Category: Good Travel Advice

I’m off to Asia in November; yet another funfilled trip during my vacation season of October-November and February-April. Why these times of the year?

It’s usually hot and gross during the summer high season and winter is also high season because of Xmas-New Years-Lunar New Year all happening between Dec-Jan.

Tickets are prohibitively expensive during this time and the weather during the other times.

I recently got a new Palm Pilot, the Tungsten C. It is fast and has wi-fi built in. Ideally, I wanted to leave the Powerbook at home this time around because I can keep up with email via the Palm Pilot and try to post from the road.

I’m going to give this a shot later on and I guess you’ll read the results if it works.

Campbell’s Apartment is one of the few surviving cigar bars in New York. Mayor Bloomberg, the ultimate RINO, has pushed through a smoking ban very similar to California’s but with no loopholes.

It’s a classy joint in Grand Central Station. Get into your nice clothes and smoke a Habano. Their martinis, excellent!

I met a bureaucrat from the UN there. She spouted the same garbage that Kofi Annan and that bunch of corrupt third world outcasts use against the US. “Pay your dues and do what we say”. What has UN membership done for the US lately? What have we gotten for all the billions of dollars we pour into that? To keep corrupt third worlders in New York?

How about this: Move UN headquarters to Boise or Des Moines and see just how plum that assignment is, eh?

When I associate Air Travel with airplanes, the concept of a big bus with 4 engines, some space and 1st class service comes to mind.

Or these

So when I have to fly a regional jet, all that goes out the window.

Isn’t this a tad too small?

In fairness, it’s pretty fast, if cramped. Smooth riding. No overhead compartments to speak of. Not too bad.

But still, isn’t this a tad too small?

Today, the flight was oversold, even though we got there on time. That AirTrain thingy that goes to EWR works pretty well. Just a little bit of drama before we finally got assigned some seats. We got on the plane, in row 32 of a 757. That�s near the verrry back of the plane, folks! Check out just how far back at seatguru.
Now about the so-called “food”…
They forced us to eat vegan (favourite food lifestyle of der furher) awful sponge like �chocolate chip cookie�. How do I know this? It said so on the stupid wrapper! I wanted to spill a drink to test how absorbent the sponge like cookie really was…
They ran out of the stuffed pasta shells so there was dry chicken rice like substance. It�s not that the stuffed pasta shells are the bestest thing out there, but if you are going to overbook the flight to assure that it�s full, perhaps you should make sure that there�s enough food for people. If it�s not enough that they are trying to force an alternative lifestyle on us with Coke being replaced by Pepsi, reminding us that we fly for the benefit of the unions at the beginning of each flight and we should be grateful for what slop we do get, having to deal with the nazi vegan thing is going waaaay too far!
Yes, I like quality cookies. If you’re going to serve them, make sure they’re good! And that’s what pretty much inspired this tasteless (pun) post.

So I�m here with the fellow traveler at Tsim Chai Kee in Central.

Mmmmmmmm. Got the good Won Ton Mein fix. Yummy. And for only HK$10.00 a bowl, it�s a deal�

You meet people in the strangest places�
A few notes. I took the MTR here to capitalize on my unlimited 3 day MTR pass. MTR from Causeway Bay to Tung Chung. One change of train and a 7 minute walk to transfer. The MTR stations are huge. Then you take the #23 basi from Tung Chung for a 40 minute long roundabout way through villages and such before you get to the temple. But that�s prologue.

I get asked to take a photo�that�s par for the course. Turns out this person is an engineer from Daly City out here on her own on holiday too! Her first time in HKG and like me, also new to the HKG wilderness. So now I�ve got someone to hang out with. Cool.

She had both a digicam and a APS camera to take a snap of moi. Also a copy of the Ya Ya Sisterhood in her purse. They were showing this on the plane ad nauseaum�geez.

Just got back from Macau.

HKG maintains a 24 hour frontier with the rest of the world compared to China which closes its border at 0000.  I was told that this is for the gamers who play in Macau but need to get back home.

The Turbocat runs every 30 minutes from 2200 to 0600. Wow. That’s better than late night MUNI.  And oodles of taxis waiting for the passengers that get off the boat because public transport shuts down at 0100.  How convenient!