No, the toilets aren’t bad. Well, most of them anyway. The worst toilet we came across – or rather, that Em came across – was a public toilet three quarters of the way up the Great Wall of China. We thought it would be decent because not many people get up that far, but apparently neither do the cleaners. Public toilets where you have to pay for usage are great because they’re usually clean, but on the whole, we kept to the facilities of restaurants, posh shopping districts and, of course, our hotels.

Still, I doubt there would be many – if any – of those foul, doorless latrines I’d been warned against left. Thanks to the government’s Olympic efforts, the city has really been spruced up. Development is happening at breakneck speed but the thing that impressed me the most was the security. There’s practically a policeman around every corner. And it says a lot that I feel much safer in Beijing than I do walking the streets of PJ or KL. All in all, it’s a good time to visit…

Unless you have issues with rude people. Hotel and restaurant staff aside, probably one in three people are rude, especially the hordes and hordes of local tourists. I have never seen old people shove their fellow elderly the way I witnessed aunties doing it in Beijing, and I have definitely never had people cut my line in the toilet by wedging themselves between my person and the cubicle door. Seriously?! I have a soft spot for old people and even I felt like pushing back. But I didn’t.

Then there’s the driving. The countless continental cars around are another sign of the wealth that’s pouring into China, but I like the way Em put it, when she described the drivers as behaving as if they were still on bicycles. They stop when and where they please, change lanes however they like (even into incoming traffic!), and toot their horns liberally and ridiculously loudly. If you thought Malaysian drivers were bad, as I did, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

So the toilets were good, but the people were rude. The sights were breathtaking, but the air was really polluted (oh, how it was!). We were told Beijing only gets about 20 days of clear, blue skies a year. We got one. Guess we were really lucky.

The sights.

The goofing around.

The language.

But most of all, the company.

I did not love:

The smog.

See the rest of my photos here and here.

See you in nine days.

First stop – King Cruiser Wreck. It’s this huge sunken passenger ferry that’s now teeming with marine life.

Second stop – Shark Point. Where we saw my first leopard shark. The colours here are breathtaking.

Third stop – Koh Doc Mai. I think lionfish are one of the most beautiful creatures ever.

For the full album, click here.

When I was young, my dad used to wake us up early every morning to run along the beach. He’d run and us kids would walk, dragging our feet and complaining about not getting to sleep in. Since this was only possible when we were on an island – Penang, usually – we didn’t have to do it too often.

At the time, the only thing we hated more than getting dragged out of bed was having to make the annual family pilgrimage to Penang in the first place, so it’s funny that I now have a special love for the beach. Not for suntanning or people-watching or whatever else you may associate with going to the beach, but for the sand and the open skies and the way the ocean’s waves lap at its edges.

I love wading into the waves, I love walking along the water’s edge and staring out to sea. There’s a certain majesty and, at the same time, a peaceful calm to the beach. You sense the ferocious strength that lurks beneath the gentle surface of the water, and the unseen powers that moulded the ocean and created the skies in the first place.

The beach gives me perspective, reminds me how small I am in the scheme and beauty of everything else, gives me the chance to quiet my heart and my mind, and turns my eyes to the Creator of it all. It rights everything inside in a way that few other things can.

Y understands that I love the beach, even though it doesn’t do for him what it does for me. But he remembers my need to go barefoot in the sand, to walk in the shallows and feel the waves, and to take a moment to breathe in the open space. It’s probably the one place Mr. Long Legs doesn’t hurry me and tell me I’m walking too slowly. Even though I am, incredibly so. See the two guys in boardshorts walking ahead in the photo? That’s Y with Mark.

The most important lesson I learnt, and that I think everyone who goes to Phuket should know, is that you can’t exchange/get a refund on something as soon as you touch it.

Case in point #1:

We had dinner at this great restaurant one night. I ordered “chilled young coconut”, those are the exact words on the menu. The coconut arrives. I take a sip. And another. Then I try to scrape off some coconut flesh and discover that it’s rock hard.

I tell the waitress the “young” coconut isn’t all that youthful after all and I want to change it for another one. She tells me she can’t give me another one because I’ve already taken a sip. Apparently, the very first thing I should have done is try the flesh before taking a sip. That way, we guessed, if I reject it for whatever reason, they can bring me a new one and give mine to someone else.

Case in point #2:

We booked ourselves a fishing/snorkelling trip. As the boat heads out to sea, we discover it’s actually in terrible condition and, upon checking the brochure, that it’s not the exact boat we had been promised. Worse, when it comes time for snorkelling, we discover that the “snorkelling destination” isn’t really for snorkelling because there’s nothing to see, and the boat didn’t have any snorkelling equipment anyway.

We ask to go back immediately, cutting what was supposed to be an eight-hour outing down to four. Then we go back to the tour operator and tell him we want half our money back – not too unreasonable, we hoped, seeing as we only got to do half of what was promised in half the time originally agreed.

The manager refuses. He gives us back an eighth of what we paid and tells us that if the boat didn’t have the equipment and wasn’t the same one, we shouldn’t have gotten on in the first place. Apparently, we should have inspected the boat and grilled the crew about equipment before setting foot on it.

So now I know.

When I see something big and not-so-common for the first time, there’s always a feeling of, “Oh my God I can’t believe I’m looking at a _____.” Meet my first leopard shark. It’s only a baby but it was still pretty damn cool.

Y and I are back from our four-day trip to Phuket. It was way more eventful than we would have liked – for starters, one of us got deported from Phuket because of visa problems and another almost couldn’t come back, long stories those – but it was a great trip with fantastic company all the same. We’ll make the next one less exciting.

Pictures (definitely) and more details (maybe) to come when I can. For now, I have the sniffles to combat and work is barely allowing me time to even breathe.

(Photo taken by Neil Stretch. Thanks mostly to leopark shark up there, Y and I bought the photos from our dives.)

Apparently this year’s crowds were significantly smaller than last year’s. Y and I wouldn’t know because this was the first time we’d taken the trouble to rise early on a Saturday morning and head down to PWTC. At 9.45am, there was already a whole heap of people queueing for their admission tickets. If this is what the MATTA Fair looks like during recession, I don’t want to be there when the economy is booming.

Am currently in the midst of planning a few trips for the upcoming months. We’re thinking Phuket, Beijing and Tioman but details are yet to be finalised. The older folks may be spending less but AirAsia is simply too tempting for those of us in our 20s. Or maybe it’s just my colleagues and me.

Speaking of crowds, IKEA is impossible on a Sunday afternoon. You wouldn’t believe there’s a recession looking at the number of people in there. I could barely walk! This kid with a mini trolley charged at me and his mother didn’t even try to stop him. I stepped to one side just in time. An onlooker shook his head disapprovingly.

That is why, on that chilly morning in Paris, we were stunned when the Stranger came out of nowhere. I didn’t notice him before, but he must have been standing on the platform with the rest of us. The Metro glided to a halt and everybody rushed to get in. I don’t remember if we queued, it has been almost four months now, but it quickly became evident that we might not all make it onto the train. There were too many people and too little time for people to move in.

We tried anyway. Four of us got in safely. My dad-in-law was just about to squeeze in when the doors began to close. I tried to get on but there wasn’t even a toe-hold for me. I tried to hold the doors open – perhaps if I could do that, there would be time for the crowd to create room – but it was no use.

Then the doors stopped. The Stranger stood in the doorway, holding the doors open with his arms, his body jammed between them so they couldn’t close. He didn’t say anything, didn’t even smile or look at us, simply stood there while we squeezed in – luckily there was room by then.

When Dad and I were safely on board, he leaned out the door and shouted at the driver of the train. Shouted in French, I suppose. He gestured angrily. It sounded rude.

Dad said thank you, thank you very much. He grunted, not even in our direction. I wish I said merci beaucoup but I was, to tell the truth, too stunned. He didn’t say anything, didn’t even smile or look at us, simply stood there. At the next stop, he stepped out, looked to the left and walked away.