blog.akef.org

Flew into Seoul, spent 4 nights in Seoul.

Took a train to Gyeongju, spent 2 nights there.

Took a bus from Gyeongju to Busan/Pusan, didn’t spend anytime over there..just went to the International Ferry terminal.
Took a hydrofoil (a pretty fast boat) to Hakata in Japan. It was around a 3 hour journey.
In Hakata/Fukuoka took the Shinkansen to Kobe.
Spent 3 nights in Kobe. Day trips from Kobe:
-day trip to Kyoto to attend the fire festival.
-day trip to Hiroshima.

Took the train to Osaka where I took another train to a temple town called Koyasan. Spent the night in a temple.

Took the train to Tokyo, where I spent 6 nights. Had to change the accommodation 3 times due to unavailability. Day trips from Tokyo:
-day trip to Nikko.
-day trip to Kamakura.
Took the train to Kyoto. Spent 4 nights in Kyoto. Day trips from Kyoto:

-day trip to Himeji.
-day trip to Nara.

Most of the travelling was done on the Shinkansen bullet trains which are awesome.
Pictures will be up soon…

Well…the blog has been down for sometime..something wrong with my hosting company. I believe things are stable now however I’m seriously considering to switch providers during the coming few weeks. Lets hope the transition will be successful.
As some of you are aware I’ve been to South Korea and Japan, I’ve put a few posts on my old blog . I’m yet to post most of the pics..so ladies and gents..stay tuned

Cheers,
Akef

I was having a chatting with a friend of mine a few moments ago, and for some reason I said the following few lines…which I thought I should post on the blog:

blog.akef.org says:
you know…sometimes i’ve the feeling that society over complicates the whole marriage issue
blog.akef.org says:
ya3ni i know that el 3adat and taqaleed (customs and norms) are important to society…but the feeling i’ve is that sometimes too many of them become obstacles to the whole process of marriage

This raises a bigger question, what is society all about? The feeling I’ve is that a part of what society is, is dictating what the norms are…which are important I guess…but at the end of the day sometimes taken too far such that they over complicate life. Why do things have to be complicated? I sometimes feel that as society “advances” (yes I put quotes), things get more complicated. This applies to society, technology, etc.
So are we truly advancing? Or just over complicating things and think we are better off?

Cheers!
Akef

As usual…its been a while.
As I’ve previously noted…I’ve got loads of pictures from my India trip which I want to upload. Following are three pictures of the Meenakshi Temple located in a city called Madurai in the state of Tamil Nadu. The architecture of this place is truly impressive.

a little bit closer look…wow!

Cheers!
Akef

As usual its been quite a while since I had a post, thought of updating you of what has been happening…
A few months ago, Jazeera Airways had a special offer on plane tickets, so I booked a few…
A little bit over a month ago (during the Easter/ Sham El Nessim vacation), I had a quick 4 day trip to Luxor and Aswan. Although this wasn’t my first time there, Aswan is as always relaxing and Luxor’s rich with history. This time it was different though, I went there with my family and I decided to visit the Abu Simbel temple for the first time. I’ve to admit, Abu Simbel was truly fascinating. I guess I should have a separate post about it with a few pictures in the future.
Two weeks after that, I went to Damascus for a weekend. As some of you are aware, I’ve previously visited Damascus in Q4 2005. I spent 2 nights in Damascus however I had a day trip to Bosra which is around and hour and forty mintutes from Damascus by bus. Again I’ve a few pictures which I’m planning to post in the near future Insha2Allah.
Overall I’d say that Jazeera Airways met my expectations for what I paid. Its flights are on time, even sometimes before time. On my flight from Luxor to Kuwait, the flight departed 30 minutes early, and arrived 50 minutes early.

Have a lovely day!

Regards,
Akef

For those who know me, you’ll know that I’m pretty interested in travelling. For years I didn’t find what I want on the site of the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Last weekend I came across the following site:
http://www.mfa.gov.eg/Missions/travel/guide/consulate/ar-EG/
It has travel advice for Egyptian travellers, if they require visas or not and some information about the country and the Egyptian representation there. Currently its only available in Arabic, and I found some information to be interested. Of course there’s still considerable work to be done on it, but finally this site is here.

Regards,
Akef

Another thing that many people do when they go to India is…have an elephant ride. There’re certain wildlife sanctuaries where you could go tiger spotting on the back of an elephant…I think the term ‘elephant safari’ is sometimes used. Due to my very tight schedule I wasn’t able to visit any of these…however I did take an elephant ride…following are the pictures.

I’ve to admit its a pretty ‘different’ feeling being on an elephant. For those who know me in person you know I’m a relatively big guy, the elephant is one of the few mammals I could ride and not feel too bad about it. I sort of doubt the creature even feels I’m on top of it. Its skin is extremely rough, but I guess I could understand that from the environment its used to living in.

Anyways…here’re the pictures…

Cheers!

Akef

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I’d like to introduce the Taj Mahal. Fantasticically beautiful (is this proper English) isn’t it!

And of course…Akef at the Taj

Cheers!

Akef

As you’ve probably noticed, I’ve only updated the blog a few times on the India trip. But this was basically my itinerary.

Flew into Cochin. Stayed for 2 nights in Cochin.
Took a bus from Cochin to Munnar. Stayed for 2 nights in Munnar.
Then from Munnar took a car to Thekkady/Kumily where the Periyar wildlife sanctuary’s located. Spent 2 nights over there.

Took the bus in the morning to Madurai where I spent the day and later took a night train Chennai aka Madras.

I spent a total of 3 nights in Madras, and from there had a day trip to Mababilapurram (also called Mamalapurram I think).

Took an internal flight on Air Sahara (it was a new Boeing 737-800 plane) to New Delhi where I spent a night.

Took an organized tour for the golden triangle (Delhi, Agra, Jaipur). Went by car to Agra (where the Taj Mahal is ). Spent a night there.

Went by car to Jaipur, however we had stopped for a couple of hours in Fathipursikri(I’m not sure of the spelling). Spent the night in Jaipur.

Went to Delhi the next day where I spent 2 nights.

Flew out in the morning.

Pretty tight itinerary…

So that was around 10 cities/towns in around 15 days. I’ve to admit it was pretty rushed…but India just has so much to offer…and when I was there, I wanted to see as much as I can.

Pictures are to follow

Cheers,

Akef

On the third day…nothing much worth mentioning…I wanted to wake up early to visit more sites in Fort Cochin, but I guess I was too lazy..grrr…

Went to the bus station around 30 minutes before my bus, following are a couple of photos from the bus station:

  The bus was a pretty old bus that has a relatively loud engine. The driver was very friendly and the 4.5 hour journey had a lot of beautiful scenery.

Arrived in Munnar which I understand has the highest tea plantations in the world (I’m going to post a few pictures of these in my next post) and checked into the hotel. Went to town and walked around. The people here are really friendly.

One thing about India though….being Egyptian…some Indians actually think that I’m from another part of India (remember its population is more than 1 billion people (1,000,000,000 people!) so you could imagine the diversity. So at least in terms of looks…I don’t stick out as much as I did in China

Good night!

Akef