Tag Archives: travel

London calling – Part 1

I was really excited to go to London as I had heard so much about the city. As we had stayed with AS’s cousins we caught a train from Hove station to take us to London. The train was full so we had to stand near the doors with our luggage. After a while I was so tired that I sat on the floor :).

A lady came with a trolley selling tea, coffee, biscuits and cake like in an plane. This was something I hadn’t known would be available on the train. I guess that is good business as many people will need tea and coffee to wake up in the morning. The train dropped us at Victoria station and from there we planned to go to our hotel, which was near Hyde Park.

Experience with London tube

At Victoria station we bought the London pass as well as a day pass for the tube. One thing about the tube station we hadn’t know beforehand  was that in most of them, there were no lifts or escalators but there were plenty of steps everywhere. Both AS and I had a big suitcase each, a hand carry and I had a small bag as well so going up and down so many stairs was a nightmare. When we got on the tube from Victoria we meant to go to Notting Hill station to change for our next tube that was supposed to take us to our hotel but unfortunately something was wrong with the tracks and we had to catch another tube which meant we had to go through more stairs with our luggage. Poor AS had to go up and down several times with the heavy luggage as I couldn’t carry my suitcase up and down the stairs. After one more tube change we finally managed to get to Queensway Station which was near our hotel and were done with the tube for the moment.

We were booked into Central Park Hotel which was close to the city and next to Hyde Park. When we checked into the hotel, I was very disappointed with the size of the room. It was literally just a bed with a side table and a bathroom. It didn’t look very good either with plain white sheets and plain looking curtains but as we didn’t plan to stay inside much, it worked out OK.

We were really hungry so we went out for a stroll and to have some lunch. In Queensway Street, there were lots of restaurants as well as many shops. We choose to try some Thai food. We ordered Thai curry and Pad See Wee. The food was ok but the portion size was huge. After lunch we went back to the hotel, freshened up and were off to explore London. London tube was excellent when you were not carry luggage and we made the most of it.

Ride on London Eye

The London Eye is a giant Ferris wheel situated on the banks of the River Thames, in London, England. The entire structure is 135 metres tall and the wheel has a diameter of 120 metres. It is the tallest Ferris wheel in Europe, and the most popular paid tourist attraction in the United Kingdom, visited by over 3.5 million people annually.

We had pre purchased tickets to go to the London Eye but we had to go and exchange out e-tickets for proper ticket from the counter. It was really fast as they have a special line for online tickets. From there we went and saw a 4D film presentation that showed London through the eyes of a child on the London Eye. It was quite interesting but I and AS were having fun watching people’s reaction to the 4D effects. There was a man in front of us who ducked every time a seagull seemed to come flying out of the screen towards us. It was a nice short movie overall.

From there we went to join the queue for advance ticket holders going up on the London Eye, moved pretty quickly.

We were lucky that we chose an afternoon with very little cloud and went early. We could see the whole city from the London eye and the view was magnificent. There weren’t many people in the pod we got into so we could move around and take heaps of photos from various angles. There was a lady in our pod who was scared of heights but she did manage to stand for a few photos.

When your pod reached the top, the view was breathtaking. Being an avid amateur photographer, this was a great way to see a bird’s eye view of London. The Houses of Parliament and Big Ben along with the Millennium Bridge looked just amazing from the top.

The ride takes roughly thirty minutes for one complete rotation. No food or drink is allowed on the Eye as far as I can recall. In all honesty, the money paid to experience the Eye was well worth it. It’s a splendid way to get a bird’s eye view of the city and take a few pictures. Make sure you buy them online which makes it easier and cheaper.

The Tower of London

The Tower of London is one of the busiest museums/historical sites. It is a historic castle on the north bank of the River Thames in central London, England.

The outside area of the tower is easy to get around but inside it is really busy. It was hard to move around with visitors trying to get a glance at the  armours and other pieces. The best part of the tower is to watch a performance by Past Pleasures, a historical re-enactment and costumed interpretation company.  It was a ‘Dark Tales of the Tower’ story about an Jacobean Prisoner and the intrigue that surrounded his death.

Sir Thomas Overbury was imprisoned in the tower at the start of the 17th Century and there he was murdered.  A few years later Frances Carr the Countess of Somerset (previously Essex) and Robert Carr (Earl of Somerset) were found guilty of his murder by poisoning.  Their motive is believed to be a dislike of his attitude to and knowledge of their earlier affair (they married two months after his death).

It was a great act and the audience’ involvement made it more interesting.

The post is getting too long so I will continue  on next post.

Please click here for more photos.

Stonehenge : England

I had always been fascinated by Stonehenge as there is so much mystery surrounding it. So when we were in England, I made sure to go and visit it. We drove through the beautiful landscape of county of Wiltshire, 13km north of Salisbury and arrived at Stonehenge. The day was quite sunny , we parked the car and hurried towards the fence surrounding the henge to look at it closely. As we walked along the fence for a while, we couldn’t find the entrance. I had to ask one of the passerby and he showed me the way, which was next to the parking lot. All the people we had seen close to the fence were not planning to go inside so they were just looking at it through the fence.

While doing my research, I found that lots of people were disappointed that they were not allowed to walk among the stones. From what I read they were not happy that they were really far from the stones and but not so with me. I really loved the place.

As there were no queues to go inside, we paid £7.80 per person grabbed a couple of audio guides and walked through a tunnel under the road that separated the parking space from the henge and a staircase to go up to the Stonehenge. The audio guide can play in several languages and can be stopped and started at each point on the tour which worked well and allowed everying to go at their own pace. As it was a warm summer day, the place looked beautiful with this massive field of green grass around the Stonehenge. There were busloads of tourists everywhere and it was a bit crowed but me and my husband just took our time to look around. There was a path around the Stonehenge which had markers with number for the self-guided audio tour.

It was nice to know the history of the place. Around 8,000 BC, as the early humans discovered agriculture and farming, they dug five huge mastholes near what would later be Stonehenge.  Today, the Stonehenge parking lot covers the location of those mastholes and the only indication that prehistoric activity once took place at that spot is a round white circle which could very well be confused with a roundabout marker.

In 5,000 years, the early human civilizations advanced and developed.  They became nomads, conquerors, architects and sculptors.  They developed communities oriented around farming and hunting, domesticated ancient cows and buffalo, and wandered far across the earth to gather materials and equipment to celebrate their faith and beliefs.  And, it is around this time that the prehistoric humans in England discovered the circle.  Just as the ancient Egyptian monuments were mostly triangular and pyramidal, the henges are primarily circular or oval.

So, what is a henge?  A henge is identified by a circular ditch with an internal bank, with or without monuments in the center.  There are hundreds of henges scattered across England but the most famous are the ones in the Salisbury area.

Stonehenge was the centre of ancient Britain, according to a study which claims the monument symbolised the unification of eastern and western communities. A new study by researchers from five British universities suggests Stonehenge may in fact have been built as a sign of peace between people from the east and west of the country after a period of conflict.

The stones, which come from different locations as far afield as southern England and west Wales, may have been used to represent the ancestors of some of Britain’s earliest farming communities, researchers suggest.

As we follow the path when we got to the area where we could see the stone from closest point on the path, it looked amazing and I can’t even imagine how people thought of making something so massive. Stonehenge looked different from different angles and it still seemed so mysterious with its grand presence.

As we continue to circle around Stonehenge, we came across a large stone called the Heel stone. It is a 16 feet long tertiary sandstone.

 After we finish our walk around Stonehenge, we stopped in front of the exit and looked at it again. It feels as if I was looking at a piece of history which is so mysterious and at the same time so beautiful.

 Here are some facts of Stonehenge.

  • Stonehenge was built between 3100 – 1100 BCE.
  • The circle was aligned with the midsummer sunrise, the midwinter sunset, and the most southerly rising and northerly setting of the moon.
  • The ground plan and structural engineering of Stonehenge incorporate sophisticated mathematical and geometrical understandings on the part of its builders.
  • There were two types of stones used in its construction: the ‘bluestones’ (weighing as much as four tons and brought from 240 miles away) and the Sarsen stones (averaging eighteen feet in height and twenty-five tons in weight).
  • It has been estimated that the construction of Stonehenge required more than thirty million hours of labour.
  • More than nine hundred stone rings exist in the British Isles. Of these, Stonehenge is the most well-known.
  • The megalithic monuments of Britain and Europe predate those of the eastern Mediterranean, Egyptian, Mycenaean and Greek cultures.
  • The Druids had nothing to do with the construction of the stone rings. Druids are known to have conducted their ritual activities mostly in sacred forest groves.

Please click here for more photos.

Dubai city, Souks , Marina, Dubai land & Deira City Centre

One of the days we were in Dubai, we decide to do our own city discovery so early in the morning. We caught a cab and asked to be dropped in one of the souks. Souk means market in Arabic. The cab dropped us in a gold souk.

Gold, Spice and Utensils souk

One of the reason I wanted to go to the gold souk is because it was recommended by everyone on the internet. Even though I am not into gold, I was thought, if the place was reasonably cheap, we could buy a piece for my mom and mother in law but once I was there I was just overwhelmed.

The souk is located in the heart of Dubai’s commercial business district in Deira, in the locality of Al Dhagaya. The souk consists of over 300 retailers that trade almost exclusively in jewellery.

As soon as I got out of the cab, even at 9am in the morning it was humid and hot. Lucky we had some water with us. Once we paid the cab, an Indian looking man came over and asked if we want some bags, watches or t-shirt. From what I read from reviews, I knew he was trying to sell us fake stuffs so we declined and entered the Gold Souk.

OMG I was going crazy seeing so much gold on display in the windows. Seriously, the amount of money that costs to buy those jewelleries must be in the millions. Every shop display was filled in gold with big and chucky gold items. There were a few which had silver and diamonds but most of them were of just gold. I have seen gold shops in Nepal and India but they were nothing close to the ones in the souk. Also I realised that most of the bangles, jewel laden necklaces, rings were in Indian style.

After doing some window shopping for a while and being hassled by many more men to buy their fake product, we finally decided to go inside one of the shops. We had a rough idea on how much the gold was in the international market so I asked to see a 5gm gold coin. I realised that it was not as cheap as we expected. The price of the gold pieces is based on the price of gold by gram, plus the price of the workmanship. So AS and I decided that it was not worth buying anything from there for our mothers and left. In Nepal, they prefer ornaments made of 22carat gold but most of the ready-made items there were 18 carat gold.

For me, even if I didn’t buy anything, we were happy with my visit to the place and a few photos. After that we decided to find the spice markets. It was not very far from the gold market and surprisingly we also found a Utensils markets.

The Spice Souk, situated on Sikkat Al Khail Road, is in the locality of Al Ras. The souk comprises several narrow lanes which are lined with open and closed-roof stores that sell a variety of fragrances and spices from frankincense and shisha to the many herbs used in Arabic and South Asian food. In addition, several textiles, incense, rugs and artefacts are also sold in the Spice Souk. The air around the souk was very aromatic.

As we were walking away from the Spice Souk, without buying anything as Australia has strict quarantine rules and we didn’t want to get into the hassle of explaining every product, we stumbled onto a Utensil Souk.

I think we spent well over 2 hours in these souks and both of us were getting very tired and hot. For the first time, I could feel the heat of Dubai. Our initial plan was to go to Deira creek but we changed our mind and went to Deira City Centre. Yap more shopping. Just took a cab and went to the cool and air-conditioned shopping mall.

Deira City Centre

Deira City Centre is one of many malls in Dubai which has retail outlets, restaurants, entertainment facilities and a hotel. We went to a coffee shop and had a cake and coffee, rested for some time and then went shopping. In the end, we had our lunch there as well. It was an Arabic restaurant and the food was really good. In that restaurant for the first time, AS had a non- alcoholic beer. He was telling me that it tasted exactly like a normal beer but just didn’t have any alcohol in it.

Dubai Land

When we did a tour of Dubai, one of the places they took us to was Dubai Land. They are planning to make this big and amazing theme park and as it is going to be in Dubai, it is going to be the world’s biggest theme park when it is finished in 2020. It is estimated to cost 64.3 billion.

The project will feature cultural facilities with structures based on famous sites and the architectural marvels of the world, such as the Pyramids, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Eiffel Tower, the Taj Mahal and the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Spread over an area of 4 million square metres, it is shaped to represent the falcon, emblematic of the UAE’s heritage. In addition to that the project will consist of a full function Pharaohs Theme Park with multiple white-knuckle rides and roller coasters, Islamic Culture & Science World.

So basically after 2020, if you are thinking of going on a  holiday and can’t afford to go to Paris to see Eiffel tower, China to see great wall of China, Peru to see Machu Picchu and India to see Taj Mahal or any other wonder of the world, just go to Dubai land and you will be able to see the exact replica of everything in their original size. I really think Dubai is planning to take over the world’s tourism after 2020.

When I went to the room where there was the display of the model of Dubai Land, I was really impressed. –

Dubai Marina

We went to the Dubai Marina as a part of our tour as well. It is an artificial canal city, carved along a two-mile (3 km) stretch of Persian Gulf shoreline. It is the largest man-made marina in the world. It has a number of five-star hotels, commercial properties and residential area. There are so many outdoor cafes and restaurants and has a lively vibe that it’s remarkably pleasant to stroll down the pedestrian strip. The area has a stunning water feature that opens out in the widest part of the marina where you can eat al fresco capturing the excellent views and soak up the ambience.

I also noticed that in the marina there were lots of yachts docked. Definitely a place for the rich and famous.

More on Dubai :

Let’s start with Amazing Dubai

Hello from the world’s tallest building: Burj Khalifa

Desert safari in Dubai

The Dubai Mall, aquarium and underwater zoo

Published : Let the Revolution begin!

This article was published in +977 (a Nepalese Lifestyle Magazine in Australia) in May- June 2012 issue.

If you were in Kathmandu in the mid 90’s, you must have fond memories of the time when FM (frequency modulation) radio was first introduced in Nepal. It was one of the best things that happened in that decade for people like me, who enjoyed a wide variety of music. Choosing between various music stations to listen to was a great treat and stations like Kantipur FM,HITS FM, Classic FM, and Image FM paved the path for all other FM stations to come.

At that time, two brothers who called themselves Rhythm Brothers also made their impact on the FM front with their captivating voice, witty sense of humour and good personalities. It was their playful shenanigans that saw them climb to the top of the ratings chart and claim recognition as the modern day voice of FM radio.

I used to love them as they were presenters who could make you listen, rather than just hear and their programs were largely unscripted and instead, consisted of real chitchat and impromptu humour unlike some other programs in which it felt like the RJs were just reading from a paper.  I still remember the evenings with load shedding, when I had used battery operated radio just to listen to them; and Music Jam used to brighten up my evening. It was one of the best programs of its time and the brothers were able to make their mark on everyone’s memory.

Then I finished high school and decided to come to Australia. The day I came to Sydney, I missed a lot of things from home like my family, Nepalese food but I also missed listening to the show. It made me wish that it would have been so much better if I had an opportunity to listen to the show from here as well but unfortunately it was not possible.

Not until now that is. Yes you heard me right, now Asish and Prasan Syangden along with Manoj KC and Cabinet Shrestha have started a new radio station in Nepal and they named it very aptly, calling it REVOLUTION RADIO. In short it is also know as RVL Radio.

Talking to Asish about how they came up with this new concept for radio in Nepal, he said “Me and Prasan, and Manoj (from 1974AD) hit on the idea of online radio in Manoj’s room. We were just talking about radios and how things have become monotonous in this area and that we wanted to do something new.” As great ideas are always appreciated, they were joined by Cabinet Shrestha when he heard the concept and they expanded form the home studio to Moksh complex in Jhamsikel.

They worked really hard to convert their concept into reality and recently launched the radio station with a grand party called “Revolution at Moksh”. It was a black carpet (yes, not red carpet) event attended by many influential people of Nepal. It was a magnificent event introducing Revolution Radio followed by musical performances of Hemant Rana, Albatross, Subani Moktan, 1974 AD and Kathmandu Jazz Conservatory.

Revolution Radio has music for every taste from dance numbers, blues, metal, Nepali adhunik, Nepali folk, pop and rock music. They have live broadcasting from 7 am-11 am (12.15 pm to 4.15 pm Sydney time) everyday in the morning and the same time in the evenings as well. They are focusing not only on the audience in Nepal but also on people around the globe especially Australia,USA,UK and the Middle East.

I have been listening to them during my lunch breaks for a few weeks now and I’m loving it. The sound quality is really good and they play a great range of songs. It is easy to interact with them via Facebook, twitter or Skype. You can even have a peek at the studio from their RevCam.

The voices behind the revolution radio are:

  • Asish Syangden
  • Prasan Syangden
  • Samriddhi Rai
  • Elisha Scarlet Shrestha
  • Yanik Shrestha
  • Bhadrayo Chari
  • Sumeet Sigdel,
  • Sumita Gurung  and
  • Dj PhuCHheY
  • Monica Jha
  • Pretty Limbu

So don’t forget to tune in to Revolution Radio, I bet you will love it. Please visit their website www.rvlradio.com for more information.

They are powered by SUBISU Cablenet and partner with The Himalayan Times Kathmandu Conservatory, AGNI Incorporated Pvt.LTD.

Published: Facebook Generation

Please read the previous post if you haven’t don’t so already.

This article was published in +977 (a Nepalese Lifestyle Magazine in Australia) in May- June 2012 issue.

We are the Facebook generation. If you are like me and millions of others then you have Facebook, Twitter, Skype and even a Blog. You can’t pass a single day without surfing the internet and LOL,XOXOand BRB are the most used words, if I may call them so, in your conversation. And you can’t imagine your life without your smart phone and definitely not without internet.

Facebook has changed the way we communicate with our friends and family. It has allowed us to be in touch with our friends and look at their lives in pictures or even videos. In my case, it has reunited me with my friends from my Kindergarten / preschool after 20 years and Facebook has helped me keep in touch with my cousins and relatives who live in different countries. I even became friends with my husband’s relatives in Facebook long before meeting then physically.

With its “What’s on your mind?” question (status update), it has allowed me to know how my friends were feeling and made it easy to wish someone a “Happy Birthday” which I would have never done otherwise and same goes with sharing photos. I used to email photos to multiple people before but now all I have to do is upload them in Facebook and tag the people I want to share the photos with. You know your friends have viewed the photos when you get likes and comments on them.

I have received the news that someone got engaged, married, had a baby, went on a holiday or even died (I am serious) via Facebook. These news would have never made it to my ears (or eyes in this case) if it was not for Facebook so I have to thank Facebook for all that. Also, I have used Facebook’s events function to invite people for birthdays. As everyone I needed to invite to the event was already in Facebook, it just made my planning a lot easier. It has an RSPV option which allowed me to keep track of the guests easily.

Twittering, Blogging and Skyping are a few other things apart from Facebooking that we think are an essential part of our life like the air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat. We feel we cannot live without them.

Twittering and following the tweets of celebrities and unknown people, writing a blog to an unknown audience and Skyping instead of talking on the phone has made our life super busy these days as it takes time to manage all our social networks.

So in this busy virtual life have you ever paused for a second and thought about the people in your life, the REAL people, yes I am not talking about your Facebook friends but the real flesh and blood people, friends, family, colleagues, neighbours, people you see every day, people you used to know and who had been an important part of your life. 

Do you have anyone in your life with whom you used to pick up a phone and talk that you stopped because you are so busy with your virtual life now? 

Do you have friends who live overseas and you used to write an email frequently but now stopped writing your emails since they are in your Facebook? 

Do you feel better when someone calls to ask you about your holiday or do you feel better if they comment on your photos on Facebook?

I am asking these questions because I used to be very active on Facebook. I went through a phase (which many of you may identify with) when I felt like I was judged on the number of friends I had in Facebook. It put a lot of pressure on me to accept requests from anyone just so that I could push the number of “friends” ever higher. I have never accepted a request from a total stranger but I have from people who I had just met once and may never meet again in my life. I felt good and popular to have so many “friends”.

I wanted comments and posts on my wall and thought I definitely needed to maintain my Facebook page to keep in touch with former classmates, and relatives who live far away from me. I tried to chat whenever I was online and post regular updates to let them know how my life was rolling. I used to like and comment on other’s posts and photos regularly. I spent lots of time doing this.

Then there was a game called Farmville I played on Facebook. There were many games and still are but this was the one I got hooked on. It was simply too addictive. I actually used to time my life around it and even put alarms to remind me that I have to login and play the game. I spent a lot of time ploughing, harvesting this virtual Farm for points and rewards.

The game started on the lowest level so you wanted to complete it to get to the next one and then the next after that and so on. The game showered you with all these virtual animals and gifts so you can keep going. You even got ribbons that made you feel special. I swear, one time, I spent 3 hours moving my animals and trees to make the farm bigger so I could have extra plots to plant more virtual crops. I was literally becoming a farmer spending so much time on the game. If I had a real farm I’m sure I would have made a lot of money from those produce I grew at the farm.

When I talked to people around me, it was not only me who had that craze. Many of my friends were guilty of this and I saw lots of Status on Facebook saying “Can someone please gift me a horse”, “Why is no one sending me any pigs?” Pigs and Horses were all you thought of all day long. And they weren’t even real! 

Can you believe there were people in this world even crazier than me about the game? They were making cheat sheets for the game and forums were flooded with the questions on how to make points easily so that you could climb up the levels and beat your friends. Also people were spending real money to buy virtual stables or pagodas. God, could we be any more unreal?

That’s the day when lightning struck me (metaphorically of course or I wouldn’t be writing this would I?) I asked myself – “What was I doing with my time on Facebook? Why did I have to be number one among my friends in this stupid game?” I also had no real desire for all of my Facebook friends to know that I went on a holiday or what I liked or who I was with. That day I went and cleaned up my Facebook. I organised my Facebook friends into groups according to their importance in my life. I made sure only a few people who really mattered to me could really see what I did.

Ideally, I should have deleted anyone who was not a part of my life anymore and kept only a few as my friends but I admit I was too chicken to delete them. I didn’t want to hurt their feelings. I was quite sure they wouldn’t notice but I kept thinking about the small percentage who would.

I realised that in real life I have only a handful of friends that I can count on, which means all 300+ friends that I had in my Facebook were not real friends, just people I know. They won’t be there when I need help or advice. They don’t feel sorry when I am down and won’t support me when I need a hand, so should I share my personal thoughts, feelings and my life with these strangers? My answer was definitely a big fat NO.

I had the most wonderful meal today. :)”, “I went to a spa today.” and so on are just some examples of the Status updates that you can read every day on Facebook. Do you think anyone out there is really interested in that kind of information about your life? Do you care what time your friends wake up, where they go to, what they eat for breakfast, who they are hanging out with? If you don’t really care, do you think anyone else cares about your Status updates?

When I was doing a First Aid Training the other day, the trainer pointed out to us that in case of an emergency (touch wood it never happens) if you need to comfort anyone who is in distress, just go and hug them, as a hug works to calm a person. Real human touch always has magic that no words you type or any comments on Facebook can even compare to. I realised then that we are losing touch with real human bonding due to this virtual social networking.

Another thing that bothers me is the privacy on these social networking sites. I am an IT professional, so I use all my skills to take major precautions to avoid the privacy pitfalls that are ever present on the internet.  I feel sorry for people out there who post all their details on social networking sites without knowing the risks that they face. Putting personal information on Facebook or online in general is not safe and can make you a victim of identity theft and cyber crimes.

Many people will like to have strict control over their personal information which is difficult if you are on Facebook, unless you are very careful not to divulge them. We all like to make sure our personal information is only visible to our trusted friends, not the whole world but the constant updates and frequent changes made by Facebook has made it difficult to keep control of the privacy of our information on Facebook.

First and foremost always be aware of what you are sharing online and with whom. You can edit the privacy option in Facebook so if you have not done so already please go and edit it to make your personal information secure. Make sure your contact information is private and control who can access your information like photos, wall information and status updates. It is easy to stop sharing information with total strangers. If you don’t know how, just Google it and you should find tutorials on how to do it. Be aware and alert every moment.

Someone wise once said, “We realise the value of time only once we are old” so let’s balance our life and utilise our time from now so we don’t regret it in the future. There is no harm in being on Facebook but also make sure you have friends you can connect to outside of it. Call a friend instead of leaving a comment on their post, try to hug a friend instead of “poking” them on Facebook and definitely have a few real friends than just the hundreds of virtual friends online. We should always admire and appreciate what is innovative so there is nothing wrong in building your social networks on Facebook but don’t forget the real world while you are chasing the virtual one.