Ngong Ping 360 Cable Car

Last weekend we rode the Ngong Ping 360 Cable Car and saw the Tian Tan Buddha (nicknamed the Big Buddha).  The Big Buddha is located on the top of a hill on Lantau Island.  You can get to it by either taking a bus or riding the cable car.  Tommy was especially excited to ride the cable car.  It had been rainy and foggy all week, so we weren't sure if we were going to be able to go until we woke up in the morning.  It was pretty clear in the morning, but the clouds moved in throughout the day.  We all really enjoyed the ride. 

The cable car ride is around 20 minutes (after about 1.5 hour wait in line).  The cable car route goes right by the airport.  Tommy loved watching the planes on the way.

Tom and Tommy checking out the airport

The cable car lets out in Ngong Ping Village.  It is a tourist area with a promenade filled with souvenir shops and restaurants.  They have Asian restaurants as well as western restaurants like  Starbucks and Subway.  We told the kids we were going to see the Big Buddha, but didn't explain what that meant.  There are cows that live on the hills in the areas on Lantau Island.  One of the cows had wandered into the village and there was a small crowd of people around it taking pictures.  Charlotte got excited and exclaimed, "Look, it's the big buddha."  Tom and I got a good laugh out of that.

Charlotte's big buddha

There is a 10-15 walk through this area to get to the Po Lin Monastery, which is located at the base of the buddha.  There is a good vegetarian restaurant where we ate lunch.  Then we toured the monasteries.

 

The vegetarian restaurant

People leave fruit as an offering to the buddhas

You can buy sticks of incense and place them outside the monasteries as offerings.  

 There are 268 steps up to the Big Buddha.  The Big Buddha is 112 ft tall.  It faces north to look over the Chinese people.  Tommy went straight up the steps and only stopped a few times to try to see how far behind Tom and Charlotte were.  I did my best to keep up with him.  Charlotte struggled a little more and needed some encouragement from Tom.  In the end, she ended up making it all by herself.

Tommy with the Big Buddha in the background

Tommy paused for a quick picture on his way up.  

View from the top of the stairs

We didn't have dessert after lunch and I had promised them each a treat if they made it up on their own.  (I was worried about Charlotte making it up on her own and figured an incentive might help.) Tommy chose an ice cream cone even though it was chilly and he had been complaining about being cold several times that day.  Instead of a sweet treat, Charlotte chose a windmill flower she had wanted since she saw one in the first souvenir shop.  

 

Charlotte and Tommy with their treats

After another long wait in line, we rode the cable car back down.  We had a great day!

Tram/Hong Kong Park

One of the few modes of transportation left for us to ride in Hong Kong is the tram.  Tom was in the States this weekend, so I thought that would be a fun thing to do with the kids.  The tram runs along the northern part of the island, near Central.  I decided we would take the tram to Hong Kong Park.  Unfortunately, all the bus/train routes to the tram from our house took us right by Hong Kong Park.  Therefore, we ended up going way out of our way to get there.  Tommy wanted to time how long we were out, so I started the timer on my watch when we left the house.  It took us 3 hours and 15 minutes to get to Hong Kong Park.  :)  We took the MTR and a double decker bus to the start of the tram line.  The tram is a double decker.  Of course the kids wanted to sit on the top.

A blurry picture of the tram (in the middle)

The windows on the second level of the tram seem to be fixed in an open position.  Charlotte loved sticking her head out the window to enjoy the view.

We had a short walk to Hong Kong Park.  They have a nice children's playground we hadn't been to yet.  It has six different levels, each with its own play area.  None of the play structures were too spectacular, but the different levels made things interesting.  The kids would play on each level and then after a few minutes, they wanted to go to the next level to see what else there was.  Also, having the different levels lets the park accommodate a lot of kids, but since each playground is relatively small, it is easy to keep an eye on your children.  They had a great time!

Hong Kong Park-slide connects the second level to the first

Girls' day

Last Saturday, Tom took Tommy to Macau for the Grand Prix race.  Charlotte and I decided to stay home and have some mommy/daughter time.  Charlotte wanted to dress up and chose the elephant dress we bought in Thailand. 

 First, we took the train to do some shopping.  Charlotte has one of my old cellphones she likes to play with.  She insisted on bringing a purse along with her and included her phone.  She pulled it out on the train to make a few calls. 

 We went to Sham Shui Po to get some beads at the bead market.  Then, we got some dim sum, one of Charlotte's favorites. 

 Then we came home and had fun making bracelets and necklaces.  We also made some cupcakes and decorated them. They were delicious. (I forgot to get a picture of them before they disappeared.)

Our huge bag of beads

After dinner, we watched a quick video and it was time for bed.  We had a fun and busy day.

South Korea

I'm finally getting around to documenting some of my travels.

I visited Seoul, South Korea for a large eSports tournament in September.  Korea was beautiful with mild temperatures and clean air.  It's very spread out and flat - most of our day trips often took an hour to travel from one part of the city to another.

One of the interesting bits our tour guide pointed out was the lack of mature trees and forests around the city due to heavy bombing during the wars in the last century.

Seoul is very spread out

National Theatre where we saw traditional drumming performances.

We ate here for lunch.  No one spoke any English so we all ended up getting the only thing we already knew how to say in Korean: Be Bin Bop.  The staff laughed a lot.

We visited a "traditional folk village".

And what would a folk village be without mascots and amusement park rides!

Bridge in the Folk Village - the fall colors were really starting.

I'm in love.   I ate tons of Korean BBQ on the trip.

The view from the Lotte World hotel, including the inflatable yellow duck.  The building under construction will be the highest in Seoul. Lotte is a huge conglomerate in South Korea, you see their name everywhere.

Sold out 40,000 in attendance at the game.  Coke sold cans customized with Lux on it.

ESports are big in Korea - here is the crowd after gates opened.  It was great to experience.

Overall I really enjoyed South Korea.  The people were friendly, the food was good and the air and water were clean (what a simple thing to suddenly appreciate).   I'm looking forward to going back with the family.

Take a ride on a tuk tuk around Thailand

Thailand: home to the most stringent  transportation laws in the world.  But it sure was fun!

School Fair

Tommy and Charlotte's school has a fair every year that is a huge fundraiser for the school.  They have vendors pay for booths to sell their goods, they have parents donate a variety of food for the international food buffet and cookies and cakes to sell in the cafe.  Also, many of the classes run games you have to buy tokens to play.  Parents also donate used books, new items, and prizes for the school run book stall, newly donated goods stall, and tombola.  There is entertainment from local groups as well as a student talent show and performances from the choir.  They end the day with an auction for donated items, including a private flight over Hong Kong (our school and community are popular with Cathay Pacific pilots and their families).  The school raises thousands of dollars each year. 

One of the great things about being in Hong Kong is even though the fair is in November to help vendors sell items for Christmas, the weather is usually in the 70s, so the majority of the fair can be held outdoors.  Unfortunately, for the first time since they started holding the fair, this year it rained.  The morning of the fair, they had to move all the tents off the field onto the black top and most of the vendors got moved to the classrooms.  We didn't end up staying as long as I had originally planned, but we still had a great time.  We also didn't do a few things we had originally planned on, like the bounce house. 

The kids were really excited about the food.  Tommy told me many times how they were going to have a cafe that served desserts and asked if they could get something.  Charlotte decided she wanted to get some cotton candy (or candy floss) which they had never had before.  Tommy picked the biggest thing he could find in the cafe, which was a muffin. 

They also had a lot of fun playing the games.  We bought them each a bag of tokens they could use for games and activities. 

Charlotte painting a Chinese fan

Tommy doing putt putt

Their favorite activity was the tombola.  Parents had donated prizes (in exchange for a dress down day where the kids could wear whatever they wanted to school).  All the prizes were numbered, and for a certain number of tokens, you could pick a number out of a box and that was the prize you got.  They had separate prizes for kids and adults.  The kids won treats, a stuffed duck that sings Old MacDonald, a bubble gun, and a Disney princess watch set. 

Overall, it was a fun, but wet, day.

Bangs

Charlotte is over 4 and has never had a haircut.  I am glad the hair she does have is such a pretty color.  I haven't wanted to cut her hair, but lately she is always pushing her hair out of her eyes.  I decided it was time to give her some bangs.  She was so excited about it.  One of the girls in her class, Allyson, also has bangs.  When I was cutting her hair this morning, Charlotte was telling me how she was going to look just like Allyson and her teacher wasn't going to be able to tell them apart.  This is especially funny because Allyson is Asian and, of course, doesn't look a thing like Charlotte.  I mentioned this to her teacher when I dropped Charlotte off.  Charlotte thought it was funny that her teacher told her several times today how she thought she was Allyson. 

Happy Halloween!

We had our first Halloween in Hong Kong.  Halloween is definitely celebrated here.  Many people here have Halloween decorations, businesses have Halloween based promotions and events, etc.  However, I think trick or treating is not something that is done in many countries (I know it is common in the US and UK, but I am not sure of anywhere else).  Our neighborhood does do trick or treating so we are lucky.  Because trick or treating isn't prevalent, Halloween costumes are hard to find.  I went to the local shopping market this week expecting to find many vendors with racks and racks of Halloween costumes.  Instead I shopped for several hours (I was also shopping for other things) and only found one kiosk that a few costumes that were cheaply made and very overpriced.  Luckily, I had brought one of Tommy's old costumes that still fit him.  Charlotte also had her costume from last year she could have worn, but she wanted to be a witch and one of my friends had a witch costume she said we could borrow.

Tommy and Charlotte with one of Tommy's classmates

We had some friends over for dinner and then all went out trick or treating.  Probably less than one fourth of the houses in the neighborhood participate, but the houses are close together and even though we only did a small portion of the neighborhood, the kids got plenty of candy.  We all had a great time. 

Missing Tooth

Tommy lost his first tooth!  It has been loose for over a month now and I was starting to think it was never going to fall out.  When I picked him up on Tuesday, he was excited to show off his new smile.  He had lost his tooth at the end of the school day and his teacher gave him a tissue to wrap it in and put it in his bookbag.

Tommy had a lot of questions about the tooth fairy and if she would be able to find our house in Hong Kong, but we assured him she would figure it out.  In the morning he couldn't wait to show us the $10 bill he had gotten (about $1.25 US) and the note the tooth fairy had left him answering some of his questions. 

Cooking class/night market

Thailand, Day 3
Sunday was our final day in Thailand.  One of the things I really wanted to do was take a Thai cooking class.  I found one that was highly rated and several reviewers mentioned they had brought their kids.  They picked us up at our hotel.  We had 2 other couples in our group, both from the US.  We started with a market tour to show us the local ingredients that are prevalent in Thai cooking.  It was interesting.  The market was pretty similar to the open air markets in Hong Kong, although there were several stands with prepackaged foods.  We bought some dried fruit and tea to bring home.

When we got to the cooking "school", which was set up in a home, we got to choose what dishes we wanted to make.  We did the half day option, so we got to choose a soup, noodle dish, and a curry paste to make into a curry.  The other people in our group did the full day option, so they also got to choose an appetizer, dessert and main course.  We didn't have to choose the same dishes, she encouraged us to pick different ones.  At first, I had been hoping it would just be the 4 of us in our group, but it was actually better to have a larger group because we got to see the differences in the dishes. 

The first thing we made was soups.  I chose Chicken Coconut Soup and Tom picked Hot and Sour Soup.  Our group had chosen 3 or 4 different soups, but we all started with the same ingredients.  The only difference was the liquids and spices. 

Tommy and I getting ready to chop up our vegetables

 

Chicken coconut soup.  It was amazing.

Tom's hot and sour soup on the right, fried big noodles on the left

Then, we made the noodle dish.  Tom chose Fried Big Noodles and I chose Drunken Noodles.  One of the other guys was asking the teacher about drunken noodles and she seemed excited he had chosen it and mentioned it was the most fun.  I thought it would be a good one to try.  We cut up all our ingredients, then moved over to the woks.  She had the three of us making Drunken Noodles together and wanted us to wait until the others were finished.  We added a few of our ingredients then she told us to stand back while she added the liquids.  She also made the kids go to the other side of the room. She told us to make sure we started stirring as soon as the liquid went in.  I was the second of the 3 she did so I knew what to expect.  It was a little counter-intuitive to stick your hand into a burning pan to stir.  Now I know why she was excited people chose this dish. 

Trying to stir without getting burned

Tom making his noodles

Big helpers

Drunken Noodles-delicious

After we made those two dishes we got to go inside and eat them.  Even splitting our dishes with the kids, we were pretty full after just 2 courses.  Next we made dessert.  Our program didn't come with dessert, but since the rest of our group was making dessert next, she let us do it too.  We made mangoes with sticky rice.  I hadn't had any dessert yet in Thailand, but this was delicious.  In general, I have found that desserts in Asia are not as good as in the US or Europe, but this was really good.  The rice had a sweet coconut sauce on it. 

Mangoes with sticky rice-yummy

After we made dessert, it was time to make our curry paste and then make a curry with it.  I had chosen a red curry with pumpkin and Tom had chosen yellow curry.  We didn't want the red curry to be too spicy for the kids (or us), so I only put a few chilies in the curry.  Therefore, it was almost as mild as yellow curry.  We chopped up our ingredients and then mashed them with a mortar and pestle.

 Then we chopped up our ingredients for our curry and cooked it in the wok.  Our teacher was great!  She gave great instructions and was very witty.  Once our curries were finished we went inside to eat our curries and desserts. 

Red curry with pumpkin, we ate it with rice

All the food was amazing.  The kids were so stuffed, Charlotte told me she couldn't eat another bite, then she realized she hadn't had her dessert yet.  She powered through and ate most of it.  We ended up taking most of my curry home.  Then it was time for us to leave.  The other people in our group still had 2 more dishes left.  I can't imagine how they had any room to eat them. 
We got a recipe book to bring home.  I am going to try to make the Chicken Coconut Soup for dinner tonight.  Hopefully, it turns out. 

After we got home from cooking class, we rested for a few hours and then got a tuk tuk into town for the Sunday Night Market.  Every night there is a night bazaar where locals can sell their handicrafts to tourists.  The Sunday Night Market is supposedly the biggest number of vendors with the best prices.  Apparently the locals shop there as well.  We bought several souvenirs and gifts.  Bartering was fun.  If you asked how much anything cost and then put it down and walked away, the price continued to drop for each step you took.  There were also many stalls selling delicious food and drinks.  I told Tommy we would look for a toy tuk tuk at the market.  After we found one, he was all done with shopping.  Tom and the kids had fun sampling the food while I finished shopping. 

picking out an carved elephant souvenir

Our flight on Monday morning was at 6 AM, so we had to get up at 3:30 to leave.  The seats on Air Asia are really small so Tom had booked the exit row both ways and I was sitting with both kids.  I was really hoping they would sleep on the way home.  Neither one did.  I got up to take one of them to the bathroom at one point and everyone else on the plane was sleeping but them (including Tom).  We had an early bedtime that night. 

Not much cooperation from Charlotte at 6 AM

We had such a great trip, but we are glad to be home.  The kids are already asking about our next vacation.