Laura's Year in Asia = Fun Stories

Nirpa is the Best

2007-01-25T08:12:00.001+07:00

Just a post to let everyone know that we had the best Sherpa in Nepal...

From : Deep Nishant
Sent : December 5, 2006 2:14:25 AM
To : *****@hotmail.com
Subject : Namaste from peacefull Nepal!!

Namaste! Dear Lifa and justina'

How are u?and hooz going on?I am fine and I do Hope that u and Jus... also well there. I am back from trek and I receved a heart full of Gifts (A gift pack you left for me!) thank u so much ! I love u. may Hitory repeats and we have Greet Fun again.

Hope ur fine and Enjoying in India Trip. Did u? my be still ur Journey going on.

wish and Loving

Nirpa(Nishant)

Videos

2006-12-24T08:19:00.000+07:00

Now that I'm back in technology-land (aka Canada) You can check out some of the video highlights of Justina and I in India....

TREKKING AT 5416m

OUR ABODE IN GOA

CUTE RAJASTHANI KID WITH HOT DANCE MOVES

Been There, Done That

2006-12-22T10:06:00.001+07:00

Well, what can I say?

I made all my flights home - even met up with Jon Major on my flight from Taipei to Vancouver! Small world that Asia....

How about it's great to be home! After the typical stormy adventure that international air travel is, where I always seem to be in the eye of the storm, I arrived in Vancouver to, "Grey skies and six degrees." Ummm ew?

Like I said though it's still great to be home. The showers are enclosed and strong, the peanut butter jars are huge, the breakfasts are not at restaurants, the people are in houses and not standing on the streets staring at me, the signs are in coherent english, and my bed is perfect.

I can't believe it was almost 8 months and I think I'm going to have to re-read this blog to figure out what the heck I did.

Anyways, that's about it for this blog. I'm updating the travel photos section as we speak - but other than that I'm not in Asia anymore, and 2006 is almost done. So bon voyage to everyone else, and if you're in Vancouver gimme a call!

India who?

2006-12-16T15:44:00.000+07:00

One new airport, a coup d'etat and 3 new street Pad Thai vendors on Khao San - and I'm back in Bangkok.

Bangkok is like seeing that ex-boyfriend again after a while, and forgetting why you broke up with them. I'm in love. This place is so clean. I'd eat off the streets if they'd let me. It's amazing what India does to a girl. The new airport is soooo nice. Just like VIA, but less Haida more Thai. The Pad Thai vendors came in handy when my flight arrived at 5am, but my hotel rezzo wasn't until 10am, so I had to wander the streets for a few hours, and indulge. I've only got 3 days here, so i'm cramming in all the street food I can get.

Yesterday I met up with a friend from exchange in South Africa, Asya, who is teaching just outside Bangkok now. We reminisced about the good ol' UCT days while drinking real coffe. Yes real dark, bitter coffee. I love life! Today I did So. Much. Shopping. I'm rationalizing it by thinking about the 8 months I bought nothing, and the fact I'm purchasing in Baht, not dollars - but holy cow. The only thing that made me stop and leave MBK and Siam Paragon is that I physically couldn't hold any more bags. A couple designer handbags, three pairs of jeans, countless cheap Asian shirts, shoes, underwear, knockoff perfume, skully shirts and DVDs...its all to much! (probably all too much to fit in my bags too) I also spent the afternoon taking advantage of cheap beauty treatments. A massage, pedicure, manicure and facial (my new favourite) were on my menu all for under $25. I'm pretty sure they scraped off every last bit of Indian dirt on me.

Now, some final thoughts on India.

I may be here in Thailand now, but I honestly can't stop thinking about that country. It's really weird because my travel experiences in India seem more real now that I've left....Hard to explain but while I was there I think it was just go-go-go all the time that you really didn't have much time to sit and reflect.

First, I left India with that typical Love/Hate feeling that everyone has. I loved hating it, and I hated loving it. India ripped my heart out, stomped on it, and then put it back better than before.

Second, I realized I'm not Indian. I know that sounds weird, but too many people come here expecting to get into the local culture and see the "real" India. UGH! Nothing could bother me more. I had an amazing three months observing the weird and wonderful ways of India, but it was little more than an introduction. I saw things I wont be able to ever comprehend with my Westernized upbringing. Its a country that is just too deep for any travelers to fully engage. Travelers are tourists for a reason, and when they go to a country to travel it, they aren't going to be treated as a local. Yes, some places people are nicer than others, but you're still not a local. This is especially true in India where their culture is just so fundamentally different from ours that you can't expect to understand it and become it in one day/three months/one year.... (If you want a great book to read, and an excellent example of this read Shantram its sooooooo good) It's not my country, it's not my culture.

Third, I want to go back, but I need a long break.

Strike Three! Dehli YOU'RE OUT!

2006-12-16T15:20:00.000+07:00

Well before I get to Dehli, I should probably let you all know what i've been doing for the past 2 weeks. A typical day would go like this

0930 - awake to the sounds of the ocean crashing outside our cocohut door, decide which bikini to put on and carefully get out of our mosquito nets and stumble down the stairs to go to the bathroom
1000 - take 37 steps to our favourite restaurant and enjoy a breakfast of PB portugese rolls and Banana Lassis. Chat with Amin and the other waiters who have come to know us and our strange breakfast habits.
1100 - gather the sunscreen, sarong and pink floatie and walk 43 steps to the beach and set up camp for the day.
1230 - head into the water for some floating as it just gets too hot to lie on the beach in 37* heat.
1400 - resume beach tanning, maybe with a book
1415 - give in and go buy an overpriced Coke Light from the beach kiosk
1500 - flag down a "pineapple, papaya, watermelon, drinking coconut, eating coconut" guy and buy a couple chopped pineapples for a dollar
1630 - one more swim in the water with a possible treading water workout if i'm feeling unusually active.
1730 - shower the salt and sand off and resume reading in hammock in the shade
1900 - watch incredible sunset and wonder what you did all day
1930 - pick one of the incredible restaurants to go have fresh tandoori seafood, cheese garlic nan and cold beers for dinner.
2200 - back to bed. and dream about tommorow

As you can see it was a tough tough life that Justina and I got used too. We became locals in our little cocohut complex and made tons of friends with the other British and Irish beachbums who couldn't leave either.

Some breaks to the routine happened when we went on a boat trip to watch the dolphins play in the bay next to ours. Another when we rented Scootys and drove the 80km up to Anjuna to check out the hippies flea market.

On my last night in Goa (and last night traveling with Justina) we decided to create and attempt the First Annual Paloelm Pub Crawl 2006. On the beach there are about 55 restaurant/bars, and we figured if we started at the southern end, maybe we could have a drink at each and make it to the northern end. Remember, we go big! It started well enough at 5pm, enjoying 2-1 tropical cocktails on beach chairs and Kings stubby beers. Then we stumpled a bit when we ran into two British guys who were interested in joining our Pub Crawl, can't talk and drink at the same time, so we slowed down to a point where we came out of the seventh bar and everything else was closed. So we may not have made it, but only because Paloelm couldn't keep up with US! We did make it further to the 24hour liquor licence bar of Cafe Del Sol, which is basically a meeting point for Brits Abroad who drink all night and get up at 3pm only to resume drinking again. I even saw girls wearing JEANS there! gah! We had fun though - and it was defenitly a memorable way to end the saga of Jusfa in India.

It was a bit weird in Goa though, because even though its 'the highest of high season' the place was basically 50% empty. Most people are speculating its becasue of the Mumbai bombings earlier this year, and the next attack is suspected to be against tourist targets in Goa. Sounds too much like Bali or Egypt for some people, and unfortunatley its keeping them away. Although these days, I've learned you can't travel like that, It's as risky to go to the grocery store on Dunbar or Bombay's Victoria Terminus.

Regardless, I caught my Spicejet flight (which clearly states that Chilli powder is prohibited in your carry-on luggage) to Dehli, leaving Justina to meet up with her Mom who is coming to take my place and lead Justina through Southern India. Now in Dehli i'm trying to get used to the whole wearing shoes, pollution, too many people and dirty streets stuff that I forgot about in Goa. Although looking in a mirror for the first time in 2 weeks has been a surprise, I guess I got a little sun ;) Otherwise I did tons of shopping, so much I had to buy a new tourister to tote it all back to Canada. Then got some heena done, and the heena guy noticed that my centre is all outta wack, and thinking i'm some hippie-acupuncture girl tried to convince me to get some treatment for this. Saying I'm mentally and physically exhausted (maybe that was traveling through YOUR COUNTRY for three months with a backpack buddy!). But as the heena was drying I figured why not, so for 1/2 hour i got poked and pulled and apparently now the lines on my hands line up and my stomach is softer than before. All good signs! I had a typical Dehli experience trying to get a cab that was 1/2 hour late - then a bus accident on the highway - then huge lineups at security - then the fun of checkin with Indians, where they try to bring all their belongings in bags bigger than a refridgerator. I made my flight with literally 30 seconds to spare. But I got out of India (no small feat) safely and really enjoyed that first "Sawadeekah" from the flight attendants.

ps. Happy Birthday Christine!!!!

I Deserve Goa

2006-12-06T21:43:00.000+07:00

The sunset over the Indian Ocean from our cocohut - no photoshop needed!

Because ?'ve squatted for 7 months
Because I get attacked by cows when I go on the street
Because I walked for 18 days in the Himalays
Because I'm tired of being from "Jamaica" "Married" with "4 children" (long story)
Because I hold my breath while having showers
Because I lived with a pigeon
BecauseI rode an overnight bus amongst vomit.
Because I've starred in over 500,000 cell-phone pics/movies belonging to Indian men.

That is why I'm here in paradise for 14 days. Yes, 14 days. And that isn't even enough. Belinda Carlisle said it best in the 80's. Heaven is a place on earth

I'm in Goa, the said heaven on earth, on Paloelm Beach. Its the most southern of the beaches in Goa, and did I mention the most perfect???? It's not too hippie, not too 5-star resorty, not too Israeli, not too backpackery, but just enough of each to make it a perfect HOME (miss having one of those) for 2 weeks.

Our Coco-hut (made of nothing but twine, coconut trees and grass matts) is right on the beach and after yesterday when they took down the only hut blocking our view, we now have a 180* view from OUR BEDS of the perfect blue Indian ocean. The food here is great, the weather great (haven't seen a cloud yet and its about 35* everyday), and there is nothing to bother us. With all the practice i've had in the past week, if tanning were a sport - I'd be an Olympian! The food here is incredible too: Fresh fish and cheap Belo beers EVERYNIGHT!!! So much to say, but so little patience to sit at a computer when its right outside waiting for me to get back!!!

When Justina and I aren't tanning our butts off, we bought neon floatie mats (mine hot-pink) to ride the waves, a hammock to chillax in. We rented scootys one day and headed north to the famous Hippie flea market in Anjuna. Some boat trips out to see the dolphins and deserted butterfly beach are in store, as are renting ocean kyaks and exploring the edges of our beach.

I have to go now, and probably wont get to internet while i'm here for the next week and a half, but i'll be seeing ya'll soon enough! Enjoy the snow and exams (sorry just couldn't help it)

Mumbai-bye! I'm Goa-ing to the Beach!

2006-11-30T16:24:00.000+07:00

We were warned about Mumbai.

"It's expensive"
"It's hot"
"accommodation is crappy at best"
"It's expensive"
"It's expensive"
"Bragelina and Johnny Depp are in town!"

But how can you pass up going to Mumbai, Bombay if you will...? So we put on our just-get-through-it Indian attitudes that have worked so well in the past months, and walked out of Victoria Terminus and demanded a cabbie take us to a hotel. But of course not only is Mumbai expensive, but all the normal rules in India apply. Randoms on the street will attach themselves to you and demand commission from the shops/hotels you want, and all the hotels will arbitrarily increase their prices by 50% from any published prices. Why? Because they can. Not in the mood to deal with this crap - Justice and I yelled, screamed, kicked and hit anyone who attempted to come near us, and found a hotel on a leafy street near Colaba. We were paying more than double anything we had ever paid for a hotel room in India/Nepal before, but it came with quite a few delights:

a) A pigeon who lived in our bathroom and came in and out at his pleasure
b) Green and white mold on the walls that fell all over you and your stuff when the fan was on
c) A toilet that would not flush
d) A hot-water shower that did NOT send hot water through the pipes, but did send electrical currents through the metal to you while you were standing on the perpetually wet floor.
e) Random crashing into our barely locked door at odd hours of the night

Oddly enough, this was considered a good deal in Mumbai - so we stuck it out for 3 nights.

Mumbai greatly improved though after our first day. Living up to its world-class reputation, its a stunning city created by colonialism and enhanced by the tropical climate. The streets are orderly with cars and no cows, people are well dressed on their cell phones going places, and there are sidewalks with tree lined boulevards! We were staying in Southern Mumbai, a block away from the Gateway to India, built by the British, now controlled by the giant baloon sellers and hawkers who give the promenade some life. We spent our days wandering the cheap-stuff stall lined streets buying silk scarves, 3 pairs of sunglasses (not taking any chances anymore!), bangles, books, Bollywood DVDs and soundtracks... and enjoying drinks at the old time bar Leopolds where any expat/traveler whose worth their worldly attitude, drinks their Kingfishers. We took a ferry out to Elephanta Island, a disappointing World Heritage sight of some old Hindu caves. It was poorly set up and poorly displayed, typical of most Indian Cultural Crap - so we spent our time watching in amazement as Euro tourists bought crappy necklaces for 15X the price we paid for them, and chatting to an Aussie who told us all about how great our next stop in Goa is going to be...YES!

We wandered all around Mumbai, watching the new 007 at the old Regal theatre, and going back to watch a SWEET new bollywood movie DHOOM:II, hitting up Fashion street, the old colonial fort area, watching cricket games in the park, and cruising Chowpatty beach. Chowpatty beach is pretty interesting as its like a Camps Bay or Kitsilano, but dirty and pervy. You can't swim in there without getting the plague, or sit on the beach without getting gawked at. Regardless there are awesome street food stalls and we enjoyed a couple incredible Masala papads and dosas while being talked to by an old Indian guy (you don't have conversations here, you get talked at). Some iced coffee, gelato later (Mumbai is AWESOME) we wandered around the beach and got offered to star...ok be an extra in...a Bollywood movie. Although its a dream of mine to just participate in one dance number, we had to decline as our bus to Goa was leaving that night. Sad but true - my Bollywood aspirations will have to wait for the next trip...Although on the bright side I am staring in at least 349 cell-phone camera movies filmed by pervy men.

So that's how Jusfa did Mumbai. It's a city that brings you from feeling assy - classy in just one day. Unfort. Bragelina actually took off to Vietnam for the weekend, leaving it up to us to take the brunt of the paparazzi, and we didn't see Johnny at any of the Masala Dosa stands! But now it's off to Goa now to do nothing for 2 weeks. NOTHING.

Medieval Europe = Modern India

2006-11-30T16:10:00.000+07:00

It all started with wanting Mentos at the bus station in Udiapur...

But then suddenly our bus was leaving. This was no normal bus. The Indians have created this thing called a sleeper bus, that still has all the seats of a normal 2x2 greyhoud bus, but on top of them beds in little cubicles. Justina and I decided that for our 10 hour overnight ride we would opt for a cubicle of our own. Bad move. The bus was about 3m high, and had a very low centre of gravity, so all through the night we were moving and shaking and getting major air time thanks to the "paved" roads in India. 12h later, when I didn't think my cheeks would every stop jiggling, we arrived in Surat (pronounced SURREY-RAT). Surat is a big industrial and commerical city with no reason to vist. Oh ya and it had an outbreak of the plague in 1994.

THE PLAGUE?
THE BUBONIC PLAGUE?
1994?

Yes, you read that right. Medievil Europe AND 20th century India. Consult your grade 9 social studies notes for more about the Bubonic plague. As if that wasn't bad enough for Surat, they are also rated India's dirtiest city. And dirty in India has a whole new meaning. Maybe you should go down to Main & Hastings, roll around a bit, go to the bathroom sans toilet paper on the curb, rub some street oil in your hair, sit on a cow, then go eat dinner with your hands - for 4 days straight without having a shower. That is how dirty India is. But I digress, back to lovley Surat.

We got dropped off on the side of the road in the pitch black in a town where NO ONE SPOKE ENGLISH - not even "railway station". So off we go wandering in one direction to find...da da! The railway station. Our luck didn't exactly improve as we had to get train tickets - working our way Indian style through the "line ups" secured us two unreserved tickets on a local train. We ended up waiting and getting started at for 3 hours sitting on the betal-spit stained floor of Surat Junction for 3 hours until we caught the not-so-local train, but still local enough to take 7 hours to go 200km. The only thing that saved me from puking from exhaustion was the whallas who come up and down the isles selling 'CHAIIIIIII, and SAMOOOOOOOOSAS". We had some of the greatest Samosas ever, and at 10rs for 3, you can't go wrong. Another highlight was the performance of the local lady-boy, square jawed and decked out in a beautiful sari. He must have come straight from Thailand too.

Much later than we expected we arrived in Jalgon, another Indian city with no reason to visit. But it was the closest to the Ajanta caves, which we wanted to visit in the morning. We found a descent hotel, and were off to the train station to try to score tickets to Mumbai. It was that kind of day for us where there were 15 trains a day to Mumbai, but all sold out. So we were introduced to the Indian Railways waiting list. Knowing how these people can't even line up in a straight line, we were doubtful about any organized list system. Just when more things couldn't go wrong for us, we went to a restaurant who served us Mirinda (the other orange drink) instead of Fantas, and the power went off for 3 hours between 5pm-8pm - prime power using time. We killed time eating coconut candies and masala dosas (best food ever, i'll be devoting a whole blog to it soon) and then crashed - tired you could say.

Up at 6am to catch a local bus 60km south to Ajanta - site of the UNESCO World Heritage Ajanta Buddhits caves. The local bus was surprisingly fast, fair and not crowded - good start for the day. The caves are one of those see-to-believe places. About 30 caves that are built in into the rockface in a bend in a river. They're from 200BC, and tottally and completley awe-inspiring. Each one has carved buddha images and pillars with such detail you can't believe its stone you're looking at. There are lots of frescos still on the walls dipicting Buddha's life and whatnot. Really cool. And really worth every single of the 100million stares we got from Indian tourist there.

We ended up catching our overnight train to Mumbai - well a suburb of Mumbai. We caught the only time a train has ever been early in the history of India, which dropped us off in Dadar at 4am. What is there to do at a suburban train station at 4am you ask? Well we decided to check out the action in the local train terminal and set up camp on platform 2, right beside the gypsy women and her kids. A few glasses of 3 rupee chai later, we decided that we needed to get to Mumbai central station, wandering aimlessly in a train station when you're white and have huge backpacks on attracts a lot of attention and I don't really know what compells an Indian man to come up to us and offer to help us, but at the time I wasn't willing to bet on genuine kindness, so we declined the offers and preferred to get on an unmarked train heading in what we thought was the right direction. Luckly they enforce the "ladies only carriages" here, so we had a pleasant journey. Arriving at Victoria Terminus, THE railway station in the commonwealth, at 6am was no fun either. But a couple hours later, after we were unsuccessful at getting reserved train tickets to Goa, we finally got to see what Mumbai had to offer....

Its funny because these 3 days were a great example of what travelling is like. When things go bad, everything goes bad. Local busses, dirty cities, no food, no power.... but then just like that it all turns around. The lows are sure low here in India though - at least traveling to and from Surat was!

Rajasthan-izzle

2006-11-28T12:59:00.000+07:00

Well last I checked in I think my world centered around a camel...Now not so much. From Jaisalmir we went back down to southern Rajasthan, and stopped in Jodhpur. Known as the Blue City because all the house of Brahmins are painted bright bright blue.

Jodhpur (as in the pants) is a pretty busy Indian town, with a population of "Eleven hundred thousand" (a Indlish quote from our hotel owner) So there isn't much to do but wander the narrow streets of the old town, or hit up the market to buy overpriced bangles. Jodhpur also was our entrance to the 'Underground Travel Network' in India. Bascially it involves gettin to the approximate area of a recommended hotel in the lonely Planet, and then balking at the inflated prices the hotel now quotes, and going to the next two or three hotels on the same street for much cheaper and better prices. AND once you get to one hotel, buddy has a friend/cousin/brother/Muslim associate in the next city you're going to, and will hook you up with a free rickshaw and pickup from the bus station. And you're never forced to stay anywhere - its common for me to make small talk about my home country of Jamaica and 4 kids (don't ask long story) with the owners while Justina goes next door to check out the other places. (good rooftop restaurant? Mattress thicker than 10cm? Ample hooks on the walls?). We utilized this network to the fullest in Jodhpur, and lucked out at buddy's brothers hotel that had the best view of the old city with the HUGE fort in the background. All for 50rs each a night. A DOLLAR!!!!!!!!!!!

We did get out in Jodhpur, pulling ourselves away from the seemingly endless supply of milk coffees and saffron lassis we were able to consume on said rooftop, and hike up to the massive Meherangarh fort. You guys know how forted-out I am, but this was apparently the fort Not to Miss in Rajasthan. Included in the tourist price was a free audio tour. Best thing ever. Not only did the guy in my earphones have the best Colonial Indian meets Barry White voice, but it combined the knowledge you gain from having a guide and the sanity you gain from bein able to turn it off whenever you want. (Indian guides in person don't shut up) We wandered the fort for a couple hours, snapped some shots, and generally enjoyed this fort experience! On the way home we grabbed some Frooti mango drinks, and tried to dodge angry cows that take up the whole old city lanes, and avoid the children taking their morning squat in the gutters.

From Jodphur we bussed it to Udiapur, on a recommendation from another traveler. Udiapur = Indian wedding capital of the world. Cause or Effect (?) is that the city looks like one big white frosted lacy wedding cake. It surrounds a lake, that is only a lake after monsoon season, and has more top-end hotels per square foot than anywhere I've been. James Bond 'Octapussy' was also filmed there, and no one lets you forget it. So we spent one night watching the movie on a rooftop wondering how James was able to get rickshaws so easily? The lake palace (runs around $3000US/night...more than my budget for the whole 3 months here) dominates the lake, and although we couldn't even afford the boat over for lunch, I think I saw a rich person turn on their light. Liz Hurley and the pick of British celebs were apparently on their way over for her wedding, but we didn't see Elton at the internet cafe or Bhang shops. Damn. Justina and I also took a cool autorickshaw trip up to the Monsoon palace that overlooks the whole Udiapur valley, for a romantic sunset on our 11-week anniversary of traveling together.

From Udiapur we decided, "Hey why not take a quick cut into central India to check out some Buddhist caves. It will only involve an overnight bus ride, a stop in a town that has never seen a white person, a long local train ride, and 3 sanity-saving samosas!" Stay tuned for that wonderful blog... Pics will come I promise, but I'm at the point where if the keyboard of a computer works I'm ecstatic, let alone USB ports....some PICS can be found here on Justina's blog.

Promised Pictures

2006-11-27T17:32:00.000+07:00

Found an internet cafe here in Mumbai - basically the only thing that has gone right so far in this city - that uploads pics. So here's what I got up.

wandering around Jailasmir - buying 20 yr old postcards from kids.

Camel SAFARI

Kissy-face Moyira

Here's to Looking at You Babe

2006-11-24T13:35:00.000+07:00

Ok time for my bi-annual travel blog rant.

In India men dominate women. It's obvisously a simplification of a much more complex relationship, but for Westerners to understand the relationship they have to think in terms of property. Property that is owned, used, and controlled. Justina and I haven't figured out if its because we're two white girls traveling alone, without male companionship that we get started at constantly by Indian men, or what. But its honestly a fact that every man, high or low caste, young or old, Rajasthani or Bengali, rich or poor, will stop everything and stare at us. Wherever we are, whatever we're doing and whatever we're wearing. They don't want to talk to us (beyond "wha country yo fom?"), they don't want to touch us. Just stare. And this isn't the passive glances travellers usually get in foreign countries. Looks of curiousity, intrigue and confusion. These looks are acts of aggression. Justina is reading Life of Pi right now and pointed out the quote, "In every animal species as in humans, staring is an act of aggression." And that is exactly what it feels like everytime a man stares at me. Aggression. Exactly the same as if he slapped me in the face or placed his hand on my chest. It's pure aggression to assert his dominance over me. And when this happens minute after minute, day after day, every single second you are out in public, it wears you down to a point where we either submit or rise to their aggression level.

An ordinary bus ride from one city to another (that we've done dozens of times in the past 3 months) provides a perfect example. We sit in our seats on a basically empty bus, and within a minute all the seats and the isle around us is full of Indian men. The rest of the bus still empty. The prospect of spending 6 hours being visually undressed and threatened is too much for Justina, so she decides she'd rather put her scarf over her face for the whole ride. See no evil. I turn on my iPod to distract myself from it all - but none of it works The man in the sleeper bunk accross and above us sits proped up on his elbows leaving the sliding door open just to stare at us. I catch him and try to return the stare and he looks away. But I keep glaring at him, knowing by his constant blinking and shifty eyes that knows i'm still starting. I just want him to feel the uncomfortable feelings of constant staring. After staring at him for 2 minutes i go back to my book, and and within 5 seconds he staring at me again. I catch him again, he looks away, he looks back, I catch him... see the pattern developing for the next 6 hours??? Then there is the guy who decides to stand in the isle 30cm away from me and bend over so his head is 10cm from my face. I tell him to move his head, he doesn't, so i hit his arm and physically meet his staring aggression and move him out of my way. He still doesn't move so I kick him in the ankle and point away and say "OUT". He moves towards the back of the bus - probably only 50cm behind me and still staring - but you pick your battles.

It's not only on busses and trains. It's walking down the street, it's at the internet cafes, it's the Army Cadets swarming you at a museam, its the millions of men who do nothing but sit on the side of the roads waiting to die and stare at you to pass the time. It wears Justina and I down to a point where there are days we don't want to even go outside to walk to dinner. When one more "tsst tsst" from a guy on a motorbike provokes an outburst from me beyond any reasonable reaction. I never knew this point existed in me, but then again I never knew India either.

It's not like this happens everyday, it's just that its such a big part of traveling in India as a female, I thought I needed to share it.

So there you go. Now i'm a hippie AND a feminist. Thanks India.

"I Hate Camels" - My Ass

2006-11-20T17:17:00.000+07:00

* And I hate computers in India, and can't even get one pic to upload or even send them by email. So you'll have to visualize me in the desert with a Camel (ok me in the desert kissing my camel). Once I find a place I promise to upload all the pics. Prob. in 5 days when we get to Mumbai and I meet up with Brangelina and get use their personal laptop....
*************************************************************************************

After another horrific overnight bus ride from Pushkar, where I broke yet ANOTHER pair of cheap Asian sunglasses, we arrived at the giant sandcastle known as Jailasmir. On the edge of the Great Thar desert, and only 100km from the border to Pakistan its a really unique town with its own defenite vibe.

We spent the first day - sleeping - as there was no sleep to be had on the bus that pumped hindi pop and had a horn that made General Lee's sound like the trackers (meep meep). We ventured out to explore the dusty golden old town that is a maze in the middle of the thousands of sandstone buildings. We also booked our Camel Safari. Yes, that is right, we decided (totally sober) to ride through the desert for 2 days on a camel and sleep on the sand dunes. We chose one of the more "non-touristic" safaris that had advertised "no boundation". Obvisously not knowing what we were in for.

We got picked up early the first morning and drove a bit in a rusty old jeep with two girls from Denmark and a French guy. Stopped at some ancient mosque, right beside a cell phone tower, and then drove to a "desert village" that had internet cafes. Not the coolest start, but it all turned around when we met our camels. Everyone got their own camel, and mine was just so great. The Tyra Banks of camels if I may say so myself. She was darker, skinnier, had a prettier dress and loved kissing more than anybody elses camels. Moyra and I hit it off immediatley. Riding a camel is a weird feeling. First, the craziest part is right away when the camels stand up. They sit in a weird crossed legged position and stand up in burst, back legs, front legs, then stablize then up. And then you're up in the air wondering if this stupid animal knows what's going on. We set off in the direction of what we thought was the uninhabited desert, but over the course of 6 hours we crossed 2 roads, a few power lines, and saw a lot of wind-turbines. Needless to say when we arrived at the "dunes" at 5pm we were exhausted from the sun, sand, and INCREDIBLE PAIN IN OUR ASS/CROTCH/THIGHS!!!!!!!!!!!!! Camels have got to be the most uncomfortable animal to ride - they walk all funny and are so wide you basically do the splits the whole time. To say we were walking like a cowboy after is putting it gently. We settled into the small but decent dunes (No Namibia that's for sure) for a campfire and our camel drivers made us some incredible Rajasthani Thali (rice, dahl, curry, chappatti) and of course a guy came by to sell us beer, at our non-touristic camping spot.

The night was spent lying on a small blanket on the dunes under the crazy blanket of stars, and had our first night of silence since arriving on the subcontinent. The jingle of goats bells and the odd camel fart was much nicer than the spitting and honking of every other Indian night. We woke up in the morning to our breakfast of mini-toast pieces and chai - and worked up the courage to get on the camels again. Our stiff legs objected, but after an hour or so we were back in the rythym. A few chai stops, a long lunch break on the dunes, and we were back at the jeep pick up and after a quick ride back in to Jailasmir, back to wash the camel off.

The next morning we were in no shape to go anywhere, so spent the day wandering Jailismir and doing all the "cultural shit" but in this town you could do it while shopping! The old fort that rises above the town, is still lived in, and all the old Havelis and palaces are now shops! So a few pics, a few pairs of pants, and a camel leather pair of shoes later we were knowledgeable in all that is 12th century desert trade route forts. Had lunch on a rooftop watching the impromptu circus that was set up on the streets below and drank lemon sodas (India's non-alco G&T). Went back to our hotel to deal with the owner who scammed us on the safari prices, but in true Jusfa styles, we not only got our money back - but a deal on the next guesthouse in Jodhpur. Round 2 - Jusfa:78 India:0

Pushkar

2006-11-20T17:10:00.000+07:00

Ok, I got a bit lazy and didn't do up a Pushkar blog, but click HERE to check out Justina's complete with pics!

Bollywood-ed

2006-11-13T16:34:00.000+07:00

I would write about Jaipur, the first city in Rajastan that we traveled to, but it was pretty boring. Did some cultural-stuff, saw some Raj palaces, wandered the old town, got lost in a 12th century fort...etc. But the highlight of Jaipur was going to our first Bollywood movie.

Jaipur has built this new theatre that is described as the place in India to go see a Hindi movie. Its big, its pink, looks like a giant pink twinkie, and sells popcorn for 20rs. The Raj Mandir was the perfect setting for our Bollywood introduction. We picked the 6:30 movie that turned out to be the 'action adventure' DON not really knowing what we were getting ourselves into, we could only wait as the theatre filled up with 500+ of India's middle and upper class.

I don't want to ruin the movie for you - because if you have the chance to go to Surrey and watch it DO! - but here's a brief rundown of what was the most entertaining 3 hours of my life. First the dialogue was mostly in Hindi and some catch phrases like "life ain't pretty" in english. The plot was kinda James Bond + The Matrix + Law and Order + Young and the Restless. I didn't fully understand the plot, and I doubt I would have even if it was all in English, there were so many twists and turns and secret twin brothers, ninja trained girls, stealth helicopters, and DANCE NUMBERS! The acting was atrocious but I fell in love with my first Indian man, who was a random character who never really fit in. We decided that all the georgus Indian men are in Bollywood movies, leaving all the creppy pervy ones to sit on the sides of the street to stare at us. The best part of any Bollywood movie is the singing/dancing numbers - and DON did not dissapoint. There were the,

"I'm in a club wearing a sequin dress"-number

"At a Hindu Ganesh festival in Mumbai"-number.

"Dancing in the shallow water at the beach so my sari gets wet"-number.

"I'm drunk off homemade booze and want some masala tobacco but my girlfriend wont let me"-number.

And my personal favourite, "We came home from the club together and I want in your pants so I'm going to dance around your apartment and do aerobics on your bed poles"-number.

The movie was basically a bunch of good vs. bad fighting scenes, including a fight on an airplane between Don (or his secret twin?) and a random white guy with a ponytail, but this fight spilled out of the plane and continued as they fought while holding onto a parachute backpack with two fingers freefalling. So realistic I couldn't handle the suspense.

Now we're in Pushkar, enjoying the hippie-traveller-meets-hindu-holy place vibe this place has going on. I've started wearing my kermit-green hippie pants and getting my hair oiled. But don't worry, I'm drawing the line at rainbow cotton shirts. We missed the famous Camel Fair (and exorbant prices that go with it) by a week, so we'll have to get our Camel fill in Jalismir. We went to a ladies house to get our feet heena'd, and went through a good-karma Hindu cerimony at the lake to recieve our "Pushkar passport" of a red ribbon around our wrists. The priests who were lucky enough to get us down to the lake were something else, they led us through hindu chants, cleansed our bodies with the lake water, and proceeded to bring good karma to all our friends and family. (ya'll are lucky i'm here!) But at least Justina's priest looked the part, mine was wearing ray-ban sunglasses and a neon yellow shirt. And he seemed more worried about my 'husbands' name than any other of my family members ;) We also ate some great falafels on the roadside (always loving the food!!!)Now we're off to get a head massage by a guy whose father once gave Queen Elizabeth a head massage when she was in India...ya I'm excited.

(check out Justina's blog for Jaipur pics....)

I think I'm Turning Nepalese, I Think I'm Turning Nepalese, I Really Think So

2006-11-07T17:38:00.000+07:00

So after the trek, we arrived in Pokhara a little ahead of schedule, so we had some time too kill. We booked a rafting trip and decided to see the sights....that is see the sights Jusfa styles.

First we wandered around town gathering provisions. Fresh baguette sandwiches, Frooti mango nectar, Fantas, cookies, bombay mix and some water. Then we went down to the lake and rented a party boat. (think Osoyoos in the summer styles) The best part of this boat was we didn't have to paddle around like the other suckeers, ours was a foot-paddle boat. We nicknamed it B.Lassie (Banana Lassie) and spend the next 4 hours chilling and eating in Phewa Tal watching the Annapurna mountain ranges still taunting us. We also hiked up (as if we didn't have enough already) to the World Peace Pagoda that overlooks Pokhara and enjoyed the views. (check Justina's blog...if she ever updates...for pics)

Then we went on a 2 day rafting trip that ended up more aptly called a "eating trip" because we spent more time prepping food and eating it than rafting. There were some rapids, but nothing like the rafting in Nepal we'd heard about. The night we spent camping on the river banks was fun, we had some incredible Dal Bhat and beer for dinner, and then retired to what could be called a tent, but more sutabily titled a piece of wet fabric proped up with a rafting paddle on a soaking wet ground sheet with no working door or closures on the sides. It was a wet and uncomfortable night we spent, but of course spent it all laughnig at how blog-worthy it all was.

Back to Pokhara to chill and do nothing but read books and drink lassis. Caught a bus to Kathmandu where we resumed right were we left off and spent our last few days shopping our faces off. And I finally got the courage to order a 'sizzler' for dinner and braved the huge embarassment of it being delivered full of steam and loud sizzes....love being the focus of the restaurant.

We awoke on the morning of the 8th to hear that the Maoists and Nepalese gov't had reached a settlement after 72h of deliberation. Didn't get too much of the details, but basically means the Maoists are now a political party with full electoral powers. Plus the king of Nepal might be outta a job after all is said and done, no hard feelings though. On our way to the airport there were people everywhere reading newspapers, too bad we had to leave the country (peace = no fun for us) I'd have liked to see the next few days reaction. Speaking of leaving the country....Kathmandu airport is crazy. Boring crazy. I basically stood in as a Nepalese Immigration officer while we waited for the airport to open...played stampy-stamp! Then we had some extra rupees to spend, and went wild buying the Economist, Newsweek, and the most decadent treats we could imagine. Toblerones and pringles. Wasting money in overpriced airport stores is fun. Our flight on Druk Air (Royal Bhutan Airlines) was better than expected, coming from a country like Bhutan (check out their flag...someone was drunk!). We arrived in Dehli and boy-o-boy did we dominate. It's like night and day compared to the last time we were here. Train tickets, left baggage, hippie pants and new shoes are just some of the things we accomplished in less than 4 hours.

Off to Japiur now, the pink city!!

Annapurna Circuit Trek I

2006-11-06T14:09:00.000+07:00

After deciding to do the whole Annapurna Circuit trek, Justina and I spent a frantic 48 hours trying to organize everything we needed. I'm not going to lie to you, we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. Who goes into the bush for 3 weeks, let alone the Himalayas? As you can see from the picture below, the main concern was making sure we had enough chocolate bars and white rabbit candies to last us.

Day 1: Kathmandu - Bulbhhue
We left Kathmandu on a minibus with our Sherpa (if I was more politically correct I'd call him a porter...but i just can't bring myself to do it) Nirpa Thapa. Nothing out of the ordinary occurred on our typical 7 hour Nepali bus ride - saw a huge bus accident with 11 dead, and ate some dal bhat at a roadside restaurant. We got to Besishsar, the official starting point of the trek, checked in with the ACAP office and got our expensive trekking permits stamped, and off we were....on another bus. This was a local bus though, and we opted for the local 'upper class' option of riding on the roof with about 25 other people. It was exciting to say the least as the bus lurched through river beds and along narrow cliffs, fun if only slightly deadly. The bus dropped us off and we walked another 20 minutes or so to our first teahouse. We learned a lot that first night. 1) rooms are CHEAP at 100rs ($1.50) for a double, basic, but have INCREDIBLE views. 2) The bigger the lady running the place, the better the food. Over the trek we developed this "Big Mama Index" to perfection.

Days 2-3: Bulbhue - Bahundanda - Chamje
We quickly got into the rhythm of trekking. Up at 6am, pack up everything, eat breakfast (that was pre-ordered the night before. GENIUS!) that consists of Tibetian bread, Nepali tea and eggs at 7am, and be off on the trail by 7:30am. These first days we followed a river valley that was so green and lush that it was hard to keep your eyes on the trail. The Annapurna Circuit trail is actually just local village trading routes that connect each village to the next. Thus its a really easy trail to follow, but you quickly learn that Nepali's take the saying, "The shortest distance between two places is a straight line" VERY SERIOUSLY. Especially when crossing rivers.
Sometimes there was a bridge, and others it was test-and-go. Justina bailed once and after that left me to do the pioneering. You start to meet the same people on the path, with a few of the fast people catching up and leaving the slow behind, and we met tons of people from every corner of the earth, but as typical travelers we shunned them all and hung out with a father/daughter combo doing the trek also from Vancouver (main st. actually...haha) and talked about high school and mutual friends all afternoon (Joe Mergens!!). This part of the trek was one of the most scenic as you have waterfalls crashing down the valley every couple hundred metres and tons of stream crossings to negotiate. The highlight of these days though was arriving in Chamje to the Tibetian tea house and playing with the kids. We were a pretty big deal when we started handing out Canada balloons and letting them listen and dance to our iPods.

We were also met with another checkpoint on day 3, as we officially crossed into the Autonomous Republic of Tamuwan. Yep, we met the Maoists. Even though there is officially a cease-fire right now in Nepal, it has not stopped the Maoists from the lucrative business of forcing tourists on treks to "donate" to their cause. You're charged anywhere from 1000-3000 rupees for your trek, and nicely enough give a receipt from the rebels. You also get a wonderful pamphlet attempting to outline their stance, but with sentences like, "The contemporary political situation of Nepal is transitional and specific enough, About 250yrs old feudal monarchy which was limited to a narrow pertiteri because of the direct effect of the people's war." They're not winning many English speakers over. (spelling and grammar mistakes THEIRS not mine.) It's a tough situation because paying the donations only contributes to the ongoing instability of this wonderful country, and its obvious that the Maoists, even in rural areas, are not putting that money towards any sort of development. But refusing to pay not only puts yourself in danger, but more so your porter or guide. Nirpa insisted that we be quiet and let him handle it so not to endanger himself. It's just not a good situation at all.

Day 4-5-6: Chamje - Bagarchhap - Chame - Pisang
Welcome to the cold. Day 4 I realized why I've been huffing around my fleece/down vest/wool socks and gloves for 5 months. It got COLD! Not only that but the trekking got tough. Bar with me, I'm going to copy my journal so you can get the full effect....
I'm so cold i can't even dear diary straight. What a day. I think i used over 98% of my bodies reserved energy today. I was up at 7am, trying to massage my legs into just getting down the stairs from our room to the kitchen. Our first hour of trekking was super tough because my legs felt like 100lb weights, and the path was all uphill. I definitely took advantage of the stone lean-tos that line the path for porters and took the trekking equivalent of lots of cat-naps. Working through the pain seems to be what this trek is going to be about though, becasue after 2 hours I didn't feel any pain and was ready for our lunch break in Tal. The kids at the restaurant we stopped at were sooooo cute, but sooooo snotty. So we offered them some toilet paper and hand sani and then gave them some balloons to play with. Obviously a good choice, cuz their mom loved us and made us some of the best Dal Bhat ever. So creamy and the potato curry was just to die for. After a long and lazy lunch in the sun, we stopped at a waterfall to have a cool down and i had what proved to be my only semi-shower in 6 days. The path in the afternoon was no less forgiving as it would go all the way up one side of the valley, then down to cross the river, then up the other side.....hour after hour. Only broken up by the really steep parts that were long stone staircases up and up and up. We saw some guys building the stair cases, well actually sitting beside a bunch of rocks smoking hashish...this is Nepal people. Justina and I both broke our super trekking sticks today, and now find their performance to be less than stellar on rocks.... I also had my first "accident" today, thanks to a renegade pony who bolted from his caravan and sideswiped me with his saddle bag. Nirpa and I fell against the rocks, and i scraped my calf. Justina only hurt her stomach from laughing so hard at me. (Little did we know that this wouldn't be our last run in with these stupid animals...) Then because the Circuit Trail is constantly changing due to the construction of a road that will eventually replace the village trails (yes in 10 years you will be able to trek by bus....sad) we had a much longer trek to our endpoint and by the time we go there my hands were so swollen and knees weak that we literally fell into a teahouse to wait for Nirpa. Spending the night at 2150m proved to be COLD! I wore my lifa long underwear AND my down puff vest! Honestly though I can't believe how much I'm loving this even though I'm in so much pain. And i know that all we have to go is more up. After the 7.5 hours of trekking today I don't want to think about that though - all I want is a small pot of Lemon tea and some momos.
So all the days weren't quite like that one, it was just the first time my body was actually dead tired and dead cold. I defiantly got used to it though. Plus the mountain views from this point were legendary. We were IN the Himalayas, and everywhere you looked was another 6000, 7500, 8000 metre peak just right there. Even out our bedroom windows (we always got stellar rooms) Its hard to explain how I just got used to the whole trekking all day thing. Picture walking from UBC to the Grouse Grind, up and down the Grind, then back to UBC. (Or from Mowbray to Table Mountain, up and down, then back to Mobs....) Everyday. It's no wonder our apres trekking was less whistler styles (beer, nachos and a canucks game) and more eat dinner at 5:30, and be in bed by 6:30 or 7pm. Our bodies literally needed the 12 hours of sleep to repair and prepare themselves.
In Pisang (3000m) we started our first real acclimatization precautions, as we soon learned, we were now in "the death zone". We followed the recommendations to trek high and sleep low, by doing afternoon walks up to higher villages and temples, drank tons of water, and had garlic soup for at least one meal a day (local Nepali altitude remedy). I had my first waking-up-gasping-for-breath experience in Pisang too as my lungs were obviously getting used to the constantly thinning air. In Pisang we spent the night watching one of the most unfortunate movies I have ever seen. The movie rendition of one of the greatest books of all time Into Thin Air by Jon Kraukauer. This movie though has some of the worst actors/cinematography/script/production you can ever imagine. Although Justina, Christiana and I loved it as it provided us with priceless sayings for our extreme trekking like, "HEY We're in the death zone now, its turn back time" and instead of oxygen being our lifeline, like our friends on Everest, we were concerned with "TURN up my Pringles intake!!! STAT!"

Days 7-8-9: Pisang - Manang - Yak Kakarka
We started into new territory in this part of the trek. Not only were we at a much higher altitude, but now in the rain shadow of the Annapurna Himalayas, so the environment was much more barren. And we were in the Buddhist majority part of Nepal now, so there were many more prayer flags, chortens everywhere, and Mani walls of prayer wheels at the entrance to every town. I really loved this part of Nepal, much more than the Hindu areas, but more about that later. Plus we were now officially in Hashish Territory. Marijuana grows like fricken dandelions here. There are plants (some big enough to be called trees) everywhere, most restaurants have them lining their balcony so you can just reach over and grab some. The more resourceful (desperate?) trekkers would tie branches onto their backpacks to dry in the sun as they walked, but I could barely handle caffeine at this altitude (I had a coke one night and my body made me pay) So there was no way I was indulging in anything else. Especially after we came across the mountain goats who based their diet on the said plants. Stoned goats are pretty funny though.....
We trekked with Christiana for a few days here, her Dad decided to do the intense upper route, while we stuck to the "Nepali flat 4 hour" option. Nepali flat though means only a few wrek-beach like staircases up and down. The three of us had a sweet time just making fun of the other trekkers (German tour groups just make too easy of a target!) and eating great cinnamon rolls fresh from the smaller bakeries in even smaller towns.
Once we finally reached Manang, one of the biggest commercial centres in the area, we settled in for a 2 day acclimatization rest spot. On our first day there we woke up to a blanket of snow an absolutely freezing temperatures, wouldn't be a problem if we could actually "rest" on this rest day, but we had some important thing to do. First, wash ourselves and our clothes for the first time in 7 dirty and sweaty days of trekking. The showers were cold as usual, so it only consisted of getting my hair wet and using minimal shampoo to semi-clean it. The layers of grime on my body would just have to wait. Then we had to wash our shirts and underwear by hand in an bucket with ice cold water and our trekking sticks as agitators. My hands were ice stumps after but the clothes smelled 100X better. Second, i walked along the path into town to find a guy with a sign that said "shoe fix" to sew up my Crap-mandu purchased hiking boots that were falling apart at the heel already. These two activities were enough to exhaust me at the 3500m altitude, and give me a splitting AMS headache, so off to bed in 3+ layers of clothes.
"The AMS is sure getting to me now, every once in a while there is a sudden splitting headache that feels like my brain is being squeezed in a vice from all directions, constantly tightening. Eating isn't any easier as your appetite comes and goes. Going from starving to puking in 5 minutes hasn't been uncommon. And its like I keep forgetting to breathe, and every few minutes end up gasping for breath. My poor body is just so confused!"

That afternoon we went to the NGO clinic run by the HRA (Himalayan Rescue Ass'n) that is set up to educate locals, trekkers, guides and porters about the symptoms, cures and dangers of altitude related sicknesses. The volunteer doctor put on a free talk that was really informative and just basic, not trying to scare us, but teach us. What I learned came in handy later on the trek for sure. Anyone who is doing the Circuit trek in the future I'd for sure recommend going to see this guy!
After watching a huge Yak being killed by a group of Nepali men using successive blows to the head with a blunt axe right beside the trail, we were off to Yak Kakarka, a teeny town only 3 hours trekking away. The nice thing about trekking at this altitude is that you really can't go fast or far, so it made for nice easy, relaxing days. Although when we arrived in Yak Kakarka, it was so cold that we literally spent the afternoon in our beds wearing nothing less than: 2 pairs of wool socks, one pair of cotton socks, long underwear, lululemon pants, 2 lifa polypro shirts, ski club tshirt, windstopper 200 fleece, puffy down vest, wool mitts, yak wool tuk, sleeping bag, huge blanket and a spare tuk on my face to keep my breathing warm. And we were still cold. It was a boring afternoon/night for sure.

Annapurna Circuit Trek II

2006-11-06T14:07:00.000+07:00

Day 10-11: Yak Kakarka - Throung Pedi - Throung La - Mukinath
From Yak Karka, we didn't take off one single piece of clothing when we started trekking to Throung Pedi (means foot of the hil, last stop before the big pass!) The trekking today was slow and in snow that had fallen the night before. A little daunting, we saw a lot of people backtracking to Yak Kakarka becasue they got so sick at Throung Pedi... but Nirpa was so confident in us, maybe because by this point he had taken to dictating all of our movements, when we trekked, how fast we went, where we stayed, when we slept, and even what and when we ate. (strict diets of garlic soup and carbs)

After a lot of ups and downs and slow slow walking (3 deep breaths per step) we were the first to arrive in Throung Pedi for the day, and were rewarded with the best room that had windows on BOTH sides. Luxury. I started to get a horrible headache that some soup and a bunch of Tylenol got rid of, and enjoyed the rest of the day thinking how i was 5km straight above everyone back home. There was a weird mood in the dining room, as everyone there was wondering if they'd be the one who had to turn back from the pass tomorrow...such a big unknown hanging over everyone's heads. But Justina and I did all we could to prep and had a huge dinner of pasta and tea, drank lots of water and tang, and were in bed at 6:18pm. Yes, that early.

Woken up at 4am on "summit day" and getting out of our warmish beds to go walk another 1066m straight up for 3 hours in -20*C, was not the best start of the day I've ever had, but the adrenaline started pumping and I knew this is the kind of thing I live for, and as uncomfortable as it was probably going to be, I was totally and utterly stoked. After choking down breakfast we set out in the pitch black with our headlamps lighting the way up. It was so surreal taking slow, deliberate steps and having to literally stop to do anything else. The first hour was a blurr of breathing attempts and the pain of putting one foot in front of the other. It was really trippy to look up and not know where the star filled sky stopped and the headlamp-spotted mountain began. The only way to tell was the slight wobble of the headlamp lights every 4-5 seconds when the person took a step.
After 58 minutes we made it to high camp and here at 5000m we watched the sun rise over the Himalayan ranges and just took it all in. Although there were probably another 100 people on their way to the pass too, it seemed like we were all alone. As we started walking again this is where the altitude really started to take its toll on me. Everything was just so difficult, its hard to explain what actually happens to you without your normal amounts of oxygen, bu at times I couldn't even think. I tried to put my hand in my pocket to avoid the inevitable frostbite at one point and fell over on the trail. Lesson learned - one movement at a time. As the sun rose higher the snow crystals started to sparkle around my feet (which I couldn't take my eyes off of or risk another tumble) and played weird tricks with my vision. Nirpa made some comment about how the 3cm of skin on my face was bright red, and i was surprised that blood was actually still going to my face it was so numb. I remember a lot of twists and turns and steep hills, that weren't even hills, but just steep enough to make the uphill walking nearly impossible. I took a lot of 5-step breaks in the last 2 hours (2 minute break every five steps) and I really didn't think I'd make it at that point. Just so completely exhausted from every step, and no end in sight.

But you just keep going, and as I put my head down and kept walking eventually on one glance up, there it was - the 5416m Throung La Pass with tons and tons of colourful Tibetan prayer flags. I remember noticing the colours most after only seeing the white of the snow and my brown boots for so long.
Justina and I snapped some shots with a Canada balloon and then stumbled into the hut and drank some ridiculously overpriced tea just to try to warm up. It is not comfortable to be standing around at 5416m in -20*c temp. Trust me. Then bammo - the Acute Mountain Sickness hit me full force. Justina says she noticed me just snap out of it and knew we had to head down ASAP. Luckily the AMS couldn't have hit me at a better spot, as we were at the high point of the trek and had no where to go but down. I started to feel the HACE first (High Altitude Cerebral Edima) with a deadly headache and dizzyness that made me walk like a 4am Granville st. drunk. Next the HAPE (High Altitude Pulmonary Edima) hit and my lungs were so full with fluid that they felt like solid rocks and every breath felt like someone punching me hard in the chest. Then came the vomiting and HAT (High Altitude Tears.....sounds more hardcore than crying..haha) I can't go into details about the 1600m descent from the pass to Mukinath because I have no recollections of it other than throwing up on the snow a lot and total dizzyness 100% of of the time. Check out Justina's blog for what she remembers. It was a tough 6 hours for sure though. When we finally reached Mukinath, we got to a teahouse and I literally took off my soaking wet pants and socks, climbed into bed, and threw my fleece over my face because any sensory input led to severe waves of pain throughout my body. The afternoon/night was just painful - more vomiting, constant headaches and general all over body pain. Poor Nirpa was so worried about me, he kept coming in and offering tea and soup, but I couldn't do anything let alone open my eyes. But, like the HRA doctor said, just rest at a lower altitude and the symptoms will go away. And go away they did, so that the next morning I was able to sit up, eat breakfast and even trek.

Days 12-13-14: Mukinath - Kagbeni - Marpha - Ghasa
SO there I am semi-conscious, but feeling much better than yesterday, so we decide to trek onto the next stop 3 hours away, as going lower can only make me feel better. That and spending the whole day in bed was not appealing to me, the seasoned trekkker I now am! This parrt of the trek was so nice since it was a) downhill and b) in the dusty, dry, aird region similar to the tibetian plateau called Mustang. (Upper Mustang is considered the famous Shangri-la, and still very difficult to gain entry too...the permit alone for 7 days costs over $700 USD.) Just a stunning area with tons and tons of 7000+ metre peaks at every turn. Kagbeni turned out to beautiful and probably my favouritie town on the trip. Not only because there was a restaurant called "Yak Donalds", but we stayed in a cool traditional tibetan teahouse that was so nice, had hot showers, and the nicest family runing it. And the views - just breathless.

On our way from Kagbeni - Marpha we trekked along a dry river plain that was just one big wind tunnel of dust, and in Jomsom we stopped to get me some meds for the lingering effects of my AMS. The iodine gargle wasn't too pleasent but combined with the sinus pill they gave me, the chaos in my respiratory system seemed to subside. We arrived in Marpha - The Apple Capital of Nepal! - and spent the night drinking strong apple cider, apple brandy, eating dried apples and apple crumble. Hey, when in rome! The next morning we took in the local culture by visiting the distillery. Yep, the distillery where they make apple, peach, apricot and carrot brandy. A few free shots later, and our porter buying a big bottle, we were ready for the day of trekking ahead. Or so we though, I don't know if it was the 9am Brandy shots, but it was an awfully long day trerkking along a horrible path that ruined our legs so that night we couldn't even stand in comfort. I turned into a 6-year old and had a little stomping tantrum about the stupid path with its stupid uneven rocks and the stupidness of the trek. But that soon passed. The night in Ghasa (not the strip) was boring and filled with bad trekking lodge food.

Days 15-16: Ghasa - Tatopani - Pokhara
After the painful trek to Ghasa, we made up or minds to finish the Circut trek without crossing into the Sanctuary area and extending the trek by another 5 days. Many people do it, and it is a great option, but we were trekked out and wanted to spend those extra 5 days rafting or doing something else fun in Pokhara. So with the end clearly in sight now we happily headed off to Tatopani (Nepali: tato= hot, pani = water) The trail was much nicer with dozens of waterfalls and bridges to cross that made it pleasant to trek along. When we arrived in Tatopani we wasted no time heading to the hotsprings. Along the river just 200 steps from our room was the most delightful hotsprings pool I have ever been in. That may be due to teh past 15 days of the absolute torture I inflicted on my body, but also due to just the sun setting over the valley, tall green mountains over a crystal blue river and me sitting in a stone pool with warm, soothing water. Yep. Heaven. No wait, Heaven came after this when we dried off and then headed up to the restaruant that had Happy Hour from 4-6 and we celebrated our successful last day of trekking with two of the coldest, most refresing Everest beers ever. And free popcorn.

Our last day started like every other one. Up at 6:00 to pack - trekking by 7:30. We trekked for about 3 hours, had our last Dal Bhat lunch and then caught a jeep to Beni where we caught a local bus back to Pokhara. Unfortunately this day was ruined by some obnoxious and selfish Israelis who.... actually I can't (shouldn't?) go into the details, or i'll start to rant. But lets just say it's a continuing theme here in Nepal. And our "welcome back" to the non-trekking world was having to have a big fight with the bus driver who insited that although we bought tickets for 3 seats, we only got 2 and had to have people sitting on our laps Only 3 hours out of our trek and the bitch was already back up to 8. Ugh. Pokhara was such a welcome sight as we went to a restaurant that didn't only have "tourism management approved trekking foods" and we took Nirpa out for a big meal and some good beers. It was so sad saying tood bye to Nirpa who had become one of us over the last 16 days. I mean he helped us out so much that I couldn't imagine doing the trip without him. Anyone doing a trek in Nepal should serisously consider hiring a porter or porter/guide. Not only are you supporting their business, but more selfishly, they help you out soo much. He knew the good guesthouses, the restaruants to avoid, the good towns, where the unique off-trail destinations were (hello distilleries!) and was able to book ahead rooms so we were never the ones stuck outside in -10* temps. The details of his company are on my links if anyone wants a trustworthy and good-value guiding service while in Nepal. THANK YOU NIRPA!

So just like that we were done the Annapurna Circuit Trek in a speedy 16 days. We realized after we doubted our abilities coming from a place like B.C. where the Chief, Grouse Grind or even hiking Harmony on a powder day are things that a lot of the world doesn't do on a normal basis. It was a pretty moderate trek, not easy at all, but doable, and we dominated it ;) Now we just had to face the insurmountable task of showering and attempting to clean our smelly, trekkey bodies. Ew.

Annapurna Teaser

2006-10-29T12:24:00.000+07:00

I'm BAAACK!

Internet here in Pokhara is REDICULOUSLY expensive (WTF is with set prices?) so no time to update the whole Annapurna story yet....But here's a little teaser

- Did the whole circut in a speedy 16 days
- Made it over the 5416m Throung La pass
- Got Acute Mountain Sickess big time and lived to tell about it.
- Ate Yak, Saw a Yak being killed, stayed in a town named after Yaks and wore a Yak hat
- Got DOMINATED by a pony/donkey convoy and came out with only a scratch
- Made a new best friend in our porter Nirpa

See you in Kathmandu

3 Weeks in Pics....

2006-10-12T13:48:00.000+07:00

Alright, you lucky kids. Here's the deal. I'm in Katmandu preping for our huge Annapurna trek that starts in something like 15 hours...and found the best internet place that has decent comps and will upload my pics. So you're getting a double dose of blog entries (just to last you the next 3 weeks) Here are some random funny pics from the last few weeks in India/Nepal.

Our favourite part of Katmandu is Tuk shopping.... 2000+ at your basic street stall

Justina looking for Buddha-esq enlightenment in Bodgaya

A good place to eat and feel good about yourself in Bodgaya

One of our bazillion train rides on good ol' Indian Rail.

Along the Ganges river in Varanassi, I look super awkward since my feet are IN the Ganges and I don't know if i'll ever walk again....

More of the scene in Varnassi, the holiest of Hindu cities.

A festival in Agra, on our way to the Train stn. I bought the hat/whistle combo, but didn't have enough rupees for a baby...

Rickshaws, Brangelina aren't the only ones.....

Really excited to be Pony Trekking in Darjeeling.

Size matters in Bodgaya

Make That a LARGE Pot of Tea....

2006-10-11T17:56:00.000+07:00

Nepal, Nepal, Nepal, why do I love you so???

It's not the ease in which things can be done here thanks to a little common sense and a reasonable climate. Nor is it the friendlyness of people and their honesty that makes it more enjoyable to travel. I don't think its the plethora of adventurous, fun and outdoor-oriented tourists who are here either. I really truly think its due to their tea. Yes Nepali tea is just about the greatest concoction to ever touch my lips. It's sorta like Chai, but more milky (probably Yak milk) and more pumpkiny spicy....yeah. Its just great. 2 pots a day at least. I told a storekeeper today I'd marry a Nepali man just to stay here and drink tea for the rest of my life.

Actually Justina and I have been doing more than drinking Nepali tea during our first week here in Nepal. We first arrived in Katmandu during the festive season for Hindus, so the streets were empty and there were zero crowds, we spent a lot of time sorting out visa and money junk. But also found time to explore the real Katmandu past the Thamel district which is the Khao San rd. of Nepal. (Thamel is basically Wreck Beach and the Grouse Grind smushed together, you get dreds with your goretex and cotton pants with your Northface)

We did a 1/2 day walking tour, trusting our map skills, through old Katmandu to Durbar Square, which is a really cool centre of town from the old OLD days. Incredible architectuer and even mroe incredible Monestaries and Hindu shrines that dot the landscape as much as the embroidered t-shirt shops. A few wrong turns down skinny cobblestone alleyways later we were back in Thamel drinking ice cold LEMON Fantas (yes i haven't gone crazy, but these Lemon fantas are almost better than orange ones...I know i'm investing in that company asap) contemplating how we were going to get to the Monkey Temple. The Monkey Temple actually has a much longer Tibetian name, but its up on this hill overlloking the Katmandu valley and overpopulated with monkeys big and small. Still confident in our mapping abilities we decided to attempt the walk, even though our map kinda blurred over the area we needed. We got there with only one small wrong turn, and proceeded up the steep steep steps that made it seem like we were climbing Everest already. Saw tons of Monkeys and got a beautiful view of the pollution that hangs over Katmandu like my dirty-wet trekking socks. Walk home in time to catch sunset from a rooftop restaurant in Thamel eating Eggplant Lasagne and Tomato soup.

We really wanted to head south to the Chitwan National Park, but wasn't interested in the package tours that everyone and their monkey tries to sell you. No one seemed to understand why we didn't want their package, maybe because when we got there - the place is 80% empty thanks to the Maoist insurgency and tourists reluctance to stray past the Thamel bubble. We got incredible deals on our accomodation, and had the whole safari camp to ourselves the majority of our time there. Big room, big balcony, big bathroom, really all I ask for in life these days.

Chitwan is famous for its elephants, tigers and rhinos. We focused hardcore on the first one. Our first day we went down to the river and got to bathe with the elephants. Pretty much the best experience in my life to date I'd have to say. They'd lie down in the river and you'd scrub them with rocks and mud, basically an elephant massage! Then they'd lift you up with their trunks and if you could climb over their head and on to the ir back you could dive in the river, OFF AN ELEPHANT! They were so so playful, never more than wehn you'd be sitting on their back and instead of just drinking the water, they'd suck it up and spray you with it, soaking you from head to toe. A fun morning to say the least. That afternoon we rented bikes and tried to cycle through the local villages to the Elephant Breeding Centre, where all the Elephants used in the park are raised. Of course my crappy Indian-made mountain bike broke 1/2 way there, so it turned into a muddy walk. The centre was really informative, but really we went to see the baby elephants. There were 4 moms and their elephanties. The youngest only 4 months old! Most of the babies were the size of my old Tracker, but this one was just so small Justina really thought we could put a leash on it and bring it home on the plane.

Just to complete the elephant triple-crown, the next morning we took an elephant safari at 6am through the actual national park. It was pretty incredible sitting on an elephant as it meandered through the jungle and into rivers. You had to keep an eye out for big branches and deadly spiders (nothing that we don't usually encounter in our bathrooms here though...) but there was tons of time to relax and look at the tons of wildlife around. We saw crocodiles and wild pigs, and tons and tons and tons of birds. No rhinos or tigers, but really now... I was on an elephant!

Coming back to Katmandu was an adventure too as our minibus clinged to the side of the cliff/road for the whole 4 hours. Not to mention we saw a huge truck accident at one point which just brings you back to what kind of risks you have to consider when traveling in places like this. But we're safe and sound of course and ready for the next adventure. Which starts tommorow. Justina and I got so good at Katman-doing stuff that we've fast-tracked our trek around the Annapurna conservation area to start tommorow. Today we organized our Sherpa (porter) who is going to carry all our crap, and help us keep to the path for 21 days. We've decided to go big, and not home, and do the whole Annapurna circut. The Annapurna Himals are a section of the Himalayas that has a dense concentration of 7500m + peaks. Basically its the most scenic trek in Nepal. Its just that the trek itself is long (21 days) and goes through a pass that is one of the highest in Nepal (5400m) So around October 20th think of what your doing, and then think of me, taking 3 breaths for every step I take. Excited? Yes I am. Nervous? Of course. But we're here and I don't want to have to come back and do this when I'm old. haha.

So that's to where Justina, our Sherpa and I are now. Off to the Himalayas for 3 weeks.

Ponies, Toy Trains and Automo-jeeps

2006-10-05T15:39:00.000+07:00

*The runner up title to this blog is "Pimp My Pony"

After our crazy trip to Darjeeling, we were ready for a sleep, some mountain vistas and a shower. Considering that there was no water in the whole town thanks to a landslide the week before, we could only manage 2/3.

Our first day there was spent doing stuff. I know it doesn't sound blog-worthy, but actually getting stuff done in India is such an accomplishment. We also wandered up and down and up and down the town that is a quintisential British Colonial hill-station (read on a 5km mountain face) We sampled the incredible Darjeeling teas that are all around town, and found some great bakeries that may have been better than their Lao equivillants. We bought our first himilayan touques (aka TUK) and just enjoyed breathing fresh clean mountain air.

At the end of our first day we were walking home after dinner and wandered past a horse stable. Randomlly Justina asks the owner if we could rent some of his ponies to trek to Tiger Hill where you can see 4/5 of the world's highest mountain peaks. I don't think I can stress the randomness of this request. In NO guidebooks, or travel agencies or through NO travelers recommendations did we hear that this was an option. I'm pretty sure we were the first to do this. The guy agrees to set us up with 2 ponies and a guide to take us to the hill for sunrise. We were to be ready at 3am. Yes 3am. In Vancouver, no problem staying up - I usually come home from the PIT at 3am....But in India, we still tried to get 6 hours of sleep by goign to bed at 8pm. "Morning" comes and the skies are full of stars - but we have no ponies. 1/2 hour later, on Indian time, comes 2 guides and 3 ponies. Instead of all of us riding down the village paths along the mountain sides, the two guides walk our two ponies (Petting zoo styles) and lead their other pony. It was such a random set up, and took us over 2 hours to get there since we were at walking pace. Plus the ponies were teeny-tiny little things. My poor Thukpa was not having anythng of me. We get there after weaving in and out of the jeep convoy that the normal tourists take too see the sunrise (the looks we got on those ponies...) we watch the sunrise from a nice grass meadow and decide to hike up the last 500m to the summit to see the 360* view. Once you get up there it was so crowded with pushy and annoying Indian and Bengali tourists we didn't stay long. As we were walking down the path back to our ponies we see a huge crowd of people around them. While we were gone our guides Pimped out our Ponies. Yes for 20 rupees you could sit on it and get your pic taken. The Bengalis were loving it, Justina and I tried to demand 50% of the profits...but suddenly the guides lost thier English skills.

The way home was more of the same, uncomfortable saddles and slow walking paces. Justina's horse had its shoe fall off and slipped down the path a few times. Mine was just plain slow. 6 hours after we left Darjeeling we were back with much MUCH sorer bottoms. Luckly the fog rolled in and we didn't feel bad about spendign the rest of the day in bed.

The next day we took a joy ride on the Darjeeling toy train. It's pretty famous. Something about being really small and having a really long and steep journey, I was still pony-exhausted so didn't pay too much attention. You can google it. It was a fun little 2 hour ride on the Queen of the Himilayas (Much better than going to Langdale on the Queen of Surrey).

The rains came in the next day, everyone was saying it's because the Himilayan weather gods are upset about the WWF helicopter crash, but luckly we were leaving for Katmandu, Nepal. Little did we know what we were in store for there..... Got in a shared jeep. 2 flat tires and 3 hours into a 1.5 hour ride we ditched that jeep and flagged down another one. Got into Sirigurli to board another shared jeep to the Nepal border, in which I faced death about 3 times thanks to an untrained and I think unconscious driver. All in all it took us 8 hours to go 80km. Then from the Nepalese border (where apparently there is a height restriction b/c all the gates are about 4ft high) we boarded a local bus to Katmandu. The said 14 hour journey extended into 21 hours after we stopped to pick up 8 squeeling pigs from a farm, and everyone who was standing on the roadway (note I did not call it a highway) who wanted to go for a ride.

Our reward was arriving in Katmandu 25 hours after we left Darjeeling. Beaten, but not battered. I love this town! We're here for a few days as I get my visa situation sorted out for India, and we are loving the Thamel area. It's basically the Khao San rd of Nepal. But more outdoor gear than pad-thai stalls. Basically it seems like MEC threw up all over the streets. You can get anythign and everything you need to hike Everest here. All I need is sunglasses though as my Lao pair just broke as I was typing this blog....

Why the Amazing Race Doesn't Come to India

2006-09-28T19:12:00.000+07:00

Well it's still definitely the first three weeks because everyday here in India we say the 'F-word' about 1 billion times. But the F-word here in India is Frustration, everything is just so frustrating that it makes you feel like you've gone crazy some times. Anyways I could go on and on and make this whole blog about the trials of travel in India, but you wanna hear the fun things I'm sure.

We spent 4 days in Bodgaya looking for the enlightenment that Buddha seemed to achieve. Makes sense too, you'd need to be in a completely meditative state to find peace amongst India. Justina and I were wondering what it would feel like to achieve complete enlightenment, and the closest we could come up with was the taste of a cold Fanta (in a bottle of course) after a hot Indian day. Well, it finally got sunny, and we spent some of the days wandering the Mahabodhi garden and temple, sitting under the bodhi tree and watching Tibetan monks going through their nightly ceremonies at the Tibetan temple. Justina has come down with some weird throat infection thing, so we also spent a fun morning at the clinic surrounded by ants and medical waste.

Then we had to truly Amazing Race it out of Bodgaya to begin our journey to Darjeeling. It's hard to explain how daunting this task is, but I might be able to blog you through it. First we had to somehow get from Bodgaya to Gaya. Not too easy as you may recall my previous blog about the potholes, cows and general chaos that involves street level journeys. We got in an autorickshaw, that up until now have only held Justina and I .....With 12 other people. Brought back some great memories of Mowbray minibuses in South Africa. Bouncing along the dusty roads for a good 45 minutes we arrive at the train station. Here is where Phil would have explained the "detour" choice we had. We could either take a 3 hour local bus to the provincial capital. This was the faster option, but with a big unknown because we've never been on a bus in India, and their reputations are less than stellar (think 1/2 the passengers riding on the roof). The second option was to get a local train ticket to Patna. This would involve trying to figure out the ticket purchasing system WITHOUT a tourist quota office (those who have been to India know how easy the quota system makes everything). And then figuring out what platform/train/carriage to go on since everything is in Hindi. I don't know what Fran and Barry would have done, but Justice and I chose the train. Somehow we ended up in the unreserved ticket line up for Women, full of men though, and got a ticket for what sounded like a 1pm train on platform 4. Well we waited (and even waiting in India is frustrating because every single pervy man - and woman - is staring at you constantly) and around 1:30 a train rolled in. Now I've been warned about taking anything other than first class in India, but we had little choice. Onto the 3rd class carriage with about 10 people hanging off the outside, to push our way to 2 1/2 seats. Which we glady took up and refused to move even an inch. People were sitting above us on the luggage racks, out the window, and on each others laps. No aircon, little fan action, and a train that stopped every 5km made for a long, hot and dirty 3 hour journey.

Once we got to Patna, we had 6 hours to kill before our overnight train to NJP (luckily we had booked this one at a quota office in Varanassi!) we thought we'd try to brave the streets and find a place to eat. Well we attempted to cross one road, ok 1/2 a road, and made the smart decision to pay a rickshaw driver 10 rupees to pedal us across it. Believe me, no chickens were crossing this road EVER. Well we ended up at a sweet aircon 3* hotel who opened the restaurant and internet cafe for us to use. Best Dal, Nan and Fanta dinner ever.

After 5 hours in the lobby, and another rickshaw ride, we were back at the train station catching our night train to NJP. We were so excited to just get into our aircon car and fall asleep on the fresh sheets...What do we find? Only a tour group of 80-somethings IN OUR BEDS! Of course they paid quadruple for their tickets and private tour guide than we will pay for our whole three months, so they felt fine not moving or even checking their tickets. Justice and I were not having anything of it and after some stern talks with the conductor got two similar beds in a different (but still AC) car. I hit the pillow like a rock. The night passed with random families sitting on my bed and hiding Justina's shoes, nothing that is out of the norm for India. We got to NJP quasi-refreshed and it only took 2 trips to and from the tourist info to the rickshaw stand to figure out where to go. Another long hot rickshaw ride with us two crammed into the small seat and our bags piled ontop, we were at a Jeep stand, where we could hire a jeep to take us up the mountain to Darjeeling.

Ok, we get in the jeep with 9 other wonderful people and off we go for the said 3 1/2 hour ride. Literally 5 minutes into the ride Justina and I have the conversation about the drivers apparent lack of braking skills....hmmm....30 minutes later we're all parked on the side of a cliff while Mr. No-breaks fixes the car after he rear ended another Jeep. Great. It was a welcome pee break, but little else. On the second attempt we spent the next hour winding up and down through the foothills of the Himalayas on a road that makes the Sea to Sky hwy look like the I-5. Even calling it a road is stretching my beliefs a little. Landslides, families, and the odd cement truck made it nearly impassable at some points. We got held up in a small town along the road that was having a ceremony for what we think was a dead-baby wrapped in white cloth on a bamboo stretcher. The ceremony just happened to walk along the entire road for about 1 hour. Stop-Go-Stop-Stop-Stop.... I could go on forever about this jeep ride. But eventually we made it to Darjeeling and the driver just kicked us out at a random point in the middle of some bazaar. Now Darjeeling is a hill-station. Literally a town built on a steep steep hill. It's very spread out and there are no straight roads or even roads in general. We had no idea where to go or what to do - except head up. So with our huge bags we begin what seems like the Mt. Everest trek, until we find a guy who has a rope. Turns out we hired our first sherpa of the trip!! He straps BOTH our bags together and throws them over his head and off we go up and up and up to our hotel that we picked. Turns out its on the TOP of the mountain. Oops, a good 60 rupees spent though.

One hotel was full, the next was beautiful - Hotel Long Island (free advertising) - we have a HUGE room with two beds and some snoogle-ly blankets because if I didn't mention IT GETS COLD HERE!!! We're about the altitude of Whistler village, so its like September there, warm during the days but sharp and cold at night!!! I'm back in my climatic-zone! We wandered the town last night to find the best restaurant I've been to on this trip. Literally a hole in the wall it was a Tibetan couple who had a kitchen and a few chairs that were packed with locals. The walls were lined with Avril Lavigne cutouts and Tibetan prayer flags, and puppies were crawling at our feet. We squeezed into a table and ordered two Thukpas (hearty chicken vegetable noodle soup) and Tibetan bread. It was the greatest meal ever. I dunno if Vancouver has Tibetan restaurants, but go if you can.

Other than that Darjeeling is my new favorite place in the world. Right up there with Luang Prabang and Maputo. We're probably staying for 5 days since there is so much to do here. Sunrise over 4/5 worlds highest mountain peaks, toy train rides, tea planataion tours, sky rides in gondololas.... Only thing that would make DJ more perfect is if my pictures would upload....But alas no where in the world is that great ;)

ps. Check out Justina's blog for a hilarious recount of our 36h travels across India....Its great.

What Would Buddha Do?

2006-09-26T16:43:00.000+07:00

Justina and I found the answer at the intersection of Buddha rd. and Temple st. here in Bodgaya, India. It's where Buddha came to develop his theory of enlightement, and the Bodhi tree that he sat under is still here today. (well a decendent, it was something like 6th century AD) Its a really cool place, that is a little more laid back than the bigger cities we've been in. But its still full of the hassles inherent in India, electrical power is intermittent at best, probably on about 3 hours a day. And lots of beggars and touts just getting in your way. Getting here was another day long adventure that I don't even think I can begin to blog - but we drove THROUGH a garbage dump and the potholes on the road were so deepI swear we were half way to Vancouver. Last night at 7pm when we decided we needed some chips for dinner, we wandered out of the hotel and just about started a riot. White girls on the loose!!! The hotel manager followed us around to make sure we were ok. Its a funny place here.

Justina has come down with a little something, so we're taking it easy here - probably wander the dozens of temples that Buddhist countries have set up here (I actually said Sawadeekaa today!) and go to the Zen meditations at the Japanese temple at 5pm. Then we've got an intense 48-hour travel period to get to Darjeeling... Himalaya views and great tea awaits.

ps. Happy birthday Heather and Megan!!!!!

"Everything in India Has More Spice"

2006-09-22T21:59:00.000+07:00

....Is what the mother of the family who shared our sleeping berth on the 15 hour train from Agra to Varanassi. We lucked out with a sweet aircon 3 tier train. So so so exciting to have something work out. Well, I should start from the beginning of our day. As I wrote the last blog entry, there were multiple power-outtages in Agra, and we were told to get off the internet after only 45 minutes of use. Then the guy tried to charge us for 1.5 hours that we supposedly used according to his secret book that he writes in. After being up since 5am and dealing with 37* heat with no power (fan or AC!) Justina and I had enough. We absoultley fought tooth and nail with this guy about how unfair and dishonest he was being, and the funny thing was he kept adding on the blatent lies! It was just typical of what we had been experiencing the days before and we didn't want to take it anymore. We wouldn't leave without getting our money back and kept up the arguing. After about 30 minutes - he gave in and gave us our money back (20 rupees, not even a dollar, but such a symbol!) It was incredible the feeling that we had of beating an Indian at his own game.

So if anyone is keeping score at home it's now India 11 : Justice and Lifa 2.

We left our hotel around 8pm to find the biggest street party taking place along the maze of streets in Agra. Huge floats dipicting the Hindhu gods, cows, goats, camels, elephants all combined with thousands of people with fireworks wandering around. It was hectic to say the least, but Justina and I got into it and bought a crazy hat with a whistle and partied our way to find an autorickshaw.

We sat on the concrete platform leaning against our backpacks, drinking chai tea out of clay cups watching the cows, women in neon pink saris walk by and I really felt that I was in my element. I was just so excited to be actually doing this - ahh its hard to explain but after all the hassles I realized that I am enjoying every second of this trip and can't believe I'm here.

So now we're in Varanassi, basically the holiest place for Hindus to come. Most come here to take a dip in the Ganges. Others come to die since death here means you are freed from the reincarnation cycle. It's a crazy place that I don't think I can even blog properly. There are Ghats that line the river where bodies are cremated (if people have enough money, if not they're just thrown in the river) and the whole riverside area is a maze of alleys no bigger than 1m accross, so if a cow is heading towards you - find a silk shop to jump in fast. Every turn is another surprise and it's hard to know if you should look up (to find signs), down (to watch for the big cow droppings), in front (to avoid the millions of touts yelling at you), or behind (to see if Justina is still alive) There is also a distinct smell here that can't be explained properly without you actually coming here. And unfortunatley I just don't have enough rupees to send for you all to experience this! We took a day trip to Sarnath, a place of ancient Buddhist ruins where Buddha came after his enlightenment. It was a really cool place to check out, but the 40 minute ride through Varanassi to get there in an autorickshaw was the highlight. It's amazing how few systems there are in India, and how many people there are just doing nothing. Justina observed that there are no machines here to do things, and just as she said that we came to an intersection where instead of a traffic light, there is a box for a policeman to stand in and direct traffic. I guess with a billion people hanging around its cheaper to get a bunch of them to do the work rather than install and upkeep the machines....

Internet and electricity in general has been more off than on here in India. So pictures aren't going to be forthcoming until I find a reliable internet cafe that wont charge us extra to upload pics (any way to squeeze a bit more money out of you...honestly.)

Whoa India!!

2006-09-21T13:49:00.000+07:00

Delhi: I met up with Justina at the airport, and amazingly we were able to find our way to the prepaid taxi booth and ignore most of the annoying touts around us. This is where our luck ended, our driver (and his random friend) would not stop trying to sell us other hotels, other tours, telling us he didn't know the hotel, the roads were closed, it was 5km too far, etc... Less than an hour in Delhi and we had to turn our bitch on to 11. It's hard to explain what Dehli is like because by putting it into coherent english words makes it normal, and that is the one thing Delhi is not. We spent our first night staring out our window at the scene infront of us on the Main Bazaar in Parahgnaj (the picture above) The next morning we awoke to the honks and moo-ing and shouting that creates the soundtrack to Dehli-life. It took about 3 hours to get up the courage to do our first acclimatization walk. And what a shock it was. Stepping out the door you are just a target for everyone and everything. A 5 minute walk around the block felt like an hour. We found refuge in an aircon cafe and re-energized with a few fantas and roti. Our next acclimatization trip found us eating dinner on one of the many rooftop restaurants along the Main Bazaar, enjoying the food we point-and-pray ordered but mostly enjoying the view of the chaos below. Day two was much more adventurous as we tried to get some visa situations sorted out at a few government offices. All I can tell you about that is civil servants in ANY country are grouchy, unhelpful and just plain frustrating to deal with. We tried an afternoon excursion to the Red Fort in Old Dehli, but the rickshaw (a bicycle with a big seat on the back peddled by an old man) took a wrong turn and we spent 45 minutes in delhi rush hour on the back of a bike. Fear factor should make a show about it. All in all Delhi was an experience and it toughened us up for the rest of India for sure. Constant stares from everyone you pass, numerous power outtages in 37*C humid heat, and the fun of barging Indian-style.

The rooftop of Shanti Lodge, sometimes the Taj needs a little pinch.

After 3 days in Dehli we decided enough was enough and headed down south to Agra, home a la Taj Majhal. A 6am 2nd class train ride squished between a German engineer and 3 Indian army officers (WITH wooden muskets straight from the American civil war in hand) it was a long 3 hours. But we arrived in Agra to find a pretty nice autorickshaw driver who only tried to sell us one tour. We decided on one of the budget hotels around the Taj area, and didn't expect much. But we were SO surprised to find that not only do we have a big clean room with a powerful fan, a nice COLD shower (trust me no need for hot water here), but the most incredible rooftop restaurant with the BEST Banana Lassi (yogurt banana and milk shake) with cashew nuts, raisins, coconut and choclate sauce on top!!! The view is mediocre as you can see from the picture ;) We spent the late afternoon watching the Taj, and the cows, rickshaws, motorcycles, colourful saris, and camels wander the streets below.

Me....the TAJ!

Agra itself is such a change from Dehli, much quieter, and we've found a great way to deal with the touts who are everywhere, yelling "NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" in their face may seem rude to Canadians, but its the most polite way to do things around here. Justina has also found that acting crazy and doing a little dance scares them away enough. Today we woke up at 5am and walked down to the Taj to check it out at sunrise (and before the heat of the day) So incredible to just be there. It's huge and impressive and just a completely awe-inspiring masterpiece. 3 hours, and over 100 pictures later we had done the whole grounds and were suitably impressed. Still early in the day we decided to check out the huge/red Agra Fort. We had an exhausting 3km ride to the fort, and by exhausting I mean exhausting for the 80 year old man peddling Justina and I in the 35* heat. He gave up 1/2 way home and we had to walk the last km. We took the "long" route home through the local area winding our way through the streets of Agra, lots of kids running with us shouting hello and trying to get us to pet their monkeys...very India. On to Varanassi (the Ganges river) on the night train tonight!

Vang Viang: The Town the Lonley Planet Built

2006-09-15T15:14:00.000+07:00

Well Well Well.....

Did I mention in my last blog post that I loved Laos? Because J'adore it even more now. On my last day in Luang Prabang I hiked up the 300+ steps to the wat in the middle of the town - over looking the Mekong river and mountains...so beautiful. Then went to give blood at the local red cross - Not quite the same as Cambie street, but fun nonetheless. You get a free massage afterwards! That afternoon me and some of the slow boat people took a tuk-tuk out to the waterfalls around Luang Prabang. There are no words that can explain what they looked like. Even 'waterfall' sounds too ordinary. It was an amazing afternoon swimming in the crips clear water jumping off the multiple terraces and trees.

The next morning saw a few of us head down to Vang Viang, a town about 200km away, but on Lao roads that means at least 7 hours. Within the first 20 minutes on our bus 50% of the Lao passengers were sick and there was a moat of puke running down the centre isle of the bus. It was a disgusting ride to say the least. Unfortunate because the scenery was incredible. If you could forget how dangerous the actual road was, the limestone karst cliffs and lush rainforest valleys were incredible in the early morning mist. We arrived in the town of Vang Viang (or VV) late afternoon and proceeded straight to the first "friends bar" we could find. VV is full of these bar/restaurants that instead of chairs, have beds that all face 2-3 TV screens and play Friends episodes (or Simpsons) 22 hours a day. No joke. Its great for veging out - but doesn't do much for the conversations! There are a lot of travelers who hate VV for that reason, but as I discouvered there is SO much more to that town if you look past the travel agencies, seedy guesthouses and friends bars. It's an outdoor mecca where you can do anything from rock climbing, river tubing, kyaking, caving, trekking...sometimes all in the same day!

Of course everyone goes to VV mainly to do one thing. Tube down the Nam Son river. They've got the setup down pat for sure! You walk 10 meters down the road and rent a tractor tube for the day. Then you jump in a tuktuk and drive 20 minutes to the drop off point. You get in the crisp river and in less than 2 minutes you're at the first BEERLAO bar. The bars use long bamboo sticks with tubes attached to pull you in and if you buy a Beerlao or Laolao you get to use their "funpark" as much as you want. The Funparks start at the first bar as a bamboo platform about 5m in the air, and a zip line straight into the middle of the river. Its so fun!! And going down is only 1/2 the fun, when you surface you find yourself 20m down river and have to fight to get to the shore and climb up the sharp rocks...to go again!!! The same theme continues for the next 5 or so bars, with the fun parks getting bigger and bigger. The best is the third bar that has a 15m trapeze that swings you accross the river and its a matter of deciding to let go at the begining when you're going really fast or after a few swings when your fingers feel like they're giong to fall off. The 4th bar has a big swing that fits 4 people on it. The fifth bar is a surfboard (ok shack door) that you can surf the river current on, the sixth bar has a 10m diving board....You get the point. There are also caves that are a bit inland from the bars, and after a few jumps into the river exploring the caves is relaly exciting. Tubing down the river itself is supposed to take 1.5 hours, on our first day we spent 8 our there. I loved it so much that I went again the next day!!!! I could barely lift my full bottle of Beerlao though my muscles were so sore and legs so scratched up!

I also did a 2 day lead rock climbing course while I was there in the mornings before tubing. It was really fun as there were only 3 of us plus the guides, and th scenery was incredible. I learned the basics of lead climbing, and more importantly learned that I need to start working out some more if I want to do anymore climbing!!!

After 3 days of tubing you really get to know every traveler staying in VV, that combined with the rest of our slow boat crew ariving serisously ment that I couldn't walk 1m without running into someone at the Luang Prabang Bakery or Corner Cafe or Namlao Discotheque. Lots of long nights with Irish, British, American, Austrian, Canadian, Chilean, and South Africans drinking snake whiskey and beer lao. It was hard to leave, but that ticket to India is burning a hole in my backpack! I'm in Vietnane right now, and back to being in love with the incredible Lao cities. The cute little cafes mixed with dirt roads and torn up sidewalks with tuktuks and Beerlao signs everywhere. I just love it. With the teeny bit of Thai I speak combined with the teeny bit of French, I think I almost am considered fluent in Laos! Now if only I could find a use for my Afrikaans.....

I've only got 100,000 klip left and 24 hours to spend here in Vietiene - I'm pretty sure 99.9999% of it is going to be spent at the incredible bakeries here though!!! I'm staying at a really nice guesthouse right on the river, and got to eat some incredible meals at the little cafes that line the semi-paved streets here. I wandered to the Arc de Triumph that the Lao government built with concrete donated by the US to build roads...burn! They also built it 10cm bigger than the one in France just to spite their former colonial rulers...double burn!

(and I just put up all my Laos pics in a webshots album, check it out cuz it took me 2 hours!)

It's Time to Switch to Laolao We've Been Drinking Beerlao All Night

2006-09-11T13:45:00.000+07:00

In Laos, Safe sex means having a condom ride shotgun in your tuktuk.

I'm in love with Laos - not so much with these slowboats though

Just arrived in Luang Prabang after 3 days of grueling travel. First I left Nan on Friday, of course when they told me, "YES you can get a bus straight from Nan to Chaing Kong" in reality it was just a thai-yes. A Thai-yes neither confirms that they comprehend your question nor does is it an afirmative response to your question. It is just a sound they make. So I ended up having to transfer busses twice, once at the side of a road and another at a random bus staition where I was again the only farang for miles. I ended up 8 hours later at the Thai immigration check point, and they didn't want to let me leave since I had just renewed my visa...that is until it turned out taht the immigration office went to Sriwiangsawittayakarn school a long time ago. Once that was figured out I was expidted through and didn't even have to pay the bogus 20 baht "bribe". Got a small boat accross the mekong and checked into Laos immigration. Bought or visas there, whcih were supposed to be 15 day visas, but they gave us 30 day ones. Hm? Great. Met a British couple who I went out for dinner with, but Huay Xai is a really small town so we were back at the guesthouse by 9pm.

The next morning got on the 2-day slow boat that was to take us down the Mekong river to Luang Prabang. (A much better option than the 20 hour bus ride on Lao-roads) There were about 25 other farangs there - all of us sitting on the 2-piece plywood seats. Not the most comfortable! We survived the first day of 7 hours though through lots of card games and the Beerlao service onboard. Our stopover was in Pak Beng which is a one road town filled with guesthouses and sandwich shops. A few british travelers and I followed some 17 year old girl from the dock to her family guesthouse, which was nice and cheap, but dark due to the lack of electricity. We went out for a great Indian dinner and lost track of time enjoying more Beerlao at a riverside restaurant and missed our 11pm cirfew and had to walk back in the dark and wake up the family to let us back in. Oops. The next morning we piled back on the slowboat (which in Asian style, got smaller and more uncomfortable) in the pouring rain and tried to prep ourselves for the 9 hour trip that day. It wasn't too exciting at all, more cards, more travel stories shared, and even flatter bottoms.

We arrived in Luang Prabang, the UNESCO World Heritage City, that evening and ended up at a beautiful guesthouse with friendly owners and a nice terrace to enjoy...more beerlao ;) I'm in LOVE with Luang Prabang, its an incredible city with such a nice feel to it. Lots of French colonial influce in the architecture and food (best bakeries here....I just had an apple croissant to die for) and its just a nice laid back river side town. Going to hike up to the temple on a hill overlooking hte city for sundowners tonight. And tommorow going on a trek to the nearby caves and incredible waterfalls. Probably throw in a few more pastries too...and some more beerlao ;)

What/Where/Who/How Laura?!?!

2006-09-07T09:26:00.000+07:00

Alright, time I explain a few things here I think...

Today is my last day of teaching at Sriwiangsawittayakarn and my last day living in Wiang Sa. Apparently we're celebrating with the Ovaltine truck coming to school and giving us free Ovaltine CRUNCH all day and playing bad thai pop music and carnival games. Anyways I digress....

Tommorow i'm catching a bus to Huay Xai, just accross the Mekong river in Laos. From there I'm planning to take the 2 day boat to Luang Prabang, see the waterfalls and bakeries there. Then go to Vang Viang to partake in the (in)famous river tubing/rope swinging/dock bar experience. Then kyaking to Vietnanne to go to more bakeries. (I got my travel plans from Megan and Heather...can you tell?) From there its an overnight train to Bangkok where I get to thai up some more loose ends until I fly out to India the night of September 17th

I'm meeting Justice at the Dehli airport and hopefully we'll get out alive to celebrate her birthday that night. (For future reference Justice = Justina and Lifa = Laura ...might get confusing) and the next three months will be filled with adventures in and around India, Nepal with possible detours to Tibet and Bhutan. Might be meeting up with Caitlin (from my Cape Town days) too in there.

I'll be blogging as much as possible - and hope to hear from you all!
See ya at Christmas

THAI-ing Up Loose Ends

2006-09-06T13:03:00.000+07:00

(thanks maeve...)

So its all coming to an end...

My last week here in Wiang Sa i've been thinking a lot about what this experience was really like. I can't say I enjoyed every minute of it, but it also wasn't a complete disaster...how can I put it?

I absoultley love the people I've met. And it's hard to seperate those incredible experiences from the bigger role of the project, i'm not even sure if they should be completley seperated since our involvement in the community is a part of this project....But I can't say enough about Noot, Julie, Mel, Mem, Oil, Pa Pian, Uncle Jai, and all those other people who have such complicated names I will never be able to pronounce them....

First the teaching. After this I know i'll never go into teaching as a career, it's not that I dislike children or hate teaching itself, I'm just not cut out for the job. That is for sure. But it has also given me so much more respect for people who are actual teachers, and good ones at that. I look back at my experiences in high school and elementary school to those incredible teachers I had (Ms. Day in grade 5 at Southlands, Mr. Keenlyside in french at PG, Mr. Procyk in Biology at PG...etc) And i'm just even more amazed at their skills.

I think I would have appreciated the teaching aspect to this experience much more if I had acutally had some previous knowledge or training as to what I was getting into. I constantly compare it to swimming. If you're just thrown into a pool with no idea of what 'swimming' is, how to make the physical strokes, or have the knowledge of sinking or floating....you're going to hate every moment in that pool. But if someone explains to you how to float, and then introduces you to the skills needed to do the front crawl or tread water...well then the pool becomes a fun experience. In the teaching here I have defentily realized my limitations as an un-trained teacher. You can only do so many crossword and simon-says games, and the most frustrating moments are when you don't know how to teach a child vocab or sentance structure, things that would come with more training. So yes, I've defenitly gained a whole new respect for teachers, and not just in the fact they spend most of their days surrounded by little brats ;)

Also I've been thinking about this whole 'volunteering' experience. Anyone who knows me, knows i've been obsessed with everything international since I took my first POL260 course at UBC. the UN, MSF, Rwanda, Cambodia, Somalia, Diplomats, etc... and finally getting this introduction to the world of international volunteer experinces (be it the 'diet coke' Thailand GAP version or not) has been much more valuable for myself than any experiences i've had actually teaching.

It's hard to explain to someone who has never gone abroad for an extended volunteer placement, and i'm not trying to be cocky here or anything, but honest. In fact although lots of people think that its one big 'feel good' trip that by going abroad and volunteering your time and services you will come home feeling all fuzzy and good about your contribution to the world. Not really. In reality you learn a lot more about failure than success. It's hard to explain, but imagine you wake up every morning and think about what you have to do that day. Well not only teach english to kids, but give them the skills, confidence and will to use these skills to further their education and lives. Well, i'm pretty sure i'm not going to tick off that task as complete today. So before you even opened your eyes you feel that sense of failure. This isn't even taking into consideration the other tasks you have to do to get yourself through the day. Find food to eat (hopefully edible), try to get daily chores done with access to water/electricity/soap/gas (take your pic depending on the day). Not to mention the langage barrier. What about communication ? Just to ask a question or engage in a sanity-saving conversation with another person it takes SO much energy and effort to do.

It was VERY overwhelming having so much failure during my first few months here. Personally and through the project. Some of the hardest times I had emotionally were when I let the failures get to me and cloud my mind. What saved me was when I eventually came to the realization that I loved the failures. What seperated myself from someone who would let the continuing failures really get to them and cause them to give up and go home was the fact that I actually enjoyed the failures. And just because I encountered a small failure that didn't mean that the whole project was a failure either! That kinda sounds weird, but what really happened was that I realized I was involved in something so much more than a simple task that I could "complete" with "success". A project like this is ongoing and the failures aren't in fact true failures, but just the continuing challenges. And I love challenges. Even more than I thought I did before this. So while I may have said (ok while I did say, a lot) that this or that sucked or I hated something about the project - really I just was feeling the challenge of working through a task that seemed to have no forseeable goal in the near-future.

So I guess i'm trying to say that I didn't do this project for any sort of altruistic reasons. I wish I could say that I felt a moral purpose while helping out in the rural schools of Thailand, but honestly I got involved, and stayed involved with this project because I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the challenge of putting others needs before my own, and working through cultural differences. Selfish? Yes. But is it really? Like one of my favourite books right now - Hope In Hell: Stories from MSF in the Field - a MSF volunteer who has been to some of the worst areas on earth said: "I hated everything about my first assignment, but at the same time I loved every moment of hating it" I can't explain how true that is.

The first month I was sure that I would need to find another career. How could I possibly want to go abroad again and work in this type of environment?? No thanks. But now i'm as addicted as ever. Just no more loud thai kids 8 hours a day please....

That being said i've had an AWESOME last week, the first bit was not fun with zero running water for 4 days (that's 5 without a shower for all keeping track) and then got a bit sick, but nothing that a few rounds of Cirpo couldn't clear up. Last night we went out for what the teachers told me was my going away dinner, but then it was another teacher's birthday...so I didn't figure that out. Regardless it was at an incredible restuarant built out of palm trees and bamboo shoots right on the Nan river. Nan right now is lit up with millions of little white lights and street markets since its Dragon Boat races weekend. We had an incredible dinner of baby corn & prawns in garlic, sweet and sour chicken and cashews, tom kai, flowered hotdogs (really good...trust me) and fried rice. I'm going to miss the Thai buffet style dinners....mmmm. Anyways i've got 2 days to finish watching my VCD's, send home a bunch of Thai junk, and pack up some stuff for India! I'm leaving Thailand in less than 48 hours!!!!

Thank You Party Laura and Mo

2006-09-01T12:46:00.000+07:00

So a couple of pics from my last full week in Wiang Sa. The first is of Pa Pian and one of our other neighbors working on dinner. (Pa Pian is the one with the freshly died hair, she wanted it to look more like my "chocolate hair") A couple of our backyard chickens had to be sacrificed for our Pad Thai Kai...oh well. Its funny though because we just got an email from someone in the GAP offices in Thailand telling us that to be safe in Thailand we should try to stay away from live poultry and poultry products. Well, hmmmmmm. That's ok there's no bird flu in Wiang Sa!

Then there's a glamour shot of Maeve at the Greek Restaurant in Chiang Mai that we went to for her birthday. The anatomically-incorrect mural on the wall really added some ambiance to the whole Greek experience. Not to mention the owner of the place buying her 8 roses, and mixing extra strong Vodka/diet cokes.

Then there are these wonderful shots from "THANK YOU PARTY LAURA AND MO" that the teachers at Sriwiangsawittayakarn gave us last night. Miranda is leaving for Bangkok today, so we had the whole goodbye celebrations already. It was an interesting experiences. First it started with a monk in civillian clothing coming to bless us with good luck for the future. A pretty intricate cerimony that involved us sitting infront of him with the two banana leave statues things that the students made. And a dead chicken or two with some random thai sweets. We held onto the string and Wei'd for about 20 minutes while he chanted and chanted and chanted and chanted (check the webshots album to see who long it went on!) Then he sprinkles us with tap water using a tree sprig and then he took some of the string from the banana leaves and tied them around our writs saying 'BAD OUT BAD OUT BAD OUT GOOD IN GOOD IN GOOD IN' Then each teacher came up and did the same. I've got some hot Avril (pre marriage) cuffs going on here now. Then the teachers made speaches and gave us some little presents. They were actually quite thoughtful since they knew I was heading to India for 3 months, gave me pocket money instead of carpets and cloths and stuff. Then we started the feast of great food. Ate so much that I was sick that night...yuck. But not before the traditional Karaoke stared. Honestly Thai people LIVE by their Karaoke skills, or should I say lack there of. Anyone will sing anything. They tried to get Miranda and I up there, but there was just no way. Some of the teachers went pretty crazy after drinking most of the whiskey and water (100 pipers, it was a special occasion!) Anyways it was a fun night. Off to Nan this weekend to say goodbye to all the farangs I've met there, then ONE MORE WEEK TILL LAOS!!!

The Suite Life in Chiang Mai

2006-08-29T12:33:00.000+07:00

Just got back from a weekend in Chiang Mai. Met up with Nick, Maeve, Paradie, and Ece for one last party weekend before everyone leaves Thailand. It was the BEST weeekend i've had in Thailand for a while. Since we had all been to Chiang Mai before and done the tourist sights this was purely a weekend to a) get away from teaching b) eat western food c) not speak thai. I know I might be sounding a little whiney and ungrateful, but it's hard to explain how difficult it is to live day after day in such a different culture. And those people who have traveled through Thailand usually follow the tourist trail, or only spend a few days/weeks in a remote area. So it's a little different for me after 4 monhts.... I do love it here, but I need these "Chiang Mai Breaks" once in a while lets just say.

Anyways we got there Friday night and proceeded to get some good ol' burgers and beers at the Chiang Mai Saloon then go straight back to our Apartments and watch HBO and the Disney Channel (brought back some great TNBC/TGIF memories). Great night. The next morning we went for breakfast at Starbucks (haha I know every backpacker is just cringing right now, but the frap i had was incredible) and then wandered around the Ta Pae gate area buying english books and getting AMAZING pedicures(Christine's Salon - free advertising for it since they were so incredlbe!) A little shopping at the Airport Plaza mall, and wandered the night market for last minute gifts. We then got ready to celebrate Maeve's birthday (well ONE of Maeve's birthdays) and started the night off at an interesting "greek" restaurant that overserved us liquor and gave Maeve 8 (yes 8) roses. Good times and cheap food though. Then tuk-ed it to the nightclub Bubbles which is so fun. It tries to be all upscale-Caprice styles, but really there are just a lot of grubby travelers under black lights there. Kept the night moving by heading over to the afterhours club Spicy which was....interesting. Maeve and Nick had the moment of the night when they tried to do what can only be called a dirty-dancing move where Maeve jumped off stage onto Nick, and then they both proceeded to fall all over everyone/everything. Great times. We almost got in a fight with one of the many Thai-escort ladies there when she was trying to get around me, but of course she's like 4'5 and i'm 5'11 and I couldn't hear her. Maeve said she pushed me, but I really couldn't feel anything..haha. Maeve, Nick and I then tried to go to Karaoke but like always the Tuk-tuk driver just took us on a wild ride to nowhere and then scammed up out of our money after saying he understood us and then, "oh no i no understand..." argggghhhh. We got back to our apartment in time to watch America's Funniest Home Videos though.

The next day we spent ALL DAY IN BED. Watching HBO (lucky us...a marathon of Entourage!!! SO the best show on TV right now) and eating crips. A chill night followed and I spent the next day at the Indian embassy getting my visa, which they processed wrong obvisously, but nothing I can do about it. Made it back to Wiang Sa that night to find that the river levels have gone down and school is back in session. We have a few funerals to go to this week, but other than that I think my last two weeks will be semi-back to normal.

Wiang Under Water

2006-08-24T12:31:00.000+07:00

The main road in Wiang Sa, on the right is where I usually get my Lemon Drjuee in a bag!

That's a phone booth and a billboard on the right and a house on the left. DEEP!

Well the past week has been interesting. Nan Province has been hit by the worst flooding in 25 years. And the city of Nan (25km away) and my village of Wiang Sa have been some of the hardest hit. Wiang Sa is situated in a valley between the Nan river and the Sa river, good for when you're growing rice, bad for when the river rises 10 meters above its banks. On Sunday it started to rain pretty hard, but I didn't really notice it that much since it was more like Vancouver-constant-grey-sky rain rather than Thailand-intense-but-short-black-cloud rain. It continued all night and by Monday everything was flooded. It wasn't so bad in Wiang sa at that time, so we all showed up for school, even though there were no students! Although in Nan, our friends Nick and Joss had to canoe to their school which was 8ft underwater. Of course all day Monday it kept raining and the rivers around Wiang Sa just kept rising. Miranda and I were out of drinking water, and all the water pipes were shut off for who knows how long, so the we tried to make the trek to Tescos in Nan that night.

The river, that usually you couldnt even see from the highway, was right up against the edges, and pouring over in some sections. Every house along the road was flooded up to the first floor and people were everywhere trying to move their possessions to higher ground. We made it to Tescos, but of course so had everyone else so there was little water and basic rations left. We stocked up on what we could and then tried to make it farter into Nan to check to see if our teacher Noot's uncle was ok. We got stopped at an army checkpoint where the water was about 4ft deep over the highway. We took one attempt in Mel's truck to go through it, but had to abandon that 1/2 way and carry the provisions through river/highway to his house. The TV stations had all their sattelites and flood lights set up, and couldn't resist the shot of a farang wadding through the muddy waters with TESCO water bottles balanced on her head. So, i'm apparently a star on iTV now! We made it home barely, and it kept raining through the night...so school has been cancelled indefenitly now. Tuesday and Wednesday I tried to keep busy by going down to the part of Wiang Sa that has been hardest hit and help out. It's hard though without being able to speak Thai. Plus the government and army seem to have things under pretty good control with lots of rescue shelters set up in the Wats for people to go to. I did spend a few hours handing out food to some of the people who have chosen to stay in their houses on the second or third stories. But there isn't much to do until the water starts to receed. Today the weather is a little more sunny and warm so the water has receeded in some areas, and there is layers and layers of mud left behind. Its going to be a messy clean up. We haven't had running water in our house for 4 days now either, so the lack of showers and clean clothes are starting to show!!!

There have been quite a few casualties, mostly due to the fact that people can't get to the clinic or hospital because of the flooding. Some are really hitting home too....It's actually pretty sad becasue the director of my school lost his Mom on Monday, and then one of my students in Pratom 1 died on Tuesday, she was one of the smartest little kids in the class and its so sad to see her family (her sister is in Pratom 6 at our school too). But the whole neighborhood is really helping them out.

Anyways, hopefully everything will start to get sorted soon with the worst of the weather over with. Miranda and I are meeting up with all the other GAP volunteers this weekend in Chaing Mai for one last party before we all go our seperate ways. Should be fun. Then next week who knows if i'll be teaching or cleaning?

GT's In the GT

2006-08-15T12:12:00.000+07:00

Good times in the Golden Triangle

Last weekend was a long weekend in Thailand (Queen's Birthday therefore also Mother's Day) So the all the teachers at Sriwiangsawittayakarn decided it's time for a road trip....Thai styles. All Miranda and I knew before hand was that we were going to be picked up at 2:30am Saturday morning and we were going north.

Well of course they didn't pick us up until 4am, and then we drove for 45 minute and parked on the side of the road for 2 hours - no idea what we were waiting for. So far Miranda and I were really happy we woke up at 2am for this. Then we drive for a few more hours (as I dozed in and out of consciousness...) and ended up at this Wat in Pha Yao (or P-YO! As the cool people call it) and proceeded to go through the rituals of getting blessings and good luck for our trip. And went to the pond where we fed the most disgusting cat-fish things in the world.

It was still about 8am, so we got back in the car and drove for another hour to a Wat just outside Chaing Rai. It was pretty spectacular, a famous Thai artist has built it from scratch using all the profits he has made selling his paintings worldwide. Trying to get some good Karma (and he makes no secret about how much he's spent on it: 30 million baht and 4 years) Of course it has the obligatory "hell" display that all Wats have, this one was a bit more original as it was a bunch of cement hands and faces reaching out from the ground as you walk over a bridge. Kinda crowd-surfing styles.... Then we had Thai noodle breakfast with icecream for dessert and headed in the car for another 3 hour drive. This time to Chaing Sein which is a border crossing to Laos. We hit up the markets along the Mekong river which was fun. There were TONS of Chinese imported foods with some of the funniest slogans I have seen yet. The teachers bought about 50 kilos of apples and sunflower seeds...And I bought a couple packs of Giant Pocky Stick packages.

Then it was a 30 minute drive to the Golden Triangle. This is where the corners of Thailand, Laos and Burma/Myanmar (Burma is the internationally recognized name, but the illegitimate government has renamed it the Union of Myanmar...In Thailand it goes by Myanmar) all meet along the Mekong river. And China is only 200 meters up north. It used to be the centre of all opium production and smuggling, but lately there are more farangs there than Opium Caravans.... It's sorta one big amusement park but less rides and more Buddha statues. I of course checked out the immigration office. Other than maybe the Afghanistan/Pakistan border, I'd say that would be one of the worst Immi postings you could get ;) The opium production has been basically eradicated from Thailand as one of the Kings big development projects has been to introduce crop-substitution programs for the farmers in the Golden Triangle area. It has worked quite well from a Thai perspective, but basically it has just pushed the cultivation and production over the borders to Laos and Burma. Anyways from our carnival-side in Thailand you look across the Mekong into Laos, and its all shabby boats and grass huts. Then on the Burma side there is a HUGE Casino that basically welcomes all the Farangs with their money. Not the best thing though since the Burmese government is so corrupt and actually illegitimate (the democratically elected president Aung San Suu Kyi is still under house-arrest by the military dictatorship) most of the money that tourists spend in Burma goes right into their pockets. So the international community and Aung San Suu Kyi have called for a Tourist Boycott of Myanmar. It's a tough choice though because many people also say that travelers can help out the oppressed Burmese people by going there and shopping at local markets and staying at locally owned guesthouses rather than government owned ones.... It's just a matter of being responsible about your spending and being aware of the consequences of your presence. Anyways political situation or not - It didn't seem to be stopping people from going over there on speedboats with crash helmets incase of impact with debris that causes these boats to "disintegrate on impact"

From the Golden Triangle we headed to Mai Sai, the official border crossing between Thailand and Myanmar. Over 600,000 people cross a day mostly to sell goods at the markets. Basically Mai Sai is what the Peace Arch border crossing would be if Bellis Fair was literally ON the big lawn. And if Bellis fair sold 90% illegal things. The market is described as, "A place you can find anything and everything to get you arrested at Customs on your way home" And its true. Weapons, counterfeits, people, narcotics, etc. You get the picture. A former Customs Inspector's Paradise!!! (I of course was there strictly for research) I spent most of the afternoon on the Thailand side checking out the cheap sunglasses and watches, then crossed over into the Burmese side, by jumping accross a river since my Thai visa is a single entry, but Burma was more of the same stuff so headed back. I almost got stuck in Burma though since the 3pm rain storm made the once-small river turn HUGE. Luckily I got over just in time. I ended up with three pairs of sunglasses, a fake Adidas watch, a Film Rattapoom CD, and way too much Chinese candy.

We left Mai Sai to go to Doi Tung, the Royal Villa. Built by the King of Thailand for his mother to come back to when she is reincarnated. It's an amazing garden about 20X the size of Vandussen. Incredible. And on the top of a mountain so you can see the whole Chaing Rai province valley. So nice, and they had the best coffee shop I've been to in Thailand there (Starbucks quality for sure) By this time it was about 5pm and we got back in the cars and drove for 5 more hours back to P-YO! To have dinner. It was the most uncomfortable dinner I've had in Thailand. Just the fact we had been traveling for 20 hours, no one was in a good mood especially Miranda and I, so when the teachers and director kept talking about us in Thai and saying "SING SONG SING SONG FARANG FARANG FARANG" we didn't have the normal patience to deal with it that we usually do. That and the food was pretty bad....Yuck. So over to sev we went to have our own diner of snickers and chips. Then we got in the car and drove the 4 hours back home (took the long way for some reason...) to Wiang Sa, where we arrived exactly 24 hours after we left. Like I said, a Thai-style Road Trip is definitely unique!

I spent all day Sunday cleaning everything I own in Thailand, as it has all become covered in a layer of mold. Nice. Luckily I learned the Thai word for bleach fast. Monday I went to get a bunch of passport pictures for India and Nepal visas, and in Thailand passport pictures are taken like Sears portraits. A whole big show with makeup and mirrors, then they retouch them and airbrush them before printing them out for you. Although they airbrushed me WHITER than I am..... Oh Thailand! Only 2 more weeks of your crazy shenanigans!!!

Sriwiangsawittayakarn English Day Camp 2006

2006-08-07T12:35:00.000+07:00

Last Saturday my school held its annual English Day Camp, well annual since they've had GAP volunteers at the school. Basically an English Camp is a day for the students to have fun, play games, sing songs all in English (theoretically).

Nick, Joss, and Paradie (the other GAP volunteers placed up north here) came to help out, so we had a decent camp ratio of 5 volunteers to 150 thai students. Some english camps there is only one native English speaker who is expected to run the camp themselves, so having five of us much easier!!! I have participated in a few English Camps while i've been here in Thailand, but this was my first time organizing and helping run one. A little different, but not much since my Thai teachers really helped out and took care of most of the annoying organizational stuff. We had 5 stations that had 5 different activities focusing on basic English conversational skills.

1. Telling time
2. Listening
3. Holidays
4. I like/ I don't like
5. Nationalities

So groups of 30 Pratom 4/5/6 students would go around to each station and play the games run by us volunteers. We did Christmas Bingo, The "hello" game, What Time is it Mr.Wolf, and other wordsearch style games. It was actually pretty easy and fun at sometimes!! The best part though was when we had all 150 kids together and we'd teach them some of our favourite english songs, like the banana song or the som tam song you get all those kids dancing around...its pretty hillarious. Of course we ended off the English camp with the obligatory autographs, pictures, and certificates that every Thai event needs to have. Our certificates this time were really colourful, but of course they spelt our names wrong (Laura Daviesse and Marper Harper) and our little envelope of pocket money - 500baht (same as one week's wage for me!). After I signed every single kids book with my name, email, canadian phone number, birthday...etc. I don't know how they're planning on calling me in Canada, but its pretty funny anyway.

After the english camp we biked back to my place with the kids following us and wanting to play more games...But us volunteers piled into the back of a teacher's pickup truck and headed into Nan for a celebratory dinner at the Runway Restaurant where I proceeded to eat more than I ate during hte whole month of July. It was soooo good. After dropping Nick and Joss off we went to Tescos for the 15baht DQ blizzards that are my life now!! And back home with Paradie to watch Traffic. (which I rented thinking it was Crash...I told you my English skills are slowly diminishing) After the exhausting Saturday English Camp, the rest of the weekend I spent sleeping and finishing (finally) Anna Karenina. Now its Monday at 2:45 pm and since i'm done my teaching for the day I'm heading for a massage. 2 hours for 50 baht (ohhh $1.50) It was a tough day today.... ;)

Buddhist Vegas Baby!

2006-08-01T16:26:00.000+07:00

Even the Monks have gone Vegas on us. Instead of the old sticks-in-a-tin way to get your fortune told at this Wat in Nan, you put 10 baht in to this machine and it whirls-twirls and does a few sparkley things and gives you your fortune. I Love it.

And yes those are disco balls in the corners.

Technologicalization and Pig's Head

2006-07-31T15:40:00.000+07:00

I have just spent the day technologosizing Sriwiangsawittayakarn school. (technologosizing is a quote from one of the thai english teachers)

I am exhausted, at first I thought it would be a great deal. No teaching all day (2 classes of those pratom 1 brats..) and just setting up a few email addresses.

See....apparently an urgent memo came from the provincial education office that all teachers must be able to be contacted by email. That's cool, I mean it is easier than the memos they literally still send over by horse-cart (a la the horse and carriage in Mowbray, South Africa) ..... Anyways there is internet all over this school and its about time everyone got an email address. What i didn't anticipate was the day turning into a how-to computer seminar run by Laura!!!!

Everyone who is aged 5-30 right now remembers what it was like when their parents discovered the computer. 'HOW DO I WRITE AN eh-mail to your aunt?' 'WHAT DO YOU MEAN GO TO FILE?' 'Where are the pictures? What is a www address? ...." and my personal favourite.... 'NO don't just do it, explain and show me!' ....oh dear. Well today was like that X100 + in THAI - any ability to grasp the concept of why I just can't make up an email address of noot@sriwiangsawittayakarn.com

They didn't even know what email server they wanted to use, so I googled around and found thaimail.com which they could navigate in Thai. But 1/2 way through that stopped working. So we moved over to Yahoooooooooo. Which they kept yelling for the next 3 hours. (Think asian-cowboy voice). I made up not only their email addresses, but their english-translated names. It was a long lound day with over 50 teachers in my office yelling at me in thai about their phonetic names. "OIIIIIIIII OIIIIIII OIIIIII" which they demaned be spelt Oil....but of course there is no available oil@yahoo.com .... ahhhh

And now i just got asked to fill in a spreadsheet (all in Thai on THAIexcel) of all the names/emails/phone numbers...etc. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. I haven't sat infront of a computer this long since UBC's essay-season in March.

So anyways moral of the story is.....I should have them blogging by September ;)

WAIT!

I'm just about to post this blog entry, and Noot (one of the thai-english teachers) comes in and says that we go eat downstairs since she passed the exam to become a director (principal) and placed 3rd out of 50 competetors. So it turns out she bought some food because she promised the Gods that if she passed the exam she would have a feast. Sweet! But then she says to me, "I think you mae chop..." (I think you wont like) and I give her my now famous suspicious eyes (i use these in Thailand more than you can imagine) that just by looking ask the person if they're serious of just putting me on because i'm a farang.... So she says, "OK come with" I go downstairs to the outdoor/indoor room and what do i see sitting on the table.

A BIG GIANT PIG'S HEAD. Teeth, eyes, ears, spine sticking out..everything there. and the teachers laughing their heads off and offering me little pieces they have cut out of the cheeks. Now i'm not too picky anymore thanks to Thai cuisine presentations....but this was sick. And it didn't even taste like meat. oh man. Well ya. so that is my story about Pigs and Technology. It's just another Monday at Sriwiangsawittayakarn

ps. happy birthday dad

The Welcome Wagon Just Keeps Coming!

2006-07-29T14:59:00.000+07:00

Most places i've been too, things get more mundane the longer I stay there. I've been introduced to most food/people/activities and I usually get used to those weird and wacky things that were so crazy at the begining. NOT in Wiang Sa. Here's just a short list of the weird and random stuff that keeps being introduced to me.

- Daily outdoor aerobics for all the fat people in Wiang Sa. In front of one of the government buildings, what I could only describe as spandex-clad Thai soccer moms, gather at 6pm each night to do Sweatin' with the Oldies for a good hour. Miranda and I have promised to go back at least twice a week. I don't know what is a better workout, the laughing or the aerobics.

- The ladyboy volleyball team. Well its not all ladyboys, but the ones on the team sure overshadow the others. First, the grade 6 team (boys and girls) could for sure beat the varsity team I played for at the University of Cape Town... they're amazing. Second, the ladyboys are great players. Mostly setters, but still have great height to play the net. But when they do something good or bad it's their reaction that is priceless.

- The tour de france seems to have made a detour through Wiang Sa too, as there is this man who is decked out in full-body spandex and state of the art biking gear who goes past us at warp speed everyday at dinner. This is weird especially in a town where nothing moves faster than the grass grows. But everyday there he is whizzing by all aerodynamically.

- Shortages. Now i'm used to the electricity being shut down at random periods of the day, but when we didn't have water for 5 days...not cool. And at school we ran out of paper. There was no bug spray at TESCOS either. Not to mention Miranda and I have watched every english VCD that Lotus has to rent.

- The small birds that fly into my window repeatedy every morning between 6am - 9am. I can see once thinking they can fly through (although its really dirty) but they fly full-speed into it over and over and over again making the most annoying cling-CLUNK sound. After each hit I pray that it's broken its neck, but there it comes again.

- THE FOOD. Everyday its something new put in front of us. My recent favourite was the 'sun dried bananas' that were black, oozing some pus stuff, and tasted like pure mold. Sickest things i've eaten in Thailand hands down. We had some great mini-crepes that were folded like tacos with what I think is marshmallow creme and sugar on it, but there is no such thing in Thailand... so I don't want to know what it really is. Other meals this week have included: Seafood wonton soup, Thai spa-ghett-tee that looks like XLong KD noodles (so hard to eat b/c of the long hole in the middle) and is covered in a garlic oil sauce, and a drink in a bag that tasted like that McDonalds orange drink concentrate mixed with ice. I'm not complaining since I end up loving 70% of what I am given to taste, but that other 30% doesn't go down easy!

- Lizards in my toaster. There is this one lizard (one of the pale ceiling dwelling ones) Who loves to live on/in/under my toaster. So everymorning I have to pick it up and shake it to get him out. Even though i'm expecting him there, it still gives me a little fright when he scuttles out! Miranda and I tried a control-burn the other day to teach him that the toaster is not a safe refuge. (Don't worry he ran away once it got hot) But he still came back the next day!!! So weird.

ps. check out my webshots albums link on the right for pictures from when Christine, Megan and Heather came to teach at Sriwiangsawittayakarn.

Back in the WIANG

2006-07-20T09:46:00.000+07:00

Uncle Jai, Miranda, Me, Pa Pian and some of the randoms who came to Bangkok with us.

I'm back in Wiang Sa, where no one appreciates my tan!
Back to teaching too. Same old same old. It's a lot cooler here though now! I didn't even need to use the fan in my room last night! AND i'm not sweating as I write this ;) Anyways nothing is new here. The tables got re-arranged at Pa Pian's restaurant, that's big news.

Megan, Heather, and Christine are coming up here on Sunday and we're going to do the Wat circut of Nan, hopefully hit up some waterfalls and then they're going to find out what it's like to teach at Sriwiangsa as they take all my Monday classes!

Full Moon - Koh Phi Phi

2006-07-19T12:42:00.000+07:00

So last I checked in I was preparing for the Full Moon Party...well preparing as much as you can. Megan and I tried to nap, but the gosh darn ocean at our front door kept us awake! I started the night off like any true athelete: Carbo-loading. Had a complete meal pasta and mashed potatoes mmmmmmm. Then we hit Had Rin in true F.Mooner style, with classy buckets of whiskey, sprite, and redbull. The beach was packed. Not only do you have everyone on Koh Pha Ngan at this party, but there are speedboats coming from Koh Samui every 15 minutes bringing in more partiers. You couldn't find a place to stand on the beach amongst the throngs of flourescent-body painted people dancing on the sand to dance, techno, pop, R&B. Jon, Jen, Megan, Christine, Heather and I decided to take in the beach scene by heading down to the Mellow Mountain Bar at one end of the beach. Its not really mellow, and not really on a mountain, but provided incredible views of the craziness that is the Full Moon Party. The rest of the night was fun. Danced with people, lost people, met people, crashed into people...its all part of the fun. Us girls had to meet our taxi at 6am that morning to get off the island though - so we went home and packed at 5am. And then began our epic travel journey.

Just so you can get a sense of what we went through with ZERO sleep and 2 buckets in our system, our next 14 hours went like this:

hike - taxi - boat - bus - taxi - wait at a random restaurant - bus - boat - boat - hike.

And looked like this:

At the end of it we were on Koh Phi Phi, the AMAZING island off the Adaman coast. Although not before we got caught in a huge storm off the coast of Krabi that caused waves to go over our boat (and in through the many cracks) and made your stomach jump every 3 seconds. Needless to say everyone was feeling a little vominos!! The same storm caused us to have problems trying to get a 'boat-boat' to our beach on Phi-Phi, with no roads you have to take longtail boats everywhere, but with the waves no one was willing to go to Had Yao. So we had to go around the island and hike over to the beach. We sure deserved our air-con/4 person/hot-shower/beachfront bungalow that night!!!

I don't want to preach about the lasting affects of the 2004 Tsunami.... But you can still see the affects of the destruction on Phi-Phi Don. It's sorta like the re-development stalled after 6 months or so. While I was down there I read an article saying that international Tsunami relief donations totalled around $7,000 USD per person affected. At least on Phi-Phi I didn't see anywhere near that put back into recovery. It's such an incredible island that I hope that when it does get back into developing its tourism infrastructre that they do it right without overdevelopment like we saw on Koh Samui. Ok sorry, that was a little bit of preaching....

Our three days there were incredible and SUNNY (rare in their off season). It was topped off by our trip over to the national park of Koh Phi-Phi Ley. What a stunning island. It's like Cape Town, you can't believe such immense natural beauty exists even though its right infront of your face! We took a sunset cruise over there, stopped off at Monkey Beach, where dozens of monkeys came out to meet us and eat our bananas. It was there I learned that my ass looks just like a piece of banana because I literally had to fight off the monkeys who kept grabbing it!! We went over to Pilah Bay where we got to kyak around the huge lagoon with sheer 10 storey rock faces plunge into the sea. It was so....just so ahh! Then it was over to Maya Bay, the famous location where the Beach was shot in 1999. Now I'm really starting to think that Richard, Etienne, and Francoise had it easy getting to their secret beach. A few miles of swimming, a drug field or two and a simple plunge off a huge waterfall. EH Whatever!! When we went the sea was still too stormy to get into the bay through the Western opening. so we pulled around the backside and had to dive in the water off the boat and swim over reefs to a cliff face with a small patch of not-so-sharp coral that only sorta-cut Christine's feet. The waves would push you up the slippery coral and you had to find some way to navy-seal your way up. Then through a small cave and up a waterfall to the 5 minute hike into the backside of Maya Bay. It was so worth it though - the empty bay was so incredible, and the perfect backdrop for a TB2BThailand photo shoot!! After 1/2 hour it was back on the boat for some GREAT fried rice and back onto Phi-Phi Don where us girls celebrated our last night together with the Full Moon After Party at Hippies Bar. Megan and I attempted the drinking contest that involved lots of running on the beach and drinking alcohol in various containers. We wern't much of a match for the 4 other teams of boys. It was much more fun to settle onto our beachmat table and watch the fireshows.

I left Phi-Phi VERY reluctantly the next day and while we left Christine and Heather tanning on the beach Megan and I endured a ...ahem...nice... 30 minute hike in the midday heat to Ton Sai through the jungle, mud pits, across beaches and into town. But I still loved every second of it and i'm seriously thinking about heading back in September. Plus we never found Harvey!!!

Just a few photos are up - I don't want to give away the farm! Check the rest out on my webshots album

Koh Pha Ngan: Pre-Pre-Pre Full Moon Party(s)

2006-07-12T13:51:00.000+07:00

So from Koh Samui we slowly made our way to Koh Pha Ngan, getting picked up EARLY from our guesthouse (!!) and then transfered twice to get to the ferry which was packed with other farangs spread all over the decks. And I believe that the taxi/sangthaw drivers have control over mother nature here because as soon as we stepped off the ferry it started to monsoon and of course the taxi drivers are more than willing to drive you the 2 blocks for an absurd price. We waited it out and then tried to find a place in Had Rin with room for us. It was harder than finding a room for a baby in Bethleham! Everywhere was full, and we trekked barefoot wiht our backpacks through the dirty puddles and up dirt roads and finally found a nice little resort that apparently had room. Well the bungalows they had were....ummmm.... about 50 meteres up a mountain side that turned into a mudslide during the afternoon monsoon. The poarch was falling off, and i'm still positive that the rest of the structure is not far behind. There was some incredible mold formation on the walls (Heather's picture) and we were defenitly living in some ants main abode. I did not fit in the "bathroom" with the door closed either. FUN! So we got up extra early the next day to see if we could switch and lucked out with two beachfront bungalows 1 meter away from the surf. 400 Baht a night too! We fall asleep to the moon setting over the ocean right in front of our picture windows, and the crashing waves keeping heather up all night.

The past few days have been spent exploring the town, doing some great shopping in the little boutiques that have mroe than the usual knockoff stuff in most Thai tourist traps. I've contributed to my backpacking uniform and bought some of the cotton puma running shorts. Soon i'll fit in with the rest of these farangs! At night we head to the beach and on the way stop at one of the convienence stores to pick up a bucket, bottle of red bull, 1/2 mickey of whiskey and a can of sprite/coke. Mix them on the way, and go chill at the beach, sometimes go into the open air dance clubs that line the beach, others watch the fire dancers (not as good as the ones in South Africa at Clifton though!) Its fun since all my GAP volunteer friends are here, Jon and Jen, the TB2BTs...I run into someone wherever I go! Yesterday we went on one of the boat tours around the island (Munchies Boat Tours.....we decided against the snoop dog tour, or the bob marley tour since Christine doesn't like the 'nnst nnst' noise in Bob Marley songs.....) You go to the waterfalls with about 500 of the other travelers, snorkeling at a remote beach, swimming at bottle beach and have lots of other fun extras thrown in at no cost. Execpt yesterday we got caught in the afternoon monsoon and it was defenitly a 'white squall' moment...if they wore sarongs and sunglasses in the movie.....Eating is fun. For dinner I had pad thai with a side of french fries (I feel it's really symbolic of my life right now...) And Schnitzel sandwiches for lunch. This place is exactly like Alex Garland's Beach - even down to the movies shown in the restaurants every night. Its really fun though....and even now looking out the window there are just so many people here (expecting about 8000) just waiting for the biggest beach party.

Tommorow we leave for Koh Phi Phi at 6am.... So no sleep after the FM party i'm pretty sure.

Birthday Part 2: Koh Samui

2006-07-09T13:24:00.000+07:00

I love Southern Thailand!!!

I've had a crazy last 3 days meeting up with basically everyone I know in Asia right now! Came down from Wiang Sa in a van with 12 other "friends" of our homestay family. I got a really nice 1ft. cube to make myself cozy in for the 12 hour drive. Had an interesting birthday breakfast at 5am with some of their friends in Bangkok - fish head soup. Then went to the airport to meet Jon and Jen who just arrived from Taipei. So fun to catch up with them and share teaching (horror) stories. Then we took the beautiful ferry across the turquoise waters of the Gulf of Thailand and ended up at Koh Samui where Chritine, Megan and Heather met me at our little bungalow resort. We talked for about 5 straight hours and headed out to check out what Chewang beach is all about. Ended up having swordfish and sangria, then to HAGEN DAAZ for some pleasure baskets of chocolate ice cream and fresh fruit. mmmm heaven. Chilled on the beach at the bars that have lounge chairs on the sand and drank interesting cocktails called "osgrams" hmm?

Met up with Maeve and Ece too and enjoyed a few days where all we worried about was where to eat and how much sun we should get. Last night we found out where basically all the white people in Thailand are: At the Green Mango. Sorta a street of 5-6 bars that just pour onto the street and you can hear at least 3 different songs at one time. Watched a bit of the Por-Ger game and had some late-night McD's to top off a perfect birthday week.

Today its off to Koh Pha Ngan to try to find some accomodation for the full moon parth week. It shouldn't be too hard, but we're just wondering if we really want to stay on teh beach where the techno music starts at 10am.....Heather says yes.

Birthday Part 1: Wiang Sa

2006-07-05T12:10:00.000+07:00

Today is my Wiang Sa Birthday. The teachers got me the cutest cake (who knows where they found somewhere in Nan to buy a birthday cake!) and the director sang me Happy Birthday. Which was odd since he has never spoken a word of english, or spoken to me at all for that matter, since i've been here.

Then as I was teaching my Pratom 5 class - The Ovaltine truck comes up and starts unloading speakers, prizes, free ovaltine drinks....kinda like the old Pepsi taste test.... so classes get cancelled and we all drink cold ovaltine for the rest of the morning.

My grade one class didn't really understand it was my birthday, but decided that the funniest thing in the world today is "PEE" and kept sneaking up to the chalkboard to add 'pee' to my good-morning/good-afternoon drawings.

Anyways, its officially vacation and in 5 hours i'm heading off with Uncle Jai and his family in a 11 seat minivan for the 12 hour trek to Bangkok. Meeting up with Jon and Jen at the airport and flying down to see Megan, Christine and Heather on Koh Samui!!!

POGGS

2006-07-03T11:33:00.000+07:00

I can see why the teachers at Southlands Elementary School banned 'POGGS' when I was in grade 4.

The kids at Sriwiangsa have these 'Advent' cards that they collect and then play this game where you hold them in your hand and then high-five someone else with one and the cards fall to the floor and someone wins. I obviously as an ancient teacher don't understand it, but I do understand how annoying it is when the kids are secretly playing the game, or trading the cards, or shuffling them, or....ahhhhh!!! I mean isn't the riviting lesson I'm teaching about prepositions and nouns exciting enough???

I snapped today and took them away from a kid, and he started to cry. Not that crying even bothers me anymore, a kid crys about twice a lesson: but I was nice and gave the cards back after his 5 minute time-out.

Other than students being students, I'm having a great day! My lessons this week are so great, some of the best I've come up with I'm sure. This weekend was fun. On Sunday I rode my bike to Laos. Well by mistake, I just turned right instead of left and kept going. Apparently I rode the 30 km to Laos and had to turn back at the river. On Saturday it was Canada day, and as all my friends in South Africa know, I'm pretty passionate about spreading the greatness of Canada through culinary methods. So I figured I'd make my Thai host-family, the random neighbors who are always around, and the teachers some Kraft Dinner. Using one of the two precious boxes I brought from home. I got the rice maker (the only cooking item we have) some milk and butter (not easy feats in rural thailand) but everyone was busy that day....argh. So instead of waste the precious blue box I decided to save it for another day. By the time i'm finished traveling the world is going to be so confused as to what day is Canada Day... (Texas and South Africa already think it is August 1st) I had some fun conversations about the day though, this one took place at lunch with Pa Pian our homestay aunty....

Me: "Today is Canada day. Birthday of Canada"
Pa Pian: "Yoo? Birftdahy Loourla?"
Me: "Nonono, pratet (country) Canada, today, now, birthday."
Pa Pian: "Ohhh Caaaanaaadahhhh. Miss Universe? Natalie!!! Souuuai (beautiful)"
Me: "No. Not Natalie. Canada. Pratet. Birthday. neung roi sam sip ho (136) Like King birthday in Thailand. Now Canaday Birthday"
Pa Pian: "_____________" (the stunned look with mouth partly open that I get about 698792 times a day)"Ah roi maa kah?" (do you find your lunch delicious?...changing the subject to what we talk about every single meal)
Me: sigh.... "Jow, ahhh roi maaa" (yes I find it delicious...giving up any hope of sharing my cultural celebration...)

Teaching...

2006-06-30T10:58:00.000+07:00

So just finished "helping" a Pratom 3 student prepare for the Provincial English Speech competition that is taking place next week. And by helping the teachers expected us to pick the student from the whole grade. (We picked a girl named Nim) Then compose the entire speech, teach it to the student (since she doesn't even know the alphabet how in the world would she be able to read it!) and ensure that on July 13th they will be able to get on a stage and speak proper English. Ya right. Its 3/4 of the way to a disaster already. I don't know how this is helping the students at all, but its typical of the style of learning most Thai kids go through. The teacher will dictate, the students repeat exactly what they hear, and you end up with conversational english that sounds like, "i'm FINE thank YOU and YOUUUUU?" or "My NAME izzzzzzzzzzzzzz........"

The rest of the week has been ok, went to Nan for dinner twice, got to go to Tescos and stock up on VCDs, and had some fun English lessons that I disguised as art projects. On Monday afternoon, the ducks protest turned out to be part of an national anti-drug campaign. So the students had big banners, and we paraded around the village behind a pickup with a megaphone telling people not to smoke or drink. All of this in the middle of the day. Anyone who has been/lived in the tropics knows the stiffiling heat and humidity that comes the hour before the daily afternoon thundershowers....try marching around in that with 600 kids - NOT FUN.
Miranda and I just found out that instead of taking the bus to Bangkok on Wednesday night, Uncle Jai and his family want us to come with them in their car. They're going down to Bangkok to pick up their daughter who is a nursing student. So its going to be 8 of us in the van for 10 hours....should be a good story.

Nothing exciting going on this weekend, maybe some friends from Nan will come by on Saturday and we'll watch some VCDs...

Just Another Manic Monday....

2006-06-27T12:33:00.000+07:00

So after that redic weekend. I didn't have any energy to plan the weekly lessons for my classes. "Eh...I'll wing it" I thought. Then at 8:45 I notice the kids aren't at their normal assembly and the teachers are all bustling around the room. So I ask what's going on? And THEN I get told that its some big holiday today and there are no classes, only (and this is a direct quotation) "A history catwalk where we watch." So whatever that means, at least I don't have to teach!!

It ends up that all the students/teachers go to the auditorium and the Pratom 5&6 kids dress up and do these routines and skits. No idea what it was all about still. But everyone was going crazy! There was a aerobic-dance show to start the morning off. Then a bunch of kids came up and had the awkward experience of presenting their memorized speaches. Then there was sort of a fashion show of boys in makeup with some mermaids and a tiger. Then the kids all watched a DVD and sang-along with it.

Then at lunch I ask if we are teaching in the afternoon, and literally another direct quote. "Ummmmm no maybe yes we will march through village to protest ducks. You march with me"

So, i'm just waiting to see what THAT is going to reveal. I TOTALLY agree with Heather's observation about just going along with things and not asking questions to maintain your sanity! If I keep getting answers like these ones - I dunno how long I will last!

OH! And I'm very excited because I just booked my flight to Koh Samui for my Super-Fabulous-Tropical-Beach-Paradise 22nd birthday party! In the spirit of Julia's birthday in Paris, I'm hosting a party in Thailand - come if you're in the neighborhood: July 6th! I've already got 3 confirmed guests from Vancouver, 2 from Vancouver via Taipei, and 2 from Samut Songrkram (lol other GAP volunteers)

Jungle Trekking and Rafting

2006-06-27T10:16:00.000+07:00

You know it was a good weekend when come Sunday night its painful to take your shoes off...

After a mediocre week at Sriwiangsa teaching, Basically all the teachers in Nan met up in Nan city for a weekend of adventure. 7am we piled into a 4WD and drove up north to one of the National parks to begin our Jungle Trek. For the next 6 hours we wove up, down, in, out, through, over the jungle-draped hills of northern Nan. It was incredible being surrounded by huge bamboo trees, Palm trees, banana plants, and insects the size of small rodents. A lot of the teek trees had orange-monk robes tied around them, as the locals use this tactic to prevent deforestation. By making the tree a Monk, it is impossible for anyone to kill it without serious rammifications. The trekking was nice when we were under the jungle canopy as it remains quite moist and cool, but once we got into the clearings it was 45* + humidity and it was just sweat-city. We drank over 3L of water and I was still dehydrated afterwards. We ended up at a hilltribe village which is basically in the middle of nowhere and consists of one street built vertically along one of the hills (not like there is any flat land around here) Cooled off with some pineapple and orange fantas before we headed back to Nan. As soon as I got to our hotel I showered and then passed out. I was so dehydrated I couldn't even stomach any water. It didn't lead to a fun night, with pain radiating from every part of my poor heat-stunned body.

But at 6am the next day I felt ok enough to go white-water rafting! After a breakfast of chocolate, chips, redbull and tylenol, 9 of us piled into one pickup truck and drove an hour to Mae Charim park where we did a 2 hour raft through the same mountains we trekked over yesterday! Lots of rapids where it seemed that I was always the only one to get soaked or be in danger of falling out (I was warned about sitting in the front....so I did it!) We drove back to Nan in the same pickup truck - and Miranda and I took the bus back to Wiang Sa (after a few lemon djroy drinks in a bag of course) where we literally steped in the door and a huge thunderstorm errupted. Let me tell you the last thing I wanted to do after such a activity-filled weekend was mop up my bedroom after it flooded. After that we settled in to watch some of our favourite english VCD's and after only one huge dinosaur/lizard scare we went to bed early..... As much fun as this weekend was, there was one downer to it all: My streak of not wearing socks came to an end. From May 4th to June 24 I did not let anything enclose my precious Thai toes....oh well here's to a new streak ;)

Tale of Two Thailands...

2006-06-20T15:16:00.000+07:00

Chaing Mai reminds me a lot of a city like Kelowna B.C. Its dominated by the local gangs. Everything from restaurants, transportation, and clubs/bars are owned and operated by them. But its also just a nice secondary city that has all the convienences of a big city, without the urban sprawl, pollution and general big city problems of Bangkok. But its also naturally beautiful. Its an old city with the reminants of the old fort walls and a moat still marking the boundaries of Old Chaing Mai. And set in beautiful surroundings with the cool (30*C) climate of the mountains surrounding the city, and its a jumping off point for so many people to go on treks, or other outdoor adventures.

So us folks from Nan arrive in Chaing Mai, refreshed after 6 hours of lots of cookies and cream soda complements of the Green Bus co., to the swarm of Sangathew drivers looking to con us poor farangs 'Fresh off the Bus'. There were 8 of us, and we had a guesthouse already booked, so we were having nothing of the scammers and got a ride in the red sangathews nice and cheap. Only had to go to one other guesthouse because the driver 'accidentily' took us there. ps. accidentily means he wanted commission.

The 6 other GAP volunteers met us, who are also ready for a vacation from Thailand, which is what Chaing Mai is. You can go months without having to eat/speak anything Thai. We bought english books at the many book stores, went for late night snacks at a chilli fries restaurant on the corner, watched the world cup games at the English Pub, drank at the UN Irish Pub and danced after hours at Spicy with all the other Farangs in Chaing Mai. It was actually really nice being a tourist again. I think that is why i'm starting to enjoy my time here in Thailand so much more. When I get tired of the 'local experience' of being the only white person in a small town, I can escape and blend back in to the Backpackers on Khao San rd. And then come right back to Wiang Sa when I start to crave bamboo sticky rice and som tam.

We rented motorcycles in Chaing Mai and that was so so so much....SO MUCH FUN! Mine was neon green. Asia is made for motorcycles and it is just so much easier to get around on them. Traffic is no problem because you dart onto the sidewalk, or make your own lane. And you dont have to deal with bargining to go everywhere, and being a Farang you can basically drive right into a bar and park beside your table. 3 of us girls decided to rent them for a day to drive up to Wat Doh Sithup which is 45 minute drive through the mountains. Such a beautiful wat with 308 steps up to the actual wat that is perched overlooking the Chaing Mai valley. We were up there the same day as Prince Albert of Monaco but didn't see him, or become one of his wives..... Then on the way down stopped at some glorious waterfalls and the Chaing Mai zoo. That night Maeve and I didn't feel like going to dance, so we did a 3 hour midnight drive around the city. Saw a lot, and ended up at a locals Karaoke bar, thank GOD Maeve can sing, as her rendition of Celine Dion's "Titanic" won the crowd over! We also went to a local Muai Thai boxing competition about 20km out of town. We hitched a ride with a local boxing school and ended up in a big dirt/mud field with a huge ring set up in it! Very cool to actually watch little kids kick each other. Apparently the retiring age is around 18 years old!!! I'm glad I got to see it, since it's defenitly a Thai thing (especially for free!), but don't expect me to be signing up for classes any time soon!

Then had to get up at 8am to go to the train station to book my ticket and sadly return my bike. Got a little lost on the way but that's 1/2 the fun! Had a fun night at the Chaing Mai night bazaar. Claimed to be the biggest night market in Asia. It was pretty big yes. Some great deals too! But lots of the same old crap like Beer Lao shirts, thai silk scarves, counterfiet everythings, etc. Decided to mix up the transportation a bit and take the overnight train to Bangkok so I went to the train station a bit early to makes ure I got a ticket, and ended up meeting the nicest monk ever who told me all about his life in Thailand, and how I should stay up north and not go to the islands, and that the monk life is defeintly the way to go. He was very interesting, and so generous! Always offering water/snacks/friends business cards/herbal pills. It must have looked funny to have a white girl talking to a monk in a dark train station! Hard to remember all the customs I had to adhear to like not pointing my toes at him, not touching him (a 3 day clensing cerimony would follow!), and not passing anything directly to him but placing it on the floor for him to grab.

Nan Ed. Dist.1 M.5 English Camp: LONG LIVE THE KING!

2006-06-20T10:35:00.000+07:00

Here is the English Camp post with the pictures (hopefully) working this time!

On June 5th at 11am Miranda and I were told we were going to Nan that day to talk to the director of the school district about their english camp. At 2pm the same day we found out that us (and the two other GAP volunteers in Nan) would be running a 4 day English Camp for M.5 students (grade 10) starting tommorow. That's the way things are done around here!

We went back to Wiang Sa to pack up our stuff and the next morning headed to our hotel in Nan, and then to the Non-Formal education centre that we would call home for the next 4 days. As you can see, even the banner introducing the camp was misspelt - so we had a lot of work on our hands.... It was actually really fun though. The kids had a higher level of english than I was used to, so we could play games, sing songs, and do activities that had some meat to them. The section I was teaching was called "reading and writing" so we got about 80 old magazines, mostly National Geographics from the 1980s, and the students chose an article they were interested in, had to read it and then write a summary. Some of them were incredible, but when it came time to read their summaries to the class it was evident where their english needed help. Their pronounciation was awful, But it was actually helpful to identify where the attention was needed and at the next english camp we're going to focus a lot on speaking. One of my students chose an old edition of the economist to write his summary on. He ended up writing about an article on gay marriages in California...yikes! So cute when he would come up to me and ask me definitions of "Govenor of California" and "jurisdiction".

The camp was more fun than work for the students though - during meals and at free time we would chat with them about everything, and they got to meet tons of other students from the province. We played games that involved covering everyone with baby powder (teaching students ON, IN, LEFT, RIGHT words....put the baby powder in your left hand and then on your partners head) Us teachers defenitly were the first to get covered, Jeeze.....as if I couldn't get any whiter!!!

The last night of English Camp was a talent show, and in Thailand that means its time for the Lady Boys to shine. There were about 5/6 at our camp, and went crazy. We had a Miss. Thailand show where they dressed up in drag and did a beauty pagent, there was a lot of Thai dancing and singing, and our Thailand Idol competition provided more than a few future RuPauls!!!

After 4 HARD and exhausting 16 hour days, and with our completion certificates, pocket money, and gifts from the teachers in hand, we decided we not only needed a night on the town but some good ol' western food. So we met up with another 2 English teachers who are teaching in Nan and basically ran the English camp for a couple days (also they're Canadian!) - and had superb Pizza/Pasta dinner (again Julia's eating Thai food in Greece and i'm eating Italian food in Thailand.....)then went out. It was so fun - first time i've been out out since Bangkok! We went to this Thai coppertank style bar that was all bamboo, with a live band that was basically the Thai-Bon Jovi. Bought our Sangsom whiskey bottles from the stores accross the street for 1/2 the price and brought them over to enjoy. Then took motorcycles over to ChannelX nightclub - pronounced in thaienglish "cshanex" - fun place to dance, but it made the PIT Pub look like Crush Champagne Lounge.... and had a great time dancing to thai music and basically getting stared at all night. But nothing i'm not already used to

Stayed out pretty late that night, which didn't bode well for our 9am bus to Chaing Mai the next morning, but we made it to the bus station where I had a nice nap on the plastic chairs. Luckly we shelled out the extra 50 Baht to get an 1st class aircon bus, I don't think I would have made it.

sorry.....

2006-06-19T13:56:00.000+07:00

I hate technology...
I just put up a few posts about my last week or so of traveling in Thailand, but of course the computer lets me upload the pics then 5 minutes later wont show them. So I have no idea what is going wrong let alone how to fix it. I'll see what I can do later tonight. For now - look at the pretty words instead ;)

Back in Bangkok

2006-06-19T13:03:00.001+07:00

Phewf. A little country girl from Wiang Sa like me just can't handle the big city life of Bangkok anymore i'm pretty sure.

I spent 2 full days in Bangkok trying to remember what its like to live in a city. Went down there from Chaing Mai and was really surprised to see how good my Thai has gotten. I'm the first to admit its limited to "shopping and eating vocabulary" but knowing the numbers, how much, too much and no way can sure get you far when bargining for stuff! I spent a whole morning trying to get to the travel clinic, which is only 6km away from Khao San, but that's about 30 minutes in Bangkok's eternal traffic jam. Only to find out that they are out of the vaccine that I reserved a week ago. Sigh, I'm going to keep trying up here, maybe the hospital in Nan can get it. But i'm avoiding mosquitios like the plague right now. Decided it was way to hot in Bangkok, and didn't get an Aircon room at my guesthouse so hopped over to a 5 star hotel and hung out in their lobby reading my books, and then went up to their rooftop pool for some sun. Quite nice! Met Maeve and Ece who were in town for dentist appointments at Siam Paragon shopping centre, "The Pride of Bangkok". Where I watched those two shop-a-holics spend more on clothes than i'm spending my whole 4 months in Thailand. Fun afternoon though. We went out to some bars that night, and I had some incredible street pad thai on the way home.

The next morning I woke up extra early to go to McDonalds!!! Haha not exciting you think? Well I was there to meet two of my best friends from Vancouver! So exciting! Megan's just arriving from her 6 months working in Australia, and Heather is starting her 2 month SE Asia backpacking trip! So exciting to be back with those girls again!!!!! We had a jam packed day of sightseeing and catching up on gossip as its been over 2 years since we've been all together! We battled the intense heat that covered us in sweat head-to-toe 24 hours a day and took a crazy tuk-tuk that kept popping wheelies over to Wat Po (the largest reclining buddha in the world) and wanted to go to the Grand Palace, but since its the king's 60th Coronation weekend there were royalty everywhere (about 15 different countries were represented I think?) and the place was closed down. Over to MBK shopping centre where we searched for bargin counterfiet stuff. Lost my cell phone in the cab which sucked, but got a new one for pretty cheap. Then back to Khao San for dinner/drinks and some nightmarket shopping!! We had the sweetest guesthouse room WITH AC! (such a luxury) that was more Canada's Next Top Model style than America's...but nonetheless it was cheap and cool!

The next morning I introduced them to the best banana pancakes in Bangkok at the New Siam guesthouse...and we split ways. Those stupid girls get to go on a 5 day diving trip to Koh Tao and me, well back to Wiang Sa. I went to the bus station and just missed a bus to Nan, so waited about 6 hours in the terminal where, SURPRISE! I was constantly stared at. But got a decently cheap ticket on the overnight bus to Wiang Sa. I went to the platform and while I was waiting I was *ta da* Upgraded!!! To a VIP Bus!! It was incredible. First the decore was like combining Julia's Delta Gamma Sorority and velvet Elvis paintings from the 70s. Pink velvet everywhere. BUT the seats reclined into proper beds, we got neck pillows and blankets, meals, snacks, water, juice, english movies...I didn't want to get off! Which was evident when they had to wake me up at my stop. oops. So 6am I'm back in Wiang Sa, walking down the highway fending off offers for rides on motorcycles, watching the sun rise. I'm happy to be back, even happier to be eating Uncle Jai's pad thai!!!

Western Detox

2006-06-12T10:41:00.000+07:00

Ahh just waiting to catch my overnight train to Bangkok - thought i'd pop into this pub that has not only milkshakes (!!!) but free internet. sweet. I've had a crazy weekend that when I write about it will remind you more of Aarons SE Asia blog than mine probably (hehe ;)....lots of partying, dancing and late nights, fun motorcycle adventures, and stories that involve OTHER WHITE PEOPLE! Haha, Chaing Mai is interesting - you can't go 2 steps without hitting an English Pub, or an American Pizza place....

Alright off to Bangkok where i'm meeting up with MEGAN and HEATHER!!! So excited for some TB2BThailand adventures.

On Monday's we Wear Yellow

2006-06-05T09:02:00.000+07:00

We just got our "Kings 60th Celebration of his Ascention to the Throne" Yellow Polo shirts. SO HOT right now in Thailand. Yellow is the new black. I even went to the Nan market wearing it and I swear I got better prices on my Lemon Djroy (more about those magical drinks later)

Its kinda funny how big of a deal we are in this town. Its not weird anymore when someone calls our cellphones and says "hello" and that's it, you try to continue the conversation but the only english they know is Hello, so that's all they say. Or when we are sitting on our deck there is a steady stream of visitors who just come over and stare at us. Its almost getting normal, although I am thinking of having my first child in Namibia to get away from the scrutiny.

Speaking of getting stared at - I went to the huge Sunday market by myself! And sorted through the general crap to find lots of nice lacoste tshirts for $2 and a fabulous huge straw hat that is better suited for working in the rice paddies, but I think I'll wear it while biking around in the 45*C heat....(not to draw anymore attention to myself) I also have a new favorite edible treat. Slurpees in a bag. Well not really slurpees. They take sweet lemon tea and some crushed ice and put it literally into a small plastic bag, throw in a straw and BAMMO! You have the genius of Lemon Drjoy!! So great on hot days! That with the 1/2 chopped pineapple costing only 20 baht (36 baht = $1 CDN) I'm living a nice life up here.

This last weekend was really fun. The teachers took us on another surprise-demand trip to Nan that included going to Tescos! (basically the British Wal-Mart) So exciting. I even saw 2 other white people there. Then to a temple that gives you your fortune, but I don't know if its just the english translations that they wrote on them, but they're all horrible! Mine said,

"Like rowing a boat upstream your life is going to be very difficult with insurmountable obstacles. No legal success in the future. Future children will be male. "

After a lot of "phssss no worry Lau-la, it nothing" from the teachers we cheered up with noodle/crouton ice cream at the night market. On Saturday the other 4 GAP volunteers from Phrae (2 hours away) and Nan (30 minutes away) came to hang out in Wiang Sa. We did A LOT of bike riding to and from the bus station to pick everyone up. 6 white people biking through town sure makes a big scene. It was so fun catching up with other english speakers again - we even got to watch some English VCD's! It was fabulous. Uncle Jai and Pa Pian made an amazing dinner of Khao Pad (fried rice) and chicken, and Pad Thai the other night..mmmmmmmmm. The other volunteers were saying how lucky we are to have such a big house, COUCHES, and awesome food ;) On Sunday we tried our luck at finding some sort of breakfast food in town that did not consist of noodles or rice. Could only get a few apples and these thai style doughnuts. Not bad, but not good. When we got home there was a lady waiting for us to GIVE US MASSAGES at our house!! So great. And only 50 Baht/hour - $1.25 CDN (most massages are at least 200 b/h). In Thailand its legal to work up to 10 hours a day, so I figure 9 straight hours of Thai massages wont be too much to ask in the future ;) She said she would come by anytime we want. Ahhhh heaven, thai massages on-call.

All this week the Provincial Director of Education asked us to help run an English Camp in Nan (the city) for 16/17 year olds. We don't know much except we show up and run a few stations where, "You sing song play game fun fun." And we all know how much I love singing infront of 100s of people! I've learned that teaching English is really nothing if it isn't a lesson in humility! But at least there will be other English speakers there. There is this one woman who is about 50, from Oklahoma. She's been a missionary in Thailand for 30 years now, and I don't think I have heard anything funnier than her speaking Thai with a Southern US accent. Priceless!! A few girls from Princeton just arrived for a 1 year internship at a school in Nan, and there are some other Canadians helping out at this camp. Should be a fun week since Miranda and I have been put up in a hotel in Nan - and teaching lessons from 8am until 9pm at night!!! Then next weekend its off to Chaing Mai for lots of shopping, watting, and river boat cruises!!!

Tickle THIS

2006-05-31T11:42:00.000+07:00

Last Sunday we went to this Wat that had a special "Tickle Magic Tree" that if you touch its trunk its leaves shake. So I tried it, and yes the leaves moved...but so did the leaves on every other tree thanks to the wind.
I was pretty skeptical so a monk came over. Even his powers couldn't convince me.

This is Miranda, Nuch, and I hooking up some sweet, sweet Karma from the Saturday Buddha.

Swimming in the waterfalls (ANTM eat your heart out) where you aren't allowed to wear a bathing suit!

Our bicycle trip to/from Sriwiangsa school each day.

Heather's 'Samui' to the power of 3. (still no silver coins from Julia though!)
That seems to be all I can upload right now.... Later ;)

I'm the Greatest Teacher Ever

2006-05-29T10:56:00.000+07:00

Look how smart my kids are! Basically the little brats are fluent already.

Still Chubby and Pale...

2006-05-27T10:29:00.000+07:00

ugggggghhhhh

Just getting over the first big sickness. I knew it was coming, especially living in such a rural area. You can't follow any of the "traveler's code" of not using local water, not drinking anything with ice, not eating fruit that is already peeled, not eating street meat, etc. But I figure what doesn't kill me makes my iron stomach stronger.

Today is parent's day at Sriwiangsa. Ummmm that means Miranda and I have to meet all the parents, which is extra awkward since no one speaks english and just likes to stare at us. We just finished the assembly, where about 500 Thai parents sat looking at us on-stage trying to talk about ourselves in broken-simple English. Now we have to wait around in the 45*C heat to meet & greet them, although i'm not sure how that is going to work since .... THEY DON"T SPEAK ENGLISH!

It was sunny yesterday in Wiangsa, so Uncle Jai and Pi Pian came over, knowing how crazy white people are that they love to sit in the sun, and brought us some beach mats and beach chairs. We sat outside in the garden fending off scorpions, gekos, ants, chickens and butterflys and tried to get a bit of a tan. We called it 'Koh Jai'. But since its so fricken hot out you just can't sit outside for more than 5 minutes. Next weekend we're trekking around the national parks, going to waterfalls and river rafting. So hopefully I'll catch some sun then.

More Rain.....

2006-05-24T14:50:00.000+07:00

http://www.bangkokpost.net/News/24May2006_news00.php

Watting

2006-05-23T10:16:00.000+07:00

Here are some pics from one of our random trips to Nan, the provincial capital about 20km away. The Wats, the market fruits, and the bus we take to get there(I think the pop is about 4000 people)

Dear Mr. Goretex

2006-05-22T15:33:00.000+07:00

I don't know if I can explain how much it rains here. I thought after living in Vancouver on the wet-coast, and living in Cape Town (basically the only place it balls-out rains in Africa....) I would know what rain is. But Wiang Sa is a rainforest if I've ever seen one before. In the past 24 hours it has rained over 55cm. YES Centimeters....not millimeters...Just to let you know the all-time BC record at Tofino is 48.9cm(http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0010745)

It's like Mother Nature just gave up trying to control the rainfall and just let it dump. I didn't know there was this much freshwater in the world. The raindrops are the size of timbits and hit you at a rate of about 200 drops/second. I came to school today wearing my goretex jacket, a rain poncho that all the locals have, and my umbrella....still arriving soaked to the bone. The rice paddy on our property is now a 5ft deep lake, and the football field at the school is now the swimming pool. I didn't fall asleep last night until 2am because the sound of the rain on our tin roof was deafining.

Well its 12:04and i'm off to teach grade 5 how to write their name, birthday, interests and phone number. That is if the classroom isn't flooded. A teacher just told me that the Nan river just overflowed its banks, so there actually might be some flooding in the area, but no one seems overly concerned....

...So all you who are jealous about me being in Thailand, just stand under a hot shower on full power for 24 hours and see how tanned you get.

The Moffets, Monks and Motorcycles

2006-05-20T17:57:00.000+07:00

Weekends are weird in Wiang Sa

Yesterday we showed up at school thinking we were teaching english club, but found out that it has been cancelled and moved to Tuesdays (good for us b/c now we don't have anything to do on Fridays - LONG WEEKENDS!) One teacher tells us (that's how it works here, people tell us/don't ask us) we're going to Nan with her. Well we get in her 4x4 with another teacher, and that teachers niece who is adorable. And drive to Nan, go to the national museam with its famous black elephant tusk from 200 years ago. Then we do the Wat circut. I will never get tired of Watting (my new verb for going to all the wats) they are so beautiful with the red and the gold and the intricate INTRICATE detail. I've got some stunning pics i'll put up soon. We then drop the kid off at the city playground and go to the market where the teacher Noosh keeps asking us "you like?" and of course we have no idea what the heck these flourescent-spikey fruits and veggies are, but to be polite we keep saying yes. And she keeps buying us them. We have eaten everything from things that resemble lychee nuts to Durien!!!!!!!!!! ewwwwwww. and these waffle things that ....

oh man a teacher just randomly came in and gave Miranda and I these crepe things wrapped in power-ranger tissue paper and said "EAT YOU" just an example of the randomness

....anyways the waffels had corn in them. Weird. Then we go to the street markets for dinner that consisted of hot dogs deep-fried on a stick and sliced to look like something from a Dr. Seuss book. And some other meat on sticks. And some of those mini cocktail weenies wrapped in noodles and then deep fried. There goes my plan to loose weight in Thailand. After washing those down with a couple Fantas, we get ice cream. WITH CROUTONS, PINK NOODLES AND BUTTER on it. so so so weird. We came home to our poarch which turned out to be the late night local hangout for every creepy-crawly insect, amphibian, and lizard in the rice patty. We counted 6 geckos smaller than our palm and 10 bigger than. The biggest was one about the size of my whole arm. A few coackroaches, and bugs I can only describe as beetles with spider legs.

Then today we're just hanging around waiting for our laundry to be done and Uncle Jai (our neighbor/homestay host who makes us dinner and does our laundry) comes over with coconuts/mangos from our garden. The coconuts he had just sliced the tops off and put a straw in so we could drink the milk! Very cool afternoon snack. Then "honk honk" Noosh is back to pick us up on her motorcycle and take us to school to pick up our bikes we left there before our Watting adventure. 3 people on one motorcycle is interesting even if you aren't following Thai driving rules (none at all) Now we're here at the school using the internet with the Thai radio station on in the background that just played one of the bigger hits in Thailand right now by the band "Same Same" who are just the two Moffat twins from that good ol' victoria pop band The Moffats! Haha

Well like I said, just another weekend in Wiang Sa

PICTURES!!

2006-05-18T09:54:00.000+07:00

So here are some pics of my last few days. Karaoke in Bangkok, Our arrival in Nan, our House/Jungle garden, and our school/assembly/teaching desk in the english staff room...

Another Day, Another Dinosaur

2006-05-18T09:42:00.000+07:00

http://http://area.obec.go.th/nan1/

If you check out the link above you'll see the Thai Ministry of Education's (OBEC)Website. Staring yours truly and her fellow Gappers who are stationed in Nan. I really don't know what the rest of it is about since my Thai is still horrible, but the second set of photos is sure our visit to the ministry right after we arrived at the airport. Apparently the newspaper is going to print today, so we'll get a few copies of that soon.(like ummm all of them)

Other than that life has been pretty interesting. I basically bombed my first teaching class, since they just threw me in there, "GO TEACH YESNO?" (yes no is one word in thai which makes it so confusing to agree/disagree) i didn't know the grade/english level/names or even have a thai teacher to help me. We played 'head and shoulders' for about 40 minutes. Turns out they were grade 5.

"I was singing old macdonald when they wanted to hear Coolio" - quote from our training class in bangkok.

Its 9:42 and i just finished teaching a kindergarden class which was awesome. they're so much fun. we played ball games and learned our ROYGBIV, which actually was ROYGIBPP cuz i wanted to do pink and purple. So fun and so cute. I'm glad i have 3 kindergarden classes a week! I'm also teaching Pratom (grade) 1,3,5, a computer skills class (yes my technological skills are coming in handy megan) and we run an english club that the older kids come to and do skits and fun stuff. We're also planning a province-wide english camp for the first weekend in June, which is going to be crazy.

Last night we got home and had a full night of trying to kill bugs. And when I say bugs I don't mean little wimpy Canadian bugs, not even the ones you find in Manitoba. These are monsters. "Prehistoric Dinosaurs" - Jade. With coackroaches and random flying beatles as big as my fist, Miranda has to kill them as I can't bring myself to squish something that looks the size of one of my old corgie dogs. We also had a couple lizards enter the house, not those cute little geckos that were in our African shower. These are massive mini-dinosaurs that make the scariest clicking sound. Our neighbor who makes us dinnner and washes our clothes heard our screaming and came over to fill the cracks in the roof with toilet paper (which i'm convinced dinosaurs can eat through) I still tucked my bednet in extra tight.

Anyone Speak English?

2006-05-17T12:44:00.000+07:00

Well........

First sorry no pics yet. there are computers here at my school but i forgot my usb port at home. so i'll post 'em tommorow

What a few days. I can't believe its only been 2 days since i was in Bangkok pretty much dominating that city, but alas here I am in Wiang Sa. Ok so I guess I have to start from the beginning:

So our last night in Bangkok together, all of us (with some of the old Gappers who are traveling around Thailand now) went to this other area of Bangkok where we hadn't been before. To get there we took our fav. transport Tuk-Tuks!!! We are sooo good at bargining now "MAING PAAAA means too much" and we try to cram at least 6 people in them for the full effect of tuk tuks. We only had to bribe one police officer the whole time there, so we considered our week of tuk-tuks a success.

We found a karaoke bar and basically dominated it for 6 hours. Every karaoke song you can imagine we did. I even worked the bar for a bit - Sangsom and cokes are my specialty. We did S Club 7 Brits vs. Bryan Adams Canadians. I did a sweet Achy Breaky Heart rendition complete with line dancing WHILE i was singing. Don't worry there are pics. My fav. moment was when Maeve (the girl from Tdot) did some shaggy, and damn that girl has a sweet jamacian accent.

The next morning we dragged ourselves out of bed to catch our flight to Nan. Miranda and i to get to Wiang Sa, and Nick and Joss to go to Nan (about 20 minutes from our placement) the flight was incredible. tiny airplane - getting on was very......reminded me of that famous nixon pic.....did the wave to bkok.

At the airport we got picked up by a huge group of thai teachers who gave us flowers and gifts and just made a big fuss over us, we of course had no idea what was going on and no one told us anything since WE ARE THE ONLY PEOPLE WHO SPEAK ENGLISH IN OUR TOWN. its redic. we get taken to some gov't office where we meet with tons of people and the tv cameras and newspapers are there, still no one speaking english!

then we get driven around in some teacher's car with all these other teachers and keep stopping at places but no one tells us what to do or whats going on. once they came back with these bags of the most amazing snack. Deep fried bananas. wow. new fav. food ever. anyways about 2 hours later (after visting some monks, a motocycle repair shop, tescos...) we get to the school which is so great. its pretty big. very open concrete structure with windows with those wooden shutters, no glass in this whole place. i'll send pics asap dont worry. had everyoen looking at us and waving. the kids are just about the cutest things ever. i want to pick them up and throw them!!!!!

more driving and listening to thai people speak and we get to our house wich is on this guys property. our house is in the middle of the rice patty with chickesn and roosters and pigs everywhere. lots of frogs and bugs too...... but its incredible. very big for thai standards. concrete with same open layout. tile floors with wood shutters, no glass. we have a bathroom that doubles as a shower. apparently hot water, a tv with only thai channels. its really very basic but much mroe than we could have hoped for. Our neighbors are this big family with some guy named Uncle Jai wh o comes over to fix everything and cook us dinner each night. he's great. sometimes the little baby who's two comes over and just sits looking at us. its all very very random.

some teachers came by to pick us up for dinner....someone birthday? and we got to this amazing restaurant which is like a wooden fram over a rice patty lake. sooooo thailand-in-pictures. right away they pull out the whiskey and water. ew. but we had to be polite so we had a glass.... but yuck. its funny cuz the first thing they told us in traiing was don't drink if you're a lady and esp if you're a teacher......oops.

then the food comes. thai style with alll us eating. so awkward though cuz we didn't know what's polite, for us to eat first, keep eating. leave some....ahhhh such a cringe moment. miranda and i were dead tired but the teachers were partying. and trying out their english on us...we were just not in the mood (and you guys know my not in mood mood) i felt so bad cuz obvisously it was such a status thing for themt o have us at their dinner....but it was just so wet, so many bugs, so tired, so confused, sooo.....ugh.... we just had no centre. no idea what was goign on. Anwyasy then they take us to Tescos to go shopping. so random it was like midnight and we're at tescos. bought some cofffe and stuff, and they bought us some water and whatnot. gave us our spending moeny. 500 baht a week! ballers!!!!!

then this morning we wake up and get our bikes. soooooooooooooooooo funny. we couldn't work the kick stand so ppl had to come help us. then we tried to get on them in our long ankle length skirts and ride down the road to the school. ohmygod two white gilrs riding bikes in this village must have been redic.

so we get to school and there is a huge outdoor assembly going on. everyone in lining up formation looking at us riding up on the dirt road....sooooo cringe. we are ushered to the front where we have to introduce ourselves and talk about how happy we are about thailand and sriwiang sa (the school)

Anyways we just found out that the only teacher who speaks a bit of english is in bangkok right now. so we're so lost, have no idea where/when/what we're supposed to do. I just ate some lunch which they make for us everyday..... I guess i'm going to get used to rice and cabbage soup.

everything is very messy right now - and i'm looking forward to getting a pattern, and just figuring out what the heck is going on here. also excited just to get some rest. Its all a pretty big challenge, but that's what i signed up for right?

Bangkok: Hot deals and Hot Massages

2006-05-13T18:48:00.000+07:00

So I don't have much more to update on. Been cooped up in the Asia hotel for 4 days doing my teaching course. Its quite funny actually, some other english teachers just come in and tell us fun games to play with the kids, and how to teach without ANY resources. Nights are spent roaming the town in a tuk-tuk looking for random places to eat. We found this one gem where its just a ton of thai people eating on the sidewalk and the waiters brign you a shabu-style pot to cook on. We didn't really get the hang of it, but ended up with soem funky green noodles and random meats that tasted pretty good. Everynight I go for an hour thai massage ($5). The best description I've heard of Thai massages are "they're just forced yoga" Basically true. these women stand on you, under you, throw you, push their elbows into crazy places, but you always walk away with a smile on your face. Its especially funny cuz they make you wear these fab pjamas that are always too short for me and too tight on my thighs, i'm pretty sure the woman are laughing AT me. Today we had a day off, but thanks to going out last night on Th Kho San, and the wonderful chiang beers I didn't make it up by 8 am to go to the Grand Temple, Wat Po and those other things. Although I did find the best hotdog vendor outside of North America.

Its so true that here in Thailand you're most likely to get scammed by someone being friendly to you rather than someone attacking you. If i go to one more silk suit shop in a tuk tuk when I clearly stated "100 BAHT NO STOPS!" at the begining I might just steal the tuk tuk for myself. Even random old ladies seem so nice and tell you about their favourite places to eat or shop, and its all just for them to get commission of us bloody farangs. Its all a part of the fun I guess. But argh. We found a way to avoid the tuk-tuk scams, and discovered the canals of Bangkok. Apparently it was supposed to turn into the venice of asia...but a few still remain, and for 20 cents you can go on these rusted boats anywhere you want, as long as you can correctly guess when to jump the 2ft. gap between the boat and the dock. The driver actually yells something in Thai that means 'have a calm heart!' Speaking of Thai my language learning is going great. I can count to ten, say hello, goodbye and thankyou. Not to mention the key terms of TOO MUCH! YOU'RE CRAZY! I PROMISE I WILL WALK AWAY!

I fly out to Nan on Tuesday, and before that I have to go back to the fab MBK mall and buy some more stunning short sleved blouses. I keep going there to get them, but spend my money on the abercrombie/hollister/LV/billabong/polo/Lacoste clothes they have for sooo cheap. I also accidently bought a bunch of $0.25 DVD's....to use as teaching resources of course ;)

I'm getting along SO well with all the other gapper teachers. They are tons of different ages and backgrounds. Paradie is sitting beside me and says hi to everyone that we both know. Oh! I added a few pics up top. My favourite ATM in Bangkok so far was at the elephant zoo. Some pics of Th Kho San. THE GLORIOUS MALL! Our teaching classroom. The beautiful view of B'kok from our hotelroom. And some action shots of tuk-tuk-ing

Bangkok: The other side.

2006-05-09T11:22:00.000+07:00

This post is dedicated to the wonderful feasts and sketchy transportation of Bangkok.

So now that i've shed the hot, sweaty, farangs of Th Kho San road, I find myself in the sweetest airconditioned, five star hotel with a shower bigger than my whole room at the Siam guest house. I hang out with diplomats and expats at the bars at night, and during the day cruise the airconditioned malls for the best knock-off goods. It's a tough life this teaching business.

Anyways food. It is incredible here. Not only are the orange fanta and banan' pancakes still plentiful, but with my newly found confidence thanks to the 5-star, aircon hotel I have ventured out to try the delic street vendors. WOW! They are incredible. The curried pork on a stick along with some fresh fried noodles is a classic for only 20c. Also this morning i got up extra early since i was so excited to try out the free breakfast buffet. WOW! over 100 dishes of everything you could ever want to eat, wantign to get my deals worth i ate a little too much, but it was so worth it. Not to mention the excitement of gettign to have a bowl of PRO-STARS cereal for the first time in over 15 years. I love Thailand.

I've met up with the 10 other volunteers (britsh and canadian) and we all went out for dinner last night at the NOOD-BAR. the english translation leaves something to the imagination, but it was still great. it was one of those point-and-pray ordering methods, but i ended up with some amazing singapore-style noodles with prawns and pork.

The brilliance of Thai cooking is balanced by their inability to conceptualize proper driving techniques. Apparently Thai's regard any sort of official driving rules as anthethetical to good sense and well...anything goes. The tuk-tuks are my new favourite transportation option as you get the rush of being at exhaust level of the big trucks/busses but the (somewhat false) sense of security of a few metal rails around you. Although trying not to get scammed is the bigest obstacle to overcome. I've masterd the vocabulary of "no stops, no gas, no shops, 40 bhat" that usually lets you get your way, but even yesterday we got scammed and tuk-tuked aroudn the city to different suit shops and government offices. Even with the scams the barely legal aspect of tuk tuks is still worth 40 bhat just to weave in and out of the "recommened" three lanes of traffic that usually end up to be about 8-9.

Anyways this side of Bangkok is amazing. I just got back from visiting the Canadian embassy and the consul-general met with us and told us where he vacations in the south if we ever want to drop by, oh and how HIS 20 year old son is also teaching here....hmmmmmm ;)

I promise i'll get pictures up asap. This city is just screaming to be photographed and I can't wait to get out there.

Bangkok Loves Farangs

2006-05-07T11:56:00.000+07:00

So after a whole day here in Bangkok i'm sorta getting used to the heat, but its still like a wet-soggy-wool blanket on your whole body while you're wearing wet socks. Just smothering. Although I did sleep for 12 hours last night when i repositioned my bed under the fan so i got a little bit of wind througout the night.

Bangkok is a really weird city. First of all there are billions of Farangs (white tourists) and everyone loves them. The taxis have "I LOVE FARANGS, LETS SPEAK ENGLISH TOGETHER" stickers on them, and every thai person i've met speaks some sort of english. There is every kind of traveller here too. My favorite thing is to sit on the balcony of my guest house's restaurant and just watch the people walk by. I saw two Paris Hilton 17 year old ameican girls walk by wearing their nude money belts on the outside of their frilly white skirts, then you see 3 hard core russian guys who have just been trekking in Bhutan going into the same guesthouse. Its just weird. Bangkok is also a city where its hard to meet other travelers, everyone is pretty paired off or in their groups. Like I said, weird. But I of course with my magnetic personality and stunning features have met some nice British folk and today will be goig to the Bangkok city zoo with them. crazy times.

I haven't braved the tuk-tuks yet since i'm not up to being ripped off quite yet. And the busses (ANTM style) are just too expensive. So im walking around town getting caught in the HUGE rainstorms. All of the sudden you hear a crack of thunder (which i may or maynot have thought was gunshots) then all the thai people run for cover. I decide to keep walking and get soaked. then 1 hour later after continuous torrential downpour it stops and gets sunny and wet-socks hot again. Yeah for rainy season.

I would post some pics, but i haven't taken many, and i left my camera in my room which is on the 5th floor of this guesthouse. I know i have to work off the banana pancakes which i eat about twice a day, but those stairs are redic!

That's about all for now. I miss you all as much as I miss the cool waters of lacarno beach.

Taipei: Observations

2006-05-05T14:55:00.000+07:00

I've done/seen some really cool things during my 7 hour layover here in Taipei, but all the stories boil down to two major themes:

1) I'm tall
&
2) I'm white

This is going to be a fun year.

Intro

2006-04-07T03:26:00.000+07:00

Hello friends!

So starting May 4th i'm off to Asia, because apparently 2006 is the year of Asia (how many people are traveling over there?) Actually I've got a volunteer position in Thailand for 5 months where i'll be living and working in a small community near Nan in the North-east hills. Then its off to India to meet up with Justina and head all around South Asia.

I'll be updating this all the time with pics, thoughts, etc.

Bye for now,
Laura