A thrilla to get in and out of Manila

June 02, 2013 • Blog

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World » Philippines » Manila » Pink Manila

Apparently, there is no easy way to get out of Manila’s main international airport. Asking several staff, the only suggested option was taking a cab, something I typically try to avoid, specifically when leaving airports.
I probably was messed over, though there was no real way I could have avoided it. I took an official cab and paid the metered price. At 14 euros for just over 8km, it was an annoyingly expensive ride.
But it could have been worse. Though the ride apparently should have cost 5 or 6 euros, another less lucky fellow was charged 30.

Manila appears a quite pleasant city, not too different from Bangkok, if perhaps more laid back. Certainly affordable, people are friendly, while a vast majority speaks English. Not nearly as humid as Singapore, while public spaces are policed in quite similar fashion as compared to the city state. But, thankfully, the Philippines are not a police state.
Here and there, impressive but fading architecture hides between city blocks bustling with energy, 7/11 supermarkets, and a host of national and international fast food chains.

Buying a drink from a hole in the wall, I was welcomed with a “What’s yours”?

The worst reachable airport in the world

Depending on your terminal and arrival time, Manila’s main airport can already be quite the hassle, though it appears that taxis don’t have a tendency to rip you off when going there. Though this mostly might simply be due to most drivers being fairly honest, while the dishonest ones congregate at the airport, as they servicing the airport can be like structurally hitting the jackpot.

But the worst is left for Clark international airport. In true budget airline style, this one is claimed to be Manila’s second international airport, even though its nearly 100 kilometers away from town. AirAsia and a few other budget airlines fly from here, but none offer an even somewhat easy connection between the airport and the city.
There is one bus company which links up Manila with Clark directly. But, when I showed up at their sales counter, 4.5 hours before my flight’s scheduled departure time and an hour before the bus was supposed to leave, I was told I should instead use another bus company which served the nearby town, reputedly, hourly. The clerk feared that their bus would not have enough time to clear Manila traffic and get to the airport in time for me to reach my flight.

Off I trundled, in search for another bus terminal.

Already finding the first terminal was a bit of trouble. The bus company doesn’t specify on their website where it is, only mentioning the suburb. So, I asked the ladies at my hostel, who had a knack for not letting me finish my sentences.

“So, I’m going to Clark airport tomorrow. And I understand that Philtranco runs a shuttle between Manila and Clark.”
“Yes?”
“They claim their bus leaves from MegaMall and Pasay, and…”
“MegaMall is very far. Take Pasay.”
“Yes, well, I know where MegaMall is, but I don’t know where in Pasay…”
“Pasau is right here, very easy.”
“Yes, well, I will still have to know where in Pasay I will have to take the bus…”
“Pasau is right here, is very easy. You just go.”
“Just go… Where?
“To Pasay. You need to take bus from Pasay, yes?
“Do *you* know where I might be able to find the bus terminal in Pasay?”
“You just go and ask. Everyone will know. Then you take jeepney.” A jeepney being someone of a shared taxi, almost identical to the Thai songthaew.

Finding the right terminal and starting at the south side of town, it took an hour just to get to the north side of Manila, which I could have reached in 10 minutes by metro, instead of the 2 hours it had taken now.
At the Dau bus terminal, Day being the town fairly close to Clark, but still perhaps 10 kilometers from the airport, time was starting to run out, there were no taxis in evidence. Absurd, but confirmed by several of the workers at the bus station. I could take a jeepney, waiting for it to fill up, or rent the whole jeepney, which seats a dozen or so, myself. Or I could take a motorbike taxi to the ‘Main gate’. I opted for the latter.
The ‘Main gate’ turned out to be the town’s short distance bus station, perhaps still some 6 or 7 kilometers from the airport. Here, I still had to take a jeepney, renting the whole thing with three fellow passengers just to get us going.

I eventually arrived just under an hour before my scheduled departure, covering the 95 kilometers from hostel to airport in just under 4 hours and 15 minutes.

Then, adding insult to injury, i was charged a 9 euro ‘Teminal tax’ upon departure.

Clark was, until 1991, the largest American air base outside of the US, the States having played a somewhat unsavory role in Philippine politics before then. The airport was refurbished and reopened as the capital’s second international airport two years later.

Food and friends in Singapore

May 30, 2013 • Blog

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World » Singapore » Theatres on the Bay

Primarily a visit to a good friend, who turns out to both have a pregnant partner and getting married in six weeks, I found Singapore nice, if overly organized, sterile almost, and amazingly expensive. We contemplated going to a quiz night, where pints go for 18 euros. Instead, I ran along with two hashes, meaning good company, affordable drinks, and getting acquainted with somewhat less usual parts of the country.

With the country's diverse ethnic make up, it's easy to find almost any type of cuisine in the city state. And though it's easy to spend a lot on food and drinks, there are also plenty of affordable road side eateries, of which some would say they're the best place to get your foodie thrills.

Singapore's major downside is it operating as a police state. As long as you stay in line you won't notice a thing, but fall between 1984s cracks and you might end up with a whipping.

The bustle of Hong Kong

May 24, 2013 • Blog

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World » Hong Kong » Kowloon Public Pier

Clearly, Hong Kong served as a model for the newly developed cities of China, while Hong Kong seems to have had its initial architectural boom in the 60s and 70s, judging from the style and decay of many of hte high rises.
The city has very much been built on top of itself, with a diverse local community from all over Asia. My accommodation, in the heart of Kowloon, just across the bay from Hong Kong proper, sees more Africans, Philippinos and Indians than Chinese walk in and out.

McDonald's, Starbucks and many other boring fast food joints are all over the place. At night, madams tuck at your arms and keep on insisting that you have to check out the girls before going to bed. "You are a young man, right?"
I'm told that if you spend 1000 dollars in one of the nudie bars, you get a complimentary on-site blowjob thrown in.

Within 45 minutes of arriving in Hong Kong, taking the bus from Guangzhou through a country side covered in factories owned by Hong Kong Chinese, I was off on a hash, skirting the border with China in a torrential monsoon rain.

I unluckily had too much rain while in Hong Kong, the weather only clearing up on the day I had to leave. A pity, as the best views of the city are from the hills on the southern side of town. Using a tram to go up the hills, climbing an incline which at times makes a neat 45 degrees, all I saw was a white mist while being drenched by pouring rain.
But I could have known. In the morning, the first 'black cloud' warning in two years was raised. Within 24 hours, 500mm of rain poured from the skies.

In Guangzhou

May 19, 2013 • Blog

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World » China » Guangzhou » Sunshine Home

Guanghzou's province, Guangdong, is what gave the world the name Canton. Trading with the Europeans for hundreds of years, it was here that the Portuguese and Brits set up shop, claiming bits and pieces as their own turf.
Macau, filled to the brim with casinos, is now taking in more money than Las Vegas, while Hong Kong is living a precarious existence, perhaps slowly sliding into the state controlled straight jacket the rest of the country is challenged with. Guangzhou, meanwhile, is slowly attaining more freedom of movement.

Guangzhou under communism already had a less stringent connection with the west, annual trade fairs being the odd flirtation with capitalism and it is also here where, now, most of the Africans importing from China to their home country set up shop.

The small Shamian Island, in the Pearl river, was once under control of the French and Brits, used as a staging ground for their trade with China. With somewhat older architecture, the island still sports a faint hint of Europe and is popular for its leafy streets, packed with wedding couples and fashion shoots.

Arriving in a fiercely air conditioned train, I was wearing a sweater when I stepped onto the station's platform, only to be slapped in the face by tropical humidity.

Eurovision 2013

May 18, 2013 • Blog

World » China » Guangzhou » Sunshine Home

Easily the most prominent event celebrating European unity in all its diversity, the first semi final's opening sequence, last year's winning song performed on the outskirts of Europe, merging from one to the next, culminating in a dramatic, even touching, performance as the opening of this year's eveng in the Malmö Arena, with Loreen once more showing off her spectacular voice.
The opening sequence nicely fit this year's theme, 'We are one'.
The, event, though not as spectacular (or expensive) as last year's, at least didn't try to overly push the qualities of the host nation, the introductory videos to the songs being shorts featuring the countries' artists.

This year saw only one host, Petra Mede, a Swedish comedian, bringing the event to the masses. She did still occasionally switch from the default English to French.
And, totally absurd, Australia, where, Eurovision has been a sleeper success for years, actually got a segment during the first semi to highlight the country's love for the event.

Also, Eurovision's performers have to a large extent moved to winners of national talent shows. The biggest advantage of this being that the artists mostly actually are able to sing very well.
On the other hand, somewhat worrying, if pleasant to the eye, more and more of the performers are babes. I do have a feeling that the organizer's led something of a ban against showing off too much leg this year. A sad moment in time.

But, there also appears to be yet another trend. After several countries mocking the event with ridiculous entries, mostly during the 90s, the resurgence of Eurovision has this year resulted in an impressive lineup.

And, for the first time, voting through a smart phone app is an option. But not for me. I tried staying up for the finals, but a day of hashing didn't allow me to make it for the 3am opening, considering I was in China.
I wonder if the app has to be tied to a phone number, or how else individual voters are connected to their countries.

After a surprising parade of all participants, obviously referencing an Olympic opening ceremony, the finals skipped the conventional start of beginning with the previous year's winner.

The finals were opened by France's Amandine Bourgeous, the first of the many national Idols (or whatever the local flavor) winners. The big 5 (Germany, UK, Spain, Italy and France) don't have to qualify for the finals for contributing the bulk of the European Broadcasting Union's (EBU) expenses. An obvious advantage, but also a risk, as it also makes these countries a tad more complacent with selecting their submissions.
But, 'Hell and me' wasn't at all bad, somewhat reminiscent of 80s synthpop, Niagara, or perhaps early Eurithmics. But not nearly good enough for Europe, coming in, surprisingly, nearly at the bottom of the pile.

Though there seems to be a tendency to send more and more babes to Europvision, Lithuania didn't need one with Andrius Pojavis. This more classic rock song sung in accented English is nice, but was a tad too generic, too tame, like France being pushed to the bottom of the list.

The tiny country of Moldova succeeds almost every year in submitting something at least appreciated by the whole continent, only once out of their nine tries not making it to the finals.
This year fielding a babe with quite a fiery dress, they submitted Aliona Moon, who last year was one of the backing vocals to her country's Pasha Parfeny. The song, a dramatic ballad, is good, but didn't stand out enough to make a stab at the top spot, ending in the middle.

Last year's Finnish entry was one of the best of the field. Very emotive, but not making it to the final. This year, Finland threw in Krista Siegfrids, with really something cute, if little more, though catchy. Well. Until the last seconds of the song, when Krista's plea for marriage turned out to be one for her female lover, surprising Eurovision with a girl on girl kiss on stage, immediately prompting Turkey to refuse to play the Eurovision finals live on television, which might give an insight as to why Turkey perhaps withdrew from Eurovision this year, originally claiming disagreement with changes to the voting system which happened years ago. But, superb, repeating the kiss in the finals.
Rather surprisingly, this cutesy, and somewhat balsy, song, scored abysmally.

Spain, one of the big five, only left sad little Ireland behind them in the final tally. El Sueño de Morfeo has been around for over ten years and their blend of indie/pop/rock/celtic apparently does quite well in their home country. The song, 'With you until the end', somewhat hinting at the mix is nice, but the lead singer Raquel del Rosario's voice was not up to par with that of many of the other participants. Perhaps that, combined with being within the first group of performers, which often typically do worse than contestents scheduled later on in the show, is why Spain failed miserably.

Belgium, for a change, made it to the finals with Roberto Bellarosa, of Italian decent. The man reminded me of both Overattached Boyfriend and Chris de Burgh. If de Burgh would try his hand at anthems, the song, starting of as a ballad converting into very dancable pop could be de Burgh's own. Surprisingly pleasant, ending up in the middle for points, but deserving a place in the top 10.

Estonia's Birgit Õigemeel sang a power ballad, in Estonian, that I thought didn't really stand out too much, was too tame, but still, if barely, made it to the final, where she didn't do very well.

Where Moldova seems to know what works and what doesn't in Europe, their near-neighbours Belarus often struggle. Though, now, for a change, they did make it to the final, only for the third time since their first submission in 2004. Having a checkered history with its submissions, the country went for a bit more of convention, meaning long legged babe Alyona Lanskaya and a song that, really, more resembled a second-tier Europop song from the mid nineties while visually being a copy of last year's Greek entry, 'Aphrodisiac'; A tad cringeworthy ('we play-o to the rhythm of cha-cha'), this has been done too often. And better.
Interestingly, Lanskaya was supposed to represent her country last year in Azerbaijan, but was disqualified by the president after it was 'discovered' voting was rigged in her favor. For this year, the song originally selected to be performed was a different one from the one staged. Only in Belorus.
Coming in at 16th place, Lanskaya did much better than I had expected.

For the small country that's Malta they've historically done very well at Eurovision, though they still have to win. Like last year submitting an extremely likable bloke, Gianluca Bezzina, who makes his living as a Doctor, part time singers being the leitmotif for Maltese submissions. His song, like a contextually logical obverse of the tearjerker Iceland submitted in 2011is a feelgood love song.
An outside contender, Malta came in at a reasonable 8th posiiton.

Russia's Dina Garipova performed a surprisingly catchy dramatic ballad which was, during the first semi final, the first song this year that I wanted to hear again after it finished. But, Garipova's voice was a tad less perfect in the finals, perhaps punished with a still reasonable 5th place.

Germany fielded Cascada with a dance anthem that was too much like Loreen's Euphoria, with Natalie Horler having not as good a voice. Even being accussed, but cleared of plagiarism, particularly the opening of the song is what propbably made too many viewers remember last year's winner, resulting in a poor score at the end of the evening.

Armenia is back on the stage this year after last year's safety concerns, Azerbaijan and Armenia still effectively being at war with each other over Nagorno-Karabakh. The band, Dorians appears competent, but their rock ballad doesn't much stand out, their scoring being in line with that. They also tried out for representing their country in 2009.

At last and finally, Holland's Anouk put the country in the finals for the first time in nine years. The song, nice, was too timid and too sad to stand a chance.
And it's surprising that Anouk, known for her rock songs and 'bad attitude', went for this opener from her latest album Sad Singalong Songs, which really says it all.
Coming in at a reasonable 9th position, Holland at least has made up for their long Eurovision losing streak. And, even better, the song *is* very pretty.

Romania decided to send a baritone dressed up in what perhaps Vlad would have enjoyed as well. Or not a baritone, as Cezar The Voice a few seconds into his song gets kicked in the balls and subsequently drops the bass and goes up in pitch. Not just one musical switch in the three alotted minutes is enough enymore, you have to have two! And Cezar did just that with his surprisingly catchy performance.
Easily the most absurd, and gay, performance in the finals, sadly only raking in enough points to make it to 13th place.
Only Montenegro in the semi finals was more absurd, but it seems that Eurovision doesn't have much love for hip hop. After last year's Austrian hip hop duo, which I thought was pretty darn good, Montenegro, after last year's, well, dubious entry, this year put forward a mix of dubstep and hip hop where Who See, dressed as astronauts, put down a spectacular performance. But. They. Did. Not. Make. It! And they even put a babe on stage!

The BBC always has an ace up its sleave for picking their Eurovision submissions. This year's Bonny Tyler is a coup but her slow, somewhat sad, ballad Believe in Me, opened a bit rocky and was too conventional to stand a chance. And I was wondering (and not the only one) whether Tyler perhaps had a few drinks before going on stage.

Stepping in Loreen's, ehm, big shoes, Sweden's Robin Stjernberg did a nice, if somewhat middle of the road pop song.

Hungary decided that last year's German submission was the perfect visual role model for their entry this year, with even the song having a similar feel to it. Strangely, Roman did it better, but Hungary's ByeAlex this year scored better, coming in 10th in the final tally. If anything, the performance in the finals was better than during the semi.

Tipped for the top spot from early on, babe Emmelie de Forest represented Denmark with a rhythmic danceble, somewhat ethnic, pop song.
The song is quite typical for what the Scandinavian countries have been doing regularly during the last few years; mixing up more conventional Western European pop with more Eastern European rhythms. Indeed, I suspect the very reason that south eastern Europe, where the same formula is often applied, and Scandinavia peform well in Eurovision these last few years.
The song is good, and perhaps even a deserved winner, but also didn't sound as much an original.

Iceland decided to send Thor. Or maybe it was a guy with an unpronouncable first name. Singing his ballad in Icelandic, it's surprising he made it to the finals, where the song didn't do very well. I think it could have worked for an opening tear jerker in a Disney musical.
The man is the lead vocalist for an Icelandic progrock band.

Azerbaijan this year put forward the pretty boy Farid Mammadov effectively singing a ballad with a slightly off-key finish. Not too special, really, which made it quite a surprise the country finished second, coming first in the second semi final. The stage show, with a guy inside a glass playing the singer's shadow, *was* nice.
The Aliyev's know the challenges in making a dicatorship look like a democracy. Perhaps…
Also, akward, Azerbaijan's connection with Turkey, Mammadov releasing the song in Turkish, dedicating that version to his Turkish fans, for that country's decision to not participate in this year's contest.

Greece, which probably most consistently throws in the ethnic beats, submitted 'Alcohol is free', the resulting performance coming close to Moldova's Zdob și Zdub from 2011.
Not as absurd, but at least as entertaining. They should have done better than coming in at 6th place. The combination of modern rock with classic folk, here performed by Agathonas Iakovidis works very well.

Ukraine continued with Zlata Ognevich, the three minutes allotted too short for this quite spectacular, if feeling unfinished.
The country, now participating for the 11th time, historically does well, now coming in in third place.
It also was Zlata's third time trying to represent her country, failing the first two times.

Italy almost always does quite well at Eurovision and although pretty boy Marco Mengoni's ballad is nice enough, his 7th place was a more than expected. I suppose Europeans really like Italian.

Norway's hottie with a big ass Margaret Berger normally does electropop but here branched slightly off to a mix of numetal, throwing in violins for good measure, ending up with somethihg that's catchy, dramatic and dancable. I think I liked this more than Denmark's winning entry, but Berger ended up 4th.

Georgia completes the trio of countries from the Caucasus making it to the finals. The song is too slow, but the duo reminds of Azerbaijan's entry from two years ago, which went on to win the event. So, presumably they were somewhat gambling on a proven formula.
Europe didn't go for it.

Ireland for once decided not to submit Jedward, but still stuck with a bloke, Ryan Dolan. The song and Dolan have more than a touch of Bruno Mars, resulting in some rather enjoyable powerpop, a song better than most. But, surprisingly, Dolan's last act of the evening also saw him at the bottom of the pile at the end of the night.
Where's the magic, Ireland? Is Dolan not pretty enough?

And then there were the many that didn't make it.
Babe Natália Kelly started off the first semi final for Austria, with an excellent voice, and a rather nice, but perhaps a tad too tame, too slow, song.
Slovenia's Hannah Mancini, actually an American living in the country she represents, started off in proper dubstep. Very much a dancable anthem, the public perhaps thought it too much like last year's winner, Slovenia not making it to the finals.
The ensemble Klapa s Mora, representing Croatia, put down a very commendable operatic performance. But, classical music mostly doesn't do very well at Eurovision.
Cyprus got their babe-directive somewhat mixed up, sending Despina Olymiou, close to 40, if with wells of eyes, singing a slow, if pretty, ballad.
Serbia also got the babe-directive wrong, sending no less than three babes in Moje 3. Conplimented with three backup babes, the song, actually pretty decent Europop, was perhaps too much of a comic performance, to make it to the finals.
PeR, Please Explain the Rhythm, representing Latvia, opened the second semi final and did an upbeat mix of pop and hiphop. Somewhat catchy, but also not overly exceptional, Europe was not appreciative. Not surprising, after Montenegro not making it with a much butter, but somewhat similar track during the first semi final. Not even their stage dive, nor their Star Wars reference, saved the day.
San Marino's Valentina Monetta was too classical in her performance, and italian, without even showing leg or hotness. Starting off on a false note, her performance was just too much short of dramatic, though the halfway switch from near opera to decent Europop was surprising. Perhaps San Marino, which seldom makes it to the finals, just has too few real friends.
Macedonia also put forward an odd combination of near-Turkic classical wails mixed with more regular pop. The performance was certainly interesting.
Bulgaria should have had a surefire hit on their hands, sending Elisa & Stoyan to Eurovision for the second time after their first try in 2007, where they came in 5th, Bulgaria's best performance yet. Not this time, not even making it to the final. The song is actually pretty good, but the title, only champions, in Bulgarian rendering as 'samo shampioni' sounds to at least part of Europe as 'only mushrooms', which is… distracting.
Israel can't do any good at Eurovision recently, apparently. Their submission, Moran Mazor immediately reminded me of Nana Mouskouri, though the song was a tad more Celine Dion. The song was pretty decent, if not overly outstanding, but I really suspect that Israel's arrogance to stick to their own, rather, ehm, less pleasing, language and the political lack of appreciation of the country is doing them in.
For the small country that is Albania, they do surprisingly well, this year being the fourth time since their first performance in 2004 that they *didn't* make it to the finals, even though the performance was more than competetent, though perhaps lacking recognizable vocal elements, the rock song being a tad too ethnic, even though the combination with some light folk elements make the song quite attractive.
Switzerland sent a delegation from the Salvation Army, for which the band had to change their name, as both political and religious content are banned at the show. The rock song has some resemblance to christian rock and is not bad at all. The band's name for the event, Takasa is an acronym for The Artists formerly Known As the Salvation Army. Cute. Their oldest member is an impressive 95 years old.

The terracotta army

May 15, 2013 • Blog

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World » China » Xi’an » Terracotta warriors

The first heartland of China, the emperor which left us the terra cotta army was the first to unite China. Though rather totalitarian, which seemingly sits well with the current Chinese state, he was also much more indigenous Chinese than the father of, for all intents and purposes, China as we know it today, Kublai Khan, the grandson of everyone's favorite world conqueror, Chinggis Khan.

Xi'an still has its walls, nicely restored and, for their height and size, impressive, totaling a cool 14 kilometers. The city, a bustle, with the heat being a mixed blessing; unattractive men doing the Asian shirt roll, but scantily dressed women making more than up for that, showing legs.
But, the city, even the old city, mostly looks just like every other city in China, the 'old town' mostly being a collection of malls. And it's loaded with tourists. To the extent that the area around the south gate has not one but two Belgian beer bars, as well as a host of other tourist oriented restaurants. The strangest of which is probably being a German bar/restaurant partially staffed by Russian looking women from Kazakhstan. Who don't speak English. Or German.

So, the thing not too miss in Xi'an is the terra cotta army. Put together over 2000 years ago by the first emperor uniting the seven warring kingdoms, creating effectively a proto-China, the army was lost to time until drilling for a well in 1974 accidentally uncovered what is now the largest of three pits, containing no less than 6000 clay warriors. Being allowed in is costly, as are most tourist attractions in China, but you hardly can't go when in the area.

On the road to Tibet

May 10, 2013 • Blog

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World » China » Yarkand » Tomb of Amanishan

From central China, there are roughly three access roads to Tibet. From western China, there's only one, and it starts in Yarkand. This road to Tibet is still mostly off limits, though it is possible to get a permit to travel this road from one chinafied region of China to another.
That was not my intention. I basically had a choice of checking out the road to Pakistan, visiting what is supposed to be the very uninteresting Tashkurgan, or checking out the road to Tibet, visiting somewhat interesting Yarkand.
 
Yarkand is also one of the string of smaller towns surrounding the Taklamakan desert. Yarkand, with a nice enough mosque, a few mausoleums and a sprawling cemetery, has not yet seen it's history bulldozed by progress. Sadly here, too, though, the Han Chinese are on the rise. The new town is indistinguishable from any other Chinese city, if smaller, while right next to the old center of town, a newly constructed 'old town' is being created from scratch. Kashgar also has one of these, which does not seem to be a hit with the tourists. Or at least not the foreign ones.
The old old town is genuine, but also not overly inspiring; strings of mud brick buildings lined with shops on the main roads with sealed off houses on the side roads, access given by the same wooden doors you'll find in similar towns from here to Addis Ababa.

Interestingly, locals lounge to eat and drink tea mostly on flat benches, the size of a double bed, lined with carpets. Not so in Kashgar, but the same in an arc stretching from Yarkand, through Afghanistan to Iran.

In China, closer to Istanbul than Shanghai

May 09, 2013 • Blog

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World » China » Kashgar » Old Town Youth Hostel

In many ways, Kashgar is a sad facsimile of its former self, superimposed with what according to China is defined as 'development'. The old town has virtually completely been torn down, only to be replaced with modern renditions of the exact same buildings. Outside the old town, it's the same Chinese constructions, apartment buildings, shops and malls, that you see anywhere else in the country.
It appears that the only things authentic in the old town are the carved, ornate, wooden doors, transplanted from old dwelling to new dwelling. With their colors and spikes, they could just as easily have been transported from Muscat, Zanzibar or even parts of south east Europe.

For its location, Kashgar is as much Central Asia as you can get, if not the only place able to make that claim, the whirlwind of countries around Kokand, in Uzbekistan, being just one other example.
Kashgar is almost as far west as you can go in China. Further west than New Delhi, it's about 500km to Kazakhstan, about 100km to Kyrgyzstan, 250km to Tajikistan, less than 450km to both Afghanistan and Pakistan and, almost due south, about 600km to India.
The region around Kashgar, roughly the bit of China Afghanistan's Wakhan Corridor points it finger to, was by some thought to be the most likely hiding place, the empty corridor being the escape route, of Osama Bin Laden.
Still, though the Han Chinese are on the rise, the majority of the population still seems to be Turkic. But, with all the newfangled constructions all over town, the street sellers and shipowners have a bit of a displaced feel to them.

But, admittedly, Kashgar grew on me. Life is laid back and the Uighurs appear more carefree, able to live their lives undisturbed enough from the influence of the coastal Chinese.

Walking to my hostel one night, I realized that the muezzin's call to prayer from the nearby mosque was the imam standing on the roof of his one story affair, cupping his hands around his mouth. Very much small town charm.

Ethnic tensions have clearly not yet ebbed away, however. China already the archetypical Big Brother society, with surveillance cameras everywhere, your ticket and passport are typically checked four or five times before you can board your train. At train stations, luggage is scanned like in airports the world over, but it was in Urumqi where I wasn't allowed to take either shaving cream or bug spray, for being inflammable.
"You can check them in." The friendly, somewhat cute, but resolute, security girl said. "Where are you going?" She continued.
"Kashgar; Kashi." Me using both Turkic and Chinese names for the city.
"Oh! I'm sorry. Then I can not help you." Pulling a bit of a sad pouty face.

The journey from Urumqi to Kashgar opens up some impressive scenery; rugged snow capped mountains alternated with dry lower ridges and vast steppes. But, closer to Kashgar, after crossing the Heavenly Mountains, with the Taklamaklan desert to the south, the scenery also becomes incredibly boring. Vast empty wastelands covered in grey dust.

One of the many idiosyncrasies of China is the whole country sticking to one time zone, Beijing time. With Kashgar being closer to Cairo and Istanbul than to Beijing and more to the west than Delhi, where it's 2.5 hours earlier, sunrise and sunset happen at warped times.

Also odd, almost every third shop in downtown Kashgar is a dentist. I asked my receptionist why. "These people", she was Han, coastal, Chinese (or, more accurately, simply some 90% of the people in China), "they don't eat any vegetables".
Quite possible, though here, as elsewhere in China, fruit is a very easy street food to find. But, what's more, though bad teeth are very common with the (Han?) Chinese, the teeth of the Uighur population in Kasghar seemed in much better shape.
Perhaps, simply, Turks value their dentures more.

I was running a fever in Kashgar and skipped one planned destination close to town. Shipton's Arch, first reported in the 1940s but only rediscovered by a team from National Geographic in 2000, is a natural rock arch some 400 meters above ground level in a nearby mountain range.
A few years ago, the journey there took an hour on tarred roads, then an hour off road, followed by a thirty minute climb.
Now, leave it to the Chinese, there is no tourist bus there, yet, but getting there is as simple as chartering a taxi, driving up to the entrance gate and paying the entrance fee.

A taste of Xinjiang

May 05, 2013 • Blog

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World » China » Urumqi » Maitian hostel

The Chinese have made a point of brushing the ethnic majorities aside in the outer regions of the country, displacing them with Han Chinese from the coastal heartland. Tibet is an obvious example, Inner Mongolia is somewhat less known, mostly because the Chinese managed the displacement quietly, but Xinjian, the western promise, has seen a little bit more international press for the unrest the region has seen over the last decade or so. And though fairly recently over 80 percent of the population was ethnic Uighur, a Turkic central Asian ethnicity, now, it hovers around 50. And the high speed connections with the test of china also sees hordes of national tourists stampeding over the many, and what seems to be as usual in China, overpriced attractions.
Or rather, stampeding in season. The one major site I visited while in Urumqi was certainly geared to mass tourism, some 100 tour busses waiting at the entrance for bringing them pesky tourists to the actual site, but only a few were used during my visit.

The 4000 km journey by train from Shanghai to Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang province, takes only, if you can call it that, 45 hours and though it crossed my trip from Kunming to Beijing, the scenery only started becoming impressive when we reached Xi'an, where the tracks cross and recross the Yellow River. But even then, much of the landscape more resembled an endless connection of open mines and dry river beds, later slowly transforming into typical central Asian scenery; vast steppes, snow capped mountains in the distance, the occasional mud brick structure along the way. And, closer to the capital of Xinjiang, what seem to be wild camels on the side of the tracks, with the occasional ger, or yurt, thrown in for good measure.
A Chinese fellow traveller, perhaps about my age, told me that when she was a child, the journey took four days, while the trains did not have any sleepers.

The appropriation of Urumqi by the Han Chinese is probably why the beating heart of the city is not the sterile wide streets downtown, lined with impressive high rise buildings and the occasional central Asian wedding cake.
The city is alive around the Turkish bazaar. Though the bazaar has been refurbished, Chinese style, pulling everything down and then rebuilding it again, strangely throwing in a copy of the Bukhara minaret from Uzbekistan, itself again under renovation, its visitors and the streets around it are (still) authentic. Walking down the dilapidated streets lined with street vendors and shops, manned by Turkic men with little round caps on their heads, speaking Turkic Uighur, you could mistake the city for some remote town in Azerbaijan or Turkey. Indeed, the outward focus here does not appear to be towards China, but to Turkey, Turkish flags and shop names being an easy find in the neighborhood.
And not just Turkish. Perhaps it's the somewhat older buildings, but its not hard to find shop names and other signage in Russian. Maybe dating from when the Chinese and Soviets had a much closer relationship.

But the beating heart is also neglected. Beggars on china's main streets are a rare occurrence. Not so around Urumqi's Turkish bazaar. Wailing women, men with stumps for legs, mothers with their sick or dying children emphatically shouting for mercy.

Not so heavenly

Probably the most visited site near Urumqi is Tian Chi, heavenly lake, in the Tian Shian, the heavenly mountains, which surround the city. Pretty and, once, idyllic, the area, like so many others in China, has been extensively cultivated. Sure, it is pretty, but not extremely exceptional, even though, after my arrival, the slowly dissipating mist and cloud cover, revealing an Alpine beauty in all its technicolor glory, was quite impressive, similar scenes can be had all over the world.
And the exorbitant entrance fee is downright ridiculous. More so as it doesn't include additional sights like the temples inside the park, for which you need to pay extra.
Somewhere in the last few years, the entrance fee has been nearly doubled. And even though the lake is only some 40 kilometers away from Urumqi, as the crow flies, it takes about 2.5 hours by public transport to get there, three busses from the center of the city.

I had perhaps at least as much fun meandering around Fukang, the town where you have to switch buses on the way to Tian Chi. This middle of nowhere town with its overload of humongous power plants is decidedly Turkic. Taking in the sights and sounds of the Sunday market, eating foods never before seen in my life and watching the world go by, basking in the sun and sipping coffee, was a great way to see a tiny bit of the veil lifted from Uighur city life.
Also interesting, though Fukang had more than its fair share of power plants, both sides of Urumqi have fields covered with hundreds of industrial power generating windmills.

Then, with the stark blue sky holding, the views of the heavenly mountains, God's peak in particular, looming over Urumqi, is near spectacular.

Urumqi is built around the banks of the Urumqi. Already closed up in the downtown area, workers were constructing even more of a tunnel to hide the river from sight. Or rather, to build a sewer for the non existing stream.

The ethnic mix

The ethnic mix of peoples in Urumqi is fascinating. The high streets are dominated by Han Chinese, the coastal Chinese trying to ethnically standardize China as a whole. But, the Turks, Uighurs, are everywhere, some indistinguishable from their Turkish brethren on the far western tip of Asia, some even with light blue or green eyes.
Then there are the obvious Kazakh, Mongols, Tajik and Kyrgyz. All blended together in one huge mix, it's a shame Central Asia is so extremely Balkanized. Banding together they could rule the world. It wouldn't be the first time.

A royal party

April 30, 2013 • Blog

World » China » Shanghai » Kaiba

The Dutch consulate in Shanghai has taken up the tradition of throwing a three week party around Queensday called the Dutch Days, this year’s centerpiece being an extensive party on the actual day the Dutch queen was to abdicate in favor of her son. Tickets were sold out weeks in advance so we were left with the alternative, hosted by a bunch of Dutch students in a bar that makes most of its money selling overpriced Belgian beers.

Arriving early, with Benno, the only one, besides us two, apparently in good enough shape after the night of partying from the previous night’s wedding, we settled on a few stools, at two high tables in the middle of the room. When the organizers emptied the room to make way for the throngs of party goers, we were never asked to move, clear the table, or pay for that matter.
As a result, we had the best seats in the house added to which the constant flow of sponsored beer, Dutch fries, cheese and apple pie meant we had a reasonably smashing time.

A major disappointment, though, was the lack of both the Dutch anthem as the newly composed “king’s song”. And no bitterballen.

A wedding in China

April 29, 2013 • Blog

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World » China » Wuzhen

The central reason for our trip to China was Michiel and Lan's wedding. The event was to be held in Wuzhen, sometimes called China's Venice, and not totally without merit, both for its look and feel as well as its huge amounts of tourists.

The ceremony, only somewhat chaotic, included the newlyweds being moved around by both boat and bier, accompanied by a snake charmer's trumpet, without the snake.

Also, unstoppable amounts of fantastic food. And licquor.

In Shanghai

April 28, 2013 • Blog

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World » China » Shanghai » The Bund

Not as impressive as I expected, the two sides of the Huangpu are still extremely iconic. The city is, after perhaps Hong Kong, the country's most like The West. The best feature perhaps being its street foods and its most baffling the enormously overpriced coffee in some, but not all, coffee shops.

In the Northern Capital

April 24, 2013 • Blog

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World » China » Beijing » The Forbidden City

Taking the train from Kunming to Beijing, the landscape rolling by is impressive. Mostly somewhat shrouded in mist, much of the hillsides and plains is cultivated. Engineering is everywhere, with the many rail bridges and tunnels jutting out of the sides of hills, spanning the many rivers and lakes.
But, perhaps because it’s a Sunday, or perhaps because, just like the cities, the country side’s architectural wonders have been overdimensionalized, the roads see nary a car, the towns are quiet and many of the buildings appear empty.
The train journey was quite pleasant, even though traveling second class meant sleeping six to each compartment. The worst was the Chinese carefree attitude towards generating bodily sounds of any kind.

In Beijing, meaning ‘northern capital’, we were welcomed by what felt like an Eastern European winter, though halfway through our stay, this changed to a somewhat more welcoming crispy spring.
The city’s sights were overrun with tourists, mostly Chinese, perhaps already taking their days off in preparation for the upcoming national holiday of labour day. The crowds, and the many tour groups, typically all decked out with the same headgear, were a bit too much to keep the sights enjoyable, including the city’s two main attractions, the forbidden city and the summer palace.

We had more luck with a somewhat overpriced tour of the Great Wall, at least as far as fellow tourists went. Our visit did not go to the most often visited Badaling section, but went a bit further, to a less well restored stretch where we literally were the only ones to be seen. A pity it was that eastern European winter when we visited.

Spring city

April 19, 2013 • Blog

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World » China » Kunming » The Hump

Called 'Spring city' for its agreeable climate, Kunming is quite amazingly modern. A clean Bangkok if you will, almost boring, generic. So amazingly quiet, specifically after just coming from Kolkata.
Taking a taxi from the airport, it took a while to register why in fact it was so quiet. All scooters are electric. And there's virtuallty no honking, while at traffic lights, ladis hold banners in front if the bikes to stop them from shooting off before the lights turn green.

I arrived fairly early, with, on the city's central square, groups of old ladies practicing tai-chi in super slow motion. And shoeshiners are women.

Later, a crowd stood and watched as I bought fermented veggies on the street. In Chinese.
There's an app for that.

North of the city, in green lake park, the cacaphonic absurdity of ethnic and modern dancers, orchestras and singers competing for supremacy with low quality amplifiers, too high pitched, too much echo, creating an orgastric wall of sound, interspersed with ladies in native dress from the provinces, doing their own dances.

Trying to characterize Kunming, I first ought of it as a mellow cross between Bangkok and Tokyo, but later realized that it's simply very much what it is: a highly successful product of communism.
The skyscrapers haven't yet reached stupefying levels, but there are many. But more intriguingly, the streets are neat in a way that provincial Russian streets are; overly planned, too quiet, but also with obvious mistakes here and there, perhaps the result of some too heavy handed directive from above.
Yes, at night, there is some neon to light up the streets, but its very subdued. There are a few too many, though very pleasing to the eye, police booths around town, reminding the visitor that this is still a country where government wants to keep control.

The outskirts of town are quickly changing into a forest of high rise apartment buildings. But even though the structures are both good looking, for what they are, and quite impressive, in reality they are just modern equivalents of the typical Soviet apartment blocks.

I spent a day in the western mountains, Xi Shan, on the shores of Dian Chi, a lake some 40km long and 300km squared. The views of Kunming across the lake are decent, but I felt very ambivalent about the whole experience. The 6 or 7 kilometers you have to walk up the mountain are on a freshly tarred two lane road on which a large bus plies the route every few minutes. Part of the way, you can take a freshly laid and well maintained path straddling the road. Recycling bins line the roads, popping up every 50 meters. A few temples as well, charging surprisingly steep prices to get in. And on top of that you have to pay more than peanuts to get into Dragon's Gate, the viewpoint everyone comes for.

Many of the visitors have their cellphone or radio playing their favorite tunes, while your ears might be accosted to some laughing group, hiding somewhere, trying out their best ha-ha.
Even on a Friday, the route is busy, crawling with people, the whole experience so extremely cultivated that it feels more like a theme park than anything else.

In town, though the streets are lined with decidedly upmarket and international chains, they also see plenty of old school road side stalls, selling all sorts of foods and cheap pirated goods, alternating with the physically handicapped and the occasional child doing karaoke using low quality sound systems, hoping to earn a few yuan.

Censorship

Mostly, foreign social networks are blocked in China, though foursquare is an exception, perhaps because it's so very much location oriented.
However, strangely, it's possible, within China, to pay for an online service, with a Chinese credit card, through a Chinese bank, that circumvents the great firewall, allowing you to access Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

The city of joy

April 15, 2013 • Blog

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World » India » Kolkata » Victoria Memorial

Still outside of india more commonly known as Calcutta, I arrived by train from Mumbai, the near 2000km journey taking just under a day and a half.
At Mumbai train station, the tremendously long train had docked with the lower classes closest to the head of the platform, where travelers appeared to come close to outright fights in their attempts to get on board. But, the biggest employer in the world reserves a bunch of 1st and 2nd class tickets on every train for foreigners. On the quieter routes, this is a boon. on the busier routes, this might mean waiting a while for a ticket, or throwing yourself in byzantine fray of getting a regular ticket.
Still reasonably enough priced, it meant the four-to-a-compartment sleepers were quite doable, if kept a bit too cold by the relentless AC.

Interestingly, in India, train stations appear to be the best place to attract voters. In Mumbai, several political parties had information booths strewn around the train station hall, with many of the walls plastered in promotional party material.
Also, the many digital clocks at each station were not in sync with each other.

Arriving in Kolkata, architecturally, the city is not overly impressive, if pleasant in a faded kind of way, the biggest draw being the Victoria Monument, a palace somewhat like a neoclassical interpretation of the Taj Mahal but built in honor of Queen Victoria's diamond jubilee, if completed 20 years after her death.
For a long time the colonial capital of India, much of the city has clear British roots, and although being the second largest in the country, after Mumbai, and said to be the cultural capital of the country, the city is also distinctively poorer than the home of Bollywood.
I arrived just after dawn, to many of the smaller streets being packed with men in their cotton wraparounds, gathered at the many water points, taking their morning baths. When do the women bathe?

There is an interesting collection of dilapidated British architecture around town, hiding behind crumbling facades, sometimes literally. One synagogue, no longer in use, once having had its entrance on a main road, had another, fairly narrow, building constructed right in front of it.
With the clear construction boom at the start of the previous century, some of Kolkata's streets conjure up the image of a some post apocalyptic Central European inner city during a blazing heat wave.

The city was indeed exceedingly hot. Halfway the first day, I took refuge in the planetarium, just to be able to enjoy the aircon for thirty minutes.
I planned a bit better ahead on my second day, buying a drink on virtually every street corner; sugar cane juice, fresh fruit juice, lime juice, chai. The hydration paid off, I didn't keel over.

Turns out, my stay coincided with Bengali new year, which indeed coincides with Thai new year. Not that it was noticeable. The first I heard of it was while being interviewed by one of the local TV broadcasters after coming out of the Kolkata zoo, which was not nearly as bad as it once was, known for its cramped housing, occasional mauling and, more intriguingly its now defunct big cat hybrid breeding program.

In its city planning, Kolkata stands out for the small fraction of its surface taken up by roads. The city has no wide boulevards and many of its streets are just glorified alleyways. As a result, traffic is a major issue and also why the city was the first in the subcontinent to have a metro. Already five lines were planned in the 1970s, but so far only the north-south line has materialized. It's extremely cheap, though, at just under 6 euro cents for a ride.
Apparently, in a 1984 BBC survey, it was voted the most agreeable metro in the world, but that's a stretch. It's fine, but feels very used, if useful.

Another interesting aspect of the city is it not lighting up at dusk much, the buildings staying surprisingly dark when night falls. Perhaps, just like mornings see the men of the community washing themselves at the outdoor water pumps, the British built architecture, which must have been constructed with plumbing as well as, I suspect, electrification, has fallen to such a state of deprecation that neither water nor power is available in many of them. Or they're mostly empty, but that would require many more of the 18 million or so Calcuttans to be out on the street, all the time.

An interesting quirk, one way streets tend to reverse direction in the middle if the day.

Connecting through Mumbai

April 09, 2013 • Blog

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World » India » Mumbai » Gateway of India

The taxi ride into town from Mumbai airport, just after sunrise on a Monday morning, a holiday, is surprisingly pleasant. Quiet, sweeped streets, a slow sunrise bathing the city in a golden light. Shar Rukh Khan and Amitabh Bachchan have something to say on every second billboard, or so it seems, and coming closer to Colaba, the southern edge of the city and the touristic heart of town, hordes of locals doing their morning exercises on the corniche, trotting, but not quite running, some with a dog in tow.
The corniche, locally called ‘the queen’s necklace’, for how it shimmers at dusk, is lined with fading Art Deco architecture, most of which could have been pulled straight from downtown Dar es Salaam.

The government run taxi service, prepaid at the airport, is reliable, but the receptionist conveniently forgot to give me the exact change. I called him out on it. “What!? I didn’t give you the right change!? Check it!” He relented way too easily.
But, Mumbai is very reasonably priced overall. Several times, I had to recalculate the prices, thinking that the conversion rate or my calculations had to be wrong.

I spent a day on Elephanta, an island just of the coast, harboring several impressive 1500 year old Hindu stone carvings. The island hosts a lot of monkeys, luckily not aggressive. One was tugging at my pants as it turned out I was standing on some of his lunch.
And I visited a Jain temple in the more affluent Malabar area. A dwindling religion, about as old as Buddhism, the temple resembled something of a wedding cake, though I wasn’t allowed to enter.

I found the city surprisingly western. The once Portuguese and long time British influence of course helps, not in the least because of downtown’s major architectural wonders all being British build, but also mumbaikar attitude is surprisingly western. Sure, you’ll find women in sari, or even completely covered in black, but picking your area just right, you’re even likelier to see younger socialites wearing string tops and way too tiny shorts.

The city has an extensive suburban train network. Interestingly, all the suburban trains I saw never closed their doors, the openings lined with commuters taking in the breeze while moving from station to station,

Dérive

One of my plans was to do a dérive in every city on my journey.

Not so easy. Requiring Internet access to make this work, it turns out that getting a SIM card not only requires you to identify yourself, you also need proof of address. For tourists that means a letter from your hotel that states you are actually staying with them. And then it will take three days before your SIM card starts working.
And, apparently, it’s not uncommon for a cafe providing wi-fi to make a copy of your photo ID before they let you go online.
Apparently, the Indian government is one of many to keep track of your browsing behavior.

Somewhat surprisingly, later, in Calcutta, it only took five minutes and a quick photo of my passport for me to get a SIM card and online.

Switching from Google Reader

April 06, 2013 • Blog

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World » Uganda » Kampala » GOAL apartments

It still is a bit of mystery why Google announced shutting down its Google Reader service a few weeks ago. Earlier, products that were shut down by Google typically resulted in a tiny backlash from a typically small community of dedicated users.
Not so with Google Reader, which, as it turned out, has a sizable following, even after Google limited its functionalities with the introduction of Google+. Case in point, one of the Google Reader alternatives, Feedly, announced 3 million new users just two weeks after Google's shutdown announcement.

I'm one of the avid users of Google Reader and have been for many years. It's one of the two tabs that are always open in my browser (the other one being Gmail). I use Google Reader for four things:

+ Reading the entries of RSS feeds.
+ As a platform through which any and all RSS clients can synchronize.
+ As an RSS aggregator (primarily for customers), outputting aggregated RSS feeds.
+ As a place from which to send content to somewhere else, most notably delicious, for further processing (primarily for customers).

I've been investigating alternatives over the last few weeks. Here are, in short, my findings.

Google Reader for reading feeds

There are numerous alternatives for this. The prettiest is Feedly, which is available in the browser, on Android and iOS. However, the interface doesn't always work as expected and appears buggy a bit too often for comfort. On the up, they announced they were going to provide an alternative to using Google Reader as the synchronization platform for their users' feeds. Feedly is free.
Also, the flexible online interface allows for a quicker scan of updates than Google Reader, and many of the other Google Reader alternatives.

Bazqux, not free, and a close copy of Google Reader, if not as easy on the eye, is another alternative. One advantage is their inclusion of article comments in their feed reader.
Feedspot , free, is easier on the eye, but is very much a walled garden.
NewsBlur, not free, has a bit of a power user interface with a layout efficiently presenting a lot of information at the same time. Also has an API.
Feedbin, not free, has a clean interface and a basic API.
The old reader comes closest to the Google Reader experience, but also lacks in more advanced functionalities that many of the other readers have. It took them about two weeks to finally import my list of feeds.

All the paid readers are affordable, typically costing around 20 USD per year.

Then there are a bunch of standalone solutions, like Fever, Vienna and Cleverfeed.
Digg has promised an RSS reader, but won't deliver for a while.

Google Reader as a synchronization platform

Feedly has promised an alternative to Google Reader as a synchronization platform, but its Feedbin and NewsBlur who already have an API.

Google Reader as an RSS aggregator

Feedbin and NewsBlur have an API, though this would require client side coding. Free alternatives are self hosted and use libraries like SimplePie or MagpieRSS. These also required client side coding, but then don't rely on third party services.

Sharing to other platforms

Feedly and Bazqux allow for sharing to a bunch of platforms, straight from the reader. Standalone readers typically do as well, but require a piece of software to be installed.

Also notable

For news discovery, for which I use Zite and, to a lesser extent, News360, there are also some online alternatives. Prismatic is one.

Concluding

There is, sadly, not one ideal solution for replacing Google Reader. For news consumption, the best alternative currently seems to be Feedly. For developer support, probably Feedly, or one of the self hosted solutions like SimplePie or MagpieRSS.

The ma in Kla

March 19, 2013 • Blog

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World » Uganda » Murchison Falls national park » Murchison Falls

My mom came to visit. It's been a while, so a special occasion indeed.

We hopped over to Murchison Falls National Park, after visiting the rhino sanctuary at Ziwa. At Ziwa, we were lucky, spotting 9 of the park's 12 rhinos, which are being bread to be put back in the wild, after going extinct in Uganda in 1983, partially due to Idi Amin's hunting prowess and the civil war that followed his ousting.
In Murchison Falls National Park, we were lucky to spot lion and jackal, as well as the usual suspects. Even though the elusive leopard was, well, elusive.

Returning to Kampala, we braved traffic for many hours to go to and come back from Jinja in the span of one day. Traffic was horrendous. The 75km journey back took us four hours.
And, on the way there, for the first time ever, after having been stopped many times by traffic police in Uganda, we finally were fined, without the traffic officer even soliciting for a bribe. I overtook a truck, crossing the yellow continuous line.
More commonly, traffic police threaten with a fine but, if no bribes are forthcoming, typically 'forgive' you. Not now. The cop didn't seem to be interested in a bribe and happily wrote up a fine. The annoying bit was the lack of clear instructions on how to deal with it all.
The cop thought we would first have to go to the URA, the Uganda Revenue Authority. We assumed we could just go to a bank and pay, which is the general assumption amongst Ugandan expats. Neither is correct. First going to Stanbic and being redirected to the URA, we were told that we could go and pay the fine directly at an Orient bank branch. There, they told us we'd have to go back to the URA. But, not so, we discovered at URA. Simply paying at Orient marks the end of the process.
In this case, though, the cop decided to keep my driving license, which is not uncommon practice. So, we had to head back and find him with proof of payment.

Zanzibar is not Oman

February 17, 2013 • Blog

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World » Tanzania » Zanzibar » Stone Town » Malindi guesthouse

After visiting Oman and already having planned to spend some time in Dar es Salaam, it only made sense, due to Oman's historical connection with Zanzibar, to also visit the island off Tanzania's coast.

I was hoping that, with the fresh eyes and having just now visited Oman, I would find a host of subtle, almost hidden, connections between these places once united under the same sultanate.
But, I was a bit disappointed. Though Matrah town has strong similarities with the streets of Zanzibar, and the city walls and some of the architecture are clearly mirrored in the buildings of Stone Town, the only obvious Omani leftover I found was the Omani consulate I bumped into. Excited for seeing the waving Omani flag, it turned out just to be a regular diplomatic representation.

Also on while I was there was the fairly famous Sauti za Busara, an African music festival held in Stone Town's old Portuguese fort. Tickets for foreigners are unreasonably expensive (Tanzanians get a 95% discount), so I easily refrained from going. Until a friend offered me a leftover complimentary VIP ticket. 
I was not impressed.

What was much more fun was the Dar Hash, who organized a lovely semi-chaotic run through the old town, finishing with a few drinks on the rooftop terrace of one of the hashers. On on!

Return to Dubai

February 11, 2013 • Blog

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World » United Arab Emirates » Dubai » Dubai Mall

In part avoiding the obligatory 'airport parking fee' for when returning a rental car to Dubai airport, and in part because I wanted to take advantage of the shopping Meccah that is Dubai, I meandered around town in my twice-upgraded car, in search for a downtown office of Dollar rent-a-car.
Dubai isn't as badly signposted as Muscat, but the maze of streets wasn't helping much to find my way.

In the end, I discovered an office at the World Trade Center, where I chatted with a young Kenyan, fresh off the boat, now working as security at the ticket line, about to open up, to sell tickets to Dralion, Cirque de Soleil's latest show.

Afterwards, I ended up in the largest mall in the world, apparently, right next to the tallest building in the world.

The mall is truly a shoppers' Meccah, though not a shopper's paradise. At best, prices are identical to prices in Europe, say, but without sales tax, but because most available brands, here, are quite upmarket, you might get a relative deal, but you won't get it for little money.
Add to that the general costliness of everything from food to accommodation, Dubai isn't a budget destination of any kind.

Case in point, an on-the-spot ticket for heading up to the viewing deck of the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world at over 800 meters and more than 160 floors, will set you back an astounding 80 euros.

In fact, where Oman was cheap for everything except accommodation, with the hilight being petrol at a bare 25 eurocents per litter, Dubai does have affordable petrol, but little else that is really cheap.

It does also seem that Oman does not (yet?) enforce copyright, whereas the UAE does, which does mean that apparent deals in Muscat might not be deals at all.

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