I woke to the sound of birds, not drills and Jack hammers but still couldn’t sleep,  so set off for a walk. Now walking here is like a sport. Dodge the cars, avoid the motorcycles, twists around bicycles and tuk tuk drivers who all move along like in a well choreographed ballet. Great to watch as you walk along trying not to trip on uneven gutters, bits of stray concrete building materials,  sleeping dogs and people selling things from carts. So interesting to watch but then try crossing a road. I got the hang of it, just like I did in China a few years ago. Step out and walk steadily , don’t stop, don’t increase the speed of walking and .you just might get across. Well I got the hang of it and walked for ages. I got to Riverside and a saw few large monuments.

  It’s a big city but without the extreme pollution of Beijing or the brassiness of Shanghai or the cleanliness of Singapore. It’s got it’s own unique “Asianness” and has it’s nicer areas. 

Living here is a mixture of easy and hard. As one guy from Pete’s AFL team put it – the difficult things in Australia are easy here and the easy things at home are difficult here. He had started an IT business. To register his business took several months here but at home it would be done online in a day. But he started anyway and no problem here ! At home he’d be fined for starting with out official registration. 

 Well my walk took me past the monuments and the statues, past the stench of a small creek, past the new Sofitel through the Hutongs of  PP. – like in Beijing these are little alleyways where whole families live in little houses ( I use the term loosely). I wandered for over an hour till I. Realised I needed to get back for Pete’s pickup so just jumped into a tuk tuk. They are on easy option. I was delivered back for $2 

A lovely tropical breakfast in our pretty courtyard and we were ready for Pete’s pick up with his favourite tuk tuk driver OJ.