We contemplated on paying double the price for the “any time any day” priority access tickets to One World Observatory, which we did… and it turned out to be the right decision because 1) we moved our visit a day earlier due to better weather and 2) the admission line wrapped around two floors and out the door whereas we literally walked past everyone into the elevator. Ground Zero is now fully opened to public without the need to go through heavy security check unlike our visits from 5 years ago. Later that night, we learned about the terror attack that occurred half hour after we left that area and less than 4 blocks away from where we were at. Since then, the police made their presence felt even more and additional concrete barrier blocks were strategically placed at crowded areas in Manhattan.

Watching the New Yorkers celebrate Halloween was a sight to see. There were many adults and kids dressing up in costumes, walking from stores to stores trick-or-treating along the busy streets. In fact, the Halloween Day might be the most hated day by the pushy costumed characters at Times Square because most tourists ended up taking free pictures with folks with interesting Halloween costumes instead of the typical fatty Batman or Elmo the Molester.

The last time we visited the Statue of Liberty was 17 years ago, but back then, we only paid for the general access to walk around the Liberty Island. This time, we bought our tickets 4 months in advance to go all the way up to the Crown, which has very limited spots since it could only hold 6 to 8 people at a time. We spent the whole day on both Liberty Island and Ellis Island and, as immigrants ourselves, it was a rather meaningful visit. For those who like to build walls or occasionally forget what America is made up of, it doesn’t hurt to refresh one’s memory by visiting Ellis Island, also known as “Island of Hope, Island of Tears” and stand in the big Registry Room hall where thousands of arriving immigrants once waited to be registered by the Immigration Service officers at daily basis for 2 decades (1900 to 1924).

A trip to New York is probably not complete without watching a Broadway show. We purchased the most expensive tickets of our lifetime to watch Hamilton show at Richard Rodgers Theatre. At $464 per ticket, it is more expensive than the Omakase sushi we had in Tokyo earlier this year. It was also the cheapest tickets we could find and we bought them 6 months in advance because the “cheap” tickets were sold out rather quickly. Given the ridiculous price, Hamilton is just astoundingly fabulous. It was better than all the shows we had seen in Las Vegas. If my past history classes were taught using this approach, I would have aced all my history tests. Lin-Manuel Miranda didn’t perform as his last Hamilton appearance was on July 9, 2016. The most memorable characters that night were Alexander Hamilton, Aaron Burr, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and the really funny King George.

Overall, it was an eventful trip. We visited two Chinatowns (Manhattan and Queens), ate great food, enjoyed weather that was 30 degrees warmer than the Midwest, used Trump Hotel’s restrooms, stumbled upon many French tourists and saw a glimpse of Reese Witherspoon at MoMA and Greg Norman at NBC’s Today Show. The only thing that left us wanting more was the fall colors in New York, which was very lousy. We thought we had time our visit well, however, due to the unexpected cold weather in the summer, most leaves either were still green or had turned brown.

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One of our main responsibilities is to 1) read the baby gender card given by Jenna’s doctor, 2) fill the big balloon with the correct color of confetti and 3) not reveal the baby gender to anyone else. I contemplated on pulling a Steve Harvey by putting the wrong color of confetti, or even better, mixing both colors of confetti in the balloon, but I also didn’t want to get chased down the street by the angry crowd with pitchforks and torches.

After a short ceremony of T-shirt giveaway by Rick and Jane, we had a great early lunch with lots of delicious dishes. Then, all of us moved to the open backyard to join the balloon popping event. The balloon popped… the crowd went wild… the photographer self doubted whether he got the moment shots or not.

Andrew and Jenna, big congrats to you guys!

The “quality sleep” countdown begins now… T minus 5 months…

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The first morning in the campground was the coldest with the temperature hovering a little above freezing point at 36F due to the cold front. It was so cold that our exposed foreheads and noses felt the biting cold throughout the night. That said, the morning weather gradually got warmer since then (41F and 53F). The upside of cold weather is we did not have any mosquito or bug problems. We spent the whole Friday in Itasca State Park, covering the must-see attractions and hiking for several hours to see fall colors. The fall colors in the park was rather irregular since some areas were dominated by giant pine trees while others had more maple and oak trees.

On Saturday, we spent half day visiting Bemidji, a small town located about 45 minutes drive from Itasca State Park. There, we hiked in Lake Bemidji State Park and visited the Bemidji State University and the famous Paul Bunyan and Babe The Blue Ox statue. In the late afternoon, we rented bicycles in Itasca State Park and rode along the bike trails in the park since it was too windy to get a paddle boat out on the lake.

On Sunday, It started raining after midnight and it rained the whole day until we reached home in the late afternoon.

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St Croix State Park is the largest Minnesota state park. It takes about half hour to get from the campground to one of the trails by Kettle River. The most surprising (and pleasant) part of our camping trip is this state park has very clean and modern individual shower rooms equipped with hot water.

We survived our first camping trip with flying colors. The wet and cool weekend didn’t dampen our spirit with the temperature hovering between 50F and 65F. We consumed luxury meals (BBQ chicken, grilled pork chop, hot pot, American breakfast), hung out with good friends and at the same time, made new friends.

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Minnesota is not within the path of totality but we were able to see up to 85% obscuration of the solar eclipse. Although it rained in the morning, the sky quickly cleared up at noon and all of us were very fortunate to witness this event between 11:45 AM to 1:30 PM with maximum eclipse at 1:08 PM. The clouds quickly rolled in after that and it rained an hour later.

I initially didn’t plan to take any pictures, but decided to lug my camera to work at the last minute. The next total solar eclipse will be visible in the United States on April 8, 2024… this time, passing through Mexico, the central US and east Canada.

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Throughout our time in Door County, we enjoyed the complimentary wine tastings at three wineries, hiked six miles in Peninsula State Park, tasted lots of freebies at every market store we stopped by, ate fish boils twice, and drove around aimlessly. We also spent about half day in Green Bay to visit the famous Lambeau Field.

A couple of observations…

• While Door County is surrounded by Lake Michigan, the lake is usually not visible from the main road due to dense wooded areas, unlike the drive along Minnesota’s North Shore where Lake Superior could be seen from the road.
• Wisconsin ranks fourth in producing cherries in the US and they are all grown in Door County. That said, we tasted lots of cherry related products: cherry pie, cherry wine, cherry salsa, cherry jam, cherry flavored olive oil, etc.
• The most touristy town is Fish Creek, closely followed by Sister Bay. These towns have quite a few places to see and eat, hence, lots of people and traffic.
• Lake Michigan Whitefish is very delicious. However, Canadian Walleye is still one of the best fish we ever had.

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We decided to spend all our time in Tokyo due to our short time there. We chose to stay in Shinjuku, which is known to be the best area for first-time tourists to stay in Tokyo. Shinjuku represents the real Tokyo: endless neon lights, huge department stores, entertainment establishments and lots of places to eat. While our hotel is located in Kabukicho, the largest red-light district in Japan where most businesses are run by members of the Yakuza, we felt pretty safe throughout our time there.

We did most of the touristy attractions, such as getting up at 4:45 AM to go for sushi breakfast at Tsukiji Fish Market, wandering around in Akihabara, learning about old and new Tokyo at Edo-Tokyo Museum in Sumida, witnessing plum blossom at Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden, tranquil strolling at Meiji Jingu in Shibuya and many more.

A couple of observations…

• The Japanese people are polite to a fault. There are a lot of bowings and greetings. When an ambulance passed by a crowded intersection in Ginza, it used the loud speaker to say thank you to the pedestrians. An elderly lady sweeping the floor went out of her way to point us the right direction to our connecting train station to Edo-Tokyo Museum. People patiently queued up while waiting for the train to arrive, then allowed passengers in the train to get off first before boarding them. The streets are always very busy, yet most drivers rarely honk… a stark contrast to the drivers in New York.
• While smoking is not allowed on the streets except on designated areas, it is usually allowed in most restaurants we have visited.
• The language barrier is certainly an issue in some cases, but it wasn’t too bad. Most of the time, we would get one’s attention by saying “Sumimasen” (excuse me) first, then ask the question in English and got a fluent response in Japanese instead. We got around through hand gestures and pointing on the phone.

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We visited a few touristy places, including Genting Highlands, the only casino in Malaysia. Located 6000 feet above sea level with the temperature hovering between 60F to 75F, it is one of the very few places in the country where the locals have a chance to wear and show off their windbreaker jackets. Genting Highlands has changed a lot and everything looks different. The last time I was there, I was a kid. Now, Genting Highlands has five hotels and one of the hotels, First World Hotel, holds the Guinness World Record as the largest hotel in the world with 7351 rooms.

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Our 2-night stay at Permai Rainforest Resort was fantastic. The smell of earthy scents after the rain, the crashing wave by the shore, the cooler temperature in the rainforest, the free-roaming wildlife around us… a few words to sum up the whole experience: quiet, peaceful and tranquil. We also visited the nearby Damai Beach and did a morning hike at Mount Santubong National Park.

We spent a night at Angelina’s cousin’s place on the 3rd night in Kuching before spending the remaining 2 nights at the Imperial Hotel in the downtown area. Throughout our stay in Kuching, we visited several relatives and friends as part of the Chinese New Year celebrations. We also celebrated Angelina’s dad’s 70th birthday at a restaurant with his old friends.

During our last day in Kuching, we visited the Semenggoh Wildlife Centre to see orangutans before heading home. It is the biggest orangutan rehabilitation center in the state of Sarawak that serves as a sanctuary for the injured and orphaned orangutans.

Although we didn’t plan much for this trip, it actually turned out to be really relaxing and fun.

A few observations:-

• The drive from Sarikei to Kuching are mostly on single-lane double-yellow-line roads. There are lots of Pan-Borneo Highway constructions along the drive, which is supposed to stretch from the state of Sarawak to the state of Sabah. That said, most drivers disregard the “no passing” signs and pass slower traffic at dangerous speed.
• We contemplated choosing either Damai Beach Resort or Permai Rainforest Resort since both resorts are closely located among one another and they are away from the bustling Kuching downtown, but ended up choosing the latter because it was much more secluded and it has 10 treehouses that are 20 feet from the ground. That said, it didn’t dawn on us that we had to walk quite a distance to reach our accommodations. Thankfully, we were able to persuade the resort workers to provide buggy ride for the parents and at the same time, lug some of our belongings in.
• The orangutans, known as “the old men of the forest”, are only found in parts of Borneo and parts of Sumatra. The Sumatran species are critically endangered, with only about 7500 left. The Bornean species fare a little better with about 104K left. Most orangutans live in Indonesia. To see free-roaming orangutans at Semenggoh Wildlife Centre is truly a treat. There are two orangutan rehabilitation centers in Malaysia: Semenggoh in the state of Sarawak and Sepilok in the state of Sabah. These centers are not meant to be touristy spots but the visitors have an unique opportunity to see the orangutans during designated feeding times from a distance, and at the same time, get educated regarding these species by the knowledgeable wardens.

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