Paris, France. 1997

Paris, 1997

Ahh, Paris in the spring. The smell of springtime flowers and fresh baked croissants. Sunny days brimming with hope of a new season. Spring is the most romantic time of year in one of the most romantic cities in the world. But November is the off season for Paris, and in keeping with my frugal nature, the best time of year to visit. Anybody can go in the Spring. And besides, it was our thirteenth wedding anniversary and I wanted to do something special so I arranged a surprise trip for us.

I had booked the trip to Paris but had told the Light Of My Life that we were going to Atlanta to visit friends for the weekend. She fell for it and never suspected a thing, even when our tickets arrived via the FedEx pouch from British Airways, right up until we checked in at the British Airways counter. The desk clerk gave us two boarding passes each, one for that afternoon’s flight to London and one for the next morning’s flight to Paris. My wife, still thinking we were going to Atlanta, told the clerk we weren’t flying anywhere in the morning and to fix the problem. I showed her the boarding passes and just floored her. We got all the way through security before she could even talk. The first words out of her mouth were “But I’m not packed to go to Paris”.

Paris in the off season can be quite pleasant. The weather was brisk with sunny skies and a bit of a nip in the air at night. The hotels weren’t booked solid and you could get a seat in the restaurants. The locals aren’t quite as busy and stressed as they are during the summer so they are friendlier to deal with. My French is atrocious, despite my Canadian schooling, and I kept lapsing into Spanish but we still managed to communicate with the Parisites. The Apple Of My Eye (Pomme de Terre) tried out her French and got about as far as I did speaking Spanish.

The hotel was part of a small chain. Our room was so small that we had to move the bed to open the bathroom door. The good news was that the plumbing was all there and it worked. We tried a variety of restrooms during our visit including coin operated outhouses and unisex bathrooms in restaurant basements. The public restrooms in a city give an insight into the local population and customs that is often overlooked.

We only had a few days so we hit all the high lights. We grabbed a cab at the hotel and made our first stop at the Eiffel Tower. The Gypsies were out in full force, cruising the line-ups for the Tower, thrusting their grimy babies into out faces as the begged their way through the crowds. We paid for our tickets and boarded the elevator. The glass elevators afforded a great climbing view of the city and a good look at the mechanisms that drove the elevator up to the middle level. From there another elevator took us to the top for a great view of the entire city. We walked around the platform taking in the views of the city before heading off on a marathon walk through the city.

After the Tower we walked along the river and headed toward the Arc De Triomphe. We walked past the expensive shops with me pointing out distractions on the other side of the road. We strolled along the Champs Elysees and got caught up in a wedding group getting their pictures taken at a fountain. They were all guys, including the bride. He wore white. He wore a white dress.

After the first cab ride to the Eiffel Tower we stuck to walking or taking the subway. There were more beggars in the subway trains. When the train doors closed they would stand up at the front of the car and tell their tale of woe, speaking quickly and looking at the floor. Then they would walk down the car, hat in hand accepting donations and get off at the next station. At least I think it was a tale of woe. It sounded sad but it was in French so who knows? It could have been a recipe for cheese fondue. The Metro subway system was easy to use (we only got lost once) but mostly we walked. Paris is a fairly easy city to walk and the most of the things we wanted to see are all grouped along the river.

Most days we just strolled through the city, following the river. We would do some light sight seeing in the mornings and stop in a sidewalk café for lunch. The Beaujolais Nouveaux had just come out and we usually had a carafe of the wine along with a plate of cheese and bread for lunch. Maybe even another carafe of wine depending on the mood. Sidewalk cafes are plentiful in Paris and we had no shortage of places to stop along our walks. And, apparently, no shortage of the Beaujolais.

The graveyards of Paris are quite crowded. There is no grass, just little stone houses that look like outhouses crammed together. The tombs are packed next to each other and many were in bad repair. Broken stones exposed gaping holes under them. We couldn’t see any bones, though. I imaging the rats or tourists carried them away. Some of the stones were large and quite elaborate. Oscar Wilde’s stone is a large cat with wings, very reminiscent of something you might see in Egypt. But we weren’t looking for Oscar Wilde, despite his great contribution to European wit. We were looking for Jim Morrison.

Jim wasn’t hard to find. Arrows with the name “Jim” were spray painted by the Doors faithful on the little stone crypts at regular intervals so there was no getting lost. His grave was a simple one. Just a headstone, part of which was missing, and a low stone railing around a small gravel plot. Offerings left on the grave included a pack of cigarettes and some peas in a baggy. Not sure what the significance of the peas was but there they were.

We did all the touristy things we could think of. We toured Notre Dame Cathedral and climbed the steps to the top of the bell tower. The close up views of the carved gargoyles and other architectural details that we saw on the climb were well worth the effort. We walked through the Louvre and spent a drizzly morning looking at the works of art that have captured imaginations for hundreds of years. The weather outside had driven all of the tourists into the museum and we saw the Mona Lisa over a sea of Japanese tourist’s heads. The Venus De Milo was radiant but still without arms. Sculptors have a hard time with arms apparently.

We rode on a boat down the Seine River. By then the sun was shining and we basked in the warmth as we slowly cruised. The rooftop seating on the barge gave an excellent view of the numerous bridges over the river. The most interesting view of a bridge to me is usually from underneath and a boat gives a great platform for seeing the interesting bits.

We took a day to tour some of the smaller galleries. I mapped out a walking tour through one of the districts north of the river and away we went. We hit a few galleries but mostly just walked the autumn streets. We stopped for lunch at Bastille Plaza and enjoyed the last day of autumn weather while we had lunch in a sidewalk café.

It turned cold with snow flurries on our last day. The snow was enough to screw up the roads and the flights but we made it out of the city, to London and on to home. C’est frommage!

Ulsan, Korea Jan. 2005

Trip Report
Ulsan (Jan 2005)

Note: Photos will be added.

I spent a month in the shipyards of Ulsan, South Korea one winter. The South Korean shipyards had, at the time, sixty percent of the world’s ship building capacity and they were putting a ship, usually a freighter or a tanker, in the water every three days. Ulsan is a company town centered around the Hyundai Heavy Industries shipyards. We stayed at the Hyundai Hotel across from the Hyundai Department Store that was next door to the Hyundai Hospital.

The portion of Ulsan that we were in is separated from the main city by a short highway through a small mountain range. The terrain is quite rugged with exposed rock and weathered pine trees prominent in the landscape. The shopping area near the hotel had narrow winding streets and small shops. The streets were steep and wide enough for one car or a couple of motorcycles. Add wooden crates and tanks of fish out front of the restaurants and there wasn’t much room on the streets. There were tanks with squid, octopus, eels and those spiny inflatable fish. The restaurants were mostly seafood places with low tables and no chairs. There were a few small grocery stores and bakeries as well. The stores catering to westerners were closer to the main roads. We didn’t spend much time down there.

The hotel was a full-service hotel that catered to western travelers. They had a gym and health spa for use of guests and locals alike. The facilities looked nice and clean but I got turned off of the hot spas after my first visit. A group of naked old men filled the medium hot tub and proceeded to loofa each other. The thought of all that dead wrinkly skin floating around in the pool made me think of oatmeal and I never did go back in.

I thoroughly enjoyed the people of Ulsan and they inspired me to learn the Korean language. But, of course, I never did learn any Korean beyond how to order a beer and say thank you. Once we got out of the hotel we found that English was rarely spoken. We resorted to picking up restaurant menus and just randomly pointing at things to order. Some restaurants had picture menus but most did not. Many times the waitress would not serve us what we selected and would bring us what she thought a westerner would like, usually a pork cutlet in gravy.

We fell into a comfortable routine. The bus would pick us up at the hotel for the commute to the shipyards and bring us back in the evening. It gets dark early in February so we would walk across the street to the food court in the Hyundai department store basement. The food was good, hot and inexpensive. We could do our grocery shopping in the basement as well.

I had never seen so many people working in a department store. In a North American store you can never find anyone to assist you. In this Korean store there was a salesperson for every display bin or counter. When we bought fruit in the grocery store there was always someone to select the fruit, package it and weigh it for us. At closing time each salesperson would stand next to his or her bin, there would be a closing announcement over the PA, a bell would ring and they would all bow deeply in unison, facing the same direction, before leaving for the day.

After dinner we would cruise the streets for a while. There were several bars near the hotel that were not in the entertainment district. You took your chances entering a bar in the entertainment district. Hostesses would sit with you and expect you to buy them cocktails. I suspect the cocktails were just fruit juice or tea but they cost $20. We found a couple of bars that didn’t have hostesses and we frequented them instead. One bar, the Bull’s Eye, had satellite TV but only got the Discovery Channel in English so we watched a lot of that.

Eugene was our favorite bartender at the Bull’s Eye bar. She spoke English and was quite entertaining but mostly she left us alone. We nicknamed her assistant "One More" because that was the extent of his English. We would finish a beer and he would ask "One more?".

Eugene’s bar didn’t have a kitchen but she would go out to a nearby restaurant and pick us up something if we wanted. One evening Eugene was eating a plate of greens with little chunks of meat in it. It smelled really good so we asked her if she would go get us some. She brought us back two plates and we dug in. It was good, spicy but not hot, and the greens weren’t overcooked. The meat was a little rubbery but the sauce made it quite tasty. We were half done when our Korean host arrived. He peered at our plates, laughed and said it was an interesting choice for westerners. We asked what it was and he explained that the meat was from the digestive tract of a chicken. I asked if it was intestine and he relied that it came from lower down. There’s only one thing lower down in the digestive tract than the intestine. Just as we realized we were eating chicken assholes Eugene walked by, slapped herself on the ass and broke out laughing. But, the food was good so we finished it up.

Sundays were a day off and a good opportunity to roam around the area. One Sunday we climbed the mountain behind the hotel. There is a series of hiking trails that finish up at a pagoda on the mountain top. The trails ranged from wide gravel paths to steep climbs over boulders. We spent over an hour scrambling up the mountain and arrived at the top completely out of breath and worn out. There were twenty or so older Koreans exercising on the mountain top. They looked like they were in their eighties mostly and were doing sit ups, pushups and what looked like tai-chi. We felt totally bushed after the climb but and these elderly people had energy to go through an exercise routine.

From the top of the mountain you could see north to the City of Ulsan with the downtown core. You could also look down into the Hyundai shipyards and see the tankers that were under construction. Three LNG tankers with their distinctive domed tanks were being built and were so large that we could easily make them out from the mountain top.

The shipyards were a fascinating place to hang out for a month. During the short time we were there we were able to watch them build tankers in an assembly line fashion. There were three tankers on the pier. The one closest to the water was almost complete. Beside it was the second tanker with most of the hull complete. Third from the water was a tanker keel, just the bottom of the ship. Pieces of the double-hulled tankers were welded into large sections scattered all over the yard. The double walls of the tankers are over a meter apart and there is room between them for welders to crawl inside to do their work. Crawlers would move the tanker sections over to the assembly area and the cranes would lift the pieces into place. The most impressive lift we saw was the 1500 ton crane placing the deck in one piece onto the hull of the tanker. The deck was easily the size of a football field.

Once the tanker closest to the water was ready to sail they would bring a submersible barge next to the pier. Polished steel rails extended along the ground from under the ships onto the barge. Small compressible pillars sat on the rails and supported the ships. Frozen nitrogen was pumped under high pressure into the cylinders and the nitrogen would seep out the bottom of the cylinder onto the polished rails. This created an almost frictionless surface between the pillar and the rail that allowed the ship to be easily pushed along the rails onto the submersible barge. The ballasting of the barge was a little tricky as they have to keep the barge and the pier even as the barge accepts the weight of the ship. Once the ship was on the barge they submerged the barge and the ship would remain floating on the surface. The other two ships would be moved over closer to the water and a new keel would be laid in the third spot.

There was always something interesting going on in the yards from the early morning exercise routines of the welding crews to the construction of an offshore oil-loading platform.

The first birthday is a big event in Korean life. Celebrations usually include a dinner for all of the family’s relatives and friends. We were invited to our host’s son’s birthday dinner and it was quite an event. The family wore traditional Korean clothes. Speeches were made by senior members of the family and there was a lot of toasting with beer and soju. A full buffet dinner loaded with traditional Korean food was also provided. One of the young men at our table translated for us and filled us on some of the local traditions. One of the final events was a game in which the young child predicts his future. Items were placed on the floor around the boy and whichever one he selected first gave a clue to his future. If he picked the coins he would be wealthy, a ball indicates an athletic life and a roll of wool meant he would be a tailor. He selected the pencil and now looks forward to a life as an intellectual.

Our host took us out for seafood dinner one evening as our tour was coming to an end. He explained that it wasn’t a restaurant to which they would normally take westerners as the food was a little more exotic than usual but he had decided to take us there on the night he saw us eating the chicken assholes. Our party was placed in a private room with a low table. There were back rests that made sitting on the floor a little more comfortable. The meal started off with gruel which was followed by an endless parade of seafood dishes. There were whole fish that were salted and smoked, fish heads in a spicy sauce and fish organs both cooked and raw. There were shell fish, regular fish, octopus, shark, eel, abalone and others that I could not recognize. Most of the dishes were small and the plates were quickly emptied and replaced. I tried everything except for the raw fish intestines and I thoroughly enjoyed everything I ate. The meal took a couple of hours to finish and my hosts were polite enough to look away as I struggled to stand up. Grace has never been my strong suit and my legs had fallen asleep sometime early in the meal.

After a month of Ulsan it was time to head back north. I traveled through Korea on my way to Russia several times in the next couple of years but never did get to spend as much quality time there again as I did in Ulsan.

Seoul, Dec 2003

Trip Report
Seoul (Dec 2003)

Winter in Seoul is pretty much like winter can be in New York. You can get long stretches of cold gray days separated by a few days of sunshine. The snow falls, screws up traffic and makes life miserable for anyone walking the sidewalks and, after a few days, it melts.

I was sitting on a low stone wall in front of a Buddhist temple on one of those sunny days, eyes closed with my face turned up the morning sun. Even though the weather was still cold, it was the first time in days that I had been out in the sun and I was enjoying the mid-morning people watching in the sunshine. Westerners don’t typically attract a lot of attention in downtown Seoul but I was getting lots of odd looks from the passersby. Others had joined me in the sunshine, sitting on the stone wall and after a while it dawned on me that they were all deformed, crippled or otherwise handicapped in some way. It turns out that they were all beggars and I was in the middle of their usual begging territory in front of the temple. Apparently I looked healthy enough because nobody saw fit to give me a donation.

This was my first of many trips to South Korea. We were checking out a factory in the Anyang District and the work days were short so there was lots of spare time to look around. Seoul is pretty easy to get around in. They have a good subway system, most of the cabbies understood hotel names and the sidewalks are wide. Even with the crowds I never felt crowded. I was staying in a nice hotel that had a free happy hour, including drinks and food, for those staying on the executive floors. I wasn’t on those floors but looked like I fit in so nobody ever questioned me or presented me with a bill for all the food and drinks I consumed.

I picked up a few Korean phrases when I arrived in Seoul. They are the same phrases I learn wherever I go; hello, please, thank you and beer. Most of the younger educated people you run into in Seoul can speak English and we never really had any language problems.

I took the subway out to the Itaewon district one evening. It is a tourist zone with shopping and bars. You used to be able to buy some good knock-offs for cheap but now real stores have moved in and the independent vendors are harder to find. It was rush hour and the subway was packed with a standing room only crowd. I was the tallest, whitest guy on the train and all I could see was a sea of black hair.

We arrived in Itaewon without getting too lost on the subway and we started hitting the bars. The buildings along the main drag had storefronts on the lower level with bars either in the basements or on the second floor overlooking the street. Most of the signs were in English, unlike other areas of Seoul.

We moved from bar to bar along the main street and mixed in some shopping between drinks. I didn’t buy anything. I wouldn’t know a Hermes scarf from a herpes infested towel and wasn’t interested in buying a Coach purse that was made of cardboard. We found a couple of bars that had decent music but didn’t stay long at them. Every bar had a fleet of hostesses, each one anxious to be your friend as long as you bought drinks. That gets tired real fast so by midnight we were in a cab heading back towards the hotel. The cabbie was an old guy that didn’t speak any English but did manage to get us within half a mile of the hotel.

We were only in Seoul for a few days and spent the rest of the time there sampling the bars and restaurants in our hotel’s district. I love Korean food and you can eat pretty well for not much money, especially if you buy your food at a cart and eat out on the street. Even in the cold weather there were many street vendors offering up hot food and drink. I wasn’t sure what I was eating most of the time but it was tasty. I’ve always had a fairly robust constitution and can eat anything.

Our host took me out for dinner at an upscale restaurant and I was introduced to a Korean custom that I still don’t like. When in Korea it is polite to pour someone else’s drink and leave yours to be poured by him or her. The guys I was having dinner with always had a full glass, courtesy of yours truly, but mine was always empty. Maybe they were just really bad at taking hints (lip smacking, sighing, knocking my empty glass over, trying to drink out of an empty glass, trying to lick the bottom of the empty glass….) but the dinner was great. We had a constant stream of small dishes that were cooked on the tabletop grill. The grilled meat was tasty and when mixed with the side vegetables provided a great meal. I recognized most of the vegetables but tried everything. Some of the kim chi (fermented spiced cabbage) was a little strong but still very good when mixed with the meats.

Kim chi has a worldwide reputation that I was unaware of. When I left Incheon airport to head home I picked up a gift pack of 3 plastic bags of a variety of kim chi. I took it on the airplane with me and stuffed it in the overhead bin. The smell of the food slowly started seeping through the plastic wrap and soon the smell was just kind of hanging in the back, not really there but just enough to remind me of what was in the overhead bin. When we landed in San Francisco I opened the bin and the smell of kim chi rolled out like a wet porcupine and I almost choked. I pity the poor bastard that had his carry-on luggage in the bin with my kim chi. I made it through Immigration and headed to Customs. I had checked off on the Customs form that I was bringing in a food product. The Customs agent asked what I was bringing in. I replied that I had some kim chi. He laughed and told me that kim chi wasn’t food, stamped my form and I was in the country.

Al-Khobar 8-Feb-07

Trip Report
Al-Khobar, Saudi Arabia 8-Feb-07

The weekend is upon us. This is a good thing, the weekend, in most places but here we have limited recreational options. The weekend, as one of my neighbor's said once "is all about killing time". Neighbor was talking about something else, maybe his work day, but the sentiment fits.


If the weather is nice we can head down to the Corniche, grab a Starbucks chai and go for a stroll along the beach walk. There will usually be a few people out fishing and some families enjoying a picnic but, for the most part, the park is empty.






Another option is to head south along the Gulf shore for a Friday drive. There are several Family Only beaches. There are also opportunities to rent 4 wheel drive ATVs and race along the dunes. A picture of one of the rental agencies is shown here. Camel rides and pony rides are also available. The ponies are so little that my feet would be dragging if I ever got on one.




Trips to Bahrain remain a popular option for the weekend. We went over last weekend and stayed at the luxurious Tylos Hotel. The place was cheap but not that clean or comfortable. The beds were like concrete slabs. John found roaches in his room. I was woken by a phone call at 1:30 AM by a woman wanting to know if I wanted a massage.
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So, if the hotel is so crappy, why do we go? Bahrainis have beer. There are several bars clustered in the cheap hotel disctrict. I figured that after 5 weeks of drinking nothing but tea and water I deserved a cold beer so of I went.





Scenes from the car: Here is a picture of one of the larger mosques in Bahrain.




Bahrain is different from Saudi Arabia in more ways than just having beer. They are building a large financial center, skyscrapers and everything, along the Gulf shore. Several buildings are going up and most have some degree of architectural thought to them. No big rectangular boxes for these guys.










Scenes from the car: Construction cranes at the Financial Center.

















The big pointy building shown here is a pretty neat building. There are 2 similar towers side by each. The towers are connected by three walkways. Each of the walkways will have a windmill installed midway between the buildings. The windmills will generate 75% of the building's energy requirements. My question is... If trhee mills will generate 75% of the building's energy requirements, why not install 4 mills and be energy independant?

We also had the opportunity to walk through the local vegetable, meat and fish markets. I couldn't take pictures due to local cultural sensitivities but perhaps it is just as well anyway. Picture a big warehouse, filled with stalls, each run by an independent vendor. Who smokes. While cutting up your fish or your meat. The sanitary conditions in the meat market could turn you vegetarian. Uncovered, unrefrigerated meat hanging and dripping on the floor. The fish market was somewhat better but that is only because they were selling the fish whole. Only a few vendors were gutting and cleaning the fish.

All of that being said, what are my plans this weekend? I'm going to sit in the sunshine by the pool and do some reading. If I get adventurous I'll head into downtown Al-Khobar and buy a new pair of running shoes. I'll take the slow bus from the camp because, as we know, it's all about killing time.

Norway, 2004

Norway (Feb 2004)

Bodo (pronounced like Buddha) is a beautiful Norwegian port city on the North Sea just north of the Arctic Circle. Bodo is at the mouth of a rather long fjord with the town of Rognan, our final destination, at the far end of the fjord. We arrived from Oslo on the morning flight and waited in Bodo for the rest of our group to arrive. The group eventually consisted of a few Saudis, a Belgian inspector, our Norwegian host and myself.

While we waited our host took us to the Bodo Museum. The museum contained an excellent set of displays that chronicled the local area’s efforts during the Second World War. If you’re ever in the area I highly recommend visiting the museum.

It was February but it wasn’t as cold as I expected for being north of the Arctic Circle. A light coat and a pair of gloves were enough to keep warm. I am experienced in winter driving so we divided up the group between my car and our Norwegian host’s car. We drove along the fjord heading east on snow-packed narrow roads that rose and fell with the contours of the land beside the fjord. The road would drop steeply from mountaintops to just a few feet above the fjord. There was a slight chop to the water and it was a very cold looking, inky blue.

I was thoroughly enjoying the drive but my Saudi passengers, not used to snow or winter roads, looked extremely nervous. The car was a front wheel drive VW Golf with studded tires so I wasn’t concerned about the back end sliding around a little. My passengers sure were, especially when we were close to the water.

We arrived in Fauske and checked into the best, and only, hotel in town. The hotel restaurant was excellent and I had a great slab of musk ox for dinner.

The next morning we continued up the road to Rognan, a town of about 2,000 people with around 5,000 in the entire area served by the town. The largest employer in town used to be the insane asylum but two moves by the Norwegian government in the 1980s changed that. It was decided that the insane would be better served in Oslo where they could be close to hospitals and their families. It was a reversal of the previous “out of sight, out of mind” philosophy. The government also thought it would be a good idea to diversify the remote northern economies and encouraged businesses and factories to relocate northward. I didn’t ask how many of the factory workers used to be asylum workers but I kept a running tally in my head as the week wore on.

Rognan is a relatively quiet town, even in the summer. There is one hotel and the downtown is four or five square blocks. The shops are all small and they close up early with most of them, including the beer store, closed by 4:00 in the afternoon. The hotel dining room had a great view of the fjord. The dining room served good, basic meals and I had a reindeer steak wrapped in bacon one night that was fantastic. The steak was extremely tender for game and the bacon kept it from being too dry.

I have never slept in a smaller bed than I slept in at the hotel in Norway. Even as a kid I had bigger beds. They were big enough, barely, that my arms would not hang over the sides. My calves hung over the end of the bed. One of our group was used to bigger, grander hotels and insisted on having a bigger bed. The hotel managed to rope two little beds together but he still wasn’t happy.

We spent 4 days in the factory and we impressed with what we saw of the place. The food in the factory cafeteria was simple but really well prepared and tasty. We would get a cut of meat, usually chicken or fish, vegetables, either potatoes or rice and a dessert. There was always a big jug of fresh milk on the table.

I make it a habit of getting out of the hotel and cruising the streets in the evenings when I travel. The fresh air and exercise are good for me and I get to see some of the town. Usually there is a little bar somewhere along the way a guy can stop in and have a pint. I found a pub in Rognan but it was nearly empty and I found out why when I got my tab. Beer was around US$9 per pint. Our Norwegian host explained that most Norwegians drink at home due to the excessive taxation on alcohol. Up until then I had enjoyed Norway.

We headed back to Bodo along the south side of the fjord, along a road that swung far from the fjord into the surrounding mountains. One of our hosts had a small cabin up in the mountains that they would cross country ski into for weekends during the winter. We parked on the side of the road behind him and he pointed way off into the mountains to show us where his mountain retreat was. Several people in our group expressed doubt over the wisdom of having a cabin that you couldn’t actually drive up to.

We made it back to Bodo and checked into the hotel for the night. I ducked the group that I had been with for the last week and walked through the cold night air along the waterfront looking for a decent bar. Apparently this was a unique waterfront in the waterfronts of the world as there were no bars. I found a coffee that sold beer and quickly ran up a large tab.

I would highly recommend a trip to northern Norway for anyone interested in mountain scenery, fjords, friendly people and good food. If you drink beer there are better, cheaper places to go.