still going...

...around and around. The last time I wrote on here I was in Dalat, Vietnam. A city that is held with the opinion by the Vietnamese that "If you do not have your honeymoon in Dalat, then your marriage is non existent." It really was a charming city.

Which brings me to a thought. Much of what we in the west hear or think of when we are faced with the idea about places like Southeast Asia and other "third world" countries is that they are dirty, smelly, dangerous, and other assortments of somewhat negativity's. This I have learned is not true. There are so many beautiful places that are full of charms in every tiny corner of the world regardless of where those places stand on the platform of world economy. Parks, manicured dogs, museums, walks around lakes, and adorable people of all ages are in vibrant existence all over the place.

We are now in Macau, China. This developed a couple months back while we were in Kota Baru, Malaysia after stumbling onto Air Asia's website and being faced with a 48 hour 20% off all flights, anywhere and anytime sale. Within twenty minutes we decided to fly to Hong Kong and India. Hong Kong being a short ferry ride from mainland and Macau being the Las Vegas of China, we chose to hop over. Macau is a very strange place. It feels more like being somewhere in Europe rather than China. Except for the fact that English is not spoken here anywhere. Finding vegetarian food has proved to be more difficult than I ever imagined it would be in a place like China. But I tend to find that expectations about anywhere I have never been to are over and over again proven to be silly and untrue. Macau was heavily built as a city by the Portuguese and they definitely left their mark. All the street signs are in both Chinese calligraphy and Portuguese so for us there is absolutely no understanding of anything. And I wonder to myself if the calligraphy and the Portuguese translate out to the same thing, or if the two cultures have their own separate names for all the streets.

There are plenty of ritzy, fancy casinos here. They won't let you in if you're wearing flip flops, so if you ever come here and want to check out the gambling side of the city (which is somewhat unavoidable) don't wear flips or hats. Arghh...dress codes. A good indication for me that I really don't want or need to be in the place that enforces such silliness. The funny thing about the casinos is that they are mostly Chinese games and the minuscule amount of English language here makes it all the more interesting. Some of these games, well most of them, make absolutely no sense so even if I were gambling, I would have no idea what I was doing with the money. But I must admit that the odds seem better when I have no idea what they are. Pure luck and chance makes the hooting and hollering more justified to me that way.

Hong Kong was truly amazing. Such an alive and vibrant city. So many lights with such a retro or eighties (I still don't know what "retro" is so I guess I shouldn't use that word) feel. Or better yet, it feels like the whole city is one giant Nintendo game. The original 8 bit Nintendo. Every single night at 8pm there is a light and music show. The lights are actually on the building structures. You sit on a pier on either Kowloon (the peninsula) or the Hong Kong (the island) side and watch the opposite side. It's like the buildings become transformers and light up in synchronicity with the total Nintendo soundtrack synthesized music. Lasers and neon galore. Totally fantastic.

Tomorrow we go back to Hong Kong to catch a flight to Bangkok where we will sit in the airport from about 11pm until 7am. Then we are off to Kuala Lumpur for one day. We are staying with our friends Pitt and Paulz who we met during our stay in Langkawi. And then it's back to the airport for the flight to India.

Which means that this excursion is in the wrapping up phase. Both Brent and I have purchased tickets home and I feel that it is about time. Emptying the bucket sounds like a great time to me. And I do miss my family, friends, and well my home I guess. I am so grateful that we did this whole thing with absolutely no plan. It is a complete sense of freedom to not have had choices made prior to the experience. Just being able to decide where to go whenever and however I please has been so magnificent. Learning truly that moments exist more than the future does and that what happened yesterday truly is what happened yesterday and does not dictate today. Simplicity is a blessing.

But there is still a whole lot of time in India...big smile on my face right now.

I will see you in the not too distant future.
with love, care, hugs, cute kittens, and pizza (it's been too long)
nate