Author: James

We’re going to Mexico … Mazatlán!

Zhaoyang wanted to do another “work away from home” trip and after some debate, we settled on Mexico since it has a favorable timezone for her work and is easy to get to. After an exhaustive search of many places in Mexico, including San Miguel Allende, Puerto Vallarta, Guadalajara and several other places, we finally settled on Mazatlán!

Our AirBnb search narrowed down the condo choices to about a dozen and then we started to do a more detailed review about the restaurants and bars in those areas. We ended up with two choices: Torre Eme and Boca Del Cielo. They are about 20 minutes apart and each have pros and cons. After a coin flip, we decided on the Torre Eme condos due to their proximity to the Malecon and several beach side restaurants!

Wei’s Notes From Her Visit – 魏的访问笔记

On the last day of Wei’s trip while we were drinking Champagne, she read from some notes she had prepared. I asked her if it was ok to publish them here on the blog as I thought they were touching. I used the AI Claude 3 Opus to extract the Chinese characters from the hand written notes and then translated it into English. Then ZY checked it and made a few corrections.

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Moving Day! – 搬家日!

Well our first part of our Penang trip has come to an end. Today we moved from our apartment in Tanjung Tokong, at the Straits Quay Suites to a place nearer to George Town called Gurney Ville. I was surprised at how much extra stuff we had accumulated in the first five weeks (mostly food and kitchen stuff). Also, it was a work day for PJM so we decided to make the move in a few steps, leaving her computer set up for her work.

好吧,我们槟城之行的第一部分已经结束了。今天,我们从丹绒道光的海峡码头套房公寓搬到了更靠近乔治城的一个名为 Gurney Ville 的地方。令我惊讶的是,在最初的五个星期里,我们积累了多少额外的东西(主要是食物和厨房用品)。此外,今天是 PJM 的工作日,所以我们决定分几步进行搬家,让她今天正常工作。

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Getting Ready for Malaysia!

Well after many years of discussing and trying to make it happen, we are finally about to embark on our three month trip to Malaysia! the idea came during Covid as Zhaoyang was working from home as a CPA at a Public Accounting firm and we thought, well you can work from anywhere, let’s go to Asia!

So we started looking for places to go in Asia and settled on Penang, Malaysia due to its proximity to many other parts of Asia, the food culture, the prevalence of English and Chinese. So we began looking seriously at George Town, a former British settlement, in fact the first one in Southeast Asia. The next step in making the trip was to get approval from Zhaoyang’s employer. While they were supportive, there were many hurdles to overcome due to the nature of her work and the need to get specific approvals from the companies she was handling.

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Planning for Mexico City

We’re traveling again, yeah! Actually, after Tokyo, Zhaoyang travelled back to her home town in China in August for a brief visit and then we met up in Honolulu for a week. It was actually a working vacation for her since she didn’t want to burn up any more of her PTO 🙂 But regardless, we had a great time and she snorkeled for the first time!

Anyway, we are heading to Mexico City for a week or so. We will leave just after Thanksgiving and return the first Sunday in December. Beyond getting our plane tickets and an apartment, we haven’t done much planning on where or what we will see.

But we’re excited to be traveling again and this time Zhaoyang will be blogging!

Getting Excited to Travel Again!

We are leaving in about a week and the pleasures of traveling is starting to kick in. Zhaoyang is finishing up her last week of work at the accounting firm and will be starting a new job after we get back. So along with looking forward to a new continent to discover, she will have a new job as well!

We have been watching Youtube videos to get acquainted with the places we will be visiting, the food we may encounter

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Leaving tomorrow …

Quick update on our trip. I started having sinus pain near my eye several days ago. Today I got concerned enough to call my doctor. Given that we are traveling tomorrow she got concerned as well and so prescribed a 10 day course of antibiotics. Hopefully that solves the problem. She also said to take Tylenol an hour before landing and taking off since the sinuses could become very painful.

Also today, a wacko judge eliminated the mask mandate with a single order throwing the industry into a scramble. Will be interesting to see who still wears a mask. We will!

Talk to you from Spain!

Getting Ready for the Trip!

Well, we have about a week to go before the trip and we’re definitely getting excited to travel again. We were in Greece last October and enjoyed it so much we thought we had to return. Plus, I had wanted to visit Corfu, but in October the weather was too cold so we decided against it. This trip is all about the Mediterranean and associated seas that are less familiar like the Balearic Sea and the Tyrrhenian Sea, but for our purposes, we think of it all as the Mediterranean.

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We Got Covid :-(

Well, about two weeks before our trip, we both came down with Covid after going two years without getting it! We were being careful, wearing masks in public etc. but I guess we let our guard down. So since this is our Covid 22 Trip, I should tell you a little about the experience we had having Covid.

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A week to go …

Well we leave in about a week and yesterday I woke up to a message from the Ferry boat operator informing us that they had cancelled our ferry from Santorini to Paros!! Hopefully this isn’t a harbinger of things to come!

I was able to get a refund and rebook on another ferry but at this time of year the ferry schedules are very light or non-existent.

Anyway, perhaps I should tell you about our trips plans! ….

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Our 2019 Trip to Thailand

Timeline:

  • Fri, Oct 4 – Fly to Bangkok via Taiwan 1:30am EVA flight BR27
  • Sat Oct 5 – Arrived BKK 11:15am – Checked in to Hotel around noon
  • Sat – Dinner – Near hotel Jok Pochana Cafe
  • Sun – Lunch – Yok Krok, Red Elephant
  • Mon – Dinner – Met Brian and Family at Ariyasom Villa where they were staying for a few nights
  • Tues – Explored the city, saw the Jay Fai restaurant (famous woman cook)
  • Tue – Dinner – Khao San Road
  • Wed – Order Blue Crab Papaya Salad delivered
  • Wed – Beers and Zhaoyang had a massage
  • Wed – Dinner at Magic thai food by Max (Permenantly closed)
  • Thur – ZY spent the day at Nap Lab to study
  • Thur – Dinner – Local place near hotel
  • Fri – Dinner
  • Sat – Left Bangkok at 11:40am arrived back in SFO at 4:30pm same day