Classes finally ended on December 2nd (well, actually they ended on Dec 4, but I thought they should end on the 2nd), so off to Laos I went for a much-needed vacation from a ridiculously chaotic semester. My friend Stephen and I hopped on a bus at 8pm, arrived at the Laos/Thailand border at about 6 in the morning and spent the next 2 hours getting our visas. Once everyone on the bus got their visas, we got on another bus to go about 1000 feet and then got on yet another bus (have I mentioned how inefficient SE Asia is??) to take a 3.5 hour, very bumpy ride from Vientene, the capital of Laos, to Vang Vieng, our destination. We arrived at Vang Vieng at about 3 pm—I could have almost traveled to the States in that amount of time! Once we get there, we head to the nearest restaurant, which oddly enough, was not playing the television show “Friends”. Ok, some explaining is needed here. There is a very strange phenomena in Vang Vieng, where 90% of the restaurants are set up so all the tables are pointed at several t.v. screens, all of which play repeat episodes of “Friends” ALL day long. I literally watched between 15-20 episodes of Friends while I was in Laos for 5 days. AMAZING ☺
Okay, so Stephen and I eat at the restaurant and then head to Green Discovery, to book a trekking tour for the next day (after I spend a few minutes convincing Stephen trekking for 6 hours is actually fun). Then, we find a ridiculously cheap guesthouse (for 3 days, I think I paid about 3-5USD, no joke), and Stephen heads to an internet café to write an essay that was due 3 days ago. While he does that, I take a ridiculously cold shower, out of a hose, not even a shower head! It was like dumping a bucket of ice water on my head. After I get out of the shower, I met an Israeli and I exclaim how cold my shower was. Here’s how the conversation went:
Me:“Wow, that was the coldest shower of my life!
Him: “Ya, the water heater doesn’t work too well”
Me: “Water heater….? What water heater?”
Him: “You know, the big box that has a dial on it? You cant miss it!”
Me: “Hmm, I don’t remember seeing any box.
Him: “Let me show you…”
(then he walks into the OTHER bathroom and bam, there’s a water heater and a real shower head. Of course). I thank him for saving me another cold shower and we part ways so I can explore the town and marvel at all the Friends episodes I hear around me. Later, Stephen and I eat dinner at one of the Friends restaurants and then we explore the rest of town, find a massage place and decide to see what a Laos massage is. Turns out great! These adorable Laotian girls, who we seriously think are under 16 years old, give Stephen and I an oil massage and then we all chat (sort of) afterwards over a pot of tea. Turns out the Laos language is very similar to Thai, with a few twists. Then Stephen and I decide to grab a few yummy shakes and before we know it, we’re completely passed out, at 11pm… in true Tracey fashion. Its okay though, we have a big day of trekking ahead of us!
The next morning, Stephen and I grab baguette sandwhiches and banana shakes from the street, meet the Belgian couple we are trekking with, and begin the adventure! On the trek, we literally climbed hand over foot for 75% of the hike, with Stephen exclaiming “Level 2 trekking!? I don’t think so…” It was a really beautiful hike, with a few caves and ridiculously cold (and I deemed unswimmable) water, which only Stephen was brave enough to venture in. After the trek, the Belgian couple invites us for a beer, and we all went to a Friends restaurant and proceeded to watch 2 hours of Friends and literally not say a word to each other. Haha, so much for socializing! Although in our defense, we did look over at each other whenever something funny happened, and laughed together; does that count?
After that, we part ways and agree to meet up with the Belgians at a bar in a few hours. Little do they know my party tendencies and my affect on others. 2 hours later ( at perhaps 8pm), Stephen and I are fast asleep. I wake up at 10pm, ask Stephen if he wants to go meet the Belgians and have some drinks. He groggily mumbles “Yes”, and then we both fall asleep again. At some point in the middle of the night, he wakes up and mumbles that we’re the most boring people in the world. I agree.
We wake up at 9am the next day, after a wonderful 12 hours of sleep, have breakfast and then head to tubing, the highlight of Vang Vieng. Basically, Vang Vieng has turned into a tourist town solely based on the tubing. Within 25 feet of getting into the water, there is a bar with a huge (and frightening) rope swing, and much alcohol to be drunken. This time, I decided not to be boring and Stephen and I share the first of one too many buckets. A word about buckets: they are the greatest alcoholic invention ever. You literally get a bucket of 70% liquor and 30% mixer. They really do you in though, you have to be careful. Once Stephen and I finished the bucket, I get up the courage to get on the rope swing and I can barely convince myself to let go, I was so scared! I hit the water nicely and decide to do it again. Mistake # 1. This time I semi=belly flop into the water and my chest hurts for the next 30 minutes (until I start on bucket # 2!). Stephen and I get back into the water and stop 30 feet later at bar #2. I’m really not kidding, the bars were spaced out by 25 feet. Oh, and each bar has bumping music and people dancing everywhere. Imagine MTV’s Spring Break, in Laos. That’s exactly what it’s like; it is really crazy. So, Stephen and I start on the second bucket and this is where things get fuzzy. I remember Stephen constantly swinging on the ropes, which left me to mingle with strangers. I met tons of people, somehow made it on the rope myself, then on to bar #3. This one had a mud-wrestling pit and Stephen turned into a MONSTER! He was brutal…by the time I got out of the pit (barely with my life), I had bloodly knees, scrapes all over my side and perhaps the mud pit is where I got one of my 2 fist size bruises. Or perhaps not, I’m not entirely sure. We spend another hour (maybe?) at this bar, ride the rope swings, pick up a new German friend, Sven, and move on to the next bar. Apparently this one had a slide which I rode down, and then we went to another bar, and I had a shake. Next thing I know, my arms are absolutely killing me and I’m paddling as fast as I can in my tube, desperately trying to get out of the water. You do NOT want to be in the river when the sun goes down; I was freezing my little Texan butt off. Someone did not design this tubing experience correctly. All the bars are in the first 300 feet of the river, then you have to drunkenly paddle the next 1.5 hours till you finally get into town, freezing and utterly confused (“Why am I wet?? Where am I??), or at least that is the experience I got. Needless to say, SO much fun. It was the BEST thing ever!!
Stephen and I return our tubes and head to a Friends restaurant (surprise surprise), where we randomly run into our 3 friends we were supposed to meet up with earlier (oops). They seemed a little mad, but once they saw the state I was in (I was behind Stephen, shivering and laughing at absolutely nothing funny), I think they understood. We agreed to meet them at 9pm at Bucket Bar. Next thing I know, I’m waking up from a nap at 9:30 pm. Oops again. I grab a sandwich, and Stephen and I go to meet our friends at Bucket Bar. We hang out with them for the next hour and then we go to bed.
The next day, the others (Courtney, Robert, and Nina) want to go tubing, so we repeat the whole process again (minus the drinking for me). After tubing, Robert and I go back to the massage place Stephen and I went to and we get massages. First, I lock myself in the bathroom (the lock got stuck, really!), and my massage girl, Nui, has to rescue me. Then she massages me and I burst out laughing when she gets my ticklish spot. Hehe, it was really funny, she looked so shocked when I burst out laughing and squirmed away from her hands. After that, I think we all head to sleep since we’re all pretty tired from the long day of tubing adventures.
The next day was my favorite—we rented bicycles and rode all over town, exploring caves. In the beginning of the day, we got a map and saw a cave with a grotto (think Playboy mansion style), and I decide that is our destination! Unfortunately, we began riding in the exact opposite direction. I have absolutely no sense of direction, it’s quite sad. Either way, we ride 5 km until we reach a cave with requires about 20 minutes of hand-over foot climbing to reach. Once we get to the cave, we see many stairs that lead into a very dark hole. I stupidly lead us all in, without a flashlight (the flashlight I bought specifically for this trip is stowed away safe and sound in the hotel room. Of course). Once we get to the bottom of the stairs, we immediately turn around and go back up. I mean, what were we planning on doing, hanging out in a pitch-black cave?? Anyway, after the cave, we find an organic farm and we eat the most delicious lunch of fresh pumpkin soup and veggies picked straight from the garden. Yummmm! Afterwards we ride back to town, drop off Stephen and Sven (our new German friend we adopted into our clan), and the rest of us head to another cave south of town. Guess what we find at this new cave? The Grotto!! Yayyyyy….Robert and I jump in (Brrrr), and begin to head into the underwater cave, but freak out after about 5 feet and just swim around the outside of the Grotto for while and have a photo shoot.
After the Grotto, we all go back to town, return our bikes, take showers, and try to find Stephen. He’s no where to be found, so we decide to head to a Friends-less restaurant (we wanted to actually talk to each other, how odd). Once we order food, I leave to find Stephen and I find him wandering around town, shoe-less. Whaaaat?? I ask him where his shoes are, and he says something about how he is looking for them and he thinks someone stole them. Haha, okay, so I help him try to find them for a while and after a few minutes we decide someone did in fact steal them (aka Stephen lost them). After dinner, Stephen buys a new pair of flip-flops and we head to Bucket Bar, to FINALLY have a party night. We meet lots of people, enjoy some buckets and then Robert and I decide to go back to the massage place and steal the massage girls away from the owner, so they can party with us. Robert spend 20 minutes talking to the massage girls in Laos/Thai, and I help the owner finish his English homework (its so cute, he literally has a workbook where he practices using English in the right tense, and with correct grammar). We eventually convince the owner to let the girls come party with us, and then we all split a bucket back at the bar. It was SO cute, I taught the girls how to “Hook ‘em” and we (kinda) talked, although we only understood about ½ of what the other is saying.
Once the girls leave, I somehow split from all my friends, and spend the next few hours hanging out with this super cool Danish girl. Before I know it, its 2 am (not sure how that happened, since the bar closes at midnight) and I’m finally heading to the guesthouse.
Oh, I forgot to mention: when Robert and I gathered the massage girls, we also picked up a German, Yentz. As we’re dancing away at Bucket Bar, somehow the topic of waking up early comes up and Yentz and I agree to have breakfast at 8:30am. Not being one to cancel on someone, I meet Yentz the next morning, 8:30 sharp, and we have our breakfast date. He was actually quite an interesting person; he worked as an entertainment lawyer in Germany and recently quit to travel through SE Asia. Anyway, we have breakfast until 10am, and then I grab my things to check out of the guesthouse. Afterwards, I have breakfast # 2 with my friends and then we hang out and watch Friends for a couple hours until our bus leaves.
The best part: We get on the bus from Vang Vieng to Vientene, which is a 3.5 hour, very bumpy ride. As soon as we sit down, Robert states that he needs to pee. Throughout the journey, I notice him fidgeting and I can tell he is getting very antsy to get out and pee. Only problem is there are no stops in the near future. What does Robert resort to? An empty water bottle—classic. I hold up his backpack to block the view, and he shifts his weight and pulls the perfect “Dumb and Dumber” move. How nice it is to be a boy. 19 hours later, we’re back in Bangkok and crazy, messy, anxious Tracey comes out. 3 finals in 24 hours, move out, farewells, oy vey. Let the fun begin.
Next destinations: Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, BKK, and then finally back to good ‘ol Texas! Can’t wait to see everyone soon!
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Krabi
After 2 weeks of staying in Bangkok to study for Finance, I took a well deserved vacation down to the islands in southern Thailand. I was planning on leaving right after my Finance midterm Tuesday evening so that I would make the Full Moon Party in Koh Phangan on Wednesday night. Too bad the last bus left as I was taking my exam. Damn! Not only did I miss the Full Moon Party, but I also missed Loi Krathong, an annual festival held in Thailand to worship the goddess of water, as I was on an overnight bus to Krabi. Finance is ruining my life (I have a feeling I will be saying that for the rest of my career, oh god)!
Okay, my friend Abby and I make it to Krabi at 6am (as I sleep through a cop getting on the bus and forcing 4 Thai men off...hmmm, as long as they weren't after me) and make a beeline for Ao Nang pier, where we wait until 9am to catch a longtail boat to Railay beach. While we are waiting, we meet a really cool Thai guy, Ping, who is from Railay beach, but travels to Bangkok periodically to dj at local clubs. After talking to him for a while, he shows us a place to stay while at Railay and then shows us the bar where he works. We hang out with him and his newfound Australian buddy (who paid for Ping's passage from Bangkok to Railay, as he lost his wallet in BKK) for most of the morning and then head to the beach with the Aussie, to explore the surrounding areas. When we finally find a beach (there's several different beaches on the island: West Railay, East Railay, and Tan So (spelling?) ), we immediately leave to explore the surrounding sea caves. I am in the lead (always a bad idea), and after a few minutes of swimming and climbing over rocks, I run into what looks like a dead-end. While any normal person would turn around and head back, I was determined to find a way around this huge, scary rock. So I begin climbing over it, as I perch my leg on a nearby rock. I continue this odd climb (with each leg on a different rock), until my legs wont go any further and I am still 5 feet above the ground. 5 feet, I can jump, right? Well, not quite, as there were sharp rocks at the bottom and I didn't quite feel like dealing with a bloody foot, again. As I am contemplating what to do next, the Aussie and Abby come around the outer edge and stand right below me. Whattt, there was another way around?!? Ughh, of course. Then, the Australian holds out his arms and I jump into them...saved by the Aussie! After safely getting around the rocks, we are back in the ocean, right around the corner from where we started. As we start to swim back, I feel a stinging sensation in my neck. Then, under my arm. Then, on my legs....what is going on?! I think I'm imagining it, but Simon (the Aussie) shouts out "Are you guys feeling stings?", and then I remember....the jellyfish-like fish. SO annoying, they are these tiny fish that serve the sole purpose of annoying human beings who are trying to relax on the beach (or something like that). After we make it back to the beach, I pass out for a couple hours until we decide to go grab lunch. Indian food, my favorite! While eating, Simon runs into this girl he met in Laos (what a small world), and we all relax and watch a movie together. Towards the end of the movie, I leave to take a shower, and when I'm done, the movie is over and everyone has dispersed. Hmm, what to do next? Ohh, I know, have a banana shake and visit all the mini-marts! Visiting mini-marts is this weird thing I like to do while I'm on my little weekend trips. I just really enjoy going to all the different mini-marts and buying something new (like candy) at each. As for banana shakes, those are just delicious! Thursday night, I have banana shake # 1. Eat dinner, watch the first 15 minutes of Eternal Sunshine of the Spot, and promptly pass out by 10pm.
I wake up bright and early the next day, have breakfast (banana shake # 2) and get ready to explore the island. First stop, a mini-mart. Haha, this was a necessary stop though, as I needed water to get me through the day. Next thing we do is head for the island’s viewpoint lookout. To get to the viewpoint, you have to climb hand over foot for 200 meters up a slippery hill. While at the bottom, we realize it is impossible to climb up the hill with our heavy backpacks. Does that stop us? Of course not. The natural solution is to hide our backpacks in a nearby cave. Once we do that, we go back to the hill and hear some other backpackers remarking about how they want to climb the hill, but don’t want to risk breaking their leg, since they don’t have proper climbing shoes on. Abby and I have flip-flops on. Does that stop us? Of course not. We take off our shoes, and begin the hike. 20 sweaty minutes later, we’re at the top of the hill, looking down at the beautiful view of Railay beach. Naturally, we then have a photoshoot. For 35 minutes. The only thing that stops us is the fear that someone may steal our backpacks from the cave below (ya, right, we hid them so cleverly!). We carefully ease down the hill, grab our dirty and now cobwebby backpacks, and head to West Railay beach, which is very nice, and slightly less crowded than the beach from the day before. As soon as we get to the beach, we set out stuff down and head into the water. Once we start swimming, Abby decides to swim through a sea cave and see where it ends up. I wasn’t about to follow her, as I remembered what happened the day before and didn’t want to get trapped again (the Aussie wasn’t there to save me this time). Shortly after I make my decision not to follow Abby in the cave, she gives a yelp of pain from cutting her foot on the rock and that is all the persuasion I need to change my mind and follow her in (note the sarcasm). Nonetheless, I do go into the cave, scrape my hand up a bit, get stung by more of those jellyfish-like fish, and swim to what we think is Tan Soi beach. Once we get to the new beach, I begin to follow some people who are shimmying their way through 2 big rocks, into what looks like a way through the mountain, back to West Railay beach. As I am dripping wet and climbing the rocks, Abby decides this plan is too stupid and leaves to swim back, under the condition that if I’m not out in 20 minutes, she will come back to search for my body. After I shimmy through the rocks, I come to a semi-clearing and a path that leads up and around the trees. I follow the path for 10 minutes, with some hand over feet climbing action, and end up on West Railay beach, 20 feet away from where we set out backpacks. Success! I spent the next hour awkwardly watching Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on Abby’s i-pod, while trying to keep the sun out of my vision path. After I get halfway through the movie, Abby and I leave to grab lunch (and banana shake # 3). After lunch, we stumble across Diamond Cave and head in to explore the 3rd cave of the trip. While in there, I discover that my camera has a night mode, sweet! What a genius idea ☺ After the cave, Abby and I head to the beach and catch a long-tail boat back to the mainland, to meet up with our friend, Mj. Once we find a guesthouse in Krabi town, Abby and I head to dinner (banana shake # 4), and I finally finish Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind as we wait for Mj to arrive from the Full Moon Party on the east side of southern Thailand. Mj arrives, we hear her ridiculous party stories, and head to second dinner (banana shake #5….um, just kidding). Mj eats an entire pizza at midnight and I offer her 200 baht to eat another pizza. She accepts….whaaatt? Damn girl! Head to bed at 1am (way past my bedtime), and I sleep in until almost 9 am. I wake the other 2 girls, who tell me if I ever wake them up at 9am again, they will murder me. Yikes. Someone’s not a morning bird. Once I finally get the troops moving, we head to a travel shop, book a kayaking tour for the next day, and have breakfast (banana shake #5) at this great little restaurant we found. After breakfast, we head to a mangrove forest along the river, relax there for a bit as Mj and Abby discuss politics (I listen to my i-pod and daydream), and then we depart for banana shake # 6 (banana shake # 0 for the other two girls). After my banana shake, I leave the girls to head to the beach for some final sunbathing while they have a nice, long massage. I catch a song taew (truck taxi) to Ao Nang, where the beach is. I fall asleep on the beach for less than an hour and when I wake up I can’t find the water! Low tide came, and I literally had to walk straight into the ocean for 10 minutes before I actually hit water. After washing off, I walk around town for a bit, grab dinner, contemplate another banana shake (but opt for an ice cream cone instead), and then head back to Krabi town to meet up with the girls. When I arrive back at the guesthouse, I ask them how their massages were. They sheepishly told me they skipped the massages for a 400 baht Italian feast instead. Haha, I knew it! Sounded delish though. I shower and then we go to the night market to get fruit and a second dinner. Afterwards, we head to bed, since we have an early day of kayaking ahead of us.
The next day, we get picked up at 8am to begin our kayaking-through-sea-caves-adventure. After about 1 hour of driving to reach the launch point, we get in the kayaks and spend the next couple hours exploring limestone caves and splashing each other with really salty lagoon water. After a rough morning of kayaking, we sit down for a 5 course family style meal. Cashew nut chicken, sweet and sour fish, tom yum soup, shrimp tempura, and grilled vegetables, followed by fresh pineapple and watermelon, yum! Stuffed to contentment, we then head to a natural springs for an afternoon of swimming and swinging off ropes into the chilly water. We are then served tea and biscuits (are we in Britain??) as we dry off in the sun. Wow, what 30 USD will get you in Thailand! After we dry off and change, our tour guide brings us directly to the bus station so we can catch a bus back to Bangkok. The next 12 hours are spent desperately trying to get comfortable and sleep in a hopelessly uncomfortable situation. We arrive back in Bangkok at 4am and I check my email after not checking for 5 days (yikes!), and finish just in time to head to my 9am class. Joy.
This will be my last blog for a while as the next few weeks will unfortunately be spent in Bangkok, making up for 3 months of not studying anything but finance. Yikes, finals here I come!
ps. A note from today: I went for a jog around the campus soccer field and left my bag on a bench an older gentleman was sitting on. After a few minutes of running, the man tries to say something to me in Thai. Naturally, I don't understand him, so I just nod, smile and keep running. After another lap, he makes the same gesture to me and I still don't understand. After the next lap, I notice he is all packed up, as if he is going to leave. Yet he hasn't left. After a few minutes, it dawns on me that he is ready to go somewhere, yet he is watching my bag for me until I am done running! I tell him it is okay, that I am keeping an eye on my bag as I run, and he says okay and leaves. Unbelievable! SO sweet :)
Okay, my friend Abby and I make it to Krabi at 6am (as I sleep through a cop getting on the bus and forcing 4 Thai men off...hmmm, as long as they weren't after me) and make a beeline for Ao Nang pier, where we wait until 9am to catch a longtail boat to Railay beach. While we are waiting, we meet a really cool Thai guy, Ping, who is from Railay beach, but travels to Bangkok periodically to dj at local clubs. After talking to him for a while, he shows us a place to stay while at Railay and then shows us the bar where he works. We hang out with him and his newfound Australian buddy (who paid for Ping's passage from Bangkok to Railay, as he lost his wallet in BKK) for most of the morning and then head to the beach with the Aussie, to explore the surrounding areas. When we finally find a beach (there's several different beaches on the island: West Railay, East Railay, and Tan So (spelling?) ), we immediately leave to explore the surrounding sea caves. I am in the lead (always a bad idea), and after a few minutes of swimming and climbing over rocks, I run into what looks like a dead-end. While any normal person would turn around and head back, I was determined to find a way around this huge, scary rock. So I begin climbing over it, as I perch my leg on a nearby rock. I continue this odd climb (with each leg on a different rock), until my legs wont go any further and I am still 5 feet above the ground. 5 feet, I can jump, right? Well, not quite, as there were sharp rocks at the bottom and I didn't quite feel like dealing with a bloody foot, again. As I am contemplating what to do next, the Aussie and Abby come around the outer edge and stand right below me. Whattt, there was another way around?!? Ughh, of course. Then, the Australian holds out his arms and I jump into them...saved by the Aussie! After safely getting around the rocks, we are back in the ocean, right around the corner from where we started. As we start to swim back, I feel a stinging sensation in my neck. Then, under my arm. Then, on my legs....what is going on?! I think I'm imagining it, but Simon (the Aussie) shouts out "Are you guys feeling stings?", and then I remember....the jellyfish-like fish. SO annoying, they are these tiny fish that serve the sole purpose of annoying human beings who are trying to relax on the beach (or something like that). After we make it back to the beach, I pass out for a couple hours until we decide to go grab lunch. Indian food, my favorite! While eating, Simon runs into this girl he met in Laos (what a small world), and we all relax and watch a movie together. Towards the end of the movie, I leave to take a shower, and when I'm done, the movie is over and everyone has dispersed. Hmm, what to do next? Ohh, I know, have a banana shake and visit all the mini-marts! Visiting mini-marts is this weird thing I like to do while I'm on my little weekend trips. I just really enjoy going to all the different mini-marts and buying something new (like candy) at each. As for banana shakes, those are just delicious! Thursday night, I have banana shake # 1. Eat dinner, watch the first 15 minutes of Eternal Sunshine of the Spot, and promptly pass out by 10pm.
I wake up bright and early the next day, have breakfast (banana shake # 2) and get ready to explore the island. First stop, a mini-mart. Haha, this was a necessary stop though, as I needed water to get me through the day. Next thing we do is head for the island’s viewpoint lookout. To get to the viewpoint, you have to climb hand over foot for 200 meters up a slippery hill. While at the bottom, we realize it is impossible to climb up the hill with our heavy backpacks. Does that stop us? Of course not. The natural solution is to hide our backpacks in a nearby cave. Once we do that, we go back to the hill and hear some other backpackers remarking about how they want to climb the hill, but don’t want to risk breaking their leg, since they don’t have proper climbing shoes on. Abby and I have flip-flops on. Does that stop us? Of course not. We take off our shoes, and begin the hike. 20 sweaty minutes later, we’re at the top of the hill, looking down at the beautiful view of Railay beach. Naturally, we then have a photoshoot. For 35 minutes. The only thing that stops us is the fear that someone may steal our backpacks from the cave below (ya, right, we hid them so cleverly!). We carefully ease down the hill, grab our dirty and now cobwebby backpacks, and head to West Railay beach, which is very nice, and slightly less crowded than the beach from the day before. As soon as we get to the beach, we set out stuff down and head into the water. Once we start swimming, Abby decides to swim through a sea cave and see where it ends up. I wasn’t about to follow her, as I remembered what happened the day before and didn’t want to get trapped again (the Aussie wasn’t there to save me this time). Shortly after I make my decision not to follow Abby in the cave, she gives a yelp of pain from cutting her foot on the rock and that is all the persuasion I need to change my mind and follow her in (note the sarcasm). Nonetheless, I do go into the cave, scrape my hand up a bit, get stung by more of those jellyfish-like fish, and swim to what we think is Tan Soi beach. Once we get to the new beach, I begin to follow some people who are shimmying their way through 2 big rocks, into what looks like a way through the mountain, back to West Railay beach. As I am dripping wet and climbing the rocks, Abby decides this plan is too stupid and leaves to swim back, under the condition that if I’m not out in 20 minutes, she will come back to search for my body. After I shimmy through the rocks, I come to a semi-clearing and a path that leads up and around the trees. I follow the path for 10 minutes, with some hand over feet climbing action, and end up on West Railay beach, 20 feet away from where we set out backpacks. Success! I spent the next hour awkwardly watching Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on Abby’s i-pod, while trying to keep the sun out of my vision path. After I get halfway through the movie, Abby and I leave to grab lunch (and banana shake # 3). After lunch, we stumble across Diamond Cave and head in to explore the 3rd cave of the trip. While in there, I discover that my camera has a night mode, sweet! What a genius idea ☺ After the cave, Abby and I head to the beach and catch a long-tail boat back to the mainland, to meet up with our friend, Mj. Once we find a guesthouse in Krabi town, Abby and I head to dinner (banana shake # 4), and I finally finish Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind as we wait for Mj to arrive from the Full Moon Party on the east side of southern Thailand. Mj arrives, we hear her ridiculous party stories, and head to second dinner (banana shake #5….um, just kidding). Mj eats an entire pizza at midnight and I offer her 200 baht to eat another pizza. She accepts….whaaatt? Damn girl! Head to bed at 1am (way past my bedtime), and I sleep in until almost 9 am. I wake the other 2 girls, who tell me if I ever wake them up at 9am again, they will murder me. Yikes. Someone’s not a morning bird. Once I finally get the troops moving, we head to a travel shop, book a kayaking tour for the next day, and have breakfast (banana shake #5) at this great little restaurant we found. After breakfast, we head to a mangrove forest along the river, relax there for a bit as Mj and Abby discuss politics (I listen to my i-pod and daydream), and then we depart for banana shake # 6 (banana shake # 0 for the other two girls). After my banana shake, I leave the girls to head to the beach for some final sunbathing while they have a nice, long massage. I catch a song taew (truck taxi) to Ao Nang, where the beach is. I fall asleep on the beach for less than an hour and when I wake up I can’t find the water! Low tide came, and I literally had to walk straight into the ocean for 10 minutes before I actually hit water. After washing off, I walk around town for a bit, grab dinner, contemplate another banana shake (but opt for an ice cream cone instead), and then head back to Krabi town to meet up with the girls. When I arrive back at the guesthouse, I ask them how their massages were. They sheepishly told me they skipped the massages for a 400 baht Italian feast instead. Haha, I knew it! Sounded delish though. I shower and then we go to the night market to get fruit and a second dinner. Afterwards, we head to bed, since we have an early day of kayaking ahead of us.
The next day, we get picked up at 8am to begin our kayaking-through-sea-caves-adventure. After about 1 hour of driving to reach the launch point, we get in the kayaks and spend the next couple hours exploring limestone caves and splashing each other with really salty lagoon water. After a rough morning of kayaking, we sit down for a 5 course family style meal. Cashew nut chicken, sweet and sour fish, tom yum soup, shrimp tempura, and grilled vegetables, followed by fresh pineapple and watermelon, yum! Stuffed to contentment, we then head to a natural springs for an afternoon of swimming and swinging off ropes into the chilly water. We are then served tea and biscuits (are we in Britain??) as we dry off in the sun. Wow, what 30 USD will get you in Thailand! After we dry off and change, our tour guide brings us directly to the bus station so we can catch a bus back to Bangkok. The next 12 hours are spent desperately trying to get comfortable and sleep in a hopelessly uncomfortable situation. We arrive back in Bangkok at 4am and I check my email after not checking for 5 days (yikes!), and finish just in time to head to my 9am class. Joy.
This will be my last blog for a while as the next few weeks will unfortunately be spent in Bangkok, making up for 3 months of not studying anything but finance. Yikes, finals here I come!
ps. A note from today: I went for a jog around the campus soccer field and left my bag on a bench an older gentleman was sitting on. After a few minutes of running, the man tries to say something to me in Thai. Naturally, I don't understand him, so I just nod, smile and keep running. After another lap, he makes the same gesture to me and I still don't understand. After the next lap, I notice he is all packed up, as if he is going to leave. Yet he hasn't left. After a few minutes, it dawns on me that he is ready to go somewhere, yet he is watching my bag for me until I am done running! I tell him it is okay, that I am keeping an eye on my bag as I run, and he says okay and leaves. Unbelievable! SO sweet :)
Monday, October 27, 2008
Pookies in Malaysia
My good high school friend, Erica (who was part of our "pookie" clan), is doing a semester at sea program where they travel the world in a ship, docking at different ports. This past weekend, she docked in Penang, Malaysia and I flew down there to meet up with her. I flew down Thursday afternoon, after spending about 4 hours in the airport (thank you AirAsia for delaying your flight!)....the good part is there was this one lady in the airport who was giving chocolate samples so I just walked by her every 20 minutes :)
Once I arrived in Penang, Erica and I hopped a bus to Little India, which is pretty much my haven as I LOVE Indian food and am consistenly thrilled and amused by Indian accents. We wandered around Little India for a couple hours, trying all the Indian sweets ever created (yum), and then got a cab to meet her friends from the ship. We went to their hotel and then proceeded to eat a delicious chocolate cake to celebrate one of her friend's 21st birthdays. Afterwards, we headed to Slippery Senioritas, one of the many fun clubs in a posh little club district close to where their ship was docked. When we got to Slipper Senioritas, there wasn't a single person on the dance floor, but we soon changed that! We tore that place up with our crazy dancing, I don't think they know what hit them! They even asked us girls to get on the top balcony to dance in front of their entire club. The music was the best part-- a combination of 80's style (think Michael Jackson's "Beat it") pop and hottest hits of the last 6 months. After a couple hours there, we head to another club, except it doesn't seem to be a club. Rather, there was some kind of beauty contest going on. I spent 15 minutes trying to figure out if the beauty contestants were male or female. I came to the conclusion they were male, perhaps Thai ladyboys?? Then, we head to another club, where we once again tear up the dance floor. Perhaps a little too much. One of the boys we came with literally got picked up by the bouncer and thrown out for provacative dancing. Haha, I guess we forgot we were in a muslim country.
Then, we mossey around for a little longer, meet a fellow El Pasoean, reminisce about good 'ol times (we knew the same people from middle school!), and head home to sleep for a few hours.
Wake up the next morning at about 9 am, spend far too long being indecisive about what Erica and I should do for the weekend, and finally decide to go to Lankawi Geopark for some jungle-trekking action. By the time we've figured all this out, its about noon, and Erica and I are hot, hungry and ready to get to a beach! Too bad we missed the 8:30 am ferry to Lankawi. Alternative? Take a ferry to the mainland, get on a bus to Alto Setar, grab a taxi to the ferry, and then take another ferry to Lankawi. Needless to say, the day was spend in transportation and we arrived in Lankawi barely in time for dinner. Oh wait, we first walked around for 3 hours trying to find accommdation we could afford. Naturally, Erica and I picked a national holiday (Deepavali festival) to go to an island, where all the Malaysians were vacationing for the weekend. On the bright side, we eventually found the most amazing place ever, the Rainbow Lodge. It was located pretty far off the beaten path (as evident by our 3 hour journey to find it), but it was SO worth it. Clean, bright, and big (the room even had a vanity!!), Erica and I slept like rocks, even as it was monsooning outside. We wake up to a bright, sunny day (of course, how else would the weather be after 7 hours of monsooning?) and head out to pay for our room and find an activity/tour to do. Oh wait, we can't because you have to book tours a day in advance and Erica has to leave tonight to make it back to her ship in time for a meeting. So, we decide to eat our losses and relax/have a photoshoot on the beach. After less than an hour of this, we randomly bump into her roommate from the ship. Funny story: I asked Erica what her roommate was doing this weekend, and she told me she was going to Lankawi, but had no way to contact her, as neither of them had cell phones. So every white person we passed, I'd ask "Is that your roommate?" Oddly enough, she knew almost all those white people from the ship!
Anyway, one of the times I asked "Is that your roommate?", the answer was yes! So, her roommate tells us about how she went to the 7 wells, which is a hike up to some really nice waterfalls, jungle trekking, nature, etc. As soon as I heard that, I decided we must go! But first, we need to get our ferry tickets back to Penang, as Erica's roommate told us they may be almost sold out. So Erica and I find a travel agency, try to get a ticket, and are told the tickets are 70 ringet! Yikes! So, we go to another travel agency to compare prices, and this one is even more expensive! Okay, we go back to the first travel agency and are told we have to wait 30 minutes (which we cant because we have to go to 7 wells, which is 45 minutes away and come back within 3 hours). So then we go back to the other travel agency to see if we can do it quicker, but are told to come back the next morning. Huh?!? Then, we finally get it all sorted out by calling the ferry, realizing there are plenty of tickets left, and we don't need to buy any. So, we leave to 7 wells, without purchasing any tickets. Effective use of an hour. Lol....one thing I've learned from traveling through SE Asia is to just have patience and not let frustration get in the way of how you communicate with people. This is a big lesson for me. Hooray for learning things :)
Okay, we get to 7 wells, and begin the trek of 380 stairs to the top. Oy! First, we take a side trip to a waterfall and quickly (remember, we only have 90 minutes!) take some photos and jump in the cold, refreshing water. Well, more like fell in for me. Afterwards, we keep hiking up nature's version of a stairmaster until we finally reach the top, where a gorgeous view and very fun waterfall await us. A word about the waterfall: its formed in a way that a natural waterslide has been formed. The rocks have smoothed themselves over in such a way that if you sit at the top, the water will gush over you and carry you down the waterfall until it spits you up into the air for a second, before you fall into a 5 or 6 foot deep area of water. SO much fun. Slightly painful though. Still, SO fun. Just have to be careful to stop yourself before you go over the edge, 380 steps worth straight down. Eeek.
Since we still have 47.8 minute left (haha), Erica and I find a trail and begin to trek through the jungle, my favorite thing ever! Sadly, we reach a crossroads after about 20 minutes, and don't have time to go much further. We head back down (after pulling the leeches off us), get in a taxi back to the ferry and then sit at the ferry for 1.5 hours, because it is delayed. Of course!! Well, at least we got tickets. The ferry ride back is so beautiful, 3 hours of speeding through the water, watching the sunset and just enjoying the moment.
Once we arrive back in Penang, Erica and I see a few of her friends, and we all proceed down to the night market. Oh, about 3 hours prior to this, I really had to pee, but didn't because the ferry restroom was so horrible. I've seen some pretty bad stuff while traveling through SE Asia, but this was just horrible. So, by this point, I have to pee really badly. Nothing really funny happened as a result, just thought you'd like to know I had to pee. Okay, when we get to the market, Erica and I make a beeline for a restaurant and guess what we find? An amazing Indian restaurant, that truly finds us. We're looking for a bathroom, and this random restaurant pops out of nowhere. As we're eating Indian food (yuuuumm), 2 Australian guys walk past us, and we begin talking to them. We end up hanging out with them until midnight, when the night market closes. Then, we part ways with them to make it back to the ferry by 1 am, when the last boat out to Erica's ship leaves. We make it by 1 am, but the ship people won't let me on the ship since I'm not a family member. Therefore, Erica and I are left without a place to sleep for the night and the first bus out to Kuala Lumpur leaves at 6am. That gives us 5 hours. What's our obvious solution? Stay up all night partying, of course. We actually end up overhearing that some of Erica's friends are staying in a hotel close to Slippery Senioritas, so we make our way over there, find out what room they are in, and are about to knock on the door when we hear 2 voices. 2 voices of a couple. Uh-oh, we decide to let them be alone. We head back towards Slippery Senioritas, then devise a plan to go back to the hotel, and ask her friend's if we can leave our backpacks there so we can party and not look like a ragged backpacker. We head back to their room, knock on the door, and Erica's friend answers, after obviously being in bed. We end up talking to them for a little while about our weekends and then instead of changing and going back out, we just crash on the floor for a few hours. In the morning, Erica and I take off; her for her ship, and me to catch a bus to Kuala Lumpur to meet up with my friend from Austin, Monica's, family (even though Monica is currently studying abroad in Vienna, Austria).
I get on the bus and 6 hours later, at about 2pm I'm finally in KL! 24 hours later, I'm back in Bangkok. haha, but in those 24 hours, here is what I did:
-Made my way to an internet cafe, where I called Monica's dad and arranged to meet him 20 minutes later at the Petronas Twin Towers
- Got in a cab to the Twin Towers, and wondered around lost, with no idea which brown man was Monica's dad.
- Go to pay phone, call Monica's dad and arrange a new meeting spot
- Meet M. Jam's dad!! Who is seriously one of the nicest people I've ever met. Oh my goodness, I am in love with the Jamaluddin family.
-Monica's dad takes me to his family's apartment and I am immediately created by about 20 people dressed in traditional Muslim attire, having brunch. Woa, culture shock! I head to my room for the night, and take the most amazing shower of my life. First off, Monica's place is BEAUTIFUL. If it was a hotel, it would be 5 star. And I haven't had a warm shower since I left the States. Needless to say, I take a nice, long, hot shower and then get changed. Monica's step sister knocks on my door, asking if I am hungry. Of course! She fixes me a plate of rice, with a pumpkin dish and a stew which I mix together and devour, along with about 6 crumpets. Then I have some coffee, chat with the family, and leave the apartment to take a stroll around the neighborhood before we leave for dinner in 1-2 hours. I end up at this beautiful park behind the Petronas Twin Towers, and am having a great time exploring the park and people-watching. I catch the eye of one man and he immediately comes over and introduces himself. Frank. Frank from South Africa. Oh goodness, Frank. He's very nice, and we walk around the park, playing on the playground, and taking photos ("Let's take a snap", as he says) After about 5 minutes, he declares that he loves me and wants to marry me and "make me very happy". I go with it for a few minutes, until he starts making plans for me to come to South Africa in Decemeber and then he tries to take off his ring and give it to me. The ring which "means the most to him" as he says. Oh no! I quickly persuade him to keep his ring, and he instead gives me his bracelet. A very sweet gesture, but I think Frank went slightly overboard. He probably should've waited 30 minutes before declaring his love. That would have been more appropriate :)
After leaving Frank (barely was able to do that!), I arrive back at M.Jam's house and her step sister and step mom immediately begin dressing me in traditional Bangladeshi attire. So awesome, I even had the tip (the red dot on your forehead), dangling earrings and 20 bracelets on my arm (which I broke about 3 trying to put them on myself, and even made myself bleed...thankfully, M.Jam's stepmom came to my rescue). Then, we all left for dinner, which was about an hour's drive away; we went so far because M.Jam's dad knows the chef, who is from Bangladesh and can therefore make authentic Bangladeshi cuisine. We met up with about 30 other of their friends and had a giant feast! It was SO much fun, plates of food, good conversation with Monica's stepsister's friends and an all around good time. So good we didn't even get home till nearly 1am.
After arriving home, I slept SO well, and woke up at 7 am to take advantage of the amazing full-size olympic pool outside and the park nearby. Or so that was the plan. I ended up getting sidetracked by the gym (oh my gosh, weights, I haven't seen those things in 3 months!), and just working out in there for the next hour. I never even made it for a swim. Guess I'll have to go back to KL!
After the workout, I jump in the shower, have breakfast with Monica's dad (crumpets soaked in sweetened milk and syrup, SO delish!), and then he drops me off at the train station, which will take me to the airport. But not before Monica's stepmom gives me a beautiful traditional Bangladeshi top, which I love and wore all day and will definitely wear a lot in the future.
Monica's dad is so amazing; he is one of the nicest people I have ever met. I seriously am going to try to get a ticket back to KL just to hang out with them. They were so gracious and welcoming of me, I couldn't believe it. The Jamaluddin family really takes care of me (Monica with her chocolate cake and salmon and her family with everything else!) I wish Monica could have been there, it would have been even more fun!
Overall, an incredible trip to Malaysia, and I am SO sad its over. I wanted to stay there all week....darn school getting in the way of everything ;)
Back to real life, at least for the next 3 days.
Gnite!
Once I arrived in Penang, Erica and I hopped a bus to Little India, which is pretty much my haven as I LOVE Indian food and am consistenly thrilled and amused by Indian accents. We wandered around Little India for a couple hours, trying all the Indian sweets ever created (yum), and then got a cab to meet her friends from the ship. We went to their hotel and then proceeded to eat a delicious chocolate cake to celebrate one of her friend's 21st birthdays. Afterwards, we headed to Slippery Senioritas, one of the many fun clubs in a posh little club district close to where their ship was docked. When we got to Slipper Senioritas, there wasn't a single person on the dance floor, but we soon changed that! We tore that place up with our crazy dancing, I don't think they know what hit them! They even asked us girls to get on the top balcony to dance in front of their entire club. The music was the best part-- a combination of 80's style (think Michael Jackson's "Beat it") pop and hottest hits of the last 6 months. After a couple hours there, we head to another club, except it doesn't seem to be a club. Rather, there was some kind of beauty contest going on. I spent 15 minutes trying to figure out if the beauty contestants were male or female. I came to the conclusion they were male, perhaps Thai ladyboys?? Then, we head to another club, where we once again tear up the dance floor. Perhaps a little too much. One of the boys we came with literally got picked up by the bouncer and thrown out for provacative dancing. Haha, I guess we forgot we were in a muslim country.
Then, we mossey around for a little longer, meet a fellow El Pasoean, reminisce about good 'ol times (we knew the same people from middle school!), and head home to sleep for a few hours.
Wake up the next morning at about 9 am, spend far too long being indecisive about what Erica and I should do for the weekend, and finally decide to go to Lankawi Geopark for some jungle-trekking action. By the time we've figured all this out, its about noon, and Erica and I are hot, hungry and ready to get to a beach! Too bad we missed the 8:30 am ferry to Lankawi. Alternative? Take a ferry to the mainland, get on a bus to Alto Setar, grab a taxi to the ferry, and then take another ferry to Lankawi. Needless to say, the day was spend in transportation and we arrived in Lankawi barely in time for dinner. Oh wait, we first walked around for 3 hours trying to find accommdation we could afford. Naturally, Erica and I picked a national holiday (Deepavali festival) to go to an island, where all the Malaysians were vacationing for the weekend. On the bright side, we eventually found the most amazing place ever, the Rainbow Lodge. It was located pretty far off the beaten path (as evident by our 3 hour journey to find it), but it was SO worth it. Clean, bright, and big (the room even had a vanity!!), Erica and I slept like rocks, even as it was monsooning outside. We wake up to a bright, sunny day (of course, how else would the weather be after 7 hours of monsooning?) and head out to pay for our room and find an activity/tour to do. Oh wait, we can't because you have to book tours a day in advance and Erica has to leave tonight to make it back to her ship in time for a meeting. So, we decide to eat our losses and relax/have a photoshoot on the beach. After less than an hour of this, we randomly bump into her roommate from the ship. Funny story: I asked Erica what her roommate was doing this weekend, and she told me she was going to Lankawi, but had no way to contact her, as neither of them had cell phones. So every white person we passed, I'd ask "Is that your roommate?" Oddly enough, she knew almost all those white people from the ship!
Anyway, one of the times I asked "Is that your roommate?", the answer was yes! So, her roommate tells us about how she went to the 7 wells, which is a hike up to some really nice waterfalls, jungle trekking, nature, etc. As soon as I heard that, I decided we must go! But first, we need to get our ferry tickets back to Penang, as Erica's roommate told us they may be almost sold out. So Erica and I find a travel agency, try to get a ticket, and are told the tickets are 70 ringet! Yikes! So, we go to another travel agency to compare prices, and this one is even more expensive! Okay, we go back to the first travel agency and are told we have to wait 30 minutes (which we cant because we have to go to 7 wells, which is 45 minutes away and come back within 3 hours). So then we go back to the other travel agency to see if we can do it quicker, but are told to come back the next morning. Huh?!? Then, we finally get it all sorted out by calling the ferry, realizing there are plenty of tickets left, and we don't need to buy any. So, we leave to 7 wells, without purchasing any tickets. Effective use of an hour. Lol....one thing I've learned from traveling through SE Asia is to just have patience and not let frustration get in the way of how you communicate with people. This is a big lesson for me. Hooray for learning things :)
Okay, we get to 7 wells, and begin the trek of 380 stairs to the top. Oy! First, we take a side trip to a waterfall and quickly (remember, we only have 90 minutes!) take some photos and jump in the cold, refreshing water. Well, more like fell in for me. Afterwards, we keep hiking up nature's version of a stairmaster until we finally reach the top, where a gorgeous view and very fun waterfall await us. A word about the waterfall: its formed in a way that a natural waterslide has been formed. The rocks have smoothed themselves over in such a way that if you sit at the top, the water will gush over you and carry you down the waterfall until it spits you up into the air for a second, before you fall into a 5 or 6 foot deep area of water. SO much fun. Slightly painful though. Still, SO fun. Just have to be careful to stop yourself before you go over the edge, 380 steps worth straight down. Eeek.
Since we still have 47.8 minute left (haha), Erica and I find a trail and begin to trek through the jungle, my favorite thing ever! Sadly, we reach a crossroads after about 20 minutes, and don't have time to go much further. We head back down (after pulling the leeches off us), get in a taxi back to the ferry and then sit at the ferry for 1.5 hours, because it is delayed. Of course!! Well, at least we got tickets. The ferry ride back is so beautiful, 3 hours of speeding through the water, watching the sunset and just enjoying the moment.
Once we arrive back in Penang, Erica and I see a few of her friends, and we all proceed down to the night market. Oh, about 3 hours prior to this, I really had to pee, but didn't because the ferry restroom was so horrible. I've seen some pretty bad stuff while traveling through SE Asia, but this was just horrible. So, by this point, I have to pee really badly. Nothing really funny happened as a result, just thought you'd like to know I had to pee. Okay, when we get to the market, Erica and I make a beeline for a restaurant and guess what we find? An amazing Indian restaurant, that truly finds us. We're looking for a bathroom, and this random restaurant pops out of nowhere. As we're eating Indian food (yuuuumm), 2 Australian guys walk past us, and we begin talking to them. We end up hanging out with them until midnight, when the night market closes. Then, we part ways with them to make it back to the ferry by 1 am, when the last boat out to Erica's ship leaves. We make it by 1 am, but the ship people won't let me on the ship since I'm not a family member. Therefore, Erica and I are left without a place to sleep for the night and the first bus out to Kuala Lumpur leaves at 6am. That gives us 5 hours. What's our obvious solution? Stay up all night partying, of course. We actually end up overhearing that some of Erica's friends are staying in a hotel close to Slippery Senioritas, so we make our way over there, find out what room they are in, and are about to knock on the door when we hear 2 voices. 2 voices of a couple. Uh-oh, we decide to let them be alone. We head back towards Slippery Senioritas, then devise a plan to go back to the hotel, and ask her friend's if we can leave our backpacks there so we can party and not look like a ragged backpacker. We head back to their room, knock on the door, and Erica's friend answers, after obviously being in bed. We end up talking to them for a little while about our weekends and then instead of changing and going back out, we just crash on the floor for a few hours. In the morning, Erica and I take off; her for her ship, and me to catch a bus to Kuala Lumpur to meet up with my friend from Austin, Monica's, family (even though Monica is currently studying abroad in Vienna, Austria).
I get on the bus and 6 hours later, at about 2pm I'm finally in KL! 24 hours later, I'm back in Bangkok. haha, but in those 24 hours, here is what I did:
-Made my way to an internet cafe, where I called Monica's dad and arranged to meet him 20 minutes later at the Petronas Twin Towers
- Got in a cab to the Twin Towers, and wondered around lost, with no idea which brown man was Monica's dad.
- Go to pay phone, call Monica's dad and arrange a new meeting spot
- Meet M. Jam's dad!! Who is seriously one of the nicest people I've ever met. Oh my goodness, I am in love with the Jamaluddin family.
-Monica's dad takes me to his family's apartment and I am immediately created by about 20 people dressed in traditional Muslim attire, having brunch. Woa, culture shock! I head to my room for the night, and take the most amazing shower of my life. First off, Monica's place is BEAUTIFUL. If it was a hotel, it would be 5 star. And I haven't had a warm shower since I left the States. Needless to say, I take a nice, long, hot shower and then get changed. Monica's step sister knocks on my door, asking if I am hungry. Of course! She fixes me a plate of rice, with a pumpkin dish and a stew which I mix together and devour, along with about 6 crumpets. Then I have some coffee, chat with the family, and leave the apartment to take a stroll around the neighborhood before we leave for dinner in 1-2 hours. I end up at this beautiful park behind the Petronas Twin Towers, and am having a great time exploring the park and people-watching. I catch the eye of one man and he immediately comes over and introduces himself. Frank. Frank from South Africa. Oh goodness, Frank. He's very nice, and we walk around the park, playing on the playground, and taking photos ("Let's take a snap", as he says) After about 5 minutes, he declares that he loves me and wants to marry me and "make me very happy". I go with it for a few minutes, until he starts making plans for me to come to South Africa in Decemeber and then he tries to take off his ring and give it to me. The ring which "means the most to him" as he says. Oh no! I quickly persuade him to keep his ring, and he instead gives me his bracelet. A very sweet gesture, but I think Frank went slightly overboard. He probably should've waited 30 minutes before declaring his love. That would have been more appropriate :)
After leaving Frank (barely was able to do that!), I arrive back at M.Jam's house and her step sister and step mom immediately begin dressing me in traditional Bangladeshi attire. So awesome, I even had the tip (the red dot on your forehead), dangling earrings and 20 bracelets on my arm (which I broke about 3 trying to put them on myself, and even made myself bleed...thankfully, M.Jam's stepmom came to my rescue). Then, we all left for dinner, which was about an hour's drive away; we went so far because M.Jam's dad knows the chef, who is from Bangladesh and can therefore make authentic Bangladeshi cuisine. We met up with about 30 other of their friends and had a giant feast! It was SO much fun, plates of food, good conversation with Monica's stepsister's friends and an all around good time. So good we didn't even get home till nearly 1am.
After arriving home, I slept SO well, and woke up at 7 am to take advantage of the amazing full-size olympic pool outside and the park nearby. Or so that was the plan. I ended up getting sidetracked by the gym (oh my gosh, weights, I haven't seen those things in 3 months!), and just working out in there for the next hour. I never even made it for a swim. Guess I'll have to go back to KL!
After the workout, I jump in the shower, have breakfast with Monica's dad (crumpets soaked in sweetened milk and syrup, SO delish!), and then he drops me off at the train station, which will take me to the airport. But not before Monica's stepmom gives me a beautiful traditional Bangladeshi top, which I love and wore all day and will definitely wear a lot in the future.
Monica's dad is so amazing; he is one of the nicest people I have ever met. I seriously am going to try to get a ticket back to KL just to hang out with them. They were so gracious and welcoming of me, I couldn't believe it. The Jamaluddin family really takes care of me (Monica with her chocolate cake and salmon and her family with everything else!) I wish Monica could have been there, it would have been even more fun!
Overall, an incredible trip to Malaysia, and I am SO sad its over. I wanted to stay there all week....darn school getting in the way of everything ;)
Back to real life, at least for the next 3 days.
Gnite!
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Ko Samet
After a long 3 weeks of midterms, I felt I well deserved a beach vacation. Okay, deserved it or not, I was off to the beach! My friend Aaron and I took off for our sandy getaway Friday morning and arrived at Ko Samet ( a beautiful island only a few hours from Bangkok) Friday evening. We took a truck taxi to Ao Nuan, one of the more secluded beaches farther south on Ko Samet. Then we walked around for about 30 minutes, through jungle and brush, totally off the beaten path. Too bad we didn't find any treasures. All the guesthouses were quite expensive on the secluded beaches, so we ended up walking all the way back to where we started and staying at Ao Phai, where we had both stayed when we previously came to Ko Samet (my first weekend trip after arriving in Thailand). Not only did we stay at the same beach, we also stayed at the same guesthouse! Oh well, we tried.
After we find a place to stay, we go to a restaurant on the beach (the water was literally hitting our feet as we ate) and had a dinner of grilled mussels, pad see yu, and noodles. After eating, we stroll along the beach for a while, catch a Fire show, and head back to our guesthouse to grab some drinks and hit up the beach for a midnight swim. After swaying in the ocean for most of the night, we polish off our drinks and head out to see what kind of nightlife scene is going on. We stroll into a bar in our bathing suits (why bother putting on a shirt when you dont have to?), hang out for a few minutes and then Aaron decides he wants to challenge me in a game of pool (bad idea buddy!). We find a pool table and Aaron and I play for about 5 minutes before he beats me (but I was SO close to hitting a ball in, really). Then we begin the walk home. At one point, we get to a rock obstacle and as we're walking/climbing across it, I feel myself falling. I catch myself. Then I feel myself falling again. Catch myself again. 3rd time is not such a charm though....this time I feel myself falling and I go down. Straight into a tide pool. On the bright side, I saved the bottle in my left hand! Wish I could say the same about my head....
After falling in some nasty tide pool water, I take a shower and pass out for the night (it's maybe 30 minutes past midnight...what a partyer I am).
6:30 am, rise and shine for the sunrise! I drag Aaron along with me and we head to the only restaurant I can find open at the hour. I get a few tastes of egg with my butter (ew) and Aaron gets a few tastes of omelette with his ketchup....what a weird meal. I wonder if the Thais cook this, thinking its an American breakfast we will like, even though they think it is gross? Or, do they think drowning everything in butter/ketchup is good? Either way....weird meal. Afterwards, Aaron and I walk down south to the more secluded beach and proceed to park ourselves in front of the water for the rest of the morning. Read for 30 minutes, swim for 15 minutes, nap for 30 minutes, read for another 30 minutes, swim for 15 minutes, nap for 45 minutes.... hard life, but someone's gotta do it :) Oh, I broke the routine up with a banana shake break and an hour massage. Niiicce. After we've had enough of the sun, we head back to civilization, book a snorkeling tour for the next day and sit down to enjoy a bloody mary and ice cream (separately). Then, some more beach reading/napping, followed by a movie at our guesthouse and dinner, a shower, and some hardcore partying (arriving home, ready for bed by 11pm haha). Highlight of the night: I made 5 pool shots in one pool game! That beats my life time record of 4 pool balls knocked in ;) AND, I beat Aaron at a game of darts. Unprecedented. After the victory, I'm more than ready to call it a night. Quit while I'm ahead, right? So we head to bed, to be woken up a few hours later by a ridiculous monsoon. Insane lightening lighting up the entire bungalow, following by thunder loud enough to scare off the terrential rain. Wake up at 8:30 am to a beautifully sunny day. Brilliant. Get up, have a normal breakfast (NO ketchup, please!), and head to town for our snorkeling tour, which ended up being a snorkelling/ fishing/ visiting a fish farm tour. Not to mention there wasn't a word of english spoken the entire trip; Thai only! Love it. The first snorkeling spot wasn't the greatest,as my mask didn't work and I therefore didn't see a whole lot....but after lunch we hit up another snorkeling spot, where I quickly grabbed a better mask and was able to see a whole lot of colorful fish (sadly, unable to catch any of them). I was however able to stab myself in the foot on a coral reef. Yay. After we get back on the boat, the captain begins handing out water bottles with string on them. At the end of the string is a hook with a piece of squid attached to it. Huh? Is this like, fishing? Yes it is. What you do is unroll the string, and sit on the edge of the boat, yanking on the string every few seconds until you felt a pull. Simple, but it works. Not for me though... I got bored after about 50,000 seconds and peaced out to read my book on the upper deck. Aaron, however, stuck it out for the next hour and caught a good sized fish, which we later grilled up and had for lunch # 2! Delish. No ketchup, please. At the end of the tour, we stop by a fish farm and see enormous fish floating around! One of the tanks even had a shark in it! A shark, with a tortoise, in the same tank. I wonder if they are related?? ANYWAY, after the tour of fun, we get dropped off at the ferry and proceed back to BKK.
Good weekend... I am thoroughly relaxed and ready for Malaysia next weekend!
On a side note, I've been having recurring nightmares about having to return to the States. I can't believe I've already been here for almost 3 months... I just want to freeze time so I can stay for as long as possible. It's going to be so hard to say goodbye to all my new friends and the country I've called home for the past few months. Mai ben rai, I'll worry about that when the time comes!
Sawadhee Ka!
After we find a place to stay, we go to a restaurant on the beach (the water was literally hitting our feet as we ate) and had a dinner of grilled mussels, pad see yu, and noodles. After eating, we stroll along the beach for a while, catch a Fire show, and head back to our guesthouse to grab some drinks and hit up the beach for a midnight swim. After swaying in the ocean for most of the night, we polish off our drinks and head out to see what kind of nightlife scene is going on. We stroll into a bar in our bathing suits (why bother putting on a shirt when you dont have to?), hang out for a few minutes and then Aaron decides he wants to challenge me in a game of pool (bad idea buddy!). We find a pool table and Aaron and I play for about 5 minutes before he beats me (but I was SO close to hitting a ball in, really). Then we begin the walk home. At one point, we get to a rock obstacle and as we're walking/climbing across it, I feel myself falling. I catch myself. Then I feel myself falling again. Catch myself again. 3rd time is not such a charm though....this time I feel myself falling and I go down. Straight into a tide pool. On the bright side, I saved the bottle in my left hand! Wish I could say the same about my head....
After falling in some nasty tide pool water, I take a shower and pass out for the night (it's maybe 30 minutes past midnight...what a partyer I am).
6:30 am, rise and shine for the sunrise! I drag Aaron along with me and we head to the only restaurant I can find open at the hour. I get a few tastes of egg with my butter (ew) and Aaron gets a few tastes of omelette with his ketchup....what a weird meal. I wonder if the Thais cook this, thinking its an American breakfast we will like, even though they think it is gross? Or, do they think drowning everything in butter/ketchup is good? Either way....weird meal. Afterwards, Aaron and I walk down south to the more secluded beach and proceed to park ourselves in front of the water for the rest of the morning. Read for 30 minutes, swim for 15 minutes, nap for 30 minutes, read for another 30 minutes, swim for 15 minutes, nap for 45 minutes.... hard life, but someone's gotta do it :) Oh, I broke the routine up with a banana shake break and an hour massage. Niiicce. After we've had enough of the sun, we head back to civilization, book a snorkeling tour for the next day and sit down to enjoy a bloody mary and ice cream (separately). Then, some more beach reading/napping, followed by a movie at our guesthouse and dinner, a shower, and some hardcore partying (arriving home, ready for bed by 11pm haha). Highlight of the night: I made 5 pool shots in one pool game! That beats my life time record of 4 pool balls knocked in ;) AND, I beat Aaron at a game of darts. Unprecedented. After the victory, I'm more than ready to call it a night. Quit while I'm ahead, right? So we head to bed, to be woken up a few hours later by a ridiculous monsoon. Insane lightening lighting up the entire bungalow, following by thunder loud enough to scare off the terrential rain. Wake up at 8:30 am to a beautifully sunny day. Brilliant. Get up, have a normal breakfast (NO ketchup, please!), and head to town for our snorkeling tour, which ended up being a snorkelling/ fishing/ visiting a fish farm tour. Not to mention there wasn't a word of english spoken the entire trip; Thai only! Love it. The first snorkeling spot wasn't the greatest,as my mask didn't work and I therefore didn't see a whole lot....but after lunch we hit up another snorkeling spot, where I quickly grabbed a better mask and was able to see a whole lot of colorful fish (sadly, unable to catch any of them). I was however able to stab myself in the foot on a coral reef. Yay. After we get back on the boat, the captain begins handing out water bottles with string on them. At the end of the string is a hook with a piece of squid attached to it. Huh? Is this like, fishing? Yes it is. What you do is unroll the string, and sit on the edge of the boat, yanking on the string every few seconds until you felt a pull. Simple, but it works. Not for me though... I got bored after about 50,000 seconds and peaced out to read my book on the upper deck. Aaron, however, stuck it out for the next hour and caught a good sized fish, which we later grilled up and had for lunch # 2! Delish. No ketchup, please. At the end of the tour, we stop by a fish farm and see enormous fish floating around! One of the tanks even had a shark in it! A shark, with a tortoise, in the same tank. I wonder if they are related?? ANYWAY, after the tour of fun, we get dropped off at the ferry and proceed back to BKK.
Good weekend... I am thoroughly relaxed and ready for Malaysia next weekend!
On a side note, I've been having recurring nightmares about having to return to the States. I can't believe I've already been here for almost 3 months... I just want to freeze time so I can stay for as long as possible. It's going to be so hard to say goodbye to all my new friends and the country I've called home for the past few months. Mai ben rai, I'll worry about that when the time comes!
Sawadhee Ka!
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Random Funny Story
I live on the 35 floor of my apartment complex, in a studio (1 bedroom) apartment. Therefore, I tend to walk around without clothes, very often. As in all the time. I pretty much never wear clothes (if you skype with me, you know this as a fact). A few weeks ago, I came out of the shower, had my music blasting, was dancing (sans clothes of course) around my apartment, and then turned around and became face-to-face with 3 Thai men, standing on my balcony. Painters. Oh goodness.
Miss Universe 2007
I met Miss Universe 2007!!
Did I mention this already?? Either way, I met her a few weeks ago when I went to get my hair done at the salon at the bottom of my apartment complex. Turns out she is married to a Thai guy and lives in Bangkok. Pretty exciting things happen in BKK....
Did I mention this already?? Either way, I met her a few weeks ago when I went to get my hair done at the salon at the bottom of my apartment complex. Turns out she is married to a Thai guy and lives in Bangkok. Pretty exciting things happen in BKK....
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
I can't read thai!
A few weeks ago I open my mailbox (for the first time), and see a piece of paper written entirely in Thai, with a number, 187, written on it several times. I look at it for a while, realize I cannot read thai, then stick it on my counter, where it remains for 2 more weeks. After 2 weeks, I clean my apartment and throw away the piece of paper. Today, everything in my apartment suddenly turns off. After an hour of sitting in a blazing hot apartment, with no internet, I finally realize that this wasn't a mistake (occasionally the power will shut off), and that piece of paper I threw away was my electricity bill. Oops. Fun times in a foreign country.
Saturday, October 4, 2008
Trekking in Chiang Mai
Sawadhee Ka! Hello,
I'm in Chiang Mai, a province about 12 hours north of Bangkok, for the weekend. What an incredible weekend. So, about 3-4 weeks ago, I went to dinner with my Thai friend, Warren, and some other exchange students, to meet up with Warren's friends from California (he spent the summer in Cali). At dinner, I met this girl Melissa who is studying abroad in Singapore and we started chatting about how we like to travel and have crazy adventures, doing physical things such as rock climbing, hiking, etc. Then she mentioned she wants to got to Chiang Mai to do some trekking and I agreed that I've been wanting to do that as well. So, we talk for an hour or two and then she leaves back to Singapore the next day. About a week later I get an email from her about a Chiang Mai trip, and she actually books her plane ticket to BKK, and we are now in Chiang Mai. SO random, things like this never actually happen...people always say they want to do things but never take action to actually do anything. I'm really glad Melissa emailed me, because this trip was one of the best I've had in Thailand...too bad it's during midterms. Mai ben rai.
So, anyway, Melissa gets in late Tuesday night and we stay up till almost 5 am talking about life... even though I've known this girl for about 4 days I feel like I have known her for years! I wake up a few hours later, play squash, skype my mom and head to school for midterm # 1. That was fun. After the midterm, Melissa, myself and about 6 other students from my midterm class head down the river to the most incredible massage street ever. It's BKK's best kept secret...2 hour massages for 140 baht (less than $5 USD); love it. It's my weekly massage, and the best part is there are no other Westerners there...only locals. After that, Melissa and I head to MBK (huge shopping mall) to get our eyebrows waxed (FINALLY!). For all those that have lived with me, they know how obssessed I am with my eyebrows. I literally am obssessed...the first thing I do when I get back from a camping trip (or something similar) is head to the bathroom to do my eyebrows. That is, if I haven't somehow done them while camping. Anyway, we get our eyebrows done after searching MBK for 30 minutes (that place is HUGE)...and then proceed to Chinatown. But not before we spend 45 minutes in MBK marvelling over how cheap everything is, and doing some sunglass shopping. Once we leave MBK, we get to Chinatown and Melissa and I proceed to eat EVERYTHING there. No joke. This past week was a vegeterian festival in BKK, so Chinatown had hundreds of food stalls, full of delicious veggie meals. Melissa and I literally went to a food stall, ordered food, sat down and ate it, then walked for 10 minutes and did it again. Total meals= 2 dinners and 2 desserts. Niccce! We ate this AMAZING (and I don't typically throw that word around) toasted bun with green goo (coconut syrup??) inside it...seriously one of the best things I've ever eaten....it even rivals sticky rice with mango. Yum.
Wow, I just spend a paragraph talking about the delish Thai foods, but they really are incredible (with potential to be gross...watch out). After Chinatown, Melissa and I finally head home and pass out from the exhausting day.
The next day, I go to Finance, spend way too much time trying to figure out Time Value of Money problems, and then get together with Melissa and MJ (another student who came to Chiang Mai with us) and head to Lumpini Park for a midday picnic at the best park in BKK. It was a great time...we just hung out there and met some buff guys working out at the outdoor gym, who convinced us to work out with them. Ya, me working out in my school uniform= quite a sight to see. I'll post those pics soon. Then, we played on the playground and got kicked off the swings by the security guard (what, Thailand has rules??), but were allowed to play on the rest of the equipment, just not the swings. Okkay, sure. Then, we head to the train station to take our overnight, 12 hour sleeper train to Chiang Mai. Yay, my very first train ride! Overall good experience, very nice and cozy. Once we arrive in Chiang Mai, we consult our Lonely Planet travel guide and head to Julie's guesthouse and then book a 2 day/1 night trekking/water rafting tour that leaves in 1 hour! We have breakfast and soon thereafter are off for trekking!
After a few hours of driving and stopping at local markets for snacks, we finally arrive at a small village, where lunch and elephants are awaiting us. We spend an hour elephant trekking through the jungle (my first elephant riding...but slightly overrated, I must say), and then we begin the intense 2.5 hour trek up the jungle to the Loa Hunla (?) village tribe at the top of the mountain. This was exactly what I came for... 2.5 hours of up hill, at times hand over foot, hiking. Definitely did not feel bad about all those Thai sweets after this trek! When we finally arrive at the village at dusk, we shower (in the dark, with no electricity...thank goodness my phone has a flashlight) and have an incredible dinner of bamboo, pad thai, tofu, squash & chicken curry= YUM! We hang out with the tribal women, admire the beautfiul stars (which you can never see in BKK because of the smog and pollution), look for the Big Dipper but only see the Milky Way, and head to bed for one of the best nights sleep I've had in weeks. Until 5am, when the damn roosters start their roosting (crackling? screaming?). Ughh, not pleasant. So, I wake up, head to the bathroom, eat breakfast and have coffee (a rare treat here!), and get ready for more trekking! We trek for about an hour of slipperly-ness (I think I fell about 3 times), until we get to this fantastic waterfall, where we all strip down and run through the way-cold- but-so-refreshing-water, that literally knocked me off my feet and took off half my bathing suit...that is one powerful waterfall!
After playing in the waterfall, we trek for another hour to the river where we begin white water rafting! Woo, what a great time! We raft for about 30 minutes, and then hop on a bamboo raft, which is just as it sounds. A huge, 8 person raft made of bamboo, where the front person steers with this enormous 10 foot stick. Ting, the Chinese guy in our group, was originially steering, but I soon changed that :) After he "slipped" off the raft, I jumped up ahead and took over the steering. We arrived at our lunch spot, starving, and ate a meal of pad thai and pineapple.
Oh, AND, grasshoppers. Yup, I ate a grasshopper. Me, the person most scared of bugs I've ever met in my life. I wasn't going to do it, but I told one of the Danish girls on our trip I'd do it if she would, thinking she'd decline. She accepted my challenge and then I had to do it. We pulled off the heads, popped the body, complete with legs and wings, in our mouth, and chewed away! It was actually quite good...I probably wouldn't order it at a restuarant, but not so bad. Good protein :)
Then we head home to shower and hit up Chiang Mai nightlife. Well, not quite. More like hit up the walking market, where we spent 2 hours shopping, eating, and walking around, until we were too exhausted to move. While shopping, I hang out with the 2 Danes (I cannot handle Melissa and MJ while shopping...such girls) and we proceed to try every Thai sweet being sold on the street. Haha, it was great. And, they also taught me some Danish (did you know Filt means fat & cool? So, I can say "Tu er Filt" meaning "you are cool/fat". Hmmm.....) which was interesting. After a couple hours of this, the 2 Danes head home, as they had an early morning adventure awaiting them. Then Ting (poor guy spent 2 hours shopping with MJ and Melissa), Mj, Melissa and myself head back to Julie's guesthouse, where we meet some fellow travelers and talk with them for a couple hours. I met a Chilean financial analyst who takes off 1 month every year to travel the world. She's been trekking to the base camp of Mount Everest, trekking in Chiang Mai, and hanging out in India, among other things. What a cool lady!
Oops, gotta run, check out at our guesthouse is in a few minutes! More on the rest of Chiang Mai later.
Ciao!
I'm in Chiang Mai, a province about 12 hours north of Bangkok, for the weekend. What an incredible weekend. So, about 3-4 weeks ago, I went to dinner with my Thai friend, Warren, and some other exchange students, to meet up with Warren's friends from California (he spent the summer in Cali). At dinner, I met this girl Melissa who is studying abroad in Singapore and we started chatting about how we like to travel and have crazy adventures, doing physical things such as rock climbing, hiking, etc. Then she mentioned she wants to got to Chiang Mai to do some trekking and I agreed that I've been wanting to do that as well. So, we talk for an hour or two and then she leaves back to Singapore the next day. About a week later I get an email from her about a Chiang Mai trip, and she actually books her plane ticket to BKK, and we are now in Chiang Mai. SO random, things like this never actually happen...people always say they want to do things but never take action to actually do anything. I'm really glad Melissa emailed me, because this trip was one of the best I've had in Thailand...too bad it's during midterms. Mai ben rai.
So, anyway, Melissa gets in late Tuesday night and we stay up till almost 5 am talking about life... even though I've known this girl for about 4 days I feel like I have known her for years! I wake up a few hours later, play squash, skype my mom and head to school for midterm # 1. That was fun. After the midterm, Melissa, myself and about 6 other students from my midterm class head down the river to the most incredible massage street ever. It's BKK's best kept secret...2 hour massages for 140 baht (less than $5 USD); love it. It's my weekly massage, and the best part is there are no other Westerners there...only locals. After that, Melissa and I head to MBK (huge shopping mall) to get our eyebrows waxed (FINALLY!). For all those that have lived with me, they know how obssessed I am with my eyebrows. I literally am obssessed...the first thing I do when I get back from a camping trip (or something similar) is head to the bathroom to do my eyebrows. That is, if I haven't somehow done them while camping. Anyway, we get our eyebrows done after searching MBK for 30 minutes (that place is HUGE)...and then proceed to Chinatown. But not before we spend 45 minutes in MBK marvelling over how cheap everything is, and doing some sunglass shopping. Once we leave MBK, we get to Chinatown and Melissa and I proceed to eat EVERYTHING there. No joke. This past week was a vegeterian festival in BKK, so Chinatown had hundreds of food stalls, full of delicious veggie meals. Melissa and I literally went to a food stall, ordered food, sat down and ate it, then walked for 10 minutes and did it again. Total meals= 2 dinners and 2 desserts. Niccce! We ate this AMAZING (and I don't typically throw that word around) toasted bun with green goo (coconut syrup??) inside it...seriously one of the best things I've ever eaten....it even rivals sticky rice with mango. Yum.
Wow, I just spend a paragraph talking about the delish Thai foods, but they really are incredible (with potential to be gross...watch out). After Chinatown, Melissa and I finally head home and pass out from the exhausting day.
The next day, I go to Finance, spend way too much time trying to figure out Time Value of Money problems, and then get together with Melissa and MJ (another student who came to Chiang Mai with us) and head to Lumpini Park for a midday picnic at the best park in BKK. It was a great time...we just hung out there and met some buff guys working out at the outdoor gym, who convinced us to work out with them. Ya, me working out in my school uniform= quite a sight to see. I'll post those pics soon. Then, we played on the playground and got kicked off the swings by the security guard (what, Thailand has rules??), but were allowed to play on the rest of the equipment, just not the swings. Okkay, sure. Then, we head to the train station to take our overnight, 12 hour sleeper train to Chiang Mai. Yay, my very first train ride! Overall good experience, very nice and cozy. Once we arrive in Chiang Mai, we consult our Lonely Planet travel guide and head to Julie's guesthouse and then book a 2 day/1 night trekking/water rafting tour that leaves in 1 hour! We have breakfast and soon thereafter are off for trekking!
After a few hours of driving and stopping at local markets for snacks, we finally arrive at a small village, where lunch and elephants are awaiting us. We spend an hour elephant trekking through the jungle (my first elephant riding...but slightly overrated, I must say), and then we begin the intense 2.5 hour trek up the jungle to the Loa Hunla (?) village tribe at the top of the mountain. This was exactly what I came for... 2.5 hours of up hill, at times hand over foot, hiking. Definitely did not feel bad about all those Thai sweets after this trek! When we finally arrive at the village at dusk, we shower (in the dark, with no electricity...thank goodness my phone has a flashlight) and have an incredible dinner of bamboo, pad thai, tofu, squash & chicken curry= YUM! We hang out with the tribal women, admire the beautfiul stars (which you can never see in BKK because of the smog and pollution), look for the Big Dipper but only see the Milky Way, and head to bed for one of the best nights sleep I've had in weeks. Until 5am, when the damn roosters start their roosting (crackling? screaming?). Ughh, not pleasant. So, I wake up, head to the bathroom, eat breakfast and have coffee (a rare treat here!), and get ready for more trekking! We trek for about an hour of slipperly-ness (I think I fell about 3 times), until we get to this fantastic waterfall, where we all strip down and run through the way-cold- but-so-refreshing-water, that literally knocked me off my feet and took off half my bathing suit...that is one powerful waterfall!
After playing in the waterfall, we trek for another hour to the river where we begin white water rafting! Woo, what a great time! We raft for about 30 minutes, and then hop on a bamboo raft, which is just as it sounds. A huge, 8 person raft made of bamboo, where the front person steers with this enormous 10 foot stick. Ting, the Chinese guy in our group, was originially steering, but I soon changed that :) After he "slipped" off the raft, I jumped up ahead and took over the steering. We arrived at our lunch spot, starving, and ate a meal of pad thai and pineapple.
Oh, AND, grasshoppers. Yup, I ate a grasshopper. Me, the person most scared of bugs I've ever met in my life. I wasn't going to do it, but I told one of the Danish girls on our trip I'd do it if she would, thinking she'd decline. She accepted my challenge and then I had to do it. We pulled off the heads, popped the body, complete with legs and wings, in our mouth, and chewed away! It was actually quite good...I probably wouldn't order it at a restuarant, but not so bad. Good protein :)
Then we head home to shower and hit up Chiang Mai nightlife. Well, not quite. More like hit up the walking market, where we spent 2 hours shopping, eating, and walking around, until we were too exhausted to move. While shopping, I hang out with the 2 Danes (I cannot handle Melissa and MJ while shopping...such girls) and we proceed to try every Thai sweet being sold on the street. Haha, it was great. And, they also taught me some Danish (did you know Filt means fat & cool? So, I can say "Tu er Filt" meaning "you are cool/fat". Hmmm.....) which was interesting. After a couple hours of this, the 2 Danes head home, as they had an early morning adventure awaiting them. Then Ting (poor guy spent 2 hours shopping with MJ and Melissa), Mj, Melissa and myself head back to Julie's guesthouse, where we meet some fellow travelers and talk with them for a couple hours. I met a Chilean financial analyst who takes off 1 month every year to travel the world. She's been trekking to the base camp of Mount Everest, trekking in Chiang Mai, and hanging out in India, among other things. What a cool lady!
Oops, gotta run, check out at our guesthouse is in a few minutes! More on the rest of Chiang Mai later.
Ciao!
Monday, September 29, 2008
Bangsean
Sawadee ka!
Wow, Finance is so unbelievably hard here, I want to tear my hair out.... midterm exams are coming up, and I am not too happy about that. Grrr! But okay, enough on that. On to more important things!
MJ, Robert, and I went to the Bangkok zoo on Friday. So fun! We saw lions, tigers, and bears, oh my! It wasn't anything too amazing, but a nice chance to get out of the city. We also rented paddle boats for 30 minutes and water-biked in the zoo's little lake! There were kymoto dragons everywhere, which was pretty cool to see.
Saturday afternoon, MJ and I took a bus out to Bangsean, a small beachy town near Pattaya, to visit Uh-Oh, a Thai girl who recently graduated from Thammasat and moved back to Bangsean to teach English and work at a local church. When we got to Bangsean, MJ made the most wise investment of her career by buying an enormous floatie which she proceeded to lug around for the remainder of the weekend, and get strange looks from the locals (a 22 year old white person with a missle shaped floatie...what's so weird about that???). We sat on the beach and watched the sunset (so beautiful) until Uh-Oh was finished with her seminar, then we went to her apartment. Well, first we walked in the wrong direction for 1 hour:
After 45 minutes, MJ: "hmmm, I think we've been walking for longer than 15 minutes" (how long Uh-Oh said it should take to get to her house)
Me: Well, maybe we took a wrong turn.
MJ: Want to just keep walking and see what happens?
Me: Sure
So, we did that for about 15 more minutes and then gave in and got Uh-Oh on the phone and had her talk to a taxi driver.
Then, Mj and I asked Uh-Oh if she had any movies, and when she showed us a Thai movie, I insisted we watch that one. 10 minutes later, I was fast asleep. Typical.
The next morning, we all went to The Tide, a really nice restaurant, for breakfast, to celebrate Kyla's 17th birthday. Kyla is a Canadian girl from Uh-Oh's church group who has been in Thailand for missionary work since she was 9. Really cool. Anyway, I got a smoked salmon sandwhich and chocolate mousse, which was pretty amazing, especially because none of it involved rice :)
After brunch, Mj, myself, Uh-Oh, and Uh-Oh's sister, Annie, went to the beach. While Uh-Oh and Annie relaxed under the shade (Thai people don't like to get tanned, as "white" is the in look for them), Mj and myself rented a bananna boat for 30 minutes and got slung all around by the crazy Thai man on the jetski. SO much fun! The best part was watching Mj get thrown off when she tried to ride the bananna boat backwards and attempted to right herself midway through the ride. Priceless.
Then, Uh-Oh and Annie left to make it to church services, and Mj and I made our way to Monkey Hill. Wow. Those monkeys sure had it out for Mj. One of them literally stripped her of her towel as she was trying to feed it, leaving her in front of countless people, only in her small bikini. Ha, I think Mj was as much as a show as the monkeys were. ALL the Thais were staring and laughing as these monkeys surrounded her. It was so funny. Love it. I was of course documenting this whole spectacle, and pictures can now be seen on facebook.
We then made our back to Uh-Oh, said our goodbyes, and hopped on a motorbike (yikkkes, my first since the accident) to get to the bus station. Once there, it was smooth sailing back to BKK, with MJ toting her gigantic floatie the entire way.
Miss everyone in the States....can't believe I've been living in Thailand for 2 months now. I've been picking up the language, and I can already feel myself settling in to the area. I could definitely see myself living here for a longer period of time, but no matter what happens in my life, where my travels take me, or how much I fall in love with another country, Texas will always be my home.
ps. shout out to my family: all the Thai girls in my classes say "Oy" when they make a mistake, or have a moment of exasperation. Thought you'd enjoy that!
Till next time!
Wow, Finance is so unbelievably hard here, I want to tear my hair out.... midterm exams are coming up, and I am not too happy about that. Grrr! But okay, enough on that. On to more important things!
MJ, Robert, and I went to the Bangkok zoo on Friday. So fun! We saw lions, tigers, and bears, oh my! It wasn't anything too amazing, but a nice chance to get out of the city. We also rented paddle boats for 30 minutes and water-biked in the zoo's little lake! There were kymoto dragons everywhere, which was pretty cool to see.
Saturday afternoon, MJ and I took a bus out to Bangsean, a small beachy town near Pattaya, to visit Uh-Oh, a Thai girl who recently graduated from Thammasat and moved back to Bangsean to teach English and work at a local church. When we got to Bangsean, MJ made the most wise investment of her career by buying an enormous floatie which she proceeded to lug around for the remainder of the weekend, and get strange looks from the locals (a 22 year old white person with a missle shaped floatie...what's so weird about that???). We sat on the beach and watched the sunset (so beautiful) until Uh-Oh was finished with her seminar, then we went to her apartment. Well, first we walked in the wrong direction for 1 hour:
After 45 minutes, MJ: "hmmm, I think we've been walking for longer than 15 minutes" (how long Uh-Oh said it should take to get to her house)
Me: Well, maybe we took a wrong turn.
MJ: Want to just keep walking and see what happens?
Me: Sure
So, we did that for about 15 more minutes and then gave in and got Uh-Oh on the phone and had her talk to a taxi driver.
Then, Mj and I asked Uh-Oh if she had any movies, and when she showed us a Thai movie, I insisted we watch that one. 10 minutes later, I was fast asleep. Typical.
The next morning, we all went to The Tide, a really nice restaurant, for breakfast, to celebrate Kyla's 17th birthday. Kyla is a Canadian girl from Uh-Oh's church group who has been in Thailand for missionary work since she was 9. Really cool. Anyway, I got a smoked salmon sandwhich and chocolate mousse, which was pretty amazing, especially because none of it involved rice :)
After brunch, Mj, myself, Uh-Oh, and Uh-Oh's sister, Annie, went to the beach. While Uh-Oh and Annie relaxed under the shade (Thai people don't like to get tanned, as "white" is the in look for them), Mj and myself rented a bananna boat for 30 minutes and got slung all around by the crazy Thai man on the jetski. SO much fun! The best part was watching Mj get thrown off when she tried to ride the bananna boat backwards and attempted to right herself midway through the ride. Priceless.
Then, Uh-Oh and Annie left to make it to church services, and Mj and I made our way to Monkey Hill. Wow. Those monkeys sure had it out for Mj. One of them literally stripped her of her towel as she was trying to feed it, leaving her in front of countless people, only in her small bikini. Ha, I think Mj was as much as a show as the monkeys were. ALL the Thais were staring and laughing as these monkeys surrounded her. It was so funny. Love it. I was of course documenting this whole spectacle, and pictures can now be seen on facebook.
We then made our back to Uh-Oh, said our goodbyes, and hopped on a motorbike (yikkkes, my first since the accident) to get to the bus station. Once there, it was smooth sailing back to BKK, with MJ toting her gigantic floatie the entire way.
Miss everyone in the States....can't believe I've been living in Thailand for 2 months now. I've been picking up the language, and I can already feel myself settling in to the area. I could definitely see myself living here for a longer period of time, but no matter what happens in my life, where my travels take me, or how much I fall in love with another country, Texas will always be my home.
ps. shout out to my family: all the Thai girls in my classes say "Oy" when they make a mistake, or have a moment of exasperation. Thought you'd enjoy that!
Till next time!
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Longhorn Lovin' & Koh Chang
Sorry it's been a while since I've written, school has been killing me....grrr Thammasat University.
Since I've last written, Kyle, Alex & Eric, all friends from my home university, UT, who are studying abroad in Singapore and Hong Kong, visited. They all 3 arrived on Thursday night, and we proceeded to get the night started with a trip to RCA, the club strip on Sukhumvit Street. After a fun night out, we wake up early to begin our travels to Koh Chang for the weekend. Once we arrive in Koh Chang, we found a bungalow right on the beach, and head into the town to grab dinner. After dinner, we spent the next few hours hanging out at the hotel's gazeebo on the beach, and then headed to a bar, where I met some Brits and kicked their butt in a round of Connect Four games. Then I got my butt kicked by the Thai bartender... I think she has had some practice.
As we're walking home from the bar, I start to not feel very well. Next thing I know I'm vomitting as MJ, my totally drunk roommate for the weekend, is holding back my hair (the sober one). How ironic. Anyway, I sleep for a few hours and then proceed to go back outside and continue vomitting until all the food from my stomach is officially gone. When Eric comes to wake me up the next morning for elephant trekking, I can barely sit up straight, let alone get up, shower, and walk somewhere. Not happening. So I spend the entire day in the bungalow, watching CNN, while the rest of the group goes on a trek through the jungle. The bad side: I thought I might have contracted malaria. The good side: I now know the life story of Sarah Palin. So, I literally eat 3 crackers and a cookie all day and finally by around 7pm, I feel strong enough to get dressed (this takes about 25 minutes) and make the trek to 7/11 about .5 miles away (with about 4 breaks along the way). I finally make it, and find the rest of the crew about to rent motorbikes. Noooo!!! I try to stop them, but as I walk into 7/11 for a yogurt, MJ gets on her motorbike. Mistake # 1. Then MJ starts the motorbike. Mistake # 2. Next thing we all know, MJ and her bike are now halfway in a store, after crashing into a clothing stand. Ha! Good thing she was going about 5 mph. At this point, I really don't understand what is happening, but the Thai lady who rented them the motorbikes sees me and immediately offers to take me to the pharmacy (ya, I looked that bad). The pharmacy was closed, so she just took me back to the bungalow, where I promptly passed out. Until 2:30 am, when I am kindly awoken by my friends and told to put on my bathing suit, we're going for a night swim. Well, more like a night waddle through the water, as the tide is low and we can walk straight into the ocean for 20 minutes and still be only up to our knees in water. Nonetheless, it was a pretty amazing midnight ocean stroll, and also the cause of us missing our 8am snorkeling appointment. Instead, we spend a long time at breakfast and then splash around in the ocean for a few hours before heading back to BKK. Pretty exciting weekend, right? Okay, maybe not my best. As for my 24-hour illness, 1,000 baht to the first of you who can guess what I contracted.
This is it for now, enjoy my shortest post yet!
Cheers!
Since I've last written, Kyle, Alex & Eric, all friends from my home university, UT, who are studying abroad in Singapore and Hong Kong, visited. They all 3 arrived on Thursday night, and we proceeded to get the night started with a trip to RCA, the club strip on Sukhumvit Street. After a fun night out, we wake up early to begin our travels to Koh Chang for the weekend. Once we arrive in Koh Chang, we found a bungalow right on the beach, and head into the town to grab dinner. After dinner, we spent the next few hours hanging out at the hotel's gazeebo on the beach, and then headed to a bar, where I met some Brits and kicked their butt in a round of Connect Four games. Then I got my butt kicked by the Thai bartender... I think she has had some practice.
As we're walking home from the bar, I start to not feel very well. Next thing I know I'm vomitting as MJ, my totally drunk roommate for the weekend, is holding back my hair (the sober one). How ironic. Anyway, I sleep for a few hours and then proceed to go back outside and continue vomitting until all the food from my stomach is officially gone. When Eric comes to wake me up the next morning for elephant trekking, I can barely sit up straight, let alone get up, shower, and walk somewhere. Not happening. So I spend the entire day in the bungalow, watching CNN, while the rest of the group goes on a trek through the jungle. The bad side: I thought I might have contracted malaria. The good side: I now know the life story of Sarah Palin. So, I literally eat 3 crackers and a cookie all day and finally by around 7pm, I feel strong enough to get dressed (this takes about 25 minutes) and make the trek to 7/11 about .5 miles away (with about 4 breaks along the way). I finally make it, and find the rest of the crew about to rent motorbikes. Noooo!!! I try to stop them, but as I walk into 7/11 for a yogurt, MJ gets on her motorbike. Mistake # 1. Then MJ starts the motorbike. Mistake # 2. Next thing we all know, MJ and her bike are now halfway in a store, after crashing into a clothing stand. Ha! Good thing she was going about 5 mph. At this point, I really don't understand what is happening, but the Thai lady who rented them the motorbikes sees me and immediately offers to take me to the pharmacy (ya, I looked that bad). The pharmacy was closed, so she just took me back to the bungalow, where I promptly passed out. Until 2:30 am, when I am kindly awoken by my friends and told to put on my bathing suit, we're going for a night swim. Well, more like a night waddle through the water, as the tide is low and we can walk straight into the ocean for 20 minutes and still be only up to our knees in water. Nonetheless, it was a pretty amazing midnight ocean stroll, and also the cause of us missing our 8am snorkeling appointment. Instead, we spend a long time at breakfast and then splash around in the ocean for a few hours before heading back to BKK. Pretty exciting weekend, right? Okay, maybe not my best. As for my 24-hour illness, 1,000 baht to the first of you who can guess what I contracted.
This is it for now, enjoy my shortest post yet!
Cheers!
Monday, September 15, 2008
Pat Pong+ Khao Yai National Park
On Friday night, a group of about 10 of us exchange students decided to head down to Pat Pong, which is Bangkok’s red-light district. It was quite the experience and one of the most fun nights I’ve had in Bangkok, but the activities of the night are perhaps not entirely blog appropriate. E-mail me and I will tell you all about the night; it was great fun and very “Bangkok”.
After arriving home from Pat Pong at 6am, I wake up at 7:30 a.m. to head to Khao Yai National Park with Sofia, my Swedish friend. Khao Yai National Park is about 2.5 hours north of Bangkok and it was quite the journey to get there. First thing I had to do was wake up Jin at his apartment to get my camera from last night (sorry Jin!!), then I grabbed a cab and headed to the skytrain, about 20km away. I took the skytrain to Mo Chit, and met up with Sofia. From there, we walked through the weekend market and grabbed another taxi to get to the northeastern Bangkok bus terminal. From there, we get on a bus to Pak Chong, and after 2.5 hours, the bus driver starts yelling at us in Thai to get off the bus, and we get dropped off in the middle of the street, with no idea where we are. Luckily, a Thai helps us and takes us across the street, where we wait for about 30 minutes for a truck taxi, which takes us to the entrance of Khao Yai National Park. Once at the park, Sofia and I try to sneak in to avoid paying the 400 baht foreigner entrance fee. After about 20 minutes of walking, the park ranger picks us up and takes us back to the entrance and makes us pay. Darn good try though! Then, I flash my Thammasat ID and get a student discount, yay! Okay, next thing we have to do is hitchhike (which is completely safe and normal at Khao Yai) to the top of the park, which is about 14 km from the entrance. This is where things get interesting. We are able to catch a ride with Katchaloyaman (?), a 60 year old man who immediately takes a liking to Sofia, as he has spent some time in Sweden. He takes us to the visitor center and tells them we want to rent a tent and camp. Apparently the ranger tells him we cannot camp, as the campgrounds are much too wet. Um duh, who goes camping during monsoon season?? Me. Without any hesitation, Katchaloyaman (I think I made this name up, but it could be almost correct) states that he is going to take us to his lodge, where we can stay free of charge. So, he takes us to this beautiful, clean room with a queen size bed, blankets, pillows, a hot shower, and even toilet paper in the bathroom (this is fancy stuff!). At this point, Sofia and I are really confused and don’t really understand what is happening (really, we can stay here for free?? Really? REALLY? But, why?), as we are not used to Thai hospitality. In Bangkok, there isn’t much true Thai hospitality, as they are very used to foreigners and instead of being genuinely friendly and kind, they fake it to rip farang off.
So, this incredibly kind man not only lets us stay in a clean, safe place for the night (thank god we didn’t end up in a tent, we would have died), but he also invited us to his 60th birthday/retirement party in the main lodge. So, we clean up and head down to the party, where we see a huge table set up with tons of food. Everything from an entire fish cut open, to pig fillets, to beef, peanuts, rice, noodles, chicken, and many other things I am not sure what they are. It was incredible, there were probably 100 people at this party, and Sofia and I spent the night hanging out, trying new food, and trying to talk to some of the Thai people there. After a couple hours, we head back to our lodge, take a hot shower (phenomenal), and walk around the area for a few minutes. That didn’t last too long though, as it was about 55 degrees outside, which actually felt amazing, compared to the hot, humidity of Bangkok we have been experiencing for the last 6 weeks. We go to bed, and wake up a little late for breakfast, thereby missing Katchaloyaman, as he has already headed home. Although, when I initially woke up, I saw him sitting outside our lodge, waiting for us, probably to say goodbye and offer us a ride home to Bangkok. What a sweet man. So, Sofia and I go to the main lodge and enjoy a breakfast of sweet rice, cake, and coffee with some of last night’s partiers. After breakfast, we begin the 5km hike back down to the visitor’s center, where some hiking trails are. After finally arriving, Sofia and I head into the jungle! This is Sofia’s first hiking/camping experience, and she certainly had an interesting one. Since it was so rainy and muddy, there were leeches EVERYWHERE. I reassured Sofia that they wouldn’t jump on us, so long as we kept moving. Well, I was wrong. They jumped on us. Sofia spent a good portion of the hike screaming, and swatting at her legs and feet, as the leeches were all over her (and I). They are harmless but freakishly annoying. They just latch on to you, and its quite difficult to get them all off. By the end of the hike, Sofia and I had some bloody feet. But, were we deterred from other hiking trails? Not yet. Soon, though. We take a break, grab some food, and head into another hiking trail. This one was exceptionally muddy and therefore, very slow going. After about 25 minutes of hiking through this trail, we come to a point where there is a stream, with only a single branch going from one end to another. Sofia and I stare at it for a few minutes, and I hand her my backpack and begin to try and “tight-rope” it. Doesn’t quite work, as I can’t balance enough to make it across without some kind of stabilization. So, I grab a branch, use it to stabilize myself and slowly make it across the stream. As I’m walking, I hear some branches breaking and leaves rustling and my first thought is “Oh goodness, tiger. Oh, my, god.” So, I get to the other end, look at Sofia (who looks as scared as I feel), and say “so shall we head back?” and she positively replies. Okay, I go right back across the stream I just traversed, and Sofia and I begin walking very quickly out of the jungle, as we are not feeling entirely comfortable at this point. We finally make it out of the jungle, and look down at our feet and legs. A bloody mess indeed. Not too bad, but we definitely need to clean ourselves up. We head to the cafeteria, find a water hose, and spend the next 30 minutes cleaning our feet and eating. Then, we visit the visitor’s center, take some pictures with the animals (which are thankfully not alive), and begin to head down to the entrance of the park. We stick our thumbs out to hitchhike back down and immediately get picked up by the sweetest couple I’ve ever met. And so we experience our 2nd dose of true Thai hospitality. They pick us up, and begin talking to us about where we’re from, who we are, etc. We learn that the woman’s name is Red Bull (at least that is what I heard), and they have a beautiful golden retriever named Gordon. When we reach the entrance, they ask us how long we are in Thailand and we reply 5 months, as we are studying at Thammasat. Once I drop the name Thammasat, the couple gets all excited and asks “Ooooh, Thammasat! Where you go, were you go?” We tell them we are going to Bangkok, and they ask us how we are getting there. We reply we are trying to get to the Pak Chong bus station, but don’t quite know where that is. They very kindly offer to take us, and off we go, after picking up Gordon at their house. They take us all the way to the bus station (which Sofia and I would have spent 5 hours trying to find without them), and wish us luck in the future, and we bid our farewells. They were probably some of the sweetest people I have ever met, and Sofia and I realize how lucky we got this weekend. It had the potential to be a terrible, rainy weekend full of leeches, but instead we had an incredible experience due to the good nature, and generosity of Thai people. This really is the Land of Smiles.
After arriving home from Pat Pong at 6am, I wake up at 7:30 a.m. to head to Khao Yai National Park with Sofia, my Swedish friend. Khao Yai National Park is about 2.5 hours north of Bangkok and it was quite the journey to get there. First thing I had to do was wake up Jin at his apartment to get my camera from last night (sorry Jin!!), then I grabbed a cab and headed to the skytrain, about 20km away. I took the skytrain to Mo Chit, and met up with Sofia. From there, we walked through the weekend market and grabbed another taxi to get to the northeastern Bangkok bus terminal. From there, we get on a bus to Pak Chong, and after 2.5 hours, the bus driver starts yelling at us in Thai to get off the bus, and we get dropped off in the middle of the street, with no idea where we are. Luckily, a Thai helps us and takes us across the street, where we wait for about 30 minutes for a truck taxi, which takes us to the entrance of Khao Yai National Park. Once at the park, Sofia and I try to sneak in to avoid paying the 400 baht foreigner entrance fee. After about 20 minutes of walking, the park ranger picks us up and takes us back to the entrance and makes us pay. Darn good try though! Then, I flash my Thammasat ID and get a student discount, yay! Okay, next thing we have to do is hitchhike (which is completely safe and normal at Khao Yai) to the top of the park, which is about 14 km from the entrance. This is where things get interesting. We are able to catch a ride with Katchaloyaman (?), a 60 year old man who immediately takes a liking to Sofia, as he has spent some time in Sweden. He takes us to the visitor center and tells them we want to rent a tent and camp. Apparently the ranger tells him we cannot camp, as the campgrounds are much too wet. Um duh, who goes camping during monsoon season?? Me. Without any hesitation, Katchaloyaman (I think I made this name up, but it could be almost correct) states that he is going to take us to his lodge, where we can stay free of charge. So, he takes us to this beautiful, clean room with a queen size bed, blankets, pillows, a hot shower, and even toilet paper in the bathroom (this is fancy stuff!). At this point, Sofia and I are really confused and don’t really understand what is happening (really, we can stay here for free?? Really? REALLY? But, why?), as we are not used to Thai hospitality. In Bangkok, there isn’t much true Thai hospitality, as they are very used to foreigners and instead of being genuinely friendly and kind, they fake it to rip farang off.
So, this incredibly kind man not only lets us stay in a clean, safe place for the night (thank god we didn’t end up in a tent, we would have died), but he also invited us to his 60th birthday/retirement party in the main lodge. So, we clean up and head down to the party, where we see a huge table set up with tons of food. Everything from an entire fish cut open, to pig fillets, to beef, peanuts, rice, noodles, chicken, and many other things I am not sure what they are. It was incredible, there were probably 100 people at this party, and Sofia and I spent the night hanging out, trying new food, and trying to talk to some of the Thai people there. After a couple hours, we head back to our lodge, take a hot shower (phenomenal), and walk around the area for a few minutes. That didn’t last too long though, as it was about 55 degrees outside, which actually felt amazing, compared to the hot, humidity of Bangkok we have been experiencing for the last 6 weeks. We go to bed, and wake up a little late for breakfast, thereby missing Katchaloyaman, as he has already headed home. Although, when I initially woke up, I saw him sitting outside our lodge, waiting for us, probably to say goodbye and offer us a ride home to Bangkok. What a sweet man. So, Sofia and I go to the main lodge and enjoy a breakfast of sweet rice, cake, and coffee with some of last night’s partiers. After breakfast, we begin the 5km hike back down to the visitor’s center, where some hiking trails are. After finally arriving, Sofia and I head into the jungle! This is Sofia’s first hiking/camping experience, and she certainly had an interesting one. Since it was so rainy and muddy, there were leeches EVERYWHERE. I reassured Sofia that they wouldn’t jump on us, so long as we kept moving. Well, I was wrong. They jumped on us. Sofia spent a good portion of the hike screaming, and swatting at her legs and feet, as the leeches were all over her (and I). They are harmless but freakishly annoying. They just latch on to you, and its quite difficult to get them all off. By the end of the hike, Sofia and I had some bloody feet. But, were we deterred from other hiking trails? Not yet. Soon, though. We take a break, grab some food, and head into another hiking trail. This one was exceptionally muddy and therefore, very slow going. After about 25 minutes of hiking through this trail, we come to a point where there is a stream, with only a single branch going from one end to another. Sofia and I stare at it for a few minutes, and I hand her my backpack and begin to try and “tight-rope” it. Doesn’t quite work, as I can’t balance enough to make it across without some kind of stabilization. So, I grab a branch, use it to stabilize myself and slowly make it across the stream. As I’m walking, I hear some branches breaking and leaves rustling and my first thought is “Oh goodness, tiger. Oh, my, god.” So, I get to the other end, look at Sofia (who looks as scared as I feel), and say “so shall we head back?” and she positively replies. Okay, I go right back across the stream I just traversed, and Sofia and I begin walking very quickly out of the jungle, as we are not feeling entirely comfortable at this point. We finally make it out of the jungle, and look down at our feet and legs. A bloody mess indeed. Not too bad, but we definitely need to clean ourselves up. We head to the cafeteria, find a water hose, and spend the next 30 minutes cleaning our feet and eating. Then, we visit the visitor’s center, take some pictures with the animals (which are thankfully not alive), and begin to head down to the entrance of the park. We stick our thumbs out to hitchhike back down and immediately get picked up by the sweetest couple I’ve ever met. And so we experience our 2nd dose of true Thai hospitality. They pick us up, and begin talking to us about where we’re from, who we are, etc. We learn that the woman’s name is Red Bull (at least that is what I heard), and they have a beautiful golden retriever named Gordon. When we reach the entrance, they ask us how long we are in Thailand and we reply 5 months, as we are studying at Thammasat. Once I drop the name Thammasat, the couple gets all excited and asks “Ooooh, Thammasat! Where you go, were you go?” We tell them we are going to Bangkok, and they ask us how we are getting there. We reply we are trying to get to the Pak Chong bus station, but don’t quite know where that is. They very kindly offer to take us, and off we go, after picking up Gordon at their house. They take us all the way to the bus station (which Sofia and I would have spent 5 hours trying to find without them), and wish us luck in the future, and we bid our farewells. They were probably some of the sweetest people I have ever met, and Sofia and I realize how lucky we got this weekend. It had the potential to be a terrible, rainy weekend full of leeches, but instead we had an incredible experience due to the good nature, and generosity of Thai people. This really is the Land of Smiles.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Ranksit + Another Peeing Catastrophe
Remember my posting about finding the swimming pool where people swim all over the place and bump into each other? Well, I decided to venture out on my own and find a better pool. So, after class Tuesday morning, I grab lunch and hop on an bus to Ranskit, the other Thammasat campus, about 45-1.5 hours away (depending on traffic). That's right, I spent almost 3 hours in a bus just to swim and workout. But, anyway, the pool was incredible. I dare say it was possibly even better than Gregory gym (the pools at UT campus, which are beautiful)....but it wasn't necessarily better, just different, with more laps. Anyway, so I hop in the water, which is SO cold and it was just incredibly refreshing. So, I swim all by myself, in my own lane, with no fear of running into anyone, and no one swimming horizontally across my lane. It was beautiful. Then, I lifted some weights (for the 2nd time in almost 6 weeks now!), and walked around the Ranksit (aka, I will now refer to it as Ratskin, because I think that is a more fun name) campus for a little while, trying to find food. After about 30 minutes, I find the canteen (cafeteria) and every single thing on the menu is written in Thai. All I know is how much everything costs (numbers are the same in every language!) I'm a bit nervous to randomly get something, for fear that I will get pork, or worse, chicken blood. So, I ask a student for help, and then I proceed to present myself as a really annoying, hard to please American. Here is how our conversation goes:
Me: Hi, I'm sorry to bother you, but do you know what that is (I point at some container of food)?
Him: Can I help you? Oh, yes, that is pork.
Me: Oh, okay. Is there any chicken?
Him: Yes, that is chicken (points at a chicken leg)
Me: Oh, no, how about chicken breast?
Him: Oh yes, there is some fried chicken over there
Me: Oh, no I don't really do fried food.
Him: Oh.
Me: Hmm, maybe tofu?
Him: Yes, that is tofu (points at fried tofu)
Me: Oh, no, I dont really do fried tofu either. Um, is there maybe anything healthy?
Him: Noodles and soup?
Me: Yes, that could work! Can she put chicken in there?
Him: Yes (points at chicken leg)
Me: Oh, no, just the soup and noodles will be fine.
Him: Which soup do you want?
Me: (I point at the first one) How about this one?
Him: Okay, the spicy soup.
Me: Oh no! I don't really do spicy.
Him: How about that one? It has mushrooms.
Me: Okay. Oh wait, right there is chicken breast!
Him: Oh ya. Do you want to try it?
Me: Yes. ( I put it in my mouth, and then make a gross face)
Him: Do you want to spit it out?
Me: Yes (and I do). Hey, what is that? Liver? (I point at something I always thought was liver, which I see at most canteens, and is put in most meals)
Him: No, that is chicken blood.
Me: WHAT?!? (It's really gross, trust me, it's hardened chicken blood in block form)
Him: Yes, it is really healthy
Me: WHAT?!? You guys EAT chicken blood?!? Okay, I'll have the soup and noodles. Thank you so much for your help.
Him: Yes, sure sure. I will leave now.
Me: Okay, thank you!! Bye.
So, that is about the most difficult I have ever been with food. I usually just eat whatever, but for some reason, I was not having it that day. Oh by the way, I ate my noodles and soup and it was not very good. 20 minutes later, I walk by a big sign that says "Main Canteen", where there is about 30 different food stands to choose meals from, and I bet some of those signs were even in English. Sigh.
Then, I try to find a shuttle bus going back to Prachin campus (the Thammasat campus I attend, and live by). I walk around lost for a while, but its actually really nice because the Ratskin campus is beautiful, with trees, a stream flowing throughout the campus and a pretty cool dualing dragon structure. Next time I go back, I'll be sure to take some pictures. Anyway, I eventually find the bus and spend the next 2 hours of my life in Bangkok traffic, having to pee. Grrr, BKK traffic has to be some of the worst in the world. Some of the boys from LA say it is at times worse than LA traffic.
Alright, we finally arrive at Prachin TU campus, and I run to the nearest bathroom to pee. I walk into the bathroom, which are only squatter toilets, and at this point, I don't even care. So, I pee, and then realize there is of course no toilet paper, and I have too many things in my bag to bother looking for some tissue. So, the bathrooms also have these water hoses (I can't remember the name of them) that the Thais use to spray their bottoms after using the restroom, and then they wait for themselves to dry before putting their pants back on (thereby eliminating the need for toilet paper). I decide to try this. I pick up the hose-type device and pull the trigger, expecting a nice, small stream of water to flow out. Um, no. A powerful gush of water comes out, and I of course panic and fumble with the house, and the water just goes shooting everywhere. All over myself, the toilet, the walls, the door, just everywhere. A couple seconds go by before I get everything under control, and by that time, the entire bathroom stall is just dripping in water. Oops. I feel kind of bad. But not too bad, because they really should have just had toilet paper.
Ahhh, gotta run, have a squash match! More later....
Me: Hi, I'm sorry to bother you, but do you know what that is (I point at some container of food)?
Him: Can I help you? Oh, yes, that is pork.
Me: Oh, okay. Is there any chicken?
Him: Yes, that is chicken (points at a chicken leg)
Me: Oh, no, how about chicken breast?
Him: Oh yes, there is some fried chicken over there
Me: Oh, no I don't really do fried food.
Him: Oh.
Me: Hmm, maybe tofu?
Him: Yes, that is tofu (points at fried tofu)
Me: Oh, no, I dont really do fried tofu either. Um, is there maybe anything healthy?
Him: Noodles and soup?
Me: Yes, that could work! Can she put chicken in there?
Him: Yes (points at chicken leg)
Me: Oh, no, just the soup and noodles will be fine.
Him: Which soup do you want?
Me: (I point at the first one) How about this one?
Him: Okay, the spicy soup.
Me: Oh no! I don't really do spicy.
Him: How about that one? It has mushrooms.
Me: Okay. Oh wait, right there is chicken breast!
Him: Oh ya. Do you want to try it?
Me: Yes. ( I put it in my mouth, and then make a gross face)
Him: Do you want to spit it out?
Me: Yes (and I do). Hey, what is that? Liver? (I point at something I always thought was liver, which I see at most canteens, and is put in most meals)
Him: No, that is chicken blood.
Me: WHAT?!? (It's really gross, trust me, it's hardened chicken blood in block form)
Him: Yes, it is really healthy
Me: WHAT?!? You guys EAT chicken blood?!? Okay, I'll have the soup and noodles. Thank you so much for your help.
Him: Yes, sure sure. I will leave now.
Me: Okay, thank you!! Bye.
So, that is about the most difficult I have ever been with food. I usually just eat whatever, but for some reason, I was not having it that day. Oh by the way, I ate my noodles and soup and it was not very good. 20 minutes later, I walk by a big sign that says "Main Canteen", where there is about 30 different food stands to choose meals from, and I bet some of those signs were even in English. Sigh.
Then, I try to find a shuttle bus going back to Prachin campus (the Thammasat campus I attend, and live by). I walk around lost for a while, but its actually really nice because the Ratskin campus is beautiful, with trees, a stream flowing throughout the campus and a pretty cool dualing dragon structure. Next time I go back, I'll be sure to take some pictures. Anyway, I eventually find the bus and spend the next 2 hours of my life in Bangkok traffic, having to pee. Grrr, BKK traffic has to be some of the worst in the world. Some of the boys from LA say it is at times worse than LA traffic.
Alright, we finally arrive at Prachin TU campus, and I run to the nearest bathroom to pee. I walk into the bathroom, which are only squatter toilets, and at this point, I don't even care. So, I pee, and then realize there is of course no toilet paper, and I have too many things in my bag to bother looking for some tissue. So, the bathrooms also have these water hoses (I can't remember the name of them) that the Thais use to spray their bottoms after using the restroom, and then they wait for themselves to dry before putting their pants back on (thereby eliminating the need for toilet paper). I decide to try this. I pick up the hose-type device and pull the trigger, expecting a nice, small stream of water to flow out. Um, no. A powerful gush of water comes out, and I of course panic and fumble with the house, and the water just goes shooting everywhere. All over myself, the toilet, the walls, the door, just everywhere. A couple seconds go by before I get everything under control, and by that time, the entire bathroom stall is just dripping in water. Oops. I feel kind of bad. But not too bad, because they really should have just had toilet paper.
Ahhh, gotta run, have a squash match! More later....
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Pictures!!
Okay, wow so I didn't know people were leaving comments on my blog! Thanks for telling me, Mom!
Now that I have figured that out, I have started posting picture online so you all can experience Thailand, through my eyes. Here is the link:
http://photobucket.com/TraceinThailand
It's messy right now, but I'll try to get lots of pictures online and clean it up soon!
Enjoy!
Now that I have figured that out, I have started posting picture online so you all can experience Thailand, through my eyes. Here is the link:
http://photobucket.com/TraceinThailand
It's messy right now, but I'll try to get lots of pictures online and clean it up soon!
Enjoy!
Monday, September 8, 2008
Thamassat Law Club Weekend Trip
To begin, this past week marked the beginning of the political demonstrations in Bangkok and the Prime Minister’s declaration of a state of emergency in Thailand. Due to the proximity of the political riots to TU campus, classes were canceled Tuesday and Wednesday. I used those 2 days off to catch up on reading for my classes and go grocery shopping. I finally starting cooking—chicken and brown rice, fancy! To go back to the state of emergency, the political protests are coming from the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), who are upset with the current Prime Minister, because they feel like he is a puppet for the last prime minister, who was forced to resign in 2006. Currently, PAD are refusing to step down until Samak, the current PM, resigns, which he is also refusing to do. So, there is a deadlock right now, and no one knows when it will end, but in the meantime, I don’t feel like the political situation has affected my life here or has put me in any danger.
So, we left Friday morning at 9am, Thai time, ie, we actually left at 10am to head to Panchaburi (?), a beautiful and quiet beach by Hua Hin. We took a 5 hour bus ride, complete with no A/C and 3 people to every 2 seats. Oh boy, not a fun bus ride at all. Once we arrived, we checked into out bungalow resort and realized the sleeping situation was about the same as the bus situation. 4-7 people per room. One bed per room. Haha, I felt so bad for the people who had 7 people in a room with one bed! My room was only 4 people, so it worked out fine. After dropping our things off in our rooms, we head to the beach and splash around, play a game of volleyball with our Spongebob Squarepants beach ball, and of course, tag. Wheww, I was tired after about 10 minutes; I really need to hit up a gym! After playing at the beach for a while, we shower up and all gather for a buffet-style dinner, in a candle-lit setting right on the beach. The ambience was beautiful; I only wish I could say the same about the food. We had a squid and octopus dinner that was so spicy, none of the international students could eat it! So, we basically just ate rice and fruit for dinner. Mai ben rai.
After dinner, we grab some drinks and party all night on the beach. The next morning, we wake up to a breakfast of squid and octopus porridge (yum!). Perfect for a hangover ☺ Then, a group of about 35 of us hop back on the bus and drive an hour away to a national park on the beach which involves a 1 hour hike that leads into an enormous cave. It was quite a hike getting to the cave, but once we got inside, it was so worth it. It was beautiful inside, and reminded me of something out of Jurassic Park. I wanted to stay there all day, but unfortunately we got ushered out after a few minutes. Then, we took a longtail boat back to shore, to avoid the 1-hour hike back. Funny thing about the boat ride back was that we got dropped off about 100 meters from shore. So, we all had to get out, hike up our shorts and walk through the water the rest of the way back. In that 100-meter walk, I spotted 4 jellyfish. Eeeee, glad they didn’t get too close to me. A few days before, a group of exchange students were swimming a few miles from the beach we were staying at, and got stung by a school of jellyfish. Ouch. At least it wasn’t a school of sharks.
After arriving back from our 5 hour hiking journey, we shower and gather up for dinner. Guess what it was? Squid and octopus, what a surprise!! Haha, we also had barbequed fish and crab, so it was a much better meal than the others. After dinner, we grab some drinks and start playing some ridiculous games. We must have played these games for a long time, because next thing I know it is 4 am! Time for bed, as Simon, a German exchange student, and I agreed to go for a run on the beach at 8am. So, my alarm rings at 7:45 am, and up I go to wake up Simon and head to the beach. Another German exchange student joins us, and we go on a fantastic 2-3 mile run along the beach. At the end of the beach, we find a rock mountain, which we decide to hike up, shoeless. Those were some jagged rocks, but it was worth it! The view was spectacular and hiking up it was fun as well. After hiking back down, we run back to our hotel, rest for another hour, grab lunch, and begin the oh-so-fun bus journey back home. This journey was especially fun, as most of the people on the bus were decently hung-over. After about an hour on the bus, we stop at a big rest area/sweets market. Me, at a food market full of Thai sweets? Dangerous!! Oh my gosh, I went nuts. First, I had ice cream with sticky rice in it (there was also the option to put corn in the ice cream. Hmmm….maybe next time), then I had something which I can’t even begin to explain. Think a sweeter version of cornbread in some type of banana leaf. Then, I went to the actual market of sweets and I saw about 5 open containers…time to sample! I had no idea what I was sampling, but I definitely swung around and had about 3 rounds of samples. So delish! Oh man, no need for lunch today! After getting back on the bus and finally arriving home, a group of about 6 of us exchange students decided to go home, get cleaned up and then head to a pizza place on Rambuttri Street, right next to Kao San Road. The pizza was so good—thin crust, old-fashioned wood-oven pizza! After dinner, we walked around Kao San Road for a few minutes to buy some souvenirs and then head home and get to sleep.
Overall, not the most adventurous and exciting weekend, but it was great fun, and I got to meet some new exchange students and some Thai students as well. I have a Finance quiz tomorrow, so most of today will be spent studying for that. Oh joy.
Ciao!
So, we left Friday morning at 9am, Thai time, ie, we actually left at 10am to head to Panchaburi (?), a beautiful and quiet beach by Hua Hin. We took a 5 hour bus ride, complete with no A/C and 3 people to every 2 seats. Oh boy, not a fun bus ride at all. Once we arrived, we checked into out bungalow resort and realized the sleeping situation was about the same as the bus situation. 4-7 people per room. One bed per room. Haha, I felt so bad for the people who had 7 people in a room with one bed! My room was only 4 people, so it worked out fine. After dropping our things off in our rooms, we head to the beach and splash around, play a game of volleyball with our Spongebob Squarepants beach ball, and of course, tag. Wheww, I was tired after about 10 minutes; I really need to hit up a gym! After playing at the beach for a while, we shower up and all gather for a buffet-style dinner, in a candle-lit setting right on the beach. The ambience was beautiful; I only wish I could say the same about the food. We had a squid and octopus dinner that was so spicy, none of the international students could eat it! So, we basically just ate rice and fruit for dinner. Mai ben rai.
After dinner, we grab some drinks and party all night on the beach. The next morning, we wake up to a breakfast of squid and octopus porridge (yum!). Perfect for a hangover ☺ Then, a group of about 35 of us hop back on the bus and drive an hour away to a national park on the beach which involves a 1 hour hike that leads into an enormous cave. It was quite a hike getting to the cave, but once we got inside, it was so worth it. It was beautiful inside, and reminded me of something out of Jurassic Park. I wanted to stay there all day, but unfortunately we got ushered out after a few minutes. Then, we took a longtail boat back to shore, to avoid the 1-hour hike back. Funny thing about the boat ride back was that we got dropped off about 100 meters from shore. So, we all had to get out, hike up our shorts and walk through the water the rest of the way back. In that 100-meter walk, I spotted 4 jellyfish. Eeeee, glad they didn’t get too close to me. A few days before, a group of exchange students were swimming a few miles from the beach we were staying at, and got stung by a school of jellyfish. Ouch. At least it wasn’t a school of sharks.
After arriving back from our 5 hour hiking journey, we shower and gather up for dinner. Guess what it was? Squid and octopus, what a surprise!! Haha, we also had barbequed fish and crab, so it was a much better meal than the others. After dinner, we grab some drinks and start playing some ridiculous games. We must have played these games for a long time, because next thing I know it is 4 am! Time for bed, as Simon, a German exchange student, and I agreed to go for a run on the beach at 8am. So, my alarm rings at 7:45 am, and up I go to wake up Simon and head to the beach. Another German exchange student joins us, and we go on a fantastic 2-3 mile run along the beach. At the end of the beach, we find a rock mountain, which we decide to hike up, shoeless. Those were some jagged rocks, but it was worth it! The view was spectacular and hiking up it was fun as well. After hiking back down, we run back to our hotel, rest for another hour, grab lunch, and begin the oh-so-fun bus journey back home. This journey was especially fun, as most of the people on the bus were decently hung-over. After about an hour on the bus, we stop at a big rest area/sweets market. Me, at a food market full of Thai sweets? Dangerous!! Oh my gosh, I went nuts. First, I had ice cream with sticky rice in it (there was also the option to put corn in the ice cream. Hmmm….maybe next time), then I had something which I can’t even begin to explain. Think a sweeter version of cornbread in some type of banana leaf. Then, I went to the actual market of sweets and I saw about 5 open containers…time to sample! I had no idea what I was sampling, but I definitely swung around and had about 3 rounds of samples. So delish! Oh man, no need for lunch today! After getting back on the bus and finally arriving home, a group of about 6 of us exchange students decided to go home, get cleaned up and then head to a pizza place on Rambuttri Street, right next to Kao San Road. The pizza was so good—thin crust, old-fashioned wood-oven pizza! After dinner, we walked around Kao San Road for a few minutes to buy some souvenirs and then head home and get to sleep.
Overall, not the most adventurous and exciting weekend, but it was great fun, and I got to meet some new exchange students and some Thai students as well. I have a Finance quiz tomorrow, so most of today will be spent studying for that. Oh joy.
Ciao!
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Leo & Muay Thai Pain
I was walking home yesterday and I ran into an elephant on the street. His name was Leo. Leo was BIG and so cute. Leo ate food out of my hand and his trunk scared me. I petted Leo and he was coarse and hairy. I liked Leo. Maybe I will run into him on the streets of Bangkok again??
On a separate note, I went to Muay Thai training today and the instructor told me to lie down on the ground, with my legs bent very uncomfortably behind me. Since I always do as I am told (!), I obediently lie down with my legs bent in a way they probably aren't meant to bend. Then, he proceeds to step all over me! Ughhh, that man is so much stronger than he looks. And, as hes doing it, he tells me "Thai massage, thai massage". Haha!! That is so not a thai massage. Then, I flip over, and he steps ALL over my back. This actually felt amazing.... I am pretty sure he cracked every bone in my body by the time he was done with me. Wow, way to start off training; I hadn't even thrown a punch yet and already I was sweating (both literally and figuratively)
That's it for today. This has to be a record for my shortest blog yet.
oh ps. this if for the family. *Disclaimer*- Contrary to popular belief, I do attend classes and I actually have textbooks which I read, highlight and takes notes on. I even (attempt) Finance problems. In fact, I studied all day yesterday. It was the most depressing day I've had since I've been here.... I almost jumped off my 35th floor balcony. Um, just kidding. I don't blog about my classes because they will put you to sleep! Has this paragraph put you to sleep yet?? Case in point!
Off to the Faculty of Law's organized trip to a resort/beach (I think... I really couldn't understand what they were saying when they were explaining this) this weekend! I'll bring my Finance problems to study :)
On a separate note, I went to Muay Thai training today and the instructor told me to lie down on the ground, with my legs bent very uncomfortably behind me. Since I always do as I am told (!), I obediently lie down with my legs bent in a way they probably aren't meant to bend. Then, he proceeds to step all over me! Ughhh, that man is so much stronger than he looks. And, as hes doing it, he tells me "Thai massage, thai massage". Haha!! That is so not a thai massage. Then, I flip over, and he steps ALL over my back. This actually felt amazing.... I am pretty sure he cracked every bone in my body by the time he was done with me. Wow, way to start off training; I hadn't even thrown a punch yet and already I was sweating (both literally and figuratively)
That's it for today. This has to be a record for my shortest blog yet.
oh ps. this if for the family. *Disclaimer*- Contrary to popular belief, I do attend classes and I actually have textbooks which I read, highlight and takes notes on. I even (attempt) Finance problems. In fact, I studied all day yesterday. It was the most depressing day I've had since I've been here.... I almost jumped off my 35th floor balcony. Um, just kidding. I don't blog about my classes because they will put you to sleep! Has this paragraph put you to sleep yet?? Case in point!
Off to the Faculty of Law's organized trip to a resort/beach (I think... I really couldn't understand what they were saying when they were explaining this) this weekend! I'll bring my Finance problems to study :)
Monday, September 1, 2008
Adventures on Phi Phi Island
Monica, my friend from UT, arrived in Thailand Wednesday evening to stay for 6 days before heading to Vienna, Austria for her own study abroad…yay! It was SO good to see a familiar face. After she arrived, we went out to Kao San Rd with 10 of the other exchange students to have dinner at a nice Japanese restaurant. Well, we thought it was nice until we got our food (which by the way, took as little as 15 minutes for one person to get their food and 1.5 hours for the last person to get her food), which was not so nice. Bad sushi, yuck. After braving sushi on Kao San Rd, we met up with a group of 10 other exchange students at an Indian restaurant & hookah bar. Well, after braving sushi and walking around for an hour in circles, we found the hookah restaurant. I am really awful at navigation, but as soon as Monica grabbed the phone from me and got directions, we found the place in about 10 minutes. Maybe she should study abroad in Bangkok. Damn confusing place. Okay, we go home around midnight and I quickly pack for Phuket, sleep for a few hours and head to Finance in the morning. Right after Finance, I run home, grab my bag, and Monica and I take off for the airport. I was nervous we weren’t going to make our flight on time, since the airport is a bit far away, but we ended up getting there almost 2 hours early, and just kickin it in the airport. Then when we went through security, they took away Monica’s sunscreen and we ended up using this little sunstick I happened to have in my bag for the entire trip since we didn’t want to buy a $15 bottle of sunscreen on the island. Haha, that was pretty good. They also tried to take away my bath soap (after I initially tried to hide it from them), since it was over 100 mL, but I refused. I asked them if they wanted me to be dirty and they said no, and eventually let me keep it. I’ve realized that if someone says no to you here, they will typically succumb if you keep pressing them to change their mind. Remember how I almost missed the Attuyaha cultural tour because I woke up late and the coordinator tried to tell me about 5 times I couldn’t come? That’s a big difference between Westerners and people in SE Asia. SE Asians, and probably Asians in a whole, are typically not confrontational and will back down when confronted. Whereas in the States, when someone tells you no, they mean no.
Okay, so we get on the 1-hour plane and arrive in Phuket. Once we arrive, we book a hotel and are immediately hounded by people trying to get us to take their fixed-rate taxi into town. I had a horrible experience with a taxi when I first arrived in Bangkok… I was lost and confused and they ripped me off with a fixed-rate taxi, as opposed to a meter. Grr. So, I am really sensitive to non-metered taxis and I refused to get in one and I made Monica walk with me for about 45 minutes into town before we finally realized we weren’t going to get a taxi outside the airport, since that is where all the taxis were going. So, back to the airport we go. Sorry Monica!
Once we arrive at the hotel, we venture out to get some food and it begins pouring rain. Yes, we went to an island during monsoon season. We stop by a convenience store, and buy an umbrella, which we continuously leave in our hotel room and get caught in pouring rain on at least 4 more occasions. How useless.
Okay, we spend the night at a couple bars in Phuket, as I watch Monica drink. Once again, sorry Monica. I am a terrible drinking buddy, but a great DD! Too bad I don’t drive in Thailand…now I am just a terrible drinking buddy. Okay, we go home, and pass out, and Monica pulls a Kasha on me. Kasha was my dog in El Paso and whenever I was with her at night, I would let her sleep on my bed with me. Well, by the end of the night, Kasha was sprawled diagonally across the bed and I was sleeping in a tight ball on the corner of the bed. I suppose that is what I get for being a non-drinking, drinking buddy and making us walk around the airport for 45 minutes.
The next morning, we take a taxi shuttle + ferry to Phi Phi island. Funny story, the night before, Monica and I called the taxi +ferry company and I spent at least 10 minutes on the phone with them, trying to tell them my phone number. Went something like this: Me: “0-800-58-2439” Lady on phone: “0281-28-94-1?” “Noooo….” (repeat 10 times) I then tried to repeat my phone number in Thai and the lady on the phone told me to tell her again, in English. Wow, my Thai must be really terrible if a Thai woman is asking me to speak to her in English.
Once we arrive in Phi Phi, we find a guesthouse to stay at, leave our umbrella there (mistake #1), and rent a kayak (mistake # 2). Just kidding, the kayaking was actually really great, we were all alone in the beautiful, vast sea and we paddled out to a big rock for a couple hours. But at the end, I got seasick and almost puked. I didn’t know I was a seasick type of person. And then, once we got back, the people we rented the kayaks from asked if we went to Monkey island, which as the name implies, is an island full of monkeys hopping around. No, we went to a rock instead. A rock. Not a special rock, just a rock I made us paddle out to. I need to not be allowed to make decisions while traveling. By the way, the weather was beautiful and the sun was shining the entire time. We get back, and as soon as we return our kayaks, it begins pouring. Literally 2 minutes before the sun was out, and everything was clear and just peachy keen. Now it is monsooning, crazy. So, we go to an Indian restaurant to seek solace from the rain and end up having some really good and expensive (7 USD for dinner, outrageous!!!) Indian meal. Then, we leave to take showers and get caught in the pouring rain, sans umbrella (which is safely stowed away in the room. Brilliant).
Next, Monica and I go get massages. Afterwards, I persuade Monica that we should go to bed at about 11 pm on a Friday night. I am such a party animal.
The next morning, we get up early and change guest houses (word of wisdom, if going to Phi Phi, do not stay at Uphill Cottages. They should be named Downhill Cottages), and then arrange our bus ticket home (all airports and trains have been closed due to political demonstrations in Bangkok). Before all this, we eat breakfast and after ordering I leave to find an osmosis tank to fill up our water bottles (I remembered seeing one on the way back from the club last night). I literally am gone for over 30 minutes, b/c I walked to the other side of the island to find the damn osmosis water tank. After finally getting back to breakfast and eating, we leave and 10 feet later, I see another osmosis water tank. Of course. Okay, so next we sign up for rock climbing and after a couple hours on the beach, off we go to climb! While climbing, we met some really cool Aussies and an English girl. After climbing from about 1pm-7pm, we shower and meet up with the Aussies for dinner at Ciao Bella, an Italian restaurant right on the beach. We have a nice, long meal and then head back to the rock climbing store to meet up with the English girl and her friend and then we head to the clubs for the Black Moon party. At one of the clubs, there are some Thai guys performing fire dances, which we watch for a while, and afterwards, the performance area turns into a dance club. Oooh, and at one point I walked off to find Monica, and I run into these two Irish girls who ask me to take a picture for them. After I take a picture, one of them starts telling me how its a bad idea to get your lip pierced while drunk (bad idea, really?), and then next thing I know I find myself in a tattoo/piercing parlor. Don't worry, I wasn't in there for myself. I was in there to watch this inebriated German guy get his nipple pierced....ouch!!!
Shortly afterwards, I go home and Monica follows suit about 7 hours later, lol.... she gets home as I wake up. Then we both sleep for a few more hours, go to the beach for a little while in the afternoon and head to Kruabi island to catch our bus back to Bangkok. 12 hour bus back to Bangkok, actually not as bad as I thought it would be. We arrive at 4:30 a.m., go home for a few hours to catch up on emails, and then head to school at 9am.
After class, Monica and I do some Muay Thai and then take a journey to find a good massage parlor my friend recommended. We finally find it and have a great massage, which was much needed after that bus ride. Then, we grab dinner, shower and head to a Ladyboy cabaret show. Ladyboys are male to female transvestites, who are really big in Thailand and the cabaret show was full of some of the most gorgeous women (genetically male or female) I have ever seen. It was quite amazing--they were hott!!
*Just found out school was canceled today for safety concerns due to the political protests and possible coup happening in Bangkok. Hip Hip Hooray, back to bed!*
Okay, so we get on the 1-hour plane and arrive in Phuket. Once we arrive, we book a hotel and are immediately hounded by people trying to get us to take their fixed-rate taxi into town. I had a horrible experience with a taxi when I first arrived in Bangkok… I was lost and confused and they ripped me off with a fixed-rate taxi, as opposed to a meter. Grr. So, I am really sensitive to non-metered taxis and I refused to get in one and I made Monica walk with me for about 45 minutes into town before we finally realized we weren’t going to get a taxi outside the airport, since that is where all the taxis were going. So, back to the airport we go. Sorry Monica!
Once we arrive at the hotel, we venture out to get some food and it begins pouring rain. Yes, we went to an island during monsoon season. We stop by a convenience store, and buy an umbrella, which we continuously leave in our hotel room and get caught in pouring rain on at least 4 more occasions. How useless.
Okay, we spend the night at a couple bars in Phuket, as I watch Monica drink. Once again, sorry Monica. I am a terrible drinking buddy, but a great DD! Too bad I don’t drive in Thailand…now I am just a terrible drinking buddy. Okay, we go home, and pass out, and Monica pulls a Kasha on me. Kasha was my dog in El Paso and whenever I was with her at night, I would let her sleep on my bed with me. Well, by the end of the night, Kasha was sprawled diagonally across the bed and I was sleeping in a tight ball on the corner of the bed. I suppose that is what I get for being a non-drinking, drinking buddy and making us walk around the airport for 45 minutes.
The next morning, we take a taxi shuttle + ferry to Phi Phi island. Funny story, the night before, Monica and I called the taxi +ferry company and I spent at least 10 minutes on the phone with them, trying to tell them my phone number. Went something like this: Me: “0-800-58-2439” Lady on phone: “0281-28-94-1?” “Noooo….” (repeat 10 times) I then tried to repeat my phone number in Thai and the lady on the phone told me to tell her again, in English. Wow, my Thai must be really terrible if a Thai woman is asking me to speak to her in English.
Once we arrive in Phi Phi, we find a guesthouse to stay at, leave our umbrella there (mistake #1), and rent a kayak (mistake # 2). Just kidding, the kayaking was actually really great, we were all alone in the beautiful, vast sea and we paddled out to a big rock for a couple hours. But at the end, I got seasick and almost puked. I didn’t know I was a seasick type of person. And then, once we got back, the people we rented the kayaks from asked if we went to Monkey island, which as the name implies, is an island full of monkeys hopping around. No, we went to a rock instead. A rock. Not a special rock, just a rock I made us paddle out to. I need to not be allowed to make decisions while traveling. By the way, the weather was beautiful and the sun was shining the entire time. We get back, and as soon as we return our kayaks, it begins pouring. Literally 2 minutes before the sun was out, and everything was clear and just peachy keen. Now it is monsooning, crazy. So, we go to an Indian restaurant to seek solace from the rain and end up having some really good and expensive (7 USD for dinner, outrageous!!!) Indian meal. Then, we leave to take showers and get caught in the pouring rain, sans umbrella (which is safely stowed away in the room. Brilliant).
Next, Monica and I go get massages. Afterwards, I persuade Monica that we should go to bed at about 11 pm on a Friday night. I am such a party animal.
The next morning, we get up early and change guest houses (word of wisdom, if going to Phi Phi, do not stay at Uphill Cottages. They should be named Downhill Cottages), and then arrange our bus ticket home (all airports and trains have been closed due to political demonstrations in Bangkok). Before all this, we eat breakfast and after ordering I leave to find an osmosis tank to fill up our water bottles (I remembered seeing one on the way back from the club last night). I literally am gone for over 30 minutes, b/c I walked to the other side of the island to find the damn osmosis water tank. After finally getting back to breakfast and eating, we leave and 10 feet later, I see another osmosis water tank. Of course. Okay, so next we sign up for rock climbing and after a couple hours on the beach, off we go to climb! While climbing, we met some really cool Aussies and an English girl. After climbing from about 1pm-7pm, we shower and meet up with the Aussies for dinner at Ciao Bella, an Italian restaurant right on the beach. We have a nice, long meal and then head back to the rock climbing store to meet up with the English girl and her friend and then we head to the clubs for the Black Moon party. At one of the clubs, there are some Thai guys performing fire dances, which we watch for a while, and afterwards, the performance area turns into a dance club. Oooh, and at one point I walked off to find Monica, and I run into these two Irish girls who ask me to take a picture for them. After I take a picture, one of them starts telling me how its a bad idea to get your lip pierced while drunk (bad idea, really?), and then next thing I know I find myself in a tattoo/piercing parlor. Don't worry, I wasn't in there for myself. I was in there to watch this inebriated German guy get his nipple pierced....ouch!!!
Shortly afterwards, I go home and Monica follows suit about 7 hours later, lol.... she gets home as I wake up. Then we both sleep for a few more hours, go to the beach for a little while in the afternoon and head to Kruabi island to catch our bus back to Bangkok. 12 hour bus back to Bangkok, actually not as bad as I thought it would be. We arrive at 4:30 a.m., go home for a few hours to catch up on emails, and then head to school at 9am.
After class, Monica and I do some Muay Thai and then take a journey to find a good massage parlor my friend recommended. We finally find it and have a great massage, which was much needed after that bus ride. Then, we grab dinner, shower and head to a Ladyboy cabaret show. Ladyboys are male to female transvestites, who are really big in Thailand and the cabaret show was full of some of the most gorgeous women (genetically male or female) I have ever seen. It was quite amazing--they were hott!!
*Just found out school was canceled today for safety concerns due to the political protests and possible coup happening in Bangkok. Hip Hip Hooray, back to bed!*
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Markets + Movies
Sunday, August 24: Played my first game of squash today! It was SO much fun ☺ I was super excited because up until this point, I’ve been playing racquetball (by myself), on the squash court in our apartment complex. Definitely a bit awkward. So, I played with this Norwegian grad student who also lives in the Rattanakosin, and both of us are new at squash, so we kind of make up the rules as we go along. That’s always a fun way to play a sport. After squash + shower, myself and 3 other guys went to the weekend market..MADNESS!! The weekend market huge—there must be thousands of booths/stores set up and thousands of people milling about. Needless to say, I lost the boys within about 15 minutes of being there (what was I thinking, going with boys?? For some odd reason, they didn’t want to look at dresses…) Anyway, my first stop was at a dress shop and I probably spent about 20 minutes there, “trying on” dresses. By “trying on”, I mean putting the dress over my clothes and crouching down to this small mirror to attempt to see how it looks. Oh, and stopping every 2 minutes to get the sweat out of my eyes. Alright, none of the dresses fit so I move on. I find another shop with a shirt and a dress I like and so begins the bargaining. I set the price at 160 baht for both shirts and she misinterprets me, thinking I am saying 160 baht for each. So, she begins the price at 360 baht, to which I laugh and say nono, 160 baht, to which she laughs and says nono, 180 baht and 150 baht= 330 baht. We argue for a few more seconds, and then she brings her friend over. I say something lower than 330 baht and he says “No, no, cannot do”. We repeat this process about 5 more times and exasperated, I finally say, “No, I am leaving”, fully expecting them to chase after me. They don’t. Damn, and I really liked those shirts. I liked them enough that I found them about an hour later and bought them for about 10 baht less than originally stated. Lol, so much for bargaining! Okay, next I am on the lookout for fisherman pants, which are really comfortable and breezy, aka great for this hot weather. I find a store with some fisherman pants and right away a Thai woman comes over and asks 180 baht for them. I immediately drop the price to 150, and she says no, and I say oh okay, that’s fine, I’ll walk around and come back later. She then drops the price to 170, and we repeat the process two more times until the price is at 150. Then, I drop it again to 140 and she says “ooh, you say 150 though”, and I start to walk away. Then, she chases after me and we settle at 140. Now, that’s the way it should be. Success. By the way, all this price bargaining is over about $1-2 USD, haha. But, with bigger things, you can bargain down a lot of money. One of my friends saw this cool elephant figurine and the seller first offered 2500 Baht for it. My friend almost talked it down to 1300 baht, but that was all the money he had. He wouldn’t have been able to eat dinner or get a cab home, but he would’ve had a sick huge elephant to take home!
After the market, Filipa, Sophie, Sofia, Lindsey and I go to MBK to watch Mama Mia at the cinema. Too bad Mama Mia wasn’t out yet (although I saw the pirated copy at the market!) Sofia and I watched Wall-E, and the others saw Made of Honor. Wall-E was cute, but I was really distracted because I was supposed to skype my mom and dad, but I completely forgot. My dad kept calling me during the movie and I continuously told Sofia to turn off her damn phone….turns out is was my phone. Oops…. I felt really awful about the situation, especially because my mom woke up early and went all the way to my dad’s to talk to me…but it wont happen again because she is getting a computer soon, yay!! Go Mom!
Monday, August 25- Signed up for Muay Thai (Thai kickboxing) today! So, basically Muay Thai is taught at school in this old, rusty little place, with no A/C. Mai ben rai….it has fans (that are also old and rusty) and is taught by this cute Thai man (who is also old and rusty). So, despite all the oldness and rustiness, Muay Thai is a GREAT workout! I sweat so much (did I mention there was no A/C and its about 1,000 degrees outside?), and am so tired after the instructor kicks my butt for an hour. It’s a really cool workout option though, because I would never do something like this at home. Maybe I will come back a boxer! I also wasted some more time today trying to talk to the bba office about classes, issues, etc. Inefficiency at its greatest!
Tuesday, August 26- Had my first finance quiz today. I think it went well, since there were no problems with actual numbers in it… Thank god. So much for my love of calculus and numbers….once words get mixed in with numbers, its not okay. Did Muay Thai again, and then went to my very first Intro Marketing class afterwards (with only a Mexican shower after Muay Thai….if you saw the unisex—yes, unisex—shower the university has, you would understand why I chose to take a Mexican shower. The shower is really just a hose coming out of a hole in the wall, and the door is basically a piece of wood that closes about ¾ of the way. Um, no thanks, even I have standards)
Later that night, myself and a few guys head down to Suan Lum Night Bazaar to hit up some cheap DVDs. I got 4 seasons of my fav tv. shows on DVD, and 2 movies for 1100 baht= about $35 dollars... love it! After that, we walked around lost for about 1 or 2 hours, and then settled at a beer garden to have a few drinks and watch a Thai band butcher some English songs. I actually thought they were speaking Thai until my friend said they were singing to a song from Grease...wow, I had no idea.
Wednesday, August 27- Monica Jamaluddin comes in today! So excited to see a familiar face ☺ We are heading to Phuket tomorrow after Finance…long post after our long weekend!
After the market, Filipa, Sophie, Sofia, Lindsey and I go to MBK to watch Mama Mia at the cinema. Too bad Mama Mia wasn’t out yet (although I saw the pirated copy at the market!) Sofia and I watched Wall-E, and the others saw Made of Honor. Wall-E was cute, but I was really distracted because I was supposed to skype my mom and dad, but I completely forgot. My dad kept calling me during the movie and I continuously told Sofia to turn off her damn phone….turns out is was my phone. Oops…. I felt really awful about the situation, especially because my mom woke up early and went all the way to my dad’s to talk to me…but it wont happen again because she is getting a computer soon, yay!! Go Mom!
Monday, August 25- Signed up for Muay Thai (Thai kickboxing) today! So, basically Muay Thai is taught at school in this old, rusty little place, with no A/C. Mai ben rai….it has fans (that are also old and rusty) and is taught by this cute Thai man (who is also old and rusty). So, despite all the oldness and rustiness, Muay Thai is a GREAT workout! I sweat so much (did I mention there was no A/C and its about 1,000 degrees outside?), and am so tired after the instructor kicks my butt for an hour. It’s a really cool workout option though, because I would never do something like this at home. Maybe I will come back a boxer! I also wasted some more time today trying to talk to the bba office about classes, issues, etc. Inefficiency at its greatest!
Tuesday, August 26- Had my first finance quiz today. I think it went well, since there were no problems with actual numbers in it… Thank god. So much for my love of calculus and numbers….once words get mixed in with numbers, its not okay. Did Muay Thai again, and then went to my very first Intro Marketing class afterwards (with only a Mexican shower after Muay Thai….if you saw the unisex—yes, unisex—shower the university has, you would understand why I chose to take a Mexican shower. The shower is really just a hose coming out of a hole in the wall, and the door is basically a piece of wood that closes about ¾ of the way. Um, no thanks, even I have standards)
Later that night, myself and a few guys head down to Suan Lum Night Bazaar to hit up some cheap DVDs. I got 4 seasons of my fav tv. shows on DVD, and 2 movies for 1100 baht= about $35 dollars... love it! After that, we walked around lost for about 1 or 2 hours, and then settled at a beer garden to have a few drinks and watch a Thai band butcher some English songs. I actually thought they were speaking Thai until my friend said they were singing to a song from Grease...wow, I had no idea.
Wednesday, August 27- Monica Jamaluddin comes in today! So excited to see a familiar face ☺ We are heading to Phuket tomorrow after Finance…long post after our long weekend!
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Ayutthaya + Puppet Show
What a great day today!
Went on Thamassat's (university I am studying at, referred to as TU from now on) bba trip to Ayutthaya, the ancient city. I was very impressed at how well organized the entire trip was (What, TU organized??? I know, that's what I thought!)
Before I talk about the trip, let me mention what I did yesterday, on Friday.
Friday, August 22- Took the 15 minute trek to Tops, a supermarket, to get pb, jelly and bread to make some good old fashioned pb & j sandwhiches. Now why would I do that when I have tons of adventurous, and amazing food to eat right outside my doorstep? Two words: Bangkok Belly. Google it. Hence why I also did not leave my apartment for the entire rest of the day. Literally, I didn't see another human being all day, after arriving home from the market. My stomach hurt so bad, all I could do was lay in bed all day and watch an ENTIRE season (I'm such a bum) of my favorite t.v. show on dvd. lol, good stuff.
Back to Saturday Ayutthaya tour. Okay, let me begin by saying we were supposed to meet at TU at 6:30 a.m. and leaving at 7 a.m. TU is about a 30 minute walk + 3 minute ferry away. Okay, I set my alarm for 6 a.m.. Of course it doesn't go off/ I dont hear it. Amin, another exchange student, calls me at 6:51 am and asks where I am. It wakes me up. I say "Oh shit, I'm on my way!" I quickly brush my teeth, hop into some clothes, grab my bag (or as Amin says, my beg) and head out the door. I grab a cab on my way out, as TU calls me asking where I am, and I beg them not to leave me ("You no come?" "Nono, I'm coming, I'm on my way, I'm almost there!!" "Okay, but no, you no come? You cant come.?" I dont know if that is a question or statement, but I reassure her I am on my way, and not to leave me... I really wanted to go on this tour).
I get in the cab, point to my watch and throw my hand out towards the street, indicating that this cab needs to put the pedal to the medal. He did....he wasn't messing around. So, I leave my apartment at about 6:58 a.m. and arrive at school at 7:07, 15 minutes after Amin calls me. Damn, I am good....well actually, I suck for not waking up on time....but 15 minutes, that has to be a record. Oh, and this whole time I couldn't call anyone to ask if they were waiting for me, since my phone ran out of $$ and I obviously didn't have time to stop and put more baht (Thai currency) on it. So, good start to the day.
Okay, I get on the bus, and immediately am offered water and some odd crab sandwhich...nice service. I throw my ipod in and relax for an hour before we reach our first destination, the Bang Pa-In, aka "Summer Palace" for the royal family. It was a really beautiful palace, etc etc.... after that we went to Ayutthaya, which is the ancient capital of Thailand, but has since been taken over by tourist stands and really cool ruins (does anyone know how to post pics on this blog?!?). Then, we pay respect at Wat Mahatad and Wat Phasrisanphet (what, you've never heard of those/cant pronounce it?? Geez, get with it people!!)...2 pretty bumpin temples. I see an enormous golden Buddha and have a sudden urge to climb to the top of it, but am told I will go to jail and maybe get put to death if I do that. So, I nix the idea.
Next is the best part; we board the Grand Pearl Cruise at Wat Chondlom Pier and enjoy a magnificent oriental and Western Style lunch buffet.... I finally got to eat bread and not just rice! Amazing. The cruise was absolutely beautiful and so much fun, although I had no idea what sights we were seeing. I do however remember the guide pointing out Bangkok Hilton. I asked, "Oh, is that the hotel in Bangkok?" Turns out it is one of the most horrific jails in the world...the inmates must eat roaches to stay alive, since all they are served is rice every day. I was just slightly off in my assumption. After being served dessert and coffee (of which I had about 6 cups, since I have been deprived for the past 2.5 weeks.... I know, poor me), we get dropped off at the night bazaar to do some shopping! Oh wait, it is 4:30 pm and the night bazaar doesnt open until 7pm. Hmm... what to do? Have a beer of course (well, banana shake for me.... so good, I think all the beer drinkers were actually quite jealous of my beverage of choice). At 6, we sit down for this incredible dinner, family style. The waiters just kept bringing us tons of new dishes, until we were stuffed! But not to stuffed for watermelon, pineapple and dragon fruit dessert....love Thai desserts! At 7, we proceed to walk around the night bazaar and I saw the entire seasons of my favorite tv show on sale for 400 baht (less than $15).... I was so excited, but I actually didn't get it, bc I know I can bargain for it and get it much cheaper, we just didn't have time since the puppet show started at 7:30.
Okay, the puppet show....wow, what a weird and cool new experience. It was a puppet performance telling the story of "The Birth of Ganesha"....it was awarded the first prize at the World Festival of Puppet Art in Prague, twice! It was really cool, the puppets fought and there were cool special effects and I didn't understand anything they were saying, as it was in Thai. But, still very cool. After that, time for home!
Another great day in Bangkok, time for bed to get ready for tomorrow: the weekend market + watching Mama Mia with the Swedes (they are excited about a movie based on a Swedish song [Mama Mia by ABBA])
Ciao baby!
Went on Thamassat's (university I am studying at, referred to as TU from now on) bba trip to Ayutthaya, the ancient city. I was very impressed at how well organized the entire trip was (What, TU organized??? I know, that's what I thought!)
Before I talk about the trip, let me mention what I did yesterday, on Friday.
Friday, August 22- Took the 15 minute trek to Tops, a supermarket, to get pb, jelly and bread to make some good old fashioned pb & j sandwhiches. Now why would I do that when I have tons of adventurous, and amazing food to eat right outside my doorstep? Two words: Bangkok Belly. Google it. Hence why I also did not leave my apartment for the entire rest of the day. Literally, I didn't see another human being all day, after arriving home from the market. My stomach hurt so bad, all I could do was lay in bed all day and watch an ENTIRE season (I'm such a bum) of my favorite t.v. show on dvd. lol, good stuff.
Back to Saturday Ayutthaya tour. Okay, let me begin by saying we were supposed to meet at TU at 6:30 a.m. and leaving at 7 a.m. TU is about a 30 minute walk + 3 minute ferry away. Okay, I set my alarm for 6 a.m.. Of course it doesn't go off/ I dont hear it. Amin, another exchange student, calls me at 6:51 am and asks where I am. It wakes me up. I say "Oh shit, I'm on my way!" I quickly brush my teeth, hop into some clothes, grab my bag (or as Amin says, my beg) and head out the door. I grab a cab on my way out, as TU calls me asking where I am, and I beg them not to leave me ("You no come?" "Nono, I'm coming, I'm on my way, I'm almost there!!" "Okay, but no, you no come? You cant come.?" I dont know if that is a question or statement, but I reassure her I am on my way, and not to leave me... I really wanted to go on this tour).
I get in the cab, point to my watch and throw my hand out towards the street, indicating that this cab needs to put the pedal to the medal. He did....he wasn't messing around. So, I leave my apartment at about 6:58 a.m. and arrive at school at 7:07, 15 minutes after Amin calls me. Damn, I am good....well actually, I suck for not waking up on time....but 15 minutes, that has to be a record. Oh, and this whole time I couldn't call anyone to ask if they were waiting for me, since my phone ran out of $$ and I obviously didn't have time to stop and put more baht (Thai currency) on it. So, good start to the day.
Okay, I get on the bus, and immediately am offered water and some odd crab sandwhich...nice service. I throw my ipod in and relax for an hour before we reach our first destination, the Bang Pa-In, aka "Summer Palace" for the royal family. It was a really beautiful palace, etc etc.... after that we went to Ayutthaya, which is the ancient capital of Thailand, but has since been taken over by tourist stands and really cool ruins (does anyone know how to post pics on this blog?!?). Then, we pay respect at Wat Mahatad and Wat Phasrisanphet (what, you've never heard of those/cant pronounce it?? Geez, get with it people!!)...2 pretty bumpin temples. I see an enormous golden Buddha and have a sudden urge to climb to the top of it, but am told I will go to jail and maybe get put to death if I do that. So, I nix the idea.
Next is the best part; we board the Grand Pearl Cruise at Wat Chondlom Pier and enjoy a magnificent oriental and Western Style lunch buffet.... I finally got to eat bread and not just rice! Amazing. The cruise was absolutely beautiful and so much fun, although I had no idea what sights we were seeing. I do however remember the guide pointing out Bangkok Hilton. I asked, "Oh, is that the hotel in Bangkok?" Turns out it is one of the most horrific jails in the world...the inmates must eat roaches to stay alive, since all they are served is rice every day. I was just slightly off in my assumption. After being served dessert and coffee (of which I had about 6 cups, since I have been deprived for the past 2.5 weeks.... I know, poor me), we get dropped off at the night bazaar to do some shopping! Oh wait, it is 4:30 pm and the night bazaar doesnt open until 7pm. Hmm... what to do? Have a beer of course (well, banana shake for me.... so good, I think all the beer drinkers were actually quite jealous of my beverage of choice). At 6, we sit down for this incredible dinner, family style. The waiters just kept bringing us tons of new dishes, until we were stuffed! But not to stuffed for watermelon, pineapple and dragon fruit dessert....love Thai desserts! At 7, we proceed to walk around the night bazaar and I saw the entire seasons of my favorite tv show on sale for 400 baht (less than $15).... I was so excited, but I actually didn't get it, bc I know I can bargain for it and get it much cheaper, we just didn't have time since the puppet show started at 7:30.
Okay, the puppet show....wow, what a weird and cool new experience. It was a puppet performance telling the story of "The Birth of Ganesha"....it was awarded the first prize at the World Festival of Puppet Art in Prague, twice! It was really cool, the puppets fought and there were cool special effects and I didn't understand anything they were saying, as it was in Thai. But, still very cool. After that, time for home!
Another great day in Bangkok, time for bed to get ready for tomorrow: the weekend market + watching Mama Mia with the Swedes (they are excited about a movie based on a Swedish song [Mama Mia by ABBA])
Ciao baby!
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Kanchanaburi
Beautiful View from atop Bridge
RCA
Posh club district on Suhkumvit Rd
Kanchanaburi
Erawan Waterfall
