Less Traveled Path

Not too long ago I flew to Seattle for a short 30 hour trip to visit the University of Washington campus. I noticed that the Seattle Airport (or SeaTac rather), actually had bathroom stalls in the baggage claim area in which the door opened outward (away from the toilet). Finally, someone had the common sense to think about how difficult it is to use a stall with luggage when the door opens inward into the stall.

But then I returned back to the airport and noticed that the stalls in a bathroom in the terminal have doors that open inward. Perhaps they were thinking that travelers would have fewer items to carry in the terminal vs. the baggage claim area.

But why not just make them all open outward?

Ever since I knew I was going to the Beijing Olympics this August, I have been researching travel options. I had no idea it was going to be such an ordeal for 5.5 months looking into options like side trips and land tours and then deciding against them. In the end, I got a sweet cheap airfare deal. I paid $1307 a person for a better itinerary than what was being quoted for $1818 to over $2100 by most travel agents (over 28% in savings!). I realized that the trick was… knowing what to look for.

I’ve shared annoyances about looking for Olympics airfare a few times. I contacted no fewer than ten travel agents.

My preferred itinerary: Flexible departure from SF, fixed dates for Beijing (my friends had already booked hotel rooms for the entire group), return to SF as soon as possible after Beijing (work beckons).

I found out about the All Asia Pass ($1099 for Hong Kong plus two other cities, $500 summer surcharge, $300 Beijing surcharge, not including taxes) and considered that, only almost every travel agent I found doesn’t book that pass despite Cathay stating that travel agent can book it (you can’t book it yourself). It turns out that the process for travel agents is so complicated that they don’t do it, or like STA Travel, they charge a processing fee for it. I’m now convinced that it’s just a marketing ploy for Cathay Pacific which makes me dislike them even more; a travel agent was in disbelief about how difficult it was to find someone who would book the Pass.

I booked my tickets through Cathay Pacific’s website (still can’t beat their airfares despite disliking them) and did the following to reduce my costs:

• Avoided flying Friday, Saturday, or Sunday which adds on a weekend surcharge
• Planned for one stopover in Hong Kong instead of two. Cathy’s hub is in Hong Kong so one stopover (stay longer than 24 hours) doesn’t add to the price of the fare, although two stopovers do.
• Went through all the acceptable combinations for flights and observed the difference in pricing based on the fare class showing on the itinerary confirmation page. I then kept the selections for the cheaper fare classes. (Restricted Economy (M) seems to be one of the lowest fares)

I ended up with an even better itinerary than the quotes I received; the travel agent I was going to go with priced out an itinerary that had me returning back to Hong Kong after midnight which meant dealing with either a 14 hour layover, or trying to get into Kowloon late at night (spending $35-$45 USD for a taxi instead of the $4.25 USD for public transportation). I learned from the agent that in general full flights might open up on Sundays because many travel agents don’t work on Sundays and seats can only be held for 24 hours.

I’ve spent countless hours on this and at some point as I was contacting travel agents (mainly emailing) I was thinking if I would’ve saved time and money if I followed Ramit’s advice on outsourcing inspired by Tim Ferriss’ 4-Hour Workweek. In any case, I realized that travel agents don’t really have the best deals and to my surprise some didn’t even respond to my email request for a quote. And some couldn’t even deal with slight complexities like comparing quotes for a trip with and without a side visit to another destination. Admittedly, I am trying to travel during the Olympics and the tickets are in high demand, but I had expected that this is what travel agents are for. In the end, if you’re willing to put in just a little more time and effort into it, you can cut out the middle person and get a great deal. In other words, do it yo’self.
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We started a Taiwan Tour the day after arriving in Taipei. The van picked us up and two couples at other hotels before we were on our way. After our third stop, our tour guide tried to figure out which language he should use on our journey. One couple was from mainland China, so Mandarin was their vote. Then there was the couple from Brisbane, Australia who could speak both Cantonese and English, but couldn’t understand Mandarin very well. I was excited at the prospect of using Cantonese (since I can understand it so much more than Mandarin), but since our tour guide didn’t speak Cantonese, Mandarin with some English was the winner.

She was 52 and her husband, a software engineer, was 57 and they had one daughter, though she did not accompany them on the trip. Both had retired and were taking the time to travel. We traveled with them for two days on the tour and I would frequently see them snacking on something; they didn’t let the possibility of water-related sickness affect their gastronomical pursuits.

Time it took for our van to reach our first official stop on the tour: 3 hours and 30 minutes
Time it took for the Australian-Cantonese lady to suggest to my mom to find a son-in-law (husband for me): 3 hours and 50 minutes

Ah, how Chinese.

Taipei, a big city with bright lights as my good friend describes it, reminded me of Hong Kong, but not as busy. Her parents learned that we were going to be in Taipei and offered to show us around. Her father used to be a department chair at a state university in the United States, but now serves as the president of university in Taiwan (with an enrollment of about 16,000). As it turns out, we discovered that his family and my mom’s family are from the same village. (Family origin generally comes up within the first few Chinese conversations.)

They live about an hour away and drove in to Taipei and greeted us with various tropical fruits for our journey: bellfruit (crunchy, juicy, without a strong flavor), guava (lots of seeds and doesn’t taste as sweet as the boxed juice version), and Chinese oranges were among the welcome gifts. We were also treated to various dusk and night views of Taipei including the Presidential Office Building, Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall, Taipei 101 and its shopping complex, and The Grand Hotel.

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My friend Sandy and her family had raved about a Tomato Beef Knife Cut Noodle Place in Taipei. While wandering the streets of Taipei, a local had recommended this restaurant to them. It’s a hole-in-the-wall type of place and without an exact address, we only had walking directions from the metro station with a link to a map, plus a photo of her sister in front of the restaurant column like the one here.

On a quest, showing the photo to the hotel’s front desk staff (and I tried reading the Chinese in Mandarin to them first), a jewelry store lady on Zhongshan Rd. (who had only started working there in the last year), and a baby clothing store lady also on Zhongshan Rd. (who said it was in the other side of town on Boai Rd.), no one knew the exact location of this place. I felt like I was trying to solve a photo clue in the San Francisco Chinese New Year Treasure Hunt. I didn’t believe Baby Clothing Store Lady and walking down the stretch of Minsheng Rd. between Zhongshan Rd. and the Shuanglian MRT station, I spotted the sign!

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My trip to Asia began on Thanksgiving night. Opting to grab dinner inside San Francisco International Airport, I was disappointed to discover that both the Firewood Grill and Firewood Cafe inside Terminal A were both closed. Why Firewood almost has a monopoly in the terminal is beyond me. Il Fornaio, the only other restaurant, was also closed. The remaining options included gift shop chocolates and various candies - the secret to a well-balanced meal! Also, it didn’t seem like a good customer service and business strategy to only serve beverages at restaurants that aren’t open all the time especially given the 3 oz. liquid container security restrictions; having mini-shops with refrigerated bottled sodas and water would have been preferable.

The Harbor Village counter outside security was predictably open, however, because it was a Chinese food establishment after all. In my high school days, when my friends and I were looking for things to do, we found that the few places that were open on Thanksgiving included movie theaters, bowling alleys, and Chinese restaurants. (I also discovered this year that AT&T had a few stores open to get an early start on Black Friday.)

Hope everyone got all that they wished for on Black Friday!

Have you ever had someone tell you that they know someone who looks just like you? And subsequently, you wanted to meet said person?

This past August, after attending mini-conference on Net Savviness in Boulder, Colorado, I decided to stay a little longer and explore the area. Many of my friends were busy so I went on the exploration by myself. I decided to take the Boulder to Denver Express Bus and from previous travel experiences, thought that it was a nice way to “take in” the area. Slight complication - it was pitch dark outside and I couldn’t see much outside the window on the bus; basically, I was a little too preoccupied with taking photos around the Boulder area that it wasn’t until around 11pm when I took the bus to Denver.

The bus was pretty empty except for about four other parties. I stuck in my white iPod earbuds when I went to sit down in the cushy seats (think charter bus and not yellow school bus) to listen to my soothing mix for the hour and a half ride to the train station in Denver. As I’m settling with my music, a guy walks up to me and gets my attention. I pull out my earbuds thinking it might be important. The guy then says to me, “I saw you there and I just had to come up and introduce myself.” Confused, but appreciating the friendliness, I say, “Hi.” He continues further and says, “I’ve think I’ve seen you around campus and in my class. I’m Mike.”

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Throughout my travels, I’ve had the chance to meet people with interesting backgrounds and fascinating stories. Many times these encounters are very brief, but enriching.

During my Europe backpacking trip in 2003, my friend and I mostly stayed in hostels and not only was it an economical way to travel, the arrangement encouraged meeting all sorts of travelers, especially during breakfast. One morning, we had a meal with two guys who were coincidentally from California. They were taking a break from studying theology in Rome, or rather Vatican City. After finishing their studies, they would then become ordained priests. Since our next stop was Rome, we had planned to meet up with them to get into the Midnight Christmas mass at the Vatican. However, we arrived at our hostel in Rome pretty late and were exhausted by then, so we sent them an email thanking them for their offer, but wished them well.

What I remember the most about my encounter with The Vatican Guys was when one of them busted out the phrase “tiiight” in conversation as in that would be tiiight, aka cool. Studying at the Vatican… cool. Priests using the word tiiight… awesome.

The last time I traveled to Vietnam (about 8 years ago) was with my late father. Although my mother couldn’t join us, she warned us about her experience going through customs in Vietnam a few years earlier and how she was given a hard time because they thought she spoke Vietnamese; the customs officials wanted her to bribe them and pay them off so that they wouldn’t give her a difficult time just because.

My father refused to participate in such corruption and so when we went through customs and the officials started speaking to him in Vietnamese, he pretended not to understand. We were given a slightly difficult time, but passed through without needing to pay them off.

Just recently, I met someone who is also traveling to Vietnam in a less than a month and was told by a travel agent in San Jose, CA that his visa would cost $50 and his friend’s would cost $75. The reason? The guy’s last name could pass for Vietnamese while his friend’s could not.
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