The Charms of China and Vivacious Vietnam

A wet city street in Guanzhou

Lately, life has been a bit of a whirlwind. I haven't really had time to extensively blog about my last few explorations because 1) I was overwhelmed by schoolwork and 2) I was too busy exploring! But these are just excuses. I said I wanted to create a complete and cohesive blog about all my studying abroad adventures and by golly, it's going to happen!

So! Here is a neat little photo recap of some of my favorite moments from my past two trips: first, I'll show you my visit to the Guangdong Province in Mainland China, and second, Hanoi in Vietnam.

Guangdong Province: A group of my friends and I left for Zhaoqing, Guanzhou, and Shenzhen on Easter weekend (March 29th-April 1st). We had very little planning time beforehand, and basically expected to spend our vacation exploring, eating and hiking. Even in the continuously pouring rain, all our wishes came true! Zhaoqing was my favorite stop on this adventure for the incredible food (it was better than Hong Kong and I didn't even try any noodles), awesome locals, and the fact that no one could understand any of the English speakers at all. Miming things out and hoping that people got what you were trying to say was really, really funny. I practiced my Cantonese with a few nice people who kind of understood me, and in Guanzhou, we completely soaked riding bikes through the rain around a lake! There was also a neat moment when we were on a tour of a mountain temple, and the rain was so heavy that we had to stay there for an hour and a half! It was beautiful and appealed  to the romantic side of me.

(Note: I just realized I didn't take ANY pictures of Shenzhen. Sorry about that! I really just had dinner and looked at art galleries with my roommate, Fiona, before heading back to HK...)

Zhaoqing cloudy skies 

Chris playing a local (and winning) at Chinese chess

The tastiest dish I've ever had! Steamed chinese sausage, vegetables, and chicken over rice. In the overcast weather, it was nothing short of perfect.

Our stylish tour vehicle around Guanzhou

Sugarcane juice machine! For just under 25 cents, a bottle of this stuff was incredibly refreshing.

The mountain temple we visited, just before it was too wet to leave. 

After the worst of the rain, we were treated to this gorgeous view.

Outside of another Guanzhou temple

We found a neat waterfall and koi pond outside of a swanky hotel in Guanzhou...

I love koi fish, so I couldn't resist taking as many videos and pictures of them as I could! 

And of course, everyone looks on expectantly for dim sum at said hotel...

I didn't take too many pictures since it was raining so hard throughout the trip, but all in all, I couldn't be more pleased with the amount of sightseeing and hostel jumping we were able to do in such a short time! Guangdong is a nice, nice area and if you ever get the chance to visit, go straight to Zhaoqing. Just be sure to bring your Mandarin dictionary and a set of rainboots...

Onto the next trip:

Hanoi, Vietnam: The weekend immediately after my trip to Guangdong, two of my girlfriends from my hall and I had planned a weekend trip to Vietnam! This was the smallest group of people I had ever traveled with, and, as a result, the experience was totally different. We made a ton of friends from our hostel including Brian, the Minnesota English teacher, Sarah, the super cool British lady, two lovely Swiss-German girls whose names I can't remember, weird guitar guy who slept above Rafaella, Marie, the lone British backpacker, and Eva, the lone Australian backpacker. I loved Hanoi for the insane nightlife, weird water puppet shows and hoardes of students and backpackers eating food and drinking beer on tiny sidewalk streets at night. Some delicious things to try are (of course) the pho (which is everywhere and CHEAP!), french fries, deep fried cheese, and one of the many local Vietnamese beers.

During the day, we took inexpensive tours to Halong Bay and the small village of Mai Chau, and at night in Hanoi, we danced until the midnight curfew. All the bars and restaurants close down at this time, but if you ask the right people you can find clubs in back alleys that break those curfews. Going to a secret curfew-breaking club was probably one of the coolest experiences of my life!

All in all, Hanoi was incredible. I didn't bring my camera as we had expected it to rain throughout the trip like it did in China, but we were actually blessed with sunny skies all weekend! So instead, here are some strange photos I took on my roommate's (broken) point and shoot camera. It gave all of Hanoi a kind of weird, ghostly effect, so... beat with me... I guess...

The average street in Old Quarter. This was taken in the morning, so there weren't too many people out and about, but at night, it's hard to walk anywhere  because of all the crazy scooters!

Trying to cross these streets is like playing Frogger, but your life is on the line.

The lake in the middle of the Old Quarter was beautiful and many people spent their time leisurely strolling around it at night. 

We treated ourselves to a fancy meal on the lake!

Notice the "Bia Ha Noi" beer

A rest stop on our way to Mai Chau, where locals sold snacks and other goods. Sugarcane and glutinous rice in bamboo sticks were my favorites.

When we arrived in the village of Mai Chau, we ate a delicious lunch, and I couldn't help snapping a quick photo of this cutie!

Mai Chau was my favorite destination by far. We took a bicycle tour of the rice paddies and I was overtaken by the lush green surroundings. I couldn't stop smiling!

I <3 Mai Chau!

The next day we took this lovely vessel on a cruise of Halong Bay. It was a lot colder and more overcast than we were expecting for our day on the water, but it was still a lot of fun.

While taking this photo, I met an art buyer from France named Pierre who bought me a Vietnamese coffee and talked to me about internships in the film/art industry. I just kept thinking, "Does this mean I'm cool now?"

We also had the chance to kayak through one of the floating villages. I like excursions where you get to interact with your environment. I loved waving at locals like a dork and seeing their dogs barking at us!

At the end of the tour, we were taken to this neat cave, though the colorful lights did make everything feel a bit artificial... 

I LIKE CAVES.

So there you have it! A quick look into my final two study abroad travel adventures. Now I'm pretty much out of money so I'm living thrifty for the last thirty days in Hong Kong (which is difficult because even taking the bus to school from my dorm costs a BILLION DOLLARS). Egg noodles and peanut butter on bread anyone? I'm living the high life!

Even though I spent a lot more money on this trip than I expected to, I figure I'm probably not coming back to Asia again for a long, long time. I feel very blessed for getting to do and see all the things I want to while I'm still here, and I feel like a more well-rounded, relaxed person because of that. It's amazing how getting out of your home country can make you a lot less worried about being somewhere unfamiliar. If nothing else, I feel a lot more comfortable talking to people of diverse backgrounds and cultures than I ever was in the states.

Well, I hope you enjoyed this little peek at my travels! I've got to go fold laundry and try not to think about how little time I have left in Hong Kong...

Have a great lazy Sunday, everyone!