Retrospective travel post 2: Budapest, Hungary and the Whitaker Conference

We arrived into Budapest, Hungary under heavy rain, and went straight to the Intercontinental Hotel. It was the first time that I stayed at a 5 star hotel -- and trust me, it is worth all the hype. We had a fabulous view of the Danube, the Buda palace, and the chain bridge.

For the next three days, I stayed in the hotel with the other fellows/scholars and we each gave presentations. Luis got to wander around Budapest and take some pretty spectacular photos. The other people at the conference were a pretty diverse group, working on a mix of projects (although the majority was in Europe, especially concentrated in Switzerland and the UK).

I was able to bring Luis to our "cultural activities" which consisted of the Swiss Romande concert at the Budapest Palace of Arts (the orchestra was actually from Laussane, Switzerland, where three of the fellows/scholars were doing their projects...haha) and a wine tasting dinner cruise on the Danube. As a side note, I was surprised that Hungary had its own vineyards, but I cannot say that I am a fan. Their signature wine is the white dessert wine, which slides down the throat like honey...I can't believe it's drank to accompany equally sweet desserts.

Before coming to Budapest, I never thought about visiting Hungary. It's one of the places that I put in the I-know-it-exists-but-why-would-I-ever-visit-it list. I was definitely pleasantly surprised. There is a varied collection of sites to visit, including lots of art nouveau architecture (one of which was the Parizsi udvar, or the Parisian court, a hidden gem in the busy center of the Budapest shopping district) as well as some impressive religious buildings, such as the Great Synagogue, the biggest synagogue in Europe and the second largest in the world (also where Zionism was born).

Perhaps more importantly, the food is pretty awesome. They are known for paprika and poppy seeds, and they really know how to use them! I was also surprised to discover that Hungary makes marcipan (made of sugar and almond meal), much like the Spanish marzapan. Szamos is a sweets company that makes delicious (and expensive) marcipan candies.

After the conference, we had about two days to ourselves to explore the city. I got to meet up with RP, a Hungarian guy I worked with three years ago, and we had coffee near Hero square.

Budapest is also known as the bath capital of the world, so one of the nights, Luis and I went to the Rudas Bath, a Turkish bath built in the 16th century located on the Gellért hill on the Buda side. It was co-ed night, and we stayed from around 11 pm until sometime past 2 am. It was really relaxing, but the water smelled strongly of sulfur. Some of the pools were scalding hot!!


Night view of the Danube and Buda palace from our hotel room.


Fishermen's bastion on Buda hill. One of my favorite places in Budapest!


National Opera House, where we saw the ballet rendition of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.


Kürtőskalács (Hungarian chimney cake) being sold at the Buda palace. It's Hungary's oldest pastry and originally from Transylvania...super yummy!

We were scheduled to leave Budapest on Saturday, but some unexpected events unfolded...(cue suspense music).

Up next...trans-European adventure (and the damn Icelandic volcano)!

Retrospective travel post 1: Vienna, Austria (and to a much lesser extent, Bratislava, Slovakia)

It has been quite some time since I posted...a lot happened in April and May, leading to some pretty unexpected events.

It all started April 8th, when I flew from Santiago, Chile to Vienna, Austria. There were two stops in the USA (where I gorged on fat-laden foods at the airport) and one stop in Barcelona, where I "picked up" Luis before flying into Vienna.

The Whitaker Conference for all the fellows/scholars was scheduled the following week in Budapest, Hungary, and I decided to stop in Vienna and Bratislava along the way just to see some sights. Vienna was fantastic. We stayed in a hotel near the shopping area and Naschmarkt (great fleamarket street with stalls selling HUGE sausages and cartoon-like cheeses...during the evenings the shops host music venues, and we saw a blues show in one of the restaurants). The palaces were amazing (Belvedere, Schönbrunn, and Hofburg), the opera was fantastic (we dressed up and saw L'elisir d'amore at the Staatsoper), and we even got to see the Wien Philharmoniker perform Beethoven's 5th and 6th symphonies (7 euros for standing room tickets!). It was a bit rainy during our 3 days there, but it was great nevertheless. I even got to see Camille, a girl from Paris I worked with 3 years ago who was in Vienna for Erasmus, a European-wide exchange program. Just walking around the city was amazing - the churches were very impressive and the shopping is fantastic (but alas...out of my budget).


The cheese sold at Naschmarkt was over 1 foot in length and width!!


Schönbrunn Palace. Not my favorite palace in Vienna, but still very impressive. It used to be the summer palace for the royal Hapsburg family.


THIS was my favorite palace in Vienna. The Belvedere! I liked it a lot more because it has a much more impressive (and varied) art collection. This photo is the back of Upper Belvedere, taken from the walkway leading to Lower Belvedere. The Upper one houses most of the impressive art collections, including an extensive Klimt collection (The Kiss is HUGE!).



Part of the Hofburg Palace. I think it was the Natural History Museum. The whole palace was very impressive, and covered a HUGE area...it included the Fine Arts Museum, the National Library, the Albertina, State Apartments, Spanish Riding School, and more museums. It was pretty daunting to walk through, and we definitely got lost. It was like a mini-city. I wish I had more time to explore, as we only got to see a small portion of the palace.

Before we knew it, our three days in Vienna were over. I was a bit sad to leave such a great city -- definitely worth it to stay a week or more! We took a bus to Bratislava, Slovakia to spend a half-day there before heading by train to Budapest, Hungary. Bratislava was a bit odd. The bad weather (rain and clouds) contributed to the grey atmosphere and the concrete buildings. The city center was a contrast of new and old, and you can definitely see the remnants of the communist occupation. I thought it was going to be dirt-cheap, but it was not. After spending about 3 or 4 hours in Bratislava, we were glad to be on the train to Budapest.

Next up...Budapest and the Whitaker Conference!

Giant 8.8 magnitude earthquake in Chile? Wait...I'm in Chile!

February 25th (Thursday), I embarked on a what was supposed to be a carefree weekend in Southern Chile with Jenny. Our vacation was prolonged because of damages to transportation routes (highway and Santiago airport) that prevented us from coming back to Santiago/Valparaíso. We were in Puerto Varas (X Region of Los Lagos, or the Lakes Region) when the earthquake hit Saturday early morning (3 am or so?). It wasn't too strong where we were, and I would guess it was around a magnitude 6. The bed shook a lot, and we all evacuated the hostel, where we were spending the night. There were a few aftershocks that followed that night. The electricity and gas were cut off during the following day, and we had no idea of how bad the earthquake was until late Saturday evening, when we were in Chiloé, a large island in Southern Chile (Northern Patagonia region). By then, everyone basically heard about the 'catastrophic' earthquake that hit Chile (epicenter Concepción, a city south of Santiago, in the region of Bio bío). Ridiculous messages flooded my e-mail while I was still fairly clueless about the situation.

We had plans of flying back to Santiago early Monday morning, but saw on the news that the airport had major damages and no flights would be able to land for 72 hours or so. It took us three days to change our flight (long hold on the phone with LAN...and even longer wait at the office in Puerto Varas), and by then, the earliest flight to Santiago would be Monday, March 8th. Since we had no choice, we booked our flight, and decided to wing the next week in the Lakes Region...

For us, our trip was not affected by the earthquake (except for the flight change), and we really had a good time. A short day-to-day chronicle (with pics!) of our trip:

Friday, Day 1: We visited Saltos de Petrohué, Parque Nacional Vicente Pérez Rosales, and Lago Todos los Santos. The Osorno volcano (and the smaller, less-majestic but still worth mentioning Calbuco and Puntiagudo volcanoes) was truly spectacular!



Osorno volcano is the backdrop for the beautiful Petrohué waterfalls.

Saturday, Day 2: Despite the early-morning earthquake, we went to the Isla Grande de Chiloé and visited Ancud, Castro, the UNESCO World Heritage churches in Castro and nearby Nercón, and spent the night in Ancud.


Houses on palafitos (wooden sticks) in Castro.



San Francisco cathedral in Castro. One of the 16 UNESCO world heritage churches in Chiloé, and one of the hundreds of wooden churches built on the island!

Sunday, Day 3: Saw penguins in Puñihuil, about 30 minutes west of Ancud. The beaches were beautiful!


My first time seeing penguins in the wild! Islotes de Puñihuil, located off the coast of Chiloé, and meters from beautiful, secluded beaches. It's the only place in the world where Magellanic penguins and Humbolt penguins coexist.

Monday, Day 4: Waited a long time at the LAN office, toured around Puerto Varas and went to Puerto Montt in the evening to spend the night.



View of Puerto Varas from the look out point in Monte Calvario hill. German-style church with a beautiful lake and three volcanoes in the backdrop? Yes, please.

Tuesday, Day 5: Woke up bright and early and took a ridiculous local bus through the Cochamó valley, past Rio Puelo and on to Lago Tagua Tagua...and then immediately took the same bus back to Puerto Varas. The scenery was spectacular...and the total 8 hours in the bus was slightly more than tolerable.

Wednesday, Day 6: Visited Puerto Octay, about 20 minutes northwest of Frutillar, and also on Lago Llanquihue. We made it back to Frutillar in time for tea (we do love this town! and its kuchens mmm).



A typical Once completa, featuring tea, kuchen (delicious cake/pie like dessert introduced by German immigrants in Southern Chile), cake, and some baguette pieces with meat, cheese, avocado, and eggs.


Thursday, Day 7: Visited Osorno, a city an hour and a half north of Puerto Varas. It had some nice, old houses and handicrafts, but nothing more. We took a bus to Entre Lagos, a little town 30 minutes east of Osorno, then took a bus to Termas de Puyehue, famous hot springs close to the Chile-Argentine border about 30 minutes east of Entre Lagos. There were no more buses running east toward Parque Nacional Puyehue, so we hitchiked to the park entrance. We managed to hitchike back to Osorno after we took a small hike through the park to see Salto del Indio and Salto Anticuro.



Salto del Indio in the national park of Puyehue, about a 10 minute drive from the Chile-Argentine border.

Friday, Day 8: Visited Valdivia, a city two hours north of Osorno, in the region of the rivers (IX Región de los Ríos). The city was rocked by the biggest earthquake recorded in the world couple decades back (magnitude 9.5). It was a nice city nonetheless, and we celebrated Jenny's 25th birthday by going to the Entre Lagos chocolate factory!



The city straddles three rivers populated by obnoxious colonies of sea lions, vultures, and other animals.

Saturday, Day 9: Bussed back to Frutillar, where we spent the night at a nice, family-run hospedaje. We visited the Teatro del Lago, whose tagline is that it is the "southernmost opera house in the world."



The tell-tale trebel clef in Frutillar, on the shores of Lago Llanquihue with Osorno volcano in the background! Every year, Frutillar holds a music festival in the summer, and is known as the city of music in Chile.

Sunday, Day 10: Spent the day shopping in Frutillar and visiting the Museo Colonio Alemán. Went back to Puerto Varas and got ready for our last night in southern Chile!

Monday, Day 11: Upon arrival at the Puerto Montt airport, we were told that our confirmed flight actually did not exist (wait...what? why do we have a confirmation page then?). After slight arguing with the LAN lady, she shoved us into an earlier flight that departed that day for Santiago.

When we got to the Santiago airport, we were told that passengers are not allowed in the airport itself, due to damages from the earthquake. There were large white tents placed in the parking lot, and passengers (and personnel) went in and out without much (or any) security. Even bathrooms were lacking (a few port-a-potties here and there).

Valparaíso and Viña del Mar didn't sustain too much damage. Some buildings were in bad shape and have to be demolished, and people were a little worried. Over the next week, there were more aftershocks, with the biggest one around a magnitude 7. Last weekend, we experienced a Chile-wide (is that even possible? over 3,000 km...) power outage that lasted couple hours, as well as a false tsunami warning that had people frantic and running up the hills.

Hopefully, everything settles back to its normal state soon!

Aftermath of the three-months hiatus

I haven't posted in three months, but I am back in action now (and with pictures, to boot!). A lot of things have happened since November.

1. Medical school Interviews! Incredibly hectic flying around and sleeping on friends' futons...two trips back to the US later, I found out that I got into medical school around Christmas, when I was in Sucre, Bolivia! I got into a couple places before I withdrew from all schools and decided on UTSW (University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center) in Dallas, Texas for medical school. It is incredibly cheap with in-state tuition, great clinical foundations, and I'll be semi-close to home (but not uncomfortably close). School starts in mid-August!

2. December trip: I spent two weeks in Peru and Bolivia, traveling with Luis. We had a great time, and saw some amazing sights. In Peru, we went to (in order) Lima, Cusco, Sacred Valley, 4 day Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, Puno, and the Uros Islands in Lake Titicaca. In Bolivia, we went to Copacabana, Island of the Sun (biggest island in Lake Titicaca), La Paz, Tiahuanaco (Tiwanaku), Sucre, and Potosi.

Here are some photos from our trip:



Women in Chinchero, Sacred Valley of the Incas near Cusco, Peru. The mountains, framed by puffy pastel-colored clouds, looked truly majestic!


After Three and a half day of hiking through the mountains (in two days of pouring rain), we finally reached Machu Picchu. The eerie (almost myth-like) clouds shrouded Machu Picchu in the morning when we arrived. The hike was definitely worth it!


View from one of the man-made floating islands of the Uros in Lake Titicaca. The inhabitants transport themselves from island to island by reed boats. The islands are super small...maybe 10 meters in diameter for a domestic island, and bigger for more "commercial" islands. There is an island with an elementary school for the kids (and a school-reed-boat).


View from our hotel on the top of the Island of the Sun in the Bolivian side of Lake Titicaca. The views were spectacular, and the long ferry ride through the lake reminded me of the incredible size of the lake.


I found this experience exceedingly amusing. From Copacabana (on the shores of the Bolivian side of Lake Titicaca) to La Paz, there is a ferry boat crossing. The blue bus that is pictured above (with white letters) was our bus. It crossed the water in a flat plank while we (the passengers) crossed in a small motor boat. I heard that there are some buses on the bottom of the lake due to accidents, so I brought our passports and money with me on the motor boat.


Street graffiti in La Paz, Bolivia. For many Latin American countries, 2010 marks an important anniversary - the bicentennial of their independence! (also, Argentina, Colombia, Mexico...wow it was a bad year for Spain)


My absolute favorite city - Sucre, Bolivia! It was amazing, and I spent Christmas in the White City (a lot of the buildings are white).


Luis and I in Potosi, a town in Bolivia famous for its mines (lots of silver). Here we are after we got out of La Negra. It was a pretty heart-stopping three hour tour. The cave had crystallized arsenic, the air was thick and humid, and the infrastructure was not very hi-tech. We survived, nonetheless, and I don't think I'll be going into mines in the near future.


In Tiahuanaco (Tiwanaku), a really large archeological site. There used to be an ancient civilization that lived here before it was destroyed. It was another rainy day, and we had to hurry through the site, but I got a couple great pictures!


We ended our fantastic trip in Valparaiso and the famous new year's fireworks on the bay. It was a fantastic way to start 2010! Happy New Year's, everyone! (also, Chinese New Year's was just last week - year of the tiger!).

BOO! It's a porcupine!

This post has nothing to do with Halloween. I thought it was fitting since it is Halloween weekend...I'm not much for Holidays though.

Anyways today I went to the bathroom to brush my teeth, only to almost trip over a porcupine. Yes, a porcupine. I forgot that we (the house) have 3 of them. They were born couple months ago, and I saw them when they were 1 month old (when they were still huggable and kind of soft). I had forgotten about their existence since 1) they stay in the garden 2) they seem to be nocturnal 3) they scurry really fast and 4) they are sneaky like ninjas.

Well anyways, needless to say I was scared shitless. I remembered that a friend wanted to see pics and a video of the porcupine, so I quickly locked the porcupine in the bathroom and ran back to my room and got my camera.

I took some pics and one really short video. It scurries really fast and it's hilarious!! In the spirit of this Holiday weekend, enjoy!



I tried to feed it some lettuce. It didn't work. It just got really scared, made this grumbling sound and curled up :-(

And here is a video, if you fancy that sort of thing (it's really short! 30 seconds I think):

Failed attempt at exiting Chile and my adventure in the Andes Mountains

This weekend is a 3 day weekend because of Columbus Day on Monday. I decided to make the most of it by hopping over to Mendoza, Argentina for a weekend shopping spree...

Well I took a bus at 8 am from Viña del Mar and by around 2 pm we made it to the Chile-Argentina border, which conveniently sits nestled amidst the Andes Mountains. It was still pretty early in the day, and the views were gorgeous:


However, all turned awry when I presented my passport at the Chilean exit point. The police asked me for a Chilean ID card, which I told them I did not have. They then told me that within 30 days of entering Chile, I was supposed to go to the PDI (Chilean version of the FBI) and the Ministry of the Interior to register my Visa and get an ID card of some sort. Well I never did that, since neither the consulate, embassy, my Visa, the websites, nor the airport officials said anything about Visa registry. Then the police said that officially, I am an illegal alien and cannot be permitted to exit Chile until I go to the Ministry and the PDI.

It would not have been so bad if:
1. I were not 300 miles from Valparaíso
2. I were not at 2000 meters altitude in - 5 degrees Celsius weather in the Andes mountains

The Chilean police dumped me and another passenger who also couldn't get by to the Argentinian border patrol to take care of. He had no idea what to do, and told us to hitchhike a ride out of the mountains.

Well it took me and the other passenger (named Hector) about an hour to finally see a car approaching. They were headed to Los Andes and Santiago, so we hopped into the car.

After we passed the Chilean checkpoint, however, it started to snow heavily. A blizzard warning was issued, and we became the last batch of cars allowed in the mountain pass. They call the blizzard "viento blanco" in Chile because everything is white and windy and you can't see a meter in front of your face.

As I sat in a car, seeing nothing but white outside, I seriously wondered when I was going to die that day.

We started talking in the car, and the couple we hitchhiked with were nice, elderly Chileans who live a bit outside of Santiago. They asked us why we weren't allowed to pass, and I told them my story.

Hector, however, had a much more interesting story. You see, he is a convicted felon, and had a record with the Chilean PDI. When he presented his ID card and the border patrol looked him up, all his crimes showed up that were not resolved, and he was turned away.

Great. Not only was I stuck in a blizzard, I was stuck in a blizzard with a convicted felon.

It took us about 3 hours to get down the mountain pass. There were multiple heart-stopping curves and iciness along the way.

Here is a picture of how the roads were:


We finally hit Los Andes, a community closest to the Andes on the Chilean side, and me and Hector (who happened to be headed for Valparaíso as well...lucky me) took a bus home.

I sat back, and was happy that I would be home in 1 hour.

HOWEVER, another complication arose. The direct high way from Los Andes to Valpo was blocked, so the bus took an alternative route, and it took 4 hours to get home.

All in all, I got home at 1 am...at the exact same location I started off at 8 am the previous day.

It was a ridiculous adventure, and I am glad to be alive and not hacked to pieces.

I am also angry at the consulate for not telling me about registering my Visa. Shit is going to hit the fan this week when I try to resolve this issue with the bureacratic annoyance in Chile and Houston...

Fiestas Patrias

This past weekend was a Chilean Holiday (Fiestas Patrias: 18th of September - Chilean Independence and 19th of September - Chilean Military Day). This meant a few things:
1. Over-eating of meat at asados (BBQ) and ramadas (outside fair)
2. Over-drinking of chicha (ale-type alcoholic drink made from grapes)
3. Lazying around all weekend
4. Parada Militar in Santiago (and the lesser known Anti-Parada-Militar Parade)

Here are some pics:

While I had lunch on Plaza de Armas, a group of young people (70 - 100 individuals) dressed as clowns (WTF) protested the Parada Militar. I think it was a general anti-Military parade. They blocked a street, and just yelled random things. The Carabineros (public policemen, dressed in green) came with some vans and a tank (!!). After about 10 minutes the Carabineros started hosing down the protesters with water that was sprayed from the military tank. Then they proceeded to arrest some people (totally manhandeled). The protestors were really young, I'd say average between 15 - 17 years old. The women Carabineros were SUPER scary looking. Eek!

The Parada Militar in Parque O'Higgins. Apparently tickets were necessary to enter the arena and sit on the bleachers. I didn't have a ticket but was in the first row at the fence, so got a semi-good view. Got too tired of standing after an hour and a half so left. It was kind of boring, but seeing the Navy/Military uniforms were kind of neat.


The coolest part about the parade was the airshow. I liked the first plane but it went way too fast for me to take a picture. I got this one though. Red White and Blue (Chilean flag colors)!

Some Chilean foods/drinks:
1. Asado: BBQ, usually pork or beef
2. Empanadas: local specialty is pino (minced beef with onion filling)
3. Anticuchos: blocks of meat and onion on a stick and grilled. Like a Kebab.
4. Chicha: alcoholic grape ale
5. Chirimoya: Chilean fruit. Looks like an Artichoke on the outside. White on the inside with black seeds.