Singapore is known as the “fine” city/country because of all of the things you can supposed be fined for (littering, eating on the subway, etc.)  You may remember an incident involving an 18-year old American citizen that was caned in Singapore in the early 1990’s for vandalism.  Or you may be familiar with the notion that chewing gum in Singapore is illegal.  For all of the hoopla surrounding the supposed police-state, I didn’t notice anything really different than any of the other three Asian Tigers (South Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan), well I’ve never been to Taiwan, but the other ones.  I got through immigration checks without having my gum confiscated and there was still miscellaneous trash on the streets.  However, it was infinitely better than the situation in Kuala Lumpur, which I’m guessing is closer in comparison to the garbage situation in India.  But it was nowhere near the manicured traffic islands complete with rose bushes, similar to Monaco, which I had been expecting.  It’s all about expectations I suppose.   Rules or not though, they must be doing something right though because their per-capita income is higher than that of the US…

The city-state of Singapore is made up of approximately 74% Chinese, so missing the Chinese New Year (in the year of the dragon, no less) by a couple of days was similar to showing up in Times Square on January 1 (I stayed in Chinatown in KL and was expecting something to be going on, but nothing interesting did).  But alas, there were a few remnants of the festivities.  Meandering through an outdoor market I hear a loud drum beating and of course had to go check it out.  I wander over to the raucous scene to find a chorus of drums and a Chinese lion undulating through the crowd (to be clear, a person in a lion costume).  The lion then lies on the ground for about 5 minutes, but the crowd (all Chinese), stays, so I follow suit.  The lion then stands back up with a tray of peeled oranges; I felt like I was at an elementary school soccer game…  Apparently he was on peeling oranges while on the ground and then presented the offering as a sign of happiness and prosperity in the coming year.  These lion dances are believed to drive away ill-fortune and evil spirits, so now by witnessing this all will go well with my travels (directed at you, Mom). 

The “fish spa” was an interesting experience.  For anyone that knows me and both my hatred of feet and my allergy to seafood this was a big act of bravery for me to do this…  The idea behind the fish “pedicure” is that you stick your feet in a tank of fish and have them bite off the dead skin.  I won’t eat fish and hate having people touch my feet, but for a once-in-a-lifetime thing, I let fish feast on my feet.  I saw it on the Travel Channel Show “Dhani Tackles the Globe”, so I had to try it, even if it was only for 15 minutes.  After cleaning my both feet, I put them in the tank of fish and immediately the little (probably about an inch or two long) buggers came right up and started munching.  It tickled, a lot.  They also had a little tray for your hands, so I could see up close what these things looked like.  Their mouth area looked similar to the snail mouths that you get to clean the sides of fish tanks, kinda creepy to realize they were attacking my skin.  I don’t think they really did what they were advertised to do, and it most likely was just a tourist trap, but oh well, I experienced my first (and probably last) pedicure.

There was an episode of the Amazing Race where the teams had to sell blocks of ice cream wrapped in bread.  I ate one of these literal ice cream sandwiches, not as bad as I was expecting it to taste.

Seoul was about 15 degrees on my last day there, so meandering around in only two fleeces and a raincoat (I elected to not pack a down coat for only a few days of extreme cold), I was freezing.  Hopped on a six hour flight to Kuala Lumpur and was greeted with temperatures in the mid-nineties with VERY high humidity.  Needless to say, I thawed out quite quickly.

Malaysia is an Islamic country.  I have been to other Muslim countries before, so it wasn’t too much of a culture shock. However, that does translate into having to dress more conservatively than elsewhere in such extreme heat.  Not that I have any problems whatsoever with covering up, but wearing pants and having my shoulders covered in heat indexes of low 100’s and walking around all day is quite hot (luckily ice cream cones were only 30 cents!).  Though a lot of other western girls choose not to follow local customs, I feel it is disrespectful to be wearing short-shorts and tube tops amongst burkas, but we all must make our own choices…  Anyway, I went to the National Mosque, and non-Muslims are allowed inside if properly dressed in the provided attire, a hijab and abaya (head scarf and robe).  I just about passed out walking around in the polyester garments for 20minutes, in January no less; I have no idea how the women do that all day in July!

I took a mini side excursion to the Batu Caves just outside Kuala Lumpur.  These are a series of Hindu Temples built within caves.  It turned out to be exactly as described: nothing too spectacular, but definitely something different.  I still haven’t been able to figure out why they built temples in a cave though, maybe for the cooler temperatures inside.  The macaque monkeys that also reside in the caves are very territorial, and I actually saw one go up to someone and bite their shoe while another one attempted to grab a Gatorade bottle out of someone’s hand, funny because it wasn’t me…

The Petronas Towers (probably the only thing about KL that you’ve seen before) were pretty cool to look at, while the Somerset-type mall inside provided a nice reprieve from the downpour outside.

After over 30 hours of travel (including layovers in Chicago and Tokyo), I finally made it to my hostel in Seoul, after midnight local time.  You would think I would be ready for much-needed sleep, however because it was 10am eastern time, I was wide awake.  This messed up sleep schedule continued for several days, slowly easing into the new time zone, 14 hours ahead.  It’s amazing what you can get accomplished by going to bed at 8pm, waking up at 3am, working on construction drawings for a few hours before heading out for a day of sight-seeing…

Overall impression of Seoul:  it’s well organized.  The airport is amazing, and apparently there is a golf course somewhere inside…  The subway, one of the most extensive in the world, as expected for the second largest metropolitan area (behind Tokyo), is extremely easy to use with well-planned numbering system and is the cleanest I’ve ever seen, and for less than a dollar you can get around to most sights.  They even organize pedestrian crossings with arrows on the ground to keep traffic on the correct side.  There are maps everywhere showing nearby attractions and where you are, which certainly helps me out until my sense of direction develops since the GPS on my phone won’t work internationally, and still puts me at O’Hare airport…  However, Seoul gets major bonus points because I put extensive effort into finding Notre Dame stuff in Michigan, which was a fruitless attempt, and a shop a couple hundred yards from my hostel, proudly displayed theirs.

DMZ Tour
The highlight of Seoul for me was the USO led tour to the DMZ (demilitarized zone between North and South Korea).  They took all of us to Camp Bonifas (US military base near the border) and the private did a brief intro into the politics behind the divide.  Then was the joint-security-area, which is what you’ve seen in pictures, guards staring each other down over the concrete dividing line.  It wasn’t nearly as tense as I had imagined, especially because Kim Jong-il just recently died, leaving power to his youngest son, a situation that created a lot of uncertainty for the south.  Anyway, it was still cool because technically I was briefly in North Korea (center of a conference table is the dividing line), though no North Koreans are allowed in the conference building is the South (or US) is occupying it and vice versa.
They then pointed out from a distance “Propaganda Village” which is the North Korean village located within the DMZ.  Apparently it includes a 525 foot long flag weighing 600 pounds and a bunch of Hollywood-type facades that look nice from the outside but don’t actually house anyone.  They also broadcast pro-North Korean messages for six to twelve hours a day over loud speakers that at night can be heard from the South.  I guess when your government installs jamming towers to prohibit cell phone, radio, and tv signals from coming through you need to listen to something…

Apparently the North has been digging tunnels in order to try to attack the South.  So far four such tunnels have been found, and I got to walk through the third one.  Just a normal tunnel: wet, smelly, and claustrophobic.  You would think that government that is dealing with mass famine would reposition some of its massive military to more productive pursuits than burrowing underground for a mile, pretending it’s a coal mine.   But when you put people in labor camps or jail for not “properly mourning the death of your leader”, you have different priorities.

Miscellaneous Sight-Seeing
I went to the National Museum of Korea in an attempt to become more cultured.   Unsuccessful attempt; I even paid for an audio guide (something I would definitely not ordinarily do) to try and make me pay attention, but ceramic bowls and tiny bronze spears just don’t interest me, and probably never will.  The one exhibit that I was interested in, about when the G20 summit was held there in 2010, didn’t have English subtitles and since I know exactly zero Korean, I got nothing out of that hour I spent there…

A much better use of my time, because I actually learned something, was the War Memorial of Korea – a museum dedicated to the ROK (Republic of Korea) military and its history.   I think I spent close to four hours learning all about the Korean War, which despite getting A’s in history in high school, I knew nothing about.  I had seen a bunch of huge displays in the subways touting travel to Norway, and didn’t see a connection, though they are definitely very pretty pictures of glaciers and whatnot.  Then it became clear why they have such a “deep relationship” with Norway: the UN secretary general was Norwegian when North Korea attacked South Korea in 1950, and he supported UN intervention, even though Norway itself only sent medical supplies.  The US, unbeknownst to me, once again shouldered the lions share of the support, while the rest of the world sat back.

We ended up waiting at the Amman airport for about an hour and a half in order to take the public bus, to our executive suite at the Le Meridian – how about that for an oxymoron?  You can imagine how utterly ridiculous we look walking in, where formal wedding receptions are taking place, with our backpacks…  Once again, Matt’s days as a consultant proved beneficial when we were able to not only stay at a nice hotel, but get upgraded to an executive suite with all the benefits that the room affords.  One of the privileges included access to the Royal Club Lounge, which again we looked very out of place among the executives in business suits in our raggy t-shirts and shorts. 

I can describe the process to get into the hotel now because I’m back home and won’t have to go through the process of allaying my mom’s fears.  Because of the terrorist bombings at hotels that took place almost three years ago, to get into our hotel we had to go through metal detectors and have our bags x-rayed.  Not to mention the unnerving sight of the well armed (automatic rifles strapped across their chests) guards in military fatigues pacing around the hotel perimeter. 

Unfortunately, staying in a nice hotel doesn’t come without drawbacks. Apparently the average guest doesn’t take public buses to tourist sites, so the concierge desk is pretty useless when it comes to budget options. Deciding not to get charged twice as much as it should actually cost to hire a driver for a day through the hotel, we decided to rent a car to drive toPetra – three hours from the city of Amman.  I did do some research into self driving, and everything I read said that it was pretty easy to get around; well maintained roads and the locals pretty much adhere to driving laws, so it seemed like the best option to get around for a reasonable price.  With all the accounts I read of driving through Jordan, not one of them managed to mention the important fact that a lot of the road signs are only in Arabic… 

After a few “minor” wrong turns we arrived at Petra, one of the new Seven Wonders of the World.  It is basically an archeological site of rose-colored stone and was used in ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade’.  From the entrance to the furthest point is about five miles, and allegedly only about five percent of the site has been excavated so far – basically it’s huge.  We wandered around on foot to the major sites, despite the locals numerous attempts to get us to hire a “taxi” (donkey or camel). 

Matt boycotted shaving in an effort to look “more middle-eastern”, complete with his blonde hair and blue eyes… It was a good thing it didn’t actually work though, because on the highway leading to the Dead Sea, we got stopped by one of the military checkpoints and didn’t have our passports.  Luckily a Michigan driver’s license and the fact that we were obviously tourists allowed us to pass through without the guards’ use of the automatic rifle’s strategically placed barrel right by the car window.  The highway also had people riding camels on the road shoulders…

Getting through the checkpoints and the brief associated scare, we arrived at the Dead Sea.  The water has a salinity of about 30%, which is about 8.5 times saltier than typical oceans.  Because of the high salt content, no plant or animal life can sustain life – hence the name.  It is quite a weird sensation to float in the water; it is impossible to sink, though very difficult to move around.  Trying to “stand up” in deep water, you still pop up so your shoulders are above the surface, then your legs gravitate to the surface as well until you are laying down comfortably as if on a raft.  The water doesn’t even really feel like water; it’s closer to a gelatin type texture.    

All in all the Middle East was unlike anything I have ever witnessed before.  I knew that women weren’t necessarily seen as being equal to men; however I had no idea to what extent it was still practiced by the general population.  A good example was when Matt and I were in the taxi going to the airport: the driver asked what airline we were flying.  I replied ‘Royal Jordanian’.  The driver again asked what airline and added the preface ‘sir’. Apparently, my word wasn’t good enough for him…  I also have never been anywhere that I didn’t dress conservatively enough in my regular clothes.  Being among the veiled Muslim women, I felt that wearing capris might have been showing a “little too much skin”, but it was simply too hot for jeans. 

We left Istanbul to go to Dubai.  But instead of flying southeast we flew northwest…to London.  Then from London to Dubai.  Apparently oneWorld thinks it is more profitable to send us on a 5 hour flight then a 7 hour flight, instead of one 2 hour flight.  All of which had empty seats, but no L class.  No wonder legacy airlines are having financial issues.
Dubai is just about the hottest and most humid place that we’ve been to on earth.  Granted it was in August, but still, you sweat within 15 seconds of being outside, and I don’t even sweat that much to begin with.  Not only is it hot and humid, the city is spread out along the coast, so it precludes anyone from walking around the city, except for us of course.

I had never really seen pictures of what Dubai looked like, so I always pictured something like Coruscant (a Star Wars city/planet covered with huge buildings), but this was not the case at all.  Dubai is still very much in its growth phase, with many buildings currently being constructed, including the Burj Dubai, soon to be the tallest free standing structure on the planet.  Outside of the business district, you’d be hard pressed to see a building taller than 10 stories.

Don’t get me wrong, Dubai’s exotic architecture and extravagance is an amazing sight to see and definitely well warrants a visit.  Although, we do not recommend going in August, it is just too unbearable to be outside, and the sky was fairly dusty (don’t know what causes that).

We hopped on a Big Bus city tour that took us to all the tourist hot spots, which in Dubai are basically the beach (which.. no), the 7 Star Hotel Burj al Arab (equipped with Helipad and costs $80 to see the lobby), the Mall of the Emirates with indoor skiing, another huge shopping complex, outdoor markets, and a couple museums.  Now that you have the gist, the only thing to do in August is to go shopping.

We went to go check out the Mall of the Emirates.  The indoor skiing is ridiculous.  Just about everyone in the ski area probably hasn’t seen snow in their lives and a majority of the people just wanted to throw snowballs at each other.

After that we had to catch the bus back before it stopped running.  And of course the last stop was another shopping center.  Here we needed a taxi to get back to the hotel.  If you look at the picture to the right, you can see just how many people use taxis as their primary mode of transport, a taxi drivers dream – drive up, pick up, and go all in less than 3 seconds.  Crazy business.

Even old New York, was once New Amsterdam.  Traveling from Romania to Turkey was a 20 hour odyssey fromBucharest to Istanbul in a vintage 1950s train car with no air conditioning with the summer sun beating in to the window from noon until dusk.  We stayed not far from the famed Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque. Massive religious wonders.  We paid the entrance fee to Hagia Sophia to get in as it was a museum, however, the Blue Mosque is a working mosque and I couldn’t get in because I wore shorts.  So Jill made it in, and of course probably played up how good it was to make me jealous (just like when we were in Rome and she was wearing a tank top and couldn’t get into a Cathedral so she borrowed my shirt to get in).  The Hagia Sophia is a mosque converted from a Catholic structure built in the 500s.  Apparently the Turks plastered over the Christian mosaics, and have been partially uncovered recently.  So you have both Muslim and Christian relics in one place. 

So Jill needed new sunglasses and we were at the Grand Bazaar, the largest covered market in the world, a giant place to buy jewelry, chess sets, upholstery, leather jackets, and sunglasses.  Most of this stuff I would have to assume are knock offs.  Anyway, Jill went to like 8 shops and found the same pair and her highest quote was 100 bucks and she bought them for 10.  People are always trying to scam tourists.

Turkish Delights.  Yum!  We made our way to a spice market in Istanbul.  And they were selling tons and tons of freshly made Turkish Delights.  I had no idea what a Turkish Delight was.  After telling one of the store owners this, he offered us samples.  We then repeated this process until we felt sick.  It is a jelly type candy with nuts (usually).  They don’t taste sweet, but they are made of sugar, so it’s weird.  However, diagnosis…delicious.   

So we found out it is harder to get a Turkish Kebap in Turkey than it is in Germany.  If you do find one, they are 2-3 times more expensive, with less meat, and don’t taste as good.