Our time in Vietnam was spent discovering the triple H’s: Hanoi, Hue and Hoi An (in that order) with an en route “one day only” special appearance in Da Nang and two days in Ho Chi Minh/Saigon (quadruple H?). The Hanoi Hilton (the REAL one) turned out to be quite a comfortable temporary abode, without any ghostly apparitions However, Will and I managed to pick up something on the plane so we weren’t feeling too great for the first couple of days in Hanoi.

On the first day there, Will stayed at the hotel to get some rest and I decided to spend the morning at the Women’s Museum (he was SO so disappointed not to go with me haha).Vietnam has a long history of war and this museum (as it was described in my travel book paragraph) was dedicated to the women who served in combat throughout Vietnamese history.

I don’t know what I was thinking.

Vietnam has a pair of ancient warrior queens (hai ba trung) who ruled somewhere in the 400s that I’ve been obsessed with for a while and I naively thought this museum would be dedicated to women in history like them. I arrived at the museum and the attendant had to run into the building and tell the curator to turn on the lights.

I was their only guest. That should have been a warning sign.
The museum honored women who fought for the communist/country against the “American Imperialist” in the most recent war, with a handful of exhibits on women who fought to break away from the French colonization. The images of combat were graphic and the stories were detailed and my American self was walking around in there feeling unsettled- to say the least.

There was no information on Hai Ba Trung or any other figures from the distant past. I walked the entire way back to the hotel scolding myself: “what was I thinking? I’m in Hanoi, the capital of communist Vietnam. I should have known better!”
This was before I realized my access to wordpress was denied.

My first museum experience did not detour me from visiting the Museum of History and the Museum of Ethnology and both of these, were actually very good. Look how happy Will looks here standing next to a huge pile of baskets on a bicycle at the Museum of Ethnology:

We spent the rest of our time in Hanoi wandering around the Old Quarter, eating ice cream four times a day (they have some of the most delicious ice cream I’ve ever tasted there) and checking out the major landmarks around the city:

We had to ride at cyclo at least once. Yea, we both rode in that, at the same time. I think the man deserved the 50,000 ($3) he charged us even if it was above the standard fare.

Flower peddlers in the Old Quarter.

If you’re wondering why there has been a lack of posts in the past two weeks, I am here to clarify the matter. Now you may have just thought we were lazy (and well, sometimes we are) but in this instance, shortly after our arrival in Vietnam I figured out that we were denied access to the wordpress site. At first I thought the internet was slow at the particular hotel we were in, and then I thought the site was down and then… EUREKA!! I remembered, we were in a communist country. I couldn’t get access into the site, the page wouldn’t even load. I don’t think they want people blogging over there, and maybe my “Hanoi Hilton” post didn’t help all that much?

But now that I’m in Japan on my magnificent 11 hour layover, I can leisurely blog. And that’s what I intend to do to kill some time- update the blog on our activities in my “pseudo motherland” (or I guess it would be better put, land of my mother. but we did meet a Swiss gentleman in the visa line in Laos. he asked where we were from…we exchanged plesantries and then names and he inquired to the “origin” of my name because I know telling him I’m American didn’t satisfy his ethnic query. when he found out the origin he responded with “oh! vietnamese, so you are technically in your homeland”…umm yea, when I’m in Laos, Vietnam it’s all the same thing especially when you’re American?) and finally close out on our lovely travel blog.

Here we go!

I’d like to write a special post today to thank my mom Teri “teddie” Ha. Thanks to her lovely American Express reward points, and patience to wait for hours on the phone with the Amex people to make the reservations, Will and I have gotten to spend a couple nights at the Hilton in Bangkok (which was QUITE nice, and QUITE fancy) and also more recently- the Hanoi Hilton. Thanks Mom.

Now after staying at the Bangkok Hilton I emailed my mom from Luang Prabang 4 days in advance to see if she had enough points for us to stay at the Hanoi Hilton and to give her enough time to call and make the reservations. Usually, she responds to me with lightening speed as she ordered me before I left “hey con, you better email me once a day. Ya I said ONCE A DAY, just so I know you’re alive“. I checked my email the next day and there was no response. So I sent her another daily email and also inquired about the Hanoi Hilton. I checked my email the next day and still no response. Finally on the third day (the day before we were supposed to arrive in Hanoi) I happened to catch my mom on google chat and our conversation went a little something like this:

Me: “Hey Ted, did you get my emails?”

Ted: “Yes”

Me: “Oh, you think you have enough points for the Hilton in Hanoi“

Ted: “Yes…but….con, you sure you want to stay there?”

Me: (thinking that this is only THE nicest hotel in all of Hanoi located in the old Opera building) “Ummm yea, I’m most definantly sure“

Ted: “But con, aren’t you afraid of ghosts?”

Me: “huh?”

Ted: “yea, that place used to be a prison where they tortured prisoners. was really gross. who would want to stay there?“

Me: “Oh ted, not THAT Hanoi Hilton! The actual hotel hotel is not the same thing“

Ted: “oh okay, I book it then“

Lost in translation.

Thanks again Teddie

Luang Prabang is considered the jewel of Laos by many (and I am in complete agreement. the city is incredibly charming, therapeutic even). It is adored by travel writers who dedicate pages and pages to the city sites and activities in travel books abound. And during our six days spent in the city we managed to visit ONE site mentioned in these books.

Yes, that’s right just one.

This ONE site that we visited happened to be the Phu Si Temple sitting at the top of a hill in the middle of the city. Which meant, we had to climb 300+ stairs to get there. We saved this activity until the end of the day so that we could catch the sunset (two for one kinda deal). After huffing and puffing in 90+ degree heat (alright, it may have been a while since I hit the gym too) we arrived at the summit to see a breathtaking view:

For all of two minutes. Because as you can see, the clouds were coming in and shortly after our arrival the sun dipped behind them.

Oh well.

But one of the reasons we didn’t make it to all the wats and other sites around Luang Prabang was because of the 90+ degrees (and that’s at sunset). After around noon, it just gets so hot- sweltering. To walk around in that heat would be the death of you and well, we aren’t morning people. But we managed to have an amazing time in the city without following in lonely planet’s footsteps.

We meet a young guy who worked at our guest house, Mr. Tong. He’s studying tourism at the university in Luang Prabang and offered to take us to his village 40 minutes away and another village to practice his future trade. He also brought along his buddy from school, Mr. Ail. We woke up bright and early and ventured off to the morning market to buy ingredients for lunch. Here’s Mr. Tong bargaining for our buffalo meat:

and here’s a part of the morning market, the meat department (just like Safeway!):

After we got our provisions for lunch we took a water taxi across the Mekong and headed towards Mr. Tong’s village. Upon arrival, Mr. Tong introduced us to his father who offered to cook us lunch while we walked around the village. A picture is worth a thousand words so here you go:

A village store:

The village meeting house:

An old man, making bamboo guns:

The children were shy at first but as we sat and ate lunch they gradually started trickling in, lingering in the doorway and by the end of the meal we had an audience of 15 or 20 sitting on one side of the room:

And speaking of lunch- it was delicious. We had a buffalo and vegetable soup, buffalo laap and sticky rice. Laap is a Laotion specialty where they mix, or rather grind with a mortar and pestle, a meat, bean sprouts, sometimes papaya, spices and of course chili pepper. Our buffalo laap was raw mixed with onions, eggplant, chili and other ingredients I couldn’t make out. But it tasted like a sumptuous ahi poke or tuna tartar with a hell of a lot of kick to it (that would be the chunks of chili pepper). Traditional Laotion food is eaten without utensils and just sticky rice as your dining tools. I’m pretty glad I brought the Purrell.

After our tasty lunch Mr. Tong took us trekking through the forest to see the “lake” where the village gets its water from. It was just about noon when we set off so Will and I were pretty eager to get to the lake to take a dip so we could cool off. Mr. Tong pointed out his father’s teak trees and other flora and fauna of the area. We started going deeper into the forest and a stream trickled past and the ground became progressively muddier. We were trekking along and then….

…..ka PLONK!!

In goes my foot, calf and almost entire leg into a mud hole, like quick sand (quick mud?). I pulled my leg out and had to implore the help of Mr. Ail to find my poor slipper deep at the bottom of the muddy hole. But Mr. Tong assured us “don’t worry we’re almost to the lake”.

A couple minutes later we arrived at a 30×40 foot stagnant body of water, the surface covered with lily pads- ta da! the “lake”.

The pond/lake was definitely not one you could swim in. No matter, our tour guides proceeded to take us to a waterfall.

Only there was no water.

During the dry season they dam the waterfall and irrigate the water to the fields. But Will managed to find a place to take a dip:

Our guides took us to a wat in a neighboring village where they practiced their tour guiding skills by explaining to us what was painted on the murals and then we headed back to Luang Prabang.

And here are our endearing tour guides (Mr. Ail left, Mr. Tong right):

All in all, it was one of the best experiences that I’ve had here in Southeast Asia, to get out of the city and from under the umbrella of the tourism and see a Laotian village.

Another awesome experience that I had while in Luang Prabang- I took a weaving class. I got up bright and early and went to the OckTokPop weaving center and learned about silk worms, silk and weaving. I then proceeded to learn about natural dyes and got to stain my fingers blue (my nails still have a hint of blue on them) making indigo dye:

And after 3 hours on the loom I, yes I, produced this lovely place mat:

I also discovered I’m an awful weaver. I just don’t have the hand/feet coordination on the loom. I’m slow, weave lopsided and broke nearly 30 threads in the process, but I managed to finish my “masterpiece” and I’m pretty proud of it!

So we didn’t get to check out most of the territory covered for Luang Prabang in the lonely planet guide book, but we got to forge a little path of our own with the help of Mr. Tong, Mr. Ail and my teachers at OckTokPop. And that, was pretty memorable.

lets see…

my camera, which i just got for christmas (thanks alika), fell out of my pocket in a tuk-tuk in phnom penh.  less than a week after i had taken my first picture with it. 

my shades were forgotten in an internet cafe in phuket.  next to the keyboard.  they were the longest lasting pair of shades i’ve had since college — a record seven months.  in the past 2 and a half years i’ve gone through a pair of dragons, electric, spy, hoven, fox, and arnette shades.  unfortunate.

i also thought that i lost my pants last week.  not while i was wearing them, but i couldn’t find them while packing last week.  found them yesterday.  turns out they were just wrapped inside my sweatshirt.

so yesterday, as we were walking down the street, i remarked to anh that “i seem to lose all of the most expensive stuff i brought with me,” to which i amended, “oh wait, i still have my ipod.”

now, i didn’t lose my ipod, but whilst my favorite apple product had the highest monetary value of anything remaining in my bag, i forgot to include those things that are, how-you-say, worth more than money.  such as my passport.

when we purchased our tickets from luang prabang to hanoi yesterday, they asked for our passports.  my favorite storage location — anh’s purse — came up empty in the search.  un poco problemo. 

at this point i started calculating how much physical and nasal pain it would cause if i were to ride the reverse route of the bus/vomit-wagon we had taken the day before and go back to vang vien, and then continue on to vientiane and the US embassy.  my calculations did not return promising results.   

after racking my brain, and nearly despairing after tossing the contents of my travel bag, i figured that i must’ve left my passport in the internet cafe where we had purchased our bus tickets the day before.  next to the keyboard.  surprise.

luckily, along with passports, anh keeps pretty much everything in her purse.  including the receipt for our bus ticket which had the phone number of the cafe handily printed on the bottom.

a short phone call later, my passport was en route to luang prabang via courier/bus-driver.

today, i spent some time hanging out in the bus station.  i finished crime and punishment.  i discussed the musical intricacies of the song “come into my heart” with the guys shilling their hotels/guesthouses to the arriving bus-passengers.  we got as far as the first name of the artist — i’m pretty sure it’s ricky (“ree-shee”).  i played the game where you start counting to 60 when the second-hand is at the top of the clock, and you look up when you’re done and see how far off you are from one minute.  and i queried every single arriving bus driver as to whether or not he had my passport.

finally, approaching 2 hours (it really seemed like longer, maybe 12), i had my man.  he handed me my passport.  i handed him some scrill.  we parted company.  it was a beautiful scene.

and that’s that.  our day was pretty non-descipt.  lunch and the passport rescue took up the entire afternoon, and i walked about 2 hours and maybe 4 miles in the morning searching for a working ATM (there isn’t one.  i ended up at the lone bank in town.  not like there were that many ATMs — 3 to be exact — but people kept pointing me towards ‘western unions’.  which apparently equate to ATMs in their mind).  my one word summation of the morning would be hot.  no, sweat.  HOTSWEAT.  and then i couldn’t even get money because they needed my passport to withdraw money at the bank.  anh was back at the room, reading.  typical.

have i mentioned that luang prabang is fantastic.  it seriously is.  the most asthetically pleasing town we’ve been in.  and the people are very friendly.  even if they can’t differentiate between a western union and an ATM.

I’d like you all to meet Jim:

“Jim” the tangerine and I got very well acquainted with each other on our 6 hour bus ride from Vang Vieng to Luang Prabang as I had him practically stuffed up my nose for the entire ride.

Unfortunately, I get incredibly car sick quite easily and lucky for me, the 6 hour bus ride we had today was loaded with fun-filled exciting twists and turns through the mountains of Laos. We went about 45 minutes before making a pit stop on the side of the road at a restaurant/food stand. Most of the passengers were wondering- why the heck are we stopping already, when we’ve got 5 more hours to go?

But oh what a lucky stop it was for me.

I was already starting to feel a little woozy and we hadn’t even begun making our way up the mountains that were looming in front of us. I took one look at them and I knew- I’m done for. On a last minute whim I bought A tangerine, remembering that on our long car rides to LA my mom would stuff them in my face to make me feel better.

I climbed back on the bus when the driver gave us the signal (which was to frantically beep the horn) and took my seat. Sitting right across the aisle from me was a little girl who looked to be about 10 years old. She wasn’t feeling too great either and we exchanged a little “good luck” half smile as I took a sniff of “Jim”, which I clutched in my hand and she gave her teddy bear a squeeze that she held clutched in her hand.

30 minutes later the little girl who had her eyes closed and looked almost angelic sleeping in her seat, abruptly began spewing vomit all over herself and her father sitting next to her. She spewed torrents and torrents of vomit while crying at the same time (hey, I would cry too- I almost felt like crying just sitting next to her). Nothing in those two seats was spared, not even the little girl’s teddy bear that was drenched in barf. At this time , I myself, was feeling like crap and when I saw the vomit being spewed just across the aisle (dare I say, if she even tilted her head a little to the left I would have had a vomit shower too) all I could think to myself was:

“oh please Jesus no!”

I took Jim and just shoved my nose into the tangerine and closed my eyes. And for all those out there who have read/seen The Secret, I just kept repeating in my head:

“I am so grateful for this tangerine“

And I really was. I just kept inhaling and exhaling, repeating my mantra over and over in my head… I am so grateful for this tangerine, I feel fine, I am so grateful for this tangerine… I am so grateful for this tangerine…

Within 15 minutes of the little girl spewing vomit, the good people on the bus (people without tangerines, I’m sure) begin to spew some vomit of their own. I suppose the silver lining on this cloud was that after witnessing the little girl’s ordeal everyone armed themselves with the plastic bags the bus company provided- the puke bags. I’d say once every half an hour or so you could hear the lovely sounds of upchuck being expelled.
But I just sat there, repeating my mantra, my “please don’t let me puke” meditation (maybe my trip to the Buddha Park indirectly strengthened my powers of meditation), while sharing an earphone with Will listening to the soothing sounds of Simon and Garfunkel on his ipod…

…..like a bridge over troubled water….I am so grateful for this tangerine….

Much to my amazement, I made it the rest of the way to Luang Prabang- puke free, clutching Jim to my nose the entire way. After the first hour Jim, being the tangerine that he is, started drying up. So I just poked holes in the sections of tangerine fruit that I had left. Did I care that my entire nose, cheeks, lips were covered with tangerine juice? It was either that…or puke. I did not take that tangerine off my face even for a moment of our long arduous mountain journey.

It was by far the best 12 cents I’ve spent.

And in closing, I come away with these thoughts:

1. I can see this being the beginning to a long term love affair with tangerines

2. We are flying to Hanoi

3. The powers of meditation and positive thinking MUST really work if I could make it through that without incident…I am so grateful for…this umm, million dollars?? Haha, hey it’s worth a shot.

Or maybe that was just a really good tangerine. Thanks Jim.

i thought that’s what we were signing up for yesterday. 40,000 kip got us both a giant inner tube and a ride in a tuk-tuk to the starting point 5 km away.

in our lonely planet guide it says something like, “the journey takes about 2 hours or more depending on how often you stop at the small bars set up along the way down.”

what does that mean to you?

when i hear small bar, i think foodstand-esque. somebody selling drinks out of a cooler. you float down the river, grab a drink from a vendor, and pick up a little buzz on the mekong.

the image in my head was all wrong.

as we rolled down (literally, for once, rolling our tubes) to the river and clambered into our tubes. i heard this funny sounding noise. it was this crescendoing buzzing sound — zzzzZZZZZ — and it was followed by this loud THWACK, a splash, and then cheering and screams of laughter. at the time, as a novice to the sport of tubing, i was aimlessy spinning around, and couldn’t pinpoint the source of the sounds. but as the noises continued to cycle, i finally figured out what was happening. at the first “small bar” on our tubing adventure there was a zipline set up running out lengthwise over the river. the series of noises was the victim going down the zipline, followed by the sound of his trapeze(?) hitting the block marking the end of the run, and the splash was, of course, the sound of their person hitting the water. i came to discover, however, that not every run was met with cheering and laughter. if said person were to let go of the trapeze before reaching the block at the end of the run, their entry into the water was met with some scattered boos, but mostly with disinterest. however, if said person attempted to retain their grip until they hit the block — resulting in a spectacular tumble and face/back/belly flop into the river — THEN they got the cheers and laughter.

this first zipline was built off a platform that help seven or eight tables, a kitchen, a bar, and about 50 people. this was the first “small bar”.

now, that day (yesterday), the power was out in the town of vang vieng. for us, this initially meant that we had to use the bathroom either in the pitch black or with the door open. but it later came to mean that we ran out of kip because we couldn’t go to the ATM. by the time we paid for our tubes, we only had 25000 left (about $3).

i only bring this up because anh had the most absolutely depressed look on her face when she realized that we could only afford one drink on the river. i’d say it might’ve even rivaled the look on her face whilst riding the vomit-wagon/bus that brought us to luang prabang today. seriously, i didn’t know i was dating an alcoholic. and i don’t even drink.

she was seriously bummed out. i was phenomenally excited by the conglomeration of ziplines/ropeswings available for my use. but never to fear. it all works out. we figured out that we still had an american $20 bill. and when the first drink we ordered came with a complementary bottle of lao whiskey and a shot glass, we knew we’d be fine.

bucket of vodka (yes that’s right, bucket) in hand, we immediately picked up company with a bunch of irishmen and canadians we’d seen at dinner the night before, and together we began the long journey down the river.

hugh, anh, me, matt. irishman, anh, me, canadian:

by “long journey” i really mean short journey. the combination of cheap booze and tourists from landlocked countries catapulting themselves off ropeswings with only a vague-to-hazy idea of how they’re supposed to land — where was the incentive to go anywhere?

we started at about 1 pm, and by about 6 that evening had moved about 5 bars down the river. maybe 400 meters total. or 400 metres total. not very far. the final “small bar” we stopped at had a beach volleyball court, a foot-volleyball court, a ping-pong table, and three tiers of platforms for watching the 30 ft. rope swing.

but yesterday i realized that i’m getting old. because the following thought crossed my mind:

wait, they’ve put together unlimited booze and above-water acrobatics? and no safety regulations in sight? (unless you count the guys at the top of each tower hollering at the tubers to get out of the way) what a recipe for disaster.

this thought was banished by the consumption of alcohol, which i suspect is how they get people to willingly participate. in fact, i think it might have played a part in anh deciding to go finally go off of a ropeswing. the last. the last AND the largest.

here she is in action. she’s smiling, but her eyes may or may not be closed.

we ARE alive. along with everyone else who participated in the festivities yesterday, i think.

parents/concerned-relatives, sorry you had to read about our irresponsible drinking. but it was really, really FUN irresponsible drinking. that makes it better, right?

anyway, it was enough fun for us. we high-tailed it out of there this morning for luang prabang. a UNESCO designated world heritage site. we are such a learned and cultured traveling duo. anh is finishing up writing about today’s journey right now. it was QUITE interesting. slash terrible.

Boop to all your faces from Laos

Hello hello everyone, once again please forgive the delay in posts. We were making our way through the Thai Islands (or at least 3 of them) and we’re currently in Vientiane, Laos and heading to Vang Vieng tomorrow morning.

Prior to coming to Laos we heard rave reviews about the country and I have to say, I must agree.  Thailand was great but there were so many tourists (just like us) everywhere especially in the islands. And while that’s all fine and dandy, it’s a bit umm, what’s the word- artificial at times. But Laos- there’s just a really laid back and chill vibe here and it’s very enamoring. The people are super friendly and the food has been pretty tasty (but we’ve come across good food everywhere we’ve gone, I’ll dedicate a post to food in the near future).

Today we went motor biking to the “Buddha Park” (and yes, it’s a park full of, Buddhas: reclining buddhas, headless buddhas, only the head of a buddha- but it was a giant head that you could walk around in, fighting buddhas, buddhas carrying dead bodies, buddha & his ladies, lady buddhas…this could go on for a while. but in the buddha park, there were a couple buddhist monks, surprise surprise. one named Keo happened to befriend us and invited us to his temple, but I digress) 24 km outside of the city. Motor bikes/ mopeds are a primary means of transportation in Southeast Asia. People do it everyday, all the time, no big deal.

But-

It was my first time driving one (on a previous trip to Vietnam with my mom I DESPERATELY wanted to ride around on a moped and my mom sent out the executive order to all my cousins forbidding me to drive a motor bike- and any accomplices of mine would experience the wrath of Teri Ha and trust me that’s a scary threat. So I didn’t get to drive. And for the record I was 21. Love ya Ted) and it was oh so much fun. Maybe not as fun for my passenger in the back (Will) especially when I was ripping through the potholes (some were puddles) on the dirt road and he kept screaming:

“Babe! Go AROUND the holes!”

But it was exhilarating for me anyways. I think we’re going to rent motor bikes in the next city we go to,  and who knows maybe on the next trip I’ll get to wheel my mom around town on a moped.

that was the name of our elephant. at least i heard “moon”, and that’s what we proceeded to call her the entire time. she never actually responded to us when we called out, but i know deep down she heard us.

we went a trekkin today. moon was our trusty pachyderm-steed up a well worn path en-route to a waterfall. and all at the age of 42. i think that’s pretty old for an elephant, but i really have no idea. i would look it up, but the local internet costs 2 baht per minute (about $4 an hour), so this blog is being typed off-line.

here she is:

moon was the leader of our elephant train — she being the oldest and all — and the only commands our/moon’s driver/jockey/rider had to utter were “oi” and “goi”, which i gathered meant ‘go’ and ’slow.’ so with a few pauses for some munchings and crunchings on the local shrubbery and a few quick ducks under low-hanging branches, we had a lovely stroll on the back of an 42-year old she-elephant. coolest part about the ride: on the way back our/moon’s driver/jockey/rider gets off her neck and goes and sits on the top of her head, and lets me hop on her neck. amazing. slash amay-jing.

anyway, moon the elephant only took us about halfway up the trail today. for the second half we picked up a guide named mahn. i’m sure that’s not how you spell it. mahn took his time leading us and stopped to point out various things along the way. at one point we stopped at a cave and he pointed to a tree that started at the top of a cliff and had roots all the way to the bottom. he said “does you know what tree?” and i was like “duh. banyan.” but i said, “um, banyan?” and he looked at me surprised and said, “yes, banyan.” and then i said, “how do you say it in thai?” and he said “banyan.”

oh.

so i knew the banyan wasn’t native to hawaii, but now i’m guessing it originated in southeast asia. brilliant.

in fact, except for the giant skinks and the hole spiders and the squirrels and the monkeys and the elephants and the flying lizards, we could’ve been walking up the trail to manoa falls back home. minus the paved path and the hoards of tourists.

and speaking of tourists, there are an absurd amount of scandinavians here. i’ve never seen so many blond people. and they all look the same. well, at least similar. i mean, they are ALL blond. and either really pale or red. it’s like norway, finland and sweden collectively decided to vacation in thailand. not that i have anything against the scandinavian races, i just have never seen so many of them before. i thought my college roommate from norway was funny looking, but it turns out that they all look like that.

and all the males like to wear shpants.

so, tomorrow we’re departing the lovely island of ko lanta and heading to railay — a place recommended to me by a friend from thailand and noted for it’s amay-jing scenery. the tough life…

Since we’ve been WIFI-less for the past few days we haven’t been able to add any pictures to the blog (as you may or may not have noticed). So this is for all my visually stimulated friends and family who have been writing me emails something along these lines:

“Hey your blog stories are nice, but where are the pictures?”

So here you go-

The view from our hotel room in Bangkok, the Chao Phrya River.

The bedazzled, bejeweled, sparkle-fest that is the Grand Palace (and none of these pictures do it any justice):

It’s so dazzling, I had to put my shades on- “I love goooold!!!”

For all you aspiring bedazzlers, a close view of the inlaid jewels.

Now on the day that we went to the Grand Palace it was a National Holiday, what EXACTLY the holiday was celebrating I couldn’t quite gather completely but I think it had something to do with the death anniversary of the King’s sister and a buddhist holiday, which may or may not, be one and the same here in Thailand.

Anyways, the point of this little tidbit of information is that as we were leaving the area surrounding the palace the King’s motorcade passed us meandering in the streets of Bangkok. It was the longest and ONLY royal motorcade I’ve ever seen. Me, being the camera happy freak that I am, started snapping away at the the Mercedes Benz’s as they passed us in a street (the street that we were forbidden to cross 10 minutes before the actual motorcade zipped by). I got a picture of the the Benz with the two royal flags mounted on the hood of either side of the car, the King’s Benz, I suspected. And when I viewed the pictures in my camera a little later all the pictures we’re fine except the ones of THAT PARTICULAR car where I can only see a teeny thumbnail and it reads “corrupted data” on my camera screen and it won’t upload onto the computer. VERRRRY interesting indeed…

…..that was a very long story about how I think the King has some sort of picture inhibiting device on his car.

But anyways, here’s a picture of a different Benz, one without the flags, without the King:

This picture is for Ted, who loves dried seafood.

Mmmmmmmm….

This is the mammoth reclining buddha, the guy is huge. I would have got an amazing picture here WITH the giant buddha if I wasn’t shoved out of the way by 30 Indian grandmas one second after taking this picture (and they can be vicious about picture taking. I tried to wait until they we’re finished but my endurance was no match for the old birds).

Wat Po, or a piece of it.

Instructions for “thai massage”

Sculptures of “thai massage”

Now, after seeing these paintings and statues depicting thai massage I should have gotten some idea about what thai massage entails. But alas, I did not and our first day on Phi Phi Island I saw a massage cabana at the top of the beach and thought to myself “oh, that would be relaxing”. So I made my way up the beach and told the lady “thai massage please” (for 10 dollars, what a deal).

Ya, anything BUT relaxing.

I lay there as my body was pulled and twisted in a million directions. Once during the session my back was hoisted onto this small Thai woman’s knees and I was stretched out and then curled in an un-godly manner as she forced my body to contort in an unnatural (especially for my lanky, non-flexible limbs) way. I think they should call it “thai stretching”.

Will, making friends with the locals. What a charmer.

Long-tailing it to Long Beach (the Phi Phi Island Long Beach that is)

On the shores of Maya Bay (for all those paying attention, or maybe for those who weren’t- “The Beach”).

Our longtail boat “The Wipaporn”, that took us snorkeling for the day.

a scenic view from Bamboo Island. We had a Brazilian couple on our boat who were snapping pictures left and right. At every opportunity the man would set up a makeshift photo shoot for his wife: her laying on the white sand beaches, her splashing in the water, her pretending not to see him taking a picture of her capturing a breath-taking view.

I have a confession to make-

I wanted these makeshift photo sessions too- but I couldn’t bring myself- fine, I having no shame, probably COULD, but Will couldn’t bring himself to play photographer (but no joke, it seemed like EVERY couple was doing it and there were a lot of couples there) So anyways, I have this:

These following pictures are from our awesome day of elephant trekking (for more fun details, see Will’s post):

I call this: “hey, I’m riding on top of a giant elephant and I’m not scared at all. ha, I’m having so much fun *cheese*”

I hope that’s enough pictures, *whew*.