Every Day is Sunday

On a small beach in southern Thailand, thousands of people from around the world gather each month to celebrate the apex of the lunar calendar. It’s called the Full Moon Party and it’s just as crazy as it sounds.

Jeff: Erin and I had only been dating for a few weeks when she promised to take me to an amazing party on a beach in Thailand.  This month she kept her promise.  I’ve often heard that the night takes on mystical qualities when the moon is full in the sky, and this night was definitely no exception.

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Danielle: When I tried to picture myself in my thirties, I thought I would own a house, a hovercraft and a dog.*  I did not think that I would spend 36 hours flying across the world to attend an all-night beach party.  Yet there we were!  Thanks to our unofficial sponsor, 5-hour energy, I managed to witness people jumping over fire, search for Erin’s lost shoes on a dance floor, and listen to a LOT of Lady Gaga. As we watched the sun rise over the ocean, I thought that I could not be further from Washington, DC. Until a Danish guy wanted to talk to me about Obama and energy policy.  I took it as a sign to go to sleep, with the chorus of “Poker Face” still ringing in my ears. I wonder what my forties will be like…

* I have none of these objects.

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Melanie: The Full Moon Party isn’t exactly a party you’d take your mother to.  There is no specific start time or even an exact location, other than “the beach in Haad Rin.”  There are no rules or instructions.  And don’t expect an invitation or a ticket or even a seat – though there is plenty of room for everyone.  You don’t so much go to the Full Moon Party as suddenly you’re a part of it.  One minute you are walking down a regular street on Koh Phangan in Thailand – which is random enough – with a group of 9 rowdy Americans, and the next minute someone that looks a lot like Jeff is jumping rope with fire.  And when you take a break from dancing you notice you’re standing on a gorgeous, moonlit beach covered in paint digging your toes in the soft, soft sand drinking liquor from a bucket with 6 straws.  That’s when you realize this is the party you traveled 36 hours on three different planes, one catamaran, and the back of some guy’s truck to attend.  This is the moment on the lunar calendar you planned your Asia trip around.  This is the night you prepared for by chugging Five Hour Energy Drinks.  This is the party that Erin has been talking about for as long as you’ve known her, and the one you said you would never go to.  Yet here you are, along with 10,000 others all howling at the moon.  You are the Full Moon Party and it looks like Tonight’s Gonna Be a Good, Good, Night…

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Andy: Full Moon 2009 - What was my favorite moment of the full moon party?  It could be the moment we set foot on the beach well before the party began as we surveyed the long stretch of sand on Hat Rin, with bar after bar set up with more speakers and drink stands than I’d ever seen, thinking to myself, man this place is gonna go off tonight…Or it could be the anticipation I felt after we’d painted ourselves up and down in flourescent body art when we hit the beach all together and the first song we heard was “I gotta feeling…that tonight’s gonna be a good night” and I thought, man this place is just about to go off…Or it could be the next six hours of madness that I couldn’t even attempt to describe when it actually went off and kept going off until sunrise and beyond.  Good times.

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Erin: I felt old and a little nervous about dragging my friends half-way across the world for a party I hadn’t attended in nearly a decade.  But as soon as I saw the fire jump-rope I knew that Full Moon wouldn’t disappoint.  The party was bigger and more crazy than I remembered.  I had a good time back in 2000, but it could not compare to being on the beautiful beach surrounded by the people I love. 

We couldn’t imagine a better way to begin our Thailand adventure than to meet up with 7 amazing friends and hit the beach.  Melanie and Danielle came from DC, the newlyweds Aggie and Andy came from Madison, Adam and Julie came from Chicago, and we haven’t let Seth out of our sight since China.

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Special thanks to everyone who signed the awesome card for us.  We love being traveling hobos, but when we saw the pictures of “ourselves” back among the DC crowd we realized just how lucky we are to have such amazing friends and how much we miss our DC world.  We’ll see you in a few short months!

Last year our friends Carl and Amanda showed us a closet full of clothes they had custom made in Hoi An.  That was all it took for us to add Hoi An to our itinerary.  With a tailoring shop on every corner (and several in-between corners), Hoi An is the place in Vietnam for custom clothes.

For months the three of us planned, schemed, sketched, and dreamed about all the clothes we were going to have made.  Erin came with pictures collected from catalogues; Seth came with sketches in his notebook; Jeff came with the modest goal of getting leather shoes that fit his irregular feet.

We gave Hoi An our best effort.  We had 30 different items made at 15 different places as we searched for the perfect combination of value and quality.  “Ya Ly” had the most consistent and best quality, but they wanted serious money that we weren’t prepared to spend.  The price was right at “Thu Vu,” but the quality atrocious.  We never found a shop with just the right mix. . . and we left Hoi An doubting whether one exists.

Looking back the whole enterprise seems a bit strange.  Every third Hoi An family has converted the bottom floor of their house into a fabric store advertising custom-made clothes, but none of them are tailors and the work gets done somewhere off-site.  We had shirts, sportscoats, and dresses made yet nobody ever stuck a pin in anything we tried on? 

Although we had mixed results, the shopping was a great experience.  We learned a lot about clothes-making and there are some absolute gems in the two boxes of stuff that we sent home.  We agreed to reconvene with Seth in one year to judge our efforts in Hoi An.  If we’re still wearing half this stuff in 2010 it will have been a huge success!

Although we came to Hoi An to shop, we won each day by leaving the shops behind and exploring everything else that Hoi An has to offer.

On our first day we rented bicycles and made for the beach.  Jeff got a flat tire right in front of a fancy hotel, and so we figured it was as good a place as any to squat for a few hours.  The water was warm and the beach was beautiful – it felt like we were in a Corona commercial.

Getting Jeff’s tire fixed proved easier than we expected.  We walked for only five minutes when a tiny, hunched Vietnamese man came to our rescue.

Our mechanic liked to communicate by writing us notes – at first on the sidewalk with chalk and then with pencil and paper.  Through a series of notes he explained that 40 years ago he worked for the American military fixing jeeps.  In his last note he wrote “America = Good,” and then “Communism = Bad.”  He then looked around furtively, ripped the page out of his notebook and stuffed the paper into his mouth and swallowed it.  We looked for some sign that he was joking around, but all he did was give us a mischievous grin.  He was quite a character.

On our second day we escaped the shops for the kitchen.  We had our own private cooking class at the Secret Garden restaurant – a new restaurant in Hoi An which is unlikely to remain a secret for long.  The manager began the class with a trip to the market to introduce us to the local meat, produce and seasonings.  

We then met the restaurant’s head chef who directed us in preparing a delicious 5-course meal.  Even the Iron Seth, whose own dinner parties and instructional cooking videos (Episode 1, Episode 3) were legendary in Washington DC, picked up a few pointers.

The most humbling part of the cooking lesson was trying to make the thin rice paper that the Vietnamese use to make spring rolls.  The sous-chefs made it look easy enough, but when it was our turn we struggled to get them off the steamer in one piece.  Not all of them looked pretty but they were tasty.

On our last day in Hoi An we rented motorbikes and took off for China Beach.  Located about 20 miles outside Hoi An, China Beach was a popular spot for American soldiers to come for R&R during the Vietnam War (or, as the locals call it, the American War).  After spending the afternoon on the beach, we made a hasty departure when we saw the huge rain clouds rolling in.

We tried to stay ahead of the weather, but after only 5 minutes on the road the sky opened up.  With rain pelting us in the face, we decided to pull over and wait it out.  The nearest shelter was a local bar where we joined a dozen Vietnamese men who were sipping on beers while they also waited out the rain.  With nothing better to do we joined them for a few. 

After about 30 minutes the rain let up, and we decided to take a chance and head back to Hoi An.  We wobbled over to our soggy motorbikes and Seth hilariously asked, “Do you think this is what my girlfriend meant when she told me to ‘Be Safe?’”

Ha Long Bay is an idyllic waterway made up of thousands of limestone karsts.  The locals call it “Descending Dragon Bay.”

The only way to explore this mystical bay is by Junk Boat.  A Junk Boat is a cross between a yacht and a cruiseliner (we have no idea why they call it a “Junk”), and not all Junks are equal. There are plenty of boats that cater to the backpacker crowd – they are cheap and you get what you pay for. There are also plenty of high-end boats that cater to those people who will pay for luxury at any price.

Erin and Seth spent the morning walking around Hanoi looking for that elusive mid-range boat. After interviewing every boat operator this side of the Mekong River they finally found a solid mid-range boat through Columbus Cruises. When we arrived at the pier the next day, however, we discovered that Columbus had given us a free upgrade onto the Pinta Gold, their high-end luxury boat. Erin was so excited she almost fainted.

There’s something regal about traveling on a first-class boat. We were miles away from civilization, yet like kings and queens they served us 10-course meals on white linen tablecloths and embroidered napkins. After dinner we moved to the top deck, ordered frozen lemonade from the bar, and spiced it with some vodka we smuggled on board. We enjoyed a perfect sunset and then sipped cocktails under the stars. It was pure bliss.

We spent our days cruising around the bay and periodically getting off the boat to swim and spelunk. We stopped for a tour of Sung Sot (the “Cave of Awe”) which was otherworldly and would make the perfect set for a science fiction movie if they could ever figure out how to get a camera crew in there.

We also went kayaking to a secluded lagoon and then passed by a floating village.

After we finished kayaking, the Pinta Gold had to head back to the pier to drop off some passengers and pick up others, and so a separate boat came to take us for lunch on a private beach. Just when we thought they couldn’t possibly pamper us any more, they set up a dining room table on the beach and served us another 10-course lunch from the kitchen on the boat.

After lunch our guide Duok led us on a 2-hour jungle trek on Cat Bay Island.  Climbing through the dense jungle we passed hundreds of huge spiders, some with beautiful orange, yellow and purple spots. Duok made sure that we admired the beautiful spiders from a distance. “The more beautiful the spider, the more poisonous,” he explained. “Just like women.” We laughed and asked Duok why he was down on beautiful women. He told us about his recent break-up with his girlfriend: “She was very beautiful and very poisonous.”

Duok's Girlfriend

With a million motorbikes and few rules of the road, crossing the street in Hanoi poses a serious challenge. If you wait for an opening in traffic you could be standing on the sidewalk for an entire afternoon. If you move around trying to avoid the motorbikes like the old-school Frogger game, you’re likely to get smushed. It turns out the best approach is to walk slowly and evenly and hope that the motorbikes avoid you.

Amid a cacophony of honking horns, we set off to find the famous old street market that Seth had read about in his guidebook.

For more than 100 years, La Vong restaurant has been serving only one dish: Cha Ca (Grilled Fish). After a morning of motorbike horns and narrow escapes, we stopped in for some lunch at this Hanoi institution. The staff didn’t speak English but we had no problem communicating.

After making our own adventure with Ma, we linked back up with the Intrepid tour for a homestay in the Vietnamese countryside. After a long hike we arrived just in time for some traditional dance.

The night also included some traditional karaoke.

And some traditional arm-wrestling.

Seth went head-to-head with our wiry Vietnamese host. Seth was on the ropes for much of the match, but he wouldn’t give up and his opponent couldn’t put him away. With hoots and hollers of encouragement from his countrymen, Seth turned the tables and won the match. It was a stunning victory for both Seth and the United States of America.

SaPa is Vietnamese mountain town, way up in the Northern part of the country.  It’s the first place we went after the (terrible) China-Vietnam border.  SaPa sits up at about 2000m (6500 feet - why can’t America go metric?) - where the French colonials used to come to escape the summer heat. The surrounding hills and valleys are green as green can be. Streams cascade down from the mountains and feed the rice paddies in the villages below.

SaPa itself is a charming little town, built around man-made lake, a central plaza/market, and a couple main streets. Everything is a bustling hub of commerce, mostly fueled by tourism. It’s one of those backpacker places just coming into its own - you can find a decent amount of English spoken, mediocre pizza to eat, spotty Internet service, but also a warm shower, helpful tour guides, delicious cheap local food and handicrafts, and it hasn’t been ruined by resorts, con artists, inflated prices, or foreign-owner bars. Like much of Vietnam, it has a subtle colonial feel still, with cobblestone alleyways, churches, and buildings painted in pastel shades, mostly soft yellow with white trim.

Much of the local color comes from the dress, smiles, and increasingly-aggressive salesmanship of women from the surrounding Hmong communities. We heard they are “Black Tai” Hmong, although we never did sort out the anthropology of the place. They wear dark blue clothes, mostly a hip-length top over a skirt with these somewhat cool retro leggings. It’s all highlighted by brightly colored sashes and big earrings and necklaces that are, of course, for sale.

A big part of SaPa is trekking to the surrounding areas, or taking whatever form of transit you like along the windy country roads.  The three of us (and a fellow Canadian traveler named Darren) decided to rent motorbikes, which are available for $5 for the day.

Now realize, motorbikes are ubiquitous in Vietnam in a way I have never seen before. Hanoi is literally choked wall to wall with them. So, we grabbed helmets, answered affirmatively to the renter “Sure, we know how to drive these” - though Jeff and I definitely did not - located an ATM that took our cards, and filled up on petrol - sold from mom-and-pop operations where an old lady with a pump handle dispenser puts a liter or two into your bike while her nephew helps, smoking a cigarette the whole time…

A group of Hmong women had been nagging us to buy something. On a whim, Jeff leaned to me and whispered, “Ask one of them if she’ll take us to her village.” So I picked one who spoke great English (a surprising characteristic in much of Vietnam), made my proposition, and after a bit of negotiation, for the right price, of course the answer was yes! So, she clambered on behind me on my moto, and away we went! Brave lady - but she made us get her a helmet and wouldn’t let me go beyond “number 2” (aka 2nd gear) until she decided I was a decent driver!

Her name was Ma, and she took us down the 10 miles of windy roads that lead to her community. Riding along the ridge, we could see the green green green rice terraces and other crops planted in the fertile river valley below. Eventually, we dipped down a rutted dirt hill, across a river on a wooden bridge, and up into the town.

We stopped at a small market to buy provisions to bring to Ma’s house for lunch. Tomatoes, rice noodles, garlic, onions, a handful of eggs. By consensus we chose to avoid meat that had been sitting out in the blistering sun.

Ma took us to her home, shed some of her ethnic clothes, and attended to her 2 small children. Other little munchkins, nieces and nephews, arrived. Her husband came around, a sister-in-law appeared, etc. Plus a lot of chickens and ducks.

Ma’s home was one of the more humble I have ever sat in (and that after 6 months in Southern Africa and years in Latin America). The structure was a low-roofed wood-bamboo-palm structure, with a dirt floor, sort of longhouse style, basically one big room. Fortunately, the hills provide plentiful water at this time of year, so a delightfully engineered system of bamboo tubes brings water into the house that then runs off into the fields when it is used.

The kitchen sink - water fed through bamboo pipe

The most fascinating thing we saw at Ma’s house was her indigo farm. Who knew that indigo was a crop much less an ordinary-looking green leaf plant? Not me. We couldn’t figure out why all the Black Tai women we had met had fingers stained dark blue – but it all started to make sense. The women soak the leaves in big barrels to create indigo dye that they use to dye their traditional dress. Fascinating.

So, we sat and played with the kids, who eventually, as they always do, warmed up to us and engaged in hide and seek and other universal games. We sat indoors laughing as a brief tropical sunshower pelted the roof. And eventually, we lent a hand in some lunch making, Jeff and I attempting to peel potatoes with a knife (a skill I’ve apparently lost since the Peace Corps), fetching some things, and trying not to feel useless. Ma and her husband cooked over a wood fire right inside the house, with soot-blackened pots and a not ungenerous amount of pork fat as seasoning.

Lunch: rice, rice noodles, a simple egg omelette, stir-fried potatoes, onions and tomatoes. We dashed them with some delicious Vietnamese spice, little fiery chili peppers that sit in vinegar to be used as a condiment.

That moment, at low-slung chairs around a well worn and stained table, feet resting on a dirt floor, was simple, mundane, and happening in thousands of homes nearby. It was also lovely and magical – the basic fabric of culture, family, and community.

We spent a bit more time at Ma’s house, and then headed out of the valley to make it back to SaPa town for sunset. Along the way, we stalled our motorbikes on the steep hill, drove through flowing water, and stopped for some stunning photos of the valley below.

Ma returned to town with us to get in some final selling of knicknacks to other tourists before day’s end (in fact, that night Ma’s husband made supercute earrings that were a copy of her own for my girlfriend Joy). We foreigners retired to cool showers and drinks in the haven of the cozy backpacker town.

That day in SaPa was one of the truly inspired, unpredictable, marvelous days that come when you drop into the “follow the flow” spirit of travel. And from it, we all extracted a totally new travel mantra: whenever possible, ride motorbikes into the countryside.

Just another in a long line of Wertkinborn wannabes,

Seth

The road from Kunming to Vietnam is long and winding.  During our 12-hour bus ride through rural China we saw things that reminded us just how different China is from the U.S., notwithstanding its proclivity toward American style big-box buildings, Times Square-esq advertising and massive shopping complexes.    

We settled in with our travel pillows and ipods and were slipping peacefully into a boredom-induced sleep when a big glittering golden Buddha head caught our attention.  At the apex of mountain was the head of a massive happy Buddha that looked as though it had erupted from the Earth itself.  Further down the mountain Buddha’s large hands extended out as though punching through the earth.  [Buddhism is the unofficial religion of China but not all forms (sects) of Buddhism are recognized.]

It wasn’t long after the random Buddha that our old rickety bus was passed by a truckload of dogs packed together for transport as if they were cattle headed to the slaughter house.  We knew the Chinese ate dog but convinced ourselves that they only ate the mangy ones.  Sadly, that’s not the case. They were really cute.

Even more disconcerting than the truck full of dogs were the 25 black bears we spotted sitting on the hillside overlooking a dirty Olympic sized pool. After much debate, Seth came up with the best theory about the random bears in middle of nowhere China.  Black bears are a delicacy and the Chinese pay thousands of dollars for Bear Paw soup.  Seriously -  these people eat everything.  We’re still trying to figure out the Olympic pool.

Our journey continued through hills, valleys, and a lot of farm land. Descending from a mountain ridge we saw small trickling waterfalls and rows upon rows of banana plants.  Smack in the middle of all these lush green plants was an oil refinement plant spewing toxic fumes.  Although more than a little out of place, the oil plant was yet another example of the massive development underway all over China.  Unlike parts of Africa, you would be hard pressed to find a remote village in China that didn’t have access to petrol, electricity and water.

China wins both the award for best and worst public bathrooms. Thanks to the Olympics Beijing has an immaculate public bathroom every few blocks.  But, as we learned during a pit stop close to the Vietnam border, China also takes “public” to a new level.

EE: From the outside it looked promising - a gleaming white building with proper signage – but the faces of some of the ladies exiting the bathroom gave me pause.  I asked one lady, “How bad?” She looked a bit green and didn’t reply.  Upon entering the ladies side I was shocked and frightened.  It must be the filthiest toilet in the world – it made the toilet from the movie Trainspotting look inviting.  And it was open…wide open. There weren’t any partitions, no doors, nothing. It was pub-lic.  I know that China has a population problem, but give a girl her personal space.  I ran out of there.

We survived public bathrooms, dogs and bears and made it to our final destination.  Driving into Lao Cai, thousands of people were gathered at the river bank for group-exercises. There were young people, middle-aged people, old people all mixed together.  Some were doing Tai Chi, some were doing line dancing, and we definitely heard the Makarena.  It wasn’t the first time we saw the Chinese gather for group exercises, but it was definitely the most elaborate gathering of our journey.   

Last stop - immigration. We got our China exit stamps and started walking towards the Vietnam border when we were accosted by Chinese immigration officers who starting digging through our bags. They weren’t looking for drugs, weapons or ancient artifacts.  They wanted to confiscate China Lonely Plant guidebooks because the Chinese government objected to the way the Lonely Planet talked about Tibet. We knew that censorship is part of life in China, but we couldn’t understand why they would confiscate something as innocuous as a guidebook, especially since we were leaving the country.  After witnessing many things that make China great, our experience at immigration laid bare China’s Achilles heel: its own government.

In Hong Kong we joined up with a tour company called Intrepid Travel for a 12-day overland trip from Hong Kong to Hanoi.

The trip began with an overnight train to Kaili, a small Chinese town of about half a million people (same population as Washington DC).  Although the train offered “soft sleeper” cars for only $6 more, Intrepid booked us into a “hard sleeper” car. The hard sleepers weren’t as bad as they sounded – the berths had mattresses and pillows – but we knew we were slumming it when a shackled prisoner took his spot in the berth next to Seth.

We made way from Kaili to Maliao, a tiny village in the Guizhou province that is definitely off-the-beaten path. Miliao is home to the Miao, an ethnic minority that has resisted assimilation into Chinese culture for the last 2000 years. The Miao are known for their stubbornness and fighting ability, as well as for their colorful garb, architecture, weavings, and rice wine.

The Miao love their rice wine. They love sharing it almost as much as they love drinking it. Our host, a kind old lady nearing ancient status, gave us a true Miao welcome by pouring rice wine directly into our mouths. Rice wine is about as pleasurable as drinking moonshine. It burns. Since our host poured it directly into our mouths, it was hard to control how much we were drinking. Declining was not an option. Our host was 4 feet tall and 75 pounds, but she was wiry and wouldn’t take no for answer.

We stumbled back to our homestay for an evening with our hosts, a local family who let us stay in their upstairs quarters of their house (two levels above the barn). They served us an amazing dinner with, of course, some more rice wine..

We did our best to communicate with our hosts but it was difficult for our one local guide to translate for the entire group. Somebody suggested that we sing songs, but it was impossible to find a common song that we all knew. Jeff suggested that we each sing our own national anthems. It seemed like a good idea so representatives from each country stood and sang the Chinese, American, Canadian, Australian, and English national anthems. Vinny, the group’s sole representative from Ireland, then stood and gave a stirring rendition of Amhrán na bhFiann.  It was really quite moving and he got a well-deserved standing ovation.

Our local guide was a Chinese woman named Ming. To say that Ming was a spit-fire wouldn’t do her justice. She was like the energizer bunny on 50 cups of coffee. She was tiny – a little over four feet tall – but had the energy of a supernova. Her enthusiasm was infectious. Ming put on some music and all of a sudden the dinner turned into a dance party.

We definitely had too much rice wine because Erin decided it was a good idea to carry Ming outside and make Jeff bench-press her.

The next day we shook off our tremendous hangovers and began a four-hour trek from Maliao to Xijiang. When we arrived in Xijiang we were greeting with, of course, more rice wine.

Xijiang is a big tourist destination for local Chinese who come from all over China to see the minority Miao people. In the evening, the Miao don traditional dress, play traditional music, and perform ritual dances.

We wanted to join in on the fun, and so we found some local garb and joined the party. The Chinese tourists loved it – they all wanted to take their photos with the crazy gweilos dressed like the Miao.

That night Ming took us out for a crazy night of Karaoke. A big group of Chinese tourists asked us to join them when they saw that we loved Karaoke as much as they did. We traded-off songs: we sang Frank Sinatra and the Beatles; they sang Chinese love ballads. After too much beer and too much Karaoke we hit the night market for some grilled chicken feet.

We said goodbye to the Miao and started our long trip to the Vietnam border. Between a 10-hour train ride and 12-hour bus ride we stopped in Kunming in the Yunnan Province. We started to grasp how enormous China is when our guide described Kunming as another “small” city of about 6 million people.

We spent the day visiting the Summer Palace and then went out that evening for a Yunnan Province favorite: hot-pot.

Hot-pot is like fondue on steroids. The table had a built-in propane tank, and two pots were placed on the burner in the middle of the table. The inside pot was fire-hot chili oil, the outside pot was hot water. First they brought a series of raw ingredients to add to the hot water to make a broth: potatoes, onions, cilantro, parsley, and fish-heads. We let the broth cook for a while, and then they brought the raw ingredients to cook in the broth and/or hot chili: beef, pork, shrimp, fish, and chicken feet.

We left the restaurant with our bellies full, our mouths on fire, and our pores full of oil. It was a fitting last meal in China.

It’s one of the most densely populated areas in the world with more than 7 million people living in a land area of less than 450 square miles.  Hong Kong makes the East Village of Manhattan look like the suburbs.

When you walk around Hong Kong you can feel the mass of humanity that surrounds you.  But the city’s planners have done such a good job that we experienced no gridlock in the city.  You may always be moving in a pack of people, but at least you’re moving.

Seth had met Taniya only once before at a work event in California, but she told him to look her up when he got to Hong Kong.  In the ultimate expression of the kindness of strangers, Taniya left her apartment to the three of us and went to stay at a friend’s house.  We spent one night in Kowloon (the “Blade Runner” section of Hong Kong), but the rest of our time in Hong Kong we spent in Taniya’s wonderful Lamma Island apartment.

Taniya is what they call a “creative” in the advertising world.  She is a free-thinker who sees opportunities where others see limitations (www.followyourpath.com).  She’s the kind of person who says things like “I’ve had enough of Hong Kong. I think I’ll spend the next few months in Bali.”  And she means it.

Although Taniya works for a high-powered ad firm in Hong Kong, she lives on Lamma Island in the archipelago just south of Hong Kong Island.  Settled in 1960s by a bunch of hippies, there are no cars allowed on the entire island.  Lamma Island is just 20 minutes away from the main island by ferry, but it’s worlds away from the craziness of downtown.

We explored the Island one morning and found it took just 2 hours to hike from one side of Lamma to the fishing village on the opposite side.  We rewarded ourselves with a lunch of the freshest seafood Hong Kong has to offer.

After a few weeks of hit-or-miss food orders in Beijing and Shanghai, we found we couldn’t go wrong with the glorious Cantonese food in Hong Kong.  We followed up our seafood meal on Lamma Island  Through a friend of a friend (who invited more friends of friends) we gathered at a Kowloon hotspot and ate an amazing meal (including an order of deliciously marinated chicken feet) with a group of Hong Kong locals, mainland Chinese, Americans, and even one Puerto Rican woman who works in New York City and speaks perfect Mandarin.

We saved our best meal in Hong Kong for last – a Dim Sum lunch to beat Dim Sum lunches.  Dumplings may have been invented on the mainland, but they have been perfected in Hong Kong.