{"id":1970,"date":"2012-04-14T17:26:49","date_gmt":"2012-04-15T00:26:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/interspacedesign.wordpress.com\/?p=1970"},"modified":"2021-06-25T11:06:25","modified_gmt":"2021-06-25T18:06:25","slug":"destination-asia-of-dragons-spice-and-everything-nice-part-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/destination-asia-of-dragons-spice-and-everything-nice-part-3","title":{"rendered":"Destination Asia: Of Dragons & Spice and Everything Nice – Hong Kong & Vietnam"},"content":{"rendered":"

HONG KONG<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hong Kong was the next port of call. Considering roundtrip airfare runs about $1600 from the west coast, I was glad to take advantage of this \u2018jet setting\u2019 opportunity.<\/p>\n

It was fun to drop in for a yummy brunch and hang out with my family for the day before hitting the high seas again in the evening!<\/p>\n

Most popular restaurants on Hong Kong are packed cheek to jowl at lunch time, so your options to dine in relative peace are either at private clubs or hotel restaurants.<\/p>\n

\"Kwan<\/a>
Kwan Cheuk\u00a0Heen Restaurant in the Harbour Grand Hotel where we went for the dim sum brunch.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Dim<\/a>
One can also enjoy the great harbor view between bites…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Plate<\/a>
Classics like roast squabs and xiaolong\u00a0bao are among my dad\u2019s favorites.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The food, despite being in a hotel, was surprisingly good and innovative: artfully crafted \u2018goldfish dumplings\u2019 were translucent skinned dumplings in shape of the namesake fish, the baked eel was full of crispy and fatty goodness, and stuffing savory minced duck into delicate teacup-sized sesame seed \u2018pockets\u2019 livened up the dining experience.<\/p>\n

\"Hong<\/a>
X’mas Night Scene on Kowloon side.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Holiday<\/a>
Holiday night scene in Hong Kong harbor.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As the ship sailed past Hong Kong harbor, we\u00a0made a video <\/a>of the\u00a0largest light show in the world (according to the Guinness Book of Records).<\/p>\n

As lasers beam across the sky, buildings on both sides of the water sport festive holiday lights and color changing LEDs \u2013 it was a truly spectacular sight!<\/p>\n

NHA TRANG, VIETNAM<\/strong><\/p>\n

Our first Vietnamese port is Nha\u00a0Trang\u00a0in central Vietnam, which is famous for its crescent sandy beaches & turquoise waters \u2013 something I increasingly shun to minimize post-vacation t\u00eate-\u00e0-t\u00eates\u00a0with my aesthetician.<\/p>\n

The other major tourist activity, a river boat trip didn\u2019t excite either. It didn\u2019t seem particularly worthwhile considering we had a lovely scenic river cruise in the picturesque neighboring town of Hoi An<\/a> a couple years back.<\/p>\n

We settled on tooling around Nha\u00a0Trang\u2019s central market area and checking out local eats instead. Fortified by a succession of muchies\u00a0in form of sugar cane, gelato and pain au chocolat (after all this is an ex-French colony!) we were happily occupied during our stay.<\/p>\n

\"Garlic<\/a>
Garlic heads whimsically decked out for the Holidays<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Trays<\/a>
The cadence of shrimp trays drying in the sun.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Nha\u00a0Trang\u00a0Market is surprisingly big and has vendors spilling out onto the sidewalks around the market.<\/p>\n

\"Po<\/a>
The Po Nagar\u00a0tower, a famous historical landmark outside Nha\u00a0Trang.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Po Nagar temple dates back to the 7th century at the time of the Cham Empire.<\/p>\n

It shows similar architectural influences as Cambodia\u2019s Angkor Wat as can be seen in my photo blog<\/a>\u00a0of the World Heritage Site.<\/p>\n

\"Courtyard<\/a>
The town has a number of caf\u00e9s with shaded courtyards. This looked super inviting as we peered in under the scorching sun.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We had a hard time getting any cafes\u00a0that would accept US dollars and ended up having to find an ATM machine first in order to join the caf\u00e9 culture \u2013 in the shade\u2026<\/p>\n

PHU\u00a0MY\u00a0(HCMC), VIETNAM<\/strong><\/p>\n

Another one of those remote gateway ports, Phu\u00a0My is a 4-hour roundtrip bus ride to Ho Chi Minh\u00a0City<\/a> (or HCMC for short), leaving little meaningful time to explore the teeming metropolis. Luckily we\u2019ve been to HCMC before. Having toured the infamous\u00a0Chu Chi Tunnels<\/a>, seen the Ben Thanh Market<\/a>, and acquired the requisite – and fake –\u00a0kopi luwak<\/a> (weasel coffee), we decided to explore the town of Ba Ria close to the port instead.<\/p>\n

\"Banh<\/a>
Banh mi, the Vietnamese baguette sandwich<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The banh mi\u2019s airy, crispy crust, coupled with the explosion of flavors between juicy savory meats and assorted pickles makes an incredible afternoon snack.<\/p>\n

\"Ornate<\/a>
Ornate railing outside the Catholic Church.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The sun at high noon starkly highlighted the metal railing of the church ramp.<\/p>\n

\"Ceramic<\/a>
Ceramic drain cover on the Church grounds.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The drain cover for the Catholic Church is surprisingly decorated with traditional Chinese motif of bats to attract good fortune \u2013 an interesting case of cross cultural assimilation.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
A flower stall selling poinsettias in 90 degree weather.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sometimes it\u2019s hard to think about Rudoplph, Santa’s sleigh and other trappings of X\u2019mas when you were practically melting in a subtropical country. It felt somewhat surreal to see poinsettias in the sidewalk shop.<\/p>\n

\"Bun<\/a>
Bun Cha Ca, a Nha\u00a0Trang specialty dish.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We missed out on a Nha\u00a0Trang specialty called Bun Cha Ca. The rice noodles are served with steamed sailfish and jellyfish. The distinctive sweet and flavorful broth is from fish bones instead of traditional pork bones. Maybe next time\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the third of a series on the blog of my SE Asia cruise visiting China, Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Thailand & Singapore. This installment covers my food excapades in Hong Kong and the culture, history & culinary delights in the central Vietnam town of Nha Trang and the south Vietnam city of Ba Ria.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8726,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,7,415,15],"tags":[33,37,61,98,136,162,189,204],"class_list":["post-1970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-architecture","category-food","category-interior-design","category-travel","tag-ba-ria","tag-banh-mi","tag-bun-cha-ca","tag-dim-sum","tag-hong-kong","tag-laser-show","tag-nha-trang","tag-po-nagar-cham-towers"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/hong-kong-roast-squab-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1970"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1970\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8727,"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1970\/revisions\/8727"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8726"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/interspace-design.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}