Recently in Overseas Travel Category

When I made my trip to the home village back in February, I was mugged by the authorities for US$135 for a multiple entry visa. At the time, it was either get a single entry or a multiple entry visa. They no longer sold the double entry visa.

A couple of months ago they stopped selling the multiple entry visa. "Smart thing" to do right before the Olympics. Hopefully for everyone who has to work over there, that restriction will be lifted when the games end.

I'm looking forward to a trip back to BJ for several reasons. I've a friend I've not seen in a while. Would be fun for a visit. In November (!). I've been hankering for really good Peking Duck. And the BJ Capital Airport FINALLY has an express train into town.

Nice. If it keeps regular hours, i won't have to deal with taxi drivers and traffic anymore!

According to this Business Week article, Singapore Airlines is planning to replace the old 747-400 Megatop with the A380 Whalejet in early 2009 on the SFO-HKG-SIN run (SQ1) and the return (SQ2).

Of cors, that depends on Airbasi actually delivering the planes! With all the delays and compensation that Airbasi has had to pay SQ for the A380 delays, they could replace a great deal of their fleet with A330s which have been used for compensation in the past.

When it eventually arrives, that means that all SQ flights that leave SFO will be the new cabin configurations! Now that's exciting...

Well, sorta. I'm out here in Tokyo to watch the MLB opener against the Boston Red Sox. Natch, the A's blew the lead in the bottom half of the game.

Here's how the tickets looked like.

And here's a very confused clerk at the New Otani Hotel who I asked to hold the tickets.

They're not THAT precious...!

Here's the World Series trophy. It seems the the Red Sox take it everywhere they go. For many Japanese fans, this is the first time that they will see the actual trophy in person.

The point of coming out here was to experience the Japanese twist on baseball. This began the opening ceremony with Awaodori dancers. They danced to an beat that was piped throughout Tokyo Dome and I swear that there were members of Edokko-Ren present!

Down where our seats were, there were dancers in the aisles!

Both national anthems were sung, first the Star Spangled Banner by some jazz vocalists than 君が代 was sung by a Japanese opera singer. Since she was singing toward center field, all I could get was her back. But her voice gave me goose bumps!!

Speaking of seats, ahem, our seats were just to the right of home plate, 7 rows back from the dugout! Talk about the benefits of commitment!!

The view was sooo incredible here. In sooo many ways!

Despite this technically being a home game for the A's, the crowd was pro-Red Sox and the only people cheering for the A's seemed to be the 50 or so people in our section. Go figure. Of course, you can figure out why since Matsuzaka Daisuke (松坂 大輔) was the starting pitcher for the Red Sox.

An obviously pro Red Sox crowd

There's more to come, this entry may be updated later.

Bye!

Right when I clicked the shutter, a raindrop hit the lens dead center!!

Mucking about in Asia is nice, but it's always a pleasure to sleep in your own bed...

So here I am at the newly rechristened Taiyuan Int'l Airport in Taipei sucking in diesel, waiting for another late basi...

They're supposedly building an extension to their MRT that will be done in about four years. A bit late for this trip...or maybe i'm here a bit early.

Actually, if I was looking forward to riding the new High Speed Rail here, I'm allegedly over a week early. Hope it gets finished soon!

After two consecutive nights that ended in the morning, I'm up early. That means instead of going to bed at 0600, I'm awake at 0600...

Heading off to Taipei today. Part of the "I've never been there" travel series. But it's still early here!

Yawn... *stretches* Yay!

Which way?

To Causeway Bay, of cors!

Back in Hong Kong for 32 hours. And so far I've experienced:

A torrential downpour for 5 hours yesterday afternoon. Home cooked food (thanks Helen!). Old HK movies on cable (God of Gamblers 2). Dessert (mango with sago). Won ton Mein and Daan Taats (they ALWAYS go together). Flaky people (if you can't make it, let people know!). Kopi. Yum cha. High ticket window shopping (LV, Dunhill, Dupont). Star Ferry to HK side (the seksi-est commute in da world!) and the HK Tram. 7.8 kilos of laundry.

And the day's not done yet! Wahahahah.

"The flight is full, so you're being moved to Business Class"...

I heard these words about 20 minutes ago as I checked in for my return flight to Hong Kong.

Amazing!