So, in the spirit of being Australian, we decided to support our team in the soccer. Foo and I had heard about the amazing win over Japan, and we were looking forward to a repeat performance against Brazil... (sigh, oh well). Still, we got all dressed up in yellow, and grabbed our Aussie flag and headed to the Walkabout - a chain of Aussie pubs here in London. It was so packed!!! And so full of Aussies (I don't know why that should surprise me, but... :) ) Anyways, it was our last couple of days in London before we headed [View Full Entry]

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There is some amazing history in London - it is bizarre coming from a place where what we consider ancient is only 200 years old... there is so much culture in London... Trafalgar Square was amazing. It's a square in Central London (not far from The Strand - yay for Monopoly!!) that commemorates the Battle of Trafalgar (1805) which was apparently a British naval victory of the Napoleonic Wars.. The National Gallery sits on one side of the square - there are some amazing paintings in here. Van Gogh, da Vinci, Michelangelo among a few. I could've spent hours there... [View Full Entry]

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Well here we are... In London. We landed around 6.30 in the morning, and my brother, and a few of our friends (thanks Deb, Trav, Nil :) ) from Perth were at Heathrow to pick us up :) It was great to see familiar faces after such a long time!! So, after a few hours of catching up on sleep we headed out to see some of the London sights. Had our first experience on the infamous London Underground, and we were absolutely overwhelmed by the number of people!!!! Foo and I were completely wide-eyed for the first couple of days [View Full Entry]

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Back home for a few days. Had enough time to hang out with the dogs, Kobe and Spark :) Hung out with the family, - my uncle, aunt, grandma and cousin... I(t's wonderful to come home :) ).... and even managed to go out on Saturday - and catch up with a few friends from Perth too before we headed for Europe... [View Full Entry]

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That evening we managed to see a cultural dancing show and some fire eating... do not try at home :) [View Full Entry]

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Our next feat was to climb Sigiriya Rock Fortress. It was originally built around 477 AD as an impenetrable fortress by King Kasyapa of Sri Lanka, and much later (16th and 17th centuries history tells us) it was used as a monastery by Buddhist monks. It is the 8th Wonder of the Modern World... The rock stands over 200m tall and there are 1200 steps carved into the rock face, some easy and some not so easy, which takes us right to the top. Elsie and I started our climb around 9.30 in the morning, and it was nearly midday when [View Full Entry]

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The Dalada Maligawa (Temple of the Tooth in English) used to be a royal palace, and is now a Buddhist temple, where a tooth relic of the Lord Buddha is kept. The relic is stored inside a gold casket and kept under lock and key. Every evening, the room is opened for the public to view the golden casket - thousands of people gather here to get a glimpse... We went to the Temple at night, it was the first time i had seen it all lit up and it was beautiful. [View Full Entry]

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The next day we headed to Kandy - the centre of the island, which used to be the capital. It is home to a lot of Sri Lanka's cultural history, and also the Temple of the Tooth (Dalada Maligawa). On the way to Kandy, we stopped at the Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage. Elsie absolutely adores elephants, so she was loving it. We watched the elephants bathing and playing. This orphanage has about 70 or so elephants. [View Full Entry]

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From Brunei, we went back to KL airport, where we stayed overnight in an airport hotel (we just couldn't bring ourselves to sleep on the airport lounges..), and then flew to Colombo, Sri Lanka. We stayed with my uncle (mom's brother), aunty and grandmother, in the house my mother grew up in, and where we have spent most of our childhood summer holidays in... Sri Lanka is amazing... if I do say so myself. A tropical paradise in the true sense of the word... shame about the civil war huh? We had an amazing time there... [View Full Entry]

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another amazing thing i saw in brunei was the water village! a whole little city built on stilts in the water. everything is built on water - the houses, the schools, even the mosques! everyone gets from one place to another on boats, or for visitors, water taxis. absolutely fascinating... it's not that the people who live there are poor, though the houses donn't look that flash - they choose to live this way. anyways, just 3 days in brunei was probably not long enough, but i'm sure i will once again visit - mostly to see foo's family again, who [View Full Entry]

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