Walking Ixus

Chinese New Year is late this year, so I’ve got time to clean. As part of my “clean the closet out” project, I’ve been going through my old travel box, tossing out a lot of old receipts and outdated brochures.
Maps and stuff from my first visit to Chicago…

That was in 1998, shortly before my first overseas jaunt
Places i’ve visited and things i’ve seen…

There’s a lot of stuff from my first visit to the PRC here…
You sure collect a lot of stuff when you travel…

Believe it or not, a lot of this stuff went buh-bye…
…because I think that if you plan to return to a place to get to know it better, you don’t have to keep a lot of the stuff you wind up with!

Well, 2006 could have been better in a lot of ways…but I DID do a lot of travel this year! I resolved at the beginning of 2006 to “go places I’ve not been before” and for the most part, I think I achieved that.
March 2006:
First visit to Australia; Sydney and the Hunter Valley. My first experience at backwards weather and driving on the wrong side of the road…

Different view of the Sydney Opera House
August 2006:
First visit to Nikko (world heritage site), Matsumoto (old castle and world’s biggest wasabi farm) and to Koenji (for the Awa-odori). Just some of the sites you’ll see if you make the effort to GET OUT OF TOKYO! I’m going to try to make it to Koenji each summer, schedule permitting from now on.

Awa-odori!
First extended visit to Kuala Lumpur and various parts of Malaysia. Surprisingly compact central city, best siu-yuk I’ve had in my life and a bargain vacation spot. Yup, that’s KL.

Street snack in Klang
November 2006:
First visit to Taiwan and to Taipei. Definitely on my “return visit” list to sample more nightlife (Luxy anyone?), food and to explore the rest of the island via High Speed Rail. Taipei to Kaohsiung in 90 minutes? Waaaaaaah!
Of cors that didn’t mean that I didn’t revisit some of my favourite cities on earth and visit places there that i’ve not been to yet!
On my last visit to Hong Kong, I discovered new restaurants, new bars and lounges and the joys of staying up all night to save HK$300 cab fare! How about Singapore? Meeting new frens, staying in new places and eating, eating and drinking! Each time I go back there it’s like meeting an old fren for the first time all over again. Ah yes, and that philosophy applies in triplicate each time I return to Tokyo!
Some places that I’d like to check out in 2007.
Hawaii: Yes, i’ve never done Hawaii properly. Yes, I know it’s closer to SFO than New York is. Enough!
Taiwan: It’s not just Taipei, ya know!
Thailand: Maybe not right away, but eventually…
Eastern Europe: Cold weather but supposed to be affordable and fun
Scandinavia: Like Eastern Europe, except not that affordable…
Japan: north of the Tokaido/Sanyo Shinkansen. That means places like Akita, Takayama, Hiroshima, Nagasaki and the like.
Australia: How about the rest of the country outside of Sydney?
Aside from the usual resolutions (eat better, lose 20 lbs, destroy my enemies), these are the places that I’d like to see this year. Wonder how many i’ll be able to check off the list next year?

New Years’ Day and Eve are usually big holes in my memory mostly because of hangovers and football on New Years’ Day.
But thanks to technology, we can remember (albeit painfully) what happened on New Years’ Eve. I do remember getting a late start to the evening, squeezing three guys into my small small car and getting to the party around 2300. Right after they closed the doors because of capacity limits due to the Fire code. Bleah.
But it wasn’t too bad. We were shielded from the wind and we started our own party on the sidewalk with smokers who came outside for a puff as well as other late arrivals that eventually got in. We all got a great view of the fireworks outside while the people inside kanna see them! WAHAHAH!
We all finally got inside after midnight. But the best part, we didn’t have to pay the cover charge and drank gratis for the rest of the night! So there’s some consolation there…

This is how it looked like inside. It went on full force until 0200…

Some of us took the opportunity to dress up
The alleged theme (alleged because that NEVER gets observed at Asian Occasions here) was “period specific dress”. That meant dress up as a 70’s person or an 80’s person or what have you. We saw 70’s tuxedos with the ruffle-y shirt, one really tall skinny guy dressed up like Saturday Night Fever. Sometimes it was hard to tell what period in time people were dressed up as.

Can you tell which one is the 70’s lounge lizard and the 80’s swinger?

I went as a 30’s enforcer, except I forgot my violin case…and we dun usually smile lidat

Just some other partygoers that I posted for no specific reason…
Of cors, the night always ends with someone getting carried back to the car, and ultimately, up the stairs…

Drinking time: 100 minutes, 11 shots and drinks: Free, Getting carried to the car: Priceless!
New Year’s Day was all about football, a big brunch involving spam, bacon, lots of eggs, rice and brown gravy. And for some of us, sleeping off our hangovers. Happy New Year!

New Year’s Eve is coming up. But for me, the real “dress up in a tux” event is six days later. See below.

Click on the picture to make it bigger (and easier to read)
There’s two events. One is the inauguration where a suit is appropriate. The other event requires black tie. Probably going to dat with frens, since my short list of dates I’d like to bring are *ahem* out of the country right now. Bleah…

Inspired by SassyJan’s results(are they REALLY accurate?), I decided to take this silly survey (click on extras then click on the box that says “What’s your Seduction Style”).

Sometimes these silly online surveys really nail it on the head! WAHAHAHAH