Leaving Mauritius Again… February 4, 2009

Ok Here it is my last day in Mauritius, my last day stress-less, the calm before the storm… literally a typhoon’s coming! As for me it’s probably going to be more of a roller-coaster! Fasten your seat belt San Fran here I come! The plan is simple… 1. Get a place to live; 2. find a job; 3. Find friends; 4. get my driver’s licence… oh yeah 5. would be nice to maybe consider finding a boyfriend… but that’s probably pushing it!

Anyways that quest will start tomorrow, well tonight I fly… if the plane can leave! I go straight to Dubai… then all the way to SF! I’m going to be so dead tired… I’m not sure how to get from the airport to the place I’m staying at… but that’s nothing new to me… and it’s always a pain… when people ask me if I work out I usually answer I travel! Honestly carrying a luggage around in public transports is quite a work out!

Well I leave you with some relaxing pictures, and will write again as soon as I get Internet access… In the mean time thanks for checking out on me…

xox

Beautiful Bel Mare

My sister

My dad and my sister

Gisèle and Stavros

The sunset of course!

 

Cruising tropical paradise February 1, 2009

Sunday, a friend of my dad invited us to spend the afternoon on his boat so we could check out some of the small islands around Mauritius! 

They are quite a few tiny islands all very different some are just a Roch some have nice beaches and sheer white sand!

It was such a different Mauritius to the main island, very quiet, still quite wild, we got to snorkel and saw a lot of fish! I even saw some blow fish! fugu sushi! We had an incredible lunch at Cap Malheureux in a gorgeous hotel, El Paradiso, and the best part was that we got to see some dolphins just swimming and fooling around so cute… so fast! It’s really impressive!

Anyways it was a perfect day… as perfect as my sunburn! Well we did make the most of our time and it’s definitely a day to remember! I’ll let the pictures do the talking… sorry no dolphin pix I was too busy watching!

Grand’bay peer

My sister snorkeling

On the boat

L’île Plate

Our skipper

Back to the boat

My sister looking sexy!

Aperitif that evening, with my aunt and uncle

The three of us January 31, 2009

My sister has arrived in Mauritius! So we get to celebrate Christmas and New year again, which is alright since Chinese New Year is just about now!

Saturday our father had an official diner party organised by the French Chamber of Commerce. So the three of us went on a vanity fair! The diner was quite nice, it was held at “l’aventure du sucre” which is a museum that exposes Mauritius’ history through the harvest of sugar. There’s also a restaurant there. To be honest the food was not exquisite, but the place is nice. As for the crowd, we got to meet the Finance Minister and some entrepreneurs on the Island.

It was a lovely evening that ended with some Sega music and dance very impressive!

Lion dance in the streets of Grand’bay

Lion Dance

My sister and I in black and white

Roseline and dad

Dad and I

Sega dancing

More Mauritius January 28, 2009

Here I am back in Tropical Mauritius for a last week of holidays before hitting back reality! Those holidays have gone passed way too quickly and I’m slowly realizing in how much trouble I’ve put myself into… but que sera sera… So far all my horoscopes for the year are rather positive… that has to count for something!!!

The calm before the storm, it’s always weird to know something big is coming but not being sure of what to expect… will it be a hard struggle will it go smoothly, who am I going to meet? will I have friends? most importantly What job am I going to find… and where am I going to live? …

Well for now there’s nothing I can do but enjoy my last days of stressless holidays!

Sunset on the 27th

Sunset Mauritius 28th

Mauritius part 1 ending December 29, 2008

Well I have been in Mauritius for week, time for me to fly off to some new adventure! 

I have enjoyed my time here, hot weather, the swimming pool, the warm Indian ocean, the beautiful scenery…

Is Mauritius the most beautiful island I’ve been to? I guess I’d have to say no, but it is definitely a destination worthwhile, if you get out of the resort and discover what the island has to offer. I tend to get along better with the Creole, they are kind and fun with interesting music called Séga. The island is quite clean, so you can enjoy the seaside, although a lot of places are privately owned by resorts or rich Mauritian, but they are still some good spots especially in the south. As for the food, it’s a nice blend of Indian and Creole food I recommend to go to the “Table d’hôte” (family restaurant) as the restaurants in hotels mostly serve expensive buffet… and who wants to pay a lot of money for re-heated food?

I have been here for only a week and I feel like there is still plenty to be discovered, I haven’t been hikking at all and I haven’t visited any of the cute islands that surround Mauritius… so probably more to come in a month!!!

Here are some pix from the south part of Mauritius

Banyan and cemetary

Tropical paradise

Children playing

Christmas Banyan, they had attached big christmas gifts!

Christmas day! December 25, 2008

Merry Christmas everyone! hmm… I dare not say it but… my day started with a nice dive! Sorry…

I hope everyone had a good time with their family, cause I guess that’s what christmas is about… so I send some special thoughts to all those that spent it away from their family… I know how it feels and how eventhough you don’t fully realize or complain about it, it’s tough! 

When I talk about Christmas with my non-asian friends, cause obviously nobody really cares about christmas in asia, it’s all about new year! People tend to have christmas habits… some are quite extreme… getting excited months and months in advance! some have kind of rituals, singing christmas carols, preparing a special dish or spending it in a special family house… I don’t think my family’s had a special tradition appart from eating and drinking more than our body can handle thus finishing the day in half slumber!  Which is probably far away from the spirit of Christmas…

Merry christmas everyone

Christmas with the neighbours… there ain’t no Christmas without champagne

Oh coconut tree! December 24, 2008

Christmas eve in tropical paradise! I spent quite a few christmas on the southern hemisphere so it doesn’t really feel that strange. Anyways I guess as you grow older the meaning of christmas changes…

This year in Mauritius just with my dad, we decided to go for a swim in the Indian ocean, and at night to go to a restaurant that had live music, the place is called NIU it’s on the total southern side of the island at ruisseau creol… I recommend quite a cute place. I wasn’t feeling comfortable going to a hotel, which is more of the classic thing around here. There’s Chirac’s favorite hotel, The Royal Palm , quite fancy from what I heard but I prefer authentic, to wanabe.

We had a wonderful night no regrets…

Mauritius north – Trou aux Biches

Mauritius North

Sail away!

Shades of blue

Ready for Christmas eve!

 

Mauritius, island of contrasts December 23, 2008

My first time in Mauritius… this is where my dad lives, I guess they are worse places for family reunion! I have traveled in a few tropical islands, Fidji, New Caledonia, Tahiti, St Barthelemy… 

So my first impression of Mauritius in comparison to what I have seen, is the great contrasts within the island. There’s a tropical paradise part, with the emerald ocean, and white sand, there’s an old volcano misty mountain side, some ruff ocean strong wind, bretagne kind of feeling… The population is also quite divided, there’s a majority of Hindu from the time it was a British colony, some creole, descendant of slavery during the french colony time, about 3% of Chinese, they have some small businesses and 3% Caucasian mostly french.

At the beginning, Mauritius was “terra nullius” that is to say it had no inhabitants, the french colonized it and produced sugar cane after the Napoleon defeat, the British claimed it as a mean to the road to India, they didn’t change anything in the island, left the French Napoleon code as a rule and french as a language. in 1968 Mauritius became independent, the british left. Today, you’ll hear more french than english around the island.

So far I have only seen a smal portion of the Island, but have only been here for a day, I hope you can enjoy the pictures…

 

View from my dad’s terrasse

The swiming pool

The 

Island colors

Vacoas lake – source of drinkable water for the island

Ganga Talao – Some Hindu priest dreamed it was a resurgence from the Gange, it is therefore a very sacred place for them

Muslim our kind driver and my dad enjoying some roti

 Tamarin fall and the black river gorge

Pineapple field

South West view

Flamboyant

Chamarel

Chamarel falls

Seven colors earth in Chamarel – it is a natural phenomenon caused by the volcanic period

Western part of Mauritius

Souillac – the first french port on the island

La roche qui pleure (the crying stone)

Sunset at my father’s place