so, it's christmas here today and it's about 9 in the morning and i am about to go hiking with michelle and charlie. i guess it's been a long time since i've written so i'll try to catch you up. i guess i haven't written since i've entered into laos.
right now, i'm in vang vieng; which is a kinda smaller city on the nam song, which is song river in lao. the landscape here is beautiful and there are a bunch of outdoor activities that you can do; which is basically all i've been doing. that and finishing the day playing darts with charlie at gary's irish bar. yeah, darts. it's been a super duper good time here. i've gone rock climbing twice and am thinking i'll go a third, hiking (through a cave to a waterfall, that i swam in, over a mountian, ending at the tubing bars (which i'll get to)), kayaking, tubing through a cave, and then taking charlie and michelle on the hike i went on to the waterfall today. not a bad christmas. anyway, i'm loving it and feeling great; which is super nice because i had a bit of a hard time through central laos and then in vientiene.
i'm thinking i got over my first wave of homesickness and just anxiety in general. it was about 2 and a half months into my trip. which is the longest i've ever been away from home, not a big deal but i was feeling it a little, a little mental hurdle if you will. i was driving through laos and i got rid of all my cold weather clothes and it was COLD. not super cold but cold enough. i was all alone, don't get me wrong, i had fun, going to the lao disco and hanging out with lao people but i just couldn't get over this anxiety, this feeling of what am i doing here and what am i going to do when i get home. how i'm going to make money to go back to school and working and doing more yoga school. just a feeling that i needed to get moving on my life. but this is my life and i had this planned out and i specifically made it a long time so i would have to get over some waves of homesickness and self doubt. so i got over it.
so back to vang vieng and what is going on here. in 1998 the owner of this organic farm a little north of town got some tubes for his employees to float down the river. he didn't know what he started. at first it was just people tubing but now there are bars lining the river and kids float down the river stopping at different bars and getting hammered. they all blare SUPER loud music. they do have platforms to jump off of and zip lines and rope swings and waterslides which are all badass. but some aren't really safe and kids get pretty injured here. apparently like 17 have died this year, i don't know if that a lao year or our year but that's a fucking lot. i haven't tubed but we have stopped off at some of the bars and done the swings, ziplines, and waterslides. i had a blast on those. but it's kinda turned this town into a mess. but you get the good with the bad. some lao people like it and make lots of money, but the lao kinda frown upon super drunk whities and you get a lot of those. every night when i go out to dinner, i see kids passed out on the side of the road, walking wasted down the middle of the road, carrying other passed out kids. i feel it brings people to laos and that they might come here for that and then branch out. plus it's just kids and kids will be kids. it does look pretty fun too, just don't get too drunk. you can youtube it and see tons of videos of the tubing.
anyway, vang vieng is also beautiful and the landscape around here is amazing. like i said, on the nam song, and set in some mountians that really remind me of halong bay and nim dinh, limestone mountians; which create lots of caves and rock climbing areas. it's beautiful. there are restaurants lining the river in town and you can watch the sunset over these mountians, it's pretty scenic. i like it a lot, and it really reminds me of buzios in brazil.
i don't really know what else to write, i'm ready to do some christmas hiking, swim in a waterfall and have a great christmas day. so on that note, merry christmas to you all from charlie, michelle, and i.
take care, pics coming.
nick
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
motorcycle diaries
okay, i've been in laos for about a week now. gone about 800 and something kilometers on betsy in laos from the boarder to pakse to paksong to two other towns i don't know the name of, to vientiane capital. what a journey! it was a long one, but amazing. i ate some cricket, i was pulled into a lao neighborhood party where i learned how to dance lao, i've met village councilmen, i've drank lots of beerlao with lots of lao people even in some shanty towns, i've been to lao disco, i've stopped at roadside chicken boxing spots, i went looking for a cave and got lost for two hours, and i saw a great wall of some kind (it was pretty enormous). oh yeah, and i took a lao sauna. which is fucking sweet, they have it like lemon essenced, it was super great and the only time i've had hot water (sort of i guess, but i'm counting it) in months???
i spent the last 5 days making that journey, no map, no phone, and most of the time with no idea where i was. only maybe an inflated confidence level that i can figure anything out. betsy had a bit of a hard time on the last day of the journey, yesterday, and i had to take her to two shops to get fixed up. it was a 200 km travel day though, usually i only make about 150 a day. not a long way, but i like to stop at all sorts of places and check out shit and talk to the people.
lao people ask me 4 questions right off the bat, usually the first is where are you from? the second is then, speak lao? a couple words, i feel like my brain is packed and i have so much khmer now in my head that i keep reverting back to it. like i used to try to speak spanish to any foreigners because that's the only other language i know. but i've got a few words down now: thank you, hello/how are you, goodbye, hahahah; that might be it. i'm still trying to learn though, because the people love it when you can speak a little bit of their language. the third question is, beerlao? of course, you gotta be careful cuz it's a lot stronger than the lager in vietnam and cambodia. and the fourth is always, are you single? if they can they usually ask why. or they try to hook me up with chicks. i don't know if it's standard or what but i've had a village councilman tell me i "could" take a lao wife and move to laos. like he approved of me enough. dudes are also trying to hook you up with girls all the time, it's a little weird. the women are way more upfront here too, than in vietnam or cambodia. i've been told, i love you by a handful of girls; from old ladies to younger ones my age. i've also been told i'm handsome from many women and even some dudes. and that i have a beautiful nose. laos is doing wonders for my confidence! hahah. the women also smoke and drink beerlao. i didn't see any women smoking in vietnam and only maybe one or two in cambodia. when i was chilling out in the sticks in a shantytown outside of pakse; i was hanging out with some dudes and some women that were getting after it. putting the beerlao back.
oh yeah, and it's also cold here. not terrifically cold but cold enough that's it's forced me to stop riding by about 4. i think the first day i encounter the coldness i got a little bit of hypothermia. not bad but i was shivering while riding and as soon as i got to a guest house i got in the bed and tried to warm up. this was partly due to the wind in central laos. man, it was windy, i almost got knocked down a few times one the bike and had to lean so much to the right while riding i might have permanent lean. i've been shedding items from my pack along the way too. and a few weeks ago in kampot, a few hours from sihnoukville, i got rid of all my long underwear, an extra warm shirt and my rain gear. i miss those items now, but i'm okay. i've kept one light type jacket and a sweatshirt and my beanie. but the only pants i have are some really thin, hippie like, traveler pants and the ones i got custom made in hoi an. and they are not very thick. so it goes...
okay so i know that i've said this before, but these people, the lao, are now the most friendly people ever. maybe it's just me being open too, but i swear. my first night in pakse, i was GRABBED off the street and PULLED into this lao community party. like a block party sort of. i was immediately handed a glass of beerlao and again PULLED onto the dance floor. no one spoke english, i didn't even know thank you at the time. but they just speak to me anyway and i usually nod and laugh or shake my head and shrug my shoulders, saying i don't understand. "no speak lao." but it doesn't matter, they still talk to me and teach me a few words and i try to learn and sometimes will repeat what they say back to them. it's really kind of amazing. at the community party a whitey was finally pulled out of somewhere and it was this lady lanna who had married a lao dude. i was a little confused at first since the dude she said is her husband looked to be about 22 and she looked... well a lot older than that. i learned later on that she was 49 and he was like 35. she has been living here for the past 11 years. she moved because it was so much of a simpler life here. she said it's becoming more like ours though, still a far way off but changing. her husband was very jealous of my beard, which since then i've gotten a lot of. the dudes always try to feel it and mention it to me at rest stops and anywhere else. the husband had a little bit of a goat tee and he had been growing it for years. i've got a fairly well developed beard by now and i told her not to tell him it was only two months worth of growing. they were super now though and wanted me to wait around for the weekend and they would throw a party and eat either some duck or some goat. i don't believe that i've tried goat yet; but then also, i've eaten a ton of mystery meat. i don't know why i didn't wait around to go to this party they wanted to throw for me but i felt a need to hit the road. since i've been emailing lanna.
the next day while riding i passed a little town and noticed that there was a ton of motorbikes parked at this one outdoor restaurant. i knew they had chicken boxing here because i'd talked to other travelers that had mentioned that. so i stopped because i knew at least something was going down with all the bikes. i was right, it was chicken boxing! now this was truly a enlightening experience. i had always thought it was pretty cruel and barbaric, and it might be, but these dudes LOVE their chickens. i mean love. i'd always thought it was a fight to the death, but this is not so. i couldn't really understand but i guess it's til one chicken gives up by trying to jump out of the ring. i'm still not really sure and i've been to a couple of these roadside chicken boxing matches too. okay, so it's pretty much like human boxing, theirs fucking rounds, who knew. AND in between rounds they doctor the chickens up. i saw a dude suck swelling or blood or something off his chickens neck. they wipe them down with hot wash clothes and water. i even saw some medicine at one of them. i had no clue! it's madness! they always laugh and smile at me when i show up too and kneel down to watch them doctor up the chicken between rounds. it's really interesting though, fascinating.
that night i stopped in paksong. as i was walking down the side of the road their were some high school aged kids riding in the back of a truck type vehicle, hooting and hollering and just being kids in general. they had a long canoe back there as well. i walked by them twice while looking for a place to get some food. they yelled hello to me the first time i walked by. the second they told me i had to row, not in so many words mind you but more gestures. so i walked across the road to talk to them. i was immediately handed a glass of beerlao and ushered into a seat. asked if i speak lao, no, but then someone always speaks "a little" english. they emphasize this whenever someone usually speak english. "i only speak english a little." normally it's pretty decent though. they played american songs off their phones for me to listen to and danced with me for a minute and fed me some shish kebabs, which you dipped into a little bowl of oil with hot peppers in it. i thought some of the meat was chicken heart and liver; but i have no clue what it is. i've eaten it for dinner a few times now too. it's pretty good. anyway, the kids had to go home so i walked to another kiosk to get a beerlao. there i sat with some other people who owned the shop and was told i love you and have a beautiful nose. i always tell them i love them back too. anyway, i bought them a beer and we sat around drinking them and talking what we could, one of the dudes spoke decent english. after a while he said we go to disco lao, okay? what the heck, okay. so we head over to this outdoor party with a big stage all setup and food vendors and lights, it was pretty cool. we got some more beerlao and then i was told it was time to dance. now lao dancing is pretty simple, which is good because i'm very self-conscious about dancing. but this you just kinda move your feet, sway your hips and and kinda roll your wrists around. after a while, i was told that i dance lao very good. which was cool. i one point we were sitting down when the dude that spoke english had me get up, i assumed it was to dance some more. i was wrong. he started to go around the stage and i just thought he was introducing me to the band. i was wrong. we did meet the lady in the band but then he walked up on stage. i followed, i mean i guess what else was i supposed to do. we get up there and he says we're gonna sing. hahahhaha. he pretty much sang the song and i danced around on stage. it was fucking wild. i mean, i don't think i would ever get on stage and dance in america. but i'm trying to make it a point to be brave here, and do things i normally wouldn't do. it was really cool. people in the crowd would come up to the stage and shake our hands. and when the song was over, i felt elated, pure joy. and i thanked the dude profusely for bring me out to this disco lao. by now, as the only whitey there and going on stage and the lao people being as friendly as they are, i was a hit at this party. i had people coming up to shake my hand and ask where i was from, taking cell phone pics of me, one gorgeous girl told me she loved me (boo-yeah), i was invited to a couple other tables to drink beer. i visited another table for a bit but made my way back to my friends cuz they had brought me. after a lot more dancing and sharing some quail eggs and beerlao, i was told it was time to go home and go to sleep. okay. it was one helluva night. on the way out the dude that spoke english asked if we were friends, i told him hell yeah we're friends, it's not even a question. best friends.
it was a pretty mellow journey after that night for the next couple. i met a monk in training the next night and he taught me how to eat lao, with your hands after washing them, and we spoke about lao and his plans for what he's going to do when he graduates from monk school. he didn't know. i spoke to his brother, he spoke, "a little bit" of english. he was in high school, he played soccer. i let him drive my motorbike, they taught me how to say goodbye in lao. the next day, when i stopped for lunch, i was invited to eat with these dudes. this is where a couple of them decided that i "could" move to lao and take a lao wife. i took it as an honor. i spoke with one of them, a mechanical engineer working for a mining company about lao and how it's freedom now and happy and good. he'd gone to school in germany. we spoke about other things, he wanted to show me around his province. he would always translate to the three other dudes what we were talking about. they taught me how to eat lao pho. with the veggies on the side, you just pick up the green beans and lettuce and cabbage and eat it with your hands. he told me the other three dudes were farmers and i asked what they grew, rice. and one was village councilman. he gave me his address and phone numbers and said in ten days he has some time and if i could come back and he would like to show me around his province, as it's very beautiful and in the mountains. again i felt honored.
last night in vientiane, i found a local soccer game and watched them play. it was great! afterwords the ref and i had beerlao (they seriously love beerlao) and we tried to speak, he knew no english and me no speak lao. but we had a good time. he gave me his phone number and then had me sing karaoke with one of the teams that was in the restaurant next to the field. when he left i sat down with the team and sang some more karaoke and we spoke because one of them spoke "a little bit" of english. i was translated that one of the dudes liked my style and i let him wear my beanie for a bit. we talked about being friends and i have noticed that this is very important to the lao people, to be friends and friendly. i told him of course we're friends.
okay, that's it for now. i think i've been in this internet cafe too long.
PEACE!
i spent the last 5 days making that journey, no map, no phone, and most of the time with no idea where i was. only maybe an inflated confidence level that i can figure anything out. betsy had a bit of a hard time on the last day of the journey, yesterday, and i had to take her to two shops to get fixed up. it was a 200 km travel day though, usually i only make about 150 a day. not a long way, but i like to stop at all sorts of places and check out shit and talk to the people.
lao people ask me 4 questions right off the bat, usually the first is where are you from? the second is then, speak lao? a couple words, i feel like my brain is packed and i have so much khmer now in my head that i keep reverting back to it. like i used to try to speak spanish to any foreigners because that's the only other language i know. but i've got a few words down now: thank you, hello/how are you, goodbye, hahahah; that might be it. i'm still trying to learn though, because the people love it when you can speak a little bit of their language. the third question is, beerlao? of course, you gotta be careful cuz it's a lot stronger than the lager in vietnam and cambodia. and the fourth is always, are you single? if they can they usually ask why. or they try to hook me up with chicks. i don't know if it's standard or what but i've had a village councilman tell me i "could" take a lao wife and move to laos. like he approved of me enough. dudes are also trying to hook you up with girls all the time, it's a little weird. the women are way more upfront here too, than in vietnam or cambodia. i've been told, i love you by a handful of girls; from old ladies to younger ones my age. i've also been told i'm handsome from many women and even some dudes. and that i have a beautiful nose. laos is doing wonders for my confidence! hahah. the women also smoke and drink beerlao. i didn't see any women smoking in vietnam and only maybe one or two in cambodia. when i was chilling out in the sticks in a shantytown outside of pakse; i was hanging out with some dudes and some women that were getting after it. putting the beerlao back.
oh yeah, and it's also cold here. not terrifically cold but cold enough that's it's forced me to stop riding by about 4. i think the first day i encounter the coldness i got a little bit of hypothermia. not bad but i was shivering while riding and as soon as i got to a guest house i got in the bed and tried to warm up. this was partly due to the wind in central laos. man, it was windy, i almost got knocked down a few times one the bike and had to lean so much to the right while riding i might have permanent lean. i've been shedding items from my pack along the way too. and a few weeks ago in kampot, a few hours from sihnoukville, i got rid of all my long underwear, an extra warm shirt and my rain gear. i miss those items now, but i'm okay. i've kept one light type jacket and a sweatshirt and my beanie. but the only pants i have are some really thin, hippie like, traveler pants and the ones i got custom made in hoi an. and they are not very thick. so it goes...
okay so i know that i've said this before, but these people, the lao, are now the most friendly people ever. maybe it's just me being open too, but i swear. my first night in pakse, i was GRABBED off the street and PULLED into this lao community party. like a block party sort of. i was immediately handed a glass of beerlao and again PULLED onto the dance floor. no one spoke english, i didn't even know thank you at the time. but they just speak to me anyway and i usually nod and laugh or shake my head and shrug my shoulders, saying i don't understand. "no speak lao." but it doesn't matter, they still talk to me and teach me a few words and i try to learn and sometimes will repeat what they say back to them. it's really kind of amazing. at the community party a whitey was finally pulled out of somewhere and it was this lady lanna who had married a lao dude. i was a little confused at first since the dude she said is her husband looked to be about 22 and she looked... well a lot older than that. i learned later on that she was 49 and he was like 35. she has been living here for the past 11 years. she moved because it was so much of a simpler life here. she said it's becoming more like ours though, still a far way off but changing. her husband was very jealous of my beard, which since then i've gotten a lot of. the dudes always try to feel it and mention it to me at rest stops and anywhere else. the husband had a little bit of a goat tee and he had been growing it for years. i've got a fairly well developed beard by now and i told her not to tell him it was only two months worth of growing. they were super now though and wanted me to wait around for the weekend and they would throw a party and eat either some duck or some goat. i don't believe that i've tried goat yet; but then also, i've eaten a ton of mystery meat. i don't know why i didn't wait around to go to this party they wanted to throw for me but i felt a need to hit the road. since i've been emailing lanna.
the next day while riding i passed a little town and noticed that there was a ton of motorbikes parked at this one outdoor restaurant. i knew they had chicken boxing here because i'd talked to other travelers that had mentioned that. so i stopped because i knew at least something was going down with all the bikes. i was right, it was chicken boxing! now this was truly a enlightening experience. i had always thought it was pretty cruel and barbaric, and it might be, but these dudes LOVE their chickens. i mean love. i'd always thought it was a fight to the death, but this is not so. i couldn't really understand but i guess it's til one chicken gives up by trying to jump out of the ring. i'm still not really sure and i've been to a couple of these roadside chicken boxing matches too. okay, so it's pretty much like human boxing, theirs fucking rounds, who knew. AND in between rounds they doctor the chickens up. i saw a dude suck swelling or blood or something off his chickens neck. they wipe them down with hot wash clothes and water. i even saw some medicine at one of them. i had no clue! it's madness! they always laugh and smile at me when i show up too and kneel down to watch them doctor up the chicken between rounds. it's really interesting though, fascinating.
that night i stopped in paksong. as i was walking down the side of the road their were some high school aged kids riding in the back of a truck type vehicle, hooting and hollering and just being kids in general. they had a long canoe back there as well. i walked by them twice while looking for a place to get some food. they yelled hello to me the first time i walked by. the second they told me i had to row, not in so many words mind you but more gestures. so i walked across the road to talk to them. i was immediately handed a glass of beerlao and ushered into a seat. asked if i speak lao, no, but then someone always speaks "a little" english. they emphasize this whenever someone usually speak english. "i only speak english a little." normally it's pretty decent though. they played american songs off their phones for me to listen to and danced with me for a minute and fed me some shish kebabs, which you dipped into a little bowl of oil with hot peppers in it. i thought some of the meat was chicken heart and liver; but i have no clue what it is. i've eaten it for dinner a few times now too. it's pretty good. anyway, the kids had to go home so i walked to another kiosk to get a beerlao. there i sat with some other people who owned the shop and was told i love you and have a beautiful nose. i always tell them i love them back too. anyway, i bought them a beer and we sat around drinking them and talking what we could, one of the dudes spoke decent english. after a while he said we go to disco lao, okay? what the heck, okay. so we head over to this outdoor party with a big stage all setup and food vendors and lights, it was pretty cool. we got some more beerlao and then i was told it was time to dance. now lao dancing is pretty simple, which is good because i'm very self-conscious about dancing. but this you just kinda move your feet, sway your hips and and kinda roll your wrists around. after a while, i was told that i dance lao very good. which was cool. i one point we were sitting down when the dude that spoke english had me get up, i assumed it was to dance some more. i was wrong. he started to go around the stage and i just thought he was introducing me to the band. i was wrong. we did meet the lady in the band but then he walked up on stage. i followed, i mean i guess what else was i supposed to do. we get up there and he says we're gonna sing. hahahhaha. he pretty much sang the song and i danced around on stage. it was fucking wild. i mean, i don't think i would ever get on stage and dance in america. but i'm trying to make it a point to be brave here, and do things i normally wouldn't do. it was really cool. people in the crowd would come up to the stage and shake our hands. and when the song was over, i felt elated, pure joy. and i thanked the dude profusely for bring me out to this disco lao. by now, as the only whitey there and going on stage and the lao people being as friendly as they are, i was a hit at this party. i had people coming up to shake my hand and ask where i was from, taking cell phone pics of me, one gorgeous girl told me she loved me (boo-yeah), i was invited to a couple other tables to drink beer. i visited another table for a bit but made my way back to my friends cuz they had brought me. after a lot more dancing and sharing some quail eggs and beerlao, i was told it was time to go home and go to sleep. okay. it was one helluva night. on the way out the dude that spoke english asked if we were friends, i told him hell yeah we're friends, it's not even a question. best friends.
it was a pretty mellow journey after that night for the next couple. i met a monk in training the next night and he taught me how to eat lao, with your hands after washing them, and we spoke about lao and his plans for what he's going to do when he graduates from monk school. he didn't know. i spoke to his brother, he spoke, "a little bit" of english. he was in high school, he played soccer. i let him drive my motorbike, they taught me how to say goodbye in lao. the next day, when i stopped for lunch, i was invited to eat with these dudes. this is where a couple of them decided that i "could" move to lao and take a lao wife. i took it as an honor. i spoke with one of them, a mechanical engineer working for a mining company about lao and how it's freedom now and happy and good. he'd gone to school in germany. we spoke about other things, he wanted to show me around his province. he would always translate to the three other dudes what we were talking about. they taught me how to eat lao pho. with the veggies on the side, you just pick up the green beans and lettuce and cabbage and eat it with your hands. he told me the other three dudes were farmers and i asked what they grew, rice. and one was village councilman. he gave me his address and phone numbers and said in ten days he has some time and if i could come back and he would like to show me around his province, as it's very beautiful and in the mountains. again i felt honored.
last night in vientiane, i found a local soccer game and watched them play. it was great! afterwords the ref and i had beerlao (they seriously love beerlao) and we tried to speak, he knew no english and me no speak lao. but we had a good time. he gave me his phone number and then had me sing karaoke with one of the teams that was in the restaurant next to the field. when he left i sat down with the team and sang some more karaoke and we spoke because one of them spoke "a little bit" of english. i was translated that one of the dudes liked my style and i let him wear my beanie for a bit. we talked about being friends and i have noticed that this is very important to the lao people, to be friends and friendly. i told him of course we're friends.
okay, that's it for now. i think i've been in this internet cafe too long.
PEACE!
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
keyboard anthropology
okay, so i will try my hand at a little keyboard anthropology. in the old days they called it arm-rest anthropology, meaning that old white dudes wouldn't go study a culture, they would just comment based on bias mostly and reading a bit about others trips. so i made up keyboard anthropology. maybe i'm the first keyboard anthropologist! hahaha.
so, what i've learned in cambodia, about the people, their culture, their thoughts on america, their government, their life, and then aspects i've noticed. this by no means is a comprehensive study, i feel like i have to have a warning. mostly my thoughts and then some condensed conversations from kim, savin, three dudes i met at dinner last night, chin, and others.
my thoughts on the garbage here. i think it's dirtier than vietnam, although i'm not sure it's hard to remember. but it's pretty polluted with debris, not smoggy like hanoi but garbage all over the place. i've stopped at tiny roadside kiosks and seen the back of markets. it's just literally tons of garbage, and they mostly burn it. i've seen a couple of garbage trucks but not much. the other night in skun, i saw a little girl starting a plastic garbage fire, it broke my heart, a new generation just burning plastic. there is recycling, but it's mostly limited to bottles and cans. not plastic bags, and they put drinks in plastic bags if you buy one at the market. that way the store can keep and return the can/bottle for money.
i had conversations with savin and kim about the government. it sounds fairly corrupt. the president has been in power for the last twenty years and has said he WILL win the next election (side note: i don't know if cambodia is communist or democractic). they did cancel the boat races for this years water festival to help the poor as many areas were damaged by the floods that hit here as well as thailand. but the government is still selling rice to other countries, keeping it from people who need it here, as they want to portray a picture that even though they've had massive floods and damage; they can still afford to export rice. savin was pretty upset with the government, the president, and the police. the police, are corrupt. i was stopped and asked to bribe the police in sihnoukville; i've been afraid it'll happen elsewhere too, but it hasn't. savin said he had been stopped by police for nothing too, just the cops asking for money. we've seen more police and ambulances here though than we ever did in vietnam. kim had a place at a different beach in sihnoukville, before Dany's Place at Otres Beach. it was shutdown and confiscated by the government. no reason, just taken; and there's nothing she could do. she is happy though, and savin is happy. i'm sure they wish for a better government and more fair and equal rights for all; but they are still happy. i find this true for most cambodians.
my first thoughts were that i had a love/hate relationship with cambodia. i liked it but i fell for that gambling scam. i had to let that go. i can't let a bad experience settle what i think about the rest of the country and it's people. plus, that was one hell of a scam, i mean really, so complicated. but i've changed my mind, i love cambodia. it's still raw, developing but upbeat and alive. i had the best converstion with three lecturers last night (i called them professors but they just said lecturers).
we spoke about everything but the kitchen sink! we spoke about america and our foreign policy and why countries do not like us and why they now seek help from china rather than us. this lead to them telling me that they've met many americans that think the same way as me, that our foreign policy (imperialism) is ruining the true american way of life, and that we have the means to feed the starving and ease the suffering of the poor worldwide on nearly one tenth the budget we spend on trying to control the worlds' natural resources. we spoke of love and why i am still single (one dude sweated me a bit about this; a lot of people in cambodia have commented on this, i think they marry fairly young compared to us, early twenties). i spoke of learning all i can about myself and becoming confident in what i am doing and what i want out of life before i can fully commit myself to another person and start a family; which i emphasized that i would like to do. we spoke of religion, and the religions i've studied. they were impressed that i've studied so many, confucianism, islam, christianity, catholicism, buddhism (cambodia is mostly buddhist, and the buddha is said to have traveled here), taoism, judaism, and pagan or naturalist religions. they wanted to know the difference between judaism and christianity and islam. i summarized that the christians believe that jesus is the prophet, that islam believes muhammad is the prophet, and that judaism doesn't believe that the prophet has come yet. we spoke of meditation and if i thought that meditation had been beneficial as a part of my life, i said yes it has. we spoke of meditation as a means to being more conscience during life and how this can lead to a deeper appreciation of, well, everything life involves. more focused on living than planning, and not getting caught up in the worries and banal complications of everyday life. how being present is one of the keys to being happy; as well as compassion. we spoke about cambodian life compared to american life. i noted that despite hardships and pauperism, the people seem to be happy. one of them replied yes, they are happy; but life here is hard. we wake up at 5-5:30 and work til 6-7; just to survive and don't make a lot of money. we spoke of how americans are always chasing the ball (his euphemism); and this is what leads to our general suffering, always wanting more, striving for more. to appreciate being happy with what you've got and saying thanks to whomever/whatever you believe, whether that is yourself (godhead in buddhism), a certain god, or bountiful nature. there is something to be said for this conversation. i am still thinking about it a day later. i complimented them on their english and fact that i thought their students were lucky to have such intelligent and thoughtful teachers. we ate more delicious khmer food.
i'll reiterate, i would love to bring kim and her family back to the states to start a khmer restaurant. i think it would do well and school people on this tasty food and the people of cambodia.
the people are fashionable. they always look cool. the men mostly wear jeans or slacks with a button up long sleeved shirt. the women the same pretty much except when they go out at night, in which case they will dress up.
did i mention that the people are friendly? they are. everywhere i go i am invited to join their party. last night i had dinner with the three professors. the night before i hung out with white people in kratie (two czech women and a danish duder). the night before in skun, with first some teenagers at a kiosk and then some older dudes. at a rest stop i was invited to have a beer with some kids, mostly in their early twenties who worked at a casino in bavet. we had beers and then they took me karaoke once again. i sang and danced, with no cares in the world. they asked if i wanted a girl, i said no thanks. they said if i changed my mind let them know and i can have my pick. this seems a pretty standard policy in much of cambodia, i saw in sihnoukville, phnom penh, that random rest stop, and siem reap. it happens i guess, although, i would put it down as foreigners looking for sex that has led to such a prospering sex trade. it looks as if age does not have such a settle limit, young ones.
the country is beautiful though, physically. great geography, beautiful sunsets (i've only taken pictures of a few). the hot cambodian sun. spralling rivers and flood lands. cities half built with dirt roads and dust.
i guess that's it for now. off to laos tomorrow.
pictures are finally all up:
https://plus.google.com/photos/100425108117169097988/albums/5682575081408852801
so, what i've learned in cambodia, about the people, their culture, their thoughts on america, their government, their life, and then aspects i've noticed. this by no means is a comprehensive study, i feel like i have to have a warning. mostly my thoughts and then some condensed conversations from kim, savin, three dudes i met at dinner last night, chin, and others.
my thoughts on the garbage here. i think it's dirtier than vietnam, although i'm not sure it's hard to remember. but it's pretty polluted with debris, not smoggy like hanoi but garbage all over the place. i've stopped at tiny roadside kiosks and seen the back of markets. it's just literally tons of garbage, and they mostly burn it. i've seen a couple of garbage trucks but not much. the other night in skun, i saw a little girl starting a plastic garbage fire, it broke my heart, a new generation just burning plastic. there is recycling, but it's mostly limited to bottles and cans. not plastic bags, and they put drinks in plastic bags if you buy one at the market. that way the store can keep and return the can/bottle for money.
i had conversations with savin and kim about the government. it sounds fairly corrupt. the president has been in power for the last twenty years and has said he WILL win the next election (side note: i don't know if cambodia is communist or democractic). they did cancel the boat races for this years water festival to help the poor as many areas were damaged by the floods that hit here as well as thailand. but the government is still selling rice to other countries, keeping it from people who need it here, as they want to portray a picture that even though they've had massive floods and damage; they can still afford to export rice. savin was pretty upset with the government, the president, and the police. the police, are corrupt. i was stopped and asked to bribe the police in sihnoukville; i've been afraid it'll happen elsewhere too, but it hasn't. savin said he had been stopped by police for nothing too, just the cops asking for money. we've seen more police and ambulances here though than we ever did in vietnam. kim had a place at a different beach in sihnoukville, before Dany's Place at Otres Beach. it was shutdown and confiscated by the government. no reason, just taken; and there's nothing she could do. she is happy though, and savin is happy. i'm sure they wish for a better government and more fair and equal rights for all; but they are still happy. i find this true for most cambodians.
my first thoughts were that i had a love/hate relationship with cambodia. i liked it but i fell for that gambling scam. i had to let that go. i can't let a bad experience settle what i think about the rest of the country and it's people. plus, that was one hell of a scam, i mean really, so complicated. but i've changed my mind, i love cambodia. it's still raw, developing but upbeat and alive. i had the best converstion with three lecturers last night (i called them professors but they just said lecturers).
we spoke about everything but the kitchen sink! we spoke about america and our foreign policy and why countries do not like us and why they now seek help from china rather than us. this lead to them telling me that they've met many americans that think the same way as me, that our foreign policy (imperialism) is ruining the true american way of life, and that we have the means to feed the starving and ease the suffering of the poor worldwide on nearly one tenth the budget we spend on trying to control the worlds' natural resources. we spoke of love and why i am still single (one dude sweated me a bit about this; a lot of people in cambodia have commented on this, i think they marry fairly young compared to us, early twenties). i spoke of learning all i can about myself and becoming confident in what i am doing and what i want out of life before i can fully commit myself to another person and start a family; which i emphasized that i would like to do. we spoke of religion, and the religions i've studied. they were impressed that i've studied so many, confucianism, islam, christianity, catholicism, buddhism (cambodia is mostly buddhist, and the buddha is said to have traveled here), taoism, judaism, and pagan or naturalist religions. they wanted to know the difference between judaism and christianity and islam. i summarized that the christians believe that jesus is the prophet, that islam believes muhammad is the prophet, and that judaism doesn't believe that the prophet has come yet. we spoke of meditation and if i thought that meditation had been beneficial as a part of my life, i said yes it has. we spoke of meditation as a means to being more conscience during life and how this can lead to a deeper appreciation of, well, everything life involves. more focused on living than planning, and not getting caught up in the worries and banal complications of everyday life. how being present is one of the keys to being happy; as well as compassion. we spoke about cambodian life compared to american life. i noted that despite hardships and pauperism, the people seem to be happy. one of them replied yes, they are happy; but life here is hard. we wake up at 5-5:30 and work til 6-7; just to survive and don't make a lot of money. we spoke of how americans are always chasing the ball (his euphemism); and this is what leads to our general suffering, always wanting more, striving for more. to appreciate being happy with what you've got and saying thanks to whomever/whatever you believe, whether that is yourself (godhead in buddhism), a certain god, or bountiful nature. there is something to be said for this conversation. i am still thinking about it a day later. i complimented them on their english and fact that i thought their students were lucky to have such intelligent and thoughtful teachers. we ate more delicious khmer food.
i'll reiterate, i would love to bring kim and her family back to the states to start a khmer restaurant. i think it would do well and school people on this tasty food and the people of cambodia.
the people are fashionable. they always look cool. the men mostly wear jeans or slacks with a button up long sleeved shirt. the women the same pretty much except when they go out at night, in which case they will dress up.
did i mention that the people are friendly? they are. everywhere i go i am invited to join their party. last night i had dinner with the three professors. the night before i hung out with white people in kratie (two czech women and a danish duder). the night before in skun, with first some teenagers at a kiosk and then some older dudes. at a rest stop i was invited to have a beer with some kids, mostly in their early twenties who worked at a casino in bavet. we had beers and then they took me karaoke once again. i sang and danced, with no cares in the world. they asked if i wanted a girl, i said no thanks. they said if i changed my mind let them know and i can have my pick. this seems a pretty standard policy in much of cambodia, i saw in sihnoukville, phnom penh, that random rest stop, and siem reap. it happens i guess, although, i would put it down as foreigners looking for sex that has led to such a prospering sex trade. it looks as if age does not have such a settle limit, young ones.
the country is beautiful though, physically. great geography, beautiful sunsets (i've only taken pictures of a few). the hot cambodian sun. spralling rivers and flood lands. cities half built with dirt roads and dust.
i guess that's it for now. off to laos tomorrow.
pictures are finally all up:
https://plus.google.com/photos/100425108117169097988/albums/5682575081408852801
Friday, December 2, 2011
angkor temples/reading list ideas/rambling
so, we've made it to siem reap to visit the angkor temples. the angkor temples are one of the reasons i was most excited to come to cambodia. they were everything they promised to be and more. built between 800-1100 bce; they are some of the biggest temples/temple complexes on the planet. so amazing. we read that you could go out there after 5 pm get a pass, watch the sunset there and that would still allow the pass to be good for the next day. so we went, we missed sunset per se, but it was still light and we walked around angkor wat for a bit, marvelling. that night we went out with this british girl we had meet at Dany's in sihnoukville, it's a small world, we had seen her on the streets of siem reap earlier that day and said that we'd give her a ride to the temples for sunset, so she didn't have to pay a tuk tuk to take her.
we did meet up with a cool tuk tuk driver that night, chin, and had him take us to some local hangouts. we told him we didn't want to go to pop street, which i guess is where all the white people hangout. so, he took us to a khmer beer garden. it was way cool, we got a tube of beer and had some fried shrimp, chilling and talking with him. i ended up walking around a bit speaking with some locals, practicing the few words of khmer i knew and ended up dancing with some people on the way out. the people love it when you can speak khmer, even if it's just, no thank you, which we've ended up using a lot to say no thanks to the tuk tuk drivers, they also love it that we've got motorbikes and travel like them. chin took us to a few places to drink and then to hangout with his friends; he wanted to take us out to the khmer dance club but since we had to get up for sunrise, we declined. gotta get that beauty sleep, ya know.
so, we did get up for sunrise. it was amazing, really cool, beautiful, awe-inspiring, surreal, ethereal, and everything else. i must have taken twenty pictures of the sunrise, just like every minute, i was like, oh, it's different colors now, gotta take a pic. most look the same. it was still cool. we wandered around angkor wat for a bit til checking out the different rooms, the massive bas-relief carvings of ancient hindu wars, and just reeling from the immensity of it all. we got some breakfast after that as we were pretty hungry by then, just running on coffee and tired from the night before. charlie and michelle were off to take a nap as it was like 9 in the morning by then; but becky (the british girl) and i had it in our heads that we would power through. so we split, deciding to meet back up for lunch. becky and i headed off to the jungle temple that had been used in Tomb Raider, the Angelina Jolie move about the video game of the same name. it was way cool. the temples had been taken over by these massive trees. trees just growing on top of them with huge roots all over the place. it was really cool, but small than angkor wat and more packed with tourists. we went outside back to the parking area, had an ice cream, a red bull, and then a nap in some hammocks that were out there. back to meet charlie and michelle for lunch, then explore angkor wat a little more after breaking off from michelle and charlie again as they were gonna head over to the jungle temple. we tried to go to the top, the bakan (i believe) but becky wasn't allowed as she had only shorts not pants and i decided not to go and hold that over her head for the rest of time. hahahah. next, we drove around to a few other temples, checking them out and marvelling at the size and area of angkor. the place and the temples are so massive, covering miles, and so intricate it's incredible. built in squares that on the bas-reliefs are carved to match these battle scenes from the ramayama (again, i think). i kept wondering about the artists who did it, i mean it seems that most of these types of structures are built by slaves, but these most have been some seriously good artist/slaves or something, i don't know. we ended up driving around and checking out the temples for hours. the place was seriously big. we didn't stay for sunset as we had it in our minds to go do some yoga that night at a hostel in town. i ended the day doing yoga and then having some indian dinner with becky. it was a good end to a great day.
on another note, i've started reading, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. what a time to be reading this book. it's basically about how the hitmen, go into developing nations and make a deal for US companies, hahahah, i just finished working for one of them, to upgrade their infrastructure on loans from the IMF, World Bank to modernize their country; but leaving them with exorbitant loans that they have to default on. Leaving their government/leaders no choice but to open up their boarders to the US for natural resources, military bases, and whatever else we want; pushing our neo-colonial/global domination agenda. i'm not sure if we ever have done this in cambodia, but i was just in one of the places it failed, vietnam and know that's it's failed in iraq and afghanistan; which is why the military had to be brought in. this basically only benefits the US corporations, our military/industrial complex, and a few priviledged individuals; usually making the poor even more poor when all is said and done. anyway, it's seems like an auspicious time for me to be reading it. i know india just opened it's doors to giant supermarket conglomerates and seeing the disparity between the rich and the poor here. anyway, this isn't a political blog; so i'll stop there. it's just a great read, very informative and should be checked out.
later,
nick
p.s. i'm trying to post pics to google+ but it's taking hours.
we did meet up with a cool tuk tuk driver that night, chin, and had him take us to some local hangouts. we told him we didn't want to go to pop street, which i guess is where all the white people hangout. so, he took us to a khmer beer garden. it was way cool, we got a tube of beer and had some fried shrimp, chilling and talking with him. i ended up walking around a bit speaking with some locals, practicing the few words of khmer i knew and ended up dancing with some people on the way out. the people love it when you can speak khmer, even if it's just, no thank you, which we've ended up using a lot to say no thanks to the tuk tuk drivers, they also love it that we've got motorbikes and travel like them. chin took us to a few places to drink and then to hangout with his friends; he wanted to take us out to the khmer dance club but since we had to get up for sunrise, we declined. gotta get that beauty sleep, ya know.
so, we did get up for sunrise. it was amazing, really cool, beautiful, awe-inspiring, surreal, ethereal, and everything else. i must have taken twenty pictures of the sunrise, just like every minute, i was like, oh, it's different colors now, gotta take a pic. most look the same. it was still cool. we wandered around angkor wat for a bit til checking out the different rooms, the massive bas-relief carvings of ancient hindu wars, and just reeling from the immensity of it all. we got some breakfast after that as we were pretty hungry by then, just running on coffee and tired from the night before. charlie and michelle were off to take a nap as it was like 9 in the morning by then; but becky (the british girl) and i had it in our heads that we would power through. so we split, deciding to meet back up for lunch. becky and i headed off to the jungle temple that had been used in Tomb Raider, the Angelina Jolie move about the video game of the same name. it was way cool. the temples had been taken over by these massive trees. trees just growing on top of them with huge roots all over the place. it was really cool, but small than angkor wat and more packed with tourists. we went outside back to the parking area, had an ice cream, a red bull, and then a nap in some hammocks that were out there. back to meet charlie and michelle for lunch, then explore angkor wat a little more after breaking off from michelle and charlie again as they were gonna head over to the jungle temple. we tried to go to the top, the bakan (i believe) but becky wasn't allowed as she had only shorts not pants and i decided not to go and hold that over her head for the rest of time. hahahah. next, we drove around to a few other temples, checking them out and marvelling at the size and area of angkor. the place and the temples are so massive, covering miles, and so intricate it's incredible. built in squares that on the bas-reliefs are carved to match these battle scenes from the ramayama (again, i think). i kept wondering about the artists who did it, i mean it seems that most of these types of structures are built by slaves, but these most have been some seriously good artist/slaves or something, i don't know. we ended up driving around and checking out the temples for hours. the place was seriously big. we didn't stay for sunset as we had it in our minds to go do some yoga that night at a hostel in town. i ended the day doing yoga and then having some indian dinner with becky. it was a good end to a great day.
on another note, i've started reading, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. what a time to be reading this book. it's basically about how the hitmen, go into developing nations and make a deal for US companies, hahahah, i just finished working for one of them, to upgrade their infrastructure on loans from the IMF, World Bank to modernize their country; but leaving them with exorbitant loans that they have to default on. Leaving their government/leaders no choice but to open up their boarders to the US for natural resources, military bases, and whatever else we want; pushing our neo-colonial/global domination agenda. i'm not sure if we ever have done this in cambodia, but i was just in one of the places it failed, vietnam and know that's it's failed in iraq and afghanistan; which is why the military had to be brought in. this basically only benefits the US corporations, our military/industrial complex, and a few priviledged individuals; usually making the poor even more poor when all is said and done. anyway, it's seems like an auspicious time for me to be reading it. i know india just opened it's doors to giant supermarket conglomerates and seeing the disparity between the rich and the poor here. anyway, this isn't a political blog; so i'll stop there. it's just a great read, very informative and should be checked out.
later,
nick
p.s. i'm trying to post pics to google+ but it's taking hours.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
on the road again
wow, okay, it's been a bit. i feel like a lot has happened since i last wrote, i guess, that was when i got back from halong bay. the day i got back from there we were scheduled to fly from hanoi to saigon and then bus to phnom penh. we made the flight but decided to skip the bus ride. instead, we bought motorbikes to drive there. no big deal. hahahahahah, a bit about the driving in saigon and now in cambodia. there's usually two lanes, one for on-coming and the other to go with, same same. now, there are usually shoulders as well; sometimes this shoulder is a 6 inch drop off into kind of a loose gravel shoulder, sometimes it's paved decently. the shoulders are used a multitute of ways, usually bicycling and/or walking, motorbikes ride in them as well while getting passed by other vehicles or for going slower (say you've got six live pigs on the back, you might go a little slower). now the shoulder can also be used as a start off for on-coming traffic if you can't cross the road right away to get to the right side. this is a bit fucked up. there are also, cows, pull carts, water buffalo drawn carts, people walking cows, fucking anything you can think of is pretty much using the shoulder for travel. so it's a bit dicey. i don't know, it's hard to explain, how crazily the shoulders are used. pretty much some people follow the laws of traffic, but a lot don't; so you'll be crossing a major road in town and the cross traffic will just kinda blow through, it's sounds super sketch, but they do it pretty well. turning left is sketch too, you just kind of go, red light, there's a race (the lights count down so you pretty much start into the intersection with about 5-3 seconds left before it turns green, also, sketch cuz people blow a lot the yellow/red lights. cars will take up your lane if they are passing another car/truck/motorbike/tuk tuk/etc. the cars in your lane expect you to get the fuck out of the way. no joke, you're in my lane and they'll just honk and flash their lights at you like it ain't no thang. i'll get back to the 6 inch drop off onto fucking red dusty gravel in a minute. so imagine this chaos, it's not really chaos but it's pretty crazy. and then imagine that you've never driven a motorbike. and then imagine that you decide to buy one and drive it around SEA, learning to drive it in saigon. pretty much either the dumbest or best ideal that we've ever made. so, we bought two bikes to make the drive to phnom penh. they ain't much, but they do work. two honda win's, 110cc (massive). i could barely test drive it around the block in saigon, no big deal. this dude leads us out to the highway, all we have to do is take one road to phnom penh. i've never been so tense, so clutching onto myself, head on a swivel, stalling in the middle of intersections, seeing people do all sorts of crazy shit and coming at me from every direction. it was mad. let's just say you're learning curve is pretty fucking steep there for a minute.
we made it to the cambodian boarder well. made it through customs okay. the other side of the boarder is like the vegas strip, okay, i'm exaggerating a bit, but there were hella casinos. i was blown away, i had no clue. i'll get back to the gambling in a minute. the suns going down, let's get dinner. okay. our trend of eating weird shit continues. we pull over at this place, nothing special, just a kind of outdoor resturant. these vietnamese people practically yell at us to join them. right on. we sit down, they get us beers and urge us to start eating. it's this stew with some kind of greens in it, some whole fish (neither of us had eaten a whole fish, head, eyes, bones, organs, all of it, before). it was pretty weird, not bad, not great, weird. the other parts of the soup were good. and there was some satueed squid and veggies that we dipped into hot pepper like oil that was really good. they kept giving us beers and cheersing (i think both the vietnamese and the cambodian people just cheers all the time. i don't think they even take sips without saying cheers). then they bring out the chicken feet, asking if we've ever tried. no... no we haven't. you must. um, okay. now the chicken feet are the first thing i didn't not like. maybe it wasn't so much the taste as it was EXACTLY LIKE EATING A FUCKING HAND! i mean exactly, knuckles and shit, tendons, whatever. these people were just ripping fingers off and getting after it. putting the whole finger into their mouths and then sliding it out along the teeth. i mean i've eaten chicken wings and you do the same thing. but they got meat and don't look like hands. this was basically just skin off a chicken's foot. maybe you'll like, maybe you won't; i just got grossed out.
so, it's dark; let's keep driving. we were supposed to drive all the way to phnom penh that first day, 6 hours or so. riding is fucking tiring though, and we stopped like every hour from general aches and pains and whatnot. our lights work great. we can see like 5 feet in front of us and like nothing else. plus, now the bugs are out in full force. just battering your body and face all over the place, i'm blinking like every second trying to get bugs out of my eyes. plus, we're not wearing sunglasses anymore and it's dusty as shit, so every time a car passes you going like 80 km/h you get sand blasted. the whole time i'm like: this is nuts, this is the craziest shit i've ever done; and we weren't even going that fast at that point. finally, we pull over and both of us are like, this is mad, we should get a room for the night and then continue in the morning. done. got a room somewhere on the map, who knows, no ones speaks english, we just got here so we speak no khmer.
the next day, we tried to get up decently early. we are supposed to either meet michelle at the airport or at The Spring Guesthouse. we were bothing thinking how bad ass it would be just to show up at the airport on motorbikes like a boss. driving the next day we see more weird shit on the roads, charlie almost got taken out by a water buffalo, shit is like 12 feet tall, i thought that was a wrap. we crossed a ferry, i was next to this dude hauling live pigs, fucking squealing, shitting, moving, just jarring the shit out of me in general. the dude driving them, charlie notes, has six toes and then a nub; he's transfixed by that. and the whole time i'm looking at these pigs, squealing, shitting, they're probably in fear for the their lives, and i'm like: that looks exactly like human skin. EXACTLY LIKE IT. i'm never eating pork again. yeah, that lasted like a day. so, we make it to phnom penh, probably in time to pick michelle up, but thought better of it as we needed to get a rack on one of the bikes to hold all of our shit.
so, we get to The Spring Guesthouse, meet up with michelle; and meet savin. savin is the coolest tuk tuk driver in cambodia. tuk tuk's are like covered karts pulled by motorbike. savin is just the nicest, funniest dudes ever. if you make it to phnom penh, we can hook you up with him to show you around. i end up going on a walk by myself for a while and meet this dude, tek. tek tells me he has a niece moving to san jose soon to be a nurse and askes if i would talk to her. i'm a little sketched out but want to trust the people and help out if i can, so i say sure. i'm supposed to meet up with them the next day. i go back to the guesthouse and meet up with michelle and charlie and we get a ride to the riverfront to see the festivities of the water festival. the water festival is the biggest holiday in cambodia, and people travel from all over to phnom penh for it. basically doubles the population. when we get dropped off at the riverfront we decide to get dinner first at this little indian place. as we're waiting for dinner a light above michelle explodes and the fucking thing falls on michelle's head cutting right next to her eye. she's okay though, and they comped us 3 beers, so that makes up for it... whatever, welcome to south east asia michelle. the festivities are crazy, we see live music, all sorts of lights, millions of people, a play, food vendors, and i don't know what else. it's a madhouse everywhere.
the next day, i wake up early and go on a run at the olympic stadium before meeting up with this niece. it's a cool stadium, i don't know what they mean by olympic, but there are some people rehabbing with missing legs there, so that's pretty cool. i go back to meet up with the people and we are supposed to go back to their house and eat and talk. i'm still a little tepidatious; but i can't hold back. we get there, sit and talk to two of the sisters and have coffee while we for food and the nurse/niece to get off work. then an uncle comes and i speak with him while waiting for the girl. this is a long time, and i'm like we could have met up later, but i don't say anything. but i'm pretty okay with it now, they seem like good people. the uncle tells me he works at the casino and that he'll teach me to play cambodian blackjack. cool, it's a little different but not much. and we play for a bit and he's calling the cards as he's dealing them. i'm fairly impressed with this and then he gets to talking about how if i want i can go into the casino and we'll take the house in like 5-8 deals and walk with 200 grand. i'm like whatever. there's a test though, of course and this dude from dubai will be at the house in a minute and he might want to play me. homeboy, the uncle, will give me money and we'll take the dubai guy. it's all snowballing at this point the dubai guy is there now. by now i know that there's no niece and that it was all a ruse for this gambling shit. i'm scared to death and don't feel like i can leave now, so i play this dude from dubai. i win a lot of money, going off the hands that the uncle taught me earlier. then in some shit the dude from dubai pulls out like 50 grand starts playing that. i almost got up to leave, should have, but at this point i'm a little scared for my life. whatver, we get to the final hand, as we practiced, i have 21 on a three card deal and the dude from dubai a 20 off the deal. what a trip! we're playing for like 60 grand at this point, me on like 38,000 credit. i'm worried. fucking worried doesn't begin to explain it. but the dude from dubai now wants to see the money, he doesn't believe my credits good. it's definitely not! we package up the cards in envelopes, seal them with the cards facing each so you can't see through, and then sign them. we'll meet back up once i've got the money to cover my end. fucking crazy. the uncle tells me he'll get the money to cover it, we know i've got the winning cards, just tells me to get as much as i can. i get dropped off at the guesthouse, i'm supposed to meetup with michelle and charlie. they aren't there cuz i told them by email earlier on this dudes phone that i'm okay and having fun. that was still when i got over there and thought they were this nice cambodian family. the people are waiting outside for me. savin tells me to be careful; but i'm this smart savvy traveller by now. i get some money, not a lot, not a little; go back and win. then, the dubai guy askes to play 4 games, me dealing. i'm fucked here. i deal and win two hands, lose the third, there was all my money on the table. the fourth deal i'm given more credit to win back the uncle's money. wow, this is absolutely bananas. the pot is now like a 100 grand on this fourth deal, i have a 20 and the dubai guy has a 19, the uncle can see his cards and has been hand signalling me all four of the last deals, so we know what he's got. the dubai guy wants to see the money again. okay, tomorrow. we seal the cards do the signing and leave. the uncle says he can get the money from his work and they drop me off at the guesthouse saying they'll pick me up at eight in the moring. they never show. so, suffice it to say, i learned a lesson, didn't die, and got made in cambodia. it was a trip. i didn't lose a lot of money, but i did get knocked down a few pegs, learn a lesson, but i'm alive.
i'm pretty despondent the next day and pissed and want to go to the embassy or their house; but what can i do at either of those places. my mistake my scar. charlie and michelle are real nice about it all and console me the next day, even though i put them through some shit. we take savin's tuk tuk out to the killing fields. their a lot of killing fields in cambodia (pol pot's regime, the khmer rouge, killed millions of cambodians in the late 70's; basically crushed the soul of the country and set them back years as he had everyone but the peasants murder). on the way there we see the aftermath of a motorbike accident. just this dude laying in the middle of the road bleeding from his mouth no helmet; and all i want to do is hold his hand while he's dying. everyone is just driving by. so that pretty much sobered me up out of my funk. it could be a lot worse. the killing fields are super depressing but interesting as it's made such a mark on this country. the monument is a building, shaped a bit like the washington monument but not too tall, with glass walls and just like 4 floors of skulls and bones. you walk around the fields and there's still clothes, teeth, and bones still surfacing. it's fucked up. we ride back to the guesthouse, no one really says anything. we make plans with savin to get some food later and go to some cambodian boxing matches.
the boxing matches are cool. after michelle and i talk about how we've never seen any live fights. we get pretty much front row sets and call out who we think will be the winner every fight, there were about 4 or 5 that we watched. it was pretty incredible. they play music at the begining and the fighters kind of do a dance around warm up, that's pretty much badass, practing kneeing, and kicking and punching all slowly to this cambodian music. it was cool. afterwards, we go get dinner and drinks and play pool and foosball with savin. the next day we are driving to sihnoukville, taking the 4 if you want to look it up.
the four is the road with the 6 inch drop into gravel, it's one of the main highways in cambodia; so why there isn't really much of a shoulder is beyond me. by now, we've had a rack made, and my bike is loaded with mine and charlie's packs and charlie's bike with him, michelle, and her pack. my bike is heavy in the back, it's got a lot more travel after a bumps. whatever, i'll learn to ride it, just like before. here's where the shoulder comes into play though. the on-coming traffic, i told you, EXPECTS you to move and WILL take up the whole lane if they are passing a big truck or something. it's fucked up. but like i said all the time paying attention, usually you can slow down and not have to bale off the road into this gravel shoulder, but sometimes it's that or die. so here i am with this bike loaded down and everytime i hit a bump this thing is all over the place and then having to careen off the road into gravel where i'm scared to death my tire's going to hit and slide all over, it does, but you deal with it. i mean, there really isn't much else you can do. you get pissed a little, and want it to be like driving in the states; but you're not in the states and you can't do shit about it. the four is scary, trucks pass you going hella fast, fucking cows and water buffalo's all over, shit's just crazy, good winds, on coming traffic. charlie and i talking at rest stops about how tense and scary and how you've got to be on point the whole time, but then both of us saying and thinking that this is one of the coolest things we'll will ever have the chance to do and reminding ourselves to enjoy it and that we are seriously motoring cambodia and the scenery is beautiful, all rice fields, and palm trees and mountians in the distance and rest stops where no one speaks english and haven't probably seen a ton of white people and they are so happy to see you and thrilled when you get food and watch while you eat it and bring their kids to say hi and how proud they are that their kids can say hi english and just all the things we would never ever get to see on buses. all of us agree that it's hard work, but that it's rewarding and amazing, and are thankful for the opportunity to just be able to see and do this. today, i was like, i'll be home at some point and whatever i'll be doing will be cool and great sometimes and then just life at others; but i'll be able to look back and think of the year i turned thrity and how fucking cool and amazing it was that i motorbiked through SEA with two of my best friends and just be blown away by remember the experience. fuck, i can feel it now, and i'm just writing about it.
anyway, we made it to sihnoukville and spent a while looking for some bungalows to stay in but got so tired and grumpy looking for places that we eventually settle on a not bad guesthouse for like 6 bucks a night. we stayed there for two days, not really into it as the beaches (ocheteul sp?) were cool but crowded with white people and just busy. michelle and charlie found THE place that we were all looking for. in sihnoukville, go to otres beach. it's just a few bungalows resorts on the chillest most laid back beach ever. and that's where we all fell in love with the place. we didn't get a bungalow but you can. we stayed at Dany's. Dany's is run by the coolest nicest cambodian people alive. there's the old man, just this dude who knows how to do everything, work on the rest, fix shit, he helped us change the oil on our bikes one day and fix em up. then there are 8 kids, 5 girls and 3 boys. kim ang, just kim for short is the oldest and runs the place. kim is the coolest broad ever, she took us to the markets, talked to us about her daughter sunny, told us about cambodia, her dreams to buy the place, how she had one before but it was taken away by the government. just all around good people. da lin is the the youngest daughter, super cool, in school, wants to be a doctor, always had to stay up the latest taking care of guests. the youngest sons, chet and joia; chet always walking around with this half grin and a kinda swagger, playing cards and dice with us. he won cards one night and was beside himself, couldn't keep the grin off his face. joia was a bit shy but would talk to us and we would always fuck with him. nareen, who was preggers when we got there and had the baby (i went to the hospital one day and saw him and her). shmi and another who cooked and then one who would do the dishes. the food they made was amazing. every time they saw me and they were eating they would call me over and ask if i wanted to taste some khmer food, and of course i had to. it was always delicious, mostly seafood, but they love chicken too. one day kim took us to the market and we bought a shit ton of tiger prawns, and this aussie josh bought crabs and they cooked it up and we all sat down and had dinner together on straw mats on the ground. it was seriously fucking cool, and fun and the food was out of this world. it was then we decided we wanted to cook them Thanksgiving dinner.
so the day Thanksgiving rolled around, i went to the market with kim and picked up 2 ducks, and 3 chickens for them (the family doesn't eat duck), a whole bunch of potatoes and sweet potates (of course!). i picked out the chickens and the ducks still live and they killed em and cleaned em right there in the market, it was nuts. we ended up cooking dinner for 5 americans (inclucing us), a german, and like 18 cambodians. it was out of this world. kim and i cleaned the foul again and chopped em up, i bbq'd the duck, one brother the chicken, charlie and michelle made the potatoes and string bean dishes, one satueed and the other mixed with cream of mushroom soup (tastey deliciousness). kim and the family made crab and some other khmer food. we ended up spending like 75 dollars on all the food but had the other travellers pitch and it was just so awesome to be able to share and feed the family on Thanksgiving. we all sat around after and played chicken head. don't ask, just stick the cooked chicken head on a plate, cover it with a bowl, shake it and then lift the bowl up, whoever the chicken beak points at has to drink. what a trip. after a while this khmer dude was challenging charlie to feats of beer drinking, drink your whole beer! wild.
anyway, we chilled on the beach for two weeks, couldn't be bothered to do much. read, listen to music, take a swim, take a drive to the end of the beach where there's no one, the biggest and hardest decision of the day was what to eat for dinner. play cards after dinner. otres was just this chill beach. sihnoukville was half the greatest place on earth, the other half was the skeeziest place on earth.
as like this blackhole of travelling, most people get there and plan to spend a couple days there. then they stay for two weeks, a month, some people like a year. others have to leave but either move back or come back for months at a time. there were old expats who would rent khmer girls, a day, a week, maybe they would get married and keep other khmer girlfriends on the side. victory hill, is the skeezy part of town, hooker bars and places where girls would act like your date for the night. then there is the chicken shack area of town on the other side of the port, i was taken there by this kid that had a khmer newborn with a khmer girl. he got a hooker at the chicken shack for 5 dollars. later on that night, he passed out on the side of the road on me. i tried to wake him up for hours, but couldn't call for help as it was 3 in the morning and i was afraid i would get robbed or killed (we had heard about a white girl winning 100 grand at the casino found dead the next day in a ditch). finally, it was dawn and i hailed some people to help, we got a ambulance and he got taken to the hospital, still passed out. i was told by the cops to go get my passport so they could take a copy. i thought he was going to die and i was going to go to cambodian jail. the second scariest night of my life. he woke up though and made his police report. it was definitely some real shit.
anyway, i'm sure there's much more i need to add but wanted to get this up because i've made it out of the black hole, we are in phnom penh headed to siem reap to check out the temples, taking the 6 if you want to keep track. later i'll try to add some pictures but for now you can check out charlie's and michelle's on his google+. i've good mad photos of the family which i am excited to put up so you can have faces with their names. they love when you take a pic and show it to them.
out for now.
nick, charlie, and michelle
we made it to the cambodian boarder well. made it through customs okay. the other side of the boarder is like the vegas strip, okay, i'm exaggerating a bit, but there were hella casinos. i was blown away, i had no clue. i'll get back to the gambling in a minute. the suns going down, let's get dinner. okay. our trend of eating weird shit continues. we pull over at this place, nothing special, just a kind of outdoor resturant. these vietnamese people practically yell at us to join them. right on. we sit down, they get us beers and urge us to start eating. it's this stew with some kind of greens in it, some whole fish (neither of us had eaten a whole fish, head, eyes, bones, organs, all of it, before). it was pretty weird, not bad, not great, weird. the other parts of the soup were good. and there was some satueed squid and veggies that we dipped into hot pepper like oil that was really good. they kept giving us beers and cheersing (i think both the vietnamese and the cambodian people just cheers all the time. i don't think they even take sips without saying cheers). then they bring out the chicken feet, asking if we've ever tried. no... no we haven't. you must. um, okay. now the chicken feet are the first thing i didn't not like. maybe it wasn't so much the taste as it was EXACTLY LIKE EATING A FUCKING HAND! i mean exactly, knuckles and shit, tendons, whatever. these people were just ripping fingers off and getting after it. putting the whole finger into their mouths and then sliding it out along the teeth. i mean i've eaten chicken wings and you do the same thing. but they got meat and don't look like hands. this was basically just skin off a chicken's foot. maybe you'll like, maybe you won't; i just got grossed out.
so, it's dark; let's keep driving. we were supposed to drive all the way to phnom penh that first day, 6 hours or so. riding is fucking tiring though, and we stopped like every hour from general aches and pains and whatnot. our lights work great. we can see like 5 feet in front of us and like nothing else. plus, now the bugs are out in full force. just battering your body and face all over the place, i'm blinking like every second trying to get bugs out of my eyes. plus, we're not wearing sunglasses anymore and it's dusty as shit, so every time a car passes you going like 80 km/h you get sand blasted. the whole time i'm like: this is nuts, this is the craziest shit i've ever done; and we weren't even going that fast at that point. finally, we pull over and both of us are like, this is mad, we should get a room for the night and then continue in the morning. done. got a room somewhere on the map, who knows, no ones speaks english, we just got here so we speak no khmer.
the next day, we tried to get up decently early. we are supposed to either meet michelle at the airport or at The Spring Guesthouse. we were bothing thinking how bad ass it would be just to show up at the airport on motorbikes like a boss. driving the next day we see more weird shit on the roads, charlie almost got taken out by a water buffalo, shit is like 12 feet tall, i thought that was a wrap. we crossed a ferry, i was next to this dude hauling live pigs, fucking squealing, shitting, moving, just jarring the shit out of me in general. the dude driving them, charlie notes, has six toes and then a nub; he's transfixed by that. and the whole time i'm looking at these pigs, squealing, shitting, they're probably in fear for the their lives, and i'm like: that looks exactly like human skin. EXACTLY LIKE IT. i'm never eating pork again. yeah, that lasted like a day. so, we make it to phnom penh, probably in time to pick michelle up, but thought better of it as we needed to get a rack on one of the bikes to hold all of our shit.
so, we get to The Spring Guesthouse, meet up with michelle; and meet savin. savin is the coolest tuk tuk driver in cambodia. tuk tuk's are like covered karts pulled by motorbike. savin is just the nicest, funniest dudes ever. if you make it to phnom penh, we can hook you up with him to show you around. i end up going on a walk by myself for a while and meet this dude, tek. tek tells me he has a niece moving to san jose soon to be a nurse and askes if i would talk to her. i'm a little sketched out but want to trust the people and help out if i can, so i say sure. i'm supposed to meet up with them the next day. i go back to the guesthouse and meet up with michelle and charlie and we get a ride to the riverfront to see the festivities of the water festival. the water festival is the biggest holiday in cambodia, and people travel from all over to phnom penh for it. basically doubles the population. when we get dropped off at the riverfront we decide to get dinner first at this little indian place. as we're waiting for dinner a light above michelle explodes and the fucking thing falls on michelle's head cutting right next to her eye. she's okay though, and they comped us 3 beers, so that makes up for it... whatever, welcome to south east asia michelle. the festivities are crazy, we see live music, all sorts of lights, millions of people, a play, food vendors, and i don't know what else. it's a madhouse everywhere.
the next day, i wake up early and go on a run at the olympic stadium before meeting up with this niece. it's a cool stadium, i don't know what they mean by olympic, but there are some people rehabbing with missing legs there, so that's pretty cool. i go back to meet up with the people and we are supposed to go back to their house and eat and talk. i'm still a little tepidatious; but i can't hold back. we get there, sit and talk to two of the sisters and have coffee while we for food and the nurse/niece to get off work. then an uncle comes and i speak with him while waiting for the girl. this is a long time, and i'm like we could have met up later, but i don't say anything. but i'm pretty okay with it now, they seem like good people. the uncle tells me he works at the casino and that he'll teach me to play cambodian blackjack. cool, it's a little different but not much. and we play for a bit and he's calling the cards as he's dealing them. i'm fairly impressed with this and then he gets to talking about how if i want i can go into the casino and we'll take the house in like 5-8 deals and walk with 200 grand. i'm like whatever. there's a test though, of course and this dude from dubai will be at the house in a minute and he might want to play me. homeboy, the uncle, will give me money and we'll take the dubai guy. it's all snowballing at this point the dubai guy is there now. by now i know that there's no niece and that it was all a ruse for this gambling shit. i'm scared to death and don't feel like i can leave now, so i play this dude from dubai. i win a lot of money, going off the hands that the uncle taught me earlier. then in some shit the dude from dubai pulls out like 50 grand starts playing that. i almost got up to leave, should have, but at this point i'm a little scared for my life. whatver, we get to the final hand, as we practiced, i have 21 on a three card deal and the dude from dubai a 20 off the deal. what a trip! we're playing for like 60 grand at this point, me on like 38,000 credit. i'm worried. fucking worried doesn't begin to explain it. but the dude from dubai now wants to see the money, he doesn't believe my credits good. it's definitely not! we package up the cards in envelopes, seal them with the cards facing each so you can't see through, and then sign them. we'll meet back up once i've got the money to cover my end. fucking crazy. the uncle tells me he'll get the money to cover it, we know i've got the winning cards, just tells me to get as much as i can. i get dropped off at the guesthouse, i'm supposed to meetup with michelle and charlie. they aren't there cuz i told them by email earlier on this dudes phone that i'm okay and having fun. that was still when i got over there and thought they were this nice cambodian family. the people are waiting outside for me. savin tells me to be careful; but i'm this smart savvy traveller by now. i get some money, not a lot, not a little; go back and win. then, the dubai guy askes to play 4 games, me dealing. i'm fucked here. i deal and win two hands, lose the third, there was all my money on the table. the fourth deal i'm given more credit to win back the uncle's money. wow, this is absolutely bananas. the pot is now like a 100 grand on this fourth deal, i have a 20 and the dubai guy has a 19, the uncle can see his cards and has been hand signalling me all four of the last deals, so we know what he's got. the dubai guy wants to see the money again. okay, tomorrow. we seal the cards do the signing and leave. the uncle says he can get the money from his work and they drop me off at the guesthouse saying they'll pick me up at eight in the moring. they never show. so, suffice it to say, i learned a lesson, didn't die, and got made in cambodia. it was a trip. i didn't lose a lot of money, but i did get knocked down a few pegs, learn a lesson, but i'm alive.
i'm pretty despondent the next day and pissed and want to go to the embassy or their house; but what can i do at either of those places. my mistake my scar. charlie and michelle are real nice about it all and console me the next day, even though i put them through some shit. we take savin's tuk tuk out to the killing fields. their a lot of killing fields in cambodia (pol pot's regime, the khmer rouge, killed millions of cambodians in the late 70's; basically crushed the soul of the country and set them back years as he had everyone but the peasants murder). on the way there we see the aftermath of a motorbike accident. just this dude laying in the middle of the road bleeding from his mouth no helmet; and all i want to do is hold his hand while he's dying. everyone is just driving by. so that pretty much sobered me up out of my funk. it could be a lot worse. the killing fields are super depressing but interesting as it's made such a mark on this country. the monument is a building, shaped a bit like the washington monument but not too tall, with glass walls and just like 4 floors of skulls and bones. you walk around the fields and there's still clothes, teeth, and bones still surfacing. it's fucked up. we ride back to the guesthouse, no one really says anything. we make plans with savin to get some food later and go to some cambodian boxing matches.
the boxing matches are cool. after michelle and i talk about how we've never seen any live fights. we get pretty much front row sets and call out who we think will be the winner every fight, there were about 4 or 5 that we watched. it was pretty incredible. they play music at the begining and the fighters kind of do a dance around warm up, that's pretty much badass, practing kneeing, and kicking and punching all slowly to this cambodian music. it was cool. afterwards, we go get dinner and drinks and play pool and foosball with savin. the next day we are driving to sihnoukville, taking the 4 if you want to look it up.
the four is the road with the 6 inch drop into gravel, it's one of the main highways in cambodia; so why there isn't really much of a shoulder is beyond me. by now, we've had a rack made, and my bike is loaded with mine and charlie's packs and charlie's bike with him, michelle, and her pack. my bike is heavy in the back, it's got a lot more travel after a bumps. whatever, i'll learn to ride it, just like before. here's where the shoulder comes into play though. the on-coming traffic, i told you, EXPECTS you to move and WILL take up the whole lane if they are passing a big truck or something. it's fucked up. but like i said all the time paying attention, usually you can slow down and not have to bale off the road into this gravel shoulder, but sometimes it's that or die. so here i am with this bike loaded down and everytime i hit a bump this thing is all over the place and then having to careen off the road into gravel where i'm scared to death my tire's going to hit and slide all over, it does, but you deal with it. i mean, there really isn't much else you can do. you get pissed a little, and want it to be like driving in the states; but you're not in the states and you can't do shit about it. the four is scary, trucks pass you going hella fast, fucking cows and water buffalo's all over, shit's just crazy, good winds, on coming traffic. charlie and i talking at rest stops about how tense and scary and how you've got to be on point the whole time, but then both of us saying and thinking that this is one of the coolest things we'll will ever have the chance to do and reminding ourselves to enjoy it and that we are seriously motoring cambodia and the scenery is beautiful, all rice fields, and palm trees and mountians in the distance and rest stops where no one speaks english and haven't probably seen a ton of white people and they are so happy to see you and thrilled when you get food and watch while you eat it and bring their kids to say hi and how proud they are that their kids can say hi english and just all the things we would never ever get to see on buses. all of us agree that it's hard work, but that it's rewarding and amazing, and are thankful for the opportunity to just be able to see and do this. today, i was like, i'll be home at some point and whatever i'll be doing will be cool and great sometimes and then just life at others; but i'll be able to look back and think of the year i turned thrity and how fucking cool and amazing it was that i motorbiked through SEA with two of my best friends and just be blown away by remember the experience. fuck, i can feel it now, and i'm just writing about it.
anyway, we made it to sihnoukville and spent a while looking for some bungalows to stay in but got so tired and grumpy looking for places that we eventually settle on a not bad guesthouse for like 6 bucks a night. we stayed there for two days, not really into it as the beaches (ocheteul sp?) were cool but crowded with white people and just busy. michelle and charlie found THE place that we were all looking for. in sihnoukville, go to otres beach. it's just a few bungalows resorts on the chillest most laid back beach ever. and that's where we all fell in love with the place. we didn't get a bungalow but you can. we stayed at Dany's. Dany's is run by the coolest nicest cambodian people alive. there's the old man, just this dude who knows how to do everything, work on the rest, fix shit, he helped us change the oil on our bikes one day and fix em up. then there are 8 kids, 5 girls and 3 boys. kim ang, just kim for short is the oldest and runs the place. kim is the coolest broad ever, she took us to the markets, talked to us about her daughter sunny, told us about cambodia, her dreams to buy the place, how she had one before but it was taken away by the government. just all around good people. da lin is the the youngest daughter, super cool, in school, wants to be a doctor, always had to stay up the latest taking care of guests. the youngest sons, chet and joia; chet always walking around with this half grin and a kinda swagger, playing cards and dice with us. he won cards one night and was beside himself, couldn't keep the grin off his face. joia was a bit shy but would talk to us and we would always fuck with him. nareen, who was preggers when we got there and had the baby (i went to the hospital one day and saw him and her). shmi and another who cooked and then one who would do the dishes. the food they made was amazing. every time they saw me and they were eating they would call me over and ask if i wanted to taste some khmer food, and of course i had to. it was always delicious, mostly seafood, but they love chicken too. one day kim took us to the market and we bought a shit ton of tiger prawns, and this aussie josh bought crabs and they cooked it up and we all sat down and had dinner together on straw mats on the ground. it was seriously fucking cool, and fun and the food was out of this world. it was then we decided we wanted to cook them Thanksgiving dinner.
so the day Thanksgiving rolled around, i went to the market with kim and picked up 2 ducks, and 3 chickens for them (the family doesn't eat duck), a whole bunch of potatoes and sweet potates (of course!). i picked out the chickens and the ducks still live and they killed em and cleaned em right there in the market, it was nuts. we ended up cooking dinner for 5 americans (inclucing us), a german, and like 18 cambodians. it was out of this world. kim and i cleaned the foul again and chopped em up, i bbq'd the duck, one brother the chicken, charlie and michelle made the potatoes and string bean dishes, one satueed and the other mixed with cream of mushroom soup (tastey deliciousness). kim and the family made crab and some other khmer food. we ended up spending like 75 dollars on all the food but had the other travellers pitch and it was just so awesome to be able to share and feed the family on Thanksgiving. we all sat around after and played chicken head. don't ask, just stick the cooked chicken head on a plate, cover it with a bowl, shake it and then lift the bowl up, whoever the chicken beak points at has to drink. what a trip. after a while this khmer dude was challenging charlie to feats of beer drinking, drink your whole beer! wild.
anyway, we chilled on the beach for two weeks, couldn't be bothered to do much. read, listen to music, take a swim, take a drive to the end of the beach where there's no one, the biggest and hardest decision of the day was what to eat for dinner. play cards after dinner. otres was just this chill beach. sihnoukville was half the greatest place on earth, the other half was the skeeziest place on earth.
as like this blackhole of travelling, most people get there and plan to spend a couple days there. then they stay for two weeks, a month, some people like a year. others have to leave but either move back or come back for months at a time. there were old expats who would rent khmer girls, a day, a week, maybe they would get married and keep other khmer girlfriends on the side. victory hill, is the skeezy part of town, hooker bars and places where girls would act like your date for the night. then there is the chicken shack area of town on the other side of the port, i was taken there by this kid that had a khmer newborn with a khmer girl. he got a hooker at the chicken shack for 5 dollars. later on that night, he passed out on the side of the road on me. i tried to wake him up for hours, but couldn't call for help as it was 3 in the morning and i was afraid i would get robbed or killed (we had heard about a white girl winning 100 grand at the casino found dead the next day in a ditch). finally, it was dawn and i hailed some people to help, we got a ambulance and he got taken to the hospital, still passed out. i was told by the cops to go get my passport so they could take a copy. i thought he was going to die and i was going to go to cambodian jail. the second scariest night of my life. he woke up though and made his police report. it was definitely some real shit.
anyway, i'm sure there's much more i need to add but wanted to get this up because i've made it out of the black hole, we are in phnom penh headed to siem reap to check out the temples, taking the 6 if you want to keep track. later i'll try to add some pictures but for now you can check out charlie's and michelle's on his google+. i've good mad photos of the family which i am excited to put up so you can have faces with their names. they love when you take a pic and show it to them.
out for now.
nick, charlie, and michelle
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
halong bay
pictures are being uploaded as we speak! four hundred and eight of them, i'll probably need to delete a few of those though, just crap shots or multiples. in the mean time i thought i would relay my trip to halong bay.
it was amazing! super, the place is absolutely stunning and picturesque. the tour was so-so, just meeting the other people on the boat (2 germans, they brought chocolate, 4 swedes, 2 aussies, 1 belgian and portugese couple, 4 italians, a brit, and an italian and kenyan couple; a bag of mixed nuts) and just floating around halong bay was worth it though. it started out as a four hour bus ride from hanoi to the bay. i got a two night three day tour with all the food included, which was nice; but we had to pay for drinks. i remember we got there and pretty much threw our crap in our rooms and had lunch, it was good, seafood, rice, some tofu dishes. a little better than i expected. then started our trip to a cavern. trip was beautiful, all of us were on top of the boat taking pictures and just reeling from the ethereal aspect of this other worldly place. the cave was so-so, it was cool, but packed and everyone was just bunched up taking pitures. so, i kinda just charged through, took some choice shots and got back outside for some air and just to gaze, transfixed. next, we boated over to an area where we could swim, which was awesome. i jumped off the top of the boat first thing, had to, didn't have a choice... i had to do a flip as well. we all swam around for a little bit and then went over to a sea village to kayak. the sea village felt kinda contrived like the cave; but it was neat to be able to just kayak at the bottom of these giant mountians of rocks just breaking up out of the water, and going through other little caves to bay enclosures and soaking it all in. we got back to the dock and i made friends with a dog and when i would try to walk away but he would put his jaws around my wrist like plumas does whenever i she her. it was a nice moment because i really would like a dog when i get home and also made me miss home a bit. the captain and our tour guide picked out some fish we would take back on the boat and cook up for dinner. dinner was excellent, we had a spring roll making class, and had the fish and some other dishes and some ha long beers. things were mellow after that for a bit, we all sat around talking and bullshitting and drinking beer. that is until one of the dudes on the boat came in and introduced himself to everyone and said it was karaoke time. the sounds of crickets filled the boat. there aren't even crickets there. so, this is it, this is my time. be brave, i'll never see these people again... i pound my beer, get up and tell them to put, "genie in a bottle" on. hahah, apparently i have great forsight as i was driving around reno in the week leading up to my leaving and that song came on. i thought, this is such a shit song, it's like four lines repeated for three or so minutes of the worst shit imaginable; and that's when it hit me that i HAVE to use this as my karaoke song. and i made my mind up right there that it would be and i have never even sang karaoke. hahaha, so i did it. it wasn't great, fuck, it wasn't even good; but i had a great time and there is something releasing about being able to face that particular fear and put yourself out there. other people started to sing and they announced that if you scored a 100, you could get a free drink. so, what do you know, i had a little competition with the vietnamese and this uruguayan that was my roommate. i won't come out and say i had a definitive win; but, i did. it was blast. after going to bed i had a great conversation with the uruguayan about his life, and how he'd been in new zealand for the past year and how it was time for him to go home and find a wife and start and family and how he had been feeling pressure from his family for this and also that he wanted to, was ready. it was cool, i just listened and weighed in when i had something to say.
the next day, i woke up a little slow from being karaoke champion. heavy is the crown, as they say. breakfast was so-so but it was food, and then we boated over to cat ba island. cat ba island is this giant national park, conservation, and study area. we had a choice, go on a hike or do a bike ride. i chose the hike. the hike, like all the ones i've been on here is straight up. i don't think they believe in switchbacks. but then again, that is pretty hard to cut into the jungle and all the rock that is here. so straight up it is. i wore my flip flops, a swedish couple and gonzalo (my roommate); were all laughing and asking if i was gonna be alright. they don't know this is the same kid that use to climb moutains barefoot at jamison and get chewed out for it. i was good but it was kinda sketch at the top with all these smooth stones worn from usage and then the slick hard packed clay trail on the way down too. but i made it! when we got to the top it was amazing. miles and miles of these rock structures. you would think, awe, the same thing; but it's just breath-taking. and then there was this fucked up, like fire tower above it like 40 ft, with a narrow stair case and steps the are so tiny. and then, the shit is hella old and rusted through in places to boot. but i had to. i climb this death trap, and the fucking stairs and wire, so your just looking through them as you climb and get higher and this gives you a little dizziness and you're not looking at where you put your hands when you hit a rusted through spot and cut yourself and get tetanus. hahha, i'm kidding i didn't cut myself; but there's a high probablity of it happening. so i get up, almost to the top, and i look at the platform... and shit you wouldn't believe it but i'm staring at peoples' feet and legs. i shouldn't be seeing that i'm thinking there's wood there. hahah, some wood. hella planks are missing and cracked and basically all of us up there are sticking to where we can see the metal below that. i'm shitting in my pants, some bees have built a nest up there, there is a ferocious wind and too many people on this questionable platform. but it's sick. i can now see the other side of this island and it's just unreal. we take some pics very quick like and get the fuck off of it. we hike down, i get a drumstick at the bottom of the hill and it's awesome. my shirt is sweated through twice over and this ice cream is the best thing i've ever had. we meet back up with the rest of the group and head over to monkey island. monkey island is this little resort with bungalows about a twenty minute boat ride from cat ba. it's really pretty cool, but not in an over extragant way. our bungalow is pretty spartan and there is a giant rock coming up in the bathroom floor but this adds a little something to the place. we get the lunch, some more good seafood and i get the best lemonade of my life. we get the afternoon to do whatever we want, kayak to where you can see the monkeys, chill, swim, play volleyball, read, whatever. i go swimming and do some yoga on the beach, it was pretty nice since i haven't taken the time to do a lot of it here. i read for a bit on the beach, just staring at this mountians, take a nap, play volleyball with some other kids, take pictures of the sunset and then get back in the water for a minute. it sounds like a did a lot there but it was so relaxed and so chill that it felt like nothing. it was seriously a great afternoon. i didn't kayak over to see the monkeys as i'd heard their kind of aggressive and basically just didn't feel like it. dinner was awesome that night, we had some two different kinds of muscles, some barbaqued chicked and beef, a cucmber salad, and something other than sticky rice. after i played shithead with a couple of the kids, bought some oreos to share and the germans broke out their chocolate, which i don't even have to say was hella good. anyway, i had an early night, read for a bit and went to sleep. we woke up at seven, had breakfast and then boated back to the docks. it was great boat ride back in, staring at the rocks, appreciating everything, doing some yoga and a little half work out. it was nice.
anyway, that's it for now. i just met back up with charlie and we are headed to cambodia in da morning. that's only in da morning.
lates.
p.s. pics posted on google+. here's the link:
https://plus.google.com/100425108117169097988?hl=en&tab=h#photos/100425108117169097988/albums/5672576968041058465
it was amazing! super, the place is absolutely stunning and picturesque. the tour was so-so, just meeting the other people on the boat (2 germans, they brought chocolate, 4 swedes, 2 aussies, 1 belgian and portugese couple, 4 italians, a brit, and an italian and kenyan couple; a bag of mixed nuts) and just floating around halong bay was worth it though. it started out as a four hour bus ride from hanoi to the bay. i got a two night three day tour with all the food included, which was nice; but we had to pay for drinks. i remember we got there and pretty much threw our crap in our rooms and had lunch, it was good, seafood, rice, some tofu dishes. a little better than i expected. then started our trip to a cavern. trip was beautiful, all of us were on top of the boat taking pictures and just reeling from the ethereal aspect of this other worldly place. the cave was so-so, it was cool, but packed and everyone was just bunched up taking pitures. so, i kinda just charged through, took some choice shots and got back outside for some air and just to gaze, transfixed. next, we boated over to an area where we could swim, which was awesome. i jumped off the top of the boat first thing, had to, didn't have a choice... i had to do a flip as well. we all swam around for a little bit and then went over to a sea village to kayak. the sea village felt kinda contrived like the cave; but it was neat to be able to just kayak at the bottom of these giant mountians of rocks just breaking up out of the water, and going through other little caves to bay enclosures and soaking it all in. we got back to the dock and i made friends with a dog and when i would try to walk away but he would put his jaws around my wrist like plumas does whenever i she her. it was a nice moment because i really would like a dog when i get home and also made me miss home a bit. the captain and our tour guide picked out some fish we would take back on the boat and cook up for dinner. dinner was excellent, we had a spring roll making class, and had the fish and some other dishes and some ha long beers. things were mellow after that for a bit, we all sat around talking and bullshitting and drinking beer. that is until one of the dudes on the boat came in and introduced himself to everyone and said it was karaoke time. the sounds of crickets filled the boat. there aren't even crickets there. so, this is it, this is my time. be brave, i'll never see these people again... i pound my beer, get up and tell them to put, "genie in a bottle" on. hahah, apparently i have great forsight as i was driving around reno in the week leading up to my leaving and that song came on. i thought, this is such a shit song, it's like four lines repeated for three or so minutes of the worst shit imaginable; and that's when it hit me that i HAVE to use this as my karaoke song. and i made my mind up right there that it would be and i have never even sang karaoke. hahaha, so i did it. it wasn't great, fuck, it wasn't even good; but i had a great time and there is something releasing about being able to face that particular fear and put yourself out there. other people started to sing and they announced that if you scored a 100, you could get a free drink. so, what do you know, i had a little competition with the vietnamese and this uruguayan that was my roommate. i won't come out and say i had a definitive win; but, i did. it was blast. after going to bed i had a great conversation with the uruguayan about his life, and how he'd been in new zealand for the past year and how it was time for him to go home and find a wife and start and family and how he had been feeling pressure from his family for this and also that he wanted to, was ready. it was cool, i just listened and weighed in when i had something to say.
the next day, i woke up a little slow from being karaoke champion. heavy is the crown, as they say. breakfast was so-so but it was food, and then we boated over to cat ba island. cat ba island is this giant national park, conservation, and study area. we had a choice, go on a hike or do a bike ride. i chose the hike. the hike, like all the ones i've been on here is straight up. i don't think they believe in switchbacks. but then again, that is pretty hard to cut into the jungle and all the rock that is here. so straight up it is. i wore my flip flops, a swedish couple and gonzalo (my roommate); were all laughing and asking if i was gonna be alright. they don't know this is the same kid that use to climb moutains barefoot at jamison and get chewed out for it. i was good but it was kinda sketch at the top with all these smooth stones worn from usage and then the slick hard packed clay trail on the way down too. but i made it! when we got to the top it was amazing. miles and miles of these rock structures. you would think, awe, the same thing; but it's just breath-taking. and then there was this fucked up, like fire tower above it like 40 ft, with a narrow stair case and steps the are so tiny. and then, the shit is hella old and rusted through in places to boot. but i had to. i climb this death trap, and the fucking stairs and wire, so your just looking through them as you climb and get higher and this gives you a little dizziness and you're not looking at where you put your hands when you hit a rusted through spot and cut yourself and get tetanus. hahha, i'm kidding i didn't cut myself; but there's a high probablity of it happening. so i get up, almost to the top, and i look at the platform... and shit you wouldn't believe it but i'm staring at peoples' feet and legs. i shouldn't be seeing that i'm thinking there's wood there. hahah, some wood. hella planks are missing and cracked and basically all of us up there are sticking to where we can see the metal below that. i'm shitting in my pants, some bees have built a nest up there, there is a ferocious wind and too many people on this questionable platform. but it's sick. i can now see the other side of this island and it's just unreal. we take some pics very quick like and get the fuck off of it. we hike down, i get a drumstick at the bottom of the hill and it's awesome. my shirt is sweated through twice over and this ice cream is the best thing i've ever had. we meet back up with the rest of the group and head over to monkey island. monkey island is this little resort with bungalows about a twenty minute boat ride from cat ba. it's really pretty cool, but not in an over extragant way. our bungalow is pretty spartan and there is a giant rock coming up in the bathroom floor but this adds a little something to the place. we get the lunch, some more good seafood and i get the best lemonade of my life. we get the afternoon to do whatever we want, kayak to where you can see the monkeys, chill, swim, play volleyball, read, whatever. i go swimming and do some yoga on the beach, it was pretty nice since i haven't taken the time to do a lot of it here. i read for a bit on the beach, just staring at this mountians, take a nap, play volleyball with some other kids, take pictures of the sunset and then get back in the water for a minute. it sounds like a did a lot there but it was so relaxed and so chill that it felt like nothing. it was seriously a great afternoon. i didn't kayak over to see the monkeys as i'd heard their kind of aggressive and basically just didn't feel like it. dinner was awesome that night, we had some two different kinds of muscles, some barbaqued chicked and beef, a cucmber salad, and something other than sticky rice. after i played shithead with a couple of the kids, bought some oreos to share and the germans broke out their chocolate, which i don't even have to say was hella good. anyway, i had an early night, read for a bit and went to sleep. we woke up at seven, had breakfast and then boated back to the docks. it was great boat ride back in, staring at the rocks, appreciating everything, doing some yoga and a little half work out. it was nice.
anyway, that's it for now. i just met back up with charlie and we are headed to cambodia in da morning. that's only in da morning.
lates.
p.s. pics posted on google+. here's the link:
https://plus.google.com/100425108117169097988?hl=en&tab=h#photos/100425108117169097988/albums/5672576968041058465
Saturday, November 5, 2011
from hoi an to ha noi
so, i guess the last time i write was in hoi an. a lot of shit has happened since then and some miles have been put up. we are now in ha noi by way of ninh binh. our last day in hoi an we had some tailored pants made, i had some like hippie pants made and charlie had some like parachute pants made. they are pretty cool and comfortable plus we talked the lady down quite a bit. she originally wanted to charge me something like 400,000 dong; but we talked her into 420,000 for two pair, so it was like 12 dollars a piece. not bad for some custom shit. anyway, we were glad to get out of hoi an as it had too much of a touristy feel to it, even though that marble moutain was sick. so we caught the bus to ha noi. charlie was so cramped and uncomfortable within a few hours and we spoke with this kid from belgium who said he was getting off the bus in ninh binh and we had heard about some cool shit to do there so that became our new destination en route.
we got there about 5 in the morning after about a 15 hour bus ride with no place to stay and pretty much no plan. luckily, there are usually like 100 motorbikes and taxis waiting. here, one dude, saying we could rent in his motel across the street for 5 bucks a night. worked for us. the cool shit we had heard about was that it was like halong bay on land. halong bay is a crazy bay full of islands that just jutt out of the water, with apparently a bunch of caves as well. the particular national park we went to was call Trang An. charlie's got a bunch of pictures here:
https://plus.google.com/100425108117169097988?hl=en&tab=h#photos/103796131705116769000/albums/5670695812952437393.
it was seriously cool, amazing, and beautiful. what was also really great is that we had a canadian from vietnam in our little boat for the tour. he kind of interpreted everything the lady rowing the boat spoke about. it was pretty cool. the area had been used 3 times in the history of vietnam as a place of refuge for the emperor when the mongolians attacked. being that the place is surrounded by massive rock moutians and swamps, i'd say it was a good place. we were sure to be told that the vietnamese defeated the mongolains all three times they attacked. each time they made refuge, a different emperor would build a different base camp and temples to pray at. these left some pretty cool ass temples surrounded this surreal landscape. we learned that some of the temples that we were seeing were about 1000 years old. pretty cool stuff. check out the photos, as i can't even begin to describe what it looked like. as i walking around the place, i kept wandering off, into keeping pace with the walking, what i would eat later, and all of these banal thoughts; i had to stop myself and really take a look around. this is what i had come here for to see this different and strange landscape; row boating through caves under enormous rock mountians and seeing far east buddists temples. it was really amazing and i was so glad that i could get out of my own head and just appreciate where it is that i am and are doing and really be happy in the moment. check out charlies photos, is all i can say; i'll try to post some later but for the time being i have no way to get them up.
so after this tour, we went and got some lunch. hahaha, it was just a normal lunch of chicken and rice, not some weird shit this time; and went to hoa lu. hoa lu is one the ancient capitals of vietnam and was pretty cool. it was in the same landscape as trang an so surround by the same type of moutains and swamps. i am not sure of how old it is and there were not many people to guide you around as it was pretty shit weather out. we did get to climb another mountain to look over the whole city and that was pretty cool.
as we got back to ninh binh and it was rush hour. our motorbike skills had to quickly engage as it was pretty mad. luckily we made it through and had to have a few beers to amp down. after that we went to go have noodle soup at a place we had breakfast at the day before. the dude running it was crazy and loved us because we had hit his tobacco bong. seriously they are all over the north, at kiosks, at shops for sale and people just ripping them all over. we had to tried it, right, we're here. so he loved us and was teaching us how to hit it the best and just straight speaking vietnames at us. we had no clue but kept laughing and smiling because he would and he was so full of enthusiasm. so we were gunna go back for dinner. dude feed us pho and both of us were thinking how jealous christian would be that we're just macing pho day after day and how delicious it always is. this was super good and we learned that the old dude ran the shop with his wife and two sons and was so proud of his family. it was really pretty cool. we hit the pipe again, just to make sure our technique was okay and then he was trying to rush us out; we thought saying he was going to shut down and sleep for the night. we had shots of rice wine with his son and then broke out... to chuch with this old dude. now, here we are in vietnam after a crazy day doing this sick tour, motorbiking our asses off, putting back some beers, hitting the tobacco bong with this dude, taking rice wine shots with his son and this guy takes us to saturday night mass. it was a trip. we had no clue what was going on, where he was taking us... and it's to mass. hahah, we both stayed as we felt out of respect and spoke about how it had been years since we'd been. it was sobering, like the moment i'd had earlier at the park; here i am and i can't believe what i'm doing. it was cool though, and we were both pretty happy that this old guy had shared that with us.
we left the next day to catch the local bus to ha noi. the local bus was pretty scary. dudes trying to pass like 4 trucks with another semi heading straight at us and motorbikes on all sides. i've said it before and i'll say it again, i am waiting to see a crash. i don't want to, but i think it has to happen. i see like 15 near, and i mean near, misses walking two blocks. haven't seen it yet though. it had been pretty hazy in ninh binh and we both commented on it but couldn't decide what from. on the way to ha noi we saw some massive strip mining on the sides of the freeway (if you could call it that) and some concrete plants, maybe. anyway, a shit ton of people drying rice in their drive ways straight on the asphalt on the side of the road and all i could think was i'll probably be eating that later. garbage fires on the side of the road as well, blocking out all site for the drivers. bathrooms with no toliets just holes in the ground, the shower and the toliet with no divider, construction workers in flip flops, for a while on the drive all i could think about were the bigger differences between our cultures. by the time we got to ha noi, i had decided the haze was pollution. it's pretty hazy here as well. it might be gross, but i know by the fact that my buggers are black. now i know why they are all wearing face masks when they drive.
despite that, i am enjoying ha noi. i went for a good run around the big lake in town, hoan kiem; and we both got lost for hours on our own. we haven't been doing too much here, just walking around and taking it easy. drinking bia hoi's for 5000 dong a piece, so that's like a quarter. there is a whole section of the tourist part of town were you can go to all of these kiosks and drink them from kegs. charlie is getting his india visa from the place here in town; that takes like 5 days, so i am breaking off to take a tour of halong bay while he holds it down here for a couple of days. i'm pretty excited, it's like a 3 day/two night tour where one night i'll get to sleep on the boat and another in some bungalows on monkey island. it's weird walking around ha noi knowing my parents were here only a few years ago and maybe they have walked down the same streets or ate the same street meat, i know pops would. but they both really wanted me to do halong bay so there i'll be tomorrow and i'm sure it'll be great.
hopefully some fucking pictures soon!
we got there about 5 in the morning after about a 15 hour bus ride with no place to stay and pretty much no plan. luckily, there are usually like 100 motorbikes and taxis waiting. here, one dude, saying we could rent in his motel across the street for 5 bucks a night. worked for us. the cool shit we had heard about was that it was like halong bay on land. halong bay is a crazy bay full of islands that just jutt out of the water, with apparently a bunch of caves as well. the particular national park we went to was call Trang An. charlie's got a bunch of pictures here:
https://plus.google.com/100425108117169097988?hl=en&tab=h#photos/103796131705116769000/albums/5670695812952437393.
it was seriously cool, amazing, and beautiful. what was also really great is that we had a canadian from vietnam in our little boat for the tour. he kind of interpreted everything the lady rowing the boat spoke about. it was pretty cool. the area had been used 3 times in the history of vietnam as a place of refuge for the emperor when the mongolians attacked. being that the place is surrounded by massive rock moutians and swamps, i'd say it was a good place. we were sure to be told that the vietnamese defeated the mongolains all three times they attacked. each time they made refuge, a different emperor would build a different base camp and temples to pray at. these left some pretty cool ass temples surrounded this surreal landscape. we learned that some of the temples that we were seeing were about 1000 years old. pretty cool stuff. check out the photos, as i can't even begin to describe what it looked like. as i walking around the place, i kept wandering off, into keeping pace with the walking, what i would eat later, and all of these banal thoughts; i had to stop myself and really take a look around. this is what i had come here for to see this different and strange landscape; row boating through caves under enormous rock mountians and seeing far east buddists temples. it was really amazing and i was so glad that i could get out of my own head and just appreciate where it is that i am and are doing and really be happy in the moment. check out charlies photos, is all i can say; i'll try to post some later but for the time being i have no way to get them up.
so after this tour, we went and got some lunch. hahaha, it was just a normal lunch of chicken and rice, not some weird shit this time; and went to hoa lu. hoa lu is one the ancient capitals of vietnam and was pretty cool. it was in the same landscape as trang an so surround by the same type of moutains and swamps. i am not sure of how old it is and there were not many people to guide you around as it was pretty shit weather out. we did get to climb another mountain to look over the whole city and that was pretty cool.
as we got back to ninh binh and it was rush hour. our motorbike skills had to quickly engage as it was pretty mad. luckily we made it through and had to have a few beers to amp down. after that we went to go have noodle soup at a place we had breakfast at the day before. the dude running it was crazy and loved us because we had hit his tobacco bong. seriously they are all over the north, at kiosks, at shops for sale and people just ripping them all over. we had to tried it, right, we're here. so he loved us and was teaching us how to hit it the best and just straight speaking vietnames at us. we had no clue but kept laughing and smiling because he would and he was so full of enthusiasm. so we were gunna go back for dinner. dude feed us pho and both of us were thinking how jealous christian would be that we're just macing pho day after day and how delicious it always is. this was super good and we learned that the old dude ran the shop with his wife and two sons and was so proud of his family. it was really pretty cool. we hit the pipe again, just to make sure our technique was okay and then he was trying to rush us out; we thought saying he was going to shut down and sleep for the night. we had shots of rice wine with his son and then broke out... to chuch with this old dude. now, here we are in vietnam after a crazy day doing this sick tour, motorbiking our asses off, putting back some beers, hitting the tobacco bong with this dude, taking rice wine shots with his son and this guy takes us to saturday night mass. it was a trip. we had no clue what was going on, where he was taking us... and it's to mass. hahah, we both stayed as we felt out of respect and spoke about how it had been years since we'd been. it was sobering, like the moment i'd had earlier at the park; here i am and i can't believe what i'm doing. it was cool though, and we were both pretty happy that this old guy had shared that with us.
we left the next day to catch the local bus to ha noi. the local bus was pretty scary. dudes trying to pass like 4 trucks with another semi heading straight at us and motorbikes on all sides. i've said it before and i'll say it again, i am waiting to see a crash. i don't want to, but i think it has to happen. i see like 15 near, and i mean near, misses walking two blocks. haven't seen it yet though. it had been pretty hazy in ninh binh and we both commented on it but couldn't decide what from. on the way to ha noi we saw some massive strip mining on the sides of the freeway (if you could call it that) and some concrete plants, maybe. anyway, a shit ton of people drying rice in their drive ways straight on the asphalt on the side of the road and all i could think was i'll probably be eating that later. garbage fires on the side of the road as well, blocking out all site for the drivers. bathrooms with no toliets just holes in the ground, the shower and the toliet with no divider, construction workers in flip flops, for a while on the drive all i could think about were the bigger differences between our cultures. by the time we got to ha noi, i had decided the haze was pollution. it's pretty hazy here as well. it might be gross, but i know by the fact that my buggers are black. now i know why they are all wearing face masks when they drive.
despite that, i am enjoying ha noi. i went for a good run around the big lake in town, hoan kiem; and we both got lost for hours on our own. we haven't been doing too much here, just walking around and taking it easy. drinking bia hoi's for 5000 dong a piece, so that's like a quarter. there is a whole section of the tourist part of town were you can go to all of these kiosks and drink them from kegs. charlie is getting his india visa from the place here in town; that takes like 5 days, so i am breaking off to take a tour of halong bay while he holds it down here for a couple of days. i'm pretty excited, it's like a 3 day/two night tour where one night i'll get to sleep on the boat and another in some bungalows on monkey island. it's weird walking around ha noi knowing my parents were here only a few years ago and maybe they have walked down the same streets or ate the same street meat, i know pops would. but they both really wanted me to do halong bay so there i'll be tomorrow and i'm sure it'll be great.
hopefully some fucking pictures soon!
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
it's life as you know it.
just some small shit. we rented motorbikes today and road to marble mountain. it was super sick. there were like 5 pagodas and 6 caves alll with shrines. it was the coolest religious momument we have been to so far. the ride there was about 15 km, and i totally tried to open up on the road, got that bitch up to 80 km/h. not that fast when you convert but still super fun. this vietnamese lady started a conversation on the road and asked where we're from and charlie replied, america and she dropped a super awesome on us; it was pretty funny. she let us park our motorbikes at their family marble shop while we visited the mountain. on the way home we both almost died, trying to pass a cart and a big fucking car mashing on the wrong side of the road trying to get by some tourists on bicycles. seriously like threading the needle. it was cool that we lived. we stopped for some dinner at a bbq joint after that and there was mad weird food, pig intestines, chicken feet, pig ear, pig tail, i don't even know what else. i thought we were going to keep our weird food trend up but we eventually just bought chicken and rice. it was super delicious and we both wanted to ask for a receipe but they spoke no english. after when we were about to leave, i asked the dudes at the table what they were eating and they gave me a bite and a shot of rice wine. i took both and a dude at the next table spoke good english so i asked him what it was and he said intestine and ear and all the random shit off a pig. wasn't bad, just salty and a bit fatty on some parts. so continues our daring each other to eat weird shit. i would have probably never went this far, foodwise, if charlie wasn't here; so i'm happy for that. not sure what else to write, hoi an is a bit of a tourist trap and we want to get to an area to post up and get to know the neighborhood and not spend so much money. even though shits hella cheap. have a good one, i hope every one is awesome and i'll try to post some pictures soon.
later,
nick
later,
nick
Monday, October 24, 2011
new thoughts and what we've been up to.
a few quick thoughts about vietnam and her people. i think these are some of the friendliest people i've ever met. everyone we've done business with has been super nice and very thankful when we have come back to their store or resturant or a motorbike ride. they all want to talk and know where we are from and when we say america, they always say, "cool." so if we find a place we like we usually have been going back again and getting ideas from them on what to do in their city. it's been good advice so far. the kids all want to say hello, so they follow us around saying hello like 10 times, it's pretty funny. also, the country is beautiful; but the amount of trash is incredible. there's no real garbage cans, so people just pile up little pastic trash bags on the streets and a bicycle cart will come by and pick up occasionally. this leaves time for the rats and dogs to get into the trash and spread it all over. the traffic is congested to huge degree and the highways are littered with trash. the motorbike rides are still fun as hell though.
oh, and i saw some like 5 year olds smoking. it was surreal, the kids from the sand dunes that took us out there, i shouldn't have paid them.
so, we are now in Hoi An, just got in this morning at 7 AM after the all night 12 hour bus ride. it was a long time and we were kinda packed. next to some other americans though, and no one tried to rob charlie. although, i'm pretty sure my giants hat got kiped. i guess these things happen. the overnighters are decent to lay down in but made for the super skinny people and charlie's tall ass is usually hanging over the edge by like two feet. we split a bottle of wine on there so we could get sleep a little easier, still the back of the bus smells like fumes and you bounce around a ton.
last time i wrote we were in Mui Ne, the day we left we treated ourselves to a little spa day. hahahah, pretty funny but nice. got some salt scrubs, manicures, pedicures, and full body massages for 20 USD. not gonna lie it was pretty nice. that night we drank with this spaniard ramon before getting on our first all night bus to Nha Trang. after everything ramon said, he would say, "it's okay," and shrug his shoulders. he was pretty cool though and we diced and drank with him until he ran out of money and then i took chuck for a fair bit of cash.
we got to Nha Trang at about 6 or 7 in the morning and had a motorbike guy take us to a cheap hotel. i thought were were getting a good deal in Mui Ne for a cheap place for 5 USD a night, i mean it was stinky and there were cockroaches but it's 5 bucks. either way, the new place was 3 USD a night, hahah, not bad. no other kids and the sheets and blankets they gave us were pretty sketch but i guess that happens when you are bumming it. the weather was pretty poor the first couple of days there so we ended up playing cards and watching the rugby world cup by this pool at this microbrewery. it cost about a 1.50 to chill and use the pool for the day. i didn't know it was a microbrewery until we got there and nearly lost it when they had some beer that was darker then a lager. seriously, it wasn't that good but it was amazing. so that was pretty fun and we got to hangout with some other travellers which we hadn't really got to before cuz we kind of avoid the super popular places but also that combined with the state of the places we've been staying i don't think many other people stay there. anyway, we went out to dinner and drinking with them that night and had a good time in general.
the next day we got a motorbike ride to the market and setup a trip with the dudes to do some tourist shit the next day. the market is crazy. it looks like makeshift tents and spots but with so much stuff out we thought they might just never close. not sure if that is true but each store, you can't even call them that, stall i guess, had so much shit out. weird things, dried fish, dried shark, flip flops, clothes, fake watches, fake sunglasses, fake everything, fruit, meats, people were gambling on horse race chess (i watched but had no clue what was going on), people were sleeping in their stalls, shellfish (charlie ate one, said it was super good), and every other thing you could imagine. the place had some unique smells, you could say in the least. we walked the 2 km back to the hotel checking out some of the alleys in town. there are the main roads in town but then there are all of these alleys. they are way crazy and cool, it's seems that they are mostly where people live, but there are lots of kiosks (we've eaten a lot of street meat and kiosk food, some good, some fairly questionable), and we saw a gym (using concrete plates), motorbike fixing shops, and maybe some resturant houses. we've eaten in a lot of resturant houses too. the best pho we got in Nha Trang was at one of these and it was probably the cheapest pho we had too at like 1.50 USD; 30,000 Dong. the money is crazy, everytime i pull cash out of the ATM i'm a millionaire. i always knew i'd make it some day. we also got a porkchop meal in one of the house resturants too and it was for under a buck. you can easily spend like 6 or so dollars a meal to or charlie and i have usually been splitting 6 dollar meals.
the next day the motorbike guys picked us up at 10 AM for our tourist shit. we didn't really know the plan but whatever. they first took us to two temeples in town, one a little newer where charlie got scammed into buying some postcards for like 400,000 dong, it's only like 20 bucks but it was still pretty funny, they told him it was for an orphanage though; so he has that going for him. i said that was too much and then offered 40,000 dong. i never figured that charlie would be the bigger sucker. the second temple was more of ruins that had been restored, pretty cool, on a hill overlooking most of Nha Trang. the we went on about a 45 minute motorbike ride on the highway out to a place where we could check out a waterfall and do some swimming. it was a little hike and we had to pay to get in but it was pretty fun. the water was really nice but both of us were a little sketched about getting in as it had been raining and the water was pretty merky. it was super freshing though. another motorbike ride back to town where we spoke with the dudes about where we could get some snake for dinner. they said, yeah, we know a place. we'll be back to pick you up at 6. so cool, we're gonna eat some snake. hahahah.
at 6 they came by and off we took into the sticks to get to the place. we get out there and we're about to sit down but they go, no, come back and pick out a snake. hahahah. here it gets a little trippy. they got some bags full of snakes, some little ones, a bag with a bigger one and then a bag with a cobra. niether of us had seen a cobra and wanted to get that but it was 2 million, so we got the other big one. i'm not sure what kind of snake it was but it was black and yellow stripped. so, they get the snake and half a liter of vodka and go back to our table. the dude straight cuts the snakes head off and drains all the blood in this vodka, which we're about to drink up! they bring some shot glasses out and we pour 4 shots out, two for us two for the motorbike guys, learn the word for cheers (yo) and gut it. now you would think it might taste different but it mostly just tastes like vodka. we have a couple shots of that and some of the best freshly roasted peanuts i've ever had, when the chef brings out the still beating heart. we got it on video, i swear to god, and charlie chews that shit up like a boss, i got video of that too. he said it wasn't that bad and kinda just tasted like the vodka. we cheers some more with the motorbike guys, until a little grill is brought out to cook the snake on. we picked out 2 types of grilled snake and then snake soup. plus there was this little chubby kid that was absolutely bananas with his family, but this little guy gets up and starts like spasing all over the place, pretending that he's cheersing with us and eating; just making weird motions and bobbing and weaving all over. but he's funny as all get out. we got video of that too. so they bring the first type of snake out to grill an some soy sauce one with peppers in it and one without to dip it in. the sanke is wrapped up in some type of leaf then grilled. and you know what, it wasn't bad. it was actually pretty good. there's lots of bones in it but you just chew through them. we have some beers with the meal, get super excited that we did some crazy shit and take pictures with the owner, the cook, and the motorbike guys. it was definitely a trip.
the next night we ate grilled frog and szchewan clams at this place that had been right next to our hotel for super cheap. stoked cuz neither of us had ever eaten frog before and it was pretty good and the clams were out of this world but mad cuz we were on the night bus outta Nha Trang when we discover the place. so it goes.
anyway, we are in Hoi An and this place is famous for buying custom clothes. you can get custom suits for as cheap as 50 USD but maybe drop more on some better material. probably not in our budget but who knows, we were thinking about getting some party suits...
oh, and i saw some like 5 year olds smoking. it was surreal, the kids from the sand dunes that took us out there, i shouldn't have paid them.
so, we are now in Hoi An, just got in this morning at 7 AM after the all night 12 hour bus ride. it was a long time and we were kinda packed. next to some other americans though, and no one tried to rob charlie. although, i'm pretty sure my giants hat got kiped. i guess these things happen. the overnighters are decent to lay down in but made for the super skinny people and charlie's tall ass is usually hanging over the edge by like two feet. we split a bottle of wine on there so we could get sleep a little easier, still the back of the bus smells like fumes and you bounce around a ton.
last time i wrote we were in Mui Ne, the day we left we treated ourselves to a little spa day. hahahah, pretty funny but nice. got some salt scrubs, manicures, pedicures, and full body massages for 20 USD. not gonna lie it was pretty nice. that night we drank with this spaniard ramon before getting on our first all night bus to Nha Trang. after everything ramon said, he would say, "it's okay," and shrug his shoulders. he was pretty cool though and we diced and drank with him until he ran out of money and then i took chuck for a fair bit of cash.
we got to Nha Trang at about 6 or 7 in the morning and had a motorbike guy take us to a cheap hotel. i thought were were getting a good deal in Mui Ne for a cheap place for 5 USD a night, i mean it was stinky and there were cockroaches but it's 5 bucks. either way, the new place was 3 USD a night, hahah, not bad. no other kids and the sheets and blankets they gave us were pretty sketch but i guess that happens when you are bumming it. the weather was pretty poor the first couple of days there so we ended up playing cards and watching the rugby world cup by this pool at this microbrewery. it cost about a 1.50 to chill and use the pool for the day. i didn't know it was a microbrewery until we got there and nearly lost it when they had some beer that was darker then a lager. seriously, it wasn't that good but it was amazing. so that was pretty fun and we got to hangout with some other travellers which we hadn't really got to before cuz we kind of avoid the super popular places but also that combined with the state of the places we've been staying i don't think many other people stay there. anyway, we went out to dinner and drinking with them that night and had a good time in general.
the next day we got a motorbike ride to the market and setup a trip with the dudes to do some tourist shit the next day. the market is crazy. it looks like makeshift tents and spots but with so much stuff out we thought they might just never close. not sure if that is true but each store, you can't even call them that, stall i guess, had so much shit out. weird things, dried fish, dried shark, flip flops, clothes, fake watches, fake sunglasses, fake everything, fruit, meats, people were gambling on horse race chess (i watched but had no clue what was going on), people were sleeping in their stalls, shellfish (charlie ate one, said it was super good), and every other thing you could imagine. the place had some unique smells, you could say in the least. we walked the 2 km back to the hotel checking out some of the alleys in town. there are the main roads in town but then there are all of these alleys. they are way crazy and cool, it's seems that they are mostly where people live, but there are lots of kiosks (we've eaten a lot of street meat and kiosk food, some good, some fairly questionable), and we saw a gym (using concrete plates), motorbike fixing shops, and maybe some resturant houses. we've eaten in a lot of resturant houses too. the best pho we got in Nha Trang was at one of these and it was probably the cheapest pho we had too at like 1.50 USD; 30,000 Dong. the money is crazy, everytime i pull cash out of the ATM i'm a millionaire. i always knew i'd make it some day. we also got a porkchop meal in one of the house resturants too and it was for under a buck. you can easily spend like 6 or so dollars a meal to or charlie and i have usually been splitting 6 dollar meals.
the next day the motorbike guys picked us up at 10 AM for our tourist shit. we didn't really know the plan but whatever. they first took us to two temeples in town, one a little newer where charlie got scammed into buying some postcards for like 400,000 dong, it's only like 20 bucks but it was still pretty funny, they told him it was for an orphanage though; so he has that going for him. i said that was too much and then offered 40,000 dong. i never figured that charlie would be the bigger sucker. the second temple was more of ruins that had been restored, pretty cool, on a hill overlooking most of Nha Trang. the we went on about a 45 minute motorbike ride on the highway out to a place where we could check out a waterfall and do some swimming. it was a little hike and we had to pay to get in but it was pretty fun. the water was really nice but both of us were a little sketched about getting in as it had been raining and the water was pretty merky. it was super freshing though. another motorbike ride back to town where we spoke with the dudes about where we could get some snake for dinner. they said, yeah, we know a place. we'll be back to pick you up at 6. so cool, we're gonna eat some snake. hahahah.
at 6 they came by and off we took into the sticks to get to the place. we get out there and we're about to sit down but they go, no, come back and pick out a snake. hahahah. here it gets a little trippy. they got some bags full of snakes, some little ones, a bag with a bigger one and then a bag with a cobra. niether of us had seen a cobra and wanted to get that but it was 2 million, so we got the other big one. i'm not sure what kind of snake it was but it was black and yellow stripped. so, they get the snake and half a liter of vodka and go back to our table. the dude straight cuts the snakes head off and drains all the blood in this vodka, which we're about to drink up! they bring some shot glasses out and we pour 4 shots out, two for us two for the motorbike guys, learn the word for cheers (yo) and gut it. now you would think it might taste different but it mostly just tastes like vodka. we have a couple shots of that and some of the best freshly roasted peanuts i've ever had, when the chef brings out the still beating heart. we got it on video, i swear to god, and charlie chews that shit up like a boss, i got video of that too. he said it wasn't that bad and kinda just tasted like the vodka. we cheers some more with the motorbike guys, until a little grill is brought out to cook the snake on. we picked out 2 types of grilled snake and then snake soup. plus there was this little chubby kid that was absolutely bananas with his family, but this little guy gets up and starts like spasing all over the place, pretending that he's cheersing with us and eating; just making weird motions and bobbing and weaving all over. but he's funny as all get out. we got video of that too. so they bring the first type of snake out to grill an some soy sauce one with peppers in it and one without to dip it in. the sanke is wrapped up in some type of leaf then grilled. and you know what, it wasn't bad. it was actually pretty good. there's lots of bones in it but you just chew through them. we have some beers with the meal, get super excited that we did some crazy shit and take pictures with the owner, the cook, and the motorbike guys. it was definitely a trip.
the next night we ate grilled frog and szchewan clams at this place that had been right next to our hotel for super cheap. stoked cuz neither of us had ever eaten frog before and it was pretty good and the clams were out of this world but mad cuz we were on the night bus outta Nha Trang when we discover the place. so it goes.
anyway, we are in Hoi An and this place is famous for buying custom clothes. you can get custom suits for as cheap as 50 USD but maybe drop more on some better material. probably not in our budget but who knows, we were thinking about getting some party suits...
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
maybe some karma
i feel like an asshole. that last entry might have been a little too crass and not very good with giving Vietnam fair treatment. but i got a bit of karma to balance that out, i lost my sunglasses this morning trying, just trying mind you to stand of a paddle board. sucks. it wouldn't have been so bad except the glasses where a gift from a friend and had some sentimental value. spiritual connections through material items. their gone now... so it goes.
anyway, so things i might have skipped over yesterday. RATS! there were some huge fucking rats in Ho Chi Minh, like these guys were big enough to eat a big cat. the pollution there was pretty crazy, but not so much more than that i've seen elsewhere. charlie was commenting that he had been trying to keep his use of plastic down in the states but comes here and wonders if it matters. it all matters but it is crazy to see. also, i mentioned that the Vietnamese ride motorbikes. i'm pretty sure that it's required that every person has at least one. and to load up a family of four on one, and ride around with like 15 cases of pepsi or a fucking pile of rebar held over your head. it's mad to see. charlie noted that they are masters of packaging and weight distribution. guaranteed! the round abouts are insane as well. i keep looking for crashes, like every other minute, but have yet to see one. we did rent one and have decided it's pretty much the best. looking to rent one in Hanoi and ride them to Halong Bay and Sapa when we're up north. backpacks and all, should be legendary.
some more pics
a VC trap with bamboo spikes at the bottom.
charlie teaching everyone that it's cool for a real man to drink out of a silly straw.
jade emperor palace
inside
me and our favorite street vendor lady in ho chi minh
opening hole to climb down into the Chu Chi tunnel system. americans too fat from smoking marijuana and eating burgers too fit we were told.
the food has been terrific and cheap. although, every time you spend money you think it is so much as you're dealing in at least the thousand and partly with hundreds of thousands. i changed money at the airport and was given 2 million dong, which was a 100 bucks. beers are like 50 cents, the pho is for real and mangoes and other tropical fruits hella good. Mui Ne is a seafood town so we've been trying that as well.
more to come at some point.
anyway, so things i might have skipped over yesterday. RATS! there were some huge fucking rats in Ho Chi Minh, like these guys were big enough to eat a big cat. the pollution there was pretty crazy, but not so much more than that i've seen elsewhere. charlie was commenting that he had been trying to keep his use of plastic down in the states but comes here and wonders if it matters. it all matters but it is crazy to see. also, i mentioned that the Vietnamese ride motorbikes. i'm pretty sure that it's required that every person has at least one. and to load up a family of four on one, and ride around with like 15 cases of pepsi or a fucking pile of rebar held over your head. it's mad to see. charlie noted that they are masters of packaging and weight distribution. guaranteed! the round abouts are insane as well. i keep looking for crashes, like every other minute, but have yet to see one. we did rent one and have decided it's pretty much the best. looking to rent one in Hanoi and ride them to Halong Bay and Sapa when we're up north. backpacks and all, should be legendary.
some more pics
a VC trap with bamboo spikes at the bottom.
the food has been terrific and cheap. although, every time you spend money you think it is so much as you're dealing in at least the thousand and partly with hundreds of thousands. i changed money at the airport and was given 2 million dong, which was a 100 bucks. beers are like 50 cents, the pho is for real and mangoes and other tropical fruits hella good. Mui Ne is a seafood town so we've been trying that as well.
more to come at some point.
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Ho Chi Minh to Mui Ne
what's going on??!! so, charlie and i are now in mui ne. we spent about 2 days in ho chi minh city; it was mad. charlie said it best, it's like playing Frogger trying to cross the streets. There are SO many motorbikes and then buses and cars, it's unreal, and most intersections people just charge, no rule no order, just go. ho chi minh wasn't bad, we spent one day trying to walk to the Jade Emperor Pagoda; got lost as shit and then took our first motorbike ride. that was pretty much the best part of the Jade Emperor Pagoda. we both thought it was going to be like this like sacred temple and there would be people leading you through or some kind of monastic seriousness to the whole thing. NOPE. it looked like people were living there, there were dishes stacked all over, empty sodas with like a sip left, and the one dude carrying a TV around with his shirt off smoking. it wasn't bad, just totally different than expected.
so, the next day we decide to wake up early and do the Chu Chi Tunnels, which was alright. it must have took 45 minutes to get out of ho chi minh, just this sprawling metropolis. the first stop was handicap handicrafts, so all these people who got fucked up from Agent Orange and bombs and mines making handicrafts. it was weird, i felt more like the people who owned it were just getting cheap labor for this shitty artworks. but maybe i'm jaded. we make our way to the tunnels next and the they sit us down and go through this whole schtick about how the tunnels were built how many levels there were, 3 just so you know and just kept pounding it us how much smarter the Viet Cong were than the US G.I.'s cuz we could only kill the people in the first level by dropping bombs and that the VC used red chili's and pepper to mess up the dogs sense of smell trying to find out where the tunnels were. the history of and crawling through the tunnels was really pretty cool, the propaganda of the tour, not so much. but whatever. so, it's also hella late in getting back to Ho Chi Minh, and charlie and i had booked a bus to leave to Mui Ne at 3.
so, we get back at like 3:15 and have to charge to the travel/tour office and they get us on the back of motorbikes and are like, cool, we gonna charge and catch the bus. it was insane, literally bananas. we have to race back to the hostel pick our our backpacks and then get on the back of these motorbikes to charge across town to catch the bus. these dudes were nuts, running red lights, mashing, it was suicidal; but the greatest fun ever. both of us have giant backpacks on, i'm holding on with one hand holding my day pack with the other going like 45 km/h. we catch the bus, adrenaline straight pumping and get on. hahahah, it was surreal.
what is supposed to take 4 1/2 hrs to Mui Ne takes like 6 at least and we get here at 10 at night with no place to stay. first order of business, get a bed. the bus worker who is on there, basically just to make sure things run smoothly says i got a place you can stay it's 10 USD. so we're like we'll check it out. turns out it's 5 a night and just a dump, charlie and i are like perfect. so, we're paying and this south korean lady is trying to complain that there's cockroaches in her bed. pretty nasty so that's the first thing we check in our room. it's stinks in the place but we don't really care.
we been two days in Mui Ne and so far it's been awesome. yesterday we mostly chilled, had a stellar breakfast with all sorts of tropical fruit including what looks like white kiwi and is super delicious. drank some beers at the beach and then played hacky sack with about 5 kids who were collecting bottles from tourists on the beach. today, we had breakfast at the same place and then immediately rented a motorbike and charged out to the red sand dunes to see em and do some sand sledding. again, some kids showed us the way and took pictures, it was pretty cool. on the way back to pick up the motorbike we haggled the price with the kids, they ask for some massive amount to money and charlie and i talk em down. charlie and i have pretty much perfected it by now and just play good cop bad cop. they say their price and one of us will say something way lower and we both walk away. they chase after and try for the original price, again way lower. but now one of us will stay and be like, "no, he wants it for the lower price." and so on and so forth until we come to an acceptable price.
it's been fun so far and there's still a ton to come.
so, the next day we decide to wake up early and do the Chu Chi Tunnels, which was alright. it must have took 45 minutes to get out of ho chi minh, just this sprawling metropolis. the first stop was handicap handicrafts, so all these people who got fucked up from Agent Orange and bombs and mines making handicrafts. it was weird, i felt more like the people who owned it were just getting cheap labor for this shitty artworks. but maybe i'm jaded. we make our way to the tunnels next and the they sit us down and go through this whole schtick about how the tunnels were built how many levels there were, 3 just so you know and just kept pounding it us how much smarter the Viet Cong were than the US G.I.'s cuz we could only kill the people in the first level by dropping bombs and that the VC used red chili's and pepper to mess up the dogs sense of smell trying to find out where the tunnels were. the history of and crawling through the tunnels was really pretty cool, the propaganda of the tour, not so much. but whatever. so, it's also hella late in getting back to Ho Chi Minh, and charlie and i had booked a bus to leave to Mui Ne at 3.
so, we get back at like 3:15 and have to charge to the travel/tour office and they get us on the back of motorbikes and are like, cool, we gonna charge and catch the bus. it was insane, literally bananas. we have to race back to the hostel pick our our backpacks and then get on the back of these motorbikes to charge across town to catch the bus. these dudes were nuts, running red lights, mashing, it was suicidal; but the greatest fun ever. both of us have giant backpacks on, i'm holding on with one hand holding my day pack with the other going like 45 km/h. we catch the bus, adrenaline straight pumping and get on. hahahah, it was surreal.
what is supposed to take 4 1/2 hrs to Mui Ne takes like 6 at least and we get here at 10 at night with no place to stay. first order of business, get a bed. the bus worker who is on there, basically just to make sure things run smoothly says i got a place you can stay it's 10 USD. so we're like we'll check it out. turns out it's 5 a night and just a dump, charlie and i are like perfect. so, we're paying and this south korean lady is trying to complain that there's cockroaches in her bed. pretty nasty so that's the first thing we check in our room. it's stinks in the place but we don't really care.
we been two days in Mui Ne and so far it's been awesome. yesterday we mostly chilled, had a stellar breakfast with all sorts of tropical fruit including what looks like white kiwi and is super delicious. drank some beers at the beach and then played hacky sack with about 5 kids who were collecting bottles from tourists on the beach. today, we had breakfast at the same place and then immediately rented a motorbike and charged out to the red sand dunes to see em and do some sand sledding. again, some kids showed us the way and took pictures, it was pretty cool. on the way back to pick up the motorbike we haggled the price with the kids, they ask for some massive amount to money and charlie and i talk em down. charlie and i have pretty much perfected it by now and just play good cop bad cop. they say their price and one of us will say something way lower and we both walk away. they chase after and try for the original price, again way lower. but now one of us will stay and be like, "no, he wants it for the lower price." and so on and so forth until we come to an acceptable price.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)