Amazing Adventures of Boris

TV is on. Somewhere. Monotonous monologue in Russian. Tonight the noise is a friend, reminding that there is life outside my dark bedroom. Nothing much worked today. VPN problems, Wifi problems, scanner / printer problems, as also phones / sims / roaming as well as credit cards have caused problems lately I am sensing a conspiracy here; technology is turning against me. Only Wii console is still providing its usable services. I tried to relax with MarioKart; no avail, victory is not upon me on this day, lost 200 points in no time to lesser warriors. Fuse burned as well to stop Wii session, used mobile phone to orienteer through my two safety doors to corridor to pull swiches in the fuse box. Light back on, but safer to hide in the bedroom. Security lady started in the renovated corridor today, or a cockroach killer. It's too early summer for cockroaches to climb to the sixth floor. And they can't use the new lift. All I see is their antennas and stains on the stairs; cockroches don't like big funeral ceremonies.

Time to wrap up this holiday. Today I got my photo of reclining Buddha, and some more curry, so all is done and time to head for Helsinki, and St. Petersburg.

 

We spent the last night in Siem Reap by pleying pool and drinking beer. One of the working girls in the temple bar wanted to show us some club, but it was (yeah, suprise suprise) a lame girl joint so we had a pizza and went to leep. Our bus trip to Bangkok was fun too, our airconditioned bus with the toilet was missing the toilet and airconditioning and it was also overbooked. The backbacks were piled on the corridor and some people were sitting on extra plastic chairs on front. The road was still under construction so it was real rumble and shake experience between the neverending rice fields. Border was quite painless, and we arrived to chaotic Bangkok traffic around 9. My hotel reservation didn't go through, so we got another one from a tourist joint and jumped into taxi. Our hotel was close to the siem square, where all the big shopping centres are. I'm such a bore these days that I wanted to avoid hotels where handjobs are included, or the overcrowded backbacker ares. Pizza, quick thai therapy and sleep.

 

Second day was extremely hot. Started off by two hours by the pool. After that we went to Chatuchak weekend market. It's a huge area where everything is sold from fake clothes to art and endangered animals. The pop art there was actually very nice; as my huge and extremely expensive art collection is already stashed away to some storage rooms in Helsinki no much point to grow amount od crao I have. Next stop was Chinatown and its amazing market strees, from gold to loads of stuff unknown to me was there. We walked to the river and got into boat heading north, just stopped by some riverside restaurant for some beer and curry and headed back to hotel. Even thou it wasd Saturday in Bangkok I just retired to Henning Mankell and slept like a baby.

 

Yesterday was serious shopping, we stayed close to the hotel and I invested some billions to brand products and fakes (fakes for others, originals for me). There are some really impressive malls, the siam paragon being the coolest I have ever been. Added to that MBK is a place to visit. Can't imagibe what you couldn't find in those. We also went to see Mummy III in Siam Paragon; good fun. We headed for Patpong area for dinner, and of course found our curries on a gay street. Nothing bad with that, good food. We sat afterwards on the only terrace without the prostitutes for a few beers and breathed in the sweet fumes of sin. We tried to follow the groovy guide's club tips and found nothing but closed joints. One taxi driver took us to "good disco, many people" and actually did that. I was 1000% sure he takes to some sleazy brothel, but it was a quite normal disco with local and foreign crowd called Boss. We got drunk, showed some cool moves, met some ladies and men who look like ladies. One girl wanted to take to some karaoke, and we jumped to Tuk Tuk and drove around hald of the city to some small bar. No karaoke, more beer, no other foreigners, loads of weird discussions and photo shoot sessions. We were back to the hotel around six in the morning.

 

When I could walk I went to take a photo of the recling Buddha and climbed the golden mountain. One friend of a friend offered to take us for dinner. And I wonder where Jari is, haven't seen him today. At least he got to the hotel =) That's it. I might write again when I have my next holiday, meanwhile you can follow my more business related blog:    http://www.tietoenator.com/blogs/blog.aspx?path=31196,31199,32752 Be cool.

Access to Cambodia was an easy one; there is a modern airport in Siem Reap with very efficient Visa line. It's quite understandable as the more or less only industry is tourism around the Angor Wat. The country is very much recovering from it's bloody history, with high corruption, loads of landmines still around and the child labour and prostitution everywhere. It's an automatic guilt trip for a lutherian; how come I have so much of everything while these people don't have anything, including too often even the arms and legs. I understood that 75% of ticket income goes to the black hole of financial ministry, and at the same time much of the national heritage is sold away to foreign businessmen in shady deals. For some reason the Koreas have a specific interest to the area; they even got a permission to build to railroad in the temple area so that the main attractions could be viewed without sweating. Due to local and international uproar that project is now on hold, and hopefully stays that way. There is an estimated 2 million tourists every year, with the peak around the dry months. Now during the monsoon season there are not too many tourists; hotels have much free space and there is even too much attention from the various sellers of goods and Tuk Tuk drivers. Children especially are selling water and books everywhere; they are asked to do this while not in school. One positive thing around this is that many children speak quite good English; if they can avoid some darker venues of business maybe there is a brighter future ahead.

 

City of Siem Reap tastes and feels like true Asia; especially now during the monsoon season. Streets are muddy, there are foof booths and markets everywhere, and then a bit isolated bars for foreigners with more western menus. Drinking angor beer and watching the rain fall during a dark night and a thunderstorm gives you the righ feeling. There is a bar street< many of the places still have the atmosphere of the war days; loads of amarican crap, free pool tables, and girls who laugh to your shitty jokes and tempt to order that one more jug of beer. Loads of shopping available, but it's very much limited to t-shirts, books and handcrafted items. Even most of the shops looik and feel to be run by others than Cambodians.

 

The temples of course are quite amazing, we started one rainy evening by watching the Angor Wat by a mountain top. Next day we had a driver to take us to Angor Thom, with its 100 faces, some smaller temples close by, and to one where they shot parts of the Tomb Raider movie. The high light being the Angor Wat itself. amazing to think that city of over 1 million existed here and was then eaten by the jungle and forgotten. Many of the restoration projects are run by other countries than Cambodia; some more succesful and responsiblr than others. Some have even done more damage than actual restoration. I really can't say why I wanted to come here for so many years; but now it's done and over with. Definitely a serious world heritage site, but also a sad experience due to state of Cambodia itself.

 

As the next thing to due there is also the floating village; you get a package trip with your own boat to take you around. There is indeed a tribe living on the big lake, moving downstream during the dry season. The bad part is that it's more like a floating ghetto, with extremely poor people trying to live their lives there. And there are couple of floating tourist gift shops in the middle and a continuous stream of tourist boats with their cameras flashing. An absurd experience; not saying I'm an inch better or worse than any other tourist there. Maybe a trip not worth doing, you can see my pics of that and skip it.

 

Today was a sleeping day; late breakfast in Red Piano. trying to book a hotel in Bangok, 3$ haircut in somne shag while watching the news from the Russia. It's weird to live in a country that is in war. Especially in a war with so many opinions about it; of course I try to stand for Russians as western media treats them with their own propaganda. No matter how things stand, one thing I'm quite sure about. With country as big as Russia, and with such a versatile history, black and white option, or good or bad setting doesn't really exist. Living room experts with their Fox news based opinions could read some Dostojevsky first =)

 

That's it, too hot to go outside, but maybe I risk for the next ice cream stall. And post office, some people wish to receive post cards outside of their usual hunting grounds. Baka.

Well, been a while. It's raining in Saigon so maybe it is time to add an entry.

 

This short holiday started from Bangkok; we landed with my friend Jari and there was a car to pick us up by another friend, a swedish fellow named Lars. He has been enjoying his unemployment in Hua Hin and also recovering from a motorcysle accident (still all bandaged up). So we went to Hua Hin as well, met up with Lars, had a lunch on an emply beach and went for some sightseeing. The king lives in Hua Hin, so it's quite empty of most of the shit you run into in Phuket or Pattaya (including the tourists that go into those places). We had quite a few beers, went to see a ladyboy show (just singing), had an encounter with a local rock band and that was pretty much it.

 

Next day I woke up late, went to beach to continue sleeping. Jari was there already. We did some shopping stuff, and by the time we got back Lars was also back from the hospital visit. We went to have a Chinese BBQ dinner in some local joint, and the co-host of Lars dog, Tammy, joined us. After dinner we went to see the local rock band again in the irish joint, one more friend joiuned us, Pep, I think. We hoped to se esome bar where localsw go, and without certain services, so we headed to a place called Hi4. There was actually a supercool local teen rockband, and loads of quite young people. We drank a lot and had loads of fun, and at some point somebody dropped us to the guest house.

 

 

Lars, being a weird businessman he is, also had a company in Nong Khai. He was heading there, so we hitched a ride to the northern border of Thailand. We got some rooms and a German guy, having a travel agency there, helped us to plan our trip further. We also had a dinner in his restaurant, and got quite drunk as a result. Jari needed an extra bite from seveneleven and I was so tired so I hitched a ride from some teenager moped girl. I had no idea where I was or where was my hotel, so it was rather long ride but once we found Mekong I got back to the hotel as well.

 

After a nice breakfast on the terrace next to the Mekong river we booked some flights, hotels and tranportations from the German fellow, Carsten. There was also maxing market in Nong Khai, with loads of things I had no incling what they were for. Still some mysteries and wonders in this world. We took our driver to some sightseeing; I wanted to see some temples, but we ended up to an amazing sculpture park of old gods. Adter that we went to a nice ourdoor part to give Nicky (the dog) a run, then just the normal - dinner and drunken stupor.

 

Next morning our car was waiting at ten, Lars couldn't join us for breakfast. Hope he is ok. We headed to the friendship bridge between Thailand and Lao. The visa process took only five minutes, we had our form filled with photos beforehand. And we were in Vientiane before the midday. Vientiane is a lazy city, easygoing and not too many people. The river bank is quite attractive with many restaurants, shops and even with public aerobic events. There was nothing much to see otherwise, we went to see some vistory gate and then soem golden stupa that was symbol of something. Shopping mall. Jari was feeling sick, so I went to find an ATM, but that evening the ATMs were down. I booked a kayaking trip up north, had a beer, and that was it.

 

I coudn't reach Jari before the morning, so I was a bit worried. It seemed that he had some stomach issues and he was in no shape for kayaking. So I was picked up by a Tuk Tuk, and then I changed to a Jumbo Tuk Tuk and traved three hours north. I had some thoughts that it's the monsoon season, and even Mekong was 20 metres higher than usual, but I managed toi quiet those easily. We had quite unstable plastic kayaks where you sit on top, and my partner in crime, Mario, from Croatia, was as experienced outdoorsman as myself. We fell down, as rest of the bunch, in the first rapids, the waves there were quite many times higher than the kayaks and the people within. It went by the book, we grabbed the boat and paddle, and eventually were able to turn it back and get on. The second was way bigger, we fell again, the boat hit my head, I still managed to grab it and I tried to breath a bit when not underwater. One girl fell and was taken by the rapids; I managed to grab her, but she was just crying. I put her hands to our kayak, but she couldn't hold on. I managed to grab he again before she was too far, and rest of the rapids we went like that. One hand on boat and one on the lifejacket of the girl. I can't swim by the way, so it wasn't the funniest possible situation for me either. After the rapids she swapped the boat with one of the guides, but the big one was only coming. Rest of the kayaks made a big raft, that girl in the middle, and headed on. We tried our best, and did quite well until the waves just started to hit us from all the directions. We fell, I hit some rocks, lost the paddle and the kayak. I was also heading for some big rocks and eddies, kayak going to a different direction. You are not supposed to swim, as you can get stuck by your feet, but the alternative looked so bad that I headed for the kayak. Mario managed to push it a bit to my direction so I managed to grab it in the end and then it was easier to take the rest of the washing machine. After that we had a nice dinner in some bamboo hut in quite a movie setting. The second part was without rapids, everybody was quite happy about that. The girl thanked me for saving her life; I don't think it was quite that serious, but I felt quite manly (doesn't happen often).

 

The trip from Kayaking was also fun; it was kind of a open van. The driver stopped for an old lady selling knives and stuff, but there was no space. So I let her in and hanged myself on the outside. There was a ledge on the top of the bumber, so I could just see the road underneath me when the driver was doing eighty on the bumpy road. The good part was the all the local moved driver started laughing and waving like crazy when they saw the white monkey hanging on the outside of the car. Closer to the city teh driver took two more sales people in, so all three of us were hanging on the back of the car. Then there was of course a police check up point, and the sales people stuffed their stuff inside and tried to hide themselves as well. I was just there with a big smile to greet the inspecting police. What fun! The driver got a fine anyway, serves him good. That evening I ate two dinners, I was so exhausted.

 

Next morning  we had a flight to Ho Chi Minh (Saigon). We heard thet you need a visa to Vietnam, but we didn't have any.. Nor we had any travel guide books. They are for tourists. In any case we had heard that if you have a flight ticket from Vietnam within one month you don't need a visa. And so it was, very modern airport and a fast process. We booked a hotel with a pool in the centre, and got there within 40 minutes. Saigon seems to be very fast moving business city, reminds more China than rest of the region. Great restaurants, big market places, some historical buidings, horriple amount of mopeds going to all directions. Also it's quite stressing that everybody is trying to sell something, there is continuos yelling "Hello, moto, massage, lady, marijuana". We had an excellent Tapas dibber and then we went to Apocalypse Now disco. It was excactly that. Loads of tourists. Loads of local people. Two dance floors. Horribly crowded. And of course a few old geezers with their 14 year old girlfriends.

 

Next day we too a ferry to Vung Tau, it's one hour ride out of the city. It didn't go exactly as planned, but we gopt some beach time and managed to get back to the city. The funny thing is that they have the same hydrofoils than in St. Petersburg taking people to Peterhoff. Viva communistic co-operation. Just excellent dinner in o'briens, some single malt, a cuban sigar and sleep. And today it's raining. I went to gym, and then here and now I should eat. Take care!

 

 

 

  

Mother was complaining that I haven’t updated my blog so here we go. I kind of decided that blogging is more for holidays; as I write another a bit more official about the Russian market at work. Well, it’s not horribly serious either, more like an experiment how blogs work as a corporate communications tool.

Enough of that. I was actually just guided to my compartment in the grand express train; the night train from St. Petersburg to Moscow. Seems pretty posh. Well, not like trans Siberian first class, but nice and comfy. When I was standing on the cold platform almost middle of the night outside the dark train I was briefly wondering if I have done all the right choices in my life. And if my life would have been different if I had married the first girl who wanted to make babies with me.  Strong maybe. The lady in the train didn’t speak a word of English, but showed me my bed, and later on brought me some instructions in English. Works fine. And as I’m writing this to kill time, I got a room mate, “Dobry vecer”, that’s as far as my Russian goes.

So if this is more like a free time blog, maybe I cover couple of weekends (that much my memory can cover). The previous weekend I was in Finland, there was one babyshower (or whatever that is for boys), and one 40 years birthday party. Just by accident our account manager from Microsoft was on the same plane on Friday, and as I owned him one sightseeing tour from Moscow I took him out. We saw some of my friends, and then had a short sightseeing walk, visited some bars and surprise surprise ended up in Lost & Found for couple of beers . Next day I took him to verkkokauppa to see how they sell MS products there, for a lunch to Seahorse (my favourite restaurant in Helsinki) and for a walk by Kaivopuisto.

After that taken care of a short nap, and then to see Hannes. He had a dinner booked in Macu. As tradition goes we ate, drank and smoked some cigars.  Around ten we got to the 40 year part of my friend Harri; he had a sauna on Esplanadi with loads of old friends from Tampere (and some new from Helsinki), so we sat in sauna and timetraveled  back to the day. This kind of events are so much fun for me, as I’m such a foreigner in any country these days. I’m glad my old friends still keep in contact, and now it’s of course easier as Finland is just some hours away.  We went to some wine bar, then to Kalle, and drank like there’s no tomorrow. I managed to get to meet two nice girls and they came for an after party to the sauna; I had saved them from some harassing men by telling that I’m their brother and that they just want to have fun tonight.  The story grew spectacular as we together described our not really existing childhood to everybody who was not aware that I had little sisters. So we drank the night away, told thousands of stories and on the “morning” I had a horrible hang over, but I felt somehow refreshed as well.

This weekend we were sampling some food in a new Leningrad restaurant in St. Petersburg, well, on Friday, that is. I was with our law firm, our marketing company ceo, one university person and there was also one guy from some new media company. Nice place, good food. We left the place and went to really funny disco called XXXX, it’s like the bars in Tampere, just drinking and dancing and having fun. No girl business, mostly local people. Some other friends were there as well, from the construction business, so we had a few beers and showed our disco moves. The sheriff and the box (hell no, just kidding). Fun. Saturday was another dinner, when I managed to wake up, in Park this time. It’s a nice Italian next to the church of spilled blood, a different team this day, banking, meat production. law and construction. I had a nice pizza and then met with Jari, we met with some Russian friends, but just for an hour or so over a cup of tea. Sunday was sports, I tried to start running in the gym, but maybe a bit too fast as my heart has been pumping like hell after that. We had sushi with Ivan, I got finally some home internet working and I was configuring my gadgets to interact. Also bought some champagne glasses. That’s the free time I have had =)