Asia Mega Tour 2026 - Days Ten, Eleven & Twelve - Transitioning To Thailand

We have left Pulandia/Indonesia and have arrived in the major tourist destination of Phuket, Thailand. 

Last Saturday was our last day in Medan. We mostly were packing though we did go out one last time with 2's. Sunday we were up early to catch our flights. We went via Singapore on Singapore Airlines. Singapore Airlines is in the same alliance as United so I have some carry over status and we were able to use the club before we departed and got priority boarding. Singapore Airlines is considered one of the top in the world in terms of service. Although we flew Economy, they served a hot meal on both flights even though those flights were only an hour and half long. How they can pull that off is quite the feat. 

Even though the flights were a good connection with one hour journey's to and from airports on either end resulted in a long day. We were pretty tired by the time we got to our place in Rawai, which is a bit calmer than most of the beach locales in Phuket. Thank goodness we are thoroughly experienced users of the Grab ride-share, delivery system. We were able to order groceries and a dinner meal and have them delivered to us within an hour. 

Today, Monday was recuperation. We took a short walk just to get our bearings, ordered more groceries as I decided to cook something rather than order out. Did some laundry. Tried out our mini-pool. 

On Tuesday, unfortunately, we have a jaunt up to Bangkok to do some medical tourism. There is a super quality hospital that does very fast work, very inexpensively. I want to check out how my kidney is doing and get advice on how to deal with my gout given only having one kidney. We'll be up early flying again. Hopefully, we can get everything done in a day.

 Road to our place

 

 We would be 3D10

 

 Our place

 

Hmmmmmm

 

 First glimpse of Rawai Beach

 

 

 SIGNS OF THE WORLD

 In order:

 People who are ventriloquists, Dwarfs, Soft shoe dancers, Overweight men, stooped over men, Formula 1 racers

 

In case of Tsunami, run you ass off!

 

Asia Mega Tour 2026 - Day Nine - Medan Tourism

And on the ninth day of the Eldership's Babylonian Captivity by the Forces of Pulandia, the Dowager Empress Pooh Lee Shah had mercy upon Captain Wife and her Crew of de-I (and de-I and de-I, etc, etc) and declared.

"For you have been faithful in following the path of gastronomic consumption dictated by my consort, I shall personally escort you to see some of the wonders of my current realm here in Medan, Indonesia."

And the Empress spoke true, taking Wife and I to the Graha Maria Annai Velangkanni and the Tjong A Fie Mansion. Both provided to be gold mines of photographic opportunities as well as interesting sites in their own right. 

 Graha Maria Annai Velangkanni 

Here is what Wikipedia has to say:

Our Lady of Good Health Church (Indonesian: Graha Maria Annai Velangkanni), is a Marian shrine built in an architectural synthesis of Dravidian, Indonesian, Chinese and local Batak styles, that opened in 2005 in Medan, Indonesia.^[1] It is devoted to Our Lady of Good Health (Tamil: ஆரோக்கிய மாதா or Ārōkkiya mātā, Indonesian: Bunda Maria dari Kesehatan yang Baik), a Marian apparition dating from the 17th century in the village of Velankanni on Southeastern India coast, in the present state of Tamil Nadu.  

 Hello. Here we are

 

 If you have seen the thousands of European style cathedrals on this blog over the decades, this is something completely different.

 

 

 

 

 

We faithfully followed the directions of the Empress

 

 

The work was done by local artists. The statues were mixed in quality.

 

 

 

 But the interior was quite unique especially the window images

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Such different representations of familiar Catholic themes like this image with a person clearly in Indian garb

 

 And thought was given to how the window scenes looked from the outside as well as the inside

 

 

 Misc.

 

 Candid shots

Cleaner who shooed us out of the interior for taking pictures that were not allowed

 

 Cleaner's daughter who was less than happy being required to help

 

 Head Nun. Studied in Italy

 

 Was told we were coming and was looking for us!

 

 The Pooh is always watching

 

 

 On to the Tjong A Fie Mansion.

Tjong A Fie Mansion (traditional Chinese: 張耀軒 故居; simplified Chinese: 张耀轩 故居; pinyin: Zhāng Yàoxuān Gùjū) is a Sino Portuguese-style two-story mansion in Medan, North Sumatra, built by Tjong A Fie (1860–1921) a Hakka merchant who came to own much of the land in Medan through his plantations, later becoming 'Majoor der Chineezen' (leader of the Chinese') in Medan and constructing the Medan-Belawan railway.

Tjong A Fie is said to be related to Cheong Fatt Tze, who built the Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion in Penang, Malaysia.

The building is constructed in Chinese-European style, and was completed in 1900. Although it has been stated in some sources to have been modeled on the Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion in Penang, Malaysia, that mansion was not completed until 1904.

 Our lovely guide

 

 Lots of Chinese style artwork

 

 

 

 

 

 

 On the interior the main bedroom and an early 20th century vacuum cleaner

 

 

 de-I telling our guide she needs to do a demonstration of the hand operated grain milling stones

 

 Wife telling de-I to stay in line

 

 The home is built around a large courtyard. The many open windows and the hallway and courtyard decorations made for excellent photographic opportunities

 

 

 

 

 

 Wife and de-I as Eldership Officers would like to feel important

 

 But #2 IS important as shown by her picture displayed in the mansion museum!

 

 SIGNS OF THE WORLD

God begot Hod

 

 "It's a secret. No phones allowed."

 

 Two Toilet Attitudes

"You WILL follow the dictates of Toilet behavior"

 

"Welcome to happy Toilet Land