Lost in a big world

Melbourne

jsherdc — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 09:17:00 GMT

I booked a room at this beautiful victorian hostel, the Nunnery, in the Melbourne neighborhood Fitzroy, which is funky neighborood filled with great resturantsand shops. Across the street from my hostel was carlton gardens and the melbourne museum (I think this is a world heritiage site). The biggest problem is that there is no place to park. So I actually parked illegally for my 3 days in melbourne, and was very lucky to not get a ticket! (Although I was stressed about it the whole time). My first evening, I went to a good veggy resturant on Brunswick street and walked around the neighborhood (great Victorian buildings are everywhere).

The next day I tried driving through the city to the royal gardens on the other side of the river, but I could not find any place to park. I kept driving, and soon enough I needed to go to the bathroom, and I still could no find anyplace to park. In fact, I could not find any place to even turn! Eventually I ran into a highway, got off at the next exit and found someplace to park and attend to my business. Whew.

After driving around a different park of the city, I drove out to Nicks Wine Merchants, a store I have ordered wine from a few times before, which is located in one of the suburbs. After looking around the store for an hour, and chatting with a women who works there, she gave me a free bottle of wine! You just don't see this occurring in the US...

That evening I ate at a very good afgani restaurant on Brunswick Street and drank the wine. The following day I drove around a bit and then met my friend, Mark Joshi, from grad school for lunch at the Melbourne University faculty club. I visited Melbourne University 8 years earlier when another friend was a professor there, but I had not remembered hw asian the school was. It seemed like a large majority of the students were asian. Interesting. Mark said thats because they can get full tuition out of students from abroad and it sounded like Melbourne university does a very bad job getting donations from alumni (MIT's Math department raised more money last year than the entire Melbourne University).

In my last full day I went to Victoria Market in the morning and bought some bread and cheese and some good wine from a discount place that refills your bottles and has absolutely amazing value wines. (Most of the wines were great, and under $10 a bottle, and 20% less for a refill). I visited the excellent melbourne museum, and then met my friends Tom and Aich (who I met in Laos) for dinner where we consumed 2 bottles of wine and some good african food.

The next day I had a few hours to kill in the morning before a mid afternoon flights. So I decided to have a picnic at a famous site northwest of melbourne. Yes, I visited the hauntingly beautiful hanging rock. I always thought that the cinomatagraphy of the film ("Picnic at Hanging Rock") was a work of absolute genius. Now I know that there was pretty good material to work with. Its really a great place.

All in all, I still love Melbourne, but transportation there sucks. Parking is a nightmare and I think trolley's are a completely outmoded
mode of transportation. Oh well. The food is amazing. And I just rremembered that I forgot to mention that I saw a great band in one of the Brunswick street pubs as well. Its just a fun place.

On the Road

jsherdc — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 06:16:00 GMT

After visiting the Barossa, I drove to Mildura which is close to the triple border of Victoria, South Australia and New South Wales. Mildura is on the Murray river (Australia's biggest river) and is the breadbasket for Australia, with lots of bulk wine and fruits produced there. I was expecting to find Lodi, CA. I was wrong. Mildura is a very nice town, with lots of restaurants, and hotels. There are a few nearbye national parks (I really want to go to Mongo NP, 2 hours north of there but I did not have time). There was also plenty of hotels, including some moderately priced ones. The other thing to note was how friendly everyone was in Mildura. Its probably the friendliest place in Australia, and that says a lot.

My first day, I went to a popular pizza place downtown. The pizza was quite good and the place was packed with families. Right in front of me this guy was sitting at a table for two with a women. And well, his pants were halfway down his butt. And well, he was not wearing any underwear. So I was sitting there eating pizza, and staring at his crack wondering if I should go up to him and say something. The wait staff just ignored it. Eventually I went around, behind his date and started making a motion of pulling my own pants up, to try to give him the hint without embarrassing him. he paid me no heed. Oh well. I never have any idea what I am supposed to do in those situations...

The next day I took a cool paddle steamer ride on the murray. The murray has a system of locks (like the panama canal) and we went through one of them, so we pulled up to one lock and the one behind us closed, our water level dropped and 5 minutes later we were able to continue on our way. It was pretty cool. There was lots of birds and boats on the murray and even a swimming beach. I enjoyed that ride.

I then drove in the direction of Bendigo, and stopped about 1 hour south of Mildura at another national park. It was the desert, but there were amazing numbers of trees and birds there. I have no idea what those birds were doing there, and where exactly was the water? Anyway, I had a nice hike and also saw some emu's while driving around.

Next I drove to Bendigo, where I had trouble finding cheap housing (I ended up paying about $80 US for a mediocre hotel). For some reason this former gold rush town (1850's), was still prospering. There were great victorian buildings, including an incredible church (with amazing stain glass windows), and a downtown area with a bunch of yuppy restaurants. I also visited briefly the site of one gold mine. Note that Melbourne (75 miles away) was a town of 20,000 until the goldrush started in 1850, and 10 years later it was city of 500,000. That whole area just exploded during that period.

On my way to Melbourne I stopped at 2 more wineries near bendigo. I especially enjoyed visiting Blackjack. I had a nice hour conversation with the wine maker (Ian?) at Blackjack who was also running the tasting room.

Barossa

jsherdc — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 08:22:00 GMT

Before driving up to the Barossa, I did a tour of Heighs chocolates in Adelaide. The chocolate was quite good, and I was ready for some wine. Sadly, I had trouble getting out of town. The signs were terrible and the roads were not straight. Imagine that you were in calfornia, and you wanted to drive north to Santa Barbara, you came to a highway and it gave you the choice of calabasas and encino. Not LA and San Francisco. Not north and South. Just 2 small local towns. Well those are the road signs in South Australia. Eventually, I found my way and first went to Grennock Creek winery, which was closed since they had completely sold out 2 months earlier. After 2 more stops, I went to my hostel, Doubles' D'Vine, which was a very nice place with two rooms, in a vineyard (they used to use the house to house seasonal pickers when they owned the vineyard). After an early lunch I had 1 more winery stop, then went back to the hostel for a nap. For dinner the women who ran the hostel suggested I go to this pub in Angston, where I had a bad meal. It turns out that there was a weekly (free entry) texas hold-em poker tournament there. I was too late to sign up, so I went over to see what was happening and soon I was drafted into the game (about 30 people). Three hours later, I had all the chips, and had won $50 worth of gift certificates to eat the bad pub food at this pub. The funniest moment was when we were 6 handed and I had about 2/3 of the chips in play. The player on my left goes all in blind, a call on my right and as dealer I call with a suited Q8 (to increase the odds that we knock out LHO). RHO and I keeping checking it down until finally the board is an unsuited 76543. I bet. One of the players who was not playing that hand starts lecturing me on strategy ("you don't want to bet here since you want to knock out the all in guy"). The tournament host responds "you know, look at his chip stack, he just may know what he is doing". Anyway, RHO folds after a long thought (what the hell was he thinking about? Only 98 or an 8x matter.). And LHO, who had gone all in blind, well he had a 98! Now that was funny. That evening, I got back to the hostel about 11:30, and there were 2 narrow posts in the driveway. I don't have great depth perception to my left (everything is opposite in Australia from the US, so the driver sits on the right side, etc.), and I dented the passenger side door on the wood post turning into the driveway. Shit. The next day I visited a couple of wineries in the morning, and then rented a bike in the afternoon, and visited 3 more wineries. At the last one (Kaesler, which was 100 meters up the road from my hostel), there were two guys from my hostel (one was a chef from Germany) who were getting a private tour and a barrel sample of their top wine (Old Bastard). I got to smell it (amazing!), but they would not let me taste it. Pure torture. :( The area was pretty flat and so good for biking. That evening I went back to the pub, had another bad meal with my poker winnings. The next day I went back their for lunch on my way out of town. I got ill from that meal. I think I lost at poker....

Adelaide

jsherdc — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 10:12:00 GMT

I flew from Perth to Adelaide and took a shuttle to my hostel. Adelaide seemed quite empty. There were nice wide streets. There were parks. There were not many people. But it seemed like a nice town. After checking into a pretty good hostel (and cheaper than perth) I went to Chinatown for dinner. And wow, what a dinner. Ying Chow! They make a form of Guanddong cooking, and there is a symphony of flavours in their dishes and large portions and main courses are about US$6. They also had a great wine list (also cheap), and corkage is $2Aus (=1.40) if you bring your own.

The next day I went exploring after making reservations for a hostel in the Barossa. Well almost. I was cut off on the phone, and was told I had no minutes left. After lots of yelling I finally discovered that when I bought my phone it did not come automatically with the minutes I had paid for, but instead there was a code on the receipt (which I no longer had) and I needed to dial some number and type in that code to get my minu8tes. I had been operating on the 5 minutes that comes complimentary with my phone. Well this was all news to me, and the store I bought my minutes from was back in Perth, so I had to repurchase a code with more minutes to get my phone to work. Oy.

After wondering around Adelaide for the morning, I took a trolley to Adelaide's beach. It really was a pretty nice beach, and the main street had lots of shops (along the lines of the Jersey shore or Venice beach). That evening I came back to the city and went to the Adelaide Casino, were I had very bad luck at Poker and lost about $80.

The next day I picked up a rental car and drove down to the Florieau Peninsula. And what I day I had. First I went to McLaren Vale, one of the many great wine regions near Adelaide. I visited a few wineries and then went to the coast (5 miles away) for some mediocre snorkelling. I then drove to the southern end of the peninsula, near the ferry to kangaroo island, and took a short walk past some kangaroos. I then drove to Victor Harbour and walked across a causeway to Granite Island, a lovely little Island with good views, nice rock formations (guess what kind of rock) and some animals. I saw quite a few dolphins swimming off the shore, but it was getting chilly, and the fairy penguins do not come on to land until after sunset (9 PM!), so I didn't stick around to see the penguins. Instead I drove back to Adelaide and went back to Ying Chow. My meal this time was even better than the last! Wow. I have to say, that Ying Chow is in the top 50 restaurants I have ever been to (probably in my top 25), and everything else on the list is at least twice as expensive (actually most are more like 5-10 times as expensive). So if you ever go to Adelaide, visit Ying Chow (on Goucher St).

Margaret River

jsherdc — Sun, 8 Feb 2009 21:45:00 GMT

I decided to rent a car and head south to Margaret River which is 3 hours south of Perth. I was excited since its a famous wine region. But its also a very popular escape for the folks from Perth. I could not find any hotels on the internet down there, and everyone said that it was going to be totally packed, and I may not find a hotel room. I went anyway. On the drive down I stopped in the seaside town of Belmont for lunch (this was January 1st). Well it was a ghost town. No one was there. The shops were all closed. I finally found a Greek place and had a very small falafel for $6 (US). I didn't see any beach, and I couldn't figure out why I heard this was also a tourist spot. Hmm.

Another hour or so, I arrived at a tourist information center about 40 miles north of Margaret river. After about 1 hour of calling around they found me a motel for $80 (US) a night 25 miles south of Margaret River. Feeling relieved. it was time to hit some wineries before they closed. I visited Leeuwin and Cape Mentelle. Both were beautiful properties with great wine. Leeuwin (known for the best Chardonnay in Australia) had a huge place with a band shell, picnic grounds and a fancy restaurant. It was all very upscale, and yet the tastings were free (as they turned out to be everywhere in australia). The chardonnay's at Leeuwin were great (I actually liked there Prelude Chardonnay even better than their famous art series), but the wine overall at Cape Mentelle was even better (their reds were also very good).

Anyway, I will give an australian wine report in a separate posting...

Cape Mentelle was less than 10 miles from the coast, so I went to the coast, which was stunning white sand coral beaches. There were surfers and even a kite surfer. I hung out with some brasilians there for a while, then found another spot where the margaret river meets the indian ocean. Truly stunning. These were almost perfect beaches with one caveat, but its a big one. Ok, maybe not physically big but there were lots of them. The fly's were constantly attacking me, so I could not stay at the beach very long.

I got a nice dinner in Margaret river, checked into my hotel (a little bit worse than motel 6 quality), and then went to the lighthouse at the southern tip of the cape (Cape Naturaliste?). Its here were the Indian Ocean meets the Southern Ocean, although how someone tells where one ocean ends and another one starts, I will never know. Anyway, I watched sunset from this spot which was kind of cool. Anyway, this area was a major improvement on Perth. And unlike Perth, it actually cools off at night....

The next day I visited 4 wineries and had lunch at Vasse Felix (nice spot but bad food, actually I did not like their wine either). I had first tried to eat lunch at Voyaguer Estate, but when I walked into their empty dining hall at noon, they told me that they were completely booked out. Hmm. In the mid afternoon, I found a lovely beach where I could snorkel right off the shore. 50 feet from shore I saw an eel and lots of fish and coral. How awesome is that for a snorkeling spot accessible from shore.

After 2 days in Margaret River, I drove inland to Pemberton, home to some very tall trees and 3 nationals parks. The Karri forests their were amazing! I got to do a waterfall hike, near a lake and in a beautiful forest filled with tall trees and birds and crickets singing. At another spot I climbed up the top of a massive Karri tree that had stairs built in a spiral around it (it is used as a fire watch station, they have a few of these. I went up the tallest of them the bicentennial tree). from the top you can see down on the entire forest which was incredible.

I wanted to get even farther south, to the famous tree top walk between walpole and denmark on the south coast, but ran out of time. But the area was amazing- I need 3-4 days for this area and I only had 1.

On my way back up to Perth I stopped for the night back in Belmont. This time I found a fun seaside town, thats a lot like Ventura. And yes, I found a very nice beach a few blocks from where I had eaten a few days earlier. I walked around a bit, hung out at my motel and chatted with some locals and went to bed, since I had to catch a flight from Perth to Adelaide in the morning.

Perth

jsherdc — Sat, 7 Feb 2009 08:40:00 GMT

I flew into Perth (Australia) the day before new years. But even before I arrived I made a discovery. Perth was rediculously expensive. I even found a dorm room in one of the hostels going for $55 (US)/night. Wow. Actually, everything was expensive in Perth. Food was about 50% more expensive than in the US.

Anyway, it was 40 C (104 F) in Perth, and did not cool off in the evening (it was still 37 at midnight). I managed to find a private room with shared bathroom at the YMCA for about 45 US. But I did not get much sleep. Perth seemed like a nice enough place, but I found it rather boring. My first night, I had dinner and hung out in Northbridge and had an excellent pizza and truely horrendus service.

The next day I took the train to freemantle (the orginally port, which is 12 miles west of Perth at the mouth of the swan rier) for the day. It was a pretty nice town, filled with vicroian buildings and lots of great art deco buildings. I didn't find all that much to do there, but I did spend a few hours at the decent maratime museum. I also had some good fish and chips, and a very pricey breakfast. After heading back to Perth, I bought a cell phone with some prepaid minutes from a store, and went back to Northbridge for dinner on new years.

Northbridge was alive that night. There were 3 stages with live music. I mostly watched a variety of swing bands. For the most part people were not very friendly in Perth (although in fremantle they were). People kept on crashing right into me, and almost knocking me other or sending my camera flying. And they just kept on going. Oh well. The one nice thing to say was that I liked the diversity of Perth with many asians living there.

After 2 days in Perth, my reaction was pure and simple. Don't come here. As a backpacker, don't even think about coming here. There is no value ofr money here.

I do need to comment on hotel prices in australia. Australian 3 star hotels are roughly the quality of 1 star hotels (well a bit worse, the 1 stars in the US always have cable TV and HBO or similar, and AC, and none of those are guaranteed in Oz) in the US but cost MUCH more. In the US a Motel 6 or similar costs in the $30-$50 range depending on location. These similar hotels in Australia start around $100 Australian (=$70). On the other hand, 5 star hotels are priced much closer to the US prices, although much deeper discounts are available in the US (for instance on priceline).

So if you are on a 5 star trip, maybe there is decent value for money, but not on a lower budget. I was dreading my 6 weeks in Oz.

Another KL stopover

jsherdc — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 21:03:00 GMT

After Phuket I flew down to Kuala Lumpur for a 1.5 day stopover on my way to Australia. After having a lot of trouble finding my hotel, I eventually found it and it turned out to be a nice and friendly place just behind the new mall (Times Square). There were in fact 4 large malls within 3 blocks, which was good for me since I had to buy another Camera. I spent all of the first day shopping for a camera, but I eventually settled on one. I then had a lot of fun taking photos in the mall. Kuala lumpur is so multicultural that the outfits and mix of peoples are fun to photograph.

The next day I went to Batu caves, a hindu site in some caves near town with a guy from my hotel. The caves were very cool, but the best thing was that there were all these small monkeys all over the place. There even was one carrying a tiny baby.

After the caves, I got lunch and went to the Islamic art museum (very nice) and then walked around town a bit.There was a lovely lake and park near the museums, but for some reason there was almost no one there.

But alas, my time in Asia was over for now. I was ready to head to Australia for new years.

Phuket

jsherdc — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 21:00:00 GMT

I was oringally planning on going to Ko Phi Phi on the way from Krabi to Phuket, but instead took a bus directly to Phuket. Now Phuket gets a bad rap on the backpacker circuit. Like bali, its a place where the highenmd resorts have taken over much of the best beaches and the main beach area (Patpong) is over developed. But Phuket is huge and diverse...

I got into the main town on Pucket (Phuket town which is not on the beach), and immediately started walking around with all my stuff looking for reapir shops, with various cabbie's harassing me to get me to have them take me to a hotel on the beach. After visiting the Apple store, and 3 camera stores, no one thought they cought do anything. The apple store would open up my ipod for $30, but didn''t think it was saveable, so I didn't bother. Then I found a cheap hotel in town for 400 baht ($11) a night with AC and a slightly uncomfortable bed. The town was a decent place. There are a few scattered resturants, 2 large malls, lots of shops, street markets, and even a lot of people who don't speak english (the tourists usually head to the beach). I actually liked the town.

The next day I rented a motorbike with foot petal gears for 150 Baht ($4). Driving it was quite fun. I drove to Patpong which was over developed as expected. I then drove north past Kamala Beach to Surin beach. I love Surin beach. Everyone was friendly there. Overpriced resturants rent beach chairs and umbrella's very cheaply (some for 50 baht/day) to put you in there territory when it comes to selling drinks and food. But there is also some cheap food stalls. I drove up the cost a little farther to the next beach north of Surin, which was also very nice, and then came back to Surin beach, bought a grilled fish (70 Baht=$2) and a coconut (30 baht) and had a great lunch, and then rented a beach chair for 50 baht and enjoyed the day on the beach.

Later I drove back to Phuket town, stopped at the fancy mall and went to the movies (100 baht), filled up the tank with gas (40 baht) and drove back to my hotel. Not a bad day, especially considering my transportation and gas cost me only $5.50, and a hotel near the beach would have cost an $15 or so, and even more if I was someplace as nice as surin beach. Driving around on the motor bike was also fun, although a bit dangerous for someone like me not used to driving them.

The next day I went back to Surin beach, but this time by bus (30 baht). Someone from my hotel was on the same bus, so we hung out for the day. When it was time to go back, we went to the main road at 4:20 and was told my the cab dispatcher that the buses don't run after 4:30 (strange lie, given its 4:20). We didn't believe him and waited for a bus, which came at about 4:45. We then had dinner at a good place in phukettown.

The next day, I got up early and got a package 1 day trip to Koh Phi Phi. Actaully there are 2 Islands there, a developed one (Koh Phi Phi Don), and one where no development is allowed (Koh Phi Phi Leh). It is on the smaller one, that you find the stunning beach and lagoon featured in the movie "The Beach." Our boat did a quick loop around the smaller island, where there where many yahts docked in the various lagoons, and people snorkleling and so on. We also stopped for some snorkeling off the shore one the main beaches on Koh Phi Phi Don, had lunch on the beach when it started to rain hard. Finally we went back to the main tourist area, which was pretty developed. All, in all, a very nice island. But since it has a very mountainess interior, it looked like you need to keep hiering expensive boats to actually get around. I personally prefer Rai Leh Beach.

For my finaly day in Phuket, I rented a motor bike again. I first tried to kill myself because when I tried to give the bike some gas to get it started I sped off into the street. Luckily, no one was coming. The rest of the bike ride went smothly. I circumnavigated the Island. First I went to a Gibbon rehibilitation center in the north part of the Island. They only had a few Gibbons that you can see, since most of them they are trying to minimize human contact. Sadly, many Gibbon's in Thailand are trained to drink and smoke in bars to get money from tourists. Why do people keep doing these things to animals?

Anyway, I saw a few other nice and moderately quiet beaches as I drove around the Island. I also saw quite a few elephants (plenty of companies offer elephant rides) and even some elephant crossing signs. At the southern part of the island, there was an especially pretty spot (supposed to be great for sunsets), although the beach was not good for swimming. There was also a rather large buddha which you can see. And the 65 mile ride cost just over $1 worth of gas. I may need to get myself a motorbike!

Overall, I quite liked Phuket. But now it was time to go.

Karst III

jsherdc — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 00:08:00 GMT

I could not decide if I should:

a. Fly to Krabi

b. Take a direct bus

c. Take the sleeper train to Surat Thani and then switch to a bus

While I was dilly dallying, a became expensive. I eventually went to the train station on my last day in Bangkok to book the sleeper train. Sadly, there were no AC cars available, so I took one with only fans (the problem turned out to be that it was very noisy having the windows open, so I got almost no sleep).

I was planning on taking a cab to the bus station in surat thani and then taking the local bus to krabi, but "luckily" the train station offered a combo ticket for foreigners only (maybe that should have been an alarm) so my train whioch arrived at 5:15 AM hooks up with a bus. I asked when did the bus leave, and was told 6 AM. I asked how long was the bus, and was told 2 hours. Well, when I arrived in Surat Thani everyone heading to lots of different destinations got put on the same bus. As we pulled out, I saw a sign for Krabi in the opposite direction from where we were going. We drove to some private depo, and I was told I had to wait until 8 for the bus for Krabi. I chewed out a few people (since this company deserved to be punished, and despite the fact that nothing constructive could occur). Eventually we left for Krabi. It was a beautiful drive, with Karst hills all around, and beautifully lined up trees in forests near the road (at least when they deforest, they replant). Instead of going to Krabi the bus took us 5 KM outside of town to another depo, where they had cabs waiting. I was steaming, and walked to the main road with a women that worked for a NGO in Bangkok, and we quickly caught a shared taxi for under a dollar into town. After walking around town for 15 minutes with my bags, I then found a nice hostel (recomended by lonely planet). I got a room with a fan and shared bathroom for 250 Baht ($7) but the place was very clean and comfortable.

I then caught a sea taxi to Rai Leh beach, which cost 150 Baht. Rai Leh beach is called by some the nicest beach in Thailand. I can beleive it. Rai Leh beach was stunning. Great limestone cliffs, a few small caves, a white sand beach with very few waves. A great place. After hanging out on Rai Leh for a while and listening to some music on my Ipod, I then decided to go around the cove to what looked like a secret beach. There were two ways there. I could walk in the water, or over a hill. I opted for the hill, which was a bit difficult in my sandles. The other beach (Toi Son beach ?) was equally stunning, and a mecca for rock climbers. In fact I ran into the women from the Bangkok NGO that was on my bus over there. Anyway, after hanging out a while, and taking some great photos of the cliffs and the beach, it was time to get back to Rai Leh. I asked someone how deep the water was, and was told it gets to chest deep around the bend, but you can go on the rocks. So, with bag held over my head, I went via water. At about the 2/3 point in the trip, it got deep. Hoping that it would not be deep for long, I continued. Disaster! The water got to chin level, the rock on the side were very sharp and I could not climb on them, and a wave knocked me over, leaving my bag floating in the water and shreading my hand on the rocks (15 small cuts). Well I made it to the beach 5 minutes later, but my camera and Ipod stopped working. I was depressed.

I then crossed Rai Leh to the otherside of the pinninsula, where the boat had left me off. I was about to catch another boat back (at 4 PM), when the guy who had taken me appeared and told me to wait until 5 for him. A pair of girls had told me earlier than they had paid 160 for a round trip, so perhaps I had paid for a round trip. So I asked, did I pay for a round trip? He said, yes round trip. Well, after waiting an hour and getting a ride back, I got charged another 150 Baht. Man I hate that....

Then next day I took a kyacking trip to see some of the caves in the area. The trip was a bit lame (although maybe I was just in a bad mood from my camera and Ipod no longer working), but there were a few cool caves, with cave painting in them and also some interesting prehistoric amphibians (as old as the dinos!).

In other news, I just found out that my mom's friends in Phenom Pehn had an even bigger disaster. There sponser for their center had eliminated their names on the account and obsconded with the $24,000 worth of grant money in it. I always said that PP makes me want to cry. Man, stealing from kids. I actually had been warned to not give money to most NGO's in cambodia without checking them out first, since they are often currupt.

I actually wrote this blog entry a week ago, but accidently deleted it. Its really hard to psych myself up to redo something you already did. I hope Anne and Georges are able to psych themselves up to restart, since it looked like they were doing a great job with the kids from that local village.

I also have to say, that despite losing my camera and ipod (and 4 days worth of photos) I am so lucky to be on this trip at all, so that is small potatos in the grand scheme of things.

The Temples of Bangkok

jsherdc — Mon, 5 Jan 2009 06:48:00 GMT

I mostly came to bangkok to visit with two college friends. Ironically, I only saw one of my closest friends from school, Rolondo, who was on my hall freshman year, and was also a physics major, once. But I got to spend a lot of time with Paul, who was also a physics major , who I really did not know all that well at school. Also, for some reason, they didnt know each other.

As I arrived in Bangkok, I played Rush's "A Passage to Bangkok" which confirmed all my exotic images of the city. Instead I found a partial modern hectic asian city, and a partial old city. Where wealth and poverity were side by side.

Anyway, Paul, who is in Thailand as a Christian Missonary showed me around the city. One day we went to see the three great temples along the river. The grand palace at the emerald buddha, which was cool, but you could not take photos from inside the temple. Wat Po had a reclining buddha, and lots of other stuff and was also great. And across the river was Wat Arun, which had a nice climb to the top and great views and well as cool reliefs.

Another day, I took an organized trip up to the old capital of aruthya and saw a few more temples (some great stuppas!) and the King's (from The King and I) country residence and grounds, including lots of interesting and pretty chinese style buildings. The trip was not great since we only had 45 minutes or less at each stop and these places required a bit more time. Also, the boat trip back to Bangkok was boring. I did run into some LA area bridge players who played bridge on the boat all the way back.

But the real temples in Bangkok were not these old temples. In bangkok the metro only goes to the new temples and not the historical temples, and by that I mean the shopping malls. Each year a new one opens, better than the last. I got to see Paragon Mall, with its pourche and mazerati dealerships on the 2nd floor. Paul and I paid $15 to see a movie in the special movie theater, which reclining lounger chairs and only 40 seats for a big screen and modern sound system (normal modern screen theaters are $3/movie). They also had a lounge with free drinks and a massaging chair that you can use before the movie. Now that was cool.

Finally, I bought a suit. Actually 2. For some reason, I didn't like the first one that much (the material itched), so I bought another one with a different material. I don't really need 2 suits, but thats the thing to do in Bangkok.

Finally, I met up with Rolando for lunch. He is finishing up his MBA, after finally discovering his PhD in comparative literature had negative economic value. It was great to see him :)

Later, after picking up my new suits and shipping them home, Paul took me to the "old town (Kao San Rd), with some signs there in hebrew and lots of places to eat, and then

to see the "nightlife" in Bangkok, much of it now family friendly. When you go to Patpong, there is a streetside market where the women can shop while the men go back into the go-go clubs. I don't know what is funnier, the scene I saw there (including a go-go club next to a mission), or being taken there by a missionary! We also went to Soi Cowboy, which seemed a bit nicer, but maybe I just like those scantily clad women wearing the ten gallen hats.

My last day in Bangkok I went to the famous weekend market, where prices were even better than on the streets in chaing mai, but I was shopped out. I did run into Tom and Aich (Tom was from my cooking class in Laos) and chatted with them for a while. Hopefully, I will see them in Melbourne.

I had a great time in Bangkok. It was not dirty and smelly like people kept telling me. But just seemed like a good place to live and I had a really nice time hanging out with Paul. Though, it definitely feels like Buddhism got run over by Capitalism...

Underwear

jsherdc — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 13:20:00 GMT

I traveled back to Chang Mai on my way down to bangkok, but I planned to stay over 1 more night in Chang Mai for Logistical reasons. The first reason is to insure that I could book a sleeper seat in the night train to bangkok (which had to be done at the train station for some reason), without too much hastle lugging by bags all over the place. The second was to recover a pair of underwear. Ok, this was not any old underwear. This was special, non-cotton, quick drying, $15 underwear that I bought at REI in the US and would have trouble replacing. These are amazing to travel with since I can wash them in the sink and just wear them again. Ok, but what happened to my underwear?

Well, at the Elephant Nature Park I changed out of my pants and into a bathing suit to wash the Elephants in the River. On the ride home in the van, I put my pants on over my bathing suit, and apparently my underwear fell out. I noticed this the next day at the Nest and emailed the ENP about it. They said, yes they had it, and they would deliver it to my hostel. I quickly emailed back saying no I was not at parami anymore, I was up in Chiang Dao, just keep them at your office I will pick them up next week. They emailed me back saying, its too late, they already dropped it off at Parami. Well to prevent them from throwing out my underwear I emailed Roger the owner of Parami to warm him that the ENP dropped off my underwaer and to please keep them until I get back in town. Roger emailed back saying that sure he would keep them.

Anyway, after dropping my bags off at a new hostel (MD house, great location, with a nice pool and TV for $20, oh yeah and a scale - I weighed in at 184 Pds down 14 on the trip), I took a shared taxi to the train station, got my AC 2nd class, lower bunk sleeper ticket, and then took the same shared taxi back to Parami. Well no one there (including Roger) had seen the underwear and was not sure if it was ever delivered. I said of course it was delivered, it was delivered BEFORE I emailed you. Roger called the other staff person who was off duty at the time, to find out if she knew something. Well the underwear did come and she threw them out the next day. Roger then wanted to put me on the phone with her, so I could "work out a deal with her to pay for the underwear", which I did not do and left.

Personally, I thought the fault was Roger's. I had emailed him in order to get them to keep the underwear and he didn't let his staff know. I don't know. Even if I got the $15 (A huge amount of money in Thailand), I still would not be likely to be able to replace the underwear. Anyway, you can all stop laughing at me now (well a few more minutes is ok). But maybe leave comments below about how you would have handled the situation. I tend to avoid conflict unless I think that there is something constructive to be gained...

I spent the evening, for the second straight sunday, at the sunday walking street, where I bought a few random silk products and a shirt, and then I spent half the night on the internet (I kept waking up, and the internet room was right by my room and unusually was open all night and was free). The following day I went for a long walk out of the main part of town. It got dirtier, and at one point I had to turn back as I walked down a smelly street (a dump was next to it) filled with wild street dogs. There were 4 dogs up ahead, and I was warned by some locals not to go. The walk was interesting, since I would often see very nice homes near very poor neighborhoods. There is a real mixing of the neighborhoods in Chiang Mai. Finally I went for a massage at a massage school in one of the wats. It was 120 Baht ($3.50 US)for a 1 hour foot massage. It was excellent so I got a 1 hr full body massage next for another 120 Baht and then tipped an extra 100 baht. Finally, a great massage! (oh, but the Thai style sure hurts...)

Finally, I took the sleeper train to Bangkok. The trip was uneventful, but I did run into Krissy and Katie on the train, and I did get some sleep (the car was pretty comfortable) although I did wake up 5-6 times during the night, and finally got up at 5, 2 hours before we arrived in Bangkok.

The Nest

jsherdc — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 00:39:00 GMT

Tired of city life, I headed North to Chiang Dao in the Mountains. My
typical trip, started with a shared taxi across town for 20 baht to the bus
station, a 1.5 hour bus ride for 40 baht, and then a 10 minute ride in (an
empty) shared taxi for 150 baht. The bus ride was interesting, since there
were 3 local women in traditional outfits that came on board (one sat next
to me and helped me figure out where to get off), a few monks, and in the
middle two military officers came on board and checked everoye's ID. That
is, everyone EXCEPT me. I was booked for days in Chiang dao Nest, a
beautiful resort in the mountains, that is known for its food. The Chaing
dao caves, a tourist attraction, is nearby. My first day, I went 10 minutes
up the road and then 500 steps up to a monastery in the side of a mountain.
At about 300 steps, you got to a viewpoint and.... wow, what a stunning view
of a wat in the side of the mountain! I did not even know about this place
and here is one of the best views in Asia. I laid down to enjoy the setting
and was relaxing, and contemplating the universe until my serenity was
finally disturbed... by a monk on a cellphone! How strange. Having my moment
disturbed, I continued to the top of the steps and looked around the wat,
which was nothing special. On my way down, I ran into Dave (of Dave and Mel)
for the 5'th time in a week. He and mel had driving motorbikes up top the
caves and then were told to go to see this monastery but Mel stayed at the
bottom, since she was not feeling well. So I went to the bottom, showed her
some photos, and sent her up for the view.

Next I took a 1 hour hike through the woods and over a small mountain to
another wat, some sacred fishes (I have no idea....), and the chiang dao
cave, which contained both cool stalactite/mite formations, neat rocks in
the shapes of things, and various Buddhas including a statue of a sleeping
Buddha. I was taken around by a guide with a candle and, after seeing the
Buddha, I reminded another group to be quiet since the Buddha was sleeping.
:)

Finally I went back to the nest for dinner (an amazing salmon with tapanade
dinner), booked myself on the 3 day trek that was leaving in 2 days, and had
a relaxing evening.

The next day, I contemplated climbing the Chiang Dao mountain (3rd largest
in Thailand), but instead just wrote 6 blog entries since I was so far
behind and I wanted to rest for the trek. For dinner, I walked over to nest
2 with a couple from the Netherlands, had a drink with them (which they paid
for without my even noticing), and then I sat down and had dinner with two
friendly british women (Katie and Krissy), who turned out to be on my trek
the next day.

On the "Trek" was myself, a guy from san fran (Toby), and the women from
dinner. I say, "Trek" since it was not quite a long walk in the woods. On
day 1 we were driven to some elephants. There were 3 large elephants owned
by one of the hill tribes. One of the mahouts, had a hook blade. I announced
that I was not getting on if he uses that, and the mahouts agreed to not use
the hook. In fact the, one with the hook left, so we went 2 and 2 on the
elephants. I still think we were too heavy, but these were much bigger
elephants than I had wridden in laos.

Anyway, after the elephant ride through some nice scenery, we had lunch and
got on some bamboo rafts. These were rafts that they took apart and put back
together everyday, so we were semi-submerged. But the rafts held, and we
had a relaxing ride down a river with only locals around. We visited 5
villages that day,. A few people were selling stuff, but mostly they were
going about there business. At one school, the kids kept jumping on katie.
It seemed spontaneuous since they ignored the rest of us, and their were no
adults around (where exactly was the teacher?). We spent the night in a
large bamboo hut, that leaked cold air, and were kept up by the roosters who
for some reason started at 1 AM. The next morning, one young guy from the
village with a long sawed off shotgun, kept passing bye, and eventually the
gun was fired, and a pig was killed. We were told it was a crazy pig, I just
think they were hungry.

I should note that there were lots of cute pigs on this trek!

On day 2 we hiked to a cave. The women did not go in, and our guide led us
through an interesting cave where we had to crawl on our bellys for much of
the hour. We came back to the village, had lunch, and then hiked for about 3
hours with our backpacks (the ONLY hiking we did with out packs), including
a visit to a waterfall where Toby and I took a shower.
Finally, we arrived at a village in a stunning location in the mountains. In
fact some local teachers came up there for the weekend also. I got drunk on
local whiskey and beer and went to sleep (with all my clothes and socks wet).
The following morning everything was still wet, and I was freezing, but I
got up, sat outside from 5 AM to 7 in my bare feet, and took photos as the
fog slowly moved. the sun had not yet come out (it didn'y come up until well
after 8) but the scenery was stunning. Almost as stunning as Angkor wat.
What a show.

A few interesting things happened the last day, when we hiked for 4-5 hours and visited a cave. At one point we visited a local school. Toby taught english for a little while and then toby and I taught "Row Row Row your boat" to the kids. One kid wasn't singing, so I singled him out to sing alone. Well he didn't sing alone, but when we started as a group again he sang. Thai's really do not like being singled out, I think...

Since the hiking was not serious, both toby and Krissy were hiking in flip flops the entire trip (I was told that my Tiva's were good enough, and were preferable to shoes since we will be going through lots of streams). Krissy's flip flops broke during the last day, so she switched to my socks. Imagine, trekking in Socks!

At lunch time, our local guide took a knife and made us brand new bowls (tube shaped) from bamboo, and cooked us some food which we ate in our bamboo bowls. How cool.

Anyway, after the final day of hiking I returned to the nest (ahh, comfortable beds!) ate a goat cheese souffle, slept, and headed back to Chang Mai the next morning on the bus. Again, the bus got stopped by military. But this time a women was taken off the bus. Hmm.

For The Love Of Elephants

jsherdc — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 08:18:00 GMT

The Elephant has long been the symbol of Thailand. A majestic animal. It roamed the jungles, lived near streams and was occasionally put to work in the service of kings. It even was used as a religious symbol at temples. While some roamed free, many were domesticated. Families took on the tradition of the Mahout, where traditionally 3 different people would care for a single elephant. Yet training methods can be very harsh. Hooks are used, elephants are beaten or starved, the large elephants are chained up in very small cages. Anything to break the elephant into submission.

Elephants today face another problem. At one point close to 100,000 elephants worked in the logging industry here in Thailand. In a Hegelian turn ("the idea, in its self, lies the seeds of its own destruction") , the elephants were helping to destroy their own habitat. Now deforestation has eliminated much of their natural habitat. Finally, 30 years ago the Thai government banned logging, in part because of the devastating effect deforestation has on flooding during monsoon season. So now there are many out of work elephants, with no place to return to in the wild, and no work to pay for the vast amount they need to eat.

Tourism has been one answer to these out of work elephants. But the tourist industry ranges from very some responsible people who actually care for the elephants, too many people just out to make a cheap buck and mistreat the elephants. Some people even take there elephants into the city to beg for food and money (tourists love feeding the elephants in the streeks of bangkok, or so I hear, even though bringing an elephant into bangkok is illegal). In the cities, the elephants do not get enough food, can't get clean water, and are sometimes hit by cars. This is not the place for elephants.

Anyway, feeling guilty over riding an elephant the previous week (although they seem well treated while I was there, but probably were trained in the traditional brutal manner), I took a day trip to the elephant nature park ( http://www.elephantnaturepark.org/) north of Chiang Mai. This sanctuary for elephants, most of whom were abused or injured (one was even blinded by its mahout who used sharp hooks on both his eyes) was founded by a women named Lek, who comes from a small hill village in northern Thailand, and grew up with elephants. She started this sanctuary (initially a smaller sanctuary at a different location) and has devoted her life to rescuing elephants. Sometimes a village has an elephant that they can not feed, and Lek travels across the country to the elephant, helps care for it, and takes the elephant back to the sanctuary (this is all quite expensive- just think about how much the elephants eat!). Once she was called to an injured baby elephant, and she stayed with the elephant for a week, nursing her back to health, with hardly any sleep. Lek also departed from traditional methods for training the elephants. Lek trains the elephants just with positive reinforcement, rewards and not vicious punishment. Just as disciplining your kids in America by hitting your kids has been going away, hopefully the more civilized approach to training elephants will replace the old ways.

Anyway, the ENP is a magical place. It is a place filled with love. Everything about the place is amazing. Its a beautiful setting by a steam, surrounded by small mountains and dense jungle. The staff and many volunteers there are warm and caring- both to the elephants and each other (there are also lots of great and sweet dogs all around this place). The elephants seem to live a great life there. Somehow, despite all there abuse, most of the elephants are trusting of humans there, even the day visitors there (can they just sense the love?). Unlike other elephant camps, you do not get to ride the elephants. But you do get to feed the elephants , and bathe the elephants in the river (I got to do both twice). Volunteers may even be involved in an elephant rescue. I got kissed by an elephant. And I gave an elephant a scrub and a Thai massage. I loved playing with the elephants.

We met many elephants, and learned there names and there stories. They had an elephant named Hope, who was brought to the camp as an orphan and was "adopted" by another elephant Ging Mai (who is now dead), and now lives free. They had Maximus, maybe Thailand tallest elephants. We met Mae Bia, a very old elephant. They had Jokia who was blinded by the mahouts (I didn't actually see Jokia). And many others.

All I have to say is I cried multiple times in the day, both when I saw videos about the elephants. I also was moved to tears by the whole experience. I did not want to leave and I will definitely return for a longer visit. (Probably a 1 week volunteer visit). This has been the highlight of my trip.

To paraphrase Bill Clinton, I still beleive in an elephant named hope. And a women named Lek who is battling the powers that be, when she shines a light on the mistreatment of these great animals (she has even gotten death threats). One person can change the world, and change it for the better if they have enough love in their heart and moxy to go with it. I urge my readers to visit the website of the ENP, and learn more about these marvilous animals.

Partying in Chiang Mai

jsherdc — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 08:08:00 GMT

I arrived in Chiang Mai, Thailand's second city, and Major city in the North. It is a huge place, sprawling for miles in all directions, with no tall buildings. It is also a pretty place. Surrounded by mountains, with a nice river, and an old city that is surrounded by a moat and is filled with wats, it is a nice place to explore. Chiang Mai is also one of the world centers for ecotourism, with everybody and their uncle offering trekking trips to visit local villages, and elephant rides (and visits to the elephant camps), and rafting, and so on. My guesthouse, unfortunately, offered what looked like the usual generic fair, with little actual walking in their trekking trips, and visits to the same villages that everyone goes to. I was still disgusted from my village visit in laos, and I wasn't going for this. As what usually happens, the first few ecotourism operators offer high quality trips, and the rest go down hill, offering poor copies of the real thing. Also, I had just run into a couple in Laos on my last day who had spent a week as volunteers at the Elephant nature park, so I really wanted to go there and my guest house (a very pretty place with a private room for under $10) didn't offer that trip.

My first evening, I walked a bit near my guest house (on a street with all sorts of good restaurants/bars along the river, but outside of the old town), then went to the famous night market where there are lots of stalls. Someone tried to sell me a custom made cashmere wool silk blend suit for $140 with a custom made shirt, but I thought I could do better and didn't buy it (I was told $90 in Bangkok, but maybe this is an old price or worse quality). There were lots of places to eat there, but I wanted to to a river cruise dinner back the the restaurant/bar called the Riverside near my guesthouse. After exploring a bit , I went back to the riverside, found out the boat was full, and went back to my guest house, got on the internet, and tried booking my trip to the elephant nature park for Monday (it was Saturday night). I paid with credit card and then got a message saying they will email me to confirm, but the email didn't come. Everyone these days heads up to this hippy town called Pai 6 hours north of Chiang Mai, so I instead wanted to go to this "mini-resort" called the Nest in Chiang Dao a town 1.5 hours north of Chiang Mai and in the mountains. So I emailed them to enquirer. Once again I didn't hear anything.

I went back to Riverside at 8, a popular bar/resturant with live bands (live music was starting at 9), whose clientele was 90% Thai. (I found out later that many of them are tourists from Bangkok, I was wondering since the place was quite expensive. $3/beer and $6 for dishes is a lot of money in Thailand). I was eventually seated (it was crowded and there was a long wait) and soon after these 3 americans were seated next to me. We soon combined tables. I had a great time with them. We hung out, we danced (the bands were fun, playing mostly american rock covers). One of them, an ex-laywer turned yoga instructor/enviormental activist, who reminded me of a few people I knew at Wesleyan, reminded me that I can change the world, before dancing and grinding with me (and the rest of the room) on the dance floor. A pretty Thai women asked me if I was with her, I mumbled something incoherent (the correct answer was NO). Anyway, the place was great. Thais are really fun. They seem to love to drink, party and have a good time. Thais are also very ethnically diverse, there is not just one look or body type. And some are quite striking (in cambodia, almost everyone was very good looking. Here it was more diverse, but some are stunning). After spending 4 hours there, we went over to the Good View next door and I spent another 1.5 hours listen to music and dancing before finally going back to bed. Or so I thought.

The bed was a rock. I got almost no sleep that night, and I had a headache and my body ached the next day. I discovered in the early morning if I can sleep on top of the blanket I could seep some, so I got a few hours of sleep finally. I finally got up at 9 and started to walk around town, but I didn't find that many sites to see, although I did run into Mel and Dave (I met them in Laos). I also found a booking office for the elephant nature park, and called the main office about my booking, they had no record of it, but told me that they will get me the next day at my guest house. Eventually I found a wat, and someone offered to drive around around (in his new camry) for 2 hours to see some sights. He was charging me 100 Baht (about $3) and gave me a bottle of water. After seeing two great temples, one newer and one that was 700 years old and built around the founding of the city, I asked him how he can have a car like this, and charge me only 100 baht? He said, don't worry it will not cost any more. I soon found out why it was so cheap, as he took me next to a street with lots of expensive factories for making silk, jade, jewelery and other stuff. After my second stop, I asked him how much he was getting for each stop (or was it a commission on sales?). He admitted to a 20 baht gas coupon. So I quickly visited 6 shops to make him some money, and then drove home. Actually, I should have skipped the last 2, since by then I had a huge headache, and paid him the extra 40 baht myself...

After spending some time on the internet, walked toward the Sunday walking street ( a large weekly street market), and having an hour to kill I stopped off for a massage. The place had cushions on the floor, and thin curtains between the stalls. Well I figured this place looked safe, and my back really hurt from the bed the night before. Nope. Welcome to Thailand. There were wondering hands despite someone else just on the other side of the curtain from me, and not much acupressure, and I refuse to say any more on grounds this is a family blog...

I then went to the internet and tried booking the nest in Chaing Dao, without inquiring about availability first. This turned out to work, and I got a confirmation soon after.

I visited the sunday walking street which is cheaper than the night market. I still did not buy anything (I guess I just do not know what to do with these silk products). After eating some street food I went back to riverside to listen to some music. This time I just stood around and watched. I will leave it to my highly intelligent readers to interpret. There were an abnormal number of western guys with thai girls. Actually this was true even in the city. At the walking street I saw a european guy about 70, with a thai women about 30. At the bar, I saw 4 american guys walk in together with 4 thai girls- what's the odds? At one table in the bar, there was one thai guy and 3 thai women. Soon after, 2 other young thai women joined them. As soon as they arrived, the guy walked over to a dweeby looking 30 something year old thai man sitting at the bar. He then beckoned for the cutest of the girls to come over, she gave the guy at the bar a wai (thai greeting with both hands pressed together and the height of it is a statement of respect, the king gets the highest wai), they chatted for a minute, then she went back. The guy at the table looked back at the guy at bar, and the guy at the bar shook his head no. No sale. Oh shit, I said I was going to leave the commentary out. Welcome to Thailand..... Anyway, despite these shenanigans, this still was a great bar. One of the best I have ever been to. Its one problem is that it too is a victim of its own success, and is way too crowded.

This night I got an extra sheet (they had no extra blankets) and I slept on the blanket covered with the sheet. This worked for a few hours, then it got too cold. I was able to partially wrap myself up in the blanket (barely) and got a few more hours sleep. I would have moved, but the logistics were complicated given I was going to the Elephant park for the day the next day.

Luang Prabang

jsherdc — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 06:38:00 GMT

I booked a highly rated hostel in Luang Prabang (A World Heritage site in Laos, Described by my friend Thy as the best place to chill in asia) called SpicyLaos. In some ways it was great. The manager was extremely helpful. They organized excursions for a lot less then the tour offices in town. Group dinners were organized and we all sat together for the free breakfast, so the place was very social. They even had a very nice TV/DVD room with great surround sound and free internet that worked pretty well. If I was there in the summer I would have loved it, but when I was there it was near freezing at night (2 C my first night), the place was built like an outhouse, so it was extremely cold, with only a thin blanket. So I did not get much sleep. The bathroom/showers where shared and in an adjoining structure, and the floors were often wet (so my pants kept getting wet) and did not have toilet paper (its really a pain to go back to your stuff, to get your toilet paper, every time you need to go...). The communal area, other than the tv and internet, was outside, so that did not work that well in the cold. Anyway, I spent 1 day just relaxing around town, spent a second night in spicylaos and then moved.

Actually, I was having trouble planning a trip. I wanted to do a multi-day excursion with one of the few reputable ourdoor oporators in town, but most of them charged lots extra if you are alone, and I could not find a group to join.

Anyway, a few words about Luang Prabang in Laos. It was a beautiful town at the confluence of 2 rivers (Mekong and Nam Khan), surrounded by jungles and mountains. The town itself is filled with Buddhist temples (Wats). Both the Laosian food and lots of french influenced western food is terrific. I ate really well in town. Its also the most chill place I have been in asia (Good Call, Thy!). Very few people hastle you to buy stuff, but there is plenty to do and buy if you want it, and the people are helpful. I really like Luang Prabang (it reminded me some of Dali, in Yunnan). My biggest criticism of the place is that its a victum of its own success. There are more tourists than locals there, and prices are triple what was listed in my guidebook. I eventually found a nicer guesthouse, and made plans for the next 2 days. I also was trying to figure out how long to stay and how to get to Chaing Mai, Thailand.

Anyway, my second day, was also chill. I took a cooking class at Tamnak Lao, (where I had eaten an amazing ginger infused fish dish the night before), and learned how make a few absolutely delicious Laosian dishes. I really like the interplay of lots of different flavours that occurs in Laosian food. I am not sure how to describe it. Its a bit closer to Vietnamese (espeically in its use of lemongrass) than anything else in the region, but it really is quite distinct. After a visit to the market, we cooked 2 dishes for lunch (Yum!), and 3 more for dinner (Yum!, Yum!), we got to feast.

The next day I booked a 1 day trip to do Elephant riding and see a waterfall in the morning, and go white water kayaking (on the Nam Khan) back to town in the afternoon. This was run by Tiger Trail, one of the first ecotourist outfits in the area. It was great, and they only charged me a small extra fee for being the only person to book this trip (lots of people were doing the morning activities as part of 1 and 2 day trips, but no one else wanted to kayak). Tom from my cooking class and his wife Aish were there in the morning as well, I had lunch with them at this lovely jungle resort on the river operated by Tiger Trail (or their partner operation) and I made plans with them for dinner.

Anyway, the trip was great. After a bus, to another bus, to a boat to cross the river, and then a short walk, we got to the elephant camp. The elephant had a driver/trainer called a mahout. the Mahout was on the elephants neck, and there was a seat on the back with room for 2 people to sit. I was rushed a bit and told to sit on the seat. We started to go down the trail, and the ride was a bit boring for the first 15 minutes. But then the driver and I changed places and I got on the elephants neck. The Mahout called out commands, and the elephant gracefully guided me down a path, through some mud, through a stream, into the river, and back up an embankment. As we went down the hill, the elephant pressed his ears against me to hold me still. What a good elephant. I alternated trying to take some photos, with giving my dear sweet elephant a massage just behind his head (the top of his head has a hard shell, but just behind that its very soft). The trek was hard work for the elephant, and I felt a little bad about taking the ride, since I think between the two of us (Me plus Mahout), we were a bit heavy, but the elephant handled it well. I had a very good elephant. Anyway, after returning to the camp, I bought a large batch of bannana's and fed my sweet elephant. I also fed my Mahout. Now that was fun visit.

Next we went to small set of cascading waterfalls. I took a short swim, walked around, took some photos, and we caught another boat ride to the lodge for lunch. After lunch, it was time to kyack. I did not get much safety instruction (and while I have kyacked before and white water rafted before, I did not know how to roll). Luckily it was just class 1 and class 2 rapids. The water level was low (5 meters below the rainy season) and it was shallow in places, and it was not even clear in a few places which way the current was going, so it was hard work, especially in the early stretch before the rapids started. I went in 1 kayak and my guide took another. For the few class 2 rapids, I followed him through the rapids. Anyway there was no problems, and I made it back in 2:50 for a trip that they said might take up to 4 hours. We did see great scenery. First the river and mountains were amazing. there were water buffalo by the side of the river. There were local villagers, removing rocks or dirt from the river to build with. And it was peaceful. Sadly, I could not take any photos since my camera was in the dry bag.

Finally, I had dinner with Tom and Aish at the Indochina Spirit (reccomended in To Asia With Love) which was great, we sat on pillows ate good food, and listened to live music of local music (which was similar in some ways to Gamelon, with this huge curving Zylophone like instument). I also ran into a couple I had met un Kumning months earlier, and they told me about there guest house ($12 including HBO a few blocks away from the center of town, I instead paid $15 for a nice clean place with no amenities, 1 block from the center of town, and right by the river). Finally I ended the day with a massage. I had to put on some special clothing and got a very good 1 hour massage with lots of twisting of the body for about $5.

The next morning was chill. I finally decided to fly to Chaing Mai rather than have an adventure (2 days by overcrouded boat with very uncomfortable seat, or so I am told, then 6 hours by bus)- I wanted to leave sunday (today was friday) but there were no flights, so I booked for saturday afternoon. I then booked a trip in the afternoon to see the famous waterfalls with a short stop at a village at the end. Just before I was leaving I ran into a guy I had met at my guesthouse in Chendgu 2 months earlier. Now this is a funny story. There is an austrialian junior bridge player named justin howard and I had been getting travel updates by email from a justin howard, starting with places in china shortly after the beijing world championships ended. I assumed that it was this Justin, although I don't actually know him, we do have friends in common (I still was suprised to be getting those emails). Well, it wasn't. This fellow I had met in Chendgu, who is from London was the real Justin Howard in my emails. So I arranged to have dinner with him for after my trip.

Anyway, back to the trip. The waterfall was nice. I took some photos and then went up to the top with a guy from Venice beach and a guy from the Netherlands. We took some nice photos and then on my way back down I ran into Tom and Aish again, so I stopped and chatted with them. After a few more photos from different angles I went back to the tuk-tuk. We then went to a village. This was the low point of my trip (lower than freezing and getting no sleep). It was a cartoon. The children were trrained to perform for the tourists. Everyone was selling something (ok they have to earn money), but there was nothing resembling village life to see there and it left a very bitter taste in my mouth.

Finally I ran into this women Mel from Calgary who I had met my first evening in town and her boyfriend Dave. They were going to Chaing Mai the next day also, so we agreed to share a cab. The logistics were tricky. I was suppossed to get a cab, drive slowly by the street next to the Mekong river, and pick them up somewhere along it.

My final day I woke up early to see the monks getting alms. At around 6-6:30, the monks walk though town, and people place rice and other food in their bowls, which is the only food they eat all day. I think they also share somne of the food with the poor. Anyway, before I knew what had happened, people started putting food in my hands to give to the monks, and charging me for it (3 things worth of food cost me $4, about triple the going rate for the stuff, so it was more like charity to the people selling the food than to the monks). Anyway, I gave the food to the mionks as the came by, usually a small handful of rice with a bannana. I also got to take a few photos.

After running into these two Australian women from my Elephant ride (we took photos of each other, which reminds me I need to find the photos and email them), and chatting with them for a while. I went up to the top of the hill in town for some photos (great view) and then headed to catch the plane. The logisitics did work, as mel and Dave arrived at the street just as we got to there spot (I had to tell my driver to wait 15 minutes so that we didn't leave too early to meet my friends). I am glad I booked the 1PM flight, becuase the 8:30 AM flight had been canceled and everyone was rebooked at 1 PM...

Temples of Angkor, Day 3

jsherdc — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 04:15:00 GMT

My final morning I woke up deliberately at 4AM, since I was supposed to get picked up at 4:30 by my tuk-tuk driver to go see the sunrise. I had no idea what time I needed to be at Angkor Wat. By 4:45 my driver still had not shown up, and I tried to get someone who worked at the guest house (and slept outside!) to help me get another driver. No tuk-tuks at this hour I was told (we communicated, although he really did not even speak broken english). I wanted to walk into town to get another one, but I was told I would not find any. Yuck. I still had not seen sunrise at Angkor Wat, but 5 minutes later my driver showed up on his motorbike (only 20 minutes late...). I got on, we started to go, and almost immediately we fell over. Shit. This guy can't even drive the motorbike. I am really in trouble today. Luckily, he had no other problems on the bike.

We drove in, but we were told (ok my driver was told, I don't speak Khmer) we had to go to the backside instead of the front. I had no idea what this was all about or how it affected me. We arrived somewhere behind Angkor Wat. I could see nothing. Not a trail. Not the temple. I had no idea where to go. Luckily someone had their PDA (to provide a little light) and had been behind AW before, so I went with him and eventually we found our way around the temple to the front. We sat down behind the reflecting pool, and awaited sunrise.

Sunrise was spectacular. There were interesting colors both in the sky and in the water. The interplay of light and shadow was terrific. To my surprise, we were looking at sunrise from behind the temple (I had not worked out the geography yet), and not seeing the light directly illuminate the temple, but it still was a stunning show. 1 hour and 200 photos later, I left. But it truly was amazing.

We then drove out to Bantey Srei. The ride was very uncomfortable, but finally we arrived at this small temple at around 8 AM. This place just glowed at 8AM! The sun hit the temple perfectly, and it was amazing. I walked around for about an hour looking at the fantastic relief work (best among the temples). By 9, more tourists arrived, and the light was not nearly as good. The moment had passed. This was easily my favorite temple, and quite frankly I might not have felt that way if I had showed up, lets say at 10 AM, when the light did not hit the temples so perfectly. I wondered how much I had missed out on the previous 2 days by not getting to the different temples at the recommended times. Instead of being on a tour that is optimized for the tourist, I was on one that was optimized for the tuk tuk driver. Shit.

On the way back I stopped off at a landmine museum, but I really was in a rush to get to my plane, so I could only spend 30 minutes there (I would have had more time, if we had gone yesterday, like I wanted to). I was taken back to my guesthouse (with my rear end really hurting by then, I wonder if the drivers get used to being on their bikes all day...) and my driver went to get his tuk tuk. It took a while but eventually he got back, picked me up, took me to the airport, and for a half day, most of which spent on a motorbike (which in Phnom Penh was half the price as tuk-tuks) he charged me $30. Well I guess I got what I deserved by not negotiating a price. I was under the mistaken impression that you get treated fairly in cambodia and don't need to bargain very strongly (maybe a little) but I was mistaken.

Anyway, this was an amazing place and a great day despite the cost. I did completely break my budget in Siem Reap (I can afford it, but you do need some fiscal discipline or all the money goes floating down the river...). But I do have some hopefully obvious recommendations.

A. Stay at a well respected guesthouse where there are lot of travelers similar to yourself (if solo, then you want solo travelers. If a couple, then a place with lots of couples. If high end, you want a high end place with great tours and so on, especially since the tours will cost triple if you are at a high end place....) Most important, the place has to be a great source of information, and ideally well located close to the busy part of town (a good place might well have recommended tuk-tuk drivers...). Since prices are often very different then when your guidebook was written, getting accurate information is critical unless you don't care if you pay triple the going rate for a substandard trip. I figured that everything cost me 4 times what it would have if I had only stayed where I should, at least for my first night (after that, you have the info you need and can stay anywhere)

B. You need to do lots of research before you come to Angkor Wat. The one page in Lonely Planet's Asia on a shoestring was not even close to enough (go through a guide book to Angkor Wat carefully). Do not agree to go on the Tuk-Tuk's scheduled routes. You plan you own route getting to temples at the correct time, and agree on a price ahead of time or a clear fixed price for a clearly defined length of time.

C. 2.5 days were not enough. Ideally, you should visit temples more than once at different times of the day. Also there are tons of temples scattered around that I did not see. I figure I could easily spend a week here without getting bored (and besides the food in town is really good), since the temples were all so different from each other. In some I even felt like Indiana Jones...

I really want to emphasize the aspect of seeing the temples in different times of day. Monet once painted a series (I think 13 paintings) of the Rouen cathedral, painted once an hour in different light for the course of a day. I still remember viewing 7 of them at the Art Museum in Williamstown MA (great place, I was so surprised, since its a small town in the middle of nowhere). I think anyone who has any interest in art, appreciates how magical this is. The artist is really doing a study of light, and how it interacts with his subject, as much as of the subject its self. This is the experience you deserve at the Temples of Angkor.

Temples of Angkor, Day 2

jsherdc — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 02:05:00 GMT

My second day at Angkor Wat started badly. Again I was woken up at 4 AM by the dogs and had to wait until 7AM for the driver. After stewing for a while, I decided I didn't like the plan that my driver had come up with. From the pictures and descriptions in my guide book I had learned that I
a. definitely need to see Angkor Wat at sunrise
b. have to visit Bantey Srei, a spectacular small temple 30 km away from town in the early morning.
We were planning on doing these on my last day, but I was worried about getting to Bantey Srei and back in time for my flight.

So I decided I wanted to go to Bantey Srei, then come back to see Preah Khan and a few other temples today, and then for my last day see sunrise at Angkor Wat and some other nearbye temple.

My driver, of course managed to veto this (why does he have veto authority?) and insisted we had plenty of time to see Bantey Srei the next day. And besides, we were going to be plenty busy today seeing "lots of temples".

I gave in. We started at Preah Khan, which is another fascinating temple, with some similarities to Ta Prohm, but also has lots of pillars and rocks lying around like the remains of the temples in greece. I spent 2 hours walking around there, in part because I had run into this women from India (originally from Australia) that I had run into a few times the day before, and in part because it just was a fascinating place. My driver came in looking for me "worried that something had happened to me". I didn't work out, until later what this was about. Anyway, we visited only 5 temples on the big route with "lots of temples." So we were done with these 5 by 2 PM (again I was not told any of this - I would have spent more time in each temple if I knew we were only going to 5 temples). I asked to see more temples. He wanted to charge me $20 or more, depending on which additional temple I wanted to see (I was paying him $15 for the day for the "big route" so this was unreasonable additional charges. Petrol for a tuk tuk might have cost an additional $1-$2 to see an extra far away temple, and probably it costs much less that that (I am not sure about the gas mileage). Well now I knew why he came in looking for me at the first temple. So I called it a day at 2 and we went back to town. At this point he told me that since Bantey Srei was so far away, we needed to go by motorbike which is much faster (and its illegal in siem reap to use motorbikes as taxi's...). Shit. The motorbike for an hour ride is going to be uncomfortable. While trying to figure out to do, and being exhausted from lack of sleep, I forgot to negotiate a price. I really was an idiot my entire time in Siem Reap.

Additionally, I felt like getting back at 2PM was a waste of a half a day. Although it turned out that I needed the time in town because....

The bad day continued, when trying to book a room in Luang Prabang both my credit cards were declined, and the internet cafe I was in had such a bad connection that it took me 2.5 hours of repeatedly calling my credit card companies, and repeatedly getting disconnected, while having to answer very loudly (so they could hear) the credit card companies security questions, while an entire internet cafe can hear the answers as well as my card number (this is actually the 3rd time this trip that holds were put on my cards, often at the exact same time). In general, my cards security has only been compromised a few times this trip, and all of them were BY the credit card company itself, with its inane fraud detection policies. At this point, totally exhausted, I finally managed to book a room in Luang Prabang and then went off to get some dinner, thoroughly exhausted.

At dinner, I was invited to join this american couple from Santa Monica. It turns out that the guy was a business professor who had gone to sloan (MIT's business school). I had a nice chat with them and then went off looking through the night market. There were 100 or show stalls there but only one of them was doing business. It was the fish doctor. There was a tub filled with small fish, and they charged people $3 for a 15 minute fish foot massage (you put your feet in with the fish and they swim around and brush against it). I didn't do it, so I have no idea if it feels good, but I do know the gimmick was great and there were lots of people doing it. Finally, I went and saw a short video on Pol Pot, went back to the guest house to go to sleep completely exhausted, since I had been up since 4 AM for 2 straight days.

Temples of Angkor, Day 1

jsherdc — Tue, 9 Dec 2008 13:57:00 GMT

Angkor Wat was one of my dream destinations and the centerpiece of my trip. Unfortunately, pretty much everything went wrong with my trip there. It started with my getting booked in a guesthouse that had some major flaws. First they spoke almost no English (French was spoken). This is VERY bad, since this is your main source of information. What are they key things for you to do? What options do you have? How much should they cost? And so on. Second, there was no one around to share the cost of a tour/driver, so that also doubles your costs. Finally, the guesthouse was no where near town, so you had no access to any other sources of information (and the first 30 minutes are critical here, since almost all of your plans for your visit are made immediately, since everyone is trying to sell you there services as your tuk tuk driver). So it turns out I was acting on some bad information from a guide book, which said that what you do is hire a tuk tuk driver for the day and they act as tourguide as well. Well this guest house first hooked me up with a driver who also did not speak english. I first had to book a flight to Luang Prabang, so after explaining what I needed, the folks at the guest house got the tuk tuk driver to take me to what might be the most expensive travel agent in town (they were charging me $30 more than what I saw elsewhere for the same flight-luckily I did not book my ticket with them and asked at another travel agency first). I soon fired the driver do to lack of english and hired another one. This new driver really did not work out either. First the driver set up a 3 day plan for me, which sounded ok. It consisted of:
Sunset at some popular location my first evening
The "mini-tour" of the parks highlights the 1st full day
The grand tour of some other temples the 2nd day
Finally sunrise and another temple the finally morning before I flew out

Well this sounded ok, but it wasn't. The driver did not seem to want to take me more than once to see a sunrise, so I was gambling on good weather the last day. Second, most of the temples really have a few times of the day where the light is spectacular, and sunrise is the most common time. So it really matters what time you go- its a completely different experience at different times of the day. Finally, as it turns out the driver
a. had a bad tuk tuk that went half the speed of everyone else (this will become significant on day 3...)
b. provided no information
c. It turns out that I was not getting him for the day, but just for some designated few temples. If I completely the temples fast, well the driver would charge me LOTS more to see anything else.

So the first evening I was taken to the popular temple for seeing the sunset- the driver stayed below while I hiked up to the temple. I spent my time looking at the temple. I was not told that the place is famous because you get a great view of Angkor Wat from this temple at sunset. (I learned that when I later bought a guidebook.) We did drive by Angkor Wat at sunset, so I took a few photos from across the moat, but I was told by my driver that they charge an extra $20 to go inside the complex for sunset (is this true? is it really not included in my 3 day pass?)

Yuck.

The next morning I was woken up at 4 AM by the dogs at the guesthouse (they woke me up at 4AM every morning), but my morning was wasted since the driver was not coming until 7 AM. I was taken first to Angkor Wat. This is an incredible temple, surrounded by a moat. Its the largest religious building in the world. There are great views from outside the temple, over some reflecting ponds and thousands of incredible reliefs all over the temple. I was disoriented and needed a guide. A guard asked me as I entered if I wanted a guide, and I said yes, although I preferred to split it. After waiting in vain for 15 minutes for someone else to come to share a guide, and ended up alone. I was charged $10 by a college student, so show me around Angkor Wat. Well I got a bad 1 hour tour, with little information and poor english. I was already pretty upset. I soon bought a very good guide book from someone selling the guidebooks at AW for $7.

I did spend 2 hours walking around that fabulous temple. Next I got taken to Angkor Thom, and amazing city, with the Bayon, a temple with these incredible faces everywhere in the center of the city. There were a number of people there getting great tours from there english speaking guides. Meanwhile, I was struggling to read my guidebook while looking at the temple ,and not finding half of the reliefs described by the guidebook. I asked one of the guides, how do I get a guide? I was told that my tuk-tuk driver should have arranged that for me back in town. But they found a police officer to give me a tour. The officer charged me $30 for the rest of the day (it was $20 for the entire day back in town, so again I overpaid badly). He turned out to be a quite good guide, and also knew where some of the best angles were to take some cool photos. After the bayon, he changed out of his police uniform, to "become my guide" (although he kept his walky talky with him). Apparently, when you get offered a full months salary (he got $30/month as a police officer) to be a tour guide, you stop working your day job, for the day.
Anyway, we saw Angkor Thom, had lunch (somehow I got stuck for the bill for all 3 of us) and then saw Ta Prohm (tomb raider was filmed there) which has incredible trees and a ghostly appearance. Its incredible how different the different temples are from each other. I was not expecting this. At this point the tuk-tuk driver says we should go to the floating village for sunset, and the tourguide (its 3 PM and I hired him about 10:30 for "the day"), said your tour is over (I thought I had agreed to $30 for the rest of the day, what the hell is going on?). For some reason, I am a loser, and I paid him the $30. I really should have insisted he comes with, or better yet that the driver not take me to the village, but instead takes me to more temples where the tourguide is of use. Now the driver takes me 1 hour outside of town, and to a boat. I said, you didn't say anything about a boat. And then I asked and found out that the ten minute boat ride cost $25 (the driver for the day was costing $12). I refused to pay the $25, walked around the small village on the land where you can see many houseboats, and then was driven back to town. The driver charged me $20 -its $8 EXTRA to go to the floating village. Now why he didn't say this before, I have no idea. But why I
a. paid him
b. didn't fire him immediately
is a mystery that I need to figure out. Since, I was just being taken advantage of, and it only got worse....

I did have a great dinner that night, including this mango salad that was to die for and a great fish dish in a banana leaf. The food in siem reap (the town next to Angkor Wat) was consistently very good.

Phnom Penh

jsherdc — Sat, 6 Dec 2008 11:57:00 GMT

Phnom Penh has lots of things going for it. It has a beautiful riverfront setting. Great French Colonial Architecture. Wide boulevards. The residents are young and very good looking. The food is great.

But everything about the city makes me want to cry. The ghosts of years of war and of the Khmer Rouge are everywhere. The population is young, because the KR killed many of the adults (and 20% of the population). You see cripples everywhere, many of them are victims of land mines (the country is covered with them). There are beggars everywhere. There is an incredible amount of prostitution. I hear that parents sometimes "sacrifice" one of there daughters, and sell them into prostitution, often quite young, to support the rest of the family. There is widespread AIDS here. And corruption is terrible (you would not believe the number of Lexus SUV's owned by government officials).

For whatever reason, it does look like the country is being repopulated. I see girls who can't be much older than 17 holding babies all over the place, so it looks like everyone starts the families very young.

Anyway, my mom's good friend and former business partner (they founded a school for immigrants and refuges together) Anne and her husband Georges spend part of the year in PP running a center that teaches English, French and Khmer to poor children from one of the villages near PP. They arranged my lodging , but my instructions were sort of scrambled. I was given an address, and a name of a residence, but I was not sure if that was where they were staying (which was full) or the place nearbye where I was staying. In any case, I got a tuk tuk (cart driven by a motorbike) at the airport, and gave the address 8 75th street. but first I needed to stop at an ATM, well I soon discovered that all the ATMs wanted to pay me in US dollars, and not in Cambodian money. I wanted Cambodian money since I felt I would get lousey exchange rates on everything. but as it turns out, everything is actually denominated in US dollars (at least in the city), and were artificially expensive (prices were about 3 times those in Indonesia on everything other than housing). It was sort of upsetting to be that in a country with an annual per capita income of $571, where teachers and nurses and police officers make $30/month, that practically everything in town cost $2 or more.

Anyway, back to my adventure, having failed to get cambodian money I just decided to go to the guest house anyway (I had some US $ on me). But we could not find 8 75'th street. there was a 2,4,6 and 10. but no 8. A phone call later, we found Riga Guesthouse 3 blocks away (actually the address outside said 35, and it was on the odd side of the road, but there business cards said 8). Anne was there waiting and soon Georges came. Georges and I were soon taken around the corner to a chinese run hotel. It was pretty nice, for $13 a day I had a bathtub and about 80 channels on TV. After walking around town a little bit ( I was about 1.5 miles from the downtown area along the river) I had dinner with Anne and george and a friend of theirs. Their guesthouse and friends were all french speakers, but shifted to english on my behalf, and Anne translated some for me and this one women who did not speak much english. After dinner I walked downtown and explored the river. I first walked past a small hill with prostitutes walking around and massage parlors everywhere. I later past many massage parlors with descriptive names such as "Titi Massage-Romantic Massage". Well at least you know what you are getting in PP. I walked past the famous foreign correspondents center (restaurant and guesthouse) which was featured in the killing fields movie and along the river for a while past the palace and temple and museum. Finally I walked back on backstreets and saw a hotel lobby filled with ladies of the night and other colorful scenes.

My next day I took a motor bike downtown for $1, went to the national museum (very small), had lunch at friends (ex[pensive but good, they give jobs to former street kids) and finally took a tuk tuk to Tuol sleng , the former school used by the KR to torture and interrogate people before usually sending them to the killing fields to be executed. Its now a genocide museum. I spent 4 hours there since I wanted to see a video that wasn't starting until 3 and I had arrived at 12:30. Afterwards, in a daze, I let a motorbike driver convince me to go to the kiling fields. I really wanted to spend 3 hours there, and get a guide, but instead I arrived 45 minutes before closing. Well, it was intensive enough seeing a wat (buddhist temple) filled with skulls and the pits that were mass graves.

Finally I went back downtown, had a happy pizza at happy herb pizza, and these girls kept aggressively selling books, so I ended up buying 3 books (good quality for $14 for all 3) on Cambodia. This was followed by a massage, where I was taken into a large room, with cushions on the floor for 20 perople, and I was all alone. It was pretty weird getting undressed for a massage in such a large room. And the happy herb still wasn't doing anything. Finally, I went back to Riga, joined Anne and George at Riga, and hung out. And finally, 2.5 hours after dinner, I was happy. Soon after I went to sleep.

My last day in PP was pretty chill. In the morning I visited Anne and Georges center and got to meet the kids in the morning shift and there staff. It was a nice facility and they seem to be doing a great job. I thought the kids were well behaved and attentive. It was interesting that the youngest (who look 2 years younger than they really are) were being taught basics-like how to even hold a pen and make letters. Georges took me over to see the village around the corner. It was built along train tracks, and the temporary stoles would quickly come down and peopled moved when the train came. Basements of homes were still partially underwater. Its very sad. The lake overflows in rainy season so half the country becomes under water. The really need better flood control, it would greatly help peoples lives (I hear a Japanese group is working on this).

After visiting the center, I mostly wondered around and had a chill afternoon. And went back to Riga for dinner.

A quick stop in KL

jsherdc — Sat, 6 Dec 2008 01:45:00 GMT

I had a very short visit to Kuala Lumpur (KL) on my way to Cambodia because my flights did not connect, so I visited for less than a day. Most people say that KL is boring and there is not much to see. I just can't understand that. I had lots of things I wanted to do there. And architecturally its a very interesting city. Anyway, I basically spent an evening in the Bukit Bitang area (where the tall buildings and nice shopping are), where I spent way too much money at a Spanish Tapas bar (mmm, spanish brandy). Actually KL is an expensive place, except that there was a really nice hostel right in the think of things, that was quite well priced (I forget but around $20 for a single). In the morning I went to see the national mosque. People kept trying to get me to go somewhere else. And hardly anyone could tell me where it was (just behind the main train station in the center of the town). The mosque was quite beautiful, and there was a volunteer there who gave me and this philopeno couple a nice 1 hour tour with lots of information about Islam. I highly recommend visiting there. But my visit was too short (I go back at the end of December). I had a nice lunch and had to catch the plane for Phnom Penh.