Everyone asks us:

2008年5月9日 星期五

50 days passed.

People we met from locals to the travellers around the world. They all like to ask us some questions as below. Maybe you can help us to come out some good answers. :D

1) Where are you from?
Are you from Japan? Korea? China? USA? (....)

2) Is your language same with Japanese? Korean? Chinese?

3) Do you speak Japanese? Korean? Chinese?


4) What is your name?

5) Is Taiwan independent? Is Taiwan a country?

6) Is Taiwan a small island?

7) Does Taiwan belong to China?

8) How big is Taiwan?

9) How many population in Taiwan?

10) How long is it from the northest to the southest in Taiwan ?
How long does it take from the northest to the southest by bus?

11) How about from the eastest to the westest?

12) Do you live in Taipei? How big is Taipei? How many population?

13) If we go to Taiwan, what we can see? what we can do?

14) Are many travellers in Taiwan?

15) Do you like Taiwan / Taipei?

16) Do you like to eat Sushi?

17) Do you hope Taiwan to be independent or be with China?

18) What is the relationship between Taiwan and China?

19) Do you have same food with China?

20) How to write my name in Chinese?

21) How long have you been travelling?

22) How long will you travel?

23) Where have you been in South America?

24) What is your next destination?
Where (or which countries) are you going later?

25) You need visa to Bolivia? to Aregenita? any other countries?

26) Are you students or you work in Taiwan?

27) Is it easy to find a job after you are back to Taiwan?

28) How to say ¨ Hi¨ ¨Good morning¨ ¨Good Night¨ ¨Thank you¨?

29) Do you drink Tea?

30) Do you eat bread?

31) Do you like Peru, Chile and Aregentina?

32) Does ¨Aligado¨ mean thank you? (.....)

33) Is Taiwan richer than China?

34) Do you have any brothers or sisters? (People who asked this question think Taiwanese also can only have one child)

35) Do you speak Spanish?

36) How you travel S. America without speaking Spanish?







37) Are you a couple? (..................#$%...) (Read more...)

Goodbye, Bariloche

2008年4月14日 星期一

4/10 - 4/13 Bariloche

Bariloche is a beautiful town surrounding with mountains and lakes. We stayed here for four days and visited seven lakes, El Bolson nearby city llao llao etc.

We enjoyed the sceneries indeed, but the weather was very cold here. The average temperature was below 10C, so we always worn a lots of clothes going out. We didnt know why the season changed so fast, as the weather was very hot around above 20C in Mendoza, like summer. However when we took 16 hrs bus from Mendoza to Bariloche and got off, o...f... freezing...in particullar, the wind blew into our face and bodies from the neck... Summer became to winnter merely cost 16hrs...


We tried to smile in the freezing days with sunshine (The sun is just for decoration... no any warm.), See us...

(Read more...)

Have you got my mail from Valparaiso

2008年4月6日 星期日

Day 17-18 4/4 Santiago --> Valparaiso - 4/5 Valparaiso

A French who is our group member of the Inca Trail trekking said ¨Valparaiso is not very clean city and there are many dogs (actually, we saw more cats and birds), but it is very typical, he likes it indeed¨ When we walked around the city in these 2 days, we found it was full of the smell of urine. One American guy said "it seems people like to go to pee in the street, it is why the smell is everywhere".

Our initial impression for Valparaiso was that it is a harbor city. There should be lots of people staying in the beach and enjoying the sunshine. Even though it is part of truth, the surprising thing for us in visiting the city is that we saw plenty of paintings on the wall or outside of houses. At that time, as if we were wandering in the public art gallery and seeing the various cretivities created by different artists.

Here below you can see the drawings by many unknown people.

(Read more...)

Cusco = Shopping

2008年4月5日 星期六

Day 8-10: 3/26 - 3/28 Cusco

Most of people in Cusco are divided into two types only: Vendor and Purchaser. Walking on Cusco´s street, lots of vendors come to you and introduce food, tours, accommodations and even souvenirs. Everything looks so great and attractive. You just take money out from your pocket and you can get everything.

We are also the purchasers in Cusco, but not really for foods, tours, etc. My baggage had no news and we had a 4-day Inca trail trek in the corner. The most urgent thing is to get my clothes, equipments done.


We first went to Topy top to get some clothes. Topy top is kind of like Net in Taiwan. You can get everything here, shoes, pants, tops, bags, hats with low price and there is a brand called Hang Tang here as well. But it is totally different with what we have in Taiwan. Also, you can get some Sport clothes, Adidas, Nike here as well.

Then, the next stuff is my underware. We went to a shop owned by a elder woman. Of course, she doesn´t speak English. Her assistant, a young girl, doesn´t speak as well. There was a male customer in the shop. He was the only one to help us translate most of things........ @@ I have no any secrets in Cusco since then...

I am a contact-lens heavy user. However, my contact-lens are in my big backpack and travel to somewhere. I thought the compensation would include this. So we walked into a glasses store. It is kind of traditional stores. Although there are lots stores around, it is always packed by customers.

The contact-lens is cheap in Taiwan, but it is incredible expensive in Peru. Of course, here no too many people use it, that´s why the price higher. I understand that, but you know, just still can´t angry at my lost baggage.

After a long confirmation with poor Spanish and poor English, we finally got the price that the 120ML liquid is 35 pesos, 14 days contact-lens is 95 pesos. The most unbelievable stuff is the plastic box for putting contact-lens, it costs me 7 soles. Come on! it should be free. Totally drove me crazy. (But at that time, I thought I would get the compensation. That´s why I just paid for it.)

I also had a test for my eye degree. It is very similar with the way in Taiwan. So I was feeling similar expect the lovely female doctor was speaking in Spanish. The last one test is to read the alphabets on the wall. The dear doctor kept asking me to read the same line. Although I could see them clearly, I couldn´t help to think : they are just 5 alphabets. Are they really sure the test is accurate?? But anyway, in the end, I got my contact lens. Happy.

To anticipate Inca trail, we have to stay in the tent for 3 days, of course, there is no power for charging cameras. So I definitely need a charger for my camera in case not to lose the landscape during the trekking.

The battery I am using is for Panasonic FX-7, and suitable for Fuji´s some models. So I tried to ask the charger for these two models. However, it seems Panasonic and Fuji are small portortion in Cusco. Some shops only sell Sony cameras. Some shops are only for Canon, Sony, Nikon. (But I saw many tourists use panasonic´s, well, they might not have the problems in losing baggage). After lots of enquiries, I finally got one in Nishiyama. It costs me USD 130 in cash and usd 145 in credit card. Please note, the price is different in different shops with same store name.

We found out in Cusco there are so many shops that you can rent or buy equipments for trekking or amazon. And the price is cheaper than the agency provides and the euipments is maybe better as well. If I knew this in advance, I wouldn´t carry a sleeping bag and a walking stick with me, and now both of them are nowhere as well.

I have to say thank TACA and LA airport to give us such different and interesting experience in Cusco. So that we could close to the local life and see various stuff here in Cusco.

Deeply appreciate it.

(A brand new Mei from inside to outside with a green new backpack. )

(Read more...)

Our favourite dishes in Cusco

2008年3月29日 星期六

24 March - 1 April in Peru

Hi, it seems we always talk about people or
something happened in Peru. Here we want to introduce our favourite food in Cusco to you after many tries in different restaurants.

Cold dish - Ceviche
(fish with sour taste)

The food is a bit like Tailand´s code dish.

Soup - Dieta de Pollo

(Chicken, rice, carrot, spinach, potato)

The suop´s taste is not very strong and smooth to eat it up.








Main Course - Aji de gallina
(Sharp huancaina Salsa, Pope, hen, onion, lettuce, rice, egg)

It is not curry food, just look like that. Try it.









Drinks - Chicha Morada
(purple corn, lemon, pineapple and so on)

The drink is very special and delicious.

Other traditional foods.

Dish1 - Dish2

Dish3 - Dish 4

Dish1: Palta Natural
The food is like fruit or vegetable.

Dish2: Chupe de Camaron
(rice, pope, milk, cheese, egg, choclo, vegetables)
However, we don´t like the soup very much, as it has a strong taste with special spice.

Dish3: Trucha

Dish4: Lomo saltado
(Fried meet, potato and tomato)

(Read more...)

The longest night and day from Ayacucho to Cusco

2008年3月28日 星期五

Day 6 night to Day 7 from Ayacucho to Cusco (Arrived on 3/25)

Daniel went to "Express los Chankas" bus station, after his work, to say goodbye to us which made us moved deeply. We were going to tear when he ran after the bus to see our leaving.
After the touching fareware, we took the Chankas bus to Cusco from Ayacucho around 6.40pm on 24 March. However, it was the beginning of our nightmare. When we got on the bus, a not good smell came to our nose. At that moment, we found our mask left in the big luggage, so what we can do was using our coats to cover our face to stop the unclear smell. When everybody settled down, the bus set off the long journey.


Ayacucho to Andahuaylas: from 6.40pm, 24 March to 6.20am, 25 March

Andahuaylas to Cusco : from 7.00am, 25 March to 6.30pm, 25 March
(one stop in the route: Abancay)

The horrible thing was that the route was not flat and full of small stone. The bus went up and down all the way made us extremely headache. We were wondering if the bad route last few hours only, however, the bus kept on the road for almost 20 hours. We were going to die really. We didn´t know how to have a good position to sit or sleep, and we didn´t know how to smile to face the hard situation.

(We were very ugly and exhausted at that time)

In the certain route, I wanna go to the toilet, but we didn´t know how to tell the driver or bus conductor for the thing (The bus didn´t provide the toilet.) Thus I decided to tolerate for a while, but you know, the bus went up and down frequently, oh my god, it was definitely a torture for me in my lifetime, I wanna cry ... Finally, Mei accompanied me to tell the conductor what we wanted and luckily he said ¨ wait a moment!¨. Then the bus stopped in a place after few minutes and let people get off. Lots of people went to find different places to go to the pit stop in the wild. Anyway, I finally released... So please keep it in mind "don´t go with the way to Cusco from Ayacucho if you want, please take flight if needed."

A lesson learn is that we should cherish what we own now, as many local people in Peru live in the harsh conditions. When Mei and I complained all the time on the way to Cusco, they still sleplt well (Maybe they also feelpainful, but we didn´t know). I was thinking were we too weak to face the tough situation? The other lesseon learn is that the bus journey gave us a chane to realise the local people´s living. Thanks god, we have experienced and we have learned.

Even though the scenery in the route from Abancay to Cusco was very beautiful and splendid, we didn´t have any energy to take as many as photos.

Accommodation in Cusco: Casa de la Gringa http://www.casadelagringa.com/ USD 12.44 per person, twin bed room with shared bathroom

(Read more...)

Exchange money in Ayachucho

2008年3月27日 星期四

Day 6 3/24 Ayacucho -> Cuzco

The first thing we needed to do today was to change money as we didn´t have enough soles to buy bus tickets. We changed some yesterday with the owner, but dare not to bother her again. There is a bank just in front of our hotel. But they don´t provide exchange service. They said: to the national bank. Luckily, Jacqui did show us where it is yesterady, so it didn´t take much time to look for it.


Before we got into the bank, we saw a long que on the street around the bank. I guessed it was for ATM or something. But I was totally wrong, the que was extenting from the bank. I asked a guard about the place to change money, (People were laughing when they heard my poor spainsh) he pointed the line and showed the meaning that you need to que...(people were laughing again...@@). We couldn´t believe this and couldn´t understand what happened here. People were so eager to withdraw money from the bank or somthing?? totally no idea.



So we were back to our good frinds, the hotel owner and the manager. The manger was trying to say that we should change money somewhere, so we kept saying the bank is full of people. Just too many people. Finally the owner showed up and said ok to let us change money in the hotel. We so love her.

We didn´t know why but the manager went out after confirming the money we needed. We thought they didn´t have enought soles in the hotel at that moment. (That was a silly idea i know) Few minutes later, we got soles and finally could buy the bus tickets to Cuzco tonight. Happy again.

The manager and the owner can only Spanish. After two days communication, we could almost understand each other via body language and unspoken consensus. That gave us strong spirit and believe we won´t have any problems in S. America. *___*

Getting enough money, we headed for the bus station to buy tickets. We walked down the stree and turned left to a walking path which we had pasted lots of time. And just found out with surprise that there are sooooo many money exchange stands over there.

We just suddently realised the fact that yesterday when we said to Daniel and Jacqui that we didn´t have enough soles, they just kept saying the shops didn´t close on sunday. At that time, we just though of bank, and didn´t have 2nd thought about money exchange. And we also just realised that the manager was trying to tell us we could change money in these places, not the bank. In the end, he came here to change money for us. We are so grateful to these things and learn more about these little things now.



We were thinking to buy the tickets for 7:00 pm one, however, the last two seats were purchased at the same time when were asking. So we changed the bus to depart at 6:40 pm.

We were a bit worried about that we couldn´t say goodbye to Daniel then, as we said we would meet around 6:30 pm in the bus station. We just couldn´t do anything.

As to the journey, it would take about 24 hours to Cuzco. I heard it is tough, but no idea how tought it would be at that time. Let´s see.

Travel: By Los Chankas, 65 soles per person (Journey is Ayacucho-Andahuaylas(change bus)-Cuzco), takes about 24 hours.


To be continued.....
.

M. (Read more...)