772610430135172010-11-25T00:44:00.000-08:002010-12-16T02:10:17.568-08:00

"Japan is all about the side trips." --Marie, an Australian girl who taught English in Japan "Welcome to my shop," said the ninja to his victims. Me and a ninja doing an attack pose Me with a samurai "Meet ninjas and samurai!" the headline screamed from the guidebook, Kyoto's Greatest Travel Tips. I'd picked it up from a pile of books at my hostel. The book happened to fall open on that

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-18030721376170700802010-08-18T16:00:00.000-07:002010-11-11T00:51:31.094-08:00

"I am totally willing to drop serious money on a bomb-ass steak." --Steven, a Taiwanese-American engineer in Kyoto My Kobe beef steak This review grabbed me: "A-1 has a relaxed atmosphere and serves thick slices of Kobe beef. The teppanyaki steak (broiled on a hot plate) is cooked in a spice, wine, and soy marinade and served with charcoal-grilled vegetables and crisp garlic potatoes." -

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" . . . the Japanese are the world's champion modifiers. Only the most serious restauranteurs refrain from editing some of the authenticity out of foreign cuisines . . ." --Fodor's Japan 2009, pg. 90 Two girls posing in Dotonbori, a nightlife area. A rock band sets up near JR Osaka train station. Chika and me at Shinsekai, a local area. "Where's the coolest place in Osaka?" I asked Chika,

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-67789595421767063822010-06-19T02:09:00.000-07:002010-11-11T00:54:05.830-08:00

"If you think Kyoto is great, Nara is even better!" --Daniel, a Polish exchange student Todaiji Temple Deer in front of Todaiji entrance gate Close encounters with deer The "path to enlightenment" was behind the Buddha's butt. One of the wooden support pillars had a small hole in it. According to legend, the hole was the same size as the Buddha's nostril. If you could crawl through, you

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-4454530311838260462010-05-07T01:09:00.000-07:002011-03-21T15:23:11.218-07:00

"If you go Kyoto, you gonna be sick of temples!" --Hiro, a staff member at Hostel K's House Tokyo Oasis. Me at Kinkakuji (a.k.a. Golden Pavilion) Me and Steven at Ryoanji Zen Rock Garden Me at Fushimi Inari Shrine I was struggling to get that perfect shot. I couldn't get a good photo with the Silver Pavilion! I'd spent half an hour asking passing Japanese tourists to take a photo of me,

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-46384728773884246342010-04-04T22:40:00.000-07:002013-09-30T11:26:36.671-07:00

I made a video where I share all my best tips on Japan budget travel. Watch this and save a lot of yen! Kimono girls at Senso-ji Temple DJ Makai at Club Velours Chefs at Maguro Bito, a restaurant that serves kaiten sushi ("conveyor belt" sushi) Writing my Japanese name in kanji characters for a calligraphy lesson "Show me your Tokyo," I said to my friends who lived there. They

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-86167346812445712742010-04-03T00:31:00.000-07:002010-12-16T00:23:48.861-08:00

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts." --Mark Twain Locals walking past the A-bomb Dome in Hiroshima. Nuclear ruins. That's what I expected to see in Hiroshima. Growing up, all I saw on TV documentaries and in history textbooks was the infamous mushroom cloud. In Shanghai, I had the great luck to become

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-63929102626714212382009-11-16T00:00:00.000-08:002012-04-06T20:55:09.544-07:00

At the office. What's wrong with Asian culture? I read a thought-provoking book recently called Breaking the Bamboo Ceiling, by Jane Hyun. While many Asian-Americans are well-educated and hold respectable white-collar jobs, there's very few of them in senior management positions. Can anyone name five other Asian-American CEOs besides Jerry Yang of Yahoo! Inc.? The book focuses on how to

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-67669111690541241202009-08-27T06:47:00.000-07:002011-07-25T01:13:54.688-07:00

At the top of Borobodur, the world's biggest Buddhist stupa. Prambanan Temples (Hindu). "Each island in Indonesia is like a different country." --Keetie, a Dutch traveler in Myanmar (Burma) The hard part about traveling in Indonesia is figuring out where to go. There are over 17,000 islands and endless variety. Many cultures on these islands evolved in isolation from each other, with their

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-38414685156597440162009-08-15T04:51:00.000-07:002011-07-25T01:09:35.957-07:00

Penang City Hall Chinese Goddess of Mercy (Guanyin) Temple Kapital Keling Mosque Penang is the bizarro version of Hawaii. Both places are a blend of Western and Asian influences, except those influences are different. Hawaii is American and Japanese, while Penang is British and Chinese. It was like being in a parallel universe. I'd wonder, "Could Hawaii have ended up like Penang?"

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-47962623223238423322009-07-05T03:34:00.000-07:002011-07-25T01:01:34.783-07:00

Backpackers wandering around the BOH tea plantation. Confession: I hate trekking. It's tiring, sweaty, and dirty. Sometimes it can't be avoided, because in certain places, trekking is really the only thing to do. And the Cameron Highlands is one of the premier trekking destinations in Malaysia. It was in Myanmar that I first discovered the concept of "hill stations"--where British and

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-15396323033756253732009-06-12T21:17:00.000-07:002011-07-25T01:06:15.061-07:00

Melaka, canal-side Locals walking in the town square The secret hope of many travelers: to fall in love with an exotic land (or exotic person), and stay there to open up a business. Jim Thomspon is the best example of this, and his traditional Thai house is a landmark in Bangkok. He was a former American secret agent who started a successful silk company in Thailand, built a magnificent

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-36532671018494607982009-05-31T22:03:00.000-07:002011-07-25T01:00:09.866-07:00

Angkor Wat: The Temple of Temples My tour guide was rattling off more boring statistics about temples when I stole a glance at my watch. 11:00 A.M. Maybe . . . "So we go on to Angkor Wat?" Samnang asked. "No, take me to lunch," I said. "Eh?" He checked his watch. "But it is only eleven o' clock!" "I know, it's okay." Samnang turned to the tuk-tuk driver and translated my request into Khmer

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-17757152511783663252009-05-12T22:34:00.000-07:002011-07-25T01:02:28.178-07:00

On the move at Mae Taeng Elephant Park "The complete backpacker package" is how my Rough Guide to Southeast Asia on a Budget describes the northern Thai city. Couldn't be more apt. Chiang Mai has temples for culture vultures, markets for bargain hunters and nightlife for partiers. But Chiang Mai is more of a place to do stuff, not see stuff. This became apparent when I saw the stacks of

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-8328173157502423142009-04-05T19:50:00.000-07:002010-10-04T12:12:17.672-07:00

After seeing Bagan in Myanmar, I got the Indiana Jones bug. Ancient temples were my new playgrounds. Sukhothai was the next target on my hit list. It's the cradle of Thai civilization, where the alphabet was invented. I was torn between going to Ayutthaya or Sukhothai, the two main temple cities in Thailand. Once I weighed the factors, I eliminated Ayutthaya because: --a lot of it was

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-20120572701999151472009-03-22T01:45:00.000-07:002011-07-25T00:40:09.628-07:00

View from a wooden stilt house on Inle Lake. Floating villages. They're the main attraction of Inle Lake, a required stop on any Myanmar itinerary. The lake isn't just a body of water. To residents, it means transportation, food and economy. Boatmen collecting seaweed on Inle Lake (Click on photo for full album)I took a boat tour with some travelers from my hotel, Queen Inn. Jeroen and Keetie

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-47238852748872016982009-03-18T02:47:00.000-07:002011-07-25T00:41:15.853-07:00

Mandalay Palace complex (click on photos for full album) Myanmar consistently defied my expectations. After experiencing the outdated infrastructure and basic facilities in Yangon and Bagan, I expected more of the same in Mandalay. Instead, I got a booming, modernizing city. Mandalay was close to China, and it was flourishing from trade with the mainland. Myanmar provided raw materials,

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-18697748628631271372009-03-16T00:31:00.000-07:002010-10-04T12:24:00.697-07:00

Sunset at the ancient city of Bagan (click on photo for full album) "The roads are bad, the food is worse, and you'll get sick," said an NGO worker I knew who had worked in Myanmar. Travel isn't travel unless things go wrong. So far, I'd managed to dodge food poisoning, tropical diseases, bad weather and political upheaval. But my luck finally ran out in Myanmar. A cool Singaporean girl had

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-16348034624200632332009-03-13T22:32:00.000-07:002010-10-04T12:28:47.030-07:00

"Then, a golden mystery upheaved itself on the horizon - a beautiful, winking wonder that blazed in the sun of a shape that was neither Muslim dome nor Hindu temple spire. It stood upon a green knoll. 'There's the old Shwedagon,' said my companion. The golden dome said, 'This is Burma, and it will be quite unlike any land you know about.'" --Rudyard Kipling, Letters from the East (1898) Monks

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-63283121607392541872009-02-26T08:00:00.000-08:002010-10-04T12:33:19.990-07:00

Royal Palace Museum A wide thoroughfare like the Champs Elysee? Check. Sidewalk cafes? Check. French mansions and architecture? Check. It's official: Luang Prabang is the Paris of Southeast Asia. With its abundance of exquisite Buddhist temples and well-preserved French houses, Luang Prabang felt more like a capital city than Vientiane. The constant flow of travelers also created a real

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-77229610263070805092009-02-19T08:00:00.000-08:002010-10-04T12:47:07.311-07:00

Patuxai, Laos' Arc de Triomphe "You gotta go to Laos," backpackers kept telling me. When I asked why, it was hard for them to explain. But they assured me that the country was awesome. It reminded me of when I was in Europe, and travelers kept saying I should go to Prague. There's no one famous thing to see; the whole city itself is an attraction. Countries acquire reputations. Cambodia

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-31864178411656627692009-02-13T07:44:00.000-08:002011-07-25T01:04:04.716-07:00

Quan An Ngon, my favorite restaurant in Hanoi. For most of my time in Asia, I've lived and traveled in what I call "The Chinaverse" (Chinese universe). By this, I mean China, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Singapore, and arguably Malaysia. After visiting Hanoi, I wondered whether I should add Vietnam to the list. As I rode the cramped "airport minibus" (really a minivan) from the airport into

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-60376667571657753532009-01-15T06:40:00.000-08:002011-07-25T00:46:38.699-07:00

"Bigger than Vegas" is what I kept reading about Macau, one of the few places in Asia that has legalized gambling. A lesser-known fact is that it's also where Chinese officials gamble away public money. A former Portuguese colony, what drew me to Macau was its blend of Latin and Chinese influences. Asian countries can often be stereotyped as homogeneous, inward-looking societies. In reality,

Marcushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00381989176805582704noreply@blogger.com32tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8451840731366418972.post-7715231532241675882009-01-08T12:39:00.000-08:002015-07-17T12:46:04.270-07:00

Shanghai Notary Public Office in China Complaining about visas is a common pastime among expats in Taiwan. But this is on a whole other level. In the past 2 months, I've had to deal with the bureaucrats of 4 governments. This is easily one of my worst experiences in living abroad. Visas suck, paperwork sucks and officials are the personification of evil. Anything I want to do, there's an

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