Peace and Love from Island of Gods, Bali.

Us, the happy girls!

Tirta Gangga

Cottage in Candidasa

Panoramic view of Candidasa beach behind our cottage

Seminyak beach

Potato Head

Peace and Love from Bali

October 2013.

It was another escape with my college friend, Muna chan. It was our first trip together and it was her first trip to go Bali. I enjoyed it very much. We spent few days in Ubud, Candidasa and our last few days in Kuta, the place I hate the most in Bali. The people there are rude. If you want to buy anything you have to start bargain from 80% off of the price they offered.

Ubud is a small town, famous for its art and craft. There are so many painters and crafters there. It is also a small town full of delicious food and expensive. We stayed at Jati Homestay, probably one of the best place in Ubud, it was quite and tranquil. It is not that expensive 25 USD for two or 20 USD for single.

Candidasa is the highlight of this trip, maybe because we stayed at a very nice cottage where it is quite and peaceful, we stroll around on bike and have fun!

Well Bali definitely is a surfer paradise, white sand beach and a lot of diversity in such a small island.We went to see few places like Tirta Gangga and Ujung - the water palace, and check out few beaches. The weather there is extremely hot.

I might coming back soon to Bali with the man :)

See ya

Taj Mahal

It was a last minute trip to Taj Mahal over the weekend. It was pretty tiring I wished I could spent more time to hear the story behind it. For those who wondering about where is Taj Mahal, it is located in Agra about 3 hours drive from New Delhi through the new Greater Noida express way. The best time to visit Taj Mahal is towards end of year when the weather is bit chilled and the mountain in the Taj complex operated.

Agra itself is a small town mostly surrounded by the buildings built by Shah Jahnan during the Mughal empire. The complex of Taj Mahal is not that big with all symmetrical buildings and forts around. The main building was built by white marble, crafted beautifully and decorated with painted tiles. The real tomb was located on the basement which was not accessible during the time of visit.

Like most of the tourists attraction, we have to purchase the entrance ticket to go to Taj. The fees for foreigner is 750 rupee and they will give you a bottle of water and a shoes cover. You are not allowed to walked with the shoes in certain area or you can walk bare f

eet. There are plenty of tour guide offered you their service, normal price is about 500-600 rupee but if you come very early in the morning you can bargain to 200-300 rupee for their service. Taj complex closes on Friday for the prayers.

Laters

xo J

Hellas med babyen part 3 - Athens

You can't go Greece without visiting Athens, the capital city of the Old Greek Empire!!! I see Athens as a very vibrant city, street art are everywhere in the town, it makes the city colourful and lively but dirty at the same time. Well even the country is in the bad shape, lots of vacant shops lot around Ermou street, where the major shopping boutiques are located, but still you can see a lot of people hang out around Monastiraki square enjoying the sun with beers or ice coffee, you still see a lot of women with shopping bags, so where is the crisis?

The food in Athens are delicious, you can find plenty of restaurants around Thissio, most of the restaurants open till mid night. They serve pasta, fried seafood, burgers, moussaka - the Greek traditional layered eggplants with minced meat, it something like lasagna. I found a gelato shop at the corner of Monastiraki Square, Bonaffee flavour was my have! At the other corner of Monastiraki Square we can find plenty of shops, mostly souvenir shops selling all kind of fridge magnets, cloths, accessories, etc. There is a flea market at the other side of Monastiraki Square towards Thissio. When you go along Ermou street you will find all the major shops like Zara, HnM, Pull and Bear, Bershka, Stradivarius, Korres, Body Shop, Mac, etc. If you like beauty product don't forget to get Korres here, it is pretty cheap and good. I bought the yogurt sunscreen it smells nice and delicious.

We went to Acropolis of Athens (a must visit place) where you feel overwhelmed by the ancient architecture of the temples. The new museum of Acropolis was amazing too, too bad I didn't have time to explore much the inside as I almost missed my flight home.

Here are some of the pics! Enjoy x!

Pantheon - Acropolis of Athens

City of Athens

Min babyen er så søt!

Hellas med babyen part 2 - Santorini

It probably one of the most beautiful islands on planet earth. I always dreamt to visit Santorini one day and voila, I was there and experience an amazing journey with babyen. There are many ways to reach Santorini by flights or ferries.  We took the Blue Star Ferries from Naxos to Santorini. Blue Star Ferries is a very nice ferry, they have a very comfortable seats (it is as comfortable as first class seat in plane). They have few cafe and restaurants inside. Traveling with the ferry is fun, time really flies. 

We were staying at Maria's place in Oia. We have the view of the Caldera sea, big balcony, nice bathroom, small kitchen with fridge where we can store our greek yogurt and very huge bed!!!

Oia is my favorite town among all. It is just a very unique and quirky town built with white marbles and blue domes. I like walking on the marble path way through out the city. For you who always wonder where all of those golden sunset of Santorini taken, it is in Oia! You have to do a little bit of walking and patiently waiting for the sunset to come. 

During my visit, it was quite, not much restaurant opens but I found a very nice restaurant with yummy food in Oia, it called Lotza. The service is kinda slow because the restaurant always full house and only 2 people are working but the food is worth waiting and it is not that expensive too!

There are plenty of jewelry shops sell mostly accessories made from black lava stone , antiques, Byzantine painting and a shop full of hand made puppet and dolls! This shop reminds me of a witch shop with all the magical thing inside. There is a very nice art gallery where the painter is from Poland and the gallery was managed by his wife. 

Fira is the main city in Santorini. There are few things to do here like walking through 600 steps to the Fira port which connecting Fira and the volcano. 600 steps sounds easy but actually it was not, you can pay about 5Euro for the donkey or take the cable car. We walked down to the port and walked up again back to city. It was so tiring. I didn't take donkey because I was afraid with it and their smell very bad. But it was okay, all the effort was well paid with the delicious food I had in town. Mama's is one of the best restaurant in Fira, every one knows it! I had chance to take pics with her, she is from San Francisco moved to Santorini for quite sometimes.

All the food from Mama's restaurant was nice. I tried the chicken soup, spaghetti, rice with some beef, the mousakka was excellent. The price isn't that expensive tho. 

We rent a car and drove around the island. There are other things to see like the red beach, the highest point of the island where you can see 360 degrees panoramic view of Santorini, now it is used as military camp.

Red beach :D

laters! xoJ

From Istanbul with Love :D

Istanbul where the East meets West.

I have been wanting to visit Istanbul ever since I read it on my history book back in college time and I know I will love this city. It is really worth 17 hours flying from home to Istanbul with few hours transit in Abu Dhabi, I was flying with Etihad. Well another great experience to flew with UAE airlines. I was sitting next to a guy from Jeddah, he is pretty cute :), he was flying from Brisbane. We had a conversation through the journey and I found it fascinating to know about how the people in Saudi Arabia lives. I had 5 hours transit in Abu Dhabi where I met a girl from Hongkong and a Thai lady who married to a Greek guy, a Turkish guy who is working in South Korea and thinks I am from Korea - trying to talk to me in Korean :). I flew with Turkish Airlines from Abu Dhabi to Istanbul, which was one of the worst airlines I ever experience, the plane was steaming hot and the seat was very cramped. I dont like the stewardess as well. So after 5 hours steamed on the plane and sitting next to two bitches who didn't let me take my toilet break, I reached Istanbul. The weather was perfect and the hotel sent someone to picked me up :)

I was enchanted by the city, with the road, train and bus system. The city is clean and pretty! It took about 30 minutes to reach Sultanahmet, the heart of Old City in Istanbul, where the hotel located. I really can't wait to explore the city, to see all the amazing buildings here. Istanbul is full with a lot of Byzantium and Ottoman architecture from the Palace to the mosques. 

A lot of people warned me about Istanbul especially about the Turkish guys and about the Muslim culture there. Well it is not as bad as I think, the Turkish guys yes - they are not dangerous species but they are very flirty, whenever you are walking on the street they try to get you to buy something from them, some of them are very polite and didn't force you to buy tho.

Me and my bf (ehm..) we stayed at Grand Peninsula hotel, right at the heart of old city - Sultanahmet, it is walking distance to everywhere and also a lot of cool hang out place and restaurant to eat. The hotel is nice, the staff are friendly and helpful. The receptionist gave us a lot of good recommendation for places to eat and hammam. One of the recommended place to it is Tria Elegance Restaurant, all the food here is delicious and their Meze is the best as well the Hummus.

You will not leave Turkey without having a hammam - the Turkish Bath. Me and bf went for Suleymain Bath which is one of the oldest bath in the city and was used by the Sultans. It is one of a good experience. I love it!

Aya Sofia was my first stop. It was a church during Byzantine empire and later it was used as Mosque when Ottoman Empire conquered Istanbul, now it functions as museum. I was amazed by the building and the architecture. The entrance fee for Aya Sofia is 25 TL. 

Blue mosque, this is one of the signature buildings in Istanbul where major movie setting like James Bond Skyfall and Taken 2 was shot here. Blue Mosque is not really blue at all, I dont know why the called it Blue Mosque. The mosque is open till late and closes during the prayer. I like the interior of the mosque better than Aya Sofia, to adore the detailing of the painted dome, the mosaic art on the windows, it is just amazing.

Topkapi Palace is the home of Ottoman Sultan. This whole complex was converted to museums. Admission fees is 25TL. It is really worth to check it out, there are plenty of things from ancient era from beautifully crafted swords, armor, cloths, clocks!

Grand Bazaar and Spice bazaar is the place to find Turkish souvenirs, you can bargain and they will happily give you the best price. Try the Turksih delight, it is something like mochi with fruity flavour and pistachio nuts.

Taksim! is the major shopping areas where people hang out and chill, there are plenty restaurants and shops selling local hand made products, accessories, etc. I like to walk around the small alleys, pass through the restaurant. Kim showed me a tea place, this place straight away became my fave place. It is kinda hard to find the main entrance to this secret tea house, it is a very tiny alley, maybe as big as one door size alley between the shops, the more you get into the alley the road become wider and suddenly there is a big court yard full with the tables, chairs and locals having chai. We had two cups of tea before we heading to Galata Tower. There was a big protest in Istanbul while I was there, was not sure what was that about but its peaceful and no violence protest. It was safe.

Galata Tower (reminds me of Rapunzel's tower). You can see the panoramic view of the city from the top of the tower, they have restaurant and night club as well. Admission fee 12TL.

Promegranate juices are everywhere, its Kim's fave. If you buy it around Sulthanamet is more expensive 5TL/cup, around taksim or galata bridge you will find it for 3TL and orange juice for 1TL.

Laters xoJ