Back in Bangkok, baby!

May 19, 2011 was the last time I was in Bangkok. I had left my host family a few days before, hiccuping and in tears, not knowing when I would be back. I cried when I visited a Thai 7/11 for the last time. I cried leaving my AFS friends behind, and they all waited up with me until 3:30 in the morning when a taxi came to take me and me alone to the airport. Some of us snuck up on to the roof of the hotel and danced in the rain in a garden of skyscrapers, savoring our final hours. When I finally got on the plane, I was physically ill to be leaving. I had a fever, a rash on my chest, a throbbing headache. All because I was leaving a country I loved and didn’t know when I could return.

Two years later, fate has transpired to bring me home. Yesterday morning, I arrived in Thailand over the Cambodian border. The Thai immigration official was friendly and after hearing my pronunciation of Ban Nong Faek (the village where my family’s house is) he conducted the rest of the mini-interview in Thai. He handed my stamped passport back with a smile and well wishes for chok dee, or good luck. Welcome home!

The bus dropped us off at Khao San Road, the tourist section of town that I have heard about but never visited. The street is lined with restaurants and bars and shops on the sidewalks and food vendors and tuk tuks ready and willing to spirit you away from the madness. My initial plan was to book another bus ticket to take me to Yasothon that very night, but navigating crowds with heavy bags strapped to your front and back, without a sense of direction and a grumbling belly is a recipe for grumpy traveler. That much I have learned. So I sat on a curb, watching the masses flow by, and waited for the internal decision to be made. Stay in Bangkok for a night or press onward? I got some Thai iced tea to help me think it over. Mmmm… Stay. It will give my family more heads-up time as well.

200 baht later, I had a room and a place to leave my bags. Success! I hit the sidewalks, taking in the smells and sounds and sights of this corner of a beloved country. I entered every 7/11 I saw, whether I was shopping or not, just for the satisfaction of seeing familiar brands and snacks. I walked laps around Khao San and the surrounding streets. I got a SIM card for the secondary phone I brought with me and haven’t used, but there was nowhere to put the SIM card in the phone. Some hilarity with the 7/11 staff who sold me the SIM card ensued, but in the end I had to by a new (to me) phone from one of the many roadside kiosks. Before that, I used a public phone to telephone my host mom. It was almost surreal; there I was on a street corner, smiling like a fool and surrounded by streetside food vendors going about their business. Oh, joy of simple things.

Being in Thailand, I am taking care of some business that I have been letting slide in other countries. I am buying new deoderant, a toothbrush, glue. I went to a Kodak store and printed pictures to put in my on-the-road scrapbook, which will be completed long before I reach American soil. In a way I have been waiting to get to Thailand to deal with some of these things, largely because prices are more clearly regulated here and I feel less like I will be ripped off. Plus it is cheap, relatively speaking.

And if you are looking for hippie chic, this is the place to be! Tie-dye headbands, embroidered linen shirts, pants in various colors, textures, and degrees of baginess. Admittedly, I would like to get a high-quality version of each of these items, but have no real need for more clothes. Maybe when I am heading out I will spring, but for now my one pair of khakis and one skirt are holding their own. (But it will be laundry day soon, that’s for sure!)

Today I wandered the city, hopping on a boat shuttle and hopping off in Chinatown, from there, I found my way back to Khao San and enjoyed the sensory stimulation along the way. The smell of Tiger Balm and unnamable herbs drying in Chinese medicine shops. The alley selling shoes of every size and color, shop after shop of shoes. The narrow indoor market with shops selling everything under the sun. Boys with overloaded dolly carts shouting Tor na krap! as they hustle through the claustrophobic walkways. Glittering fabrics and jewelery pressing themselves upon you. The smell of roasting meat, smoke trailing down the street. The occasional unexpected whiff of jasmine garlands, sold as offerings to Buddha. The cough of tuk tuks zipping farangs around the city. The smell of frying noodles in street stalls and accompanying sound of spatulas scraping woks. The chatter of vendors gossiping. The sudden coolness found by the tree-lined canals that led some people to call Bangkok the Venice of the East. The steamy sewers and their smell of old laundry water. The ubiquitous wats, or temples. Oh, Thailand how I missed you.

Last night I stretched my legs after a long day of transit. Business handled, I strolled the farang-filled streets and enjoyed the music coming from different restaurants and bars. Sometimes I would cop a squat across the street from a place with live music and groove to the beat.

I don’t remember this part of Thailand, but it doesn’t surprise me now that I’m back: people are really friendly! I have had a number of local people stop for a chat, usually in English. Many of them have family living in the States and some have spent time over there as well, making our communication even easier with their advanced English skills. For example, yesterday I was fiddling in my bag and looked up to see an older woman standing next to me. I gave her a smile, and she asked where I am from. Turns out her daughter lives in Dallas and she has been living with her on and off there for the past fifteen years. She is in Bangkok to visit her sister, who is hard to live with because she is “too picky!” She runs a tidy little business bringing in Estee Lauder and other legitimate beauty supplies from the States and resells them to rich friends in Bangkok. She does the same with Thai-style bags and goods, bringing them back to the States to sell to friends at an inflated price. She was a cunning business woman, but honest and had a conspiratorial smile that was infectious. Another man, who had lived in Michigan, stopped me and asked about Vietnam (since I was wearing my Vietnam shirt) and took an empty water bottle off my hands. Shortly afterward, another lady asked me where I am from and why I am traveling alone. “You should have brought your boyfriend and come on holiday!” she laughed. (Yeah, long story about that one…) A guy and a girl asked if they could film an interview with me and were delighted that they could ask the questions in Thai while I responded in English. I don’t know if there is something written on my face, but people are awful happy for a chat. Just another reason why I love Thailand.

And now I am about to grab a taxi to take me to the train station en route to Ubon. The train was cheaper than the bus, and I am quite excited for this experience. I haven’t been on the train in Thailand yet, which was a bit of a sticking point with me when I was here last time. So here we go, on to a new adventure and a new chapter with the Sujarit family!

Buddha is my Om boy

No, I did not make that up. I saw it on a t-shirt and thought it was funny and appropriate, given my activities at Angkor Wat yesterday. I woke up at 4:30 (really I woke up at 3:30, when some dorm mates finally stumbled their way home) to catch the sunrise. Two girls from Northern Ireland, Maria and Karen, shared a tuk tuk with me. We made it for the sunrise and did a full day of exploring. 

Angkor Wat is actually just one temple complex. There are hundreds, some grander and in better shape than others, scattered around the area. It is possible to reach many of them by bicycle, but the farther-out ones require a tuk tuk for the day. Since I only bought a one-day pass, I opted to do the small circle that had the most notable temples along its route, including Angkor Wat and the temple where Tomb Raiders was supposedly filmed.

The day before, I picked up four copper painted Buddhas at the market at five bucks a head and toted them around with me, taking pictures of them at the temples. The one sitting in lotus position is for my host sister, May, who was born on a Thursday. The one standing with his hands over each other is for my host brother, Mackey, who was born on a Sunday. My friend and Yaso sister, Anouk, was born on a Sunday as well and she has a matching Buddha. I was born on a Monday and got a Buddha standing with one palm facing out for myself (the first and only trinkety souvenir I am buying on this trip. He will keep my wooden Buddha company perched at the top of my AVID speakers when I get back to Tampa). In Thai culture, each day of the week is associated with a certain Buddha and a color, among other things. 

To find out what your Buddha is, type in your birthday to this calculator http://www.mathsisfun.com/games/dayofweek.html and then look at this page to see your Buddha http://www.phuket101.net/2012/03/buddha-positions-for-seven-days-of-week.html. Each posture represents a different part of the Buddha’s life and corresponds to a color for the day. People that like horoscopes will like this. 

And now, on to the pictures! Most of them will have on of the Buddhas in them, but some are just of the temples and I may make a few appearances as well.

 

 

Oh my Buddha, it’s the sunrise! Angkor Wat is silhouetted in the background.

 

First wai of the morning at Angkor Wat. (The Wai is a distinct Thai thing that is not so common on this side of the border.)

 

This beautiful lady is a dancer called an Apsara. She obviously recently had some plastic surgery, or plaster surgery as the case may be. Apsara motifs are very popular all over Cambodia.

The one above is my favorite from the whole day and I don’t know why it won’t rotate.

 

There are few roped-off sections of the temples, meaning that visitors can climb and lounge pretty much wherever they please on these ancient monuments, including this one, the most famous Angkor Wat. Not the best strategy for preservation, but I must admit that it is more fun to be a part of the problem in this case. You would never get away with that kind of stuff in the States. Not that we have thousand-year-old temples, but you know what I mean.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A lone monk enters Angkor Wat.

Ruins in the impossibly green foliage. It is the rainy season now, making trees (where there are trees) fresh and green.

Beautiful carvings surrounding a doorway.

Through this window, you can see the enigmatic, smiling faces of Bayon. This is at a different temple, and these large faces adorn large pillars, facing all four directions.

 

If the faces of Bayon had larger nostrils, you better believe that one of them would have had a golden Buddha boogey lodged up there. 

Bayon is in the background. Look closely and you can see faces in the ruins. 

Now that is one mighty large doorway.
I’m trying to think of something gong-worthy for this caption:
Who could toe the line with this guy around?
If I were a statue, that would be my [toe] jam!
Blown away by Buddha.
Any other ideas?
Nice frontal focus with the gateway to some other temple in the background. The long, elevated, stone walk to this temple over a long stretch of bog was impressive in its own right.
The stair structures built to get up and down some of the temples could be a little tricky to navigate. Steep with impossibly narrow boards; just take one step at a time and be thankful they weren’t slippery to boot.
Goofing around. If I had a willing photographer it would have been crazier, but the timer on my camera only allows ten seconds to get in position…
…Still, that’s enough time to strike a glamour pose among the tree-infested ruins of the “Tomb Raider” temple.
Buddha strikes again!
And again. This time it seems more literal since he is perched atop a headless statue, though the body may be hard to make out in this picture.
Buddha with the power of wood triumphing over stone.
Finally, a whole wall of Buddhas! I thought of the song “Miss New Booty” but replaced “booty” with “Buddha” in my head. A quick YouTube search revealed that this was not an original association. I would post a link here, but the computer is dreadfully slow. YouTube “buddha buddha buddha rocking everywhere” if you want some cheesy, amateur videos.

Well! Those are some pictures to highlight yesterday’s trip to Angkor Wat. Today was election day as well as a Sunday, so things were pretty quiet here. Lots of shops closed, especially because people have to go to their home provinces to vote. I caught some of the results on a projector screen on Pub Street this evening. It looks like the Rescue Party was in the lead. Each time a new commune’s results were announced and the Rescue Party was the majority, all the waitstaff cheered and shook hands and high-fived. It was really exciting to see and reminded me of standing in Grant Park five years ago, watching the polls with thousands of anxious Chicagoans. I’ll never forget the jubilation (and throwing up in my dad’s office toilet; I have refused to eat Jimmy Johns since) of that night. This election has a lot at stake for Cambodia, and I will be interested in watching the news unfold over the coming weeks.

At the moment, I am at my hostel, waiting for a 2 a.m. bus to take me to Bangkok. Still three hours away… I have time to read and doze, like I have been doing all day. Ah, the glamorous life of a traveler. Siem Reap is a nice place to chill (and be sick, since it is so tourist-oriented and is pretty small) but I am pretty much chilled out and am happy to be moving on. Thailand glitters ahead of me, and beyond that India is starting to scratch itself into my thoughts more urgently. I still think I want to volunteer with some munchkins, but since I will be arriving a few days before the fifteenth at the latest it is also possible to do a yoga retreat at the same place with which I have been in contact. I’m going to sleep on it for another week and see what beckons.

Traveler’s Nightmare

When I picked “traveler’s nightmare” as the title of this post, I thought of all the other nightmares out there. What is up with me certainly isn’t the worst thing that could happen, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t still a bummer.

First, let’s start with the good news, shall we? I am feeling better! (This should make it very easy to infer what happened.) I was able to get out and about a bit in Siem Reap today, albeit in a daze. But that’s progress! Earlier in the day it took an hour to get down to pieces of toast and then another hour to stop feeling nauseated, but I managed! Then a trip to the Angkar Museum, which is actually pretty well put together, for a few hours. Student ID saved me six bucks, which will pay for my dorm bed tonight. Frugality! All the walking stirred my appetite, and I found a pro-local restaurant called The Singing Tree that has a lot of vegetarian options. I got Tofu Amok — no, the tofu did not go into a state of murderous frenzy. If that were to happen, the irony might kill me first. Har har har. Okay end of digression: Amok is a Khmer curry that tastes a lot like Thai curry but it is harder to find a veggie version of it. Or anything, really. Here if you can afford meat and get fat then fortune smiles upon you. But I digress! The happy point here is that I was not only able to stomach the smell of the walk through the market to the restaurant, I was also able to eat the meal with (almost) my usual zeal. And no indigestion afterward. Huzzah! I celebrated my regained health with an ice cream cone. Good and trustworthy pistachio; no need to bomb my gut back to the stone age (again) by getting too crazy. I’m not out of the woods yet, but I can see the sunshine.

Now, I’ll tell you what happened, but be forewarned that it may be a tad graphic, depending on what decides to come out of these finger tips. (As you may or may not have noticed, I don’t do drafts of these posts and don’t edit them later or even reread them before posting. The same is true here. We’ll just have to see, won’t we?)

It all started four days ago. Sunday. I was in Phnom Penh, and had just written a rather long blog entry if I recall correctly. Afterward, I wandered about and got stuck on one street corner because a parade of political ralliers was doing the rounds. I got a streetside seat, had dinner, and was entertained by the antics and energy of the crowd for the better part of an hour. By that point it was quite late, and I had a bus to catch. A quick turn through the night market (the main attraction was performers singing Khmer lyrics to Thai songs, a few of which I recognized) and I was back at Nomads with the ever-helpful Robert. He let me keep my borrowed towel and take a shower before boarding the bus, free of charge. This is a real show of hospitality as most places charge and if you sneak one you feel like a criminal, made dirty by the simple act of washing. To this I say: bogus!

Blah blah blah, some waiting around, book-reading, nose-picking, that kind of stuff. And then! A tuk tuk came to deliver me to the night bus. I was the first passenger. We bopped around different areas of Phnom Penh, picking up three more people from hostel names I recognized from the Internet, and then all of us were dropped off at a corner three blocks from my hostel. Ah, well, it was nice to get a bit of a nighttime city tour. No traffic and the weather is lovely.

Before boarding, I had that premonition that it wouldn’t be long before I had to pee. My bladder sent a telegram saying I would hear again via post in thirty minutes. More time? An email then. The worst is when your bladder comes to tell you in person. That’s when you know the situation is dire. And of course that’s what happened, at 3:37 am on the road between Phnom Penh and Siem Reap. I was in seat — bed, actually — 16B. Top row, towards the back, right-hand side, in the aisle. My bedfellow was an Asian guy with whom I had zero interaction besides sharing a small sleeping cabin. It wasn’t cramped, and from the movement of the bus we could have almost been on a train. But at least trains have toilets onboard. With this bus, there was no such luck. And since this isn’t Vietnam anymore, there are no more toilet stops every two hours. (That’s one thing I marveled at in Vietnam: the buses always stopped just when Mr. Bladder was starting to send friendly letters through the neural network.) I had been sleeping but woke up to the sound of Mr. Bladder ringing the doorbell. I lay there, rocking in my narrow bed, trying to breathe and focus on when we would pull into the next stop, which I prayed wouldn’t be Siem Reap. My stomach started to cramp. The breathing became deeper. Someone bumped my knee walking down the aisle. I peeked through the curtain to see who it was. The cabin boy. Damn! I should have asked if there would be a toilet stop. I watched him pass out of whispering distance, maneuvering around a dark shape on the floor in a way that assured me it wasn’t a person. I watched him up at the front for maybe twenty minutes, debating. In the glare of the headlights, there was nothing but rice fields. No street lights. No other cars or busses. Not even one lonely motorbike. Nothing.

Gritting my teeth, I rolled out of the bed, thumping slightly on the floor below, still tangled in the course sheet. I stripped it quick as I could and made a shaky move for the front of the bus. He was sitting on the steps. I tapped his shoulder and squinted into his face; I had forgotten my glasses. “Toilet?” I whispered as pitifully as possible, unsure if it would translate. “You want toilet now?” he asked. I took a deep breath. Potty stops were obviously not part of the itinerary. Breathe out: “Soon.” I smiled. It never hurts to do so. Okay okay, he says, turning to the bus driver and casually saying something in Khmer. I had retreated a few steps, hopefully lingering. He turned back to me. “Okay okay, driver stop for you.” Sweet baby Jesus, it’s about time! Big smile, for real this time. We do indeed slow down and pull over on the narrow road. It is paved, and still surrounded by rice fields. I waddle to the back of the bus. A full moon presides over the spectacle. Well, I hike up my skirt and make a full moon of my own, right there on the pavement in the Cambodian darkness. Mine is as white as the one in the sky, as white as a flag of surrender to the forces of nature. And what a surrender! There is nothing like a strong, patiently built, roadtrip piss. It was glorious. So glorious, in fact, that I went twice. The only detractor from my satisfaction was that I had to have restraint with the flow, otherwise it would splatter all over my legs and feet and make me itchy and smelly for the rest of the ride. Toilet paper and any potential prying eyes be damned, this was a highlight of the trip. It’s the simple things, right?

Back underway on the bus, my stomach still felt tight. I’ve had cramps before from ignoring Mr. Bladder for too long, and I figured this was one of those. It should go away with a little sleep, I reasoned. So to sleep I went, only to be awakened a couple hours later at our destination. The sun was rising. If we hadn’t stopped, I wouldn’t have made it to see this beautiful dawn. But alas! Here we were, in (or at least nearby) Siem Reap. It was $1 flat rate for a tuk tuk into town to find a place to stay. I got a young man that was friendly enough and at least honest about his job and the network that it creates. As such, he brought me to a hostel where dorm beds were just $2 (the cheapest yet!) and said I could look and if I didn’t like what I saw, we could look elsewhere. It worked for me. $2? I’ll take it. Then I had to sit through a thirty minute talk about the temples with him, which was somewhat informative but was mostly a ploy to get me to book him to be my tuk tuk driver and tour guide. Not knowing a thing about my surroundings and the things to do and the people I could potentially meet, I continuously declined, saying that I was not in a position to make plans. He tried to instill me with customer loyalty, saying that since he was the one that brought me from the bus and to Siem Reap I should stick with him or else I wasn’t a good person, or something along those lines. Yeah, there are other ways to build customer loyalty….

Once he was gone, I set off to rent a bicycle to do some exploring. By this point I was aware that my stomach still felt tight and that the diarrhea was starting, but I was eager to look around and reasoned that I would be able to find toilets along the way. I stopped for breakfast (baguette and eggs) to get going and saw a few places afterward, but every time I dismounted I could feel my stomach wrapping tighter. More trips to the bathroom. This was especially regretful when I stumbled upon the ConCERT headquarters (http://www.concertcambodia.org/siem%20reap.html), which is a wonderful network for volunteers and reliable NGOs, and was too pained by my intestines to get as much information as I would have liked. But the helpful staff were willing to talk and sent me off with plenty of brochures, including restaurants and shops that support volunteering efforts. I smiled through gritted teeth, thanked him, and slowly pedaled away, en route to nowhere.

Following the American folk wisdom that ginger ale settles an upset stomach, I bought a can and drank it sitting by the river. It didn’t seem to do anything except make me emit a series of weak (not even a one out of ten) burps and feel a little bloated. Feeling fatigued, I sat awhile longer before deciding to check out the Peace Cafe, which was nearby on the other side of the river and lay between me and my bed. It was a lovely spot, with wicker lounge chairs filling an earth-packed yard and Tibetan prayer flags fluttering in the branches above. It was a lovely spot, quiet and full of people with dreadlocks talking about inner energies and the limitations of man. Alone with a Lonely Planet Cambodia and a plain soup of noodles and tofu, I ate slowly and took notes on border crossings and towns of interest.

I made good progress on the notes (looks like I may have to transfer through Bangkok instead of going directly north like I had hoped – bugger!) but wasn’t even halfway through the soup before the intestinal riot began. Off to the toilet, once again! At this point I figured it was best to give up on exploring and give in to sleep for the day despite it only being four in the afternoon. I paid and slowly pedaled the short distance back to my hostel. My alarm was set for 7:30 pm, giving me enough time to get the bike back at 8. But at the moment I wanted nothing more than to sleep and go to the toilet, not necessarily in that order.

At the hostel, there was someone in the bathroom. I asked if there was another; no dice. One toilet for up to twelve people. Outlook grim. I waited and nearly exploded upon entry. These bouts were becoming more violent. Temporarily relieved, I flopped on my floor-level bunk bed without moving a thing out of my way. I wasn’t down long before the process started again. By this point, the diarrhea was nothing more than brown water with bits of vegetable or fruit skin mixed in, like a kid trying to hide his vegetables in chocolate milk. Damn whatever source was the culprit! (I suspect some jackfruit that I bought off a lady in a muddy alley. I could taste that it was old; who knows how old? And it undoubtedly had never been washed. Always best to buy directly from the lady peeling it and putting it in a bag for you right before your eyes.)

I thought that I might be more comfortable in a private room, so I asked to be changed at the front desk. There was only one left. An old tube TV, no bathroom, no air-con. Just a fan without a cover. I moved my bags, piece by piece. I was physically weakened at this point from all of my generous donations to the porcelain throne. (Hey, at least I didn’t have to squat for this too!) I lay down and felt the urge, as well as another. It dawned on me that I wouldn’t sleep well until the bike was returned, so I hauled myself back outside to pedal it back to the rental place, a scanty two blocks away. It wouldn’t have been safe for any longer trips since a fever was starting to burn and blur my mind. I made it, and on the way back intended to stop at a pharmacy I had seen earlier to get some medication and to stop for water. Water found me first, and I was thirsty. I knew the walk back would be short, but I was so tired that it seemed like all of Cambodia stretched before me. Because of the history here I won’t call it a death march, but by this point I was in pretty bad shape. My head lolled on my neck, eyes meandered without my direction. I was looking for the pharmacy, but after walking (more like shuffling) awhile it didn’t materialize. I figured that I had passed it by, despite my attempts at vigilance. Then I felt that the hostel had passed me by too since I didn’t recognize the buildings. Was there always an abandoned school across from the hostel? I don’t think so. How long have I been gone? Ten minutes? An hour? I couldn’t tell. I was hot, without a map or a watch or a clue. Or a toilet. And I needed one urgently. Angry juices had started to squirm out of me, and it began to burn with every step. I was lost (though I knew I was on the right street!), about to shit (if you can call it that) my pants, and didn’t know how to ask for help. Merde! I started to cry. Just a little bit, but I was feeling pretty, well, shitty at this point. At a loss, I started walking back the way I came. Where are those tuk tuk guys when you need them? At least they may be able to give some direction. I walked on the sidewalk with the traffic at my back, constantly glancing over my shoulder for a tuk tuk. Finally, one appeared. I tried to wave him down, but he just waved back and pointed to his backseat. It had a piece of glass taking up the whole space. Double merde. I tried asking shopkeepers if they knew where my hostel was. Only puzzlement. Was it my accent? Triple merde. Finally, for real this time, a tuk tuk appeared and pulled over at my beckon. I asked if he knew Siem Reap Central Hostel. He smiled, scratched his head, looked around, and laughed. Dammit, just tell me! “It is close to hear, right?” Yes, right there. He pointed twenty meters ahead. Oh my Buddha there it was. I had overshot it by a lot, missing it when it was right in front of my face. I could have cried some more. “So, you want to see temple? You want tuk tuk? I good driver, very cheap, very cheap! Where you go?” he began, but I thanked him and stumbled off muttering about being sick while he was left to find someone who wanted more than duh-worthy information. (Even for a tourist, come on!)

I was back and… someone was taking a shower. Seriously? I begged to be told there was a separate staff bathroom. There was not. I sat outside the bathroom gathered the courage to ask the showerer to please hurry since I was sick and needed the toilet. They must not have understood English, because it was another agonizing ten minutes of listening to someone shampooing and brushing and doing god-knows-what in there while I was about to experience the apocalypse in my innards. I huddled on the ground and cried, snapping at a guy that came to check on the bathroom. “I’m next!” was as close to a snarl as I have ever gotten. The staff were in the back playing cards, and the two ladies near the adjacent doorway kept peeking in at my pitiful state and whispering with the other players. I let nasty things run through my increasingly fevered mind, things that I won’t type out here. 

Hallelujah, a miracle. Princess gets out of the shower and I rush in. I turn on the shower so the giggling staff can’t hear my shame. At this point, I give thanks that I am not vomiting too. I also decide that I need to move somewhere where I have my own bathroom. I wait for the burning release to subside, wash my face and hands, and go to my room to begin packing. The door is locked. I think I don’t have the key and go and bang at the front desk until someone comes. I am being rude and don’t care. All this, and it turns out I have the key already in my pocket. I mumble an apology that you wouldn’t believe (and the bell-boy didn’t either, as told by the magnificent eyeroll he gave to the day’s most fussy customer) and head to my room, which happens to be a door next to where the staff are playing their card game. Inside, it reeks of cleaning fluid and stale cigarettes. They were doing something before the card game, it seems. I have only dumped stuff on the bed but haven’t laid on it yet. I am packing again when the urge strikes for perhaps the thirtieth time today. And… someone else is taking a shower in the only bathroom to which I have access. Instead of waiting outside, I pack faster. Back at the front desk, I have to bang again (the desk boy is playing pool outside, I notice) and explain that I am checking out because “I need my own bathroom.” He has to call someone to decide if I need to pay the $2 or not for the bed. Screw the $2, I just want to get out of there! But I am sick and unreasonable and would rather not pay, so I wait the extra minute. I only have to pay $1 for this shoddy nightmare. Fine. Thank you. Good riddance to your lack of facilities.

Fully loaded with my travel gear, I stumble even more through the streets. I know a number of places are nearby on the same street even closer to the central market. I head in that direction. The second place I try has a spot open: a private air-con room with TV and, most importantly, private bathroom. At $15 a night, I take it. Much more expensive than other beds on offer, but I am willing to pay more for comfort while I am in this state. I tell the lady behind the counter that I am sick and she nods understandingly. I also beg use of the bathroom, wherein I discover that the friction from walking while I was lost and loose in the bowels has left angry-feeling blisters in a sensitive spot. They bite into me when the cool water of the bidet hits them. I cry out and try not to think of how hemorrhoids are formed. 

In the closet bathroom, I take a few more breaths for composure, then go back to the front desk to finish check-in. I am searching for my passport when I realize: Mother of all Merde! I left it under the mattress at the other hostel! I never do this, but the other place felt a little dodgy and open, so I tried to take an extra precaution. I vowed not to get lost this time and tried to slip in as quietly as possible. A French guy was in the bed now, and I apologized and then turned up his mattress. He understood after I walked out with a pouch and clear folder carrying copies of my identity, real passport, and a wad of cash. As I walked away from this hostel for the last time, I could hear the front desk guy, still playing pool, sing “And don’t you come baaack, oh oh ooooh!” Don’t worry, I won’t.

At long last, I was in an air-conditioned room with my own bathroom. Then I really started to feel the illness. I was absolutely on fire. I took a cold shower, but the water felt warm by the time it hit my skin. The saliva in my mouth was thick and mucousy. I couldn’t stand straight with the pain in my stomach. More bouts on the toilet. I crawled into bed, doubling up on the sheets. I turned on the TV for some distraction: there was a documentary about the history of mind control and psychology experiments. With the way my mind was warping, I could have been one of the patients. I rubbed Tiger Balm all over my body and waited for it to cool me down. It did, and then it didn’t stop. I have never used that much before. My fingers went numb since they had spread it. So I lie there, burning and freezing and feeling utterly drained. I woke up every hour or less to visit the toilet. On one of these visits, I was too weak to stand. I slouched on the toilet, dreading getting up again knowing I would only be back again soon. I sat there for awhile, naked and dead to the world. When I woke up, I tried to stand. My head felt light, and the change sent me over the edge. I fainted. I don’t know how long I lie there on the tiled floor, still wet from the evening shower. But I couldn’t feel the dampness, nor the cold tile. Not a thing. I was out. When I came to, I wondered if I should go to the hospital. “In the morning…” At the moment, all the could do was crawl back into bed and drift off until the next urge awoke me. 

The next day, Tuesday, I stayed in bed. The hostel/hotel backs up to a monastery, so all day I could listen to the chanting and music or read or watch TV. Mostly I slept. Around noon, I gathered the strength to go to a pharmacist. This time I found it; it was only a stone’s throw from my new location. The smells of the world assaulted me as soon as I stepped outside. I can’t quite pin down the smell of Cambodia, but it kind of smells like dust, garbage, and old meat. Not really the most pleasing mixture, and especially not to someone whose senses are hypersensitive with illness. (Though this serves a purpose since I am not likely to eat something poisoned again while I can smell like that.) I made it to the pharmacy, marked with the universal green cross and snakes. I even made it inside and was starting to talk about my symptoms when the world started swimming and then went black. I fainted again, though I don’t fancy I was out for more than a few seconds. I came to hearing a jumble of Khmer, with the lady from behind the counter now at my side and pulling on my arm. They got me a folding chair, where I stationed myself for the next hour or so, drinking rehydration powders and debating if I should go to a doctor. My verdict was to just try to rehydrate and sleep. After all, I hadn’t had any diarrhea for a number of hours. Maybe because there was nothing left, or maybe because things were turning around. Rest and fluids are the best medicine, so I bought more powder packets, thanked the lady, and hobbled home.

The rest of the day was spent in and out of sleep, with some TV intervals. Between NatGeo Wild, Animal Planet, Discovery Channel, and the Asian pop scene, I was plenty entertained.

Wednesday followed in much the same fashion. I was feeling stronger, though the lack of fluid in my joints was taking a toll. I have never felt like my bones are rubbing together before. Is that what arthritis is like? Ouch. I ventured a little further and tried to get some food down, which I managed (cheers again to no vomiting) but it tied my stomach up in knots for hours after eating. My stomach felt as taut and bloated as a drum, but anyone who beat on this drum would be inflicting severe pain. Sleep was harder to come by, but come it did.

And that brings me to today! I checked out of my recuperation station and got a bed in a groovy hostel next door. There is a pool on the first floor and  an open restaurant/lounge space and the sign on the stairs says there is yoga space on the second floor and movie/TV space on the third floor. It is clean, air conditioned, and the toilet and shower are separated. It is a world away from Cambodia, as much else of Siem Reap is. This is a town that sprung up catering entirely to tourists ever since UNESCO named Angkor Wat as one of the wonders of the world or whatever it is. Still haven’t seen it (as is obvious from the story above) but think I will only spend one day to see the most impressive sites. I like temples and all, but I have already seen so many stone carvings from the temples that I only feel the need to see just a few to get the gist, at this point in my life anyway.

Okay it is almost midnight here and this little lady ought get her and her misbehaving intestines to bed. Hope everyone reading this has had better health than me.

Phnom Penh in Pictures

Today is day three in Cambodia’s capital, Phnom Penh (the “ph” in Phnom is pronounced as a gentle p, like pink, immediately followed by “nom”) and my opinion has changed a bit since my first post written upon arrival. I am growing to accept, if not like, Cambodia more. Let me start from where I left off with the last post, which was Friday evening. (It is Sunday evening now.)

After the Internet Cafe, I took a meandering path back to Nomads, my hostel-home for the moment. Robert, the gregarious owner, was chatting with some people out front when he saw me and paused to ask if I would like to go to the Killing Fields the next day because there was another solo traveler who was looking for a companion for a full day of sight-seeing, starting with the Killing Fields. I was hoping for exactly the same thing! Funny how that works out. That’s how I met Kenny, a Chinese-American who is doing an internship in Singapore for the summer and spends weekends exploring the region. He only had one day in Phnom Penh and was eager to see as much as possible. A perfect partner in crime! We agreed to meet at six o’clock the following morning and figure things out from there. 

The next day followed the same pattern: we took things one step at a time and, in the process, ended up taking a lot of steps, starting with the tuk tuk. People of this region are early risers, so getting a tuk tuk at six in the morning was no problem. Robert counseled us on fair prices to have a driver for the day, so we agreed on $18 to go to the Fields and all over the city. The road to the Fields was largely unpaved, dusty, and riddled with potholes. It was a bumpy ride, but Kenndy got this picture of me on a smoother stretch.

 

The Fields were, needless to say, a somber place. Around 20,000 people met their end here in brutal ways. Shooting executions were rare because bullets are expensive. Instead, people were blindfolded and told to kneel, after which they were hit on the back of the neck with a machete, hoe, bamboo stick, or anything else that was available. The sturdy, sharp, and jagged palm fronds of native trees were also used to cut victim’s necks. Infants and small children were held by the ankles and swung against a tree, which was discovered after the fact still covered in blood and brain matter. Not everyone was dead when they were pushed into the pit, so DDT and other chemicals were sprayed to finish them off and disguise the smell. Propaganda music was played over loudspeakers to cover the sounds of the screams. There is an audio tour of the Fields, which provides these gruesome facts, stories from survivors, and what the last moments sounded like (propaganda music and a diesel engine) for thousands of men, women, and children. The killing almost always took place at night. 

The picture above is of the bracelets that visitors leave behind on the bamboo perimeter of marked mass graves. Many of the graves at this site have been excavated, the remains cleaned and reverently cared for. Sometimes bits of bone or teeth or fabric still wash up from the mud. Signs ask visitors to kindly resist from removing any of these items. (What a gruesome souvenir that would be…) 

There is a large pagoda at the entrance to the fields that houses skulls and large bones by the thousands. It was eerie to go in, with all those empty eyesockets staring forlornly back. Sometimes the approximate age and gender of the victim were marked and you think “that could be me.” There are many times I have had that thought while being on this trip, especially here in Cambodia. I could be the lady squatting in a squalid alley, selling bananas or sleeping in the trash. I could be the little girl forced to sell bracelets to tourists when I should be home eating dinner, playing, and doing my homework. I could be the old woman, back bent double from a life of labor with skin like animal hide. It could be me. 

But it is not. I am lucky/privileged/blessed, whatever it may be, that I come from the circumstances that I do. That I can afford to be here, that I am in school, that I come from a family and country where people love me and care if I go missing. That I can go to a hospital if I need to. How must us tourists look to these people? Coming for a few days, consuming their poverty with our cameras that cost more than a year’s wages? But people aren’t resentful. Beggarly, yes, but not resentful. And there are certainly well-off Cambodians, a majority of which I suspect is through illicit means, though I will get to that and the politics later.

Moving along from these conflicted-tourist musings: our next stop was the genocide museum, shown above. (It was a prison/torture/interrogation center that used to be a school. People were killed in former classrooms.) Having gone yesterday, I waited outside with a book while Kenny went in. Sitting outside, a tourist is never guaranteed peace. I was hassled by beggars and endless men hawking the use of their motorbikes and tuk tuks. Usually sitting in a restaurant or some such establishment will buy you some peace, though the occasional peddler drifts into all but the fanciest establishments. So I waited, patiently smiling and shaking my head and keeping my eyes on my book. I am thinking of it as training for India. 

Next stop: the Independence Monument. I don’t know when/why it was built (forgot to do that bit of homework) But it is a nice, elaborate monument in the middle of a roundabout. Sound like France, anyone? There is plenty of colonial influence here. The red-roofed building in the background is one of Phnom Penh’s many temples. 

The Independence Monument was part of the tour en route to the National Palace and Silver Pagoda. The Palace was swamped with tourists. Something tells me it is uninhabited, though plenty of areas were off-limits. Also off-limits were sleeveless shirts. I had already paid the outrageous $6 entrance fee (it doesn’t sound like a lot but here that is a pretty significant sum. I can only wish that some of it is going to help the beggars outside the gates.) and was turned away at the door because of my bare shoulders. But of course all hope was not lost since someone happened to be selling (not loaning like they do in Thailand, but we’re not in Thailand honey) t-shirts right there. Convenient, right? I was irritated at this extra expense and unleashed a torrent of grumbling English, to which the modestly-dressed Kenny was sympathetic, while forking over two more dollars for a plain, XL t-shirt. Thusly dressed, I was permitted to enter and resolved to write “I went to Cambodia’s Royal Palace and all I got was this dumb t-shirt” on it using the Sharpie wrapped in duct tape (once a techie always a techie) that I keep in my bag. Coming up with the idea made us both laugh, which made the hassle worth it I suppose. 

No pictures were allowed of any interiors, so I asked Kenny to take a clandestine one of me in mirror by the window as a final “revenge.” Petty, but it got more laughs and there was the adrenaline element since we narrowly escaped being chided by one of the many guards. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mom, you may like this picture of some water flowers in a pot outside of the silver pagoda: 

And here they are from a different angle, with a building in the silver pagoda complex in the background: 

At the Palace exit there was a Buddha shrine (one of many) with a live Khmer band playing opposite. Notice that the golden decoration above the Buddha’s head is actually natural growth from a tree. Pretty groovy. (Also note the Pepsi product placement. Anything and everything is reused and recycled.)

By this time it was getting later in the afternoon, which meant it was time to go to a boxing match. This was a highlight for sure. After living for a year in Thailand, I never went to one Muay Thai match. After living in Tampa for two years, I never managed to find the MMA (mixed martial arts) scene that is supposedly pretty big there. So finally, here in Cambodia, I got to go to see some good-natured combat. A funny desire for a peace-loving vegetarian, but there is something primal and attractive (perhaps it is the boxers themselves…?) about it. Forget cricket; this is a sport I can understand. 

The boxing arena was a ways outside of town, at the end of another dusty and bumpy road. At first it appeared that we pulled into a television station building, but a walk around beheld a large hangar that could almost house an airplane. As soon as we alighted from the tuk tuk, music began to play and the crowd cheered. The music came from a three-man band on a corner of the stage, blasted over loudspeakers. The reedy flute sounded like the instrument of a snake charmer, which was appropriate with the television camera arching over the ring, swaying to the boxers’ movements like a metallic, one-eyed cobra. The boxers felt the rhythm too. At the start of a new match, they danced around each other, taking little steps in time to the music and making deliberate punches and kicks to feel each other out. 

We found seats on dusty (everything here seems dusty despite the daily rain) bleachers and settled in to watch the progress. The smell of Tiger Balm was heavy in the air, mixed with sweat, beer, and the occasional cigarette. A downpour began soon after, and somehow the high metal ceiling didn’t rattle with the onslaught. Nothing disturbed the sound of the snake charmer, drums, and the shouts of the crowd, which was mostly male. The male demographic was generally younger and well-groomed. A smattering of foreigners stayed inconspicuously in the bleachers. Some Khmer women were present, as were children. One little girl slept in the front row, her body supported by two plastic chairs with her head in her mother’s lap. Other children ran between the chairs, seemingly oblivious to the spectacle in the ring. One little boy was naked as the day he was born. We saw him afterward, riding home on the lap of a motorcycle driver still wearing nothing but a pair of flip flops. No photos of him, but I did catch one boxer showing respect to his teacher before a match, which is done casually before entering the ring and in a formal ceremony once the match begins.  

Following the teacher and showing proper respect must of worked because he won, as I predicted:

The final stop for our ever-so-patient tuk tuk driver was at the National Museum, to catch a cultural show. It cost $12, which is again a little steep, but it went through many of the major ceremonies that mark a Cambodian’s life, from birth to the hair-cutting ceremony to the rite of passage ceremony for girls to the entering of monkhood for boys (their rite of passage) to marriage to illness consultation to a funeral. The story flowed from one ceremony to the next, accompanied by more live Khmer music and English subtitles on a screen. The subtitles weren’t the best, but they gave us a gist of what was going on. The photo below is of the mock wedding. The bride and groom are both pretty in pink: During the show, what sounded like a riot practically drowned out the performance. This was one of many motorbrigades that I have seen/heard in the past few days here. Luckily they passed by within a few minutes, and the streets were clear when we left the show. During the day, the participants look something like this except they are on motorbikes and parading through the streets: I knew it was political and had something to do with an election, as I wrote a couple days ago. Fortunately, Kenny met a Phnom Penh local, Acha, while traveling in Bangkok and was able to give him a call and arrange a meeting. The first thing I noticed was his American flag bag. There is nowhere with more American and British patriotic paraphernalia than in this region. The stars and stripes and Union Jack adorn everything from helmets to umbrellas to shoes to purses. Acha likes America, speaks good English, and was able to give us a run-down of what is going on. He is in support of the party on parade, as are most other young people. However, this party is not the National People’s Party (the one with the longest-running “president” in the world) as I thought. In fact, Cambodia has eight political parties, though as in the States only two or three really matter. I heard that the second and third parties merged to form what I am seeing now: The National Rescue Party. Two days ago (Friday July 19), when I first saw the crowds, turned out to be the day that the leader of this opposition party returned from exile after an official pardon from the king. Since he is the leader, I suppose he is the one running for president, though you can be sure that the other party will try to complicate matters as much as possible with this recent development of the opposition leader not being in-country in time for some arbitrary deadline. So the young people are hitting the streets and campaigning for change, big time. 

Now that I have a clearer idea of what is going on, I am in support of these people (I think) though I certainly won’t don a shirt and start campaigning with them. Who knows if the new government will be any better, but I really admire that the people are trying and actively making their voices heard. This is a wonderful time to be in Cambodia, witnessing what could be history and is in the very least inspiring. Acha will go to Siem Reap to vote on the 28th. People have to go back to their original locality to vote – electronic voting isn’t an option. (I made a mistake of saying “Oh, well it is a nice opportunity to visit your parents.” “I don’t have parents.” I didn’t inquire further, but it was another reminder that we are not in Kansas anymore. Since Acha is 27, his parents very well could have been killed by the Khmer Rouge. Who knows?)

After dinner and more political talk (Acha certainly has some strong views) we went to an ex-pat bar to meet a mutual friend of Kenny and Acha who they met in Bangkok. This was Sam, who happens to be from Lincoln Park, Chicago and has been living in Thailand and Cambodia teaching English. Small world! Even more bizarre was when I found out that both Acha and Sam spoke Thai. Acha has been learning for three years and sounds like a native (after all, Thai entertainment like TV, music, and film is popular with neighboring countries) and Sam started learning in Bangkok and is continuing his studies in Phnom Penh. It was exhilarating to feel that the rhythm of the language has not left me, though I need to grasp for words more than when I was on my game. But the familiarity can be brought back, which has me thrilled.

With Sam were three other people, a guy from Oregon teaching English, a woman from China teaching Chinese, and a guy from Germany just traveling through like me. It was a fun group. The guy from Oregon speaks Mandarin, as does Kenny and the woman from China. They sat in a triangle, speaking together; while Sam, Acha, and I sat in an overlapping triangle speaking Thai. What a funny world. 

We went to a few bars together. I didn’t drink because a) I already totally blew the budget for the day on all those entrance fees and the tuk tuk and b) the local ex-pats warned me that Phnom Penh can be dangerous. A woman walking in the dark is definitely a no-no. There is a reason many nightclubs ask patrons to check their weapons at the door. At some point, we got some street food. The carnivores got burgers (Sam, Acha, and the guy from Oregon) while I went with the German guy and Chinese lady to get some local-legend pizza. The stall was called Katy Perry’s Pizza and was sold off the back of a motorbike with an oven an small prep station rigged to the back. If it exists, it can somehow be rigged to a motorbike. Seriously.

The pizza was good, the reggae rooftop bar with a full view of the city (only one significantly tall building, nothing else reaches over five stories) was even better, and somehow I didn’t get home until two in the morning (via tuk tuk – $2 for the ride over an easily walkable distance was my insurance against injury). Shower, sleep, and… Blasting music? 

This morning around 7 pm I was woken by both my bladder and music loud enough to shake the floor. Outside, the day’s political rally was in full swing. They played thumping music, alternated with announcements rousing cheers, for the rest of the day. It’s madness! Don’t these people have school or work? But again, good for them for getting out there. 

Whew, and that post only covers one day! Granted, it was a pretty full day. Today was not so eventful: I just wandered, got lost, explored a new market (and creeped on people from above as shown in the picture below), snacked, watched a documentary about the Khmer Rouge, napped at the hostel (even with the music – I was tired!), and am now going to get some dinner and check out the night market while I wait for my bus to Siem Reap. Oh, and I will try to book something in advance accommodation-wise. No more of this spending a half day to find affordable and decent lodging business. 

Cheers, until Siem Reap!

Into Cambodia

This is the email I sent my parents yesterday evening shortly after I arrived in Phnom Penh:

After much blobbing around, I am finally in Cambodia. Some similarities to Vietnam and Thailand, though it has its own vibe going on for sure. I got up at 5:15 this morning to go to the market to check it out and get some grub for the journey today. This little border town had the best prices in the whole country: 12000 dong (60 cents) for a kilo of rambutans and 10000 dong (50 cents) for a vegetarian sandwich. It was nice to get the “real” price and not be fleeced which is what happens in most places. But Chau Doc was a quiet, untouristy town. 

With provisions in hand, the journey began. I took a boat up the Mekong River to the border with Cambodia. Along the way we stopped at a fish farm, which was a floating house with a few trap doors through which the fish were fed. We participated in the feeding and got mightily splashed in the frenzy. Another stop further up river was at a Cham village. The Cham people are Muslim and have been here for hundreds of years. Their houses are on stilts. One of the houses had markers for how high the river floods each year. The reason for stilts was obvious! It is pretty hard to believe how much water height can fluctuate. But the people were really friendly and the kids didn’t mind us taking pictures of them. The French student group that was also on the tour has brought long balloons and were blowing them up and making shapes to give to the kids. The kids loved it — I bet they will remember this batch of tourists for a long time to come. 

Then it was four hours in this noisy little riverboat that was only as wide as three Vietnamese-size folding chairs. The scenery was the same, monotonous but lovely. Brown water edged by eucalyptus, with wooden stilt houses along the bank every so often and the occasional rickety bridge connecting the banks. As we went, I read Catfish and Mandela, a recommended read for visitors to Vietnam that I bought in Saigon. In a nutshell, it is about a Vietnamese-American man whose dad was a POW of the Viet Kong and whose family escaped to the US after the war. He returns to Vietnam twenty years later to bicycle from Saigon to Hanoi, discovering his cultural identity along the way (or something like that). I am halfway through the book after one day of travel and hope to find someone to start trading with soon as my bag is getting book-heavy again. After this book is read, I have The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouc and then it is time to start searching in earnest. 

Crossing the border was pretty painless. We had to fill out departure cards just like in an airplane and then the guide took our passports, passport photos (I have a stash from a photo shop in Malaysia), arrival/departure cards, and $23 USD to get the visa handled. We waited an hour, during which time I worked on my kilo of rambutans and spoke with the tour guide of the student group. He said that Total, a French oil company, pays for most of the trip for children of the employees. Nice deal! I love seeing young people get out in the world – that’s how the travel bug bites. I told the guide that at least some of the kids will be back in a few years to backpack on their own. Three-week organized tours are how it all starts. At least for me…. Anyhow, the guide handed us back our passports and we were led along a dirt row lined by corn fields (I came all this way to see Illinois landscape? Yup.) to get our passports stamped. Then we loaded into two separate vans and began the drive of uncertain duration to Phnom Penh. I heard it took two hours, someone else heard three, another four. I decided to believe it would take four hours and be pleasantly surprised if it was less. 

Cambodia looks pretty much like Vietnam though it seems a bit poorer. The houses are shabbier, many people walk barefoot, there aren’t as many motorbikes and certainly not as many cars and buses. The streetside stalls have fewer items on offer. People are thin, and I mean thin. In Vietnam no one is obese, though a few extra rolls here and there on the adult population are not uncommon. The signs are no longer readable. Khmer is in the same family as Thai so the script looks similar but is incomprehensible to me. But it is hot just the same. I had time to ponder this one feature of the region when our van blew a tire. Thank goodness a tree on the side of the road offered shade while I read my book and waited for the menfolk to fix it. I wished someone was there to laugh about a joke about calling AAA. 

But no AAA was necessary as the tire got fixed and we were underway once more. Finally, the van pulled over in a nondescript alley awhile after we noticed taller buildings and denser traffic. The French kids (who were getting a bit on my nerves with their spraying cologne in the enclosed space of the van and making endless mouth fart noises – I am all for young people traveling but maybe not on my tour) stayed in the van and continued on. Me and two German girls, Tony and Mona, piled out and decided to share a tuk tuk. $1 a head, and that is US dollars. I still have a cash stash of US currency, so this wasn’t really a problem. But dealing in US currency is not something that I want to do since the smallest denomination I can do is $1, which will lead to spending more money. I have yet to find an ATM, though word on the street is that ATMs dispense US currency as well. It is kind of funny to see other travelers of European origin toting the occasional Benjamin this far away. The exchange rate is 4000 riel, so I am paying in dollars and getting change in riel. Maybe not the best system, but at least it is consistent. Maybe tomorrow I can find a place to do an outright exchange and leave the green stuff at home.

Home, at the moment, is a guesthouse near the market. The climb up the stairs winds up and down hallways as well, so I don’t even know what floor I am on. All I know is that it is room 21, I am sharing it with the two girls for tonight (I hope to find a friendly hostel tomorrow as the guesthouse owners seem to be annoyed when I asked them questions like where to acquire a map (no free maps in Cambodia) and where an Internet cafe is), and that the landing smells strongly of marijuana. I have heard other travelers say that “you can get anything in Cambodia,” which is likely true in a poorer, desperate country. People also say “don’t stray from the marked paths – there might be bombs.”

Admittedly, after a long day of travel and hotel-hunting in the rain, I was feeling grumpy. Why did I leave Vietnam? How long until I am in Thailand? And other such thoughts. Umm, culture shock anyone? And I had barely even gotten off the bus! Geez, you grumpy traveler. Chill out. And, following Uncle Dave’s advice, eat something. I went for a wander, taking a turn about the market. There I found what looked a lot like Thai iced tea (including the beloved green tea that you can’t find in the States!) and despite the rain the sun burst through the clouds in my mind. Having zero language skills here, I pulled out a Lincoln that I put in my wallet as my dinner and Internet budget for the evening. I showed it to the small crowd of ladies that gathered around to watch the farang dig in her bag, muttering to herself. Mutual understanding occurred, and the vendor produced four US dollars and 2000 riel: my change. Perfect! I smiled and nodded my assent, pointing the the green bottle that was obviously more popular than the others. Ice tea, milk. In Thailand they use condensed milk, whereas here they use fresh milk. But the taste! Like sweetened jasmine tea with some other inexplicable ingredient. Glorious day. It is funny how something as simple and familiar as a beverage can turn a mood around. I really must be a child, which is how I feel much of the time while traveling. 

Dinner was fried noodles and vegetables, which is pretty much the only option besides fried rice with vegetables as far as I can tell. The next option on the agenda is to learn how to say hello, thank you, toilet, and vegetarian in the local language. Perhaps I will do that now before my time on the Internet runs out.

So know that I am safe, fed, and getting on fabulously.

~~~

That’s all from yesterday and today’s status is pretty much the same. I walked like a fiend: heading out at 6:30 am to find a proper hostel (i.e. one with a dorm room) and not really stopping for a proper meal (but plenty of snacks) until 6:30 pm. That meal was a curry, which tasted quite a bit like Thai curry you can get in the States. (Nothing compares to the pumpkin curry Kuhn Meh – my Thai mom – makes.) While eating said curry, I looked at yesterday’s notes and made some new ones. My thoughts from yesterday mostly regarded questions that I wanted answers to in order to feel more comfortable here in Cambodia. Where can I find a dorm bed? How much should a ______ (bottle of water, tuk tuk, fruit, hour of internet use, etc) cost? Where is an internet cafe? Where is a map? Where is an ATM? What kind of money does the ATM dispense? Where can I exchange currency? How do you say ______ (toilet, vegetarian, thank you, how much, etc)? And so on. Happily, over the course of today, I have discovered the answers to all of these questions (except the translation one) and more. I even stumbled upon the U.S. embassy. You know, just in case. Kidding! Hopefully.

Really though, there was some ruckus in town today. It started as I was heading North, towards a hostel called Me Mate’s Place, when music that was faint got louder and louder as I walked. In one of the open boulevards, there was a truck with a loudspeaker pumping a knock-off of Gangham Style repeatedly. (Since this morning I have heard Gangham Style from at least five  other sources. Attention, people of Cambodia: other music does exist.) In the park and on the sidewalks, people wearing white baseball caps and white or blue t-shirts with matching logos milled around, congregating a ways off from the speaker. Once I passed the scene, growing numbers of people wearing the same gear passed me going to join the assembling mass. Lots of motorbikes whizzed by, the passengers carrying Cambodian flags and blue flags with the same emblem. The occasional heavy-duty truck would pass too, the cargo space in the back packed with people standing up. 

A couple hours later, I returned to the same spot where Hostel Nomad (whose owner, Robert, is really friendly and freely gives information, as he did yesterday even though his hostel was full when we came in looking for a bed) happened to be in the thick of the action. The mass was much larger, and a man was saying something over the sound system that had everyone cheering and pumping their flags in the air. It had the smell of a political rally, which a Cambodian later informed me was correct. Apparently there are elections in ten days, though according to Wikipedia (not the best source to quote, I know) Cambodia is a one-party system. From the looks of it, the rally I saw today (and continued to see as people zipped around town with flags, honking and hollering) was in favor of the dominant party. Otherwise, would the police (of which there were plenty) have stopped it? Who knows. But as far as I know it didn’t come to violence, so all is well on that front.

The Cambodian with whom I spoke briefly today approached me as I was walking around the perimeter of the Palace. He seemed friendly enough and was able to answer my question about the rally, but he was really a tuk tuk driver trying to get me to do a day trip. Oy vey! Everyone wants something. He was pleasant enough to talk to for the first couple minutes, which was nice because usually I don’t engage with obvious touts. I have become master at smiling, shaking my head and hand in a “no, thank you” gesture, and avoiding eye contact with the more predatory guys shouting “You! You! Motobike!” from across the road. But once he could tell that I wasn’t going to accept a ride after our little chat, he changed. The desperation was obvious, like a smell in the air. I felt bad, as a bleeding heart like mine is wont feel, but with so many people wanting, needing, mememeing, how do you choose? What do you do? 

I just walked away, and hadn’t gone fifty yards when I could hear him striking up a new conversation with some other tourists. So the cycle continues. But I didn’t get very far before I got hooked again. This time, it was an older man in a wheelchair with nothing but a blown-off twig for a right leg. He had a container in his lap and held up a sign written in Khmer, English, and French saying something to the effect of “I am not begging, I want to work. I am selling books for…” and the like. Books: my weakness! I took a look. The English language ones were all about the Khmer Rouge and the horrors of the Cambodian genocide that ended only thirty-four and a half years ago. The 70s were not a pretty time in this part of the world. First They Killed My Father is one that I saw often in Vietnam and was hesitant to get because it is heavy reading about a little girl whose family is torn apart under the regime and she is drafted as a child soldier. (Side note: a monk in the iconic orange robes just walked behind me in this little internet cafe. Just thought I would share.) 

While I was looking over his selection, a lanky young man came up peddling the same wares. He saw my interest in First They Killed My Father and produced the sequel from his own basket. Tempting, tempting… Then I innocently asked how much and the game began. I was just curious, wanting to do price checking in my head to compare with other books I have bought over here. He flipped it over and pointed to the sticker price: USA $13.95 or CAN $18.95. It’s a nicely done copy, but a copy all the same. $14?! I told him that I could get the same in Vietnam for $3. (Or cheaper, though I didn’t throw that in.) Counter-offer: fool! I was stuck now and I knew it. He was begging for 2 for $7 and I was exasperated with myself for asking. I tried to walk away, but he was on my tail and finally agreed to $3 with only the encouragement of my protests that I didn’t want the book in the first place. But once he agreed to the price I set, I had to pay. Not the worst thing in the world, though I did feel bad that I didn’t buy from the guy in the wheelchair since he couldn’t exactly follow (monk just walked by again – he smells like incense) me over the curbs as I tried to escape his younger competition. Such is life. 

After these and similar encounters, I feel that I am getting more and more distrustful. (I was torn between mistrustful and distrustful, though from grammarist.com’s explanation I feel the right one is distrustful: “distrust is often based on experience or reliable information, while mistrust is often a general sense of unease toward someone or something.” ) I always try to deal with happenings with a smile, though I am perhaps not as polite to local people as I could be. For example, one morning in Vietnam I was sitting at a mobile food stall drinking hot, sweetened soy milk when a girl around my age sat down next to me and said hello. I snapped at her, saying that I didn’t want to buy anything and realized immediately afterward that she probably just wanted to practice her English. I still feel bad about it and don’t want to do the same thing to another person, though it can be quite taxing to be harassed all the time to spend on various goods and services. 

So besides finding a hostel, snacking on street food, stumbling upon a rally, buying a book, and wandering in general, I went to the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, also known as simply S21. Originally a school, it was converted into a prison/torture/interrogation center for prisoners of the Khmer Rouge. Records indicate that over 20,000 people, men, women and children, passed through between the years of 1975 to 1979. January 7th, 1979, when the regime fell, only seven prisoners were found alive (though some reports say there were more but seven is the number the media seized upon and is the number that will live on in infamy). During those years, somewhere around the number of two million Cambodian people were killed by other Cambodians. The museum has a collection of skulls (many of which have bullet holes clearly visible) and mug shots by the hundreds. It’s a chilling place. And to think: it used to be a school and a surprising number of the perpetrators used to be teachers. Downright horrifying. Tomorrow I plan on going to the Killing Fields, 12 km outside of town where thousands of people met their end. 

Now, with the War Remnants Museum and now this business in Cambodia don’t think that I am seeking all the downer things on this trip. I think it is important to see history from the local perspective, and if this is what happened then so be it: I will learn. But good stuff is going on too. Kids ride around laughing and riding their bikes. People are openly jazzed about the upcoming election. I am in touch with Anouk (my Belgian friend in Thailand) and each day brings my closer to Thailand. Angkor Wat, a wonder of the world (I think), is just around the corner. Fellow travelers keep telling me wonderful things about India. I have a new love for Vietnam. Lots of good stuff, even with the history and its dark echoes here. 

Upon Exiting: Images of Vietnam Part I

My time in Vietnam is slowly but surely coming to a close. I didn’t plan on being here for so long, but then again, what did I plan on? At the moment I am on an organized tour, so the next couple days are pretty well mapped out. The tour involves a lot of boats (the Mekong Delta is a good place to be a riverboat captain, dad. Just sayin’.) and getting shuffled from one touristy place to another, but it’s all part of the experience. 

I am glad that I stayed a couple extra days in Saigon to do my own thing and stay in one place for awhile. I was there for a full week, so I had time to get to know restaurants I liked and feel the rhythm of the city. Yesterday, my last day in the city, I lived it up and went to a museum, the zoo, the cinema (I wanted to see Vietnamese cinema but it was a Thai movie with subtitles. Even better! I was pleased that my language skills are still such that I could follow everything and even got (most) of the jokes, of which there are plenty even though it is a ghost movie. But there is always an element of humor in Thai creations, no matter the genre.), found a nice coffee table photo book of Vietnam for my Thai host family, got a massage, and free mojitos because it was lady’s night. Not a bad farewell to the city! It felt like my birthday. Then again, I am always good at finding reason to celebrate. 

And I know I will be back in Vietnam. This place speaks to me – I could still see staying here for longer in the future. But for now I am on a set course to Cambodia. I think I will spend at least a week there before moving on to catch up with my Thai host family and friend Anouk. After giving it some thought, I don’t think I will go to Laos this time around. Other travelers say wonderful things about it and that it is a pretty relaxed country with some exceptional cities in the north. I want to go, but at the moment I wouldn’t be able to take the time I want, especially since I want to spend a good month in India. There are daily flights from Bangkok to Goa (with a stopover in BOM Mumbia) that leave at 8:50 pm for $290. I will book something in the next couple weeks. 

And now for a couple pictures…

You skink! Haha I am loving the animal life here. There are plenty of skinks, which are lizards that are popular in the pet industry because of their docile nature.

If I were to become a fruit vendor working the streets, I might look something like this. A lady bamboozled me into getting this picture taken and then buying some pineapple, but I think it was worth it.

Of everything that is hawked to tourists here, I think I enjoy the old propaganda posters the most. This one was in a museum. The caption is something like “Nixon owes us a debt of blood” or something like that. Some of these posters can quite creative.

This lady would fit right in at Gasparilla – for her teeth at least. Apparently blackened teeth are a sign of beauty in certain tribe cultures. Girls will start to paint there teeth upon hitting puberty. Smile, poppet!

In the “Fourth of July in Nam” post I mentioned my festivities for the day. Sitting on the beach with a coconut was one…

… And biking around Hoi An was another. Cheers to independence and diplomacy!

So far in Saigon…

… I have been to a lot of museums and done a bit of random encountering and wandering around. Three days ago the bus pulled in from Da Lat. The trip took nine hours when I thought it would take five – time to get new books! They may not be free, but they are easy to get cheap. Believe it or not there are book vendors plying the streets, going into the tourist bars well into the night hawking their pirated literary wares. 50,000VD ($2.50) later, The Buddha of Suburbia by Hanif Kureishi was added to my collection. I have some more travel coming up in the next couple days, so getting something else may be wise.

But for now, I am continuing to dig Vietnam. When I got off the bus in Saigon, a.k.a. Ho Chi Minh City, it was later in the afternoon. The bus dropped everyone off on De Tham Street, which is in the heart of the tourist section. Excellent! Even better was the fact that the hostel I found (but didn’t book) online in advance was on the same street. Another solo young lady on the bus heard good things and was going to the same place, which is always a good sign.

So here I am at the Backpacking Club Hostel, address 269/19 De Tham, District 1, HCM City. Finding it was a bit of a trick. 269 indicates its location on the street, which happens to be an unnamed alleyway, while 19 is the building number in the alley. Thank goodness there was a sign!

I got checked in, dropped off the bags, and set out for a wander. Saigon is a bustling city, vibrating with mopeds/motorcycles and endless in its capitalist nature. Everyone’s got something to sell, just like in any other area full of tourists. It is convenient, as in the case of the book ladies, and one gets used to it in time. So I walk past, smiling, and seek quieter spaces.

There are plenty of parks here. Not quite on par with Singapore, but the green spaces are nice. The first night, I ended up in a park next to the Notre Dame Cathedral (remember the French colonized practically this whole region – the Vietnamese fought a war for independence from France in the 1950s before they fought a war against the U.S.) and sat for a spell, watching local people doing the same thing. Young people sat in groups, snacking and talking and texting and laughing just like anywhere else in the world. One girl was celebrating her birthday, complete with cake and candles. No song for her, but there were people singing. Some peers with ponytails had a guitar and a drum box and were taking turns jamming out, singing local pop music. Security guards off duty sat on a bench. lost in their phones. People carrying wicker baskets tried to sell the nibblicious contents therein to park patrons. An old man and woman went through the trash bins, digging for bottles, cans, and paper to recycle. The lady was kind enough to relieve me of an empty 1.5L water bottle. Men play Chinese checkers. Women sell beverages. In other parks I passed, young and old practice their dance moves in groups under pavilions. Elders do slow, deliberate stretches. Children run around, generally in good temper (Vietnamese children aren’t as bratty as kids from the West). Couple sit close together, smiling and occasionally exchanging playful touches.

Later on, I ended up at the central night market. There they sell sweets, shirts, bags, hats, and all the other goodies that the central market sells by day. Beyond that, a few blocks away, I discovered that the frozen yogurt bar craze has reached Vietnam. Yogurt Space, right across the street from a suspiciously familiar-looking Startup Coffee, was bursting with local teens and twenties out for a night with their friends. At first I went in just out of curiosity, to see what flavors and toppings were available in Vietnam. Going into an ice cream shop just to look? Yeah, right. The durian yogurt was what sold me. For some reason I am not a fan of the fruit itself (though the smell is no longer so repugnant — now I actually find it to be rather pleasant) I love it in ice cream form. Durian, avocado, and a little pomegranate to round out the flavors. That with some coconut shavings and roasted cashews… life is good.

~~~

Since then, I have been to a number of museums:

– The Independence Palace which has a cinema, gambling room, dining room for ladies, helicopter pad, and dance floor on the top story à la James Bond. In the basement there are bomb shelters and tunnels. There is apparently a rumor that the tunnels go all over the city, which the tour guide assured us is not true. There are, however, many tunnels in Vietnam. I go to the popular Cu Chi tunnels tomorrow. The basement was also the communication headquarters during the American War, and there are still machines from the 1960s filling the rooms. I thought a) how much did American taxpayers pay to put these here? and b) how hot it must have been down there, with a bunch of other bodies and all the machines running and no central air conditioning and everyone smoking. I can’t even imagine.

– Ho Chi Minh City Museum, the highlight of which was the currency collection of Vietnam through the years. First coins with holes (so that they could be strung on a string to be transported), later French paper currency, then some currency that was used during the decades of war, and finally the Ho Chi Minh banknotes that are in circulation today.

– Ho Chi Minh Museum. There is one of these in pretty much every major city. I kind of wish I had made it to the one in Hanoi (which is actually the capitol of Vietnam. I didn’t learn this until I got here. Someone needs to do their homework next time!) by his mausoleum,  but this one was nice enough. What a man! He traveled all over the world and meant so much to the Vietnamese people.

– Fine Arts Museum. Pretty nice and gave a bit of insight into Vietnamese culture. The highlight for me here were the hand-drawn propaganda posters from the American War. They would be more poignant if I knew what they were saying, but the point gets across all the same.

– Women’s Museum. Not really any new information here that hasn’t already been covered by the Women’s Museum and History Museum in Hanoi, but it was free and they gave me a free book of postcards depicting country life on the way out.

– War Remnants Museum. This was, by far, the most intense museum I have ever been to. I cried a bit at Hanoi’s Hoa Lo Prison museum (where John McCain was interned during his pilot days), but this was on a much larger scale. For three and a half hours, I walked and read and cried. I was amazed to see protest pictures from every continent and many countries, from Albania to Zimbabwe people were protesting the war. Even the people perpetuating the war were protesting the war. Shouldn’t a world of outrage (literally) indicate that perhaps the actions being taken should be reconsidered? The documented ongoing horrors of Agent Orange were nauseating. Now I understand why there are an unusually large number of deformed people here. On the way to the museum I passed by a man walking down the street on his hands, his stick legs folded into his shirt, with his whole being coming no higher than my knees. What happened here was horrible, and the echoes will be heard for generations to come. The war correspondent/photo journalism collection also left me stunned. It was hard to look at every picture, to read every caption, but I got through it. At the end I was numb. So much horror, all captured on film with the photographer’s comments. It seemed endless, but one in particular sticks in my mind. It was a picture of three generations of family: a mother clutching her children with the grandmother behind. The caption was something along the lines of “I saw this family being herded up by soldiers and asked them to wait a minute while I took a picture. When I turned around, I heard gunfire. Out of the corner of my eyes I could see the bodies falling, but I didn’t turn to look.” And there were so many others…

Of course there is a bit of a political slant given the geographic context of the museum, but it wasn’t anything outrageous like some other small museums here. After all, they aren’t making this up. The war happened, and there is overwhelming evidence for the horrors that were perpetuated. It was so well documented and has me wondering what we may learn about the current wars we are in a few decades from now. Just one burning question: what can I do to help make “never again” a reality?

~~~

Whew. Some heavy stuff here. On the brighter (and more pro-world peace) side of things, I am back into couchsurfing! I went to a meet-up in Hoi An and at the Independence Palace I met a guy who was staying with a local via https://www.couchsurfing.org/ this weekend. He had a preliminary meeting with his host on Thursday night, so I tagged along and got back to check things out through my own account. What a genius idea! Wish I had used it more (or at all) during this trip, but it’s not over yet! Cambodia has some couchsurfing action, and I have met other travelers who had wonderful experiences with local hosts in India. ‘Tis a thought and is back on the radar for sure.

Okay, it is Saturday night in Saigon. Time for spring rolls and a fresh fruit smoothie. I found a stall in an alley that must be a local institution. People flock here and I have waited thirty minutes for a smoothie. But with fresh fruit chunks thrown on top, it’s worth it!

Travel preferences and other thoughts

It has been a month and some odd days since this journey began, and in that time I have learned more about how the world works and how I (prefer) to work in it. Some people like to wander aimlessly, happy as a clam without a map. Some people hop from one air conditioned bus to hotel lobby and back again. Others are somewhere in between. 

For me, I have learned that I really like to have a map. In Singapore, the Pocket Lonely Planet was always by my side, complete with maps and advice. Since then, I have been relying on maps that can be found at tourist information kiosks, hotel lobbies, and on business cards. To me, these are indespensible. I guess I knew that about myself, but when I lost my map today it became top priority to get a new one even though my destination wasn’t even on it. Knowledge is power, especially when that knowledge is your geographical location in a foreign land. 

Some travelers I have met never go on tours. They prefer to do their own thing on their own time. I see the point, especially because the points of interest on an organized tour are generally overrun with other tourists. This isn’t really a surprise, but can be somewhat distressing for those in search of the “real” <insert country name here>. True, going on an organized tour irrevocably makes you a tourist, but that’s okay sometimes. I enjoy the occassional organized tour because a) you meet other people! In Hue I did a tour of the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone created by the Geneva Conference 1954 which later became the border between North and South Vietnam. It was one of the most heavily bombed areas, which is evident from the abundance of “fish ponds” (bomb craters) scattered in the rice fields. Five to seven people still die every month due to leftover landmines.) and have been teaming up on and off with people on that tour ever since. The organized tour also comes with a tour guide, who can enrich the experience with their information. The factoids above come courtesy of the DMZ guide. It’s usually a good idea to ask around for reputable companies since some of them are not so good. So far, I have been pleased with the tours I have been on. Plus it is nice for someone else to do the organizing and planning once in awhile. All I have to do is pay and follow along. Yeah!

As a college student, dorms are nothing new. Here I actively seek them out because they are cheaper, come with roommates (a benefit for the solo traveler), and almost always have air conditioning, which costs extra if you are in a single room. Hurray for hostels!

Travel in Vietnam is incredibly easy. Travel companies are abundant in the major destinations and are more than happy to loop you in to the bus system. Travelers invariably go from the North to the South (like me) or vice versa. In Hanoi, I impulsively booked the open bus tour without doing research first. It has worked out, but next time I would opt to book as I go. The open bus tour brings you from Hanoi to Hue to Hoi An to Nha Trang to Dalat (optional if you book it) to Saigon. That’s all well and good, but once you book you have to pay extra if you have a change of plans like I did. Packages like this seem more convenient, but I didn’t save any money and sometimes getting to the necessary booking office in a new location is not convenient at all. The more you know – for next time! But no worries for now as tomorrow I will use my last ticket to go from Dalat to Saigon. From there it will be off to Cambodia!

As a vegetarian, food is always a consideration. In Vietnam I have been okay. There are times when I have a strong suspicion that there is the ubiquitious fish sauce (it’s everywhere in this region) in my food, but I pretend not to know. What’s a girl to do, not eat? I don’t think so. I quite enjoy sampling local food (especially the sweets!) and a satisfied stomach, along with sufficient sleep, does wonders for the traveler’s morale. Happily, I have learned to communicate that I am a vegetarian and now know that there are special veggie restaurants serving a wider variety than stir-fried rice with vegetables and tofu. Just one word, “chay,” makes the world a better place. For vegetarians and the animals they don’t eat, anyway.

As I mentioned above, at the moment I am in Dalat. It came highly recommended by other travelers, and I am pleased to have come. The drive from Nha Trang, which is on the beach, wound through mountains covered with lush trees and rogue clouds. There were even a few waterfalls. Here it is much cooler than anywhere I have been so far, which is a nice change. I am all for being hot and sweaty, but a few days in the cool mountain air does a body good. Last night was the first time in a long time that I wanted a hot shower. (Note I said wanted, not received. One thing about cheap accommodations is that hot water is not guaranteed.) I’m enjoying it before moving on to the hot, noisy, crowded, cultural Saigon, also known as Ho Chi Minh City. 

After a month on the move, there have been a few changes to what I packed as pictured in the first post. All the snacks (dried fruit and nuts) are gone. I am on my last book, One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez. All the others (except for the 1906 Oxford Guide given to me by my Uncle Matt) have been left in hostels or in the hands of fellow readers. However, I have learned that once this book is finished it would be wise to hold on to it since open shelves (where you can just take and leave whatever) are hard to come by in Vietnam. Books for sale are easy enough, but for free not so much. In Hoi An, I found an extensive collection curated by a Mr. Randy from the good ol’ U.S. of A. He bought $3000 worth of books secondhand (sound familiar, Meyer clan?) and shipped them over to Vietnam to start his shop. Customs charged him $5000 to do so. He says it is because the government wants to control what media is available for consumption, which is probably true. But what that means for me is that ain’t nothin’ free, bookwise anyway. 

The Socialist Republic of Vietnam is (gasp!) Communist. Despite America’s best efforts, the Communists won. So what exactly does that mean for daily life here? I have yet to find out as poking around with questions about the government is not met  with any great enthusiasm. However, from what I can see the people are aggressively capitalist. Every mama-san (and they are always mama-sans, papa-san is usually busy drinking coffee and playing cards. More on gender roles later.) has something to sell and is not shy in letting the passing tourist know about it. Prices are inflated when the buyer is a foreigner, sometimes outrageously so. It is a bit frustrating to know you are being gouged, so I try my best to barter (not always easy when the parties in question have no common language aside from their hands) and simply refuse to buy if I know the price is not correct. Live and learn. 

The two-tiered pricing system aside, I am continuing to really enjoy Vietnam. It is a safe place, with inflated prices and the occassional theft being the biggest worry. Violent crime is rare and people are quite respectful and friendly. Case in point: yesterday night I was wandering/nibbling through the dizzyingly enormous Dalat central market. At one point I stopped to consult my work-in-progress phrasebook (begun in Nha Trang and containing Vietnamese words and their English translations and pronunciation keys, just like how I learned Thai) when one vendor pointed out that a piece of paper had fallen out of my purse. The map! Very important. I gave her a smile and tucked it away. Moments later as I was wrapping up, another lady gave me a tap and pointed down. My wallet! Even more important. Much thanks to both these ladies who kept my luck from running out.

Last thing to note for this ramble: just when you think you’ve seen it all, something else comes along. I tried a new fruit today! It is shaped somewhat like an upside-down pear, leaf green in color with black spots that look prickly. Some of them are quite large, about the size of a medium papaya, so I picked a smaller one and hunkered down near a trash can to delve into this new wonder. The flesh was white with black seeds, kind of like the custard apple that is common in Thailand. After a couple bites the tate began to be familiar… I had bought random juice at the Oceanic Market in Tampa awhile back bearing the name “soursop.” Lo and behold, a quick Google search confirmed that this fruit is the one and the same. Go figure. So I have had the juice before, but the fruit itself is a new experience. It looks something like this:

Images of Kuala Lumpur

Two in one day! I must be on a roll! Really though I just woke up and don’t really have a plan for the day besides catching an overnight bus this evening, so this seemed like as good as any activity since Internet will probably be scarce in the next few days.

 

When I landed in Kuala Lumpur, I had no idea what to do or where to go or what to expect. I was clever enough to get out of the airport (via bus, which took two hours due to traffic) but then was a bit at a loss once I got to KL Sentral, which is the central transit station downtown. It was about 7 pm, so all the tourist windows were closed. Traveling like I do one really comes to rely on these information centers to give some guidance, or at least a map of the new locale. Already weary from the travel, I was willing to stay at whatever was closest if it was a reasonable price. Lo and behold, I came upon a pile of pamphlets for “Central Backpackers Hostel – located near KL Sentral!” It had a map on the back. I took it and ran, or shuffled as fast as I could with packs strapped to my front and back.

I found it relatively easily, though I was stalled a bit because I had to look up. The hostel was on the fourth floor of a busy building filled with karaoke bars and massage parlors. But it was there! I got a bed for the night and directions to a good Indian restuarant from the proprietor. He directed me to a place called Gandhi’s, which was completely vegetarian and packed with locals. I got a “fish” curry, pictured above, and some masala tea, which was drunk before the food arrived. Yum! This whole set-up cost 12 ringgit, which is about 4 USD. One thing about Malaysia is that the prices look like they would look at home (eg $12 for dinner in a diner-style restaurant) but they really only cost a third of the price. Not bad!

While I am talking about food, here is another plate from Kuala Lumpur, this time from Chinatown. I had been wandering around all day and was willing to take a chance on an eating establishment set up in the street. I communicated that I am vegetarian and liked spicey food and waited for whatever to appear. This is a plate of soft, wide rice noodles with spicy and some sweet sauce topped with sesame seeds. It was gone in about a minute.

Kuala Lumpur means “muddy estuary” in Malay, and this river is one of the tributaries to said estuary. Not so grand anymore, but it used to be an import way to transport clay. Now it is banked by concrete, with parts of the seawall tastefully decorated by graffiti. I thought the Obama-esque “Malaya Heroes” was particularly interesting.

This was a student protest that started in Chinatown and later moved to a more open space. One of the guys I asked said that they were protesting corruption in the government and that they wanted a fair voice for all. Sounds good to me, but my dad’s warning to stay away from political rallies sounded in my head so I moved on. A couple days later I saw a newspaper article that said the turn-out was lower than expected and that the police got involved because the protestors did not have a permit to be on whatever premises. Yikes! Glad I went and had some noodles instead.

The National Textile Museum in Kuala Lumpur has me absolutely smitten. There are step-by-step diagrams for how many different kinds of fabrics are made and beautiful displays of the finished products. This was one of my favorite museums so far. I tried to show some restraint in taking photos since flash is not allowed in the dark rooms, but for some of the local, traditional costumes I just couldn’t help myself.

Malaysia is a Muslim country, but there is a good mix of religions with places of worship in the city. This is a Taoist Temple, which is across the street from a Hindu temple and down the block from a church.

One Monday morning I was doing a walking tour of the government headquarters of the city and we happened upon the weekly flag-raising ceremony. It was cool to see the uniforms and hear the national anthem, but what strikes me about this picture is the smog! It was so bad that you can barely see across the street. Firsthand glimpse of international pollution. I got a bad cough, runny nose, and irritated sinuses that have been bothering me since then, though being in seaside Hoi An they seem to be clearing up. Yeah!

Images of Bali

Slowly but surely I am getting these photos uploaded…

One day in Ubud I happened to stumble upon a funeral procession. Ladies carried all manner of offerings on their heads while the men carried a large tower (the taller the tower the richer the deceased) followed by a larger-than-life paper mache bull.

Upon arriving at the temple grounds, the tower was dismantled and burned after the ashes of the deceased, who was cremated over a month ago, were transferred to the bull. The bull was filled with favorite articles of the deceased while they were living along with some goodies for the afterworld. The bull was burned while the ladies in the background sang a dirge.

The Ubud Palace is located in the heart of downtown (if you could call it a downtown) Ubud. The courts are open to the crawling, prying, and snap-happy tourists, though the private domain where the family still lives is mercifully closed off. The fashion coordination with the palace color scheme was unintentional.

Ubud was lush and green, which is perhaps why it is so popular with the tourists. This is one sidewalk. Moody jungles and placid paddies – that is (parts) of Ubud.

Ubus is also home to many artists. Whole families specialize in certain crafts like painting or woodcarving, and the knowledge is passed on from generation to generation. This is but one gallery, touting itself as the “Art Zoo.” When I walked by they were playing an Adele CD loud and clear.

Another famous feature of Ubus is the terraced way in which rice is grown. Some paddies are very small – only a few square feet at a time!

Bali was featured in the Amazing Race, which I watched with my parents before departure. One site of the contest was in the Monkey Forest, located in Ubud, so I made a point to go there, which I have written about before. The monkeys were friendly enough, though if you try to shoo them away while they are trying to take your stuff they can get nasty. But this guy works in the forest and seems to have a good rapport with the residents.

Kite flying is a popular sport for little boys. The seaside, with its winds and lack of obstructions like trees and powerlines, is a perfect location. These little boys played all afternoon, running up and down the seawall on Nusa Lembongan Island. The kite is just a tiny speck at the top-center of the picture.

This rocky point is marked as “Devil’s Tears” on the map, which I found by following a cow path through a grassy plain near the beach. What a show! I am very thankful to have been above the water and not in it. A few minutes after this picture was taken a wave came in that practically reached the spot where I was previously sitting. Quote from that moment: “Let’s get out of here!”