Southeast Asia – Some Final Observations and Closing Thoughts

We’re back! We just walked back in the front door and it’s good to be back in San Francisco. It’s hard to believe that 85 days on the road could blow by so quickly. Time flies…we’re told. So many good stories, so many good memories.

One month into our journey we wrote a piece listing some miscellaneous observations that didn’t belong with other things that we’d written. With our trip to Southeast Asia over, it’s time to add to that list.

A Couple More Things About Myanmar –

Transportation Inside Myanmar

Getting between cities inside Myanmar caused us some planning nightmares. Turboprop planes. Narrow roads on mountain passes. Rickety train lines that haven’t been updated in decades. How does one decide? The travel websites normally do a wonderful job of providing insight but in this case they raised more questions than they answered.

Flying between cities inside Myanmar was our biggest conundrum. The domestic airlines don’t exactly have the best reputations for safety and the airplanes are all turboprops. Given that we had to fly over mountain ranges during the rainy season, we had real concerns about taking flights. On the flipside, flights can take as little as 45 minutes while bus and train rides can easily eat up 10 to 20 hours.

From Yangon to Bagan and from Mandalay to Inle Lake and from Inle Lake to Yangon, we chose to swallow our fears and take flights on the domestic airlines. On one of our domestic flights, from Mandalay to Inle Lake, the check in/boarding process didn’t inspire confidence. The airline provided us with hand written boarding passes, and a sticker with our destination to wear on our shirts. We were told to “just sit anywhere” on the plane and were handed an old school, hand written luggage tag for baggage claim.

The flight operates in a continuous circle from Yangon to Bagan to Mandalay to Inle Lake and back to Yangon, like a typical bus route. The total flight time was only 30 minutes. Interestingly, the two flight attendants were still able to serve a meal and beverage. Think about this – the TOTAL flight time was 30 minutes – the actual time at “cruising altitude” was only about 10 minutes.

We flew both Mandalay National Airlines and Yadamarpon Airlines and were pleasantly surprised. The planes were very modern, the staff was professional, we always departed and arrived on time and the flights were very smooth. All of our worries were over nothing. We’d happily fly inside Myanmar again.

From Bagan to Mandalay, we decided to take a bus because it was only a four-hour trip and we thought it would be a nice way to observe the countryside. We felt like royalty as we were THE ONLY passengers on the large coach bus. The bus line had more employees on the bus than paying passengers. We had a driver, a driver’s assistant, a bus attendant (serving drinks) and a mechanic. The bus even had video monitors at each seat and a full library of movies and television shows to keep passengers entertained. Again, an excellent experience.

An interesting fact about Myanmar – until 1970, drivers in Myanmar operated right-hand drive vehicles that drove on the left side of the road. As a former British colony, this makes sense. Today however, cars drive on the right-hand side of the road, but most cars are still right-hand drive. Because we said most cars that means some cars are left-hand drive but drive on the right-hand side of the road. This can cause quite some confusion when local bus passengers must walk into traffic to board the bus on the left-hand side. But there’s another problem. Toll booths are set up for cars and buses to pay on the right side of the vehicle but in some cases the driver is sitting on the left side of the transport. As such, buses often have an assistant driver whose sole job is to pay tolls for the driver. So nutty.

During our long bus ride to Mandalay, we got to observe some quite interesting local infrastructure. For instance, we shared a LONG one-lane bridge that was also outfitted with train tracks. That’s right. Both cars and buses must not only share the bridge with traffic coming the opposite direction but also with trains.

Dining

1)  If you ever find yourself in Mandalay and craving a good Indian restaurant – you MUST visit Indian Tadka. Not only was it one of the best meals we had on our Southeast Asian trip, it may have been one of the best Indian restaurants at which we have ever dined. Importantly, we were the only two diners in the restaurant.

2)  We went to a local restaurant in Mandalay during a long day of sightseeing. We asked our driver for a local restaurant (i.e. Myanmarese cuisine). Instead he brought us to a restaurant where local Myanmarese eat. The menu is very simple, you have a choice of small, main dishes. We ordered a Myanmarese chicken curry and a dish of steamed vegetables. What we did not expect was the HUGE amount of side dishes that automatically came with the meals we ordered. Not only do they have a staff member dedicated to serving unlimited steamed rice (she came back a few times asking if we wanted more), they provided us with all sorts of standard side dishes to accompany our two meals. For US $8 we got our two main dishes, all the side dishes, a bottle of water and 2 large ice-cold beers.

3)  Despite the heat and most restaurants/bars being open air, your beer will stay cold. Bars and restaurants supply beer cozies. This was true not only in Myanmar but throughout Southeast Asia.

Shopping Experience in Yangon

Since we wanted to pack as light as possible for our Southeast Asian adventure, we decided that we would buy all our gear in Yangon for our Habitat for Humanity Build. To that end, we arrived a day early. Shopping turned out to be an entertaining day. While we did do some shopping in Ho Chi Minh City, there were a good many things that we still needed to find like pants for E, a few water-wicking shirts, hats, work gloves, proper shoes and socks.

We first went to a local market, Bogyoke Market. We meandered through this busy market only to discover most of the items sold there were local dress only. We did, however, find a shoe shop and purchased two pairs of sneakers and socks for the equivalent of only $25.00. These were not the best quality; however, we only needed them for a week and E at least was able to go for one 3-mile run in her pair.

Frustrated by our inability to find what we wanted, we decided to head over to a local store called Ocean Market Center to get the rest of our items. It was a local chain, similar to a Kmart or Walmart. We found the rest of our items there; however, we knew finding work gloves would be a slight challenge. We found a generic picture of work gloves online and saved it to our phone. We showed them to an employee and found them straight away. We’ll have to remember that trick in the future.

Additional Thoughts from Southeast Asia –

Restaurants for a Cause

Have you ever traveled in a third world country and found the service levels wanting? It’s elementary that the locals can’t deliver a simple level of service because they’ve never lived the experiences. How do you explain a martini to someone that doesn’t drink? A bottle of ketchup should come standard with an order of French fries.

The heart-breaking part of the story is that many kids leave their local villages for the allure of the big city. However, they find the big cities a challenge and often find themselves in a bit of trouble. Their positive intentions are often met with “employment” as drug mules, street criminals and prostitutes. Hardly a good situation.

But there is a remedy for both of these challenges. We found several training restaurants scattered throughout Southeast Asia dedicated to bridging this service experience challenge and finding gainful employment for the street youth. We were very happy to support them when we found them.

Our first experience was with Oodles of Noodles in Hoi An, Vietnam. Our second experience was with Sanon Training Restaurant in Bagan, Myanmar. But we found many more as we scanned local street maps for dining options.

The goal of these training restaurants is to get the kids off the street and to give them the language skills and training to build careers in hospitality. The benefactors provide housing, food and teach language skills. The kids also train as hosts/hostesses, servers, chefs and bartenders. The training restaurants also provide mentors that follow early careers and help the kids find employment at local restaurants, the big resorts and other venues catering to tourists. The training restaurants rely solely on benefactors and restaurant profits; the kids don’t have to pay a thing. It’s truly a win-win situation.

Although a slightly different theme on doing good while dining out, we found a restaurant called Cabbages and Condoms in Bangkok, Thailand. Yep, that’s the name. A percentage of their sales goes to the promotion of safe sex (AIDS and STD’s are rampant in Asia) and they even provide free condoms with your restaurant bill. Scattered throughout the restaurant are other displays for which diners can contribute funds – one notable display was for teaching local kids to swim as 4 children die every day from drowning accidents in Thailand.

We are very fond of these concepts. Not only do we feel like we are giving back (even if in a small manner), but we think this is a great practice for this region as tourism is a large part of the economy and improving service levels can only help.

Our Experience Watching American Sports in Southeast Asia

We travel a lot and it makes following our favorite sports teams a bit challenging. On this trip, we had the opportunity to watch quite a few games in local bars when we were in the larger cities. E was super excited to watch the Capitals win the Stanley Cup and we watched the Warriors win the NBA title a few days later.

Even though the games started at 7:00am or 8:00am local time, we were able to find bars showing them in Ho Chi Minh, Singapore and Phnom Penh. The bars cater to expats and always have rugby, cricket, futbol and basketball on the televisions. Naturally, they even serve alcoholic beverages this early in the morning. Particularly noteworthy was the eclectic mix of people watching the games drinking a cold beer versus those that were in their suits and ties coming in for a quick breakfast on their way to the office.

For the World Cup, we were also quite lucky. Although the games started at 7:00pm, 9:00pm, 11:00pm or 1:00am, we found several fun places to watch the earlier games. In Penang, Malaysia, we watched the Spain-Portugal epic match while being serenaded by a quite talented cover band. We lounged in plastic recliners in front of a big screen at an open-air pub overlooking the ocean in Ao Nang Beach, Thailand. In Bangkok we sat under an awning at a pub along a main road – also watching the game on the big screen. During the France-Argentina Round of 16 game, there was a huge thunderstorm also taking place – causing a few glitches in the game broadcast. Turned out there was some spectacular action in both the game and in the sky!

Before the World Cup is over we will have watched games in 4 countries and on 3 continents!!

More Random Thoughts –

Here are some final random thoughts that don’t belong elsewhere:

1)  Don’t bother packing a tooth brush. Every hotel provides a toothbrush and toothpaste for your use, and they even replenish them daily should you choose to have housekeeping.
2)  Vending machines have come a long way. We’ve all seen vending machines that even cook food while you wait. But we’ve never seen a vending machine that dispenses gas before. But there it was just down the street from our hotel in Ao Nang. Pull on your motorbike. Drop in a few coins and pump your gas.
3)  Speaking of gas stations. In Myanmar, the stations are full service. Drive in and tell the attendant what you want. Gas, water, food. Whatever you need. Nothing unusual about that. But it takes a moment to notice that all the attendants are females. Young attractive females. We get that sex sells, but gasoline? Really? Look we’re not responsible for the news, we just deliver it.
4)  Carry a small plastic bag with you when you are sightseeing. You must remove your shoes before entering any temple complex and you may want to carry them with you for peace of mind. Most people slide off their shoes and leave them in cubby holes at the entrance; however, on a few occasions we’ve heard that shoes can go missing. Not a big deal if you are wearing cheap flip flops; but, the streets are dirty and you may not be excited about walking barefoot to the nearest shoe hawker stall.
5)  S is not a big guy. In the US, he’s a large for most clothing items. When buying pants in Thailand, he’s apparently a XXXL and in Myanmar he’s a XXL for shirts. Actually, we’re not sure what size shirt in Myanmar because XL is the largest size we found in most cases.
6)  If you order a cocktail, don’t expect a plastic straw. Often you will get a metal or bamboo straw. We are OK with this – it’s much better for the environment. We’ve mentioned this before, but its fascinating given that all water is served in plastic water bottles.
7)  Smoking is still allowed inside restaurants and pubs. Open air or not, doesn’t matter. We were not a fan, but what can we do? Just know to expect it.
8)  There are a lot of stray dogs all over Asia. Most have mange and fleas but more than a few have rabies. In most cases, they leave you alone; however, some travel in packs and others will protect their turf. They also like to chase and nip at the heels of people on motor bikes. They intimidated E quite a bit and gave both of us quite a scare when 4 of them began running toward us and barking wildly as we rounded a corner while visiting a quiet temple off Inle Lake. We are sharing this so that you are not surprised if you visit any of the areas we did. Take tuk-tuks at night, don’t look them in the eye, behave confidently and cross the street if need be. We were never in real danger but it’s discomforting.
9)  One parks in a driveway and drives on a parkway. So what’s a sidewalk for? Parking your motorbike and setting up hawker stalls naturally. If you are reading this post while casually walking down a sidewalk – enjoy your nice comfy “commute.” Sidewalks as a place to walk are unheard of in most of Southeast Asia. In many spots, sidewalks don’t even exist. In others, they’re in poor shape. When they’re in decent shape, you walk in the Street due to impediments placed on the sidewalks like roadside restaurants, shopping stalls and motorbikes. And don’t get us started on the open sewers.
10)  There aren’t many communist countries left in the world, but there are four alone in Asia (China, Laos, North Korea and Vietnam). When you think of a Communist country, you may think you would “know” when you are visiting one of those countries. There must be visible signs, right? We visited two on our trip and we couldn’t notice hardly at all – well aside from the omnipresent hammer and sickle flags. In fact, Laos sells drugs openly in bars. We stuck with alcohol; however, we observed people inhaling nitrous oxide balloons, and ordering items off menus such as opium tea, marijuana pizza and magic mushroom shakes. Don’t worry Facebook works everywhere we went.
11)  Most kings and queens have long abdicated their thrones in Southeast Asia. Thailand, however, is a notable exception. You will see The King’s photo in every bar, restaurant, hotel, other public establishments and throughout the city. Do not say anything derogatory about The King – you will go to prison for a long time.
12)  Those of you itching to get a tattoo, DO NOT consider getting a Buddha tattoo. This is highly offensive and a crime.
13)  Locals would love the opportunity to practice their English with you. If you have any free time, embrace it! This is a fantastic way to spend some time engaging with the locals. When we finished our Inle Lake boat trip, we were invited into the boat company’s office where our boat driver and four other boat drivers were awaiting their teacher to arrive for an English lesson. They asked us to come in and chat with them for a while, so they could practice. We had a great time and a couple of good chuckles.
14)  Malaysia is the fourth most populous country in the world and the largest Muslim nation. On our flight to Kuala Lumpur, aboard a Malaysia Airlines flight, we observed a lot of Muslim references on each of our personal video screens. Their interactive map displayed the direction and distance to Mecca, and the only “reading material” was The Quran.  Before takeoff, a long message was posted on each personal video screen that read, “In the name of Allah, the Most Compassionate. All praise be to Allah, the one who has placed this transportation at our service, that we ourselves would not have been capable of, and to Allah we shall return. In the name of Allah, we begin to move (take-off) and stop (land). With his protection, Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate.” It’s unclear to us whether the message was shown to travelers because it was during Ramadan or if the message was meant to reassure passengers after the airline lost 3 planes in 2014.

A Cost of Living Comparison

We thought it would be fun to discuss and compare the cost of living around Southeast Asia. Some people track it by comparing the cost of a Big Mac meal from McDonalds (also known pejoratively as the American Embassy). We were never going to walk into one, so we decided early on to compare the cost of a small bottle of water. We visited Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Singapore, Myanmar, Cambodia and Malaysia. Before you peak at the order of cost below, where do you think it would cost the most/least to buy a bottle of water? Here are the costs in order from the least expensive to the most expensive:

Thailand at a cost of $0.21, or 7 Thai Baht
Myanmar at a cost of $0.22, or 300 Burmese Kyat
Laos at a cost of $0.23, or 2,000 Laos Kip
Cambodia at a cost of $0.30, or a cost of 1,200 Cambodia Riel
Malaysia at a cost of $0.38, or 1.50 Malaysian Ringgit
Vietnam at a cost of $0.44, or 10,000 Vietnamese Dong
Singapore at a cost of $1.20, or 1.60 Singapore Dollars

Thailand/Laos/Myanmar are very similar in cost and then you see a small uptick until you get to Singapore. Everything is expensive there – as expected. The only real shocker was that Vietnam was more expensive than Malaysia.

We hope you learned some fun things and think that we dispensed some useful advice if you plan on heading to Southeast Asia. We are happy to answer any additional questions you may have and/or provide some suggestions when you are ready to plan your adventure to this amazing part of our world. Please comment below or email us with feedback. Did you enjoy the photographs and videos? Are the posts too long, too short or about right? Please help make the blog more useful.