first backpacking trip

Beijing, the Great Wall, and the start of Hong Kong

parisephone — Thu, 16 Oct 2014 00:55:00 GMT

So were in Beijing! And our hotel is absolutely incredible and of course Matt and I stand out like sore thumbs walking in with our backpacks and rubby clothes. We have a suite all to ourselves, complete with smart technology. Push a button to open the blinds, turn all the lights on at once, and a two person soaker tub. The works! When first arriving here we literally just enjoyed this hotel. I know our time is short here but we've been roughing it for a while and really needed to savour the luxery. That being said we def got around Beijing in the short time we had. Thank god I got orthotics the old woman I am now. First on the list was to get McDonalds which luckily was right across from our hotel. I must say it sure tasted good after not having any fast food for a solid month! So good in fact we actually got another meal lol. Giving into the stereotype North Americans over eat I'm sure. So the first day we went to the forbidden palace, tiananemen square, and the Lama temple. The forbidden palace as our luck would have it was closed the day we went. But we did get to see the outside and the moat around it. The square you had to wait in a huge line to get into but once you were in it wasn't so bad. Coming up to the forbidden city we approached the gate which most people see when they see Beijing on TV. The mausoleum of Chairman Mao. Sorry people if you want to know who he is you'll have to google it because I honestly can't remember and we didn't have a guided tour lol. The Lama temple is the biggest Buddhist monastery outside of Tibet and houses many statues, silk sanskrit writings and painted silk. When you walk in you are gassed pretty hard with incense as they are lit when people pray. You literally can see smoke coming from the temple so many are lit. The statues are mostly made of solid gold and are forms of the many different Buddhas there are.

The next day we did the Mutianyu side of the Great Wall. We've obviously been off for too long because getting off at 6 was near impossible for us and we practically dragged our asses out of bed. Luckily it takes 1.5 hours to get there so I pretty much napped the whole way. Which was ok because the ride there is all sky scrapers. Its only when you start to get about 20 from the Great Wall do all the buildings start to disappear and more scenic nature takes place. Upon arriving its literally like your in Whistler. The Whistler village that is with all the shops and cafe's. You don't see the Great Wall at first because its so high about you right on top of the mountain. At first I was thinking how the fuck am I going to climb this but then was informed there is a cable car. Yaaaaay for me lol. Only this thing isn't a cable car, its more of a ski chair lift! Something I'm totally freaked out about. Your feet pretty much dangle down high above the ground while nothing but a little bar is the only thing keeping you from falling to your death! and its like your seated on a park bench. Literally to me it was pretty sketchy looking. It doesn't stop either your supposed to hop on and off, another thing I hate! But once your up there the beauty of you surroundings soon make you forget your fears and as you approach the top the Great Wall appears before you and takes your breath away, and you cant help feeling omg am I seriously here right now!! You can spend a ton of hours up there hiking, Matt and I just did our section and came down which took around 3 hours. Once you do one part though most of it just looks like stairs. Stairs so steep that when you at the top looking over the edge you cant see the bottom step! Some steps are short, while others are like 2 stairs but together. They lead up to different watch towers which if your not careful the archways you will definitely bang your head off of. I almost did several times. Some of the towers you can climb additional stairs to the roof and get a better look at the scenery around you.

Because of the fall we had some nice foilage, but for the most part everything was so lush and green. We were lucky because we got our lazy asses up we were literally the first people to arrive. It was like having it all to ourselves! We feel this definitely made up for us missing the forbidden city. One thing I couldn't believe though was as people were coming what they were wearing. I know I'm not the most prepared or best dressed for the occasion kind of person but what these people were wearing was unreal! For example the asian women and men were dressed semi formal, some with heels! Which is mind blowing because in hiking boots I almost rolled my ankles on those old stairs several times! Even some of the foreigners were dressed in jeans and nice shirts. For once I was the more prepared of the bunch. When you get to where you want to finish another thing I didn't know was that you can take a german made toboggan down a stainless steel shoot. Like they do in the Olympics but only steel. I think its called the Luge. No idea. Either way scary! At least one good thing is that you can control some what how fast your going. Matt says I drive like a girl but I don't care. I was so scared of sliding off the track coming down the mountain. Once we made it down there were 2 men dressed like old soldiers. Who pretty much forced us into submission to take pics then wanted us to pay them like 20 bucks for it! We gave them half but man they don't leave you alone.

So now we're in Hong Kong. The girl were renting from sent us a map of how to get here which didn't get through so it took us 3 hours to arrive. Luckily people in Hong Kong are friendly and we had three people of separate occasions help us out. Hong Kong is very overwhelming. It is how I pictured Tokyo or Beijing being with how many people there are. But Hong Kong is ten times worse. So me and Matt are walking around with our huge bags trying to get into the subway with like a million people around us. Every time the train would stop I'd almost fall over from the weight of my bag and into 20 people. When you get off they come at you from every angle. Its like nothing I've seen. Once we left the subway it was like entering Times Square, which coincidently they call the same thing. Only again times it by 10!! The lights, the stores upon stores, then high rises. Its like your lost in a concrete jungle. Everything is built so close to each other its like there is barely enough room for people and buildings. Again its like nothing I've ever seen.

Last of Mongolia

parisephone — Fri, 10 Oct 2014 16:44:00 GMT

So now we're onto the second part of our trip, Western Mongolia. Sadly we said goodbye to our travel companion Matt who went his own way. We ended up flying to Khovd cause all the flights to Olgii were booked. Then had to take a bus to Olgii. In Khovd, Gezie (a girl we met in UB that arranged our travel) arranged for someone she knew to pick us up from the airport. She was an older lady who spoke absolutely no english and was like a grandmother drill sergeant commanding us around with hand signals. First she took us to her place and gave us some watermelon, bread, and jam. Then had us stay there while she took Lance to basically do errands with her which needed heavy lifting done. We were left sitting there wondering what happened to Lance. She kept speaking to Lance even though he told her many times he was Korean Canadian. She'd be like China? What? and just keep talking as if she didn't care. The Ger she ended up driving us to was near a lake which was very very windy, cold, and had no fire. So around 5pm Matt and Lance just went to bed out of boredom. I must say I'm overjoyed we could at least get a flight to Khovd because the bus was 36 hours long and then another 7 to get to Olgii. And these aren't your regular bus rides. These are Russian vans with as many people piled into them as possible. Literally my knees were rights up against the person sitting across from me to the point when we stopped my knees were killing me. They piled 16 people in a van that would carry 8! So you were stuck up right and confined so much you couldn't move at all to get comfortable. I thought that was bad but then I was told the 36 hour bus ride pretty much had people riding on top of each other and on luggage. Literally it looks like we're packed into a clown car and all you can think is how many more fn ppl are we going to stop and pick up. Never mind when we are going to leave. We were supposed to leave at 1pm and ended up leaving at 3:30. What was nice is we ended up being on the same bus as Matt number two. Most the people in the bus with us were American peace corps volunteers. They were really interesting to talk to as they had all been here for around two years, spoke the language, and knew a lot about the culture.

So after the most gruelling 7 plus hour bus ride we arrive in Olgii. Olgii is a little village surrounded by many small mountains and the same open sky you find many places in Mongolia. There are no big buildings but little box like houses made of brick or concrete. When we arrived we called our new guide Aybek to come get us. He is a young Kazak man who built his own guest house and lives with his wife and baby. The baby is definitely not shy and entertains us. She runs around saying to us hello hello hello. She is only 2 and is so independent. She goes up and down the most sketchy steps by her self, even I almost fall down and her parents basically let her do whatever she wants which I'll admit drives me a little crazy, she's practically climbing off the walls. Tonight she grabbed a sharp kitchen knife and was waving it around and her mom was ok with this as I was having a heart attack and hoping not to get stabbed. His wife is very quite and shy but I can tell she understands more english than her husband. Aybek is a very kind man with a big heart. He has went out of his way to make us feel very welcome in Olgii. Aybek is part of the event staff for the eagle festival and we go first thing in the morning. Now I don't know why but they seem to think we need a guide so his friend coolshat(no clue how to spell her name) comes along with us and charges us for basically doing nothing but were too nice to decline her service. On the way to the festival we see all the eagle hunters riding in on horses in traditional clothing with their eagles on their arms. Their presence is something I can not describe. They just have this poise that amazes me. Their like bad ass Mongolians lol. The sight of them makes Matt giddy as this is our main reason we came to Mongolia. While at the festival we ended up meeting up with many of the travellers we have met along the way. The festival wasn't as big as what I thought it was going to be which was good cause I hate big crowds and you could get good pics of the eagle hunters without a million people in the way. Although Michelle Rodriguez from Avatar and Fast and Furious was there. Aaaaaand I got a pic with her! Which I didn't want to bug her for one as she was on holidays but I just couldn't help it. Lance had to give me the push to do it tho because I was too scared to ask. Who would think of all places she'd be in Mongolia! Matt asked her why she was here and I guess she is partly Mongolian. She was super nice. I apologized profusely for bothering her and she didn't mind at all.

There are many events at the eagle hunting festival. Such as camel racing, tug a war between two men on horses, and this whipping game where a man chases a woman on a horse then she chases him and whips him. It's a kazak tradition. Then they have eagle calls, where the hunter calls to his eagle and you watch it fly off this mountain down onto his arm. The other eagle event is the hunting, where they used to use real foxes and wolves but tourists and animal lovers basically complained about it so much they stopped and now just use the fur of one. The eagle sits on the mountain and the hunter rides the horse with the fur dragging behind and calls to his eagle with a sound that resembles one and the eagle comes down to catch it. Super cool to see the eagle soar above you then nose dive for the fur. Eagle hunters are traditionally men but there was a 13 year old girl there that ending up winning. Our "guide" says she isn't an eagle hunter even though she did everything the men did and that people are mad over her winning. Only men can be eagle hunters she says and the girl being one is just a show for toursits. To me if she does everything the men can do why can't she be.

Today is our anniversary so instead of going into the country we decided to hang in olgii for a bit. We walked around and checked out the local shops which pretty much all sell cashmire and things made of yak and camel. We ended up spotting our german and swiss friend we met while staying in a previous ger and decided to spend the rest of the day with them. one thing I will say about travelling is it just amazes me how easily you befriend people. In Canada you would never just meet someone randomly in a cafe and end up spending time with them. It truely amazes me the stories people tell you about their lives and countries. For example Sabastian is only 23 and graduated Harvard university with a phd in physics! and graduated high school at 15. He is literally a boy genius but is so humble and kind. He was telling me there are actually people who go around saying, but I go to Harvard and so on. I would have never known he went there by his attitude. It was merely by me asking him a million questions about his life. Florian is the swiss guy and he is so nice and loves the outdoors. He bought a little jigger kit from Russia for like 50 cents and lost it in the river today and took his boots and socks off and retrieved it and it was 0 degrees celcius. I thought that was so crazy but to top it off they both told me how they were swimming in the lakes here and I'm just blown away as its been beyond cold here. But like they say when its been days since your last shower being clean must out weigh the cold. Although I'm doubtful I could do it. While walking around town we ended up running into all the people we've met so far since being in olgii. You would almost think we were locals lol. One man we met, yeric took us to a place that looked like a run down building which turned out to be an awesome shisha bar. So we smoked there for a few hours chatting and enjoying the company of people who can understand english. A luxery these days. When we were about to leave one of Aybek's friends gave us a ride home. Met us once and insisted on giving us a ride. We came home to a meal made by his wife Inore and the baby Ameena was asking where her hello's were. They know very little english but always try talking with us and always load our plates full of food and insist we have seconds. Our tea cups are never empty and Inore is filling them. When they found out it was our anniversary they were so excited and congratulated us by shaking our hands. Then Abyk disappeared only to reappear and ask for Lance to join him. Upon his return he brought us a picture of Western Mongolia and signed the back saying Happy Anniversary from your Kazik friends. We were so touched. To give us something like that we were just speechless. The hospitality in Western Mongolia is like nothing I've experienced. You literally feel like a friend of the family. They treat us so well and we will forever remember their kindness. So all in all today was a great way to spend our second anniversary. Tomorrow Aybek says he wants to take us fishing when he is off work. Again just blown away at how were being treated here.

One thing i'll say that bothers me sometimes about travelling is getting screwed. We definitely were taken advantage of while we were here all while getting smiled at. All these costs came up when we went to pay, some things we didn't even get why we were charged. Just sucks because you have high hopes for people but in the end in Asia as a North American your usually just a walking dollar sign. Of course not to everyone here but I'm sure for most. Gets under my skin so much but I guess a person just has to realize at the end of the day we do have a lot more.

We are now in UB after another long packed bus ride and a delayed flight of ten hours. Again so happy to be back with a toilet and shower. We are taking it easy at the hostel I once thought was a dump but now view as a five star lol. Its also goodbye to Lance soon. Mongolia had a lot of highs and lows for me but it was definitely worth coming to. Now Matt and I are off to China!

Mongolia

parisephone — Fri, 19 Sep 2014 09:27:00 GMT

So after saying several goodbyes and several hours of flying I finally arrive in Ulaanbaatar, Mongoia's Capital City. When I get here of course I've started what ends up being an almost 3 day puke fest. So my trip really got into a rough start. Were staying in a hostel called reindeer and most things advertised such as free breakfast, 24 hour door man, and bar ect just do not exist. When we got here i was pretty delirious but we were basically pointed to a room with four bunkbeds. Pretty certain they weren't cleaned after the last guest but at this point I was just looking for somewhere to stay. We weren't asked for money or shown around nothing. Just told here are your beds and thats it lol. I've been to a lot of hostels and have to say this is definately the most unconventional one I've been to. When we first arrived we stayed with an Israeli guy and an Austrian girl. Both were very welcoming and basically gave us our intro to the place and tips on travelling to Mongolia. Whats nice is now that they have left Matt's friend lance arrived from Thailand and is now staying with us in our room so we pretty much have the room to ourselves for 8usd a night.

Once I was feeling better we made our way out into the city, which I must say was a lot different than what I had expected. It's as modern as most cities with a touch of historical buildings. The people are very fashion forward, but are definately not that friendly. When we smile or try to say thank you in their language while paying for things they pretty much just shake their head at us.

Before we left for Mongolia Matt had been speaking with another guy about possibly joining us in what I like to call the outback of mongoia because its so remote. But before meeting him we had to meet our guides who came to meet us then take us to matt(the guy were touring with is also named matt) Meget and Billet. A very nice Mongolian couple who welcomed us into their home and even gave Matt a place to stay when he arrived off the train from Russia. In Canada no one would do this. Their warmth and hopitality was really nice to see. Meeting Matt who had really bummed out his knee trekking in Russia was a bit of a surprise as I pictured him to be around our age and instead he was this 22 year old super skinny guy with really fluffy messy hair and a thick Brittish accent. Bilet told us she prefers canadians and americans because we speak "real" english which she can understand.

So in disgussing our tour plan basically what it entailed was us going into Mongolia, travelling for hours and hours in this cramped Russian jeep, myself and four guys. Camping along the way in freezing conditions, riding wild Mongolian horses who potentially could kick us off all in the hopes we may but were not gauranteed to see the tsaan people. Other wise known as the reindeer people. We would be gone for 22 days which also really didn't work for me. So Oka one of the guys working at the hostel introduced to Gezzie who set up an 8 day tour a lot cheaper and more of what we were looking for.

So we set out for what I call the outback of Mongolia, so goodbye good toilets, wifi, and any comfort you get in the city. Not to mention vegetables or any food that I would normally eat. The bathrooms are absolutely the worst I've seen and are made of two 2 by 4 boards over a hole. I always worry I'm going to slip and fall in as you balance yourself on these boards over the hole. Oka is our guide so already we know this is going to be fun as he is a young guide and easy to get along with and we met him already while staying at the hostel. Once leaving UB any evidence of ownership of property is gone. There are no homes, no gates housing land in, just nothing but scenery. The land is made of rolling hills and open skies. Its like being in the beginning of time when nothing existed. The only sign people live out here is the odd Ger you see or car driving by. The land is for the taking. The roads are so bad that you feel like your in a washing machine the whole ride. Thank god I don't get motion sickness. . Any Nomadic Mongolian can basically settle where ever they want and not pay taxes or rent. They live off the land, the more cattle or animals you have the richer you are. The first couple days we've mostly drove in an old van made for 6, with all our stuff packed tight. Every day a piece falls off that our driver must fix. At night we go stay at Gers with nomadic families. A ger is basically a mongolian tent, almost like a teepee but more round than pointed. In the ger its a basic setting, beds in a pentagon shape with a stove in the middle. We are often fed sheep meet and some type of carb noodle made with flour. All food is so heavy here and since coming I AM SOOOOO constipated. The people we meet seem friendly but I did expect them to be more friendly. They seem to keep to themselves aside for making us a hot meal and fire. With every meal they offer us this white tea, which tastes like hot bitter rice. I'm not a fan of it but they always pour me a glass anyway. And when scooping out supper they always give you enough to feed three people, which I hate because I can barely stomach the food. Another common offering here is Airag, formented mares milk. Yes it's as bad as it sounds. For me anyway. I'm not a very adventurous eater so I'm completely out of my comfort zone in every way here. Travelling with all males I will say for the first time in my life I'm feeling like a bit of a princess for how up tight I get with the bathrooms and food. Once getting over myself I'm starting to appreciate where we are and what we're doing. The land is beautiful I don't think anywhere this remote exists many places. The best part is at night because of the lack of air pollution and light pollution the stars come alive at night. They are so bright and beautiful they are literally the only light that comes through. You can see the full Milky Way horizontally across the sky. Its like your at the planetarium. Another high light here is the white lake. A day full of driving and seeing nothing but land it appears through the rocks and were all in awe of its beauty. So we decided to stay here for a couple days. Here we went horseback riding with wild Mongolian horses. These horses are half wild so you have to try not to let the thought of them bucking you off intimidate you. They are all tied with ropes rather than leather, wooden saddles, and basically gear that looks like its from the 1900's. To think we were considering going horseback riding for 5 days straight. I wouldn't have lasted. I barely get through an hour with out my vagina feeling like its been smashed to bits. While staying here we met a woman from Amsterdam. She is my new idol. She's educated, independent, and has travelled all over the world by herself. A truly inspiring individual. She has offered us to stay with her when we get to Amsterdam which makes me so excited. I only hope she means it lol. At this ger there is a little girl around 6 who smiles across the ger at me and mimicks what I do. She has a shaved head. I guess they shave the baby hair off around 6 for girls and 4 for boys. But even with her shaved head she is the cutest little thing ever. She wears these little gold earings that dangle from her ears. We bought gifts to give the nomadic families children and when we gave her hers she was so elated by just colouring pencils. We also got these pencils with a little bobbing clown on top. Before I left we went for breakfast and she was still sleeping and when she woke up she asked for it first thing and started to bobble it in bed. A little pencil bringing her so much happiness. Just melts your heart.

So its day four into our trip and my hormones are turning me into a huge bitch. We drove for 14 hours straight on roads that have no pavement. Literally its like driving through fields, no roads no paths, nothing. Were driving up hills almost like mountains up and down. Around on the edge of cliffs where the whole vehicle is completely sideways. I white knuckle the door every time. We are in absolute seclusion. Another thing I notice while driving yesterday is there are no road signs. Or even signs indicating which city or town your in. Our guide Oka pretty much hasn't had a plan for anything this whole trip and being 23 and having the maturity of a teenager I really don't think he should be planning and managing a tour. So every night I almost feel like we don't know where were going to sleep. Which is a scary thing given the outbacks remoteness. For example when we were driving our 14 hour day we came across two men whose vehicle broke down and they were waiting for help 3 days!!!! starving with no food or water. When we gave them ours they devoured it down in seconds. Its very nerve wrecking to think that could happen out here. Even if I were bucked off a horse or something there is no emergency for gettting back to UB and getting proper help. But back to Oka, so were driving all day and finally reach the town were supposed to stay in. First Oka tells me the day before were staying at a hotel, then he tells me a ger, then he tells me a hotel again. Which excites me beyond belief as I need a shower in the worst way and really just want to sit on a toilet instead of squatting over a hole! But after 14 hours I can feel my patience is really thin and he's making us bounce around to every hotel to get the best price. I literally had to breath to stop my self from ripping him a new asshole. But finally we get a hotel! And we all look like the dirtiest people ever. When I washed my hands the water was brown. Water has literally not touched me in days. I have never had so much appreciation for something so simple as a shower in my life! I don't know how people go and work in these remote places and stay long term. I've come to the conclusion I'm just a dreamer bc In actuality I like the comforts in life. Even though I want to be this great adventurer I guess I'm just not cut out for it.

After staying at the hotel my moral has been restored and I'm feeling more optimistic about the rest of this trip. Amazing what a simple shower and change of clothes can do. I think Oka was starting to get scared around me, he definitely could tell i was beyond irritated. We drove a couple hours that day to khubsgul. And stayed in little trangle wooden huts. I was elated to see they carved out a toilet from wood. No more squating over 2 by 4's halleluiah! The area is all nice fall trees over a huge lake. We ended up taking a boat over the water which was weird bc it was 0 degrees and to be on a boat made it that much colder. The rest of the trip we mostly stayed in gers. Which every night was freezing so I was always unable to sleep. And we were served the same 3 meals everywhere we went. Flour noodles with sheep meat, some sort of soup with sheep meat, and sheep meat. Something so so hard for me to eat the same things over and over. We just arrived back in Ub and Im so happy to be back to wifi, toilets, and indoors.

My new adventure alone

parisephone — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 18:42:00 GMT

So my Chev Lev (Stacey) went back to Canada. No we didnt fight or anything she just got sick of having bed bugs biting her, shitty accommo, and hauling a 30pnd bag on her back lol. First reaction eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaomg how am I going to survive!! It took the ferry ride from Phuket to PHi Phi for the panick to go away. When it finally left I realized I needed to find a roommate cause I can't afford to be paying a whole $20 a night for a room and phi phi is pricey so it would probably be even more. SO I'm walking down the street shoveling my face with food when I see this guy all alone carrying his oversized bag containing everything he owns. So much like meeting Simon I ran up to him before he got too far food in hand mouth full and all and pulled him over. At first his reaction to me seemed like he was irritated by a rodent but I came to realize he is just really shy and I think a little insecure about his English. He is from Finland and a big teddy bear of a guy that you just want to hug but he carrys an invisible DONT FUCKEN TOUCH ME sign on his chest that I can see quite clearly. It was his first day in Thailand and the lucky guy gets me haha. Well I convince him its smart to share a room with me cause all the dorm rooms in the hostels are taken. So he reluctantly agrees with me and were off. This lady pulls us a side and shows us her bamboo village. Seeing as everything so far had been booked we decided to check it out. When we got there this lady gave us a price and of course I bartered with her and got a better deal. Then Yoni my finish friend said I would have just paid what she asked the first or second time. This made me realize just how used to being here I have become. So this literally was a bamboo village. With grass for a room bamboo walls and a floor you could see right through. We stayed in something similar before but this one was a couple steps down from this one. In this one we didnt have the luxery of a bathroom or shower on the inside. We got to do that outside yay! lol. and the mosquito nets about the beds were covered in holes so everynight I would awake the sudden itching of mosquito bites. i think i have three bites on every toe now. As soon as we got there I started to show Yoni around and was reminded of the beauty of Phi Phi. It wasn't long though I wouldnt be able to enjoy it. I suddenly got really really sick. Not too surprising for me but I havent been sick pretty much this whole trip. Not sure if it was sunstroke or not but anyways I pretty much puked for 30hrs and poor Yoni gets to see me on my death bed crying and all upset about missing home and being emotional cause I"m sick. All while running across the road to puke since we dont have the luxery of our own toilet. Nice first impression lol. I have always said that travelling makes you realize the kindess of strangers, here yoni just meets me and he is bringing me gatorade and trying to make me feel better. On top of this horrible two days is the heat, nausea and heat are such a bad combo I was dying for AC but just couldnt move to go get another room. So there I laid with the fan blowing warm air on me. Well after I wasted almost all my time in PHi Phi being sick I decided it was time to do something and dragged Yoni with me. Yoni has to be poked and prodded to talk or so I find. I know he likes me but you would never know it. We went snorkelling. Again. HOw I love it though. Yoni had never been and I loved being the one to introduce it to him. I thought It wasnt going to be a good tour but then as soon as I got in the water I was amazed at how many fish were around me right off the bat. I seriously felt like they were bumping into my mask thats how many there were. The guy driving the boat told us to go over by where the limestone shoots out of the water and when we did we came along this huge coral wall with soooo many fish and different creatures swimming up the side of it. One of the most beautiful things I have seen. There were even different kinds of star fish that had what looked like feathers that were vibrant blue and just looked like they were swaying in the water. and Huge coral that were vibrant green, purple, pink, and blue. I always feel like I'm in the little mermaid when I go underwater lol. SO when we finish I aske Yoni what he thinks and he is like Amazing. BUgger gets a good snorkel right off the bat and I had to do like five shitty ones before i got a good one. Turns out he is a pro at it too. I would look over at him and he would dive down so deep he looked like a fish! I just kept putzing along as usual. Anyways After our snorkelling we rode home in the sunset from Maya Island which is where they filmed the beach. It was cool to see it at sunset cause I went there with stacey during the day. On our way back we met two girls from Australia and decided to go for drinks with them. We found this little beach bar with pillows on the sand that propped you up and just watched the long tail boats sway on the water as the waves crashed in. there were also those fire dancers as well and Great regge music playing. THen I found myself on another natural high just sitting there taking in the moment. Me alone in Thailand surviving my first couple days, now feeling better, sitting on a beautiful white sand beach having some drinks and good conversation with a guy from Finland and Two Aussie girls. All who I have only recently met. So ready to see what the rest of this trip brings.

Cambodia

parisephone — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 02:41:00 GMT

So we have been in Thailand for a month and it was time to go for a visa run. We kept hearing a lot of stories of
people getting ripped off at the border, getting screwed out of their tickets, and major delays in getting to
Cambodia. Despite hearing all this Stacey and I still decided to take the bus there which apparently is the worst
way to get there. Well it took us two days to get to
Cambodia. That is longer than it took us to get from Canada to Asia! Then when we got to the border we got ripped
off 40 dollars for a visa, which we keep hearing from people is supposed to be free. Cambodia is a lot dirtier than
Thailand and really dusty and dry. The people are a lot friendlier though but very very poor. You see children
begging everywhere. And supposedly its a really unsafe place to be. We originally planned on staying for four days
but after day one realized we wouldn't stay more than two. The first day we went to the floating village. Which is
basically where a bunch of people live in little house boats along the river. These houses are made up of just
boards and tires. While floating by you can see right into their house. There are Kids running around naked with no
clothes on, some with snakes just hanging around their shoulders as pets. These children have no fear. While
Stacey and I were boating past this floating village other boats would come up to our boat and beg and one little
girl even jumped from her boat onto ours to ask for money. The water we boated on was the dirtiest water I've
ever seen. It was so brown and had no transparency. We were told mid way through our trip there were lots of
snakes and Crocidiles in those waters. We then went to this war museum which you really wouldnt consider a normal
museum. The sign for this museum was a chalk board with rocks spelling out war museum lol and was basically just
a field with old tanks and guns used by pol pot when he was trying to kill all the cambodians. They had civil war
for like 30yrs and the stories the guy told us were horrible. He was actually a victim in the war and saw a lot of
his friends and his entire family killed. KInd of ironic he would choose to work at a museum talking about what
he went through everyday. Im not saying what he went through wasnt horrible but the whole time he was milking it
for all it was worth so we could give him a big tip. It just sounded like he was laying it on super thick. I know
this makes me sound horrible saying it but Stacey agreed too. The whole day we were taken around in a tuk tuk
hooked onto a motorbike. It was so wobbly when we were riding in it and I felt like at any minute we would tip
over. It was so dusty there as well. I felt like if I had asthma I was sure to have an attack riding around in
that tuk tuk. I almost wished I had a mask to wear. Then we went for the sketchiest massage of our life. IM
not sure if it was a happy ending place cause when we went inside there was nothing to indicate it was a massage
place and when we asked the women there about gettting a massage they looked at us confused. Finally she understood
that we were there for what her buisness was advertised. She took us up to a room up stairs with two beds beside
eachother. One older lady walks in and tells me to get on the table and starts giving me what kind of seemed like
a thai massage. I then tell her we were there for an oil massage. She then calls in another girl and leaves me
for Stacey. Since that girl had started a thai massage on me I just continued on with it especially after seeing
the oil massage was with cheap no name baby oil. The girl massaging me had no idea what she was doing. She would
just rub different places for a minute or two randomly. When the first chick went over to stacey she pretty much
just started to take stacey[s clothes off. she didnt speak english so she just would do whatever she wanted. no
privacy either basically just told stacey to lay on teh bed and gave her a little towel. Poor stacey always is
getting a molestation massage, the girl started to massage stacey's boobs and when she would finish rubbing her
legs she would finish off by patting staceys crotch. After our lovely massages we headed back to our room. what
the place we stayed at didnt tell us though was that there was a wedding going on. Cambodians apparently know how
to party cause this party went on for like three days and right outside our window. So all night and all day we
would hear Cambodian music blasting outside our window. the next day we got a tuk tuk to take us for the day to
angkok wat. Approaching Angkor wat is beautiful, the ruins are in really good condition considering how old they
are and on the way there the landscape is beautiful. the trees line either side of the road and its actually the
cleanest air i smelled in Cambodia. Kids are everywhere trying to sell you something as soon as you get out of
the tuk tuk. so cheap too. ten post cards for 1 dollar. Some ppl buy a seven day pass to Angkor wat but stacey
and I were good in one day. We stayed the whole day so we could see the sun set and got disappointed cause it
didnt set over angkor like we hoped for. All in all Angkor was worth the trip to Cambodia and without it Cambodia
would be worse off economically.

When i knew we were leaving bangkok I began to feel that happiness i felt when i knew we were leaving samatra. back
to civilization! On the way to Bangkok we met some really nice Aussies. One was this little boy named Maddy. He
was so funny and such a smart ass. Kept me entertained most the way. He let me know of all the things i should do
when I hit oz. Then we met Corey, a fellow Canadian who lived in Bangkok the last year and was moving to Oz soon.
Corey was great and got us situated in Bangkok. Its so nice to get off the bus or boat and have an idea of what
and where your going. COrey took us to BMk after that. I dont know why everyone gives Bangkok such a bad name I
thought it was a great part of Thailand. A nice dose of city. Tons of lights, buildings, and malls. MBK was my
favourite cause I could actually afford to shop there. It was there I got my fake eyelash extensions. Then
right after there was a sign on the wall saying ppl in Bangkok are going blind from eye infections cause by these
same eyelash extensions I had just gotten. Well corey thought this was hilarious. AFter that we went to the
VIp theatre. which has recliner seats with blankets and you get a free cocktail with yruo movie. you have to stand
before the movie plays for the king. they do this little tribute to him. The thais loooooooove their king and if
you speak anything against him u can go to jail im told.

The shopping in Bangkok is amazing. FOr two days thats all we've been doing. Level upon level of shopping. One
level at mbk is just phones. After just shopping we met up with a friend of matts who took us two hours out of
Bangkok to a place where we saw a bridge build by prisoners of war. To stacey and I this was a waste of two hours
for a bridge that didnt look that good. Then we went to ride the elephants. That was cool but we were saving
the elephant thing for Chiang Mai. Atleast the scenery is good there. Where matt took us was just a bunch of
dry fields. But I got to steer the elephant. That was cool cause when I dropped my sandle the elephant picked it
up and passed it to me. When we finished riding the elephants we got to feed them. I could feel them sniffing for
the bananas and blowing air on my hand. They have such big nostils haha. Next was the tigre temple which wasnt
a temple at all but grounds holding tigers. But when I saw how they were treating the tigers I soon left cause I
didnt want to contribute to that.

Then our Simon came back to us again. How we love him. I really feel I have made a great friend for life.
Today we went to the Grand Palace and some other temples. Really beautiful all made of gold. Saw the emerald
buddah. REally thought it was going to be bigger. but it was just a little a little buddah sitting on a tall
pedistole sitting in a traditional thai costume. there is a ceremony the king attends three times a year just
to change this little buddah's costume. everything in the palace is gold and filled with jewels. we paid the tuc
tuc driver 5 bhat to take us all around bangkok which is really nothing but he told us we had to stop at a few
shops to get this deal. which was no problem to us cause we "knew" we werent goign to buy anything. well turns
out we bought a lot at each place we stopped so our tuc tuc driver loved us. simon and stacey even got suits made.
all in all i really enjoyed bangkok it was sad saying goodbye to simon but the night before we left him we went out
in khaosan road and got hammered. those dam buckets i swear. you think your fine then it hits you and its too late
to turn back. luckily simon is a professional drinker (jk) and took care of me. i swear we dont need to meet any
one thats how much we laugh and enjoy our time together. we hung out just him and i the entire night dancing and
laughing. people thought we were pretty strange im sure dancing right in the street but who cares we had fun.
now were in phuket again and we thought we were going to stay only one night before heading to vietnam but we
realized how much we missed the sun and werent ready to go without it again quite yet so we are now staying a week.

koh samui/koh tao

parisephone — Thu, 7 Jan 2010 15:44:00 GMT

dec 28 2009

today we rented a bike in koh samui. it was another great day. i find renting a bike lets you see the most for
the least amount of money. on our bike ride we saw a bunch of buddhist statues and temples. im not sure what
each one means. they are all gold and have tons flowers and insence on them and were seated looking out on a pond.
there were tons of cat fish you could feed in the pond. they were going crazy for the food and just swimming around
in one big bunch. tails flapping out of the water and mouths wide open like hippos! i've never seen fish flock
to food like that! after that we went rode up to the hin lad waterfall. the hike up was about an hour and
everytime we passed someone they told us the same time 20 mins. so we wondered if we would ever be there.
the trees on either side of the trail twisted together and you could hide in some of the pockets of the trees. when
we got the top we met a guy from poland and chilled out with him near the water fall. you could swim in the water
at the base of the falls which was nice cause we were so hot from the hike up. you could even sit right under the
waterfall which i was scared to do at first cause it looked like they were pounding down. i eventually got over it
and it wasnt so bad. it was neat to feel them pound down over your head.

jan 4/10 so we rang in the new yr with the full moon party. i think its definately one of the biggest parties of
its kind. and what a way to ring in the new yr. unfortunately it was so crazy im going to leave the details out.
lets just say i got home at 8 am to two english "blokes" sitting naked in our hotel pool eating green curry and
chicken. From Koh phangan we went to koh tao. i thought koh tao was going to be a very quiet island based on what
others had told me but it turned out to be one of the busiest islands i've been on. so busy we couldnt find
accommodation. luckily the dive company we decided to go with went above and beyond and found us some. although
its no where near the school so someone has to pick up and drop us off everyday. the first night we got here
we slept on the dirtiest sheets i think i've ever seen. i think they were used by the ppl before us without even
being changed! luckily the dive company fixed it the next day. the main reason we came to koh
tao was to dive so we didnt waste anytime thats the first thing we did. our teacher's name is franky and i
have to laugh cause he really looks like franky munez from malcom in the middle.
the only difference being his bleached out surfer hair he likes to frequently
reposition his sunglasses through on a regular basis and the most aqua blue eyes i think i've ever seen. he is
english and along with the typical bad teeth they have he also uses all the slang the british have to offer,
like referring to his boss as a tosser, being cross, etc. i will also say what an amazing teacher he is. i was
really scared and he really made me feel comfortable in the water and helped me not to panick.
the first day was a lot of learning. once you learn all the dangers of diving (at least for me) its enough to
make you not want to get in the water in the first place. today was first day we got to use our new skills in the
open ocean. and i was freaking out a little. but to my surprise i did really really well. the people i thought
would do awesome actually panicked in the water. so i was feeling pretty good about myself. since koh tao is so
famous for diving i honestly thought we would see more coral and fish. a lot of ppl told us we would see whale
sharks as well. we saw none of this. in fact we saw more fish snorkelling in indo. but its a great place to
learn thats for sure. im hoping tomorrow to see more fish and to pass my test.

jan6 2010 we did our dive test and to my surprise i passed. i didnt think i would feel competent under the water
without the instructor or someone else guiding me through it to calm my nerves but i did. i realized with this
course that I often give myself no credit. i passed the written test with flying colours as well. 92% which to
me is pretty good considering there were only 50 questions so not a lot to give you the freedom to make mistakes.
so now i am free to dive anywhere in the world as long as i have a buddy with me who is also an open water diver.
i can explain how amazing i feel when im under water. i never thought i would do something like this. when i was
younger and even now i hold my head under the water and just relax. now i can stay under there for a long time and
enjoy all the fish. i feel like being under water looking at all the fish a piece of heaven on earth. the fish
swimming gracefully all around you yet even when you think you can touch them they wont let you lol. there were
these silver fish that reflected the light of the sun, they were over my head and when i would look up it just
looked like there were sparkles everywhere in the water. i saw a sting ray too. all kinds of other things i dont
know the name of. and when your swimming up to the surface it looks so close. for me it looks like your under
a think sheet of ice. and your just waiting to break through it. im addicted to this. i want to dive all over
the world now and use all my new skills. after our diving we went out for drinks with the group of ppl we dove with
robyn and sam. robyn was from holland and sam australia. and these two guys would show up for the classes hung
over yet would ace everything. which would piss me off cause i would actually go home and study and not do as well
as them. sam is your typical pot head but a genuinely nice guy. he kind of looks like wolverine too. he told
me he heard that a lot. i told him thats super cool but he didnt think so. he invited me to visit him when im in
australia as well. said he would even pick me up from the airport. thats how nice ppl are here. there all
willing to help their fellow traveller. after that we could a "taxi" which was stacey and i on a scooter with a
driver. three ppl on one scooter! whole families travel like this! there is a saying here i guess though
and it goes T.I.T, this is thailand lol. it is the reason you wait forever for thing, why they are never on time
when they are supposed to pick you up and why you travel like your a piece of luggage etc.

when i first started this trip i didnt think i was going to last. just

cause i was so far away from everyone i love and completely out of my comfort zone but now i dont know if i want
to come back. i love this way of life! not a care in the world. not focused on the stress of work, the stress of
the minor things that drive you nuts back home. its just a simple life. all my possesstions i live out of fit in
a backpack. i barely brush my hair anymore, i dont use my fancy facewash anymore, and i certainly could use a
pedicure lol. i stay in rooms that if any of my friends were to come visit me would turn their noses up etc. this
is the life im falling deeply in love with. and its funny cause before i left sonya said to me your not coming
back and i seriously laughed at the idea cause there is no way i thought i would stay abroad. but now if i didnt
have to come back for matt i would leave my life behind and start a new one here. i've met people from all around
the world who have lived life to its fullest and now i finally feel like i am too! who knows tho maybe i will
convince matt to move somewhere. atleast he is willing to try new things. anyway thats all for today. im feeling
so high on life and its great!

phuket/krabi/koh phi phi/au nang

parisephone — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 00:08:00 GMT

dec 19 2009

today started off like a pretty average somewhat boring day. we took our sweet ass time getting ready for the
day and enjoyed the last few precious hour we had with our lovely hotel with ac.
it was now time to go back to our low budget accommodations ms brown
loves so much (LOL) On our way to find a place today we spotted another backpacker and pretty much ran up to him
asked where he was staying. were not shy girls as soon as we see the backpack we pretty much flag them down and
interrogate them with questions like where are you from, how long are you in thailand, what have you done, where
are you staying. stuff like that. his name is simon and he is from leeds and tipped us off to a good place to
stay. i didnt know it at the time but we were about to form an amazing friendship with this guy.
he is one of the funniest guys i've ever met and on the gloomiest of days i truely think he could put a smile
on anyone's face. the place he recommended turned out to be great and from then on we travelled with us girls.
once we found our place amy and i had one of our always oh so amazing inspiring talks and shopped around while
stacey and simon hit the beach. its funny cause they look like they could pass for brother and sister, both of
have really blond hair dark skin blue eyes and white teeth. they look like beach babes.
on our journey today amy mentions wanting a bamboo tattoo since you can only get one in thailand.
i totally love the idea but hardly considered it for me.
first off i have no idea what i wanted, didnt know if there would be any good artists, how clean they would be,
or how sanitary, etc. then while amy and i were walking around we came across this shack pretty much on the beach
and contemplated doing it there. the girl working there wanted our business so bad and was serving us pineapple
and bananas for just looking. her name was pong. and amy is like oh shes so nice lets get it there. and im like
ah i dont know, then i saw the guys drawing and that was a no for me. so after i convinced amy to eat another meal
that scared the shit out of her cause it was on the street we passed by a professional looking tattoo parlor that
did bamboo tattoos. the guy has been doing it for twenty years, barely speaks english, and is an asshole. so we
left and googled tattoo ideas in case we wanted to do one anyway. when we left the internet cafe we were so pumped
with the designs we picked out we just decided to fuck it and go get it done that night that second.
we lucked out they were still open, not busy, and ready to rock. so there's me and amy shitting ourselves.
im so nervous i feel like im going to pass out and wished i had matts mom there to offer me a pill to relax lol.
its not like i knew what to expect after all my other tattoo is done with a machine this is done with literally a
bamboo stick with something that looks like a nail tied to the stick with a string at the top. just watching
him prep amy's made me feel sick. amy went first and took it
like a champ! i sat there and held her hand like mothers do for their children when they go to the dentist lol
i even had to scold her not to move. we were both so sweaty we kept losing grip. i must have clicked
a million pictures. then it was my turn. oh god. i thought i was going to pass out for real. i couldnt even
look up or anything i had to close my eyes and meditate or something to get through it. it was so much slower than
a machine tattoo and it felt like he was sewing a tattoo into my skin. and the tattoo was on a vein so everytime
he went there it hurt so bad. when we were done for some reason he started to be nice and took pics with us.
when we were done we were so high on life we came back to the room to proudly showed stacey our tattoos and how
told her how brave we were. she had a few beers and seeing how pumped we were decided it was time to get her belly
button pierced.
so after looking around and seeing that most the tattoo places were closed we find this tuc tuc and he gives us a
ride around ao nang trying to get this done. well wouldn't you know it if you just would have turned our heads
literally to the other direction we would have seen a tattoo place open two stores down from our guest house!

so stacey gets her belly button pierced. i thought she was going
to cry. but she didnt. again i was on camera duty. when stacey is finished getting her belly button pierced
amy sees her piercing and gets hers done, then simon gets a
tattoo done. it was just one big chain reaction. what a night!

after that we went to railey beach and brought
simon with us. it reminded me of canada when you go camping with all the trails. the one leading us to our next
accommodation. a bamboo hut. it was funny cause it literally was made of bamboo and the roof didnt even meet
the walls. all kinds of bugs could get in so we had to use a mosquito net to sleep in. at night you could hear
them all around you and i thanked god everynight for that net. i wouldnt go outside it till the sun came out and
the noise from all those bugs were gone.
when amy got there she wasnt too impressed about this. for a moment i didnt know if she would make it through,
i think if anyone was ever ripped out of their comfort zone its ms brown. at least stacey and i were eased into
the ghetto. every place we took ms brown to you could see the look on her face like really were staying here? haha
i got to give her a thumbs up she was a good sport and even though she wasnt on a budget she respected that we were
and totally slummed it with us. railey was like koh phi phi in that you had to take a boat
there and you couldnt drive but a lot quieter. we went kayaking during the day and just hung out during the nights
laughing with simon. to get to koh samui we had to take three modes of transport. bus ferry then cab.

I was really scared to take the night ferry based on what the
aussie's told me in Bali. I was so scared I was going to have cockroaches crawling all over me while i slept.
we had to take a bus to get to the night ferry first which lost its ac and almost killed us with the body heat
so everyone had to
get out of the bus and wait half an hour for it to get fixed. When we finally got to the ferry we saw jan our
friend we stayed with in koh phi phi. we met the english girls she had been travelling with before meeting us as
well. when we got on the ferry it actually wasnt bad. apart from how hot it was before we finally figured out how
to open the windows. it took an engineer from ireland to get it. then when we got them open half way through the
night it was freezing. never any happy medium here. and the ship rocked uncontrolably thank god i didnt get sea
sick cause you definately felt every wave. we finally got to koh samui which to me isnt as beautiful as the other
islands but definately seems more established and has better accomodations. we mostly just chilled on teh beach as
usual. on christmas eve we went to the half moon party in the evening. i think they have a something moon party
every chance they get b/c supposedly there are black moon half moon full moon all kinds of moon parties. its neat
here tho cause everynight so far i have been here there are fire works going off. they are the biggest and
brightest fireworks i think i have ever seen. so its nice to take a stroll out to the beach at night. they also
light those paper lanters and send them off into the sky as well which i dont like cause they just pollute the
planet and i always wonder if thats half the trash i see in the water. then there are the kids you see that want
to play connect four with you. i watched this 8 yr old barely pay attention to the game she was playing with a
tourist while looking for another target and just murder the guy. sad to see kids up that late making a living for
their parents.

on christmas day we decided to roll down the hill in a big balloon that looked like a clear beach ball. it was so
scarey! you climb up these rickety wooden stairs and get thrown into this balloon that only velcrows shut and
ties with a shoe string. simon had to run up the stairs and throw me into the ball i was so scared. i would
have totally backed out had it not been for him. he pretty much kicked my feet up and threw me in and laughed
as i pretty much cried out to him from the inside. amy told me as soon as he got down the stairs he said that
me being scared was one of the funniest things he has ever seen. hes like the worst guy to be around when your
scared cause you can pretty much gaurantee he will stand there laughing. its always a laugh with simon for
example he decided to throw on amy\s bikini and strut around outside for a laugh. all the thai ppl were laughing
at him when he opened the door so he decided to go back inside and take pics of himself with amy's camera.
before he lost his camera he would take all these funny pics and now has to resort to taking them with our cameras.

for christmas we all exchanged gifts and stacey got amy and i a yoga class and the fish spa. well let me tell you
i totally understand why people say yoga is a mind body spirit thing. i was tested to my limit and totally thought
i was going to pass out. one guy walked out of the studio. and i wanted to walk out with him. but i didnt and am
so proud of myself for staying because it was truely hard. i felt so dizzy and at times nausous.
the type of yoga we did is called bikram yoga which
is basically doing yoga in an extremely hot room so you sweat your ass off and work your muscles deeper. now think
of how hot thailand is already. when i walked out of this room it actually felt cold out. it was so
hot and i was so sweaty! more than I have ever been in my whole life! it tested my body and determination like
nothing i have ever experienced. sweat was literally dripping off my ears.
i was wearing board shorts when i got there and they were soaked as well.
it was an amazing experience and im glad i got to experience it. as for the fish thing. been there done that bought
the shirt. it was funny to watch amy go through it though. she would barely put her feet in it just grossed her
out too much. i was like that the first time but then i was like come on i paid 40 bucks for this cant waste that
money lol. im so cheap.

amy brown brought the party fort mac style

parisephone — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 23:47:00 GMT

so we arrived in thailand. we started off in phuket. after a series of problems we went through with the airlines
we had finally arrived. as soon as we got there we met a couple from edmonton and shared a cab to find a hostel.
we ended up stayign at this hostel a canadian guy owned and gave us a discount for being from canada and was
very helpful.
we ended up staying in patong beach. it was a bit too busy for my liking though so after a day of being lazy on
the beach we rented a motor bike and went up to karon beach, rawai pier, and the kathu waterfall. the waterfall
was like a stair master it seemed like they went forever and when you got to the top it wasnt even a nice view.
it was
better to just look up from the bottom. we also continued snorkeling which wasnt as good as bali for the coral
but the fish were cool and there were crabs everywhere and stace saw some jellyfish. amy arrived shortly after
we arrived and came bike riding with us. it drove me nuts
she just hoped on the bike and automatically knew what
she was doing and drove well on the left side of the road. then there is me, stacey got me to try and i almost
killed us literally. so she figured she should stick to driving. amy even got a dose of the celebrity life when
all the kids at the view
point wanted a pic with her and kept touching her hands and stuff cause she was white lol. i loved the street
food in phuket even though i
told myself i wouldnt eat any the banana pancakes were soooooo good with chocolate and the corn tasted so fresh.
i find fruit here to be really fresh as well and more tastey than any other place i've ever been.
once we finished touring
aroudn phuket we went to phi phi islands. which have those huge lime stones shooting out of the water and is
the place where many movies have been filmed like blue lagoon and the beach. the scenery is so nice you could just
sit out and look at it and be in awe by its beauty. in the island you arent allowed to drive anything but a
peddle bike. which makes it so nice and quite. its like this perfect beach town you can just got to the beach
during the day and lay, sail around then at night stroll around in the narrow alleyways and shop in the markets.
we did a tour of the whole island and went to many different beaches and snorkelled. we checked out where the
blue lagooon was filmed and the beach. the water was so blue and the limestones jetting out of the water were
magestic. the beauty of koh phi phi i will remember forever. when taking the ferry we met some guys from india
and a girl from denmark and shared a guest house with them to save money. we went out that night for some supper
and ate at this place where a guy singing there amazed us all with his beautiful voice. if he was selling cd\s
i would have bought one. he made every song he sang into his own. my favourite being use somebody by kings of
leon. we had a great meal with great company. while eating we ended up joining up with the table next to us.
everyone was from the czech republic. one guys name was borshak! how sad is that. it just amazes me how when your
backpacking you meet people for like two minutes then just end up hanging out with them. at home if i met somenoe
at the airport i wouldnt just share a cab with them, but here we would. just sitting at dinner listening to the
great music and looking around at so many happy faces from all around the world i was on the best natual high. the
booze really helped that high and took it to a whole new level though! my lord after like two drinks i was
hammered and we ended up leaving supper and going to a beach party where they had this ring of fire you could jump
through, a skipping rope on fire, and a limbo on fire. i didnt do either cause i was way too loaded. then they
painted everyones face in neon glow paint. we danced the night away with all our new friends and even met more
people there. around this time my memory fails me cause apparently i was so drunk i could barely talk. thank god
amy brown took care of me!! i still had the time of my life and luckily didnt wake up with a hangover. another
good thing about thailand is like bali the spa services are so cheap! i got a full body massage and facial for 10
bucks. then i got a full leg wax for 15. but when i went in there were two chicks working on me no curtain to
give me privacy and basically one chick took one leg and spread them apart and started ripping hair off both legs
at the same time. and not little strips. literally they spread the wax from my ankle to my knee and did one huge
rip everytime! it was insane. but loved the smooth feeling of the full leg wax i usually only do to the knee.

after koh phi phi we came to krabi. it sucked saying goodbye to our dutch friend jan but were hoping to meet up
with her for the full moon party. in krabi it rained on us so we didnt do anything during the day but in the
evening we went out for staceys bday. we got all dolled up and looked for a good party. its cool here cause there
are places right on the street that mix you drinks. so we got a couple of those and then went to go see the lady
boy show which was seriously a disgrace to drag queens everywhere. these guys dresses didnt even fit them and
some of their make up was horrible just like their lip singing. after that we went to this bar where you could
dance up on the bar and where the poles are. amy showed me the stuff she learned in vegas nothing too crazy tho
and then stacey and i got up and joined her. the bartenders there are so sexual i swear their all lesbians and
were getting a little too friendly so we ended up going to another bar with some people we met from italy. we all
were pretty loaded and when we were walking home people were actually laughing at us cause im pretty sure we were
swaying pretty badly on the walk home. looking back im sure it was quite funny.

Snorkeling

parisephone — Tue, 8 Dec 2009 15:14:00 GMT

stacey and i have been talking about renting a bike for a while but havent because one i cant drive worth a shit
and stacey would be stuck navigating and driving while i enjoy all the splendid views lol, and the other....cause
ppl drive like they dont care if they will run you right over. cars weave in and out from eachother like your in
a race car game. Well we finally decided we would say fuck it and rent the bike anyway. well before we even got on
the bike the workers were laughing at us. i guess it was pretty funny watching stacey try to balance the bike
with my fat ass behind her lol. we were pretty wobbly at first and did the whole go stop go stop thing but
eventually we caught on or she did i should say. when we were driving around kuta the foreigners and the locals
were laughing at us. we really must not have looked like we knew what we were doing. it was nice to see
the villages around kuta and all the nice scenery which mostly consisted of rice fields. the land here is so lush
and green. after we cruzed around the day we went for another massage. which would have been great but the guy
doing my massage had the roughest hands i've ever felt! felt almost as rough as the stones literally. and the ac
shut off cause they had another power outage. which sucked cause i was sweating and having oil rubbed into it but
i felt worse for the guy giving me the massage he literally had sweat beads running off his head and would have
to stop to wipe his head. gross. but atleast his sweat didnt drip on me which for a minute i thought might happen.
After that we turned in for the night. today we arranged a trip to Amed and Tuluban (sp?) cause
we heard they had the best snorkeling. We went with these young girls from
Denmark. when we got to Amed the driver told us it was a waste to even go snorkeling in Amed. Why he said that I
dont know but i'\m sure glad we didnt listen to him cause Amed turned out to be the best! you know how sometimes
you have it in your head that something is going to be terrible and ppl tell you its going to be terrible so your
expections are as low as they can go but by some strange reason it turns out to be this amazing time or experience,
well thats what Amed was for us. First off the Danish girls didnt want to snorkel there after the driver said
that but then I told them come on its only five bucks so they did. Then when were walking up to this place its
not like its a beach you walk through this path that has annorexic cows on one side and roosters crowing on the
other. Then before we even hit the black rock for sand beach we walk by a dead dog! skeleton and all rotting in
the son. It was very disturbing. The poor dogs here have it so rough I feel horrible for them just dying in the
sun. Thats what looked like happened here. So after our little stroll to the water you can imagine what we were
thinking our snorkel would be like. Well once we walked past the rocks that killed our feel and could actually
swim all around us was the most beautiful coral! Finally I was having my awesome snorkel experience I've always
wanted. But for me it wasnt just the fish it was the coral. In shades of the brightest blues purples, pinks,
orange. It looked like we were in a garden of flowers under the sea and all the fishes were like beas going from
flower to flower eating their lunch and hiding in the little crevaces trying to escape us then once we would pass
you would see their little faces peeking out. It reminded me of the little mermaid (i've seen it recently cause my
neice likes it as much as me and my sister did) where in the opening scene all the fish and mermaids are coming
out of that big coral under the sea. it was like were in another world. and we were the only ones there so all
the fish were out and not scared away. its sad to think that one day the coral will be gone from us. we seem
to destroy all of gods beautiful things. just thinking of it now im still in a state of aw. i've never seen
something so peaceful and beautiful. i was in a bad mood that day but after that i felt like a million bucks. i
can honestly say it was one of the highlights of my life. to think we might not have done it cause no one goes to
that place. what a sin that would have been. So after that we went to Tulumban. After Amed we had pretty high
expectations since our driver said Tulumban was way better. We now realized he said that so his friends would
make money cause Amed costed nothing except what it was to rent the snorkel gear. Stacey and I bought our own
cause I wasnt down with using someone else\s used mouth piece yuck! The only reason Tulumban was cool was cause
we went to this ship wreck which was from world war 2. the u.s. liberty. It was so big and so old that coral
started growing on it. its like what you see in the movie titanic obviously titanic is bigger but it looks like
what they show in the movie. when you approach the ship all you see are these huge black fish swimming in a big
school so close you can touch them. there were all kinds of fish just floating around you so gracefully. but as
far as beauty and something different each place you turned Amed kicked its ass. The scenario I was talking about
earlier can go vise vera, sometimes when I think something is going to be great it just doesnt meet my expections
and this was a prime example. Either way it was a great day and the Danish girls were happy we talked them into
coming with us. And for a day of snorkeling since they came with us we paid about 20 bucks and the site was two
hours away. So I think we got our moneys worth.

turtle island

parisephone — Sat, 5 Dec 2009 13:15:00 GMT

Nov 2 2009

So Stacey and I have come up with a bit of a routine. We wake up at whatever time we our bodies tell us too,
stroll down to our $2 buffet eat our pancakes and eggs, then either head to the beach or book an excursion for
about ten dollars each. We have recently decided one day beach and surf attempt and the next day actually do
something. Yesterday was our day to do something and we decided to go to Nusadua for some snorkling and to turtle
island. What always seems to happen to me with snorkling is I always get screwed. I always see other ppls pics of
snorkling and they are full of colorful fish and when i go i dont see one fish anywhere. I even had like three
slices of bread which is supposed to send the fishes flying at you! To top it off they wanted us
to use gross used snorkle gear. i just held my breath instead and used the just the goggles. so we snorkled for
about twenty minutes and returned to the boat to go to turtle
island. now when we pulled up to the island it looked like we were going to have to walk through deep water to get
there which i thought was weird but im getting used to the weird surprises here so i just kept my bikini on and the
guy made it seem like it would be ok since we were after all walking through the water to get there and would
get our clothes wet.
Well he said that but when we got there everyone was
dressed! so i dont know if they just didnt pull us all the way to shore so they could see us in our bikini's our
what but either way it didnt matter cause it was too late to go back to the boat. now most the ppl in indo are
muslim so they cant show any shoulder or leg hell even there hair so you can imagine how stacey and i looked wearing
bikini's with our big boobs hanging out! i felt like i was walking around naked. but before i could feel really
bad about the situation ppl on the island came running for us as soon as they saw us and asked if they could take
pictures of us. im telling you now i know what it feels like to be a celebrity lol. after the first couple girls
took pics more ppl came then a huge group of students came over the hill and saw us and came running with their
camera's asking if they could have their pics taken too even the teacher! and again everyone is fully dressed in
the hottest weather looking like they are ready for winter and then stacey and i are in our bikinis! it was
so funny/akward. so after about i would honestly say 20mins of taking pictures we starting our tour of the island
which was really really great but i misunderstood the lady before we got there she said bring your camera and i
thought she was trying to sell us a digital photo but later stacey said a digital camera. i had my camera but
thought we would come back to the main place after snorkling but instead they just took us straight to turtle
island so i missed out of the best pics ever. there were baby turtles, medium size turtles, and huge ones. there
was one that was 100yrs old. you were allowed to get in the water with them and pet them, even hold them. which
just killed me cause when i held it all i could think was facebook profile pic. they felt like rough leather and
they were so cute i love sea turtles. we also saw the fruit loop bird it sat on stacey's arm and took a shit
lol i m glad it wasnt me holding it, then we got to hold an eagle. we wouldnt hold the snake. stacey later told
me all it had was scotch tape holding its mouth shut eeek! not a very strong tape. then we saw the huge fruit bats
lee told me about aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah didnt want him to open the cage for that one either! thats what was so
cool about the island is that you could touch everything cause they were so used to ppl. and it was a conservation
place so going there raises money. after that we just took it easy at the beach like we usually do and eat at our
favourite spot the tree top cafe. the next day it was our chill out day. so not much was done. in the evening
we went down to the spa and had an hour reflexology foot massage for 4.50. when i was getting my foot massage tho
the lady was telling me the guy who owns it only gives her 10% of each client. so she makes 45cents an hour which
is actually more than some ppl here! i felt bad the rest of the time she was rubbing my feet cause i mean 45 cents
thats sad to work so hard for so little. so she was pretty happy when i slid her like two or three days wage tip.
stacey told me her boss saw and didnt look too happy but she told me before tips stay with them. the only thing
that bothers me about bali is that its not really a backpackers atmosphere. ppl come here as couples or in groups
of friends etc for liek a week like we would go to mexico so i find they mostly stick together and when we do talk
to ppl they just pretty much go back to their group and dont want to hang out after. so its a good thing me and
stacey get a long cause for the whole time here its just been her and i.

bali this far

parisephone — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 23:26:00 GMT

So we arrived in Bali!! Yay for BAli! It was crazy getting here though. The airport in Padang looked like a
ghetto version of an airport from the 70s. Even the printers that printed off your ticket were like the first
printers ever invented. like the ones following the type writer where you rip off the dotted sides. Not to
mention the lady not even so much as looking at\
our passports, security not making us take out our liquids from our bag etc. For such a popular tourist destinat
ion it amazes me the shitty airport bali has as well. Anyways after looking around a good hour for a quality cheap
hotel we finally found one at the hotel arena. Well let me tell you if i was coming straight from CAnada I| would
be disgusted and probably not stay here but seeing as we were third worlding it in Samatra this little shit hole reall
y looked appealing! The whole vibe here was so refreshing after staying in a muslim city where everyone stared
at us all the time. Our first night here we met WilliaM a guy from Holland and his friend from the U.K gram.
We went for dinner at a place called Havana's and I dont know if it was because I havent had a decent meal in like
a month but it was the best tasting burrito I have ever tasted. I literally inhaled it. Although because I eat so
little these days after like half I was full! But I gorged and finished the whole thing! Bc we were so tired we
turned in after that. The next day we got off to a late start due to the time difference. We basically just hung
out at Kuta Beach and watched everyone surf. Since we had been doing so much travelling and sight seeing we decided
to just lay on the beach. Well let me tell you I have never seen so many good looking ppl in next to nothing
in my life. Everyone here looks amazing in their swimsuits and they are all golden goddesses and gods! Stacey and I
feel like the frumpy pale Canadians. After a day of people watching and applying after sun to our torched skin we
went looking around at some of the shops here. You can get the best knock off stuff I've seen and its pretty much
like Mexico in that you barter for everything. Stacey doesnt like the bartering, but for some reason I do I guess
nothing makes me happier than feeling like I'm getting a deal lol. After that we went for a $12 hot stone massage
with aromatherapy. It was great the only thing that sucked is the chick kept heating the rocks up too hot and they were
really rough on my skin. Which really sucked cause we had the worst sunburns ever and it felt like she was taking
the first layer off our skin. I should have told her to stop but I figured since I paid a whole two dollars more
for the hot stones I would just bare it. Well big mistake the next day when the sun so much as barely touched our
skin it stung. i havent wrote in a couple days so this will be long. Stacey and I decided to try surfing.
I got my lessons from a guy named Reef, seems appropriate. Although he was a crappy teacher he was really nice and
even though I told him I had a bf was flirting with me all day. Which was funny cause he was about the size of a
short 15 yr old. We first started out in the beach where he showed me how to get my stance. Well I Could barely do
it on land and hes like lets go to the water which is why i didnt think he was that good of a teacher plus his
english was only half way decent. either way i gave it my best and i could only do it on my knees at best. i told
reef i would pioneer knee surfing but bc his english sucked he just nodded and smiled to humour me. After a day of
trying to stand up in the water going to the sand and practising my stance I still couldnt get it. So reef said he would
show me his magic trick. so that got me all excited, then his magic trick turned out to be slapping my feet which
eventually started to get higher to my legs then when i realized he would probably start going for my but i had to
remind him i have a bf. So when i couldnt stand on the medium board i was demoted to the big fat banana board.
for those who know about surfing this is means you suck and you have to look like an idiot trying to surf on this
huge board. Now I couldnt figure out if it was my lack of balance or if my arms were just too weak to push my body
weight up considering i can barely do a single push up. STacey didnt go in the water because the salt water killed
her eyes. I told her she should go atleast once of twice and the bitch gets it her first time. i figure cause she
is a snow boarder. she didnt even take lessons! so i was really jealous. im sure had her eyes not bothered her
she would have rocked that board all day long. after a day of failing surfing we strolled around kuta shopping.
the next day we went to ubud. There we went to these rice fields that go from the ground up kind of like pyramids.
a really neat thing to see since they are usually just flat fields like other crops. we had lunch on the rice
field terrace which gave a beautiful view of the fields. you could just sit right on the balcony and look out. I
mean you have to try the rice when your right next to a rice field. i was expecting it to be amazing and to tell
you the truth i wouldnt be surprised if it was uncle bens. next we went to the monkey forest which was cool but it
started to rain so all the monkeys pretty much disappeared. but before it rained stacey went to go sit by one of
them ( im convinced she is crazy going up to every creature she sees here and close i might add) and the
monkey ends up grabbing her boob twice! it was the funniest thing i've ever seen! definately surprised her. i told it
there is no milk in there hahah. we got drenched but it was so beautiful it reminded me of the movie ferngully.
the tree trunks looked like a bunch of wire twisted together reaching for the sky. and there were lots of streams
running between big black rocks. the sad thing though is when you looked down onto it there was a lot of litter
which im starting to notice the balinese really dont care about their environment. so after that i went to an
internet cafe cause i could have sworn when i read this book eat pray love that the two characters lived in this
town we were in and it turns out they did! so after tracking down the first one wayan i was very disappointed when
she pretty much brushed me and stacey off and told us to come back another time. by the brand new car in the drive
way im sure she is not roughing it anymore. we actually wanted to try some traditional balinese healing which is
what she does. but nope she wouldnt see us. and now she has a team work on you. where in the book she is portrayed
as this humble lady who goes without to help others. definately not the case anymore. so we thought we would
try our luck with ketut my favourite character in the book. so after asking some locals we finally found him.
we were told he was tired and he couldnt read anyone's palms today but our driver lied and said we were leaving
tomorrow and came from canada so he said he would see us after all! i wAS SO Excited sitting there i could barely
handle it. the guy that was waiting ahead of us kept telling us how lucky we were cause there were tons of ppl
turned away. so finally it was our turn and im listening very attentively as he reads stacey's palm.
so far he is everything i thought he would be a sweet charming old man. and he even had on a canada tshirt! then
its my turn and my smile quickly turned into a frown as he literally gave me the exact same speel he gave stacey
and we were sitting right in front of eachother!!! then charged us 25 us dollars each for like ten mins! and he
had been doing this all day! so you can imagine especially for bali how much this guy is raking in. but i was so
disappointed cause in the book it said he was so good. but i guess hollywood and money got to him. supposedly
they were filming for the movie eat pray love recently. julia roberts is playing the lead character and when you
go into wayans store you can see a pic of her in there and of elizabeth gilbert the author. so for the rest of the
day i stewed over the fact those two disappointed me so much. when we got back we shopped and spent a small
in the markets on the way to our hotel. all the vendors spotted us with our bags and we suddenly were a hot
target. all the way to the hotel they call at you. look here cheap cheap. nice deal for nice girls etc. but the
worst had to be the rice fields. as soon as we got out of the car it was like fruit flies on fruit. they were all
over us! i had one guy like nose to nose with me trying to get me to buy something practically shoving it in my
face. today we bought hired a guy to drive us to dreamland, padang padang sp ? and uluwatu sp? dream land was
pretty much a surfers paradice. the waves were soooooooo strong tho. even scarey. i tried to take my boogie
board out there (like the only one on one) and got shoved back to shore the second i made my way less than a meter
in and got a vagina full of sand from it! sorry but true. after a few attempts at this i got too scared cause the
waves were getting stronger and stronger. again beautiful beach but they litter. i mean who would litter dream
land? after that we went to padang padang which was a really nice beach. white sand clear water. and a little
more gentler waves. we could actually swim in this one! there were more surfers here tho way out in teh water.
that would freak me out cause we met this guy who told us where they all were was where octopus's are eek! never.
but they were really far out. i would die of exhaustion just swimming out. so i just stook to my water aerobics
lol. after that we went to uluwatu. which was another hindu temple. they make you wear sarongs with a scarf
around your waste before entering and women arent allowed in during their periods (dont know why) the only thing
that sucked tho is stacey's camera crapped out at the last beach. and that was really bad cause our last stop was
definatly worth the pics. it was a temple on a very high rocky cliff out looking the ocean. you could look down
and see the turquious water crashing against the rocks and see the sun setting. one of the best scenic spots i've
seen. after that we watched a kecak dance. which is 70 guys making this sound that sounds like checkaka over and
over again all in sync with eachother and moving in sync as well. then they form a circle and these other ppl
play characters who dance out old legends in the centre to the music of those 70 men. but the costumes the charact
ers wear are so decoritive and colourful. their hats are made of gold and are decorated with flowers insence etc.
the dresses are bright and colourful and they womens faces are painted heavilly in makeup. it was definatly a
great cultural experience. then we came back with our driver to kuta. i always feel bad though when we hire a
driver cause for 10-15 dollars each this guy spends the whole day driving us where ever we want to go and basically
waits for us till were ready for us to go. i feel like were viewed as spoiled rich girls. if this text looks funny its bc i have to copy and paste from a notebook application on stacey's laptop. anyways one more thing i wanted to add is that bali is full of the most beautiful ppl i have ever seen. if anyone has a complex about their body i wouldnt come cause im definately the fat girl on the beach and yes i know im not that big but really there are so many beautiful men and women here its like your surrounded by models with heavenly bodies and faces.

my third world experience so far

parisephone — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 05:08:00 GMT

So we decided to go backpacking with our friend from America. LIttle did we know we were about to change the course of our trip. First thing when we arrive they try to screw us out of money for our visa in Indonesia. Luckily our American friend knows everything about travel and has been through it all. He said he pretty much expected it. Now neither of us had any Rupia (INdo currency) so they let him go search out an ATM. Now I know some people would think thats stupid we didnt have any but in every travel place I've ever been to there has been an atm. So I didnt think I Needed to get money prior to arriving. Anyways so our friend gets a price for the visa and takes off leaving Stacey and all with all these creepy indo guys who are eye bawling us the whole time in a disturbing way. The customs guy even goes so far as to ask my email and if I want to go out with him when he is done work. So finally vic gets back with some money and the smart boy gets the exchange rate and sure as shit they were trying to make money off of us. (Vic has been through it all before so he gave us a crash course on this) So we end up talking them down a little more but in the end they still made some money off the white ppl. Then we try and find a cab. Well people think Mexico are bad. Triple it here. They just scream a bunch of shit in their language trying to get your biz. Vic basically took us stood in teh middle of all of them and shouted a price and let them go to war with eachother over who would get our biz. We finally get a ride from this young guy into the town of Nagoyan. A dump of a town with cockroaches dead in the street. Our hotel room full of ants. When you walk a long the wall the cracks in the flooring looks like they are moving there are so many ants!! EEEEEEEk! SO the next day we take a four hour ferry to the island of Samatra. Not sure why Vic picked this place but we pretty much put our faith in him that he had more of a plan than us. Thats pretty much the main reason we decided to travel with him. but he didnt have much more of a plan and we ended up finding out that most of the coast was destroyed by a small tsunami. so there went our plans but we had to take a bus from the ferry to the island we were going to. Now at first I thought we were taking the chicken bus which basically had a bus with like 7 ppl to a seat, women breast feeding, men smoking, chickens, goats, and your luggage tied down to the roof of the bus. But we got the upper class fifteen ppl to a van. Wow what an upgrade. In the hot van we rode for about 8hrs to a place called I dont even remember now I

'm so tired. This place had no where to sleep. So while sitting looking stranded these ppl approached us in broken english and asked if we were ok. Turns out they are in a semi famous band in Indonesia! Gave us one of their rooms to stay in brought us front row to one of their shows and wouldnt take a penny for it! which i didnt like cause either way I"m sure were better off than they are. But these were the some of the nicest ppl I've ever met! Their show was even pretty good even though I dont speak the language. The next day they said they wouldnt take no for an answer and brought us to the town they are from Bukittinggi. Its so funny since its not a common place for tourists we get stared at everywhere we go. and they are all muslim so they dont like showing skin so they really arent a fan of me and stacey. were wearing shorts and tank tops. all the ppl here keep telling stacey she is sexy cause she has a bit of cleavage showing lol. today we booked a flight to bali and its definatly time to hit the beach!

Raffles HOtel and our new friend who looks like Matthew McCaughnihey i cant spell

parisephone — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 01:15:00 GMT

Yesterday we did a quick day trip into Malaysia for three dollars! yes i said three dollars. It sucked tho so we left and came back to our clean lovely singapore where everyone knows english! On our way back we met a little chinese dude who was a person trainer and was wearing these super bright baby blue mini shorts! It was the funniest thing ever! but he was so nice and very helpful and insisted on paying for our fare back to Singapore. This guy is a testiment that working out is the fountain of youth. He is 47 and looks not a day over his early 30's. When we got back into Singapore we walked down Orchard Road whgich for some reason I always call Orchard park. It kind of reminded me of Vegas with all the big designer stores and lights. It was decorated with the nicest Xmas decorations and lights. I swear this place rivals new york. the only thing newyork beats them with is it just has that xmas magic to it. Today we got off to a late start. While eating breakfast we met this guy named Victor from Virginia we now call McCaughnigy. I cant spell his last name so from now on i will refer to him as m.m. now i know my grammer and spelling are going to be shit today but im just so excited i cant even get this typed fast enough. so this guy has been all over the world and after several cups of shitty coffee this morning we listened to his amazing stories about back packing nepal india africa pretty much everywhere in the world. he is in teh military too and we had a lot of things to discuss about that. Or he just got out of the military after but wants to get back in to go to afghanistan. imagine actually wants to get in just for that. reminded me so much of matthew. i told him all about matt so babe if your reading this you dont have to worry about me hanging out with a guy. anyways it was raining hard core as it seems to here morning then at night but today it rained literally all day and were talking like can soak you from head to toe. puddles are like little lakes! so after walking in the rain our first stop of the day was the battle box. which all i could think of was matt and his dad cause its one of those military history places. basically it was a bomb shelter the british army stayed in while singapore was raided and when they surrendered to the japenese in 1942. So interesting and authentic. They had these maniqins that looked just like real ppl and played out the discussions of whether to surrender or not. Showed how they used to send and recieve messages and decode them. newspapers at the time, everything! what amazes me and what stacey pointed out is how interested i am in this stuff now. like before the military wouldn't have interested me at all it just amazes me how when you love someone what is important to them and their loved ones becomes important to you. When we left there we got lucky and realized we were at the raffles hotel! The raffles hotel is like a signature Singapore building that was build in 1887 and the drink the singapore sling was invented there. So of course we had one, for 27 bucks! but you know you just had to. But this place was so amazing pics do it no justice i dont even know how to describe it. ITs like a big while colonial style mansion. and when you go in the museums there's things from ppl who have been guests there in the past. the royal family had pics there, old hollywood, and even post cards that were sent from there and stuff. it was definately the highlight of my time here so far! Along with our new friend we had the best day ever even if it was raining!!! Singapore is amazing I will be sad to leave it. Tonight we are going to the famous Clark Quey for some drinks with m.m. ok so we just got back from clark which was kind of like white ave in ed but waaaaaaaaay nicer and too expensive so we left. we met a bunch of irish guys who told me i looked like the virgin mary but were totally funny but made no sence. tomorrow we might go to indo instead of thailand. M.M knows all about the islands there so we were thinking of starting there with him and then going up to meet amy. So spontaneous. im loving this trip more and more.

Singapore Zoo and Night Safari

parisephone — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 01:36:00 GMT

So tonight we went to the Singapore Zoo. Which I'm thinking is one of the best Zoo's in the world. They had pretty much every animal you can imagine. Everything from Elephants to nearly extinct animals like those monkeys with the big noses lol dont expect me to remember anything's name. I was eaten alive by mosquitos and I'm now afraid because I dont want to catch anything. So that is the big stress of the day. It was so hot out today I feel like I'm sticky to the touch. I'm hoping I did not burn today. After we finished the Zoo we went to the Night safari which was basically the zoo at night. Very cool. Sorry this is short but I'm too worried about the mosquito bites to write anything detailed. I just wanted to add this. Since we got here we have been taking ice cold showers. and tonight because I'm so worried over the malaria thing the shower irritated more than usual. I forgot to mention our toilet is right beside the shower with no curtain seperating it so everything in the whole room gets wet. Besides that it is cold. So tonight I storm in the room and complain and here I find out because you cant have electrical in teh same room because of all the water there is actually a switch right outside the door. how funny

Shopping Fish Reflexology in Singapore

parisephone — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 00:26:00 GMT

So last night we get to Singapore. With in two mintues of being here a person realizes that they can totally live here or atleast that was my first impression! What a great city everything so clean and nicely landscaped. The city is truely put together nicely. Since we arrived late we decided to check out the area our hostel is in, Little India. Well let me tell you I have never seen so many brown guys in my life! Stacey and I not only were the only while people around but the only two females we saw around. I swear these guys look at you like they have never seen a woman before so since it was late we didnt hang out that long. Today we woke up ready to take on the day once again. We ended up going to Sentosa beach today. SO beautiful, another reason to want to live in Singapore you have this great city and then you can go chill at the beach and were not talking your typical ugly beaches that are by the cities in Canada. THis was a beautiful blue beach with tons of activities to keep a person busy. For example we passed by the pool you could practise surfing in cause it had this cord you grap on to and its like surfing or wake boarding without the boat! Then there was the Underwater aquarium. They had the most amazing huge huge fish. My favourite of course was the sea turtle exhibit though. THere were so many different kinds and I even fed them. After that I went for the craziest thing ever I'm amazed I didnt chicken out, but I went for what they call here fish refexology. So basically I go into this place put my feet into this pool looking thing and a ton and I mean a ton of these little fish come charging for my feet for their next meal. Of course I was a big chicken and it took me like 5 mins to finally put my feet in. It was funny cause the woman working there is like come on come on just do it and I'm like oooooooooh noooooooooooooo I'm scared all I could think of was omg if this was rhonda she would be freaking out lmao. Anyways the woman tells me hurry up your on the clock lol. So finally I start with my heels now these fish love dead dry skin so you can imagine how much they loved my heels. It was the creepies feeling its like you can literally feel their little teeth chewing on you like you would a corn on the cob. They go back and forth back and forth and tickeled the shit out of my toes! I cant wait to show pics! After that It got finished up with a nice reflexology session. The woman didnt say two words to me (I dont think her english was so good). So to entertain myself I laughed at the next chick who looked just as scared as me to put her fish in the water...actually she was worse so it was more funny! After that it started to rain sooooooooooo bad but its still so warm. So we went shopping. Now let me tell you I have never wanted to spend more money in my life than I do in this place. The malls are immaculately clean and have the coolest shit you will ever see. Unfortunately the prices are the same if not more expensive than Canada and I have a budget to keep. I did however buy some clothes which were more than I wanted to spend but they are amazing. I even bought a jumper! hahaha never thought I would but this one looks soooooooo good. Anyways I love this place love love love it. All I keep thinking is how blessed I am to be experiencing all these amazing things.

yes sam i did get naked lmao!!

parisephone — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 22:07:00 GMT

So after spending half a day on the train and getting the wrong directions by two different people we decided to give up on our origional plan of going to an aquarium and just do the onsen thing. Seeing as a couple blocks to us the worlds largest onsen is. Its weird such a nice place is located in such a rough neighborhood. Apparently we are staying in the ghetto of Osaka. Everywhere we have been in Japan so far you could lick off the ground its so clean they even have people scrubbing the cement flooring of the train station. But here where we are staying now its quite the opposite and the guy who helped us find our hostel a guy from Africa I'll add tells us to be careful because this neighborhood is dangerous. Now coming from a guy from Africa I took this very seriously. Anyways so we go in the Onsen. Here you can not keep your clothes on or where a swim suit...nothing! I just want to add its a very Japenese thing to do and Stacey did all the things I wanted to do so I had to humour her. Now what was hilarious is Stacey and I were going to try and scam our way through it and just keep our towels on and whip them off just before we got in the Onsen but the lady working there spotted us and actually made us give up our towels right then and there! The only thing we were allowed was a towel a little bigger than a face cloth!! Stacey and I were very bashful and giggling like stupid girls but near the end I guess we just went with it. Not comfortly I will add! We basically just chaulked it up to what happens in the Onsen stays in the Onsen and you dont look and neither will I! It was very nice and relaxing. There were several different types of Onsens to choose from the water is very beneficial for your health. Each one served a different purpose and after leaving my skin felt so soft and I felt so relaxed and since it was so close to where were staying it was nice to not have to mess with the trains. Tomorrow were going to try the Aquirium again.

Kintaikyo Bridge and Miyajima

parisephone — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 19:13:00 GMT

Last night was so cool. we were in the common area having the most interesting conversation with a group of people from all over the world about the things they have seen on their travels. I think I like that part the most, meeting people in the hostel. You just learn so much about eachother's countries and customs. This morning we went to Kintaikyo bridge first which is basically just a bridge with four arches but what makes it so special is that its made using a Japanese technique which requires no use of nails. The scenery around it was pretty as well. After that we went to the main attraction in Hiroshima the Tori in Miyajima. Which we've seen a million Tori so far but this one if you catch it at the right time looks like it floats on water. Stacey and I are definately ready to leave Japan now we've seen all that we wanted to see and all the shrines and temples are starting to look the same. I wanted to mention one thing I forgot to in the entries. This place is one of the cleanest countries I've been to if not the cleanest. There is no litter anywhere but the strange thing is is that you can never find a garbage can! Whcih is funny cause we have so many and we still manage to litter.

Memorial Museum in Hiroshima

parisephone — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:21:00 GMT

Today we are in Hiroshima. It is where the first A-bomb was dropped in Japan, Aug 6, 1945 at 815am with no warning to the people living there. We walked through the peace park and went the museum. A person definately leaves that place feeling glum. Weird that we went on Rememberence day seems appropiate. The museum basically showed what the A-bomb looked like, the after math to the city and the people, and gave you timelines. I didnt know this till today but Albert Einstine actually was behind the research for the A-bomb it was he who wrote the letter asking the president to continue doing research on it. It was really sad and disturbing to see photos of the aftermath and people burned so badly and to know there are still nuclear war fare out there today. Do we not learn. It just sucks cause its the people that suffer from it all not the politicians who get us into these situations. I'm really tired today so Stacey and I are going to try and find an Onsen to soak in, which is pretty much a public bath usually in some kind of hot sping or mineral rich water. The only thing is you have to get naked! I dont really want to do it but Stacey does so I have to humour her and it is a really Japanese thing to do. So I'll just get in asap when no one is looking lol. OOOOOOOOOOOOh and for my lovely newfoundlanders, I met a guy from there today at our hostel. It was so funny he was standing there talking and I heard him say bla bla bla something on the go and my ears perked up but I wasnt sure if he was from there for sure cause it sounded like he was trying to sound more irish. I had to laugh cause he said he was from st. Johns which as we all know people from there barely have an accent so i was laughing to myself bc he was totally trying to make his accent sound different and somewhat irish. what a loser. He didn't realize I'm a newfie expert lol. He seemed pretty pleased though that someone knew where it was lol. I forgot to mention the Japanese school children. There were tons of them all in uniform all witch matching coloured hats. Each colour hat separating each school. Anyways so groups of these kids would come up to us to practise their english and it was so cute cause they would read off of this little card holder and flip each one with each response we would give and when I tried to talk about something else they looked at me like "stick to the script lady." Then they would ask us to sign their notebooks and put down the country their from. Stacey and I said we should have set up an autograph table cause we felt like authors at a book signing. This one little boy came up to us and when he finished his cards was like now...can i take your picture and as soon as we posed with him he did the typical japanese pose holding the two fingers up. So we asked to take one with our camera too. Those kids were so fricken cute.

Tea Party In Kimono's in Nara

parisephone — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 21:28:00 GMT

So I'm starting to think Stacey and I have a horse shoe up our ass. First the Imperial palace isn't open to the public ever but because of the Emporers Enthronement we get in for the one week ever it will be open then today we get off the train in Nara and the lady tells us we got there on the one day a month you can go try kimonos and attend a tradition tea ceremnoy! So of course were pumped for that. It was held at the tourist information building by women who volunteer their time to show tourists Japanese culture and in turn the ladies told me they can practise their english, sounds like a good deal to me! I saw women walking around in Kimono's a lot lately and found out that they are having this coming of age thing this week for girls turning 20 so thats probably why we saw so many. I never realized the work that goes into putting on a Kimono! Definately a two man job if not three. So these little old ladies get everyone in and out of Kimono's for the day and show people how to participate in a Traditional Tea party. The folds on the front have to be just right the lady told me, perfectly balanced and creased. The Kimono's we put on today were for single girls and those ones have the long sleeves, the brightest colours, and the biggest more beautiful bow design on the back. (I joked with the woman telling her to give stacey a big bow so she can get a man lol) When your married your sleeves are small, less of a design in the back and the colour of the Kimono is not bright and one person can put it on themselves. The ladies even did our hair! The lady told me my hair make easy lol. They were so kind and informative. Those Kimono's are really hot though underneither. Made me wonder how those girls were walking around in them the other day without looking like they broke a sweat. Once Stacey and I were dressed, herself, I, and this girl from L.A we met had a tea party with two of the ladies. Green powder tea is what was served. The lady told us a guy brought the ceremony to Japan after being influences by the buddist tea ceremonies from China. There is a little tea house and I mean LITTLE the ceremony is held in and the space you crawl through is so hard in a kimono. When the hostest enters you bow deeply to her then the first guest drinks and makes a slurp sound when she finishes her last sip to show appreciation and manners. It is considered rude if you dont make a sound with the last sip. Then the tea is passed to me I bow to the other girl before I drink my tea but not a deep bow just a little one. But before we even drink the tea we start with a sweet desert. They gave us this little sweet bisquit with a big purple bean in the middle. The lady said they start with the sweet desert to drown out the bitterness of the tea to come. When we finish the tea we bow to the hostess. When we finished the lady even gave us a little token of gratitude for our company which was a folded kimono clad girl. She said she takes more than she thinks she gives but I think she gives so much!!! she was so informative and these ladies actually volunteer their time to do this! I told her I would remember it for the rest of my life. She seemed pleased at how greatful I was. AFter that we went to the Biggest Buddah in the world with our new Amerian friend. It's held in the Todai-Ji temple. I'm glad I have my new camera because my old one wouldnt have captured how amazing this thing was cause it was in dim lighting. It was huge and absolutely amazing! when you walk in the door there are two statues on eithier side of the door (I assume some kind of gaurdian statue) Then there it sits with two other statues on either side just a bit smaller. Some is gold and the others I'm not sure what they are made of. But before you even get to the temple you find deer everywhere!!! They are considered Sacred in Japan cause in they were the messangers legends. So there a tons and tons of deer. You can even walk right up and pet them. People sell food for if you want to feed them but if you have even a crumb you'll have like ten deer nipping at you those bastards aren't patient they want your food now! It was weird to see hwo many there were just chillin. They even have ppl paid to clean their shit. I told Stacey those deers are thinking "man we got a good gig hear those humans pay to feed us and even pick our shit up." No wonder they stick around, why wouldn't they can you blame them. After that we took the train back to the hostel and parted with from our American friend Kristen she went to pass me her card to add her to facebook then turned to Stacey and said I should just give this to you my impression so far of Josie is that she will lose it. Now how funny is that

Bicycling Kyoto

parisephone — Mon, 9 Nov 2009 19:37:00 GMT

I just want to run around singing I'm so fricken happy!! This is only the beginning and I constantly feel on a natural high! Today we hung out with our American friends again who are very handy with a map. We rented bicycles for the day and cycled around Kyoto. I almost died at first because it was all up hill but I made it and it was worth it, cause when we got to the top there was this HUGE buddah statue there that looked like it was made of sand! Then we saw some more temples one being Kiyomizu. They all pretty much look the same but it doesn't matter cause they are all unique in their own way and each one has a different garden special to it. Around the first temples this morning there were markets selling more trinkets but what made this morning so special is it was in an old part of Kyoto so we saw real Geishas! Amazing the highlight of the day! I know it was probably rude but I couldn't help clicking away with my camera. They were so beautiful and graceful. I felt bad for them walking in those shoes though because it took like twenty years for them to walk a block! lol. I read they were rare to see so I felt so lucky we got to see them. It looked like they were getting their pictures taken for something special. Then by some crazy luck we came the one week of the year of the 20yr anniversary of the Emporers enthronement and got to see the Kyoto Imperial palace which doesn't get opened to the public and its gardens! We saw how the ceremony went for that, where it was, and what the emporer and empress wore. In front of the temples they had gravel that was raked perfectly for the emporer. Not one foot step or anything putting a stone out of place! After that went to NIJo castle. Which showed how all the old Shoguns used to live, we even got to walk through it! Shoguns are like what would now be Governors and they went against the Emporer for power of Japan and it was actually ran by them for a period. What was neat tho is the floor it's called the nightinggale floors cause when you walk on them they make these squeeking noises that used to alert the gaurdians of the Shogun if anyone entered. After a day filled with bike riding I'm pooped and am goign to just chill at the hostel. Which I love cause we get to meet so many interesting people from all over the world. Just this morning we had lunch with a German guy who was telling me about couch surfing, he's been doing it for a year. Couch surfing is basically goign around the world sleeping on ppl's couch. Its a step down from a hostel and for me sounds a bit risky but its free cause someone is just letting you crash on their couch. Our American friends said they let someone crash their couch in Sanfran so I asked them to let me sometime lol. When we got back it was definately time to shower cause I was full of sweat and was scared someone would smell me so before I took my shower I went to the bathroom and I have to tell you people I tried the Bidet! lol I was scared not knowing when the water was going to splash me or where it was going to come from. At first I wouldn't do it because I thought they splashed it up from where you went pee and that grossed me out but it turns out its just under the seat and its so funny cause it hits your but perfectly lmao! These toilets are nuts they get plugged in the wall. I figured out thats why my toilet heater wasnt working the other day! This toilet at this hostel is even fancier though it has the bidet, a spray, a musical flush sound, etc. How funny is that. Oh the life of luxery I lead. : )