New Year

Sorry I've been rubbish at keeping up to date with blog posts - we have to do weekly ones at school and I usually put loads of photos and videos on there, then can't be bothered to do anything on my personal one after that. I haven't really taken many photos so it may be a bit of a dull one. First off I went to Hong Kong on a work trip. As I got to the passport check at KLIA2, instead of the usual lack of emotion, a security guard asked to see my passport then asked if I was a teacher. I said "Yes" and he then asked me what I taught so I told him, then he let me on his way. After this I went to the passport check point and there were a couple of middle aged attendants just chatting there. I gave over my passport and then they talked to each other in Bahasa but kept saying the word "Teacher" to each other then smiling at me. I have no idea what this was all about but I'm pretty sure being a teacher is like being a minor celebrity. Needless to say I felt like a beast. Hong Kong was pretty awesome. It was quite pricey though. I got in late on Thursday and went to the training session on Friday. Afterwards, in the spirit of being an expat and socialising, I went out for a drink with another bloke from the course. It turned out he was seeing a friend who lived in Hong Kong so I was in effect gatecrashing their catch up. I just smiled politely and made the most of the cider that is on sale in Hong Kong. We wandered round for a bit and I couldn't believe how clean and expensive everything looked. It looked like a great place to live, although there were quite a few seedy looking bars with middle aged white men being quite loud and drunk. It's pretty funny watching them try to flirt with locals but a bit sad too. Hannah turned up at 11pm and we went for a night out on the Friday. We found a place called Soho and went to a few bars. We randomly went into what we thought was a club and it turned out there was a pole dancing show. It wasn't particularly great, but some of the guys there were going a bit mental to see it. The music was good though and it was nice to be able to drink proper cider for a change. The next day we saw Jane and Evie (Hannah's aunt and cousin) and had a lovely time. They live on a boat so it was pretty cool staying there and they live in a lovely area just outside of Hong Kong Island. I couldn't believe how nice everyone was there, kids were just playing in the street without any worry and when a girl fell off her bike, people actually helped which was nice. The next few weeks at school were pretty non eventful (I'll try and do more regular posts as I'm sure stuff happened, I just can't remember it now). The big event though was when Hannah's parents came out to visit. It was lovely seeing Alan and Elma and in the first couple of days we showed them a few good local places to eat. After that we went to Langkawi for 4 days. We stayed in a lovely place called Frangipani. We didn't realise that it was actually Valentines day on the day we arrived. As it turned out, we had a lovely evening, although wasn't all that romantic. After dinner with my in-laws we went back to the room and got into our twin beds with an adjoining door to Hannah's parents' room. Not the most romantic Valentines day I've ever had but it was a lot of fun! We mainly just chilled out on the beach and as you can see from the photos had some fun getting photos from the setting sun. It was beautiful and the water was pretty warm. After a bit we headed up to the cable car which took us to the top of a hill. It was terrifying as it got really steep towards the end, but we went with a tour guide and he was brilliant. He showed us all the different types of tree, animal and plant growing in the forest as well as teaching us about some black magic and superstitions. Highlights of the tour included seeing a sleeping bat, a sleeping frog and the skin of a grasshopper like thing. We also went on the sky bridge which is a curved suspension bridge with views over Thailand. It was awesome so we did a little dance on there, because I had set the children in my class a homework task to learn a dance we are doing for our school play - Hannah, Elma and I led by example http://youtu.be/hqNaGxi7edw . You could see through the floor of the bridge in some places because it was glass. This terrified me but I went and had a look through all the same! After this amazing trip, we got entry into a cinema inside a dome. I was expecting a planetarium style thing or something but instead it was the most bizarre experience I've had in Malaysia yet. It was a virtual rollercoaster set on Mars, only the seats didn't move or anything. What made it though was the fact that some of the audience were screaming as if we were moving. Idiots. Anyway after that we went on our way. The holiday manly consisted of amazing food, trying to follow the map to tourist places which were not sign posted at all and swimming on the beach. It was good fun and I even got to swim in a waterfall! I rediscovered my love of table tennis and spent an afternoon playing that. We ate in a lovely restaurant called "Fat Cupid" which seemed pretty British tucked away from the main road with a lovely lawn and swimming pool. We had dinner on their sister restaurant "Sugar" which was right on the beach. Trying to not come across too much like an alcoholic, I resisted the urge to make the most of the duty free and we then went back to KL. The taxi ride back from the airport was terrifying as our driver skidded around, but thankfully we did get back safely. We had a lovely few days back there with Hannah's parents and we took them to my favourite burger place, "Fatboy's Burgers". It is probably the place we have eaten at most and it is lush - you can make your own burger and everything! We said goodbye to Alan and Elma then enjoyed a lazy couple of days before school started again. Finally, last night I went to a Karaoke evening in a proper Karaoke venue. It was amazing but bizarre. The place was in a shopping mall, next to an indoor rollercoaster. We went in this little room and they had a tv, 4 mics and lots of choices of song. There was an interesting/suspicious £1 all yo can eat buffet and a good amount of beer. It was fun singing along and I managed to beast out a version of "Perfect Gentleman" by Wyclef. That's pretty much it, I'm off to Shanghai next week on a school trip which should be fun. I'll try and take some photos and do a little post about it in a couple of weeks time!