thetyphoon

wild weather has had a habit of following me around, but now it just
may be getting ahead of itself. we are due to fly back to Taipei from
Hong Kong in a couple of hours, and are hoping that the airport there
is open again after Typhoon Haitang passed through. we have been
keeping close track of the storm's progress, since our flights back to
the US are in just a couple of days, and i really don't want to be in
Asia anymore. but it looks like Haitang will make landfall on the
mainland of the Middle Kingdom today, so we are told everything is
open and operating again in Taipei. and to think we almost scheduled
our vacation to end yesterday.

part of me, however, was wishing that it had ended yesterday. having
covered five countries in just under two weeks, i was getting to be an
avid collector of stamps in my passports. this avarice drove me to
make the trip across the Pearl River Delta to China's other "Special
Administrative Region", Macau. big mistake. no matter how badly you
want a stamp in your passport, don't go there. i had been given this
advice before, but it went unheeded as i undertook the costly trip
anyway. in contrast to Hong Kong, Macau is a dirty hole with perhaps
one-and-a-half mildly interesting sights, but certainly nothing worth
having to spend part of your life there. about the only cool part of
the trip was the mode of transportation: the jetfoil boat. this is a
large, Boeing-made boat which is indeed powered by a jet engine, and
rides up out of the water on a pair of aircraft wing-like foils.
needless to say it was a fast, and very smooth way to travel across
the South China Sea.

but i'm still looking forward to travelling across it even faster back
to Taiwan.