Taiwan was probably the best part of the whole trip since I was able to visit relatives I hadn't seen for 10 years or so, and I was able to get in touch with my roots and speak really bad Chinese with my relatives and the locals. I went to a lot of the night markets and ate at each of them. Our uncle took us to one night market where they sold turtles and snakes blood for your consumption. Also, there were foot massage shops with a section curtained off for those "special" massages. I think a common purchase of ours while at these night markets was shaved ice covered in various fruits and condensed milk, since the weather was constantly humid throughout the day. The worst part about this trip was probably being jipped in the taxi rides. Whenever we stopped at our destination, the taxi drivers would always sneak an extra 5NT into our fare. We never said much about it to the drivers. We just kept our mouths shut. Aside from revisiting the relatives that I hadn't seen for years, what I really missed was really good wonton soup. On one special gathering with my relatives from my dad's side, my aunt brought some wonton soup she had just purchased because she had heard that I enjoyed eating such things. Previously, I had tried wonton soups from different vendors, but they never reminded me of the days when I was young and enjoyed these savory dishes. I bit into the wonton, and instantly, I knew this was the winner, the one I had been waiting to sample since my first step back into the country. 

In Hong Kong, the only site seeing we did was at the Peak, a place located at the top of the mountain (of course). The view was breathtaking....I guess? It was cool to see the whole city from that one spot. Hong Kong had its cool parts, but its mainly known for its shopping. We did visit the local fish district, where almost any kind of fish you'd ever want was sold. Almost every store had bags upon bags of fish that were packed daily, just hanging outside the entrance, ready to be sold. I felt like a kid in at a candy store, wanting to buy up everything and anything I was interested in, but couldn't because I knew taking them back to the states would be difficult. One day, we took the subway to the border of China, where we went to do some bargain shopping on some fake brand name items. I sucked at bargaining, so I paid way more than I should've for a fake Salvatore Ferragamo wallet, but I had to have it because it was the only one I saw in the entire building. Even though I got jipped, I still had a lot of fun because the sellers would chase you down to try and make a sale. The second and last thing I bought was another fake Ferragamo belt. This time, I bargained a lot better because I showed disinterest and I complained about a very minor scratch on the buckle. Getting a Visa to get into China cost $30 US, and we were only there for a day, so we had to get as much as we could for the money we paid getting that damn Visa.

Thailand was probably the worst place of all that I visited, maybe because we weren't going to the right places. We arrived in Bangkok airport, and right when we got there, we were annoyed. We were bombarded by men and women, dressed in suits, trying to sell us their luxury taxi ride consisting of an old E class Mercedes and an old 940 Volvo. Trying to find the cheapest taxi ride took forever, and I knew at that point that bargaining in Thailand would be painstaking. We finally drove to our hotel, and just crashed there at night. The very first thing I noticed was just how cheap food was, relative to American prices. Almost everything was about half the price, but by Thai standards, that was probably very expensive. The next day, we went to a Wat, otherwise known as a temple. They were pretty. Then we went to Pattaya via bus. Getting to the bus station was a journey in itself. From our hotel, we took a taxi. Now, the taxis in Thailand varied in size, from compact cars to vans. We had a compact car or something. So while we were driving, the driver was mentioning the speedway pass or whatever its called there. Basically, its a freeway. So he was asking us whether or not we wanted to take this method of transportation, since we would avoid traffic, but we didn't know if we should take it or not because our friends were taking a separate taxi, and we were unable to contact them. The freeway was coming up, and the taxi driver kept pressuring us to take the freeway (there's a toll you have to pay). We didn't know, and by the time we passed it, he was saying it was too late, and that he didn't want to spend his time in traffic, driving us to the bus station. So he pulled off to the side, took out our luggage, hailed down a taxi, put our stuff in that taxi, and told him where we wanted to go. That was very jacked up, although it was good because we didn't have to pay the taxi ride up to that point, and if we did, we probably would've refused, but who knows. Pattaya  is where most of our days were spent and where we found ourselves annoyed the most. Here, we saw two red light districts. We walked through one, and saw red neon signs flashing up high above us, trying to entice us to go in. When we were nearing the end of the street, these girls started grabbing us, trying to go into their establishment. We had to fend them off with our big American muscles. Next, I noticed that there was another red light district, so I was like "hey, let's go check it out." Big mistake. This time, instead of girls, the street was full of Thai Go-Go Boys. Yuck. So the next day, we took a 45 minute boat ride out to an island, where we went paragliding, on an inflated banana boat, and jet skiing. That was pretty fun. The water was very clear, and was full of small jellyfish, that apparently, were very harmless to us. The next night, we went to see a transvestite show, went to a "massage" place where you paid $40 US to get anything you wanted basically from a girl (remember Rush Hour 2 when Chris Tucker and Jackie go to that massage place with all those girls just lined up...that's what we saw), but that's not what we wanted, so we went to another place around the corner, and paid $10 for 2 hours of massage...well..I've had enough of this talking. More bad stuff happened, and Thailand left me with a gift of traveller's diarrhea that lasted for a week and a half!!! F*** you Thailand!! And that is why I deem Thailand as the worst part of my trip!!

-Ed