Alive and well in the Philippines

Yes, I'm still alive!  I've just been in some small towns in the Philippines which did not have internet cafes.  So far, this vacation has been a lot of fun and has been much more relaxing than the last one.  The saying "life's a beach" applies here.  Today I spent all day on the beach, taking photos, reading, swimming, eating, drinking mango shakes, and talking to some kids who tried to teach me words in Tagalog.  Sadly, the only things I remember were "aso" which means dog, and "pusa" which means cat.  And "mahal kita" which means "I love you."

I have been very impressed by the quality of beaches in this country... definitely some of the best I've seen!  While travelling here has not been as cheap as other countries, the people are among some of the friendliest and the weather has been awesome!  We have about 5 more days left here before heading back to Vietnam... from one tropical country to another.

I've been taking lots of photos... will update more when I have more time.  Tomorrow we are likely going on a boat trip, snorkelling around Bacuit Bay in northern Palawan.  I know it's bound to be a great time.  The Philippines is in tough competition against Thailand for being the best beach getaway in my books...

Stay tuned for more stories next time!!

Fresh start...

I've uploaded some India pics to the blog.  You can see the rest on my Facebook album, or if you don't have FB, I can e-mail you the link.  I'm almost at 1000 blog visitors... thanks for reading!

Anyway, this post was meant to be about new year's resolutions.  It seems like every new year I try to make some resolutions but fail ... eat healthier/exercise more/learn languages/blah blah...

Basically I have the same resolutions this year.  Nothing new to report!

Do you have any new year's resolutions?  If you do... leave a comment on my blog and let me know!!  I like getting blog comments.

One wish I have for the new year is to have some VISITORS in 2012.  Family, friends... please come visit me.  The world is your oyster... it is yours to discover!

Happy new year!

Hope you have had a great start to 2012!  I know I have...

The last time I posted about our New Year's Eve plans to attend the rooftop dinner party in Agra at our hotel.  It was lots of fun!  When we first showed up, there were only 4 other people just sitting at tables looking bored, and the food was yet to arrive.  However, the small restaurant really filled up and a delicious buffet of Indian food arrived!  Since there were a limited amount of tables, we ended up sitting with a nice couple from Hong Kong and chatted with them about India and other travel stories.

At about 11pm, it started to rain.  Since the tables were all under the uncovered portion of the rooftop restaurant, everyone moved their chairs under the small roof on the other side of the room.  We were all arranged in a strange circle, but the rain brought people together and we started chatting.  There were people from all different countries... Canada, Hong Kong, China, Japan, Mexico, Holland, Scotland, England, etc.  A man from the restaurant lit a bonfire in a pit in the centre of the circle (so many fire safety rules being broken, but that's India!) ...

The rain didn't last long, and when it stopped it was around midnight.  A guy from China had a countdown on his phone, so we did the whole countdown and happy new year thing on the rooftop.  On other rooftop restaurants nearby, we could hear other people doing the same thing.  The hotel next door started shooting off fireworks from their rooftop and they were going off above our heads.  And of course the shadow of the Taj lit up by the night sky was in the distance! 
                                                                 It was a pretty cool way to ring in the new year. 

The next day we took an autorickshaw (or "tuk tuk") in the rain to the bus station before dawn, and boarded a bus to Delhi where we met up with our friend Amrita at the airport.  We arrived at some odd hour of the morning in Bangkok and proceeded to get Subway at around 2:30am which was awesome!  Sadly, we didn't get much sleep.  Airport benches are not comfortable at all.  We headed to the check-in counter at around 6am to board our flight to HCMC at 7:20.  Luckily, Bangkok to HCMC is less than 1.5 hours away.  It felt so good to be back in our home away from home.  We were greeted with hot weather (India was cold!) and familiarity.  It was nice not to have to haggle over cab ride fares, or deal with a lack of toilet paper and clean toilets.

Now we're back at work, with the first week done (only 4 working days) and one more to go before the next 2-week holiday.  We really lucked out with the schedule this year, as the Tet holiday (lunar new year) falls in January.  Tet is like Chinese New Year, FYI.  What are our plans for Tet?  Travelling again, of course.  When you are a travel addict like me, 2 week vacations are a wonderful thing.

The next destination is... the Philippines!!  Beaches, here we come!