My First Trip to Europe!

I had the wonderful opportunity to travel to London and Berlin for work. I attended two NBA Europe Live games and met with marketing counterparts at DT.

This adventure began as a business trip, with all the amenities of business class and Starwood points, but also the drawback of actually having to work. There were moments when I felt like I could have been working anywhere in the United States. Shamefully, I even went to STARBUCKS five times to quell my jet lag with hits of caffeine.

Chris joined me in Berlin after work wrapped up. Exploring Berlin together made the trip that much more memorable and special! I could no doubt write a lengthy blog of every silly story; but even a long-winded novel and 476 pictures (whittled down from thousands) couldn't do our journey the justice it deserves. I guess you just had to be there. :)

THURSDAY/FRIDAY

[The Thames River winding through London. Also, the Tower Bridge next to the Tower of London.]

THE TUBE

I arrived at Heathrow Airport on Friday afternoon after 14 hours of travel (including a layover in Copenhagen). Surprisingly refreshed, I dared to commute to my hotel by Tube, or underground trains. I could have taken a taxi, but I opted for ADVENTURE!

My adventurous spirit sagged the longer I lugged my suitcase from train to train on long meandering rides through boring, dark tunnels. After two hours commuting by Tube, I finally arrived at Canary Wharf sweaty, tired and on a mission to find my hotel. I marched out of the station and found myself smack-dab in the middle of London’s financial district. HSBC and Citigroup towered over me, while hundreds of young professionals in black suits milled about me holding cocktails and briefcases. I had apparently popped in on Friday afternoon happy hour.

Determined to get to my hotel I gathered my bearings and began the 8-block trek to the Four Seasons Canary Wharf. Along the way, I plowed through a field of London suits enjoying afternoon cocktails. I wheeled my suitcase over many a Prada shoe, indifferent to the dirty looks darted down at me. I stopped at each block to catch my breath and take a picture or two. I felt it necessary to document my first “adventure” in Europe.

SATURDAY

I popped out of bed bright and early to soak in some of the city before locking down on work. I had only a few hours to explore, so I fast-tracked through the thicket of towering financial buildings, then strolled along the beautiful Thames River where I found a café selling freshly-baked croissants. I found a bench by the wharf and had breakfast. Although we were quite a ways from London proper, Canary Wharf offered a spectacular view of the Thames River. Probably the prettiest view of all hotels I’ve had the pleasure to visit.

[The view I woke up to.]

[My days in London started with tea and croissants.]

Denise and I huddled down on work for a few hours, and then took a taxi to Bond Street for some window shopping. I steered clear of any tempting purchases, since mostly anything I saw in London I could find in the states at a much better rate.

For dinner, we ate at a Chinese restaurant near our hotel which was lovely and fun until a couple of good ol’ chaps next to us decided that we were prime American specimen to probe. Among the many fascinating details they discovered about us, the following details astounded them:

• Women work in sports marketing!?!
• Women understand sports!?!
• Women like sports?!?
• There are female security guards in America??
• All women don’t know how to make pizza from scratch?

After enduring their silly queries, Denise and I diplomatically slid past these real deal blokes, and bid them good night and good riddance.

SUNDAY

Jet lag swept over me on Sunday like a hazy fog. Although I had intended to pop out of bed early, my body had a different agenda. I woke up at 7 am, peeked out the window and saw that a heavy, gray fog had descended over the river, enveloping the hotel and buildings surrounding it. Sleepily, I snapped a picture of the view then hopped right back into bed. I slept in until 1pm. Denise went through the same thing. Around 2pm, we peeled ourselves out of bed and trotted outside, where we taxied into town for a late Sunday brunch at Boswell’s in Covent Garden.

The New Jersey Nets battled the Miami Heat at the O2 arena in London. I spent ¼ of the game mingling with the NBA and sponsors, and ¾ of the game wondering why I had traveled 10,000 miles to see yet another NBA game. Alas, the wonders of my job still bewilder me.

[Intimate moment between Jay-Z and the Commish at the Nets/Heat game.]

MONDAY/TUESDAY

I took a tiny plane from London to Berlin on Monday morning. Upon arriving at Tegel Airport, I followed the crowd to Customs. I stood in the designated foreigner line and waited patiently for my turn to approach security. The silence around me was undeniable – you could here a pin drop. I dared not even cough.

When my turn came up, I marched to the window, smiled, put down my passport and murmured a soft, but cheerful, “hello.” The officer took one look at my smiling face and started to bark out questions:

Officer: WHY ARE YOU HERE?

Me (surprised): Uh, I’m here on business.

Officer: WHERE DO YOU WORK?

Me (stammering softly): T-T-T-Mobile (American accent). “T-Mobile (British accent). Deutsche Telekom (desperate reach).

Officer: WHERE ARE YOU STAYING?

Me (pale and feeling faint): The, um, Marriott Berlin.

The kind customs officer took another cold look at me, then nodded once, quickly and purposefully. I grabbed by passport, nodded back (more like bowed), then sprinted to the next holding pen. What a welcoming introduction to Berlin.

My first few days in Berlin were spent working; however, I did manage to get our to enjoy some kangaroo stir-fry and yet another NBA game. This time i watched the Hornets crush the Wizards.

[Kangaroo stir-fry at an Asian restaurant in Berlin. What a melding of cultures!]

WEDNESDAY

Chris joined me in Berlin on Wednesday! (YAY - fist pump, high-five, toast and CHEERS!) We spent our first day wandering about Ku'damm, tasting currywurst and Berliner Weisse, finding piles of fall leaves to kick around, and just hanging out in general. This was a great day for us to explore, immerse ourselves in the culture and catch up. We even found matching German scarves for just one euro -- we sported them proudly!

[Currywurst is simply a sausage lathered with globs of ketchup, then sprinkled with curry powder. It's usually served with a hard bread roll and a plastic toothpick.]

[With his new German scarf, Chris fit the Lacoste window display perfectly.]

Thursday

Chris and I sported our ultra-touristy German scarves and ventured out into the city on an open air, hop-on, hop-off tour bus, where we explored 12 different historical/cultural stops. We hopped off at Brandenburger Tor, where we joined dairy milk farmers in a demonstration.

Friday

This was our longest, most memorable day in Berlin. We started bright and early by following our noses to the underground train stations, where freshly baked goods made for an awesome breakfast below street level. We visited Knut('s cousin) at the Berlin Zoo, then stared down some goats at the petting zoo.

For lunch, we snacked on wurst, kraut and budweiser while overlooking a great view of Ku'damm from the 9th floor of KaDeWe, a reknown department store in Europe. We slowly walked back to Potsdamer Platz to see the Holocaust Memorial, stopping for Haagen Dazs on the way.

After trying to grasp the meaning of the Memorial (we completely missed the museum below), we wandered around looking for a bathroom. We found a (free) bathroom in the biblioteque, which was right across the street of our happiest find yet -- the Hofbrau Oktoberfest tent.

Here is where we spent 6 hours celebrating in the German way, singing songs and dancing arm-in-arm, with liters of beer, and even liederhosen.

Intoxicating, intoxicated night indeed. :)

SATURDAY

Hungover from our Oktoberfest night, Chris and I managed to have a great day despite our late start.

[We met crazy Casper from Denmark, who spoke with a lisp and paired his stories with flamboyant hand gestures. Capser insisted on linking arms and drinking since we had become good chums.]

SUNDAY - MY BIRTHDAY!

Chris and I celebrated my 27th birthday with an equal share of solemnity and frivolity, (just like me). :) We toured museums and sites of significant cultural and historical meaning, including the preserved sections of the Berlin Wall and the Topographie des Terrors, the physical remnants of political power during the Third Reich.

On the lighter side, we toured different bars and cafes, including an artsy-fartsy junkyard full of fun, graffiti art, and a bar in former East Berlin, where we met some icy-looking bartenders and cheery, outgoing Dubliners.

I had a wonderful birthday -- it topped a spectacular week in Berlin!

[CHEERS TO ME! (I can only be obnoxious about my birthday one day a year...) :P]

[ I'm a speck in comparison to this tremendously towering work of graffiti art.]

MONDAY

On our way back to Seattle, Chris and I spent a 5-hour layover carousing the streets of Copenhagen with cans of beer and our ever-present thirst for adventure. ;)




ALOHA EUROPE! It was wunderbar!


For details on My First Trip to Europe, including all 476 pictures, please check out my Picasa albums, which will guide you through our entire weeklong trip:

Album 1: http://picasaweb.google.com/lizfong/EuropeAlbum1

Album 2: http://picasaweb.google.com/lizfong/EuropeAlbum2

My Solo Trip to Tokyo!

My trip to Tokyo was a personal pilgrimage for me. It's something that I've wanted to do for a while, but I let trivial excuses like: "It's too expensive," "I've got no one to travel with," and "Work's too busy," hold me back, always copping out with: "There's always next year." Sick of my own lackadaisical attitude, I spontaneously booked a flight to Narita. Two weeks later, I was cruising over the Pacific on a plane to Japan.

I was apprehensive at first to travel alone, but with so much encouragement from family and friends, I realized that the best part of traveling would be sharing my stories with all of you! This was the motivating force behind each of the 500 pictures I took in Tokyo. I felt no shame stretching out my arm, pointing the camera at myself, and smiling. I thought, "Mom would enjoy seeing what I'm eating!" or "Only Rhone would appreciate this weird bag I'm wearing on my head."

I experienced so many fun, funny, spiritual, and inspiring moments, I can't express them all in one blog. So here's a summary of the best parts:

WEDNESDAY - I woke up at the crack of dawn and trekked to Tsukiji Fish Market, a crazy Costco of fresh, raw seafood. I dodged and ducked as I maneuvered through aisle after aisle of vibrant, smelly creatures of the sea, some still slithering and snapping their claws. Workers on manic motorized keg-like coolers buzzed about the market floor, heaving crates of squid, sawing torpedos of tuna, and spraying away fish blood, guts and juices. It was an unreal experience and probably my favorite part of the trip. It was unique, eye-opening and oddly calming.

THURSDAY - I spent Thursday with a family from Mexico on a 1-day tour of Sawara, a small town outside Narita. This kind, Spanish-speaking family adopted me, as I blended the little Spanish I know with the little Japanese I know, and coined new phrases like "Muy atsui" ("very hot") and "Sake, por favor!" ("Sake, please!!). My tour guide Emiko also made a lasting impression. Tiny, sweet and a stereotypical Japanese girl, Emiko called me "Riz" and exclaimed "Oh rihrry!!" after every interesting comment. She also giggled with her hand covering her mouth -- a mannerism that I happily picked up, (but practice only in Japan). The tour itself was decent, but the people I met made the day memorable.

FRIDAY - I experienced for the first time a ridiculously crowded Japanese subway, in which passengers very politely and quietly pushed and shoved until there wasn't a square inch of floor space left. I stood squeezed between bodies, firmly planting my feet on the floor trying desperately to stay balanced; I clenched everything. With each whirring stop, the crowd swayed forward, backward, and side-to-side. It was impossible to fall down since the density of bodies kept me wobbling with the crowd. This was the worst version of "Jello" I've ever played.

I spilled out onto the platform, thankful to have reached the last stop on the Ginza line, Asakusa (ah-SAHK-sah). Here is where I enjoyed a whole day trolling through troves of treasures down Nakamise-dori, as well as joined hundreds of tourists who zipped through the Senso-ji shrine. (I found a few more quieter shrines on my own that I appreciated much, much more.)

That night I met some friends in Shibuya for yakiniku and karaoke. I haven't seen so many Iolani alumni since the last time I was at Oceans. (Yes - Oceans!)

SATURDAY - Aaron and I walked around Shibuya until we stumbled into the "Love Hotel" district, where rooms are rented by the hour for "resting" and by the night "for staying." The series of pictures really say it all. Go check them out! In the afternoon, I met up with my aunties, uncles and cousins from Hawaii who had coincidentally planned a trip to Tokyo during the same time as me. We went to the top of Mori Tower and took in the amazing views of rainy, green Tokyo (which looks very much like the Pacific Northwest!). Then we roamed through Roppongi in the rain to "Chanko-nabe," a restaurant that serves "hot pot" or what sumo wrestlers eat. After a filling, delicious 10-course meal, it was time to sleep!

SUNDAY - Before Aaron left Tokyo, he and I ventured to Harajuku to see the uniquely dressed-up Japanese teens. Here is where I mastered the art of sneaking pictures of random strangers from the inside of my jacket. (Yes - I felt sketchy and somewhat perverted, but these were sights I had to share!) Paired with the use of my continuous capture feature, my sneaky photography made for some really interesting shots!

MONDAY - I spent my last day in Tokyo in Ikebukuro, where I had hoped to try many "little nibbles" at the Tobu Department Store. Andrew Zimmern of Bizzarre Foods also visited Tobu during his trip to Japan. Since I IDOLIZE him, I wanted to track his every footstep. Unfortunately, Tobu didn't open in time for me to browse through it, since I had an afternoon flight home. Slightly disappointed by my anticlimactic last adventure, I headed back toward the subway station when, out of nowhere, I spotted "Café du Monde." I had gone to Café Du Monde in New Orleans earlier this year and loved it. It was a happy coincidence that there was one in Tokyo and a great finale to my trip.

So that's my quick and dirty summary of Tokyo. Scroll through my albums to see more. Or if you're willing, let's have drinks and catch up. I'll explain my strategy around slurping noodles loudly and free of splatter (dip your head into the bowl and take long, purposeful slurps). Or how I made a joke in Japanese just by saying "Makudonarudo" (McDonald's) to a sales girl who helped me try on red and yellow converse high tops. I'll even divulge how I found solace and peace in the many Buddhist shrines and temples I visited, where I humbly offered prayers for dear friends.

I embraced each moment, and hope I've done a decent job sharing my journey with you!

For full trip details, please check out my Picasa web albums, where you can see all the solo pics I took!

Tokyo Trip - Album 1: http://picasaweb.google.com/lizfong/TokyoPart1

Tokyo Trip - Album 2: http://picasaweb.google.com/lizfong/TokyoPart2

Living alone sometimes requires a MacGyver-like ingenuity...

Living alone sometimes requires a MacGyver-like ingenuity that I secretly believe I have. I've scaled kitchen counters to reach the wine at the top of the cabinet; I've hammered in nails with sturdy flashlights; and I've sprayed unwelcome spiders with Costco-sized bottles of 409.

Single, self-sufficient, and above all, resourceful, I thought I had conquered all the trials and tribulations of living alone. But just as I started to congratulate myself on my unabashed independence, a run-in with my sneaky, sliding screen door halted my self-adoration.

Like any pale-skinned Seattleite starved for the sun, I jumped at the chance to bask in the warmth of the city's first sunny day. So I threw on my suit, slid on my shades and sprawled my towel out on to the balcony to sunbathe and read.
After an hour of reading about the incestuous antics of the ancient Greeks - whose careless oofing had generated the abnormal hermaphrodite gene (at least according to the book I was reading) - I scooped up my towel and headed back inside.

I jostled the handle of my screen door to slide it open. At the first unsuccessful tug, I knew I was screwed. I pulled at it a few more times before giving into the fact that I was undoubtedly LOCKED out.

But ever the cool detective, I followed my MacGyver like instincts and scoured the balcony for something to jimmy the lock. With nothing metal, long and skinny in sight, I picked up a twig from my half-dead Hyacinth plant. Determined and calm, I stuck that twig somewhere between the door and the wall. Two seconds later, as my twig snapped in half, PANIC struck.

I jolted suddenly back and forth across my balcony, like a rat on crack in a small space. I paced erratically, sneaking peaks at the sidewalk four floors down. Head in my hands and muttering to myself, I cursed the sun for shining and my stupid, sliding screen door for locking me out.

[The Enemy]

I thought about calling out for help, or beckoning someone below to hold out their arms and catch. I even toyed with the idea of tying together my clothes and rappelling down the rainwater pipe; however, the realities of my own coordination got the best of me, and I opted for the less agile solution.

[The rainwater pipe]

After 25 minutes of rash, erratic panic, I soothed my nerves and faced that screen door with a Zen determination. Calm and cool like Karate Kid, I stared down that sliding door, raised my fist, stuck out my nails, and jabbed.

(Ever see Kill Bill II where Uma Thurman punched her way out of the hardwood coffin buried in the ground? Picture that EXACT same scene, but instead of Uma Thurman, think of me; and instead of a hardwood coffin six feet under, imagine a thin, net-like screen.) I stabbed that screen door until I punctured it with my nail. Then I poked my finger through the tiny opening and flipped up the latch that had locked me out in the first place.

[The Wound]

I was SAVED, and after only an hour of plotting and executing my escape. I immediately called Angela to tell her of my harrowing, near-death experience.

Since every story supposedly has a moral, here's what Ive learned from this ordeal:

1. Never lock yourself out on a balcony.
2. ALWAYS give a friend your extra set of keys, especially when you live alone, and despite your alleged MacGyver-like instinct.

While I'm single, young, independent and "resourceful," I've learned that I can't do it all alone. I'll always need someone to tell my stories to, even if my stories are slightly ridiculous and about evil screen doors.