Vignettes of the World
My Travel Journal
In this three-day, two-night trip, I tried three restaurants. After the heaviest day of sightseeing on Day 2, I decided to treat myself at Daxia Tanbao Restaurant. It serves Malaysian cuisine and offers a few significant strengths in its dining experience. Daxia Tanbao (Daxia Charcoal …
After seeing the Lvmei Ecological Park and the Shijian Park, I was geared up for some historic sightseeing. The Yamen Fort came into mind. The Qing dynasty era old fort stands beautifully restored at the mouth of the Pearl River. It has a proud history …
I had to leave and return to Xinhui in order to have a proper meal. I checked the Gaode Map App and realized that I could in fact walk from Lvmei Ecological Park to Shijian Park, which was what I intended to see next. The …
At Lvmei Ecological Park (Green Beauty Ecological Park—in Mandarin Chinese, “lv” is pronounced in l as the consonant combined with the French vowel “u”) in Shantouping, Xinhui, a flourish of purple tabebuia flowers has drawn the curtain for the spring season with a colorful song …
In January of 2025 we welcome spring with open arms. The floral season has begun, and I have been seeing some really beautiful photographs of purple tabebuia on travel and photography blogs. Striking the iron while it’s hot, I packed my bags for a quick …
More than a thousand stone rakan statues populate the temple ground at the Otagi Nenbutsu-ji Temple. Being moss-covered, the stone statues create an ambience that is faintly eerie, but the unique facial expressions on the statues convey a quirky sense of comical cheerfulness at once. …
The golden glow of the Kinkaku-ji Temple comes from actual gold leaves plated on the exterior walls of its upper levels. My heart leapt as I saw it luminesce in glory and grace. The Kinkaku-ji Temple is a ten-minute bus ride from the Ryoan-ji Temple. …
I finally managed to wake up early enough for the morning sightseeing. The most anticipated temple of the day is the famous Kinkaku-ji Temple, also known as the Golden Pavilion. I planned on getting there when it opened at 9am. I wanted to see more, …
The very last sightseeing on my first day in Arashiyama was the Nonomiya Shrine. The Nonomiya-jinja Shrine is a Shinto shrine. Because of its nature as a native faith in Japan, it differs quite significantly from the elaborate temples of Arashiyama, both in terms of …
The grilled eel of Japan is likely the most suitable first course of introduction in Japanese food for those who are not accustomed to eating raw fish. “Unagi’ is the Japanese name for freshwater eel. “Anago” is also eel, but it refers to sea eel. …