Wake Up With The Waves

We visited Auntie Isa & Uncle Jay one weekend, and it was the longest car ride that Clementine has ever taken so far.  She did allright, thank goodness!
On Saturday morning we went to the Santa Monica Pier's Wake Up With The Waves weekly concert series for little kids.  It was a cool & overcast day, and the last show of the season (I think it's mostly held during the summer/early fall). 

 

Clementine liked dancing along to the music.  She liked that a LOT.  After the concert, we walked around the pier and then took a spin on the carousel before we left.

She was not amused.  Oh well, maybe she'll like it better next time.
Click HERE for our pics and videos of Clementine dancing!.
 

Muir Woods

Grandma Fei and Grandpa Leonard were in San Francisco for a Gong family event.  While they were in town, we went up to Muir Woods in Marin County.

Clementine was amazed by the grand majesty of nature.  Check out our pictures HERE.

Last Tango... or rather, Slow Steady Stroll in Paris

After a few blissful days in the country, we head back to big city life and spend our last few days in Paris. This time, we stayed at the charming Hotel New Orient in the Opera district, which was walking distance to the Champs Elysees and Arc de Triomphe. We were also nearby the bohemian Montmartre and notorious Pigalle districts, and could easily take the metro to the Eiffel Tower.

Russell and I spent these last few days seeing the last of the can't-miss sights, and also eating and enjoying as much of the gastronomic French delights as we could stuff ourselves with.

Click HERE to see the photos from the last leg of our trip.

Land of the Loire

After a few days in Paris, we head to Pays de la Loire, the land of the Loire, to experience the rustic countryside. Russell and I stayed in the town of Ingrandes at the Hotel Le Lion d'Or right next to the Loire River, which used to be an old priory dating back from the mid-1600s. Ingrandes used to serve as a border town between France and Bretagne (Brittany), before Bretagne became part of France in the 1500s.

We were taken care of by Russell's friend Ninie, a musician who lives in the small town of La Chapelle St Sauveur a few miles away. She and her daughter Margot took us to see different sights in the area. Ninie also took us on a day trip to see the seaside resort town of La Baule, Le Pouliguen, and the medieval fortified city of Guerande (which is renowned for its sea salt). She taught me how to make traditional Breton-style buckwheat galettes, as well as beurre blanc sauce. And while Ninie & Russell played music, Margot taught me words for different animals and colors en Francais. Click HERE to see Ninie rocking out at her house.

Click HERE to see our photos from the Loire River Valley.

Springtime (kinda) in Paris

Russell and I wanted to take one last trip before the baby arrives in June. We've gone to so many countries over the years... where haven't we been? Oh! France! So France it was. Being pregnant, I couldn't have any of the runny cheeses or charcuterie or a lot of wine... but at least I could eat my fill of everything else!

We arrived on March 3, and our homebase was Hotel Acte V in the Latin Quarter, so named because of the neighborhood's proximity to the Sorbonne University & the classical Latin language spoken by the students. It's a lively neighborhood filled with inexpensive cafes, bistros, and bars. We were also a 5-minute walk to the Rue Mouffetard, the oldest food market street in Paris. Even the Pantheon and the Notre Dame cathedral were a walkable distance. We had dinner with cousin Justin, his lady Florence, and their darling daughter Zoe at Bofinger, the oldest brasserie in Paris. A couple of Russell's musician friends who live in Paris, Aurelien and Adeline, also took us around town during our visit.

Click HERE to see our photos from the first leg of our trip.

On the Road in October

Russell, Corser, and I took a roadtrip from October 27 through November 2 up the Pacific Northwest to visit his parents in Walla Walla, Washington. The route took us through Bend, Oregon, then Walla Walla, WA, then off to Portland, OR for a few days, then back down through Ashland, OR to California.









For more pics of our trip, click HERE.

Local Time in Kauai

We escaped to Kauai for 6 days in May. And it's a true "escape", complete with secluded beaches, small-town life, and empty wide open roads stretching out into the sky before you. Our hotel, the Aston Islander on the Beach, was on the border of the towns of Waipouli & Kapaa, which is on the East Shore, halfway between the North and the South coasts (the Western side of the island isn't very navigable). This central location made it easy for us to travel easily to various beaches & destinations. Our hotel was also a few minutes drive to the town of Kapaa, where a few of our friends were born, raised, and still live.

Some highlights:
-- Making our way through many of Kauai's beaches on the North, East, and South shores. A few were pretty popular, most were almost deserted. The surf, weather, and terrain varied from beach to beach, and some were more suited to swimming, snorkeling, or just lying out on the beach away from the waves.
-- Watching our pal Aldrine ROCK a live show (that links to another performance a few months ago, but so what, he's frickin amazing)
-- Chowing down on the BEST coconut manju, seafood poke, saimin noodles, and shave ice (yes, we are NOW Hawaiian Blizzard shave ice believers!) thanks to our friends' advice
-- Learning the intricacies of local pidgin language (examples: Never using the word "are", Saying "slippahs" instead of "flip flops", and Heavy utilization of sound effects)
-- Wending our way through Waimea Canyon
-- Ziplining through gorges in the rain

Click HERE for our pictures. Warning: there are a LOT! We'll be posting videos soon too.


We had a blast hanging out with our Kauai buddies, checking out the sights, and soaking up the sun (in between the rain) while laying on the 3rd or 4th beach of the day. Thank you so much to Ryan & Emmi, Aldrine, and Aaron for being such great hosts during our visit!

Release The Cor-aken! In Carmel!

We took our little domestic terrorist to unleash his wrath on the unsuspecting denizens of Carmel for the weekend. The 3 of us stayed at the Adobe Inn, checked out "Yappy Hour" at the Cypress Inn, and had dinner at The Forge In the Forest (which offers a doggy menu).

Corser makes his mark on Carmel.

Carmel-by-the-sea has a reputation for being one of the country's most dog-friendly places to visit. And it's true: there are doggies walking around everywhere with their people, being welcomed into stores and cafes and inns, getting ooh'd and aah'd and coo-coo'd over by puppy-loving passers-by. It was apparent that the pooches strolling about the town LOVED the attention, sitting and heeling like Good Dogs, wagging their cute little tails while getting their heads petted and ears scratched. And as usual, Corser had his fair share of admirers, people asking how old our puppy is, or reaching to pet him, or bending down to make their acquaintance with His Royal Highness.

The light you see in his eyes? That's pure unadulterated EVIL.

The problem with taking Corser to a dog-friendly town, it turned out, is that Corser is not a dog-friendly dog. He snapped at the server, argued loudly with the restaurant manager, and rebuffed the sweet shop owner who tried to ply him with sausage treats. We offered our apologies and received stinkeye in return. Yet, we love him just the same.

Click HERE for the weekend's pictures.

A day in Jinguashi & Jioufen / Goodbye

Back in Taipei, Tammy took us to this hidden hole in the wall for a Taiwanese breakfast of sweet & savory soy milks and fried things. Now with fuel in our bellies, we took the train to Jinguashi and Jioufen, both on the northeast coast of Taiwan.

We checked out the historic town of Jinguashi first, which is an old Japanese-era mining town. They've preserved a lot of their historical buildings and have a museum about the area's history. Being that it's all built on hillsides, getting lost in this town was quite an ordeal since it involved a lot of walking up and down unmarked back alleys comprised entirely of stairs. Let's just say that we burnt off a LOT of that morning's fried breakfast.

We then took a bus to Jioufen, down the hill. This quaint little town is essentially one big market alley that snakes through small shops & food stalls. The food here was amazing, and we ate things that were so entirely foreign and bizarre and delicious. We would taste, eat, shop, taste, and eat some more. Wending our way through to one end, we rested up at the Jioufen Teahouse during sunset. We later took a train back to Taipei, and had a nightcap at the Taipei Bear Bar (yes, "Bear" in the gayest sense of the word).

The next day was our last shopping day, and we met up with Tammy's sister-in-law (who was also from/visiting Taipei) to do some street market shopping. Later that night, Tammy's friend Zoey took us to an all-you-can-eat Taiwanese barbecue dinner, at which we consumed an obscene amount of meat. Still reeking of delicious barbecue smoke, we headed to In House lounge where we met up with her other friends Nina & Peggy for a last night of drinks before going home to the US the next day.

Pictures can be found HERE.

Breath of fresh air (literally) in Hualien

We took an overnight trip to Hualien, which is a city outside of Taipei on the eastern coast of Taiwan. This region is breathtakingly beautiful, and is supposedly the place where the Portuguese sailors who first explored the area shouted the words "Formosa!", which means "beautiful" (or something like "well-shaped", as Marco explained) in Portuguese. Hence the original name for Taiwan: Formosa. One of the attractions here is Taroko Regional Park, and the area is also the native home of the Taroko people, one of the several aboriginal peoples of Taiwan.

We stayed at Crossing the Rainbow Bridge bed & breakfast, a "homestay" owned by a Taroko gentleman & his Taiwanese wife. There were also two resident dogs, "Ati" ("Little Brother", although she was a girl) and "Muffin". Upon arrival that afternoon, the hotel provided bicycles for us to ride to the Taroko Regional Park visitors center. They also provided us with afternoon tea, followed by a traditional Taroko dinner with all of the B&B visitors (who were all from Singapore). The owner had ferried the four of us in his car, and he took us to a shop afterwards to pick up some local Hualien pastries & mochis & of course, the local wines.

After a lovely alfresco breakfast, we went on a private tour with an English-speaking guide, who took us on an all-day tour of the park area. We learned from our guide that the B&B owner is actually a very well-known and highly-regarded Taroko member who has founded a lot of community services & organizations, has been highly-educated & a principal for 30 years and married outside of his group to a Taiwanese woman (all of which are very unusual for a Taroko minority), and has even spoken in front of the UN regarding minority issues. We didn't see him again that morning because he had left early to be a guest speaker at a university conference. Jeez... if only we knew what an importang guy he was, we would have asked him for a picture. And to think, all we did was ask him "do you know where we can get some booze around here?"

HIGHLIGHTS OF HUALIEN & TAROKO REGIONAL PARK:

• Discovering all sorts of crazy/cool-looking marble, quartz, and granite stones at Cingshui Cliff beach
  
• Walking the Shakadang Trail and wandering its riverbed... made of MARBLE
  
• Watching the birds swoop around the Swallow Grotto
• Lunch of indigenous Taroko foods at Buluowan Village hotel
• Seeing the Cihmu Bridge & the crown atop Frog Rock
• Crossing a swaying suspension bridge, Indiana Jones style
• Taking the rail equivalent of the "chicken bus": on the train ride back, our car also had several "country bumpkins" who spoke loudly, acted rudely, and snorted/spat their snot rockets without shame or aim. Gross gross grossness all around.
  

Pictures can be found HERE.

Boys and Girl in Taipei's Underworld

Tammy & Marco went to meet up with her auntie who lives in Taipei, so we wandered about on our own for the morning/afternoon. It took us a few days to find out where the nearby bars/pubs were located, since there appeared to be none in Ximending other than a TGIF's, even when we asked around.

Desperate for some kind of night scene, we went to the Shida district near Taipei University, figuring college students would know where to get some booze. We caught this really great band, Boyz and Girl, at the small, smoky, and psychedelic Underworld nightclub on Shida Road.

The next day, we discovered that right across the street from the Hero House was the GLBT district, which was (of course) filled with bars! The interesting thing was that either no one knew about this district, or it never occured to anyone to recommend this district to us. It was very well hidden behind the historic Red Pavillion Theater, and you wouldn't know the GLBT places were there unless you walked behind this building. Wow, what a discovery!

MORE HIGHLIGHTS FROM TAIPEI:

• Longshan Temple visit in the early morning.
• A very sad Core Pacific Center. Most depressing mall EVER. Lonely store clerks would perk up like hopeful little puppies waiting to be adopted whenever we'd walk past a storefront window.
• A day-jaunt to the Spring City Resort at the hot springs area of Beitou.
• Meeting up with Tammy's college girlfriends Nina & Zoey for a Taiwanese hot pot dinner, one of which involved using bendy straws to suck up marrow out of ox bones.
• A nightcap at one of the many gay-friendly bars in the Red Pavillion square.

Pictures can be found HERE.

Street performers (the band is "Happy Circle") in Ximending near our crash pad:

So Long, Seoul / Taipei on the twenty-third!

We hitched ourselves to Taiwan for the 2nd week of our trip. Our homebase was at the Hero House in Taipei, a building formerly used to host military veterans but is now open to Taiwanese residents &/or "youth" guests (thank you for making us young again, Taiwan!). We would then take day trips out of the city for the next several days. The Hero House was pretty centrally located next to a main subway station in the Ximending district. This is usually described as a hoppin' place for younger people, the "Harajuku of Taiwan", filled with shops, clubs, bars, etc. We thought it would be our scene... until we got there, and saw that Ximending is filled with KIDS!!! Frickin TEENAGERS!

HIGHLIGHTS FROM TAIPEI:

• Seeing "Betel Nut Beauties" at roadside towns on the way from the airport to the main city.
• Wandering Tammy's old neighborhood, where we saw the market, streets, and apartment homes of her childhood (awwww so cute!)
• Got glasses for cheap.
• Visited the immense Taipei Zoo & saw actual panda bears.
• Had tea & snacks up the mountainside & saw the sunset.
• Went up to the Taipei 101 observation deck (and was able to stand outside in the blasting wind!)
• Dinner at Modern Toilet Restaurant (where I had the worst spaghetti and meatballs ever, but hey, we're not there for the food, right?)
• Saw ridiculous & unintentionally funny late-night informercials for Chinese viagra, starring potbellied balding guys (and special-effects "boners") & young ladies. And then there was that one channel which was nothing but pole-dancing girls in a un-sexy badly-lit 70s-era-disco-looking studio.
• Toured the Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall.
• Visited the National Palace Museum and saw the famed carvings of cabbage and pork (not kidding, it was actually pretty cool).
• Awestruck by the beauty of the Confucious Temple at dusk.
• Street food and shopping at the Shilin Night Market (and endured a Chinese foot massage afterwards).

Pictures can be found HERE.

Up at Taipei 101:

24 hours in Busan

We took a high-speed KTX train to Busan, which is a rougher-edged port city (like Osaka is to Tokyo, or Oakland is to San Francisco). This place is known for its amazing seafood, and has a HUGE fish market compared to Seoul's. It was dumping buckets of rain throughout our first day there (we were only there overnight), but thankfully cleared up the next day.

HIGHLIGHTS FROM BUSAN:

• Strolling through the sad-looking Chinatown, which was actually filled with Russians & Russian businesses/bars, which had "American" names like "Cowboy" and "Texas bar". Go figure.
• Had street food & chigae stew lunches at PIFF Square.
• Checked out Jagalchi Fish Market & bought some tasty items.
• Stayed at the rockin Zen Backpackers hostel, which is run by the ubercool June Park and located in the Seomyeon District.
• At June's recommendation, waded thru back alleys in the storming rain to an all-you-can-eat Japanese-style dinner at Dea Rim Tuna (for about $28 each!), which had multiple courses & small dishes and tons of ultra-fresh tuna sashimi (different cuts), eaten Korean-style wrapped in lettuce leaves &/or nori seaweed sheets & doused in sesame-oil or gochujang chili paste. The beondegi made a cameo appearance on our table.
• Spent a sunny morning at Haeundae beach.
• Had a street-food munch lunch in the Seomyeon Street Food Alley, where we were schooled by the vendors on how to correctly double-dip your fish-cake-on-a-stick in the communal sauce. Oh, yay.
• Was stunned by the gorgeousness of the Lotte department store food court (too bad we were full of rice sticks, fish cakes, and mandoo dumplings from the street food alley).
• Back in Seoul that night, we had a "Chicken and Hof" (i.e. Korean fried chicken and beer) dinner with Peter and his coworker, followed by a hilariously epic struggle for the dinner bill between Marco and Peter... guess who won?

Pictures can be found HERE.

Maui Madness in March

We were guests at the lovely wedding of Russell's pal Jon Suzukawa to his lady love Christine Martinez, which took place on the island of Maui on Monday March 23. In true Jon & Christine style, they had a gangload of activities for their guests, like scuba diving, Pacific Whale Foundation whalewatch eco-tour, the Old Lahaina Luau, and of course LOTS and LOTS of partying!

Most of us stayed in the Wailea area of Maui, since that's where much of the wedding-related action was taking place. But many guests (including the wedding party) got to Maui the week before and several days exploring the island and meeting & getting to know each other. Russell & I stayed at a condo at Wailea Elua Village with his coworker-friend Rachel & her husband Rich Vigil, which was (thankfully) stumbling distance from Jon & Christine's hotel.

Here's a link to the wedding website for those two crazy kids: Christine & Jon in Maui

And here's a link to our pictures HERE (I only posted small pics, let me know if you'd like me to send you any of the full-size files)

We had a mindblowing time in Maui, experiencing the most amazing things, including but not limited to:
- Snorkeling with the sea turtles, and hearing the whale songs while we were underwater
- Close encounters of the baby-whale kind (our slideshow appears below)
- Spotting a playful seal next to our beach
- Having The Best Giant Mai Tai In The World at Humuhumunukunukuapua'a restaurant & feeding their humongous freshwater carp
- Frying panfuls of spam for Spam Musubi in Jon & Christine's luxury penthouse hotel suite

An awesome time was had by all. Thank you to Jon & Christine for making such an experience possible, and for sharing your love of Maui with all of us! Congratulations to the wonderful couple!

Academy of Sciences

Spent today at the Academy of Sciences museum in Golden Gate Park. It was awe-inspiring, breathtaking, and intellectually stimulating... and crowded! It's only been open for a few months, so there are a LOT of people visiting right now. But oh. my. goodness. it is AMAZING.
The show at Morrison Planetarium was outta this world! Pun intended. So so cool. You all MUST go.
[CLICK HERE] to see our pictures.

Ferry Building Marketplace

One of my absolute must-see/smell/eat/feast places in San Francisco: the Ferry Building Marketplace

From Hotel Tomo, you can take the 38Geary bus all the way thru downtown to the top of Market Street, and hop off once you reach the end at the Embarcadero.

This BLOG (click for link) has an excellent suggestion for a 3-day tasting menu itinerary which you can pick/choose from. Or you can just follow your senses to the next bite. Enjoy the awesomeness that is Bay Area cuisine!

Cliff House

For y'all history buffs, here's a lil bit on the historic Cliff House of San Francisco: http://www.cliffhouse.com/history/history.htm

And here's a suh-weet postcard from the 50s or 60s:

All the paintings and pictures of the Cliff House show the white Seal Rocks behind it. They're named that because those rocks used to be covered with noisy seals... who have since relocated to (e.g. taken over) the boat docks at Fisherman's Wharf (view their live webcam HERE).

And the lovely white color of the rocks? Seagull poop.