Blogs from Asia - page 14744

The day started out early today. Well actually, it never ended from last night. After hitting up a couple bars\clubs in Patapong, we didn't get home till about 5:30am. Since we were up and about, we decided to catch the sunrise on top of the "golden mount" which is a wat perched on top of a man-made hill. Unfortunately, the temple was closed and the walls were too high for us to scale. We decided to hit the floating markets in Bangkok. After talking to the driver, he said he would take us out of town to a different floating market which is more "original". So off we went to Nonthaburi (I think) and spent a couple of hours crusing down many canals sampling on various local delicacies. On the way back, we stopped at a ... read more

As a pre-final (for now) farewell to my med students, we all went out for hotpot. All the other volunteers came too, as we have all got to know each other really well over the past while, there’s no separation of jobs, same as I now know the museum girls that Joe and Alex work with, we all hang out together, which has made for a far more pleasant and fun time. We had wonderful hotpot, apart from the live eel things that thrashed and splashed when they were thrust into the bubbling broth. That didn’t make me hugely happy, luckily I’d eaten enough by then. We then decided that KTV would be a good idea, they love it here. Joe and Alex ended up going once at three in the afternoon, with no beer. Which ... read more

Lotus Lantern Festival The city of Seoul and the entire country of Korea has been preparing for Buddha’s Birthday for several months. The streets have been lined with neon colored lanterns that are lit at night, and so are the temples. The festivities started off with a Lotus Lantern Festival that took place the Sunday before Buddha's Birthday, in downtown Seoul near Insadong. Earlier in the day, Jogye-sa (one of the temples in the area) hosted a large lantern-making event for foreigners. The places were quickly filled and since it was the day after Meredith and I got back from Seoraksan, we missed out on the chance to participate. In Korean Buddhism, the Lotus Flower stands for purity, perfection and spiritual enlightenment. Other than the lanterns, you will see halls filled with paintings and sculptures containing ... read more

One of my volunteer assignments has involved working with an organization called Tong-Len. It's a non-profit organization which provides education and medical support for the families that live in a slum camp here in Dharamsala. The slum camp is named "Charan," and is home to immigrants from Rajistan and Maharashtra, two distinct states in India (the state I am in is called "Himachal Pradesh.") Tong-Len has set up two children's schools in Charan, which we affectionately call "The Big School" and "The Nursery School." Essentially they are two large tents smack in the middle of all the other make-shift tents in the slum camp. The Nursery School holds classes for the youngest children (I think between ages 3 and 5) while The Big School accomodates everyone else (kids between ages 6 and 12 - all in ... read more

We bumped into our friends, Paul and Wendy, and their two kids, Spencer (9) and Ryan (7), in the foyer of the D&D Inn in Bangkok. They had been fast-tracked through immigration and got into town a couple of hours before we expected them. Last time we were in Bangkok we had scouted around the budget accommodation around Banglampu and decided that the D&D Inn was about the best. The rooms can be a bit austere, but they have a rooftop pool and an all-you-can-eat breakfast is included in the price. The six of us did the tourist bit in Bangkok over the next few days. It is possible to do a nice round trip through the city centre using public transport but avoiding the buses (keeping off the clogged roads is eminently sensible). Firstly we ... read more