East Eats West

Help me make my holidays in Singapore and Hong Kong fun!

I will visit Singapore and Hong Kong in October for holidays and I am interested to hear if you, my reader, can show me attractions of those two cities I overlooked so far. Just leave a comment by clicking here. Thanks!

My Welcome-Back Party in the Bonsai-Garden

Picture: My Asia Trip picture show

First I would like to warmly  thank all my guests for generously donating money for the Sangkheum Orphanage in Siem Reap, Cambodia. 800 Swiss Francs were collected and I will double this amount and send the money to my friend Soley, the president of Sangkheum Center. I am sure the orphans will appreciate your generosity! Thank you very much.

On a warm and sunny Saturday afternoon I was happy to welcome over 40 of my friends and family in the most romantic Bonsai-Garden in Zurich. After a tour through the Bonsai-Garden, which is located close to the Rietberg Museum in Enge, I had my first brief presentation about the economical rise of Asia and the consequences for Switzerland. Werner of the Bonsai-Garden then prepared a light dinner with an Asian touch that was followed by various yummy desserts brought by the guests. Unfortunately forced us a thunderstorm forced to move inside for my travel-presentation and I presented in 45 minutes the highlights of my trip.

As I did my Good Bye Party at the same location last year it was some kind of déja-vu. And I feel more than happy to be back home again among my friends. It is also a sign of the rise of Asia that three of my friends will move to Singapore to work for Swiss banks shortly.

PS: Should you be interested to book the magical Bonsai-Garden for events, here is the address: Gablerstrasse 3, Zürich (next door to Rietberg Museum), Phone: 044 202 74 10

Computers cannot travel and give bad advice

Let’s say you want to go on holiday to South-East Asia and have never been to Laos and Vietnam but would like to find out if a trip there suits you and what itinerary you should take. How do you go about it? Searching Google, browsing online review services like www.tripadvisor.com or www.i-escape.com or buy a Lonely Planet? What if you want to know what VISA you need and what are typical hand-made souvenirs? Online services do not answer such questions but mostly provide places to stay or tell you how much a flight cost as the information is gathered from travel-agencies and the hotel-industry. Travel books like Lonely Planet or Fodor’s might get you detailed information about routes and places to stay but might lack on the inspirational side whereas books like Spas in Asia or Hotels in Asia might inspire you but are sometimes out-of-date, unhandy and mostly filled with beautiful pictures. The difficult task is brining the inspirational side together with the detail-planning of actual arranging a trip and so far I have not found an online-service which provides that. Computers cannot travel and are often bring up search-results that are huge-lists of text but lack inspirational pictures. If you go for example buying for a dress you go window-shopping and reading through price-lists. And this is the current weakness of travel-advice websites: they are not visual and inspirational enough. Not that with thousands of travel-blogs there is a lack in text and picture provided by traveling humans, just combining human knowledge with online search ability and then presenting it in an appealing way has not been achieved yet. In the meantime feel free to ask me for free travel-tips. 

The perils of frequent flyer programs

As I fly a lot I got a Miles&More Frequent Flyer VISA Card from the Lufthansa Star Alliance Network and every time I buy something with my VISA card, I get miles. As I fly back from Bangkok via Singapore to Zurich on a journey that takes almost a day, I wanted to upgrade from Economy to Business Class. I checked my miles online and saw that I have enough miles. This is when the troubles began.

I first sent Miles&More an Email and did not get an answer for over a week. So I decided to ask the airport Singapore Airlines office and they told me they could not upgrade, only KrisFlyers in Singapore. I then decided to ask the Star Alliance Miles&More office at the airport on the day of my departure. They said that technically in the system I could upgrade but they could not do it, only Singapore airlines. I went again to the Singapore Airlines office and insisted on an upgrade. After a few calls they found out that my ticket is a special ticket and they would have to ask the issuing office in Zurich if that is possible. Unfortunately this would take about three days and therefore they could not do it. I cannot even pay for an upgrade as my ticket is some kind of special ticket.

The moral of the story is that if I had known about the difficulties to get an upgrade, I would have never got a card in the first place. Secondly the procedure is so complicated and the customer service so bad, that I really wonder what the Star Alliance Network’s added-value is and thirdly, I rule that has been true for a long-time: never ever send an email to a website of a big company as you might never get a response. No more miles for me, just give me the cheapest rate for the flight!

I am back in Zurich

On the 11th of June I took a flight back home from Bangkok via Singapore to Zurich and arrived in Zurich on the 12th. As I was waiting at the airport lounge I heard someone calling my name and what a surprise it was to see my cousin  Anina sitting there, waiting for the same flight! She just spent about eleven months in New Zealand and was on her way back home, like me! So both of us are now back and getting accustomed to a regular life again. After 307 days or over 10 months on the road through Asia, finally and yes, also gladly. I am happy to get a job, work and earn some money in contrast to just spending it.

As I already got several emails from my readers complaining that you will miss my blog, I decided to continue writing. As my blog is called East Eats West and I have now extensively reported from the East, I shall write more about the West and how the West is dealing with the East.

Picture: My cousin Anina and me at the airport Zurich upon our arrival after a twelve hour flight from Singapore.

Welcome Back-Party in Zurich

For all the ones of you who do not receive my regular Email-Newsletter, I am announcing herewith that I will host a Welcome Back-Party in Zurich on Saturday the 24th of June. Just send me an Email to confirm your attendance and I will send you further information!

Traveling helps to uncover secret agent’s little lies

Sometimes the benefits of traveling are quite eye-opening, so to speak. I watched the new Mission Impossible 3 episode and immediately realized that the movie was a little incorrect regarding its Shanghai location. When Ethan Hunt travels to Shanghai to recover the Rabbit’s Foot (who has figured out what it was?) the first scenes with the skyscrapers are shot in Shanghai. But the following shots where Ethan frees his wife and runs around canals and old-style Chinese houses are not shot in Shanghai but a few hours away from Shanghai in scenic Suzhou famous for its canals and classical gardens. And I only know that because I was in Suzhou and took pictures of the canals. Anyway, the movie rocks!

Far is not always that far

Never ask a Singaporean if something is far because nothing is far in Singapore. Nevertheless you might hear someone saying that something is far, meaning farther away then for example Suntek city or more than a 15 minutes cab-ride. In contrast Americans would not mind to drive for 3-4 hours one way to visit friends and relatives in a neighboring town, their sense of distance being greatly affected by a vast country as I learned when I lived in San Franciso. For Swiss on the other hand everything is far when it is outside the town or the canton. When I lived in Bern, the Swiss capital, a one-hour drive away from Zurich, the biggest city, many friends considered this as living very far away from “home” and only a few came and visited me. And I am realizing that with my extensive traveling far is only what is more than a four-hour flight away from wherever I am. I guess globalization and budget-airlines make the world indeed smaller.

All sorts of Chinese

Like there is no homogenous Asia there is not only one typical Chinese. People who claim to be Chinese can be found across Asia but it is not always clear what makes them “Chinese”, as many of them do not live in China or Taiwan but in Malaysia, Thailand, Laos, the Philippines and elsewhere. The best definition of being Chinese I came across is so far a shared sense of heritage derived from a shared scripture and language, taste for Chinese food and strong sense of family and Chinese ancestry. But then again, it is not that all Chinese feel as one big unity, not at all. For example when I went out with a Hong Kong Chinese friend of mine she liked to point out to me Mainland Chinese, apparently distinguishable through their attire and rougher behavior. And when I spoke to a Singaporean Chinese who lives in Kuala Lumpur, she conceded that she feels a bit superior to Malaysian Chinese (who speak Cantonese in contrast to the Mandarin spoken in Singapore). And then there is the big group of ABCs or American-born Chinese who now return home to Mainland Chinese in flocks. Interestingly the Chinese Diaspora, like the Jewish Diaspora, is spread across the world and perceived as being successful and hard-working business people. Not that this business acumen is admired everywhere as hostilities in Malaysia against the Chinese tells.

Alex is the cure!

See what I found in Siem Reap: coughing syrup by the name of Alex!