Sights | Steady Moving

Da Nang, Vietnam: Fell in love in 24 hours

Posted on September 29, 2014 by toddahummel

Upon arrival to the hotel, we hopped in the shuttle to the near by town of Hoi An. The city is an old trading port and UNESCO World Heritage site, which has remained very well-preserved since it’s activity from the 15th to 19th century. I spent the afternoon wandering around the city: exploring local silk stalls, food stands, and the riverfront, all while dodging motorbikes in the road. One thing I quickly noticed about Vietnam is how quickly it can shift between a hectic, loud bustle and pure serenity. Just walking through the city, I varied between super busy streets full of honking horns and so many close calls that I stopped considering them close calls and rather just normal traffic. As I hadn’t had any food since the morning’s flight, I began to hunt for some local grub. I turned down a random alleyway and happened upon a small two table restaurant. It was about as local as you can get, as it literally was two tables on this family’s front porch. The father of the house picked out 3 dishes and I promptly chowed down on some pork belly noodle, grilled beef noodle, and some shrimp skewers – all delicious. My first taste of Vietnam was a success. Following lunch, I wandered across the water and decided to treat myself to a 60 min Vietnamese massage – for a whopping $7 USD.

For dinner, we went to a local seafood restaurant along the beachfront back near our hotel. And when I say fresh seafood, I really mean it in this case. When we arrived at the place, we were greeted by over a dozen bins on the ground full of various types of seafood – snapper, grouper, mussels, squid, lobster, crabs, etc. We literally picked out a full snapper and several prawns, they snatched them out of the water, brought them in the back (while the fish flopped all over in the nets), and cooked them. Now that’s fresh seafood.

Our lucky snapper!

The following day, we woke up early to meet our tour guides Mr. Truong and Mr. Hai at 8am for our full day motorbike tour. I will detail the stops below, but just want to say that Mr. Truong was absolutely incredible. He has been leading tours around Vietnam for over two decades now, so he was a great resource to chat about the evolution of the country and specifically tourism in the country (and what it is like to work with TripAdvisor and Lonely Planet – both ups and downs), throughout the day. He was a great introduction to just how friendly, respectful, and caring the Vietnamese people are – I really felt like he was a friend even though we had just met. He has also very curious to hear an American’s opinion about Vietnam and about current affairs in general – I hope I represented us well!

Stop 1: Fishing Village

Ladies preparing the local fish

Fish are put out in the sun to dry, eventually turning into a sort of fish jerky with a variety of seasonings

Variety of seafood collected and prepared to be shipped to local restaurants

Stop 2: Lady Buddha Temple

Gateway to the main plaza of Lady Buddha Temple

Doing my best to mimic the gestures. Yes, I’m a tourist

View out from the Lady Buddha Temple

Stop 3: Old Military Checkpoint Separating North & South Vietnam

Old Vietcong checkpoint during the war era

View from the shop as we enjoyed a Vietnamese coffee

Grabbed a picture atop the checkpoint

Stop 4: Lang Co Island, a small village of about 3,000 people

View of the village as we approached

View from the village

Stopped for lunch at a local shop – by local I mean a random lady’s home with a table out front! Some Squid noodle!

Near-finished product of dried fish snacks

Stop 5: Waterfall

Drove a couple miles down a random dirt road to get there

Waterfall, looking downstream

Waterfall, looking upstream

The drive back:

Goat crossing

View of the peninsula atop a huge boulder

Dragon bridge

Upon arrival back to the hotel, Mr. Truong and Mr. Hai invited us to join his family party that night for dinner at his house! A true testament to the openness and friendliness of Vietnamese culture, and how well we all got along together. It was just so surreal to be sitting on a sidewalk of a Vietnamese suburb, with a family I had just met, listening to K-pop, and eating local fare. Unreal experience.

The spread!

The crew! Mr. Truong on the left, his wife across from him, Mr. Hai in the back left. His wife across from him. As well as some family friends. His wife is not entertained, clearly.

Highlights included:
1) Mr. Truong’s friend killed a huge deer the day before, so of course we BBQ’d up a ton of delicious deer meat
2) Locally caught fish from that same morning!
3) More beer than I’ve ever drank at dinner – highly suggest Beer Larue of Da Nang, a great lager
4) Mr. Truong’s “Special Water”. I did about 6 shots of this with him after dinner. He pulled it out of his motorcycle bag. It was a hazy brown liquid in a water bottle. In actuality, it was Vietnamese Seahorse Whiskey – a combination of fermented seahorse and ginger root, left to steep for months. Went down smooth, I swear!

On our last day, we hung out on the beach and by the pool to soak up the last bits of Vietnam sunshine!

View from the hotel

Take me back!

Cooking up that BBQ tableside for lunch!

I fell in love with this country in 24 hours. I will be back soon. Believe that.

Penang, Malaysia: Good Eats & Fine Arts

Posted on September 7, 2014 by toddahummel

Following the day in Langkawi, I ferried back to mainland Malaysia to spend the day in Penang. Going into the day, I had absolutely zero plans. All I knew about Penang was that the food was supposed to be incredible, but other than that, I didn’t have a clue. However, while on the long ferry ride, I discovered that Penang actually had a recently developed street art scene that began a few years back. Tucked away in small alleys and around random corners throughout the city were really unique pieces of artwork from both local and foreign street artists, which has been encouraged by the city for the past couple of years. So between the food and art, my day was pretty much set and I took off to wander every nook of the city.

It turned out to be an amazing way to experience the city, forcing me to explore every side street and alley way, which enabled me to find super coffee shops, food stalls, and local shops. To start, the food lived up to the hype. I went with traditional Indian for lunch, Malaysia for a afternoon snack, and Chinese for dinner. Let me tell you – Tek Sen, my dinner place of choice, was a master class in traditional Chinese food. As I like to do, I told the waiter to just bring me out all of the specials. While I can assure you that it was one of the best meals I have had since arriving in SE Asia, I unfortunately can’t say what exactly I ate! I definitely didn’t mind. I arrived just 15 min before opening, which turned out to be a crucial decision, as the line quickly swelled soon after the official opening time.

Dinner spot – Tek Sen

Outside the food, Penang turned out to offer an amazing array of coffee shops. Perhaps I had a bit of Seattle nostalgia, but I definitely stayed heavily caffeinated throughout the day. If you find yourself in Malaysia, their coffee chain, Kaffa Espresso, puts Starbucks to shame – great tunes, smooth roasts, and an urban chic atmosphere.

Kaffa Espresso

Finally, the surprising highlight of the day actually ended up being the street art. Penang offered a truly unique array of pieces – many of which blended graffiti with actual objects. Many of the works were hidden in random alleyways, which made the hunt a fun part of the experience. Here are a few of my favorites!

Brother & Sister on a swing

Kung Fu girl

Little motorbike bro

Rickshaw bro

Reaching for the cookie jar?

#ballin

What you got in that pot?

Lastly, I wanted to mention one cool thing I learned in Penang. All over the streets outside of residences and shops, I saw people burning small fires (see below) and making in rain fake money over top, which they burned. After leaving Penang I looked up the meaning of this ritual. It turns out that this is a super old practice – when family/friends pass away, surviving family members burn money and clothing so that the deceased are well cared for in the afterlife. Essentially, it’s a ritual to pay respects to relatives passed away. The more you know!

Malaysia ritual to pay respect to passed relatives

Overall, I had an unexpected blast in Penang. Some of the best trips in life are definitely unplanned. Once in awhile, don’t be afraid to be a bit spontaneous and let the day come to you!

There is hope in even the most barren of circumstances

Langkawi, Malaysia – “How did I end up here?”

Posted on September 5, 2014 by toddahummel

So for my first trip since arriving in Singapore in the beginning of August, I opted to fly solo and venture to Langkawi, an island off of the west coast of Malaysia. For those who happen to care, Langkawi is an archipelago comprised of 99 islands, many of which consist of light jungle and tall limestone cliffs. The islands are actually slowly disappearing over time, as the constantly crashing ocean waves are gradually eroding the limestone islands until eventually, one by one, the islands sink into the abyss. Since time is off the essence (at least geologically speaking), I figured there was no better time than the present to get my first taste of the picturesque SE Asian islands that I have only seen in books/TV/magazines/movies to date.

Boarding the ferry!

Inside the ferry. Random eastern European lady laying down the law on some hopeless passenger.

As I was not aware that flights flew directly from Singapore to Langkawi *facepalm* I flew to Penang, Malaysia (post to come) and made the fateful decision to take the ferry out to Langkawi. After reading the news recently about ferries full of tourists crashing all over SE Asia, I was a bit hesitant, but as any young adult would, I thought “That could never happen to me, right?” It turns out, the ferry was actually an awesome choice, even though what I thought was an hour ride was actually three hours *facepalm x2*. The weirdest part of the ferry ride was that the boat had a TV screen in front of the 10 rows of seats down in the hull, which played dated, American movies. It certainly wasn’t the first time I wondered to myself, “How did I end up here?” After enjoying the cinematic masterpieces of John Carter and Lone Ranger, I found myself docked in Langkawi.

View from lunch cafe. Pantai Cenang, Langkawi

For the day, I first explored Pantai Cenang (Cenang Beach), the most popular beach in Langkawi where my hotel was located. As I wandered towards the beach, I walked along the main strip of shops and stalls just off the sand, which felt like any rugged beach-town you would find in the USA, except with much more nasi lemak. Finally, I walked out to the beach a gazed upon my first image of Pantai Cenang: clear (super warm) blue water, a series of tiny limestone islands off the coast, gorgeous white sand, and more people asking me to rent jet skis than I’ve seen before (Quick, ask the big white guy!).

Pregnant Maiden Lake: potency on 110%

Funny enough, I had booked an all day Jet Ski tour already, so I ignored the numerous sales pitches and price quotes, and arrived at the my jet ski tour place of choice. My group consisted of the guide, mysself, a Canadien, Singaporean, and one Muslim couple from Malaysia (the woman kept her Hijab on for the entire tour – a real example of religious dedication!). Long story short, the tour was incredible. Our guide led us to 8 different islands, the most memorable of which was Dayang Bunting (Pregnant Maiden) Island, the second largest within the Langkawi archipelago. After relaxing on the beach a bit, our group took a short trek through the jungle to Pregnant Maiden Lake, the largest fresh water lake in Malaysia. Without going into the entire story, legend has it that the lake provides fertility upon “barren women”, as well as a bit extra “potency” for men. Whether that’s true or not, I don’t know. However, I can say that the lake was gorgeous: super serene, warm water, and even wild monkeys walking & jumping everywhere. It was my first time witnessing wild monkeys (don’t get them in New Jersey…), so I was thoroughly amused.

Monkeys!

After the tour, I ate my way around the Cenang Beach town, trying a variety of SE Asian staples like Nasi Goreng, as well as a few different seafood dishes! All fantastic. After enjoying the sunset, I managed to find my way back to the hotel, and it did not take along for me pass out early! I had another early ferry ride back to Penang in the morning, which I will post soon!

I will miss this piece of paradise!