I miss white folks...

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After 3 weeks in Asia surrounded by my fellow yellow people, I'm pretty surprised to find myself longing for white folks. Okay, what I really miss is having an actual conversation with someone in person. During the past two days, I've met some pretty cool people from all over. Yesterday I was waiting for the bus to take me to the Victoria Peak here in Hong Kong, and this dude asked me if I was going to the Peak. I said yes, and we just started talking. It always starts with the "where you're from?" When I told him I was from the States, he told me that he lived there for a year and traveled for awhile when he was younger.

The guy was an a half-Moroccan Israeli. He had a really interesting life story. Like all citizens of Israel, both men and women, he was required to serve 3 years in the army. I told him, well I have served 5 years at the University of Arizona, so step off, buddy. No seriously, he told me that he was on the front-lines fighting against Lebanon when they had that invasion last year. The really cool part that got us talking was our philosophies on life and traveling.

He's been traveling for the past half a year now and was only in Hong Kong for 2 days. He spent most of his time in Australia renting a van with other random people going to beaches. He and his buddy rented a van, went to hostels, met up with other people traveling, and just got together to go off to the next town or beach. At one point there were like 6 or 7 of them, almost all from Europe. No Americans, though. Anyway, after leaving the Peak, we made plans to go to the light show thing they have with all of the skyscrapers.

Normally I don't like sharing drinks with anyone, even relatives. It grosses me out. So I'm running real late after doing a city tour, and meet up with this guy at a tourism office. The first thing he says to me was, "Hey, try this drink." I'm like no thanks, man, I'm not thirsty. Then he offers again, and says it's real good. I didn't want to break any kind of cultural customs and offend the man, so I gamely drank it. Then we had dinner, and kind of shared that, too. We essentially split two meals in order to try each other's stuff.

After sharing drinks and food this Israeli dude, we head off to the light show. After the show, we meet up with his uncles and aunts, who happened to be traveling in Hong Kong at the same time as him. They were going shopping at the street markets here, so I went along. It was sort of surreal being in Hong Kong, walking around and shopping with this guy and family I've never met before. But they were all pretty cool and friendly. The guy and I leave them eventually and decide to have drinks.

It was pretty hard to find a regular bar here. Not because we couldn't read the signs since most are in English, too, but because some places were karaoke places. We were walking aimlessly for a while until I spot a beer sign. So we go up one flight of stairs, walk in the place, and the lady in front tells us it's $50 something dollars just to sit down. But that included a girl to sit down us. I'm not sure what else was included in that deal, but we didn't ask. The setup I saw for the brief time I was there was groups of people sitting around a tv doing the karaoke thing and drinking. That's it.

I feel kind of bad because I think the Israeli guy was down for it, being his last night and all. We eventually find a "normal" place to drink. We drank several beers talking about life, traveling, home, family, friends, music, movies, politics, and girls (he kept on going crazy whenever our waitress walked by). That last part was funny because we also talked at length about the chick he proposed to a long time ago. Apparently, he still loves her and wants to marry her, so it was pretty funny hearing him make comments about our waitress.

Now I'm sure you all have seen pictures of Hong Kong with its buildings. It really is off the hook in terms of the skyline, buildings, and just the sheer amount of people all packed together here. Over 7 million people on a piece of land that seems smaller than Tucson. I really can't describe it in words, so I'll have to show pictures. Today I went on a tour to a nearby island. Lunch was provided, but it was served in a traditional Chinese style where everyone shares the food in the middle of table. I've always done this with family, but never with strangers. It was like a U.N. luncheon at this table. Four people from Australia, one Indian from Singapore, one from school administrator from New Zeeland, and one American. Me. I am usually the only American on tours, and I think people look at me funny because of that. Or maybe they look at me thinking, "Where are this little kid's parents."

I'm going to skip over some stuff from Hong Kong and go back a bit to Cambodia that I forgot. Both involve lunch. First, I had one of the best steaks ever. It was this French place and pretty expensive by Cambodia standards. The steak was perfect and exactly how I like my women: tender, thick, and a little pink in the center. Now the other story has nothing to do with the food, though it was good. I stopped at this riverside restaurant and begin to sit down at one table, until the waitress suggests another table. It was right next to this Australian or British chick, but I sat down anyway.

Just as I sat down, she moves to the table in front of her. I have that effect on people. I noticed that she had this pad of paper, a pen, and her phone right to it. The I meal I ordered took forever, and soon the lady gets a phone call. I wasn't paying attention at first, but while waiting forever for my food, I did notice that she completely stopped eating her food and seemed really focused on the call. I get my meal finally with the chick still into her conversation. I have no clue what she's saying because I'm listening to music. Then about halfway through my meal, the call ends and I her hear crying. Then the crying turns into full-out sobbing. I feel uncomfortable and rush my meal, so I could get the hell out of there. No really, I did feel bad for her, but I didn't feel like asking her if she was okay.

And there is one last thing that before I end. On one of my tours in Cambodia, my tuk-tuk driver asks me if I wanted to go to the shooting range. Cambodia is sort of like the Wild West, where anything pretty much goes. At these shooting ranges, you can shoot M-16s, AK-47s, and rocket launchers or throw grenades. Supposedly they used to shoot up live animals. The driver knows that I'm an American-born Chinese (like everyone the first question from him was where are you from), so he explains to me that a lot of Americans and Chinese like going to the shooting ranges. Since I'm both he must have thought I really wanted to go. I had to refuse his offer.

Well, my iPod is getting low on juice, and it is time to go to back to my brick-solid bed now and get 5 more hours of sleep. At least there are two twin-sized mattresses in my room, so when I get tired of one, I can go to the other for more torture-rack agony. Tomorrow is my last full day of fun.

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