My trip to Laos ,second part.2006/2007

Vientiane is very tranquil an peaceful.Well describing as a beautiful place has different meaning for different people.
Everyday I had a plan to get my lunch from French restaurant and have Thai massage and the rest of the day cycling around the city or get sun bath and go to swimming pool.


There was a city bridge which was 15 minutes far from center of city where you could show your documents and go by bust or train to thaiLand-Shangmai was the first destination on the North of Thailand which was so far from there.
In fact there was ahalf- dried Mekong river between Vientiane and Thai border,which every night people had barbecue there.





Buddhism is a very serious religion in Laos and there were so many magnificent temples, in matter of architecture and decoration .One of the famous one is Peletora Temple.

in one of Golden temples I went I realized there 12 small Buddhas which each of them is representing of one month.Surprisingly wen I was strolling there,one guy ( similar to the monk) asked me if I would like to know bout my future he can tell me by knowing my date birth and the year.

Luang is the heart of Buddhism in LAOS ,It is built in 16 century.
During the hot,long days when sun is shining ,make a great ,eye-catching reflect to that temple as Gold is the symbol of Buddha and well being and prosperity,these combination with sun reflection add the beauty of Temple.
One thing that draw my attention so much ,was the tradition inside the temples. As I am living in China I have seen so many temples here ,but Buddhism is so different between here and there.
In Laos when you want to get in into temples you have to take off your shoes and the problem was the whole area as one of temples was very huge you have to walk with bare foot which is not convenient and the road and path not asphalt either.






Most of the temples in laos have handmade painting and carving on the bars, wallsand pillars.
Another old temple which is called Wat Sisaket,is the oldest temple which is survived after colonization and battles with Thai people which is all made of wood and when you get in can smell the woods and has a Small ga
rden with trees more than 800 years old.


There is a beautiful ,colorful gate which is called Patuxia which build after the triumph victory and receive Independence of France in 1800s,which every night the shiny ,glittery bulbs hanging from the building and fountain make the atmosphere cool and pleasant.



there is a Buddha park which is 15 minutes far from center of the city and it is very wast and huge park which has a big Buddha made of stones which shows Buddha with so many hands and this Buddha as few tails and representing a legendaryThere are so many small caves man-made there which is pretty much nice adventure to go inside and climb up and don and enjoy the bird-eye-view scenery as well.











animals in East Asian culture.
Laos dance is very famous though.The girls wear their traditional costumes and make up and artifical nails whih is for both men and women and make up as well and use their Local instrument which very similar to Erhu in china and Tar in Iran.



Another beautiful destination in Laos in Laung prabang.This city is 5 hours far from the capital and I was thinking meanwhile I am there shouldn't miss Elephant riding in jungles.

In fact this city is ambassador of old traditional architecture in Laos from the colonial time in 19 and 20 centuries.












Well that city is enjoying mild weather compare to other parts of Laos and actually When I arrived there and got a hostel room.



I found out there are some tour packages to the jungle and elephant ring almost took one day as few hours one the elephant and the rest be in jungle and feed elephant which was to be honest so amazing.
In fact it was the first experience of sitting on the elephant and it was kind of weird.
I tried once sitting on the camel when I was in Dunhuang ( in silk Road) North West of China near Gobi desert.Anyway back to elephants the guild told us it is just a young one ,15 years old and is a little slow and playful.Well I had to tolerate his playing and spreading water with trunk on my legs as well,pretty relish in the end after few hours I felt a bit giddy and had to spruce myself.


On the suburb of this town you will see the natural hot springs and stream which you could swim with nice pleasant temperature ad in fact you should protected yourself with Malaria tablets ,just in case.

There quite nice ,genuine waterfalls in suburb which Worth watching and even swimming there.I took some photos which show how much the water is clean and crystal shape.That water fall 9 Tad Sae) is seasonally good and vice verse over flooded it depend which season you go there I was there end of Feb and was prefect time.

in fact in Laos as in the news you see I didn't see any problems with Malaria,but countrysides a bit different.

I would say this city is the Jewel of laos as you can walk on foot around the town and see the ancient buildings and some beautiful temples and get along with locals and enjoy unique cuisines.
there is another temple in laos calls Pushi temple which has a very big over that 10 foots Sleeping Buddha.

My trip to laos Jan-Feb 2006 first part...

I had a break between 2 contracts and I made my mind to travel in South Asia. In fact I wanted to go to 4 countries with due to visa regulations and lack of time I could make 3.

Anyway I had almost 2 months and I started from South of China.I was with a friend of mine and we went from Shanghai to Kunming and after staying there for few days cause has so many consulates to issue the visa we moved on to Dali and then got airplane tickets to Laos.

My plan was from Laos find a way to Thailand and then got to Vietnam and then fly back to Burma and via Thailand come back to shenzhen and then shanghai.

well I know sometimes finding these routs and make an effort is pretty hard.
There are Road way go from Kunming to Laos ( capital) Vientiane ,but no one suggest that as it is zigzag and messy and harsh.

The plane with got had which had propeller.and it was pretty loud .Anyway Lao people are very friendly ,nice and warm-hearted.

Laos has been in the center of attack form so many countries in mid 19 century Americans Troops land there ,In Vietnam war use their land for their troops and Vietnamese attack this country as well.


Laos is a very small and rather to say poor country their economy depend on their Niebuhr's: Vietnam,Thailand and China.In many rural area telecommunication is inaccessible.Even in Capital we had problem with international phone calls and even anther case was Internet was pretty sow there too.
In the north part of laos a lot Thai , Chinese and Vetnamese live as well.

Laos is rich in Petrolium and minerals and gas which their economy depend on that.
Roads in Loas are not really great in the matter of quality and most of small town still have sandy roads .
Laos people are pretty good at English and there is no problem with communicating to the people.

When We arrived there I never thought I might stay there for around 2 weeks.There are so many Hostels with beautiful wooden and Arch design which has inside foot and body massage which is very cheap and famous in laos and you pay around 30 dollars to have a 5 star hotel there.

There few places to go around as I discovered in the capital you can rent a bike and find a lot of French restaurants which run by French people( as Laos was under the colony of France) and find cheap Internet cafe to hang around the whole day visit some places and Buddha places ( temples and shrines).
Laos people are very religious and pure in Buddhism.I never seen any thieves there and no one locked their car! It was so surprising.

My trip to Dali and Shang ri la 2007

Dali has a fascinating nature and magnificent scenery.When I went to Kunming I have got a bus to go to Dali and it took just few hours .
This city actually has 2 parts and one part is for tourists as They rebuild it and remade the old city wall and souvenir shops .
Apart from these this city is really peacful adn tranquil and city dwellers are pretty nice and warm hearted and helpful.Moreover there plenty of restaurants and cafe bars with Western style there as well.
If a shortlist of Dali's attractions was to be drawn up, the 'silver Cangshan Mountains' and the 'jade Erhai Lake' would top it. They are usually the first choice destinations for visitors.

Form North to South ,the Cangshan Mountains and Erhai Lake form one of the most enchanting sights to be seen in Dali.
In fact the mountain is not really high but the best way to go to the top is using cable car and you can have a great bird's-eye- view from the top which is memorable and the whole city and lake is in front of you.
There are few places around Dali which is nice to visit Jizu mountain and Jainshu county .
Dali has ancient part as well which is part of it is military base and a bit restricted to get in.
The city wall is pretty small but the claim is part of old part of great Wall.
Erhai lake is 2000 meter high and it is plateau part of Yunana province .There are ferries which you can take a around the lake which is amazing.

Ancient city in Dali face the mountain in the West and the Erhai lake on the East.

When you walk in the old part of city you can smell the tea fragrance every where.
The dwellers build the houses so unique and at the dawn you see the reflection of sun on the bricks and on the wall which makes a very beautiful harmony in fact. Decoration is one of the most important feature for this area .

Wood carving,marbles,paintings and printings all part of character of this city and locals pay attention to these features a lot.Mostly house have 3 rooms.
The Three pagodas of Dali are situated between Cangshan Mountain and Erhai Lake. They stand high and grand, and are one of the famous sights of Dali.

there are historical records which mention these pagodas stand there against earth quake and natural disasters for centuries.
Shag ri a is one of the most beautiful places to visit and it is located between DALI AND THE WAY TO gUILIN.THEY HAVE MADE A SMALL VILLAGE OF REAL SHANG RI LA THERE.

When you get in you can see the minorities and their dances and local cuisines as well and some shopping mall .There rafts and bamboo raft and small boats take you to short trip in side the village and give you more details about

My trip to Kunming 2006/2007

My second trip to Kunming started JANUARY 2007 as I had2 months break between my contract and I wanted to pass from Kunming go to laos and Vietnam and Burma as well.I had to stop in Kunming as they have consulate and issue the visas as well.

I stayed there for a week and I was hanging around in the arks and visiting stone forest ad enjoying the 17 to 20 c temperature which was amazing.



Kunming is located in South West of China and it is the capital of Yunnan province.It is called as "Spring city "due to mild climate ad enjoy eternal spring ( four Seasons in one).It has been a best destination of trade for so many centuries between Laos ,Vietnam , Burma and China.

The hubs are railroad to Vietnam and air and road paths from Kunming to Burma and Laos.
Kunming as so many other cities in China enjoying or suffering from combination of 2 different( modern and traditional lifestyles).Kunming has quite few nice parks and botanical gardens .
There is a lake calls as Dianchi lake which has so many seagulls from Siberia and it is a great destination for passing the weekend far from the hustle and bustle life and get out of the city.It looks like a glittering pear land has a very clean crystal water.
Stone forest is another attractions which is 80 km far from Kunming and as different type of stones with strange ,unique shapes


When you get into there you will find trees are capture between the stones.There is a legend story which says""There was an orphanage boy who was found by the family of Shepperd and grew up there and fell in love with their daughter and killed the family and runaway to the stone forest and lived happily with his lover afterwards."

There is a Village calls" Ethnic Village" which shows the costumes,tradion , lifestlye ,habits,food ,different kind of Art include(handycrafts and dance,printing,painting and calligraphy)of minorites in China and who are living in Yunan province to us.
aNOTHER ATTRAction in Kunming is Jingming street which worthsstrolling around and find out some cheap carp and bargin as well which is quite fun.

Travel and live in Xian ( Me and Wijbren) March 2009 ,first part

I came with Wijbren to Xian 2 months ago and I am going back in time. We finished our contract with EF institute( hopefully) .My first impression was not very positive,as leaving that city( Hanghou ) after 3 years .I felt kind of home there ,but job was a little endurable

.Anyway our trip started on 26 of February 2009 and we spent 23 hours on train to reach to Xian.The train was not too bad but the main problem was the size of the bed for Wijbren ( He is tall for Chinese ) 2 meters.

Anyhow we manage that and we had 2 other Chinese around us and I was practicing my Chinese with them and few times we pissed off and they tried to be hospitable somehow.

When we arrived I felt completely giddy and thew guy who came from University ( we got a position as instructor and supervisor here) was waiting for 2 hours for us.I felt totally embarrassed ,but not our fault.Trains in China are really fitly and pretty damn slow...no complain ..
Xian is the capital of shanxi proince and is a middle size city.It has prettyu cold weather in winter according to the locals and mildly warm in summer( luckily).
our apartment is pretty cool but by the time we were here in March was freaking cold and we were shivering for 48 hours and conditioner was on and the in just a week we had to pay 20 euro which was totally mind blowing.
Our work is pretty mellow here and I just work 12 hours per week which make some people crazy and jealous and still can save good amount per month due to cost of life is much cheaper than other cities ad food portions are much bigger in fact.


Xian has been holding a great heritage and deep culture though 12 dynasties in China.It has been located in the center of China and has been known as one of the major cities of famous silk Road in China and during the Qing dynasty there was so attention to this city.There plenty of places to visit and hang around.
before I go much deeper into historical and cultural heritage in Xian I am going to end up with my flat photos.

Our trip in November 2008 toDalian

We went ( me and Wijbren) together.It was November 2008 .We stayed there 5 days.
Dalian is located in the North East of China and pretty cold in the winter .It might reach to minus 10 at least ,by the time we were there it was almost 0 and we had flurries for few days which was surprisingly nice and lovely for us as we missed snow for few year.We used to live in South part of China.

Dalian has its own culture.Maybe the way I describe sound a little weird ,but China is a very big country and has variety of cousins and clothes and dialects ,which better to correct it" Languages".There 56 nationalities who live in China ,beside 2 autonomous regions in China( Tibet and Xingjiang).
Dalian has been affected so much by Korean and Japanese culture as it is very close to Japan and Korea border.
If you want to visit there you just need to get a jetty and it might take 2 hours to get there.There are few beaches which worth seeing and rocky,rigged cliffs for rock climbers .
There is one part of on the peak of harbor which is forbidden for foreigner to go there as has so many arson ,army equipments and literally army's base camp.

Dalian enjoys of having lovely seafood restaurants and cozy beaches.In fact locals go for swimming even in winter.When we arrived there ,unbelievably saw too many locals jump into the frozen water and we were wearing jumper and coats and shivering.Such a shame !
Hot pot is one of the delicious food in most part of CHINA and especially in Dalian has its own style.
There 2 famous beaches there one is tiger beach and another one is stone beach which are located on the North West of city....Anyhow,I did enjoy of eating cheap,fresh and toothsome seafood there.There are few Korean restaurants there though but mostly Chinese ones,which worth trying them.

The city I used to live on that time(Hangzhou) has different types of restaurants ,but with some reasons I loved the ones in Dalian.It was such a peaceful,tranquil and primitive life compare to cosmopolitan cities and people much friendlier.
People there, were so polite and not staring at us as usual Chinese do in so many cities and still pissed me and Wijbren especially has an allergy towards that.

There is a street near train Station which is called "Russian Street" where you c an buy so much crap related to second world war,photos,arson's symbols ,statues,paintings,sticks and a lot equipments for hiking and mountain climbing and too many white ,blue eyed dolls.
In fact we found a nice pool Pollard was not so crowded and reasonably cheap. which was really good though.

We saw so many Russians there and it is basically a Russian resort for summer .
The main reason to go to Dalian is having relaxing time and eating fresh ,cheap sea food and this city is enjoying of glamorous nightlife with open bars and variety of drinks and charming people around.

There were plenty of water sport activities and bungee jumping and boating and sailing .Most of resorts were closed that time,but I liked so much and was refreshing Sometimes you don't want to see so many people ,maybe that due to being in China for 6 years and streets are like parking cars full of people .Everyday I feel there any demonstration?

Anyway,There are 2 parks or better to say one is a Forest park which one is like a nice small zoo and another one is a real forest and approximately takes 3 or4 hours to walk around.It was so amazing ,as no one was there almost empty due to cold weather and we both were freezing and walking all the way to see all wide animals.

Personally I don't like to go to the zoo espcially in China ,cause it give me a deep sorrow and bad effect for atvleast a week after that.The poor animals mostly suffer from malnuration and low ,poor facilities ,but I should say I did love the Forest zoo in Dalian which was great.


I dare to say I loved it more than any other ,glamorous places and other zoos That I have been to.

most of the animals were free and so many huge birds and ostriches ,dromedaries,were hanging around.
I try ed to be so brave and take some photos with zebras but unfortunately no attention I had received from them,just their nice asses showed up.

There are plenty of performances in the hall of aquarium which is like small circus.

In one of the photos we were in zoo and I was feeding pets.In DALIAN ZOO'S YOU COULD SEE FARM ANIMALS AND PETS AND A BIG AQUARIUMS AS WELL.

There was another aquarium which has the reputation of being one of the biggest in East Asia.
We could see and play with dolphins and polar bears,but was so shame to keep them in such small place though and polar Foxes and seals and sea lions were so amazing though.
I have had a great chance as It was off -peak to take so many photos from Aquarium

Our trip to Suzhou Jan 2009,Lantern festival in China

Suzhou is located in South part of Yangtze river and it is just 2 hours far from Hangzhou by bus.There is a Chinese Idiom says:"live in Hangzhou and born in Suzhou and eat in Guanghou."

As it is said,this is one of the most beautiful cities in East coast of China with Botanical gardens and plenty of parks and lakes and bridges.

The style and structure of building are so similar to Venice in Italy .The history of this city and old part of city with bridges goes back to 6 B.C.

In contrast to the huge buildings in the north, the water townships of Suzhou are designed in the typical style of southern China, renowned for their charming watery view and ancient residential houses.

Suzhou is famous for its Silk and embroideries.Comparatively, Suzhou's fame as a vital ancient silk center pales beside its natural scenery.
Suzhou Silk Museum is the best place to learn the city's prosperity of silk in the past.

There are so many restaurants in China and in each single small town and city,but the fact is, it is pretty hard to order food if someone doesn't know how to ask and literally how to speak Chinese.We found a nice one in Suzhou ,by chance when we were walking around and the Fish head soup is one of famous ones.



There is an amazement park in Suzhou,Exquisite gardens, meandering water and green mountains around Suzhou City attract a great number of visitors every year from both home and abroad.

When we arrived to Suzhou was middle of winter and pretty cold ,actually it was Chinese New Year and everywhere firework and fire crackers the whole night and days jingling in our ears,but beside that we go a boat on river shore and visited some nice gardens and rent a bike for the whole day just 10 kuai.

Canglang Pavilion (Blue Wave Pavilion), Lingering Garden, Humble Administrator's Garden and Lion Grove Garden are the four top gardens in Suzhou, representing the architectural styles of Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties respectively. The latter three gardens were added to the World Heritage List in 1997.

The second day we went to Lingering garden.with the unique man-made stones and tranquil atmosphere representing old ancient history of China.there are some embroidery and silk museum and silk market for tourists in those areas,which you can find your own style.


There are so many corridors and halls that you should pass through and theoretically it is a family house and private place which used to be house of one of the Emperors in China.Those 2 corridors leading you to the Central parts and and a magnificent sightseeing from there windows to the garden which is amazing.
The Northen part of place in vegetable garden and in the center has a nice fountain with nice handmade stones around it.
As we stayed in old part of town which I wanted to.We had great time beside the canal. Every night form 6 in the afternoon all Lanterns were on and small bats moving and rowing on the river and carry the tourists.That canal was just behind our hostel which was great chance to be there there and enjoy eating snacks and kebab sticks and hang around and go back to the hostel.I have a photo of me wearing my polar bear overcoat as I t was pretty cold at that time there .

Lantern festival is called as ...is a traditional festival in China which is 2 weeks after Spring festival(in lunar calendar) and when the moon is full. Famiies gather together and eat cakes and sweets and children carry Lanterns in the street.






There is another famous garden which calls Classic garden.That garden full of corridors and basically divided by 2 part one part is residential area and another part is garden which replicate the style of Japans time in China.Halls,corridors and hallways.
The furniture is made of Rose wood and Oak wood and each single door ad window has great unique carving as well and valuable work of calligraphy and Chinese painting everywhere representing old and heritage of Dynasty time in China.