Travel and Health

 

We arrived in China on Wednesday and on Sunday my colleague and I were both sick. We had done a lot of things right: Used bottled water for brushing teeth as well as drinking, avoided eating food from suspect sources, but we still got sick. AJ, my partner, had stomach problems, and I had "flu like symptoms", basically achey joints and a dry cough.

What we could have done better is carry a small bottle of hand sanitizer in our pants pockets when we were out and about. Public lavatories are not frequent and don't have the amenities were used to.

And we didn't pack prescription drugs with us before we left. You can go to your family doctor, explain what your about to embark upon and (s)he will write prescriptions for the most likely problems.

The dumb thing I did is that I have a company issued travel kit that contains:

Gentamicin Sulfate eye drops for eye infections.

Diphenhydramine, Benadryl, which you don't need a prescription for, and by the way the cheapest way to get this is in Tylenol-PM.

Loperamide, which is a little safer than Lomotil.

And finally, the big gun, Sulfamethoxazole/Trimethoprim. This is a powerful antibiotic which I would only use in an emergency.

I had this kit in a convenient zippered pouch and left it in my desk!!

Fortunately, we were still able to work, and were only knocked out of exploring the area for two days.

I had made a promise to AJ that my plan was to go in healthy, come out healthy, and don't let 'em kill us. Technically, I kept my promise, we just got sick in the middle.

Xiamen and Gulangyu Photos

These are, more or less, a random collection of pictures I took during my visit to Xiamen, China and it's satellite island, Gulangyu.

Near my hotel was a boulevard that had been blocked off as a pedestrian only shopping area. My last day in country, my last couple of hours, in fact, I frantically walked through this area taking pictures of the shops and people. Some, I asked if I could take their picture, and everyone was happy to pose. Since I stood out, and had gotten used to being stared at, it wasn't difficult to get their attention with my camera. These two girls were enjoying a break.


This young lady was walking past me and let me take her picture.






This delightful woman came up to me and wanted her picture taken. I was tickled to oblige. After I'd snapped the picture, she said , "Xie, Xie." "Thank you" I said, "Xie, Xie" as she hurried away, waving, very pleased with herself. I heard this recently, "Growing old is a privilege, not a curse." She embodied that sentiment.







I frequently noticed people snacking on corn on the cob, which they buy from street vendors. When I eat corn on the cob, I'm never as elegant as this young lady.










Earlier in the week, we walked to the ferry docks to cross the channel to Gulangyu. They've created beautiful parks on both sides of the channel. This is on the Xiamen side.





Another of the Xiamen side.









The park on the Gulangyu side has almost a theme park feel to it.






I was told of two other parks within a short distance from our hotel, but didn't have the time to find and explore them. This is another view of the Gulangyu park, just on the west shore of the channel.

The previous two pictures are from a little trip to the island of Gulangyu.

It was a European, mostly British, enclave, with remarkable architecture. Some of it is in decay, but much is preserved as tourist attractions. Many guided tours passed us during our visit.

To us target-oriented-shopper types it means one thing: Pearl World and Nena.

We found the shop and introduced ourselves. The name of my employer worked powerful magic. They immediately fetched Nena, a young girl of about 25 who spoke very good English, which, I came to realize was taught mostly by people from my company. She opened a business card binder with page after page of our cards in it. I, foolishly, didn't bring one. No matter, my partner had one, and he had "The List". Pearl World is famous among my coworkers.

We spent two hours there filling orders from the people at home, selecting the pearls, deciding the length, and watching the girls string them.

I asked for a jade bracelet and got to hand pick the beads and helped arrange them into something I thought C would like. Fun!

It's 4:00 AM here, Saturday morning. We're going back!

On Gulangyu

This is a picture of a cute little girl. Her lovely, fashionable mother just happened to be in the frame. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Junk Boat

Junk Boats are motorized now.

Narita to Xiamen

The Tokyo, Narita Airport reminds me of Heathrow. The layout is almost identical. If you've been to one, you'll feel comfortable in the other.The Japanese live in a compact environment The hotel rooms are small but nicely appointed. The public restrooms are just too small for me. Even the men's room in the JAL Executive Lounge was confining. (Speaking of crowded, the culture allows line jumping. This morning, several times, people crowded ahead of me. Odd, in such a seemingly orderly society.)(Update: They might not have been Japanese.)

I'm sure that the tap water in the hotel is safe to drink. Japan is fastideous about cleanliness and health in general. I did use it once to brush my teeth, but I felt better using bottled water.

It was windy when we landed yesterday, but this morning was calm and sunny, a beautiful day to sight-see the south east coast-line of Japan. The pictures here are of the bay near Nagoya and the bridge near Kobe.

The flight to Xiamen is on a JAL 67, a wonderful plane, my favorite.

Narita

The first leg of our journey was to Narita. A 10 hour flight on United. My partner had a bad reaction to the salmon, but was better by the end of the flight. We spent the night at the Airport Hilton, and will leave in a few hours for Xiamen on JAL. The Hilton is our preferred place to stay, the ANA Hilton is smaller and not as clean. I'll get some pictures later and add them to this post.

It's easy to forget how much bigger the Pacific ocean is than the Atlantic. From Seattle to London is a 9 to 10 hour flight, half of that is over North America. Seattle to Tokyo is over a 10 hour flight.

I didn't bring the USB cable for the camera, so I'll try to buy one somewhere.

Update: Got a cable. Here are a couple of pictures of the Narita Hilton.

Travelog: Xiamen, China

Xiamen is located in the Fujian Province of China. Fujian is about 500 miles North of Hong Kong, and looks out to sea at the island of Taiwan, approximately 150 miles due East.

I will be traveling there on business in a few days and hope to provide a few insights on the trip and my experiences.

Xiamen is nestled on the mainland side of the Amoy Island.

Monica Schroeder

Thanks to John Scalzi, I've found some new music to help pass the time on my commute.
This is one of my favorite tracks also, generously made available on her web site.