Day 3 in Saigon and what happened here was even crazier than the stomach churning desert safari I had in Dubai 4 years ago. Earlier today I went for a half day trip to he CuChi tunnels located about 75 kilometers from Saigon.

These tunnels are a complex series of tunnels utilized by the Vietcong during the Vietnam war against American soldiers. So while the Americans were busy trying to bomb these Viets back to the stone age, they hid underground, striking at American ground troops when the opportunity presented itself.I crawled through 100 meters of the tunnels which were especially restored and enlarged for foreign tourists. Those with claustrophobia or heart conditions or are simply too fat shouldn’t be attempting this.

Now a tourist spot, the CuChi tunnel is also THE place in Vietnam where you can get to fire weapons used during the war. This of course takes place above ground and I spent USD 14 on 10 AK47 bullets. The rush while firing the gun was exhilarating. This was tempered by a visit to the War Remnants Museum back in Saigon. This was a sobering reminder on the horrible aftermath of war. The effects of the fighting, the landmines and especially chemical warfare in the form of Agent Orange are available here for all to see in addition to the military hardware left by the Americans.

People in the Mekong delta region are really crazy about their afternoon (after lunch) siesta and hammocks. You can see for yourself on the 3 hour bus ride to the region; there are plenty of road side stops that serve the famous Vietnamese coffee and at the same time provide hammocks and long backed metal frame chairs for people to take a nap on.

It was my first time in a decade or so since I last sat in a hammock, and true enough I nearly fell in my first new attempt to sit on one yesterday afternoon. That took place in a small restaurant on one of the numerous islands in the Mekong delta. I found out that lying down on a hammock and reading Lonely Planet off the iPhone is really relaxing, decadent even, when done in a busy place like KL (like that’s gonna happen).

In any case the trip to the Mekong delta involved visiting the Cai Be floating market which unlike the one in Bangkok, Thailand, stuff are sold wholesale. We visited several cottage industries and saw the preparation of the region’s sweets and snacks.

I’ll bd going out of town from Saigon as well today, to visit the Cuchi Tunnels. These tunnels are apparently not for the claustrophobic and were used by the Vietcong during the Vietnam war. There’s a firing range there as well, hopefully I get to fire a few rounds off an AK47.

Saigon is such a crazy place. While not as dirty as Jakarta, the motorcycles are like huge swarms of bees choking the roads. Crossing a street is may, to a first time visitor, feel like committing suicide but once you get used to it, it’s like Moses parting the Red Sea. Traffic actually make way for you and their cacophony of honks is generally to inform you that they are there and they see you!

While access to Facebook is non-existent, think it got banned here or something, I’m pretty impressed at the Internet speed I’m getting and the prevalence of WiFi hotspots. It’s pretty easy to stay “connected” to the ‘Net if you have a need for it.

The Lonely Planet guide on the iPhone has been quite a help. However some of the information wasn’t up to date or just missing. It didn’t even have the Central Post Office on the map and the GPS functionality breaks the offline maps every once in a while. It’s best to use the app in conjunction with the hotel map.

I’m heading off to the Mekong Delta region today, so stay tuned for updates.

I’ll be off to Saigon (a.k.a Ho Chi Minh City, in Vietnam) for the next four days for a holiday . Given the apparent prevalence of WiFi hotspots over there, I probably get the opportunity to blog. In the mean time, the iPhone version of Lonely Planet’s Ho Chi Minh City guide will serve as a guide. I bought it for USD 5.99 and it features offline maps with GPS integration! Pretty cool huh?

I’m over at what is known as the “Big Durian“, a.k.a Jakarta, Indonesia for several days due to work reasons. And it’s a totally different beast from Kuala Lumpur, being a smorgasbord of smells (mostly unpleasant, the air polluted), traffic (perpetual gridlock) and people (it’s just so heavily populated). However, Indonesians are very nice people and furthermore the food here has been great!

But it also looks like I’ve missed out quite a bit on what’s been happening online and in the world of sports. I missed the launch of iOS 4.0 and while there is WiFi, slow Internet speeds have prevented me from downloading both the new version of iTunes and the iOS 4.0 update itself. The hotel TV doesn’t seem to be showing World Cup matches and now I just rely on BBC’s online site for reports when I wake up in the morning.

One thing I noticed is that iPhones are not really the smartphone of choice with Indonesians, instead they go for the Blackberry. I’ve lost count on the number of times I’ve seen Blackberry ads and the number of users using the phone or clones that look like the phone. If there’s one thing I really like about those odd-shaped phones, it’s the physical QWERTY keyboard.

I leave you with what I had for lunch yesterday, Ayam Tulang Lunak. It’s basically chicken cooked within a pressure cooker until the bones are soft to the point of being edible. It’s really quite nice and the chicken is served with rice and other condiments that you can usually find with Ayam Penyet: long beans, slices of cabbage, fried beancurd, tempeh and really hot chilli sauce.

Last night, my girlfriend and I went over to i-City over at Shah Alam. It’s actually located pretty near my place and we were really curious to visit the place at night, since you can see a whole bunch of plastic trees from the Klang toll gate on the Federal Highway. Here’s why you should drop by i-City at night, and it’s worth the traffic jam getting into the place..the trees are equipped with LED bulbs and when they light up at night, the sight is really beautiful. Check out the pictures below

The place is still a work in progress. I wish they planted more real trees though as the park would be pretty barren if you were to take away the plastic trees. The sheer amount of LED trees has left me wondering how much is their monthly electricity bill. Don’t forget to watch the video below as well:

I finally gotten Mount Kinabalu out of my system, the painful way, within the short span of two days. My group started on the Mesilau trail on Sunday, putting up a night at Laban Rata before tackling the summit on Monday morning at 2.45 a.m.

I found out for myself that I hyperventilate when I exert myself at over 3000 meters above sea level, but despite that I managed to make it to 200 meters of the peak, stopping at the 8.5 km marker of the summit trail. By this time, the sun was already up and if there’s one good thing to highlight about this trip is that the weather was excellent! There was no rain at all!

This makes up for the disappointment in 2008 where we made a u-turn half way up the summit attempt due to heavy rain, which turned the entire mountain like a giant waterfall. Like in 2008, we took the Timpohon route down and it still maintained it’s knee killing properties with the big steps and crazy amount of gravel.

In any case, I’ve enough of climbing mountains and will be sticking to running on tarmac instead.

I’m the type to be really proud of my hometown of Sitiawan, Perak. Located near the coast, it’s the home to really cheap seafood.

The popular seafood restaurants all located in an area known as Kampung Cina. While all is fine and dandy on normal days, problems arise during public holidays.

While some of these restaurants can have 30 or more tables, most of them have only one cook! Public holidays tend to bring in the crowd (everyone seems to be starved of cheap seafood these days) and the phenomenon of kitchen crash.

Orders get mixed up, lost even, food quality suffers and wait times of up to 2 hours are all very common. Here are several tips to ease the suffering when eating out in Sitiawan during the hols.

1. Come early especially for dinner as the crowds are killer. If you manage to get a table at 7, expect to wait for 15-20 minutes for your order to be taken down. Expected time to partake your meal? 9.30 p.m. So come at 6 instead.

2. Check out the other tables. If you notice that a majority of tables are occupied but are not eating yet, get out! Classic signs of a kitchen crash here.

3. If you are the impatient type, you are better off with McDonalds

4. if you have a gastric problem and still insist to have seafood (and join the potential long wait), bring along some snacks.

Hopefully you don’t double over from hunger. Lol.

Ao Nang on the Krabi mainland doesn’t really have much to offer beach wise, but it’s the gateway to some amazing islands and its neighbour, Railay (Rai Leh), a peninsula on the mainland cut off by limestone mountains, and only accessible via boat. This is going to be a long post with pictures, so please be patient.

Railay’s beaches are amazing, rivaling those on the islands in the Andaman Sea, all with the same turquoise waters, and is certainly worth a day trip. To get to Railay, one would simply need to purchase a longtail boat ticket at the counter situated by Ao Nang beach. It’s 100 baht per way, per person, and your mode of transportation, the longtail (named after the really long rotor shaft jutting at an angle at the back) boat, looks like the following, and yes, you’ll need to get your feet wet, no jetties here.

The trip to the Railay peninsula is a rather short one, just 10 minutes and you’ll find yourself on Railay Beach (Railay West). To your left would be Ton Sai bay. Railay Beach is populated with several resorts and the white sand beach is worth a stroll. It’s also the main stop off point for longtails coming from Ao Nang. If you are on a day trip, your boat operator might ask you to head over to Phra Nang beach to get a ride back to Ao Nang. Just be sure to do that before 6 p.m.

In order to get to Phra Nang, you’ll need to get to Railay East first, the mangrove side of the Peninsula.  Home to several resorts and backpacker joints, Railay East is also a place for rock climbing!

Getting to Phra Nang from Railay East is pretty interesting. You’ll be walking right next to the limestone cliffs and there are some small caves to pop into. Somewhere around the midpoint you can take a detour (hike up) to a viewpoint of Railey and Ton Sai Bay, which I didn’t do. According to WikiTravel, the detour (hike down through jungle) can also lead you to a hidden lagoon!

Anyways, you might see more rock climbing hijinks on the way to Phra Nang. We had the good fortune of encountering one guy who was rather enthusiastic about a certain rock face.

Finally, Phra Nang. Another amazing stretch of beach. Very nice to take a stroll on. There’s a limestone hill out at sea which you can kayak to. Since Railay is more of resort place, street food vendors take to the beach (and sea) for their wares. Be warned though, the prices are double that of Ao Nang.

One thing you’ll bound to notice at Ao Nang beach in the Krabi province of Thailand is the amount of Caucasian tourists; it’s possible to walk the entire stretch on Ao Nang without bumping into a single Asian tourist.

The entire place seems to cater to the Western tourist, especially when it comes to food (it’s expensive), but don’t let this deter you as Ao Nang is the perfect jumping off point to picturesque locations in the turqouise coloured waters of the Andaman Sea.

Here’s a rough guide of the place, having just came back from my 4 days 3 nights vacation there:

DOs

• If you are staying in Ao Nang, take a longtail boat ride down to Railay Beach. It’s located on the mainland, adjudant to Ao Nang but blocked off by sheer limestone hills (which explains the need to take the long tail boat ride. Railay is home to Railay West and Phra Nang, both excellent white sand beaches, and is also the hive of rock climbing activity in the region.
• Take a tour of the islands, peak season prices average around 1200 to 1400 baht per person. This usually covers snorkelling at several areas, sightseeing and lunch. Be liberal with the sun tan lotion as it can be really hot out there.
• Go kayaking near the limestone hills.
• Get a Thai massage, at 200 to 300 baht for an hour long session, it’s a bargain.
• Grab a bunch of friends and hop on to one of those cute little taxi lorries for a ride to Krabi town. It cost 800 baht (remember to bargain) for a two way trip and the driver WILL wait for you in town while you get your shopping done (especially if you didn’t pay him yet). Note: lingerie is cheap in Thailand.
• Get a buffet dinner at Bernie’s Place, located somewhere near the same stretch of road as McDonalds, towards Ao Nang beach. 250 baht will buy you a buffet dinner with grilled items and some Thai dishes, and plenty of ice cream.
• Do patronise the 7-11 outlets, home toa plethora of drinks ranging from the exotic such as coconut nectar (sweet sap) to cheap but strong flavoured Thai beer and Red Bull.
• Order a really spicy bowl of tom yam at Wanna’s Place Restaurant. This is the real deal and hotter than any tom yam I’ve tried in the Klang Valley (trust me, I had my fair share) by a mile (or ten…it will burn you).
• Try out the pancakes and other forms of street food at one of the road side stalls nearby the only McDonalds outlet in Ao Nang. The pancake is actually a fried version of Indian “roti”, it comes with different kinds of fillings (e.g. bananas) and condensed milk is usually poured on liberally.
• Use insect repellant, there are plenty of bloodsuckers (vampires…I mean mosquitoes) out at night. You’ll heed this advice if you want an itch free dinner.
• Do take note of the new tsunami signs on the roadside describing how far in-land you should go in the unfortunate event of a tsunami.
• Try out the pad thai at a makeshift stall by the side of the road opposite the Ao Nang police station. The stall is next to a roadside bar whose owner keeps his drinks chilled at the back of his truck and goes: “Happy hour…alcohol!” from time to time.

DONTs

• Ao Nang’s restaurants can be tourist traps if you are not careful. The seafood restaurants by the sea are of particular note. The price of a pathetic mid-sized fish can be around 360 baht, definately not worth the money.
• Muay Thai boxing tourneys are held every Friday and Monday night. Sure there are free transfers but arena tickets will set you back 800 each and a place at the ring side, 1200 baht.
• Shopping for souvenirs at the stretch facing the beach can be an expensive affair, compared to buying stuff from the stretch of shops leading to Ao Nang beach (from McDonalds). There are several exceptions though, particularly the stores nearby Wanna’s Place.
• Don’t eat in at the Hagen Daz outlet, there will be a 10 % service tax imposed on your bill if you do.
• Don’t go around looking for a decent newspaper on the beach stretch. I can’t find The Bangkok Post but you won’t have a problem looking for tabloid rags like The Sun.
• Don’t bother buying video games from the two video games outlet on the beach stretch. They stock everything from NDS to PC games but it’s all  pirated stuff.
• Those good luck lanterns you see selling near the beach for 80 baht, well, they are going for 60 baht in town.