Write a short article about a place that you have visited as a traveller. As we read in Martin Li’s article, “Remember that most places you write about will already have been written about before. Your challenge is to find something new and original to say.”
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A place for Writing 12 students to read each other's writing, to critique, to suggest, to improve.
About Me
- Brad
- Former adult teacher who loves island beaches. Happy homebody and family man; once devoted dog owner, now without Tashi, my Tibetan Terrier. I prefer the absurdity of the imagination to the absurdity of imagining nothing.
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Parisiens on the Road
The car flashes by, its blue light flashing, the waah-waah siren blaring. It’s a ghost car, driven by a stylishly coiffed man of about 40, his window down, arm draped casually on the hot spring day. Not five minutes before, the same car sped down the broad Paris boulevard in the opposite direction. Welcome to Paris.
I lost count of the number of times I witnessed a police car or a team of “pompiers,” Paris firefighters, turn on their sirens and speed past a small “bouchon,” or road congestion, on their way to nowhere in particular. After their cars and trucks cleared the intersection, the lights would go off, the siren silenced, the vehicle again travelling sedately.
It seems the Parisiens accept that a siren doesn’t always mean an emergency. It may be we, in Vancouver, take things a bit too seriously. Consider another big city problem: parking.
In Paris, parking is at a premium, but people with cars find space somehow. Cars park within inches of each other. Often, I wondered exactly how drivers could extricate themselves when two cars had boxed them in so tightly. I admire the way each Paris street holds the maximum number of cars possible. In fact, it is legal in some places to park on a corner curve, so long as you don’t block the crosswalk.
If there is no space at all, then why not turn on the hazard lights and double park? Perhaps parking on the sidewalk would be a solution, one that clearly occurs to many drivers. How else to explain the many low concrete barriers erected to prevent the sidewalk parking alternative?
Through all this potential mayhem, Paris continues to function, at least relatively smoothly. And, if not, there is always the horn and the quintessential French gesture, one I’ve witnessed many times: the hands thrown up in the air, shoulders shrugged, both leaving the steering wheel as if to say “What the heck are you doing?” to no one in particular.
--333 words; first draft written in Avignon, France.
Welcome to Korea!
“Has anyone called for fried chicken?” He yelled in the middle of a beach!
Surprisingly, it really happens in Korean beach and when I first saw it, it’s really amazing that a delivery person knows the place and collects money.
If you haven’t been to Korea, you’re missing all the fun because there are tons of things to do around Korea and it’s great for those who are addicted to shopping, and midnight snacks, like me because there are Korean style of sushi (Gimbap), fried chicken, hot and spicy chicken wings, and most of all, my favorite noodles! It’s really cheap around traditional market places and vendors on streets. But, most of all you can get it delivered in the middle of a night! Once you’re hooked on a delivery on everything, you can’t live here around any delivery.
Ok, if you’re ready to go to Korea, the air flight costs about $1,900 for a round trip without any accommodations, but if you go to Korea and adapt to Korean custom, you’ll love it. I mean it because the moment you step a foot in Korean soil, you’ll never forget the moment.
What to see and what to do while in Korea? Well, that’s easy because you have to go to a village called “buk chon han ok ma eul,” it’s a village full of hanok houses (Korean traditional houses), and if you don’t have a place to stay, they’re a great places to stay. Next, go to insadong if you want to buy or eye shopping for any souvenirs for your friends, families, and relatives. Then go to Buddhist temples and feel free to stay if you to experience monks’ lifestyles. If you’re a computer geek, like me, you have to go to techno mart to buy all the latest tech stuffs. And you’re a fashionista, when you go to market places called “Dongdaemoon” and “Namdaemoon,” you’ll feel like home because only a true fashionista go there to shop. But if you don’t like noisiness and like to have a tea in serene place, there’s a place called “bo seong green tea field,” it’s so great to relax and have a tea.
I know it’s hectic to stay in Korea, but if you ever been there once, you’ll love it and can’t wait to go back again.
So, what are you waiting for? Come to Korea!
Part one
If you ask me what place that I love and hate most, I will tell you without hesitation: Paris. After two times visit, especially the second time, Paris brought me an unforgettable memory. It was August, 2003. I joined a tour to visit Paris, and there my trip started.
The first stop of my tour was the magnificent Louvre. One year ago, I was there, but I didn’t prepare to be impressed so deeply by this one of the largest museum in the world. My eyes were wide open, my breath was taken, and my feet were back and forth within its maze-like hall ways. Trying to remember every master piece I saw, I finally found nothing was left in my mind. So I decided to come again. “Here I am, and I am ready.” I said to myself in front of glass entrance of Louvre after tour bus arriving there. The morning chill still lingered around the renaissance style castle. The “Glass Pyramid” (the main entrance of Louvre) hid itself in the mist like a gentle giant guardian.
As my tour fellows rushed into the museum looking for Mona Lisa and Venus, I went straight to the ground floor where there was an area for French renaissance sculptures. Last time, I did not have time to see them. I was like other visitors, eager to find where Mona Lisa’s portrait is exhibited. Our tour leader warned if we don't see it at first, we will have no time to go back and forth to find it. I followed his guide, but the consequence was very disappointed. When I finally found this famous portrait, I was not allowed to take a closer look. Mona Lisa was “confined” by a yellow ribbon four or five feet around the wall, even worse, she was “sealed” inside a glass window. Come on, I came from thousand miles to see the real Mona Lisa, and this was what I got—a peeking from five feet away behind hundreds of heads? This was no better than a magazine picture! Some visitors must have felt same way as I did, because I saw a young man from my tour passed the security guard waving his hat and yelled: “Free Mona Lisa!” and then scurried away. We all flashed him a reassuring smile, no one thought it offensive.
--to be continued
Part two
After three hours strolling in this great museum, we finally gathered in the ground square waiting for the tour bus. The weather became incredibly hot. The sun light was roasting us all over. When we burst into the bus like a gust, our thoughtful driver already switched on air conditioner, so every body felt refreshed. This happy moment did not last long enough when we enter the hotel. Our hotel was located in the outskirt of Paris, nicely equipped with every convenience except air conditioning system. Our tour guide told us, summer time was usually cool in European countries, so air conditioning system was not popular there. But that year the weather was unusually hot, so most hotels barely have time to provide cooling air to each room.
I was assigned with a girl to share one room. Her name is Yuan, and we became friends later. After arranging our luggage, Yuan and I slumped on the bed panting like a dog. It was so hot that we didn't want to make a move. After a while, Yuan got up and stood by the window, she was trying to draw the curtain to block the sun light. Suddenly, she shouted at me, “Look, naked guys on the deck.” “What? Where?” I jumped form the bed and rushed to the window. Behind the curtain, we peeked through the outside building. There were four young guys sitting and drinking at their deck, with clothes off. Between our hotel and their building, there was a parking lot. However, we could still hear them shouting and laughing. Yuan and I looked at each other, broke out a riot of laughter. Actually, we were not surprised to see that embarrassment. In such a hot day, what can Parisians do to survive? That night we didn't sleep well. Yuan and I rushed to shower several times to get cool. The rest of the time, we chatted about our trip, wondering what those naked guys would think about if they knew two young girls peeking at them behind the curtain. Eventually, we all agreed that we would never come to Paris in summer.
When my trip was over, I downloaded Mona Lisa’s picture and kept it on my computer screen for a while. That way, I thought, I was free to look at this mysterious lady at any time, either near or far, just in case.
Cuernavaca, Mexico
Cuernavaca is a little known town, in central Mexico, approximately an hour’s drive from the capital, Mexico City. This small, quaint city is truly Mexico; not like the more well-known, Americanized resorts such as Puerto Vallarta, Mazatlan, and Cancun – tourist meccas – with shops after endless shops of souvenirs, t-shirts, and the corner Senor Frogs bar.
I fell in love with Cuernavaca the first time I visited friends who live there. There are NO signs in English to be found anywhere: not street signs, bank ATM machines, restaurant menus, or price tags in shopping malls . . . no, mi amigos, even those are in pesos not dollars, so be prepared to convert the currency as you shop.
Here, if you do not speak or read a little Spanish, well, you will either learn very quickly or find the next flight out to the nearest English-speaking resort, so that at least you won’t go hungry! Because, not only are the restaurant menus fully in Spanish, you can’t even ask the waiter what the items are because they only speak Spanish (nope, not even a little English, por favor.)
It was an interesting experiment as tourists for my husband and I. I speak some Spanish and picked it up more fluently as the days went on, even catching on to their local idioms, (such as “mucho gusto” when you first meet someone), whereas my British husband was completely “lost in translation”, a la Bill Murray. He commented many times of how stuck he would be if he were travelling there without me. For the life of him, he could not pick up on the language.
But the one comforting thing is that the local people are absolutely lovely. They make you feel very comfortable and like it is the most natural thing for you, an obvious tourist, to be there. They never looked down at us, or made us feel bad for not knowing the area or ever got impatient with us. That is probably one of the things that stuck out the most to me – the Mexican people here are never in a hurry or stressed out. Even in rush hour traffic (which is not for long in this sleepy town), drivers never honk or give the “universal sign” to each other. They bravely come within inches of each other but politely either give the other the right of way, or just seem to know that they can go. And NO accidents! Even without traffic lights, or marked lanes, they seem to instinctively just know where each other is at any given moment and when and where they can proceed. This would be an impossible feat in North American cities, where even with structured laws and clearly marked traffic lanes and signals, accidents seem to abound.
Besides, the Mexicans here cannot afford to get into accidents and injuries, because in Cuernavaca, it is still a third world country, and you cannot just pick up a phone and dial 911 and have an ambulance there within minutes. There is no 911 Emergency line to call and there are no ambulances! Also, to our horror as North Americans, not many, if any drivers there, have such a thing called “auto insurance”. They simply cannot afford it. So, the solution is . . . do NOT get into a car or pedestrian accident!
Speaking of pedestrians, unlike in most major cities in North America, where the pedestrian has the right of way the moment they so much as put a “toe” into the roadway, in Cuernavaca, drivers have the right of way at ALL times, and I do mean all. Even if you are crossing the street at a marked intersection, with a green light to walk, if a car is coming your way, you best get out of their way first because they are not stopping or even slowing down for you!
--651 words
Travel Experience
The Blue Mountains National Park has some truly fantastic scenery, excellent bushwalks and all the gorges, gum trees and cliffs you could ask for. The mountains rise as high as 1100 metres and despite the intensive tourist development much of the area is so steep that it’s still only open for bushwalkers. The blue haze, which gave the mountains their name, is a result of the fine mist of oil given off by eucalyptus trees.
My first time to see a bluish mountain was when my husband and I visited the Blue Mountain National Park in Sydney, Australia. I was enthralled because the tourists including us had to go up to the overlooking platform to see those beautiful mountains while enjoying the gentle wind under the sunny sky. On the other side where the tourists are allowed to explore, there is a cave called “Centenary with a new name now called Jenolan Caves.” I really fell in love in this place because it was my first time to see beautiful and unique caves. Additionally, as we entered into the caves, an instrumental music entitled “Enya” was played that captivated my heart more while discovering those caves.
I walked with my husband following the other tourists and suddenly, the sweet couple who were very sweet come to approach me and said, “There was an earthquake in Kobe, Japan eh! This couple gazed while looking at me and I just answered, “Yes Sir, and I smiled.” I whispered to my husband, “Do I looked like Japanese?” My husband asked me, “Why?.” I replied, “Because that couple ahead of us asked me awhile ago about the earthquake in Kobe.” Funny though, but I am a Filipino and to cut the story short I pretended I was a Japanese. My husband and I just smiled and could not forget it up to now. This earthquake happened in Japan in 1995 while we were in Australia that time.
As the sweet music continued playing, I was carried out on seeing the other sides of the caves and my husband and I were so amazed of stalagmites and stalactites how it is being processed. It was so nice to see things the first time; my eyes were opened wide in looking the long, clear, beige and whitish color cut in different shapes from top to bottom. Stalagmites are droplets of mineral water deposits from the cave that becomes long and bigger from the top. Stalactites are the frozen dripping of salty water stocked on the ground. I realized the more you travel, the more it expands the horizon of your mind in discovering many different things and places as you go along your journey in life. I really love to travel and discover the world more.
Adventurous people who would like to see this very beautiful scenery should have their own car, map and enough food to eat as it’s a bit far from the city. It has a big parking lot with a lot adventurous places, not only that there’s a place like Capilano Bridge in Vancouver, Canada where you can explore the bridge, the cliffs and the thickly forested areas. It was all marvelously created that my husband and I enjoyed those places and that up to now we couldn’t forget.
--547
The land that time forgot
The natural beauty of the surrounding mountain vistas together with the old world charm of the tiny ancient villages that dot the mountainsides, all with their own unique church bellower piercing the sky, the small town of Ovaro is like a step backwards in time. If it were not for the occasional modern car passing by you could swear that you were back a century ago with all the old buildings and houses restored to their former glory.
The town nestled between the huge Carnic Alps and Friulian Dolomites developed, because of its remoteness, into a unique place and people. What surprised me was the fact that all the signs for places and historical monuments had two different names. The reason for this is that the original peoples of this area have their own distinctive language so there is an Italian name and also a name in the native Friulian language, which is quite different. I always thought that Friulian was a dialect of the Italian but was surprised to learn that it is an officially recognized language with poetry, plays and literature going back to the 1300s.
The Italian government, for many years and for the sake of unity, forced all students to learn proper Italian in schools. So, the unique language was slowly dying as only the older, aging population renembered and spoke the words. Thankfully, there is a local movement to revive the language today and now the Italian government recognizes the local language and respects it as part of the unique culture of the area.
Adventure in Bangkok
Part-1
The customs officer hurried us, "Go, go!"
I wondered, "Doesn't he check anything, nor ask a common question?"
"Hurry up, don't go behind them!" he added.
I finally understood that he assumed we were the members of the group tour before us in the line. This was the first time my husband and I took my two kids going to Bangkok, in 2006 winter.
I'd heard many horrified stories about Thai customs officers or the airport police extorted money from tourists; and even, some rumour had it on the Inter net that drugs might be planted on travellers. I didn't know whether they were true or not. Anyway, my husband and I decided to make this trip by buying package (flight tickets plus three nights hotels and pickup service) because of the Thai food, their culture, improving design and movie industry. We felt so lucky that we were going to leave this crowded but grand new building without trouble. I put my hand together, palm to palm. "Sawatdee Kaa (Thai, means hello for woman to say), Bangkok. I'm coming!"
After a long waiting in the hall, I didn't see any limo driver, or someone waiting for picking us up appeared. I felt tired and depressed. Finally, I lost my patience. A row of service booths was noisy on the corner, like a fair, promoting the service of shuttles, hotels booking, and tours order. I did not trust travel agencies due to a bad experience and the cases on the news. That's why I almost travel by myself. However, I couldn't wait to go around the hotel nearby; I wanted to check in early. We needed a drive.
After we settled, I followed the map to check the convenient stores, cafes or restaurants nearby, and explore something interesting. As we were waiting for the lights to crossed the road. A man said hello to us. Just like the locals who like to have a small talk with visitors. He seemed to know a lot about Taiwan, my home country, and that really released our wariness slightly. He told us how worthy to own Thai jewellery and recommended a place to visit, and then hen called a tuk-tuk (auto rickshaw) and bargained a good deal for us. It seemed hard to refuse.
Part-2
It was a real adventure since I didn't really know where we were heading. The tuk-tuk shuttled through narrow lanes speeding. Their living places quite similar to the style of my childhood in Taipei. I could easily peek inside of the low apartments beside, so closed. My children felt excited like riding roller coaster, but I was so anxious because I didn't know what would happen to us.
The driver stopped in front of a store. It looked normal, no special decoration or showcase. Two women greeted us and offered tea, they seemed know we would come. I browsed through around their displays. Nothing was attractive to me. I really want to go. Yet, a worry came to me. I heard that if you didn't purchase anything they wouldn't let you go. However I wasn't willing to buy anyone. We tried just walking out there. Eh? Nothing happen. They didn't force us to stay. I felt relaxed after leaving there, but another problem came. Where were we?
I couldn't remember the windy route we came. Besides it was definitely far from our hotel. Fortunately I got a map and a travel guide. "Get to the main road might be easier," I thought. I checked the signpost but still had no idea. We probably needed a taxi.
A woman pushed a toddler and a little boy walked beside her passed by. I was surprised that she directly asked us in Mandarin, "Do you need help?" Later, she explained that she used to work for a family in Taiwan. She also told me that we needed to bargain before taking a car or we would not know how huge amount we would be charged. If the driver asked more than 200thb around the city was too expensive, and it would be better to observe their expressions.
After back to hotel, we decided to take a one-day tour next day, and then followed my plan to go around this city by public transportation (MRT, BTS), and tuk-tuk. Tuk-tuk was our favourite because it was so crazy and fun to travelling the streets.
During four days in Bangkok, I always saw Thai people's smil. They were not as busy as Taiwanese. They enjoyed their life. Most Thai were willing to help travellers. Although I got many warning about travelling in Bangkok, I found their nice more than the terrified stories.
--total 778 words (first draft)
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