8/4/12 - Back From China

It was a quick trip to Xiamen China and a tightly packed schedule.  The theme of the trip sure seemed to be random music that you wouldn't expect to hear over here.  I got in the taxi in Singapore at 6 AM to go to the airport and the driver was rocking out to a Bon Jovi song from the 80's.  If nothing else it woke me up enough to get to the plane.  When I was getting ready to go through security they actually asked me if I was looking for the flight to Penang instead.  Not sure if I looked out of place or airport staff is recognizing me already.

Unfortunately there were two typhoons hitting China almost simultaneously so there weren't a lot of great photo opportunities.  The rain also kept us in the hotel for dinner the first night which is how we ended up drinking mojitos in a Cuban restaurant and listening to a Cuban band alternate between covering Frank Sinatra and Shakira.  Random.  Capped off the evening with my first Cuban cigar, because, well, when in Rome (or a Cuban restaurant in China).

Our next day was split with work in the morning and early afternoon and then later in the evening until about 12:30 in the morning.  In between we successfully navigated a Chinese restaurant in the mall with minimal English.  The waitress was convinced we ordered too much food, but turned out to be just about right.  Likely to happen often with two people over 6'4" traveling together.

Since it was Friday and everything in the hotel was closed when we got back after midnight we hopped a cab to 'bar street.' This consisted of 4 bars with names like "The Londoner, The Dubliner, Berlin, and The Oriental."  The Oriental was playing Tu Pac music and had the Olympics on over the bar so we popped in there.  That stroke of fate is how at about 2 AM over a few pints of Murphy's I got to watch Michael Phelps and Missy Franklin win gold medals live, even if the broadcast was in Chinese.  Kind of fitting for 2 Americans in Asia to figure out a way to do that.

Sarah is on her outward bound Singapore excursion for the weekend as part of her school orientation.  Should be some interesting stories about her 36 hours spent on another island in the area.  I'm off to eat Chili Crab for dinner at the East Coast Seafood Centre.  Best links I could find are below.  Thanks Wikipedia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chilli_crab
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Coast_Seafood_Centre