Denmark

After our China travelling trip, it was back to Xiamen and exams (these went fine, I passed all of my modules for the year). After exams was saying goodbye to Xiamen and the various friends I'd met there. This included various meals, nights out and goodbyes, with the hope of seeing at least some of the people again. After this was what turned out to be a very long journey home, 24 hours more than planned! I am still waiting for the compensation I'm entitled to through my travel insurance for it.

Anyway, I got back to Romiley, Stockport on Wednesday 25th June and left for Denmark On Thursday 3rd July, just over a week later. This may seem very early to go away again but it was my only chance to see Alex over the summer. He's spending the majority of it in Dubai with his parents (where I went for Christmas last year) which is an expensive plane ticket from the UK! However, he and his family were going to Denmark to visit friends and family (they're Danish) so it was much more feasible to purchase an easyJet ticket to go there for a week instead. Alex and his family are from Roskilde, a town just outside of Copenhagen, so I flew from Manchester to Copenhagen Airport.

On arrival, I was met by Alex and we went by train to Copenhagen as his parents were there for the day. This gave me a chance to do some sightseeing of the capital including the outside of Tivoli, City Hall, Amalienborg (Royal Palace) and Nyhavn (Harbour). I really enjoyed walking around the Danish capital, taking in all of the sights, as I had never been there before - I hadn't even been to Scandinavia before!

City Hall

Pedestrian Shopping Street

Nyhavn

Alex and I at Amalienborg

The next day was spent in Roskilde. We went to an art gallery of a contemporary artist Alex's parents like. He mostly does abstract paintings and metal sculptures and goes by the name "The Zinker" and his trademark is to use z's instead of s's in words. It was very interesting to have a look around his gallery, I particularly liked his sculptures. Here's a link to his website: http://www.thezinker.com/

After the gallery, Alex took me to see Roskilde Domkirke (Cathedral), the burial site of the Danish Royals since the 15th century, and where Alex had his confirmation. It is a very impressive church and I would definitely recommend a visit. It's both beautiful and full of history. It costs 60 kroner for a standard adult visit, or 40 for students. Alex then took me on a little walk around the town, showing me various spots such as his old school, the park and the main shopping street.

Roskilde Domkirke

Inside the Cathedral

Inside the Cathedral

Dead Royals

Saturday was also spent in Roskilde town with Alex as my tour guide. It seemed like I was visiting at a good time as the town was decorated for the Roskilde Music Festival happening that weekend. The colour of the festival is orange so there was orange bunting, orange Danish flags, orange inflatable sofas and many other orange bits and pieces dotted around which was nice to see. I wore an orange dress specially to join in the festival spirit!

Me with our HUGE ice cream!

Roskilde town

Orange fountain for the festival

As we were there at the time of the festival, I decided to treat Alex to Sunday day tickets. I had witnessed Alex telling people where he was from (particularly Scandinavians) and them talking about the festival and how great it was. However, Alex had never actually been (he left Roskilde when he was 10) so I thought that next time this happened he should be able to tell people that he had. We chose Sunday as it was the day we knew the most artists playing and because Thursday was sold out - Rolling Stones, Outkast, Bastille... Sunday was supposed to be Kasabian, Stevie Wonder and Drake but, unfortunately Drake had to pull out due to illness and was replaced by Jack White (from the White Stripes). This was a shame as Alex had been really looking forward to seeing Drake but it was still great to get the chance to see Stevie Wonder! I had grown up listening to him and knew quite a lot of his songs. We had a really nice day at the festival and were thankfully very lucky with the weather!

At Roskilde Festival with my Tuborg and Festival Guide

Stevie Wonder playing the Orange Stage at Roskilde Festival

As the main reason Alex and his family were there was to visit people, it meant that I got to meet three family friends and Alex's grandparents. They had varying levels of English from fluent to none and, as a linguist, I felt embarrassed that I couldn't speak a lot of Danish to them! I hope that my smiles and little comments like "thank you for the meal" were enough to give a good impression. His grandparents couldn't speak any English so I hope that they still liked me. I've been trying to learn Danish but have found it quite difficult. I've never learnt a language like it before. It seems like it might be a bit like German (which I have never learnt) but has some of the same/similar words with French and English. The writing system has letters in it I've never used before and the written doesn't always represent the spoken. I'm hoping to persevere and be able to speak a bit more next time I go!

On the Tuesday Alex and I had another day trip into Copenhagen to see more of the sites. This time we got the train to "Den Lille Havfrue" (the Little Mermaid) statue and made our way from there past a lot of the sites we had already seen. It was a nice sunny day, in comparison to the grey day when I arrived, so it was nice to revisit the same spots.

Us with the Little Mermaid

Novel way to see the city

A pretty church (don't know what it's called)

Amalienborg

We headed to Tivoli, the second oldest amusement park in the world (thanks Wikipedia!). It's a really nice place, definitely worth a visit, with a mixture of old and newer rides, shops and cafés. There is also a stage at the centre where concerts were held. While we were there, we witnessed a rehearsal and some of the concert of an orchestra and two vocalists which was fun. I used to play clarinet in orchestras and sing so I particularly enjoyed it. As the park is such an attraction, it is quite expensive to go on the rides so we decided to only go on one. The ride we chose was Rutschebanen, the third oldest rollercoaster in the world, celebrating 100 years this year. It was fun bit not particularly scary! Of course, it probably was back in 1914...

Rollercoaster

Pretty Tivoli

Feeling like an excited child with my banana lollipop

Third oldest rollercoaster in the world

Concert

One of the entrances to Tivoli with Rutschebanen (the mountain) behind

The last touristy thing I did was to have a quick look at Roskilde harbour where there is a Viking Ship Museum. Unfortunately, we didn’t go to the museum as it was quite expensive and we didn’t have much time, but we still had a look around the harbour which I liked. My dad used to sail a lot ) and has recently purchased his own boat) so I have lots of memories of walking around similar places while he looks at boats!

I had a really lovely week away but it seemed to end too soon. I must say a big thank you to Alex’s family and friends for looking after me and making sure I felt welcome while I was there. I’ll be back!

Tusind tak!

Ducks. We also saw jellyfish and crabs

Roskilde Havn

Viking Ship

Viking Ship

Travelling through Vietnam - Hanoi

When we found out we had a month-long holiday for Chinese New Year we knew we had to take the opportunity to do some travelling. Alex, Chloe (my friend from University of Southampton who studies at Nanjing University) and I decided to travel the length of Vietnam from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh where Alex would leave us to go back home and Chloe and I would go on to Chiang Mai, Thailand. The journey from North to South took almost three weeks with some amazing experiences along the way. 

Hanoi

Alex and I flew to Hanoi from Xiamen on 17th January, the first day of the holiday, not wanting to waste any time in Xiamen. We applied for our visas online, printed off the acceptance letter and flew with Hong Kong airlines, via Hong Kong, to Hanoi where we picked our visas up. The visas cost 45 US$ for 1 month. We then got a taxi to our hostel in the old quarter of Hanoi, checked into our room and had a wander around the busy streets to find somewhere to eat.

Our first meal in Hanoi

Alex sitting on his plastic kiddie chair at the side of the road. Street food culture is a big thing in Hanoi

The next day we decided to look into the different day trips we could take from the city and booked to go to Halong Bay on the Sunday and Perfume Pagoda the day after. As Chloe was arriving on the Tuesday, we didn't want to do all of the sights in Hanoi without her. Once the trips were booked, we went to Hoa Lo Prison where political prisoners were kept by the French colonialists and American POW stayed during the Vietnam War, nicknaming it "The Hanoi Hilton". It was a very interesting place to visit and we were happy enough to go again when Chloe arrived a few days later. After the prison we decided to try to find Hoan Kiem Lake, another of Hanoi's tourist attractions. We ended up getting a bit lost and having to buy an overpriced tourist map but we found it in the end!

Alex outside Hoa Lo Prison

Hoan Kiem Lake

Our day trip to Halong Bay started at 8:30am when we were picked up from our hostel by our tour guide and taken to the minibus. The drive to Halong Bay was 3 hours from Hanoi so if you have more time consider going for more than just a day. When we finally got there we got onto our boat where we had lunch on the way to see a cave. Halong Bay is stunning. It is one of the natural wonders of the world and a world natural heritage site. I highly recommend going there if you get the chance! Also included on the tour was kayaking in a floating fishing village. It was great to get the chance to explore the bay and its caves by yourself rather than staying with the group the whole time. After the kayaking it was time to go back as by then we'd spent 4 hours at the bay. 

The Perfume Pagoda day trip started off in a similar way, getting picked up at 8am and taken to a minibus. The journey was only about an hour and a half this time though so not so long spent travelling! When we arrived we were taken on a 1-hour boat trip up the river as minibuses are not allowed to go into the protected area. Before going up the mountain we had our included lunch and bought tickets for the cable car having decided that there were too many steps for me to walk it (I've got a bad knee)! I was really glad we'd opted for the cable car as it was really simple and you got a good view as you went up. Perfume Pagoda is the biggest centre of Buddhism in Vietnam and they were busy preparing for when the pilgrims came during the festival. Apparently thousands of pilgrims arrive to spend a couple of days a pray at the numerous temples and pagodas. We went to see the main pagoda which was in a cave at the top of the mountain. It did feel like quite a spiritual place but was slightly ruined by the amount of tourists! At the bottom of the cable car we saw one of the main temples which was impressive. One thing we noticed was that people seemed to have brought offerings of western biscuits and soft drinks. I suppose that's what Buddha likes?

Boat trip

At the top of the mountain

Perfume Pagoda

Temple

On Tuesday Chloe arrived and Alex and I went to pick her up at the airport. When we first arrived, Hanoi had felt very foreign, more foreign than China, so we didn't want her to be arriving alone. We booked a taxi from a travel agent as it was cheaper than getting one on the meter and waited for her to arrive. Once we'd found each other we got back into a taxi and took Chloe to her hostel. She'd accidentally booked a different one to us but thankfully it wasn't too far away! We took her for a meal in the evening, traditional Vietnamese Pho (the country's national dish, a noodle soup) and then let her sleep after all her travelling.

The next day we went to a travel agent to organise our travel through Vietnam as we'd wanted to wait for Chloe to arrive before we did it. We opted for getting an open sleeper bus ticket costing 63 US$ as it meant that we had some flexibility for when we went between places and the price was cheap! Unfortunately, as we were there during the Tet festival, the ticket was more expensive than it would usually be and we had less flexibility as so many of the locals were travelling home to see their families. Once we got the important bit out of the way, we went off sightseeing. We went to Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum, Ho Chi Minh Museum, One-Pillar Pagoda, Temple of Literature, Hoan Kiem Lake for the second time and booked tickets to see the Water Puppet Show that evening. A very touristy day!

Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum

One Pillar Pagoda

Ho Chi Minh Museum

Temple of Literature - Vietnam's first university

Chloe and I at Hoan Kiem Lake

Hoan Kiem Lake in the evening

Water puppets

 For our last day in Hanoi we went back to the prison as Chloe was interested in going and went to the temple in Hoan Kiem Lake. This was just about all we had time for before we had to get our first bus for the hour and a half journey to Ninh Binh, where we stayed that night.

New Year 2014 in Hong Kong

After a lovely 9 days in Dubai for Christmas it was time to go to Hong Kong. Our flight was at 00:05 from Dubai and unfortunately neither Alex or I got much sleep despite trying. When we arrived in Hong Kong we decided to get the Airport Express rather than a taxi to save money and they offer a free shuttle bus service from train stations to the closest hotels. It cost 140HK$ to get the train from the airport to Kowloon for the two of us but unfortunately there was a bit of a wait for the shuttle bus from there.

We stayed at Pearl Guesthouse in Mirador Mansion on Nathan Road in Tsim Sha Tsui, a strange place with various shops and cheap accommodation. There are four different lifts depending on which floor you want to go to as each one went to a different set of floors. We were on floor 15 which meant that we always managed to get in the lift on the way down but sometimes had to queue on the way up. The room was very small and basic but fine for what we needed it for. Enough space for a double bed with storage space underneath and a bedside cabinet with fridge and safe. We also had a tiny bathroom with just about enough space to stand in for a shower. It was all very clean and there was a communal water dispenser and microwave available for us to use as well as free WiFi which just about worked if you stood by the door of the room.

When we arrived we crashed in the room for the afternoon from lack of sleep before venturing out in the evening for a walk down to the harbour where we saw the Symphony of Lights show, getting something quick to eat and then going to Ned Kelly's Last Stand, a jazz club where I'd been with my mum and brother, Fraser, 4 years previously. We only stayed for one drink as we were still tired from the journey but it was one of the highlights of the trip for me. I used to play the piano in my secondary school swing band so really enjoy listening to that type of music live. Alex caught onto this and bought me the house band's, China Coast Jazzmen, album as an early birthday present!

The next day was new year's eve and as we didn't really know what we were doing to celebrate in the evening, struggling to contact our friends who had come down from Xiamen, we didn't do too much. We took the Star Ferry over to Central and have a wander around before getting the ferry back, having dinner at an Irish pub and getting ready to go out. When we left the hotel to go and meet the others it was unbelievable how many people were already out on the streets at 9pm! The new year fireworks took place at Victoria harbour so thousands of people flocked to Tsim Sha Tsui (mainland side of the harbour) to see them. We were meeting our friends at IFC mall on the other side of the harbour and with the amount of people on the streets, police everywhere and MTR (Hong Kong's underground system) stations closed off we were worried we wouldn't be able to get there. Thankfully the Star Ferry was still running and we made it to the roof of the mall before 10pm. This seemed to be a popular place to go as many people had turned up, bringing their own drinks with them, to wait for the firework display. There was also a DJ, bar and ice sculpture which was slowly melting. We decided to claim our spot early as we wanted to be in a good location to see the fireworks. When it was finally time for the display it was very impressive. The fireworks were let off from barges in the harbour after a countdown to 2014 which we unfortunately couldn't see from where we were. We'd already seen them testing it earlier though so knew what it looked like! After the fireworks we went along to a club to continue celebrating.

The next day we attempted to go up the Peak but the queue for the tram was 3 hours so we wandered down to the Mid-Levels escalator instead before heading to Temple Street Night Market in the evening. The day after we finally made it up the Peak after queuing for an hour. The Peak is somewhere you must go to if you visit Hong Kong and we paid the little extra to go onto the Sky Terrace viewing platform. When we were in Dubai I had kept telling Alex that although Dubai's skyline is impressive, Hong Kong still beats it. He did have to agree with me in the end.

That evening we met up with one of my childhood friends, Marisa, for a meal at a Vietnamese restaurant. It was really nice to catch up but made me realise how long ago it was that I left Hong Kong. I mentioned my youngest brother, Ethan, in conversation and then realised that she'd never met him. He was born when we moved to the UK and he's almost 14! It was similar when we met up with another school friend, Hayley, the next day. I am thankful that after all these years we still remain friends despite the distance. 

Unfortunately it was then time to go back to Xiamen. Alex and I were booked on different flights back so I went off to the airport on my own, leaving him in Hong Kong. It worked out well though as my uncle who lives in the US was in Xiamen for business but was leaving the next morning to go back to the States. We had a few hours overlapping which meant I got to meet him at his hotel and have dinner before heading back to Xiang'an campus. It was a really good two weeks off from classes and is a bit strange that I'm already off again!