Ochen Priyatna

Finally at the last part of the 5 part series! Recalling the trip and reminiscing the hits and misses through the images we captured was an interesting activity that allowed me to rethink our experiences from an alternate point-of-view. My greatest regret was not taking enough (clear) footages to truly capture the essence of the places I've visited.

13. Nature, picturesque at every corner
Europe, or at least the cities I visited, were the epitome of picturesque. Every snap, every street looked like it came straight out of a piece of art - unique and full of character.











14. Tourist passes
Having such amazingly photogenic monuments would no doubt draw many tourists to this part of the world - the European tourism boards saw through this and launched a series of tourist-friendly passes that enables ticketing discounts at key landmarks and more often than not comes with a map of the city as well. For lazy tourists touring in the entire continent in a short period of time, these are the perfect tools to ensure you touch base with each city's offerings. For us? We were interested in the discounts for entries more than anything else.





15. Unforgettable? The goods and bads - Airbnb
The good and the bad of Europe - we saw it all

14 words to remember Europe for it's good and 1 word to recall the bad experiences we've had.
All these happened when we were in Paris. JJ has booked the accommodation thinking we've had a good buy since the price was affordable considering it's relatively centralised location. We made our way to the place and exiting the train station, we had a sense that we were in the area of French where most African-French resided in. We had no issues with that but we should have sensed something when the Airbnb address directed to an old cafe with broken furnitures in it.

(I'd insert the pictures as soon as I search around for them)

First contact
JJ first contacted the Airbnb owner who listed this property as she listed the property as a "boutique hotel" and I absolutely have no agenda for stating this but the property was a dilapidated shophouse - no more than that. We were directed by her "Receptionist" - 2 guys - to our room in the basement. As the staircase leading to the basement was too narrow for us to roll the giant luggage down, we proposed to leave the luggage on the ground level. Worst decision of our lives.

The room
When we entered, the place was extremely cold so we immediately turned on the heater. We soon realised that the basement was sheltered by glass and people walking by the streets could actually peer into the room. Feeling like my privacy was being intruded, I was quite apprehensive with staying here, especially with two guys as the receptionist in the first storey. We brushed that off since we assumed they would leave at night time.

As soon as we returned after our day exploring around Paris, we soon realised the receptionists were here to stay as they were cooking mini pots of soup on the ground level. We flashed a nervous smile entering and I nudged JJ that we had to change our accommodations. We browsed through Airbnb for the cancellation policy and we somehow ended up on a feedback page. We raised our concern of privacy and before we know, Airbnb cancelled our booking immediately and provided a full refund. We were shocked at these as it was way too late to leave for another property to stay right now. Hence, we wrote to the owner that we would definitely pay her separately on the one night we stayed at, packed up, and prepared to leave early tomorrow morning.

The shocker
The next morning, we shifted all our luggages upstairs to prepare to leave and we were shocked to see, our large luggage, is gone. Apparently, the owner was extremely pissed to know that we have cancelled on her and continued to stay at her property - even though we agreed to repay her the amount for the first night, she was asking for the full repayment before she would agree to return the luggage. We spent about 2 hours of our precious time, arguing with her, her receptionist and Airbnb - all the time in French. Jj only learnt French while he was there and he had extreme difficulty trying to explain the situation to them in French and to explain our stand as well. Things turn bad and I felt we could not waste our time and money (we had rebooked Disneyland tickets the day before for entry today) so we went ahead to check into another hotel down the street and left for Disneyland.

The whole time, the owner was setting up a context that we were cheating her money and that no luggage was stolen the whole time. We were extremely pissed with the situation as we had explained that we would pay her, but she would not return the luggage. In addition, it didn't help that Airbnb was not able to render any assistance and was trying to calm both parties down. Airbnb could have done more and they should have realised that the luggage was what kept both parties in the play. Otherwise, why the hell would we be fighting to pay the owner when the owner had nothing on us?


JJ speaking to the Airbnb peeps - who were getting on our nerves for being so unhelpful

This incident made me lose faith in Airbnb and French a little as I felt that the whole situation was so appalling and at so many situations, if we had a mediator - either Airbnb or the police - the circumstances could have been reversed and both parties would have been appeased. Both Airbnb and the police did not live up to my expectations and at times like this, I lament my lack of popularity (to hustle a crowd or response from mass media almost immediately) and my poor command of linguistics (not able to communicate well with the Police or with the receptionist/owner). This whole incident was a downer to the trip but it also made me treasure the present and made me a cautious user of Airbnb - Yes, I still use Airbnb as a platform but having been through this, I've realised that things can be better solved between people, outside of the platform.

Hopefully, this would be a good cautionary tip for people interested to book Airbnb in new places.

Tada, the end of my Europe trip recollection! coming in 9 months later but everything still seems so vivid! Ending the memories with a cautionary tip that would hopefully help Airbnb fans.

By the time we arrived in Munich, we were more than half way through our trip and I remember still feeling butterflies about the new places I was heading too but also experiencing much frustrations because of the language barriers - not that the locals did not understand what we were saying/asking, but more of the fact that I couldn't fully apprehend what everyone else were saying to their friends or family LOL is this what they meant when a person has a need for information. oh wells, let's begin.

10. Fun & more fun

From the various visits to Heineken, Bayern Munich's stadium, Amsterdam Zoo and finally the much awaited Paris Disneyland, the trip was filled with lotsa fun and laughter as we tried every facility like how a typical tourist would.









11. Witbier

I don't particularly fancy beer before heading to Europe since beer had a rather bitter aftertaste that doesn't gel well with my millennial tastebuds that can't take hardship lol. Hence, when I discovered witbier, although many say witbier has much more calories, the aftertaste of wheat is so fragrant I felt like I found a new love.






12. Sports
Europe is undeniably the home to one of the most viewed sports in the world - Soccer. Since we travelled during winter, there were no games scheduled (or players would freeze to death). Nevertheless, we (or just JJ persuading me to do so) still made it a point to visit one of the stadiums in Munich to do a stadium walking tour.

 

The reaction most people had when I said I was heading to Yangon - Wow, I didn't know your company had operations there... Yes they do have operations there but nope I'm not there for commercial reasons hahaha I reckon this must be a pretty unpopular place for vacation since it didn't occur to many minds that I was heading there to take a break from the hustlin' and bustlin'


As a first-timer to Yangon, I think I'm in a good position to vet how travel-friendly this city is. Although jj and I were travelling with our backpacks (freshly purchased from Decathlon), I firmly believe after this trip that we belong to a unique category of travellers called Glampers.

Glampers: Tourists who want the glam experiences at the price levels of campers/backpackers

So, only when you identify yourself in this category then you'd find this review useful and relevant. With that said, the glampers' first impressions of Yangon: So many pagodas?!


We travelled to Yangon with the impression that it'd be as accessible and interesting as Bangkok but the honest fact is that Yangon has more pagodas than anything other tourist attractions. Forget about the malls or markets or street-walking, when visiting Yangon, pagodas are a must.


As these pagodas are religious monuments, it is mandatory to cover yourself up (no shoulders and knees, no low-cuts or bare-backs). JJ was wearing berms and got "hand-picked" by the ticketing peeps to rent a longyi. As a result of that, the locals discovered that we were tourists and dealt us the 8000kyat (~SGD8) ticket. Otherwise, I presume our AZN looking faces & hair would have got us through the ticketing gates easily.


Talking about longyi, if you realised you've packed inadequately to match the conservative dressing culture in Myanmar, or like me, you just want a piece of Yangon to bring home, you may proceed to procure a piece of longyi from the Bogyoke Aung San Market located in Central Yangon. The market is located opposite a new fancy mall and within walking distance from Sale Shangri-La. Although the market is definitely catered for tourists more than it is for locals, it is still an interesting place to visit to take a peek into what Myanmar is known for. Rows of shops selling Jade, art pieces and clothing could be found. The Longyi I managed to find cost me 6000 kyat (~6SGD) and was made of a relatively cheap material, constantly fraying. Nonetheless, it was value-for-money as the other more beautiful longyi cost upwards of 20000 kyat. This 6000 kyat longyi served me well and even attracted locals to take pictures with me haha what a deal!






Besides the pagodas being a place for the locals to rest and chill, the vast space and constant human traffic makes these pagodas a hot favourite for animals as well. I henceforth categorise them as Pagoda Pets and from the pictures above, I think I'm more or less a Pagoda Pets Whisperer.


Another star offering when clampers go travelling are definitely food (and food shots). Flatlay images of scrumptious feast like the above are to-die-for. Yangon has pretty unique culinary offerings - we spotted Chinese, Western, Thai and Indian cuisine all around the city. Initially, we had doubt that Myanmar even had any local cuisine available. A little bit of research on TripAdvisor brought us to Lucky 7 Tea House and we ate a good spread of local cuisine (as seen in pic above!)


I'd like to bring your attention to the unofficial national dish of Myanmar - Mohinga. The special blend of spice in this mee sua like dish is a hidden gem. Together with the Mohinga, we also had chickpea rice with porkbelly loaded with oil, spring rolls (because Samosas were temporarily oos), chicken wings which are presented like balls and the infamous Myanmar milk tea which tasted a lot like teh Tarik. JJ ambitiously ordered the Kar dai version and I think he had a sugar rush thereafter.




Another attraction in Yangon would be the Circular railway that surrounds Yangon. TripAdvisor reviews suggested that the entire ride of the railways would take 3 hours and we technically had the time to do so but we were afraid the weather would turn bad in between. Hence, we chose a shorter route about 6-7 stations away from the Yangon central railway station and took the train towards Yangon railway station.