Trip Superlatives

We're in Singapore now.  Just went for a swim in the pool and sat in the jacuzzi for a bit.  Tarik's playing some free XBox while I write.  This airport is great for having a 6 hour layover.  Here are some wrap-up bests/worsts of the trip:

Favorite Country: Thailand
Favorite Big City: Saigon
Favorite Small City: Chiang Mai
Best Swimming: Ha Long Bay
Best Aquatic Scenery: Koh Tao
Best Land Scenery: Sapa
Worst Touts: Phnom Penh
Most Upset Tarik was: Koh Tao restaurant when it took forever to get our french fries.  (Tarik didn't actually order fries but the rest of us did and we had all basically finished our meals before they were brought out.  If you know Tarik you know why he got upset about this.)

Most Upset I was: Phnom Penh when a bell hop asked for a tip.  We had been on an awful 5 hour bus ride followed by being attacked by tuk-tuk drivers, brought to a crappy hostel in the middle of nowhere and then to a crappy hotel in downtown PP.  We had asked to see a room and had left our bags there after deciding we wanted it.  We then went back down to check in.  The bell hop then "showed us the way" up to our room that we already knew where it was, turned the lights on, pressed power on the air con remote, pressed power on the TV remote and couldn't actually get the TV to work.  Then before he left he had the nerve to ask for a dollar tip.  I was steaming.

Coolest Temple: Angkor Wat
Best Hostel: Spicy Thai, Chiang Mai
Worst Hostel: Hometown Hotel, Phnom Penh
Best Run: Around the Chiang Mai Park
Worst Run: Lost in Sihanoukville
Wish I Had Seen: Central Vietnam, Laos
Could Have Done Without: Sihanoukville, Phnom Penh
Best Food: Northern Thailand
Best Meal: T House, Bangkok (Tarik will say the Soup Lady in Saigon)
Best Looking Females: South Vietnam
Hardest to Understand Locals: Chiang Mai
First Place I'll Return to: Southern Thailand
Most Underrated: Thai Cooking Course
Most Overrated: Hanoi Temple of Literature
"How the Hell did we get here" Moment: Chumphon at 3:30AM watching the World Cup finals

I'm going to add some more pictures to this blog when I get back and will give a link to all of the pictures that I put up on Picasa.

Also, I hope to continue this blog once I get back to the States as I will be mostly on the road for the next month as well.  It will probably become more of a focus on 3 things: Drinking, Running and Traveling; as those are 3 things I love to do and do often.  I will try to write once or twice a week.  If youare interested in following: Great!  If not, I hope you enjoyed it thus far.  If you ahve ideas for me to write about or suggestions for me, send them to: peter.sneeringer@gmail.com

Ha Long Bay, Hanoi and the end of the trip

Sadly, it's coming to an end.  Today was our last day in Vietnam.  Haven't blogged in a while so here's a quick recap of the past 5 days:

We caught an overnight train back from SaPa to Hanoi.  We had a sleeper car this time which was infinitely better than the trip up there, though I still couldn't extend fully in the bed.  We arrived at our hostel at 6AM for a noon check in so we ditched our bags and went in search of air con.  Hanoi is miserably hot.  It's high 90's and humid everyday.  I wasn't feeling well after the train ride and napped about 4 times that day.  We feel asleep at the temple of literature (it was really boring) and got yelled at by a security guard.  We went in search of "food street" and found some outdoor stalls to have a nice seafood lunch.  Went to a night market that night that apparently only sold bra's and phone accessories and shoes.

The next day we left early for 3 days in Ha Long Bay.  It was beautiful.  The first day we spend on a boat, traveling through the hundreds of large steep rocky islands covered in trees that fill the bay.  We kayaked around some islands, went into a cave and dove off the boat.  The food on the boat was great (squid, shrimp, make your own spring rolls, etc) and the rooms were surprisingly spacious.  The next day we got dropped off on Cat Ba Island, the biggest in the bay, and opted to cycle around the island as it was too hot for trekking.  We saw Hospital Cave which is a very large cavern that was used as a hospital during the war.  It had 3 floors, 17 rooms and a cinema!

Then we went to Monkey Island, a private island owned by the tour company.  There we meet up with the other boat from our tour company that had all the fun young people on it and the trip got much better.  We swam, played soccer on the beach, kayaked, ate some great food, played drinking games, partied with a Vietnamese man whose daughter had just gotten accepted to college so he bought everyone 3 rounds of beers!  It was great.  (Note: These Scottish guys taught us the greatest "drinking" game ever.  It's not so much a drinking game as a game to play while you're drinking.  It's basically the little green man rule from kings - there's a little green man sitting on your drink and you have to remove him before you drink and put him back after - but the penalty for forgetting him, instead of just having to take a drink - not much of a penalty - is that the the man runs away and the rest of the group gets to decide where he's gone, then you have to retrieve him.  Hilarious.  He can go anywhere.  On the bartender's head, in a little kid's pocket, swimming in the ocean... and you can't explain it to anybody until after you've gotten the man.  fantastic.  Anyway...)  We were up late and then woke up early yesterday to catch a bus back to the big island to take a bus across it to catch a boat back to the mainland to take a bus back to Hanoi.  Loads of traveling but really fun.  Unfortunately, I was not feeling well at all.  We got back to Hanoi, showered, ate and crashed.

Today I feel much better though the heat here is unbearable.  We decided to skip the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum as it didn't seem to be that impressive and instead to walk around a market and see the city a little more.  We also napped through the hottest part of the day.  Great decision.  Tonight we got one last bowl of Pho (Vietnamese noodle soup) and have to pack up for the morning flight home.

It's been a great trip.  Tarik and I are still talking which is amazing.  I wish we had 2 more weeks to see Laos but I'm grateful that I got to spend this long and now I have something to come back for.  I didn't get a chance to run in Vietnam but it is way too hot here anyway. 

Leave at 1:30 tomorrow afternoon, 6 hours in Singapore - going to the pool and possibly the spa - then 12 hours to Frankfurt and 7 to New York.  Get in at 11AM Tuesday.  Back to the good ole US of A.

How many people would like a peanut butter stout if I brewed it?

If you think you would like a peanut butter stout, please comment on this post.

In other news, Tarik and I are in SaPa, leaving in an hour to go back to Hanoi.  This place is great.  I love it.  Especially when Tarik gets totallyfreaked out by the young village girls at the bar.  They looked 12.  The only bad part about this town is the massages.  Apparently somebody told them that a foot massage consists mostly of hitting and prodding my calves for 29 minutes and pushing some weird thing into my feet for the last minute.  It was not relaxing or fun and it kinda hurt.  It appeared they were doing the same thing to the guys getting neck and shoulder massages as well.  No more Vietnamese massages.

Forgot the mention in the last post the multiple times we had to stop or motorbikes to left bulls ridden by little boys cross or a man taking his pigs for a walk down the road to get out of the way.  Things I've come to expect and not think are out of the ordinary.

I'll be home in a week.  Things I'm excited for about America:

• Showers that are separated from the rest of the bathroom by some sort of curtain, glass, door, anything
• Bathroom that aren't always wet
• Flushing toilet paper down the toilet
• Mexican food specifically a burrito
• Pizza
• A cheeseburger
• Non-bottled water
• Everything not being wet all the time
• Not sweating constantly (although Sapa has been a nice change from that)
• My own bed
• Things happening around me that I understand
• Trash cans
• Not being harassed by every motorbike driver or woman selling something
• Waiters that don't had you the menu and then hover over you until you order
• Beer that tastes like something
• Sour patch kids
• Cheese

Things I'm going to miss:

• Meals that cost less than $3
• Going wherever we want ­whenever we ­want
• Haggling
• Meeting random people
• Beaches
• Trekking
• Temples
• The randomness of traveling

Cambodian and Vietnam Pics

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Tarik and Jui out NagaWorld Casino.

Tarik putting on his pink Mickey Mouse helmet before getting a moto ride to the soup lady.

Me drinking Che a dessert drink filled with many types of sweet beans, tapioca, pomegranate and coconut cream.

Our Mekong River guide pulling a full bird out of a jar of Snake Wine.

Me holding a 50 lb python.

Delicious pineapple!

Chicken feet for dinner.

SaPa

Tarik crossing over Silver Falls.

Betty.

The agricultural terraces that surround SaPa on every open bit of hillside.

Houng Lein Mountains around SaPa.

SaPa.

1 week left

Vietnam is cool.  I really like it.  The south and north are very different.  We were in Saigon for 3 days and went to a couple of war museums.  The propaganda there against the US and our "foreign aggression and imperialism" was intense.  It seems that everyone in the country forgot that the South didn't want to be part of the North when the war started.  We haven't really experienced any open dislike towards us but the Vietnamese in general don't seem to be as open to foreigners as the Cambodians and Thais were.  Unless they're trying to sell you something there completely ignore you, cut you in line and honk a lot at you on the motorbikes.  That's the other thing: the motorbikes here are way more intense.  You can barely cross the street and even then you just start walking very slowly and hold out you hand and they will avoid you.  You can't wait for a break in trafic because there hardly ever is one!  It's very intimidating at first, though I'm used to it now.

The food in Vietnam is very good, though a lot of it is just soup.  Even when you don't think you're ordering soup, you get soup.  Tarik saw a show on TV before we left about "the soup lady" in Saigon so we spent a morning searching for her.  We wandered for a while in the area we knew she was in and finally a woman who spoke no English but clearly knew what we were looking for started yelling and pointing.  We followed her directions and found it.  It was totally worth it.  She had a small roadside stand where she boiled 3 large vats of soup with unknown meats in it.  We didn't order anything she just pointed us to a table and gave us each a bowl and a plate of spring rolls.  It was delicious, we think there was a beef sausage and duck meat in the noodle soup.

The next day we did an overnight in the Mekong River Delta.  We took boat rides all around the river and the small canals through the area.  The tour brought us to a coconut candy making "factory," a rice wine "distillery," a honey bee "farm" and many small towns along the river.  The river itself was brown with silt and provide the most fertile soil in southeast asia. That is where a huge percentage of exported rice to the world is grown.  That night for dinner we attempt to get some bbq chicken from an authentic Vietnamese food stall.  We ended up with chicken feet!  They looked gross and didn't really have any meat on them.  They didn't taste like anything other than the chilli sause they were bbq with and most what was edible on them was skin and cartiledge.  We paid and then went to get pizza afterwards.

The following morning we went to a large floating market that was full of houseboats with people buying and selling fruits and vegetables.  I ate one of the most delicious pineapples I've ever had.  Then I watched a woman kill, gut and scale 3 fish in about 45 seconds. 

Saigon itself feels like the first real city we've been to.  It has a financial part of town and its economy is not based on tourism.  Bangkok was like this but we mostly only saw the touristy parts.  We flew up to Hanoi in the north, bypassing many awesome sounding beach towns on the way up the coast.  We went straight to the train station to buy a ticket to the mountain town of SaPa.  Unfortunately there were no more sleeper cabins available, so we had standard bus-like seats for this 9 hour overnight train.  It was miserable.  The a/c in our cabin wasn't really working (every other cabin was nice and cool) and we sat right next to a sliding door which didn't stay shut and banged open and close every time the tarin turned.  I knew it wouldn't be comfortable so I drank a bit hoping it would help me sleep, which it did except that when we arrived at 4 AM I was hungover and had to sit in the rear of a minibus as it bounced and turned it's way for an hour and a half up the mountains to Sapa.

It was totally worth it now that we're here though.  This town is awesome!  It's a small French-style town near the China border.  There is lots of hiking and mountain villages around.  We went to the market yesterday where the villagers were selling all sorts of handmade goods.  Then we went for a hike up the closest mountain.  Unfortunately it's always cloudy so the mountains in the distance are hard to see but that is offset by the fact that the low clouds are constantly moving and moving quickly.  This gives the scenery a different feel every 10 minutes or so because you can seee new things in the distance and others are hidden.  Today we rented motorbikes and drove around the winding mountain roads.  We hiked up to a huge waterfall and drove over a pass to see some distant villages inthe valleys.  It was all incredibly beautiful and I wish we didn't have to leave tomorrow.

Ok that was long enough. I'm going to try to upload some pictures now as well.

Cambodian and a few Vietnamese Brews

First off: I totally forgot to write about the Cambodian kareoke that seems to be on tv's everywhere even sometime when you can't hear the music.  It was on in restaurants, loud bars, in stores, even on the bus rides!  And the best part was the music videos that go with the songs.  Each one went as follows.  A man looking lonely sitting on a beach or looking at himself in a mirror.  Then he sees the girl he likes.  He sneaks up behind her and surprises her.  Together they go to look at some statue of something - usually the girl hides behind a dragon and the guy doesn't know where she is, then she jumps out.  They laugh. They almost kiss, something interrupts them and then they hug and run down the beach.  SCENE.  Hilarious.  Hours of that on the bus is very entertaining.

Anyway, to more important things like beer:

Cambodia:
Angkor:  It's everywhere!  Almost every bar has banners for it and sells it for $.50 - $.75 draught.  It's very drinkable.  Like a Bud Light.  Refreshing but not too much taste going on.

Anchor:  I'm convinced that this is exactly the same as Angkor.  But not in the same way that Coors light and Keystone Light are the same.  These two taste exactly the same and sell for the same price.  Why would the company do that?  Also, sometimes I'd order an Angkor and get an Anchor because they sound the same.  ABV: ~4.5%

Klang:  Has a white can with a gray elephant on the front.  Looks like a terrible beer.  Tastes like nothing.  Absolutely nothing.  I could only tell that I was drinking a carbonated liquid, could haev been any liquid.  I wasn't going to get one but Tarik surprised me with one the last night in PP because he wanted me to try it.  ABV: 6%

BeerLaos:  Surprisingly good.  I guess the people of Laos only have 1 beer to drink so they make it good (supposedly Laos governemtn doesn't allow other beers into the country).  Dark and foamy.  A nice dark lager.  ABV: 6.3%

Phnom Penh:  Surprisingly good for a can that looked like the label was faded and falling off.  A lighter lager that pretty sweet.  Went down well when we were watching Bruno.  ABV: 5.5%

Vietnam:
333:  Liek drinking a warm Chang.  Awful.  Enough said.  ABV: 6.2%

Saigon: Really good drinkable beer.  Actually, I think this reaction was just because I drank it right after I drank a 333.  But it was drinkable.  Like a nice cold PBR.  The first one out of the 30.  Also it came in a half liter bottle which is always nice.  ABV: 4.6%


There's a good selection of beer here including Coors Light, Budweiser (but not Light), Carlsberg, and Heineken.  Will have to try them all!

Headed to the Mekong River Delta tomorrow morning for an overnight trip to see the countryside, floating villages and markets, and who knows what else.  Will blog about that and Saigon when I get back.

Cambodia is a strange place

Not even including my ridiculous run, Cambodia is a strange place.  It's hard to feel comfortable there and almost one an hour Tarik and I would be absolutely completely confused as to what was happening.  It is dirtier than Thailand, less busy but more chaotic and although it's not that big, everything seems difficult to get to and it's very noisy.  In Phnom Penh at least.

We arrived back in PP last night after taking a bus from the coast.  The bus was excellent - they gave us water and a snack and a cold towel to wipe our faces with.  However, when we got off the bus, we were thrown back into the deep end of the busy city full of pesky tuk-tuk drivers.  It felt like we were the chum that attracts sharks.  As we got off the bus there was a gate around the area to allow the passengers to gather their bags that were stored underneath.  As soon as I grabbed my bag (I was the last person off the bus) the tuk-tuk drivers were allowed in.  They had been shouting and pushing to get our attention the moment the bus turned onto this street.  Now they swarmed all the foreigners.  I did my best to ignore them and the 4 men around me mostly gave up on me.  Tarik was talking with some Germans to find out where we were and the men were shoving maps in their faces and pointing to pictures of hotels saying they'll take them their for "real cheap."  Once we found out we were a block from the riverfront we booked it out of there, much to the dismay of the drivers.  One actually followed us in his tuk-tuk for 2 blocks until he finally gave up on us.  It was over-whelming, clostrophobic and annoying.

The rest of Phnom Penh isn't nearly this bad but I still didn't love the city.  The market just as crowded as Thailand but the owners are less aggressive and the smell of fish is everywhere.  There were chickens laying around waiting for their heads to be chopped off when a customers purchased one, live crabs being put in bags for people to take home, and fish everywhere.  Live fish, dead fish, dried fish, fish paste.  It smelled awful!

Also, there are beggars everywhere.  The beggars here are different from Bangkok because many of these people have be injured by mines and have lost limbs.  Some are just begging and others are selling sunglasses or books that nobody would ever want to read.

The Tonle Sap river is pretty to look at - much cleaner than the rivers in Thailand and the riverfront is frequently occupied by games of soccer.  We met up with a friend's sister, Jui, who has been working for an NGO in PP for 18 months.  She took us out to dinner and then to a bar for her friend's birthday.  We then went to the casino.  This was a very strange site.  It was just like any casino in the states, but when placed in the poor struggling city of PP it felt very out of place.

The following day we took a history lesson at S21 prison and the "killing fields" were victims of the Khmer Rouge were first held captive and tortured and then executed.  It was a very sobering day learning about the thousands of prisoners killed during the civil war that nearly destroyed the country.  It was similar to going to Dachau, the concentration camp outside of Munich, except that I knew much more about what happened there than I did about the Khmer Rouge reign.

We are now in Vietnam.  The trip here was much easier than getting into Cambodia.  The bus company took care of almost everything.  I nearly had to kneel when they wanted to take my picture at the border because the camera was set to the height of Cambodians. 

I'll blog about Cambodian beer soon.

Never Running in Cambodia Ever Again. Ever

So I was gonna write about how miserable the minibus ride from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh was - I felt like Shaq on an airplane - and then about the city of PP but instead I've got 12 minutes to write about my ridiculous run today in the little beach town of Sihanoukville.

Let me start by repeating that it's a beach town.  And it's barely stopped raining since we got here and is monsooning as I write this.  There's nothing to do here except go to the beach.  So I decided to run.  Bad idea.

I figured it was cool enough for a 45minute run.  I brought my iPod thinking there wasn't much to see anyway and it would help me run well.  The first 3 miles were great.  I ran along the pretty white sand beaches for a bit all the way up to the secluded Independence Beach that was occupied only by a few pale middle-aged men in Speedos.  Then I ran up some steps to a beautiful, ocean view hotel.  I decided that was far enough out and I would try to head back but via an inland route.  I had brought a map and 5000 riel in case I needed anything.

On the way down the hill from the hotel I noticed some people in the street taking pictures of the jungle.  I stopped, pretty confused because I didn't see anything noteworthy in the trees.  I soon realized there was a family of monkeys along the fencetop playing and eating bananas.  They were really cute.  I watched them for a while.  Then I continued on.  A half mile later, I came across a herd of cattle waltzing down the middle of the street - with no apparent supervision.  I navigated my way between the cows and the residue they left behind on the pavement, trying to decide if that would seem strange to a Cambodian or not.

Then I found near the beach I had been running on previously, so I turned left to go more inland.  After 10 steps up this road, a struffy looking black dog took interest in me, trotting up swiftly to me and barking.  As I increased my pace away from him 2 more smaller dogs filled in the formation behind the bigger one.  I picked up my pace to 3 quarters speed as the adrenaline was really pumping and I wondered if this was all really happening.  Luckily, as I clenched my fists and turned around I saw the dogs were falling behind and losing interest.  I slowed down a bit but kept checking behind me for the next 5 minutes.

From there I ran down the street that was in the middle of nowhere and the only person I saw was a man waist deep in his rice paddie.  Then the road starting going uphill.  At this point I realized I had definitely made a wrong turn but I wasn't going back towards the dogs so I ran up the hill.  It stretched out for a painful 3/4 mile.  When I finally got to the top of the hill, lungs and legs burning, I turned right onto the main street and was pissed to see that the road went straight back downhill into the city center.  About here is when my run went bad.

I was struggling to breathe at this point - my lungs and back hurt when I took deep breathes so I slowed down my pace.  In the city center I thought I had about a mile left and would just run it slowly.  I saw a sign that said Sokha Beach turn right and that was the beach right near our hostel.  So I turned right.  After going down a bunch of sidestreets, in what I thought was the direction of the beach, I was pretty lost.  Looking at the map I thought I knew where I was.  Then I saw a sign for a hospital and there was only one hospital on the map so I figured I must be near that one which was a block in the wrong direction but very close to the hostel.  Turns out the "hospital" was nothing more than a one room doctor's office and the street it is on is a dead end, but isn't a dead end on the map...interesting.  I went back to where I thought I could turn onto the main road that our hostel was on, but there's no main road.  After walking around for about half an hour (I stopped running because I was tired) I popped back out on the main road in city center a block before I had turned right off the road!

From here I walked down the main street a few blocks further, until I saw a sign for Sokha Beach again.  But this time the sign said to go straight!  A block later there was a sign for the Golden Lions which is the statue 100 meters from our hostel.  I've never been so happy to see a street sign that I recognized!  I ran the last mile or so at a good pace as my lungs were recovered at this point.  As I ran down the last hill, I had to move to the sidewalk for a parade of monks carrying flags and playing instruments as they marched up the hill.  I don't know what it was all about but it was definitely a sight to see.

I got back and Tarik asked if I had been kidnapped.  "Yup.  Thanks for your concern."

Abbot and Costello go to Cambodia

Are we going to see a temple now?
A wat.
A what?
A wat.
What what?
Angkor Wat.
Angkor what?
Yea, it's a big buddhist temple.
What is?
Exactly.
Exactly what?
No, Angkor Wat.
What's the name of the temple.
Angkor Wat's the name of the temple.
That what I asked you.  And why are you calling me Angkor.
I'm not calling you Angkor.  I'm calling Wat Angkor.
You're calling who Angkor?
No.  Wat.
What?
Exactly.

I was going to blog about going to Angkor Wat and watching the sunrise over the temple and seeing its reflection in the pool, but I forgot my notebook so here's the quick synopsis:

We woke up at 4 to be at the temples before sunrise.  Angkor Wat is the biggest (just the moat around it is 200m wide!) and best preserved of the dozens of temples in the complex.  It was built in the 1100's and is still in great shape.  We watched the sunrise over it and then went to 7 other temples that morning.

Angkor Thom: the old city housing many of the temples.  At one point 1 million people lives within the wall.  Now the walls are pretty crumpled but the gates are still in tact and have monkeys climbing around on them.

Bayon:  Really cool temple that you could climb all over.  The king who built it ordered the face of one of their gods to be etched into the four sides of all of the 54 spires in the temple, but apparently those faces look more like the king than the god.

Temple of 1000 elephants:  I don't know if there were 1000 but there were a lot carved into what was left standing of the front wall of this temple.

Ta Prohm:  Where parts of Tomb Raider was filmed!  Awesome temple that has been overtaken by the jungle.  The trees have their roots all entangled in the walls and our over 100 ft tall.  I got lost and way off the path that I was supposed to be on which made this temple way cooler than it might have been otherwise.

Other highlight:  A girl selling drinks and painting struck up conversation with me and when I told her I was from the states she began listing all of the states and their capitals!  This was impressive.  Then she started grilling me about state capitals and their largest cities!  Luckily I'm pretty good at geography.  I was so impressed I bought a cocunut from her for 2000 riel = $.50.

I also went for a run in Siem Reap but barely last 2.5 miles as it was hot at 10AM and the exhaust from motorbikes made my lungs burn.  I ran along the river running through the city, which is incredibly dirty: brown, stagnant and filled with trash.  I also (accidentally) ran through a markey along the river selling everything from clothes to fish to TVs.  The market took plpace in front of the people's homes so they had a storefront and behind that was their 1 room home.  This looked very impoverished until I realized many of the houses had TVs and computers in them.  Strange.

In Phnom Penh now.  It's big and dirty and smelly, but has some cool neighborhoods and a semi-clean river that's pretty.  Will detail more later.  Headed to the beach tomorrow for the weekend!

24 hours to Cambodia

We were in Koh Tao.  A taxi, a ferry, a bus ride, another taxi, another bus ride, a government bus, another taxi and a tuk-tuk later we are in Siem Reap Cambodia.

The trip here just as crazy as the trip to the islands the first time, but this time we knew (more or less) what we were in for.  The ferry dropped us off at the same pier, where we waited for 2.5 hours before boarding a bus - got to skip the minibus with the cough syrup drinking driver this time!  That got us into Bangkok at 3 AM.  Luckily it dropped us off in an area that we knew because otherwise we would have been totally disoriented and at the mercy of the taxi and tuk-tuk drivers.

From there we hopped a taxi to the bus station, which must not be used by many foreigners because nothing was in English.  After a great deal of confusion and some running through the station, we boarded a bus to Aranyaprathet, the town on the Thai side of the border with Cambodia.  Our book said we would have to take a tuk-tuk to the border but the bus actually dropped us of right at the border.  We didn't recognize this right away though and everyone you ask is trying to scam you so it's very confusing.  After ignoring at least 30 men telling us we had to buy a Cambodian Visa before leaving Thailand (and trying to charge us way too much money) we found the Thai immigration office.  We filled out the paperwork and crossed a bridge to leave Thailand.

Once entering Cambodia and going through a quarantine checkpoint, a very helpful Cambodian government worker showed us step by step how to enter the country and get a visa and everything.  We got our visas, took a government bus to the bus station where we met an Aussie man who had been scammed 3 times at the border but was still in good enough spirits to split a taxi to Siem Reap with us.  We each paid $10 US.  (They use US dollars here for whatever reason, though everything below $1 is in Riel notes which exchange at about 4200 riel to the dollar.  It's way confusing to get and give change.)  The 2 hour drive was a good introduction to Cambodia.  The rural towns are clearly very poor and impoverished.  More so than in Thailand.  The houses were mostly one room shacks, often on stilts to protect against floods, and often with uncovered windows or even whole walls.  There were irrigation ditched in front of each house that protect against flooding, water the crops and probably serve as drinking water too.  the countryside was lush with green bushes, palm trees and crops.  It was pretty and like nothing I've ever seen but very poor.

We made it to our hostel finally and collapsed as it took us nearly 24 hours of traveling to get here.  We had man tuk-tuk drivers approach us wanting to take us to the temples and after choosing the one that Lindsay and Leah (Tufts friends) used I felt bad telling the others we didn't need them.  Everybody here is very friendly and has good English so it makes it seem more rude and harsh when I ignore them.

We met up with Lindsay and Leah for dinner that night.  It was great to see some familiar faces in a strange new land.  I ran yesterday and we went to Angkor Wat today which I'll write more about tomorrow but here's a few pictures:

Angkor Wat at sunrise.

Tarik's famous half-opened eye.

The front of the temple.

Ta Prohm.  The temple where Tomb Raider was filmed.  It's over taken by the jungle!

You for Scuba today?

It's been awhile.  I should probably tell you all about scuba divin because I'm sure you're dying to know.  So here goes:

We signed up for the PADI Open Water course which is 4 dives taking us up to 18 meters and teaching the basics of scuba diving.  There were 9 people in our course, all of them were couples (except the english dude who's girlfriend didn't want to do it).  That's pretty much how the entire island was.  Tarik and I make a cute couple I think.  Our instructor Marcel was a crazy Dutch man who told ridiculous stories.  He definitely made the boring parts of the course entertaining.  The first night we had to watch 2 hours worth of boring videos.  Then the next day we learned most of the basics and then went into the pool for the whole afternoon.  In the pool we practiced all of the skills we would need to have for diving in the ocean including: obtaining neutral bouyancy, clearing water from our masks, regulating and checking how much air we use.  I thought most of the skills would come naturally but I found that I would breathe much more shallowly than I should and it was difficult to relax at first underwater.  Breathing through the regulator was very strange at first.  It feels like the air is being shot into your lungs so you inhale very quickly but then exhale forever.  Also, my jaw got very sore from biting down too hard on the mouthpiece.  It took me a long time to ease up on that because I was worried it would fall out.

On the first 2 dives I was nervous about equalizing my ears as the pressure feels very strange.  You have to plug you nose and try to blow through it every foot or 2 while decending to equalize the pressures.  I got much more comfortable with this later on.  I seemed to relax a bit once we got to the bottom and rested on the sand but i had a hard time finding neutral bouyancy and found it difficult to control where I was floating.

The 3rd and 4th dives on the next day were much better than the first 2.  I was able to control my breathing and bouyancy much better and actually had time to look at what was going on around me underwater.  The 4th dive had visability of almost 15 meters which was way better than the first 3 so it was cool to see all of the fish swimming around and coral at the bottom.  There were lots of angelfish and damselfish (the orange one from the pictures).  On this dive we went to 16.5 meters but after about 10 meters you don't notice the change in depth except that it gets a little bit harder to see.

We decided to continue on and do the Advanced Open Water course which makes us certified to go to 30 meters depth anywhere in the world.  The first dive we went down to 28.2 meters.  It was much darker and difficult to see at this depth on this site.  With lower visability the group has to stay close together and then everybody is always running into each other.  At one point I was above Tarik and he rose up kinda quickly and all of the sudden his air tank was between my legs.  Our instructor happened to be looking back and he nearly spit out his mouthpiece he was laughing so hard!  Unfortunately nobody in our group got nitrogen narcosis - which makes you act buzzed and high because of the depth - but usually that doesn't start until after 35 meters or so.  Our instuctor was really hoping one of us would be it's hilarious.  No dice though.

On the 6th dive they told us how to use dive computers and to navigate the dive site and after 20 minutes underwater sent us off in our pairs by ourselves.  This was cool as we could take our time and go wherever we wanted.

The 7th dive was a night dive.  Unfortunately the dive site we wanted to go to was too rough and it would have been difficult to get on and off the boat so we had to switch to a shallower, less exciting site.  That meant we didn't get to see any big fish or barracudas and there was a lot of silt on the site so the visability was terrible.  The colors that usually come out when you shine your flashlight on the coral weren't really there.  It was a totally different feeling though being in the dark and seeing only a few beams of light in the water.  Also at once point everyone turned off the lights and moving around in the water lit up the bioluminscent planktons.  It was really cool, all of the little bright green particles floating around us.

The last 2 dives had incredible visability compared to the rest: you could see 25-35 meters.  THat makes everything much more relaxed because you can always see the group you are diving with.  We also had an underwater camera on these dives which was fun to play with and try to capture the colors and fish.  At one point I was trying to take a picture of a small bright blue fish with rainbow stripes (I forget the name) and it kept attacking the camera and swimming circles around me. I think I was too close to his home or something but it was quite entertaining.  The last dive the instructors just briefed us and sent us into the water by ourselves - making us true divers.  It was awesome to go at our own pace and navigate the site by ourselves.  I felt very accomplished afterwards.

All in all I loved everything about it.  The island of Koh Tao is beautiful and all the people there are laid back divers (who seem to chain smoke, not cool).  The resort we stayed at was great and so were all of the people in our groups.  I'm totally hooked on diving and can't wait to go again!  We're in Cambodia now will blog about the travels to get here soon.  But want to say that I really enjoyed Thailand and think I could have stayed there for another month and not gotten sick of it.  For the most part everyone is friendly and the food is really good and everything is cheap.  I'll have to come back sometime... Who's with me?

Also, yes I buzzed my head before I came here because I knew it would be too hot with hair.  So far I'm liking it though I'm still not totally used to it.  Gotta do something about the widow's peak...

Scuba and more Koh Tao Pics

I have more pictures but this computer is being difficult with the cd.

 Me underwater.

fishes


Justine and Merius
 
Sea Urchin

Marcel, our crazy Dutch instructor.

Tarik Gearing up

Our Advanced Open Water crew 

Fire Twirler

Me with a bucket of Sangsom

pretty fish

Beers in Thailand

As you know, since I started brewing beer a year and a half ago I've become a told beer snob.  This is a bad thing in Thailand as they have a max of about 5 - 7 beers in any given store/restaurant.  Most have 2 or 3.  However, some are drinkable.  Here's the rundown of the beers:

CHANG:
The national beer of Thailand.  Ubiquitous everywhere we've been.  On the beach, in the Hmong village, on the streets of Bangkok.  Everybody seems to love it.  That must just be because it's cheap.  It tastes like a PBR that's been left out in the sun and rechilled a few too many times.  The first few sips are drinkable but once it starts to get warm, you better start chugging.  The last few sips are brutal.  But, like any beer, the more you drink the easier they go down.  Apparently the hangover is bad too.  ABV: 6.4% though I heard that this isn't regulated and totally depends on the batch.  Sometimes you can get some that are closer to 8%.

LEO:
My favorite beer so far and go to at the bars.  A nice dark lager with a sweeter finish.  Tastes similar to a Sam Adams Boston Lager but a little sweeter.  Was told it doesn't give you the hangover that Chang does though haven't thoroughly tested this theory.  Has a cool tiger on the label which makes no sense because Leo means lion.  Go figure.  ABV: 5.5%

TIGER:
Apparently this has become popular in the States, though I've never seen it outside of Asian restaurants.  It's a darker lager that is totally drinkable.  I think it's a spin off of Leo as they taste about the same and have nearly the same label.  This time the tiger makes sense.  ABV: 5%

SINGHA:
The fancy beer of Thailand.  A bottle of this will run you 10-20 more baht than a Chang.  It's smooth and dark and kinda tasteless.  The label is gold and silver - I think that's why it's more expensive.  ABV: 6%

CHEERS XTRA:
Can't put it better than Tarik did: "That beer smells like ATO!"  It tastes like it too.  Comparable to Natty Ice.  Bought it once and not making that mistake again.  ABV: 6.8%

SAN MIGUEL / SM LIGHT
The national beer of the Phillipines.  A pale ale though not in the sense of american pale ales.  The light is almost completely tasteless - like a Corona Light without the lime.  For some reason they only have the light version in restaurants and I just managed to find a bottle of heavy for the first time today.  It's actually quite good.  Tastes like a Dos Equis.  Apparently Filipino beer tastes like Mexican beer.  Who knew?  ABV: 5%

ASIHA
Japan's national beer.  It's a light pilsner which is much different from the other beers.  It's very drinkable though more expensive than the rest because it has to be imported.  It tastes like Henieken (sp?) and has the same very light color.  ABV: 5.5%

BEER LAOS:
The national beer of Laos.  Supposedly they don't serve any other beer anywhere in Laos.  They export it as well but I haven't seen one since our first trip to Bangkok and I didn't try it then.  Will hopefully find another one soon.

That pretty much sums it up except for Henieken which I don't have to explain to you.  In general all of the beers are sweeter than beers in the States and have a bit higher percentage.  The green Chang labels are everywhere you look.  It's impressive really.  Going to have my first bucket tonight - Saem Song (local whiskey) and pineapple.  Should be an adventure!

Leaving for Bangkok tomorrow afternoon.  A wicked storm blew in this afternoon around 3 and it's still raining.  Guess that means it's time to go.  Will write all about scuba diving tomorrow.

Things to Look Forward to

I don't have time to write a full post right now but here are somethings that you can look forward to reading about:

• Scuba diving courses - including the night dive We're about to go on
• A guest blog by Tarik about the food in Thailand (and coke light and pepsi max)
• A blog about the beer in Thailand
• possibly a blog after I've drank a bucket (it's loaded with whiskey)
• the probably ridiculous journey we will have to take from Koh Tao to Bangkok and then Bangkok to Cambodia

Hope that keeps you hooked....

Pictures

The Grand Palace in Bangkok.

Koh Tao

Where the Hell are we?

Soooo, we got to watch the last 15 minutes of the World Cup Final.  That was probably the most normal 15 minutes of the journey from Bangkok to the island of Koh Tao - and that was in a strange building on a pier in what I can only assume was the town of Chumphon or Chumporn as it was often spelled.  But let's back up.

We made it to the travel agent where we bought our bus and ferry tickets a few minutes before six.  10 minutes later the women tells us to follow a very emo looking Thai man outside.  He told us to stand across the street with a few other people standing with packs.  After  few minutes on the street corner he tells us to follow him: through an alley, into and through a muay Thai training center, down another dark alley to a cafe, where we sat for another half hour until the bus came.  Once on the bus it was ok for the first 3 hours while Avatar was playing, except I think we were going like 40 miles an hour the whole time and stopping every 20 minutes for no apparent reason.

Somewhere along way we dropped a man off in the middle of nowhere on the side of the highway.  Literally the middle of nowhere.  The was a big building in the dstance, nothing on the side of the road except a sign indicating a town was 28 kilometers away.  At this point I took a NyQuil because I thought we would be on the bus for another 6 hours and I wanted to be able to sleep.  BAD IDEA.  An hour later we stopped at a shack on the side of the road for a bland overpriced plate of rice and egg.  I was like a zombie there, couldn't really focus my eyes or carry on a conversation.

I managed to sleep for the next 3 hours until the lights came on and a man told us to get off the bus.  We wre just at the side of the road again.  Our bags lumped in a pile.  He said get into that minibus, pointed to a white minivan, then hopped on the bus and drove away.  We threw our packs in the back and crammed 10 people plus the driver into he van.  I had to sit next to the driver on the front bench sea.  He was drinking cough syrup I'm pretty sure.  The town smelled like rotten fish.  We drove for half and hour, I tried to sleep by resting my head on my 2 liter bottle of water but it didn't work.  So instead I prayed that we didn't crash and that we weren't getting kidnapped - those seemed like the 2 most likely possibilities.  After half an hour of honking at stray dogs lying in the road, we pulled up at the random building and watched the soccer game.  The man told us the ferry would come at 7 am, then drove away.  It was 3:30.

After the game we pulled up a couple of old van bench seats and attempted to sleep.  At sunrise, after buses of people arrived every half hour, the boat came.  We boarded, were accosted by men trying to get us to stay at their hotels, found one from the hotel we wanted and then slept for 2 hours.  After disembarking the boat we followed the hotel man to a free taxi - a pickup truck with bench seats like before except with no cover and were on our way. 

The hotel is great and we started scuba diving today.  More on that tomorrow.

Shrimp Shrimp and More Shrimp

Last night we met up with Kobbie: a friend of my grandfather's who he taught in the 70's.  She lives here in Bangkok.  She and her nephew picked us up form near our hostel and drove us to her house just to see it and then to a Thai/Vietnamese place for dinner.  We were definitely the only white people who had been to this restaurant in a long time as it was a fancy place far from the touristy area.  Kobbie's son and his wife met us for dinner as well.  They were all very nice and we had a great meal and conversation.  Mostly the meal was the center of our convo though as the food just kept coming out and a lot of it was stuff we had never seen before.  I wrote it all down in my journal which is stuffed away in my bags as we prepare for an overnight bus and ferry to the islands tonight but I'll try to remember everything.  We had:

• Spring rolls with fresh vegetables
• Tom Yam - red curry soup with shrimp and veggies
• River shrimp with some sauce and ground up sea shrimp
• Some kind of Fish that was filleted into a spiral with the bones sticking out: It looked awesome before we cut into it
• Roll your own spring rolls with fresh garlic and pork meatballs and peanut sauce
• Mussels in some BBQ-like sauce
• Noodle soup with beef
• There were at least 3 other dishes that I'm blanking on right now
• Dessert for me was coconut milk with tapioca and canteloupe

Everything was delicious and it was the first time since getting here that I was legitimately full and didn't feel like I could eat anymore. Everywhere else the portions are small and we sometimes order 2 meals, which often confuses the waitresses and never comes out like we intended.

Last night we napped from 11-1am and then got up to watch the Germany-Uruguay game.  We watched out front of a bar on a large projection screen with a bunch of Germans, who were all very happy with the result.  Somehow we stupidly thought the finals was tomorrow night instead of tonight and booked a bus to the islands for tonight, so I don't think we'll be able to watch the game :(  Can somebody please write me up a play by play and possible tape the game for me?  That would be much appreciated.  VIVA ESPANA!

Today, we woke up late and headed to the Grand Palace.  After many Thai men tried to scam us into thinking it was closed today and to instead let them show us around, we found it and met an Irish girl avoiding the same scams.  The palace was incredible.  It used to be the home of the king and was decorated as such.  Large golden spires on every building.  Shiny tiles all along the walls.  Tile floors.  Statues of dragons and giant guardians by the entrances to the temples.  The place must have cost a fortune to build and upkeep but it was stunning.  The main attraction was the temple of the emerald Buddha.  Inside this giant temple is a huge altar with crystal and gold, very ornately decorated, atop of which is a small (maybe 2 foot tall) emerald siting buddha statue.  It was a beautiful alter, but a disappointly small statue.

After sweating buckets walking around the courtyards we headed back towards the hostel, stopping for a phalang (sp? Thai version of gringo) sized portion of pad thai and some chicken squewers (sp?).  We just showered, repacked, started sweating again and are now wasting time until our bus leaves.

Can't wait for the islands, though this overnight bus situation will be interesting.

Run Numero Dos

Went for another run yesterday.  Got smarter this time and ran early in the morning while it was still mostly cloudy and not nearly as hot as in the afternoon, though it was still really warm.  I had planned out a good loop around the Chiang Mai University, but when I got to the road I wanted to run down, it turned out to be a large 4 lane road with no sidewalk so I had to improvise aka run down a bunch of dead ends on my way to the university.  The area near the university is much different than the old city.  The buildings are newer and taller (3-4 stories instead of 1-2) and nicer and there are more flashy lights and signs.  The hostel we stayed in was in a gated community (strange?) filled with lots of nice houses with yards and garages: things I haven't really seen since getting to Thailand.

Running down the main streets to the university was difficult as te sidewalks are narrow and the awnings are low.  Everywhere we go I have to duck a lot - guess westerners are taller than asians.  While running down one of the alleys, I realized that often in Thailand the shift from nice neighborhoods to not nice ones is abrupt.  There was a large new apartment building on one side of the street and a rundown shack surrounded by a rusty fence and an unused field on the other side.

After longer than I had hoped and more dead ends than expected I finally found the main gate to the university.  The gate had multiple security guard booths but no security guards.  Interesting.  Anyway, as I ran into the campus I saw a few soccer fields with a mixture of weeds and dirt where the grass should be and a large hedge trimmed in the shape of an elephant.  Jumbos are everywhere here!  I love it.  The only thing more prevalent than elephants are pictures of the king.  He's on overpasses, in rotary circles, on billboards, wall murals, everywhere.

Past the elephant hedge was a temple, which I hadn't planned on approaching for fear that I would offend somebody by my sweat and clothing but then I realized there was a bank tent for people to take out money to donate to the temple.  So I did a lap around the temple and then found the center of campus.  It appears that the campus is it's own little community complete with banks, shops, food vendors and parking lots.  There was less English on the signs than in the rest of the city which I thought was interesting.  The students were wearing uniforms: males in shirts and loosely tied ties; females in collared shirts and skirts.  The campus buildings were mostly nice 2 story buildings and I only noticed one dorm-looking building so I'm assuming most students commute (although that building did have a sign with a 6 on it so maybe there were more...).  Then I returned to the hostel via mainroads because I didn't feel like getting lost, though inhaling the exhaust the whole way was unpleasant.  With my watch dead (the light button got stuck and drained the battery) I have no idea how long I ran for, but I'd guess about 4.5 miles.

I'm about to run out of computer time but a final highlight from Chiang Mai was piling 6 people plus the driver in 1 tuk-tuk on the way back from the bar last night.  That was impressive.  In Bangkok now, had an amazing dinner that will have to wait for the next post.  Headed to Ko Tao island for scuba diving tomorrow night via overnight bus and catamaran.  So long farmer's tan!

Green Curry and Hmong Villages

3 days ago we signed up for a Thai cooking course.  It was taught by a very funny man named Pom, who liked to laugh at his own jokes and tell us about Thai babies named Shit and Fuk.  First, he took us to a market and explained all of the ingredients we would be using and how to buy the good ones.  He showed us 100 year old eggs, which look like a pink Easter egg and smell awful.  Then we hopped in the back of a pickup trunk - these are the only "taxis" in Chiang Mai besides tuk-tuks.  The trucks have covers over the bed and bench seats.  Some are nice and have padding and lights, others are just old and rusty.

Once we got to the cooking school we all put on aprons and got our utensils and our stoves set up.  For each dish we had an option of 3 meals to make.  The first meal I made was coconut milk soup with chicken.  It was delicious.  Then as a whole group we made vegetarian spring rolls with some sauce (i don't remember), papaya salad (really spicy) and sticky rice with mango (my favorite meal - been looking for more ever since).  Then we made 3 courses which we waited to eat until they were all cooked.

I made pad thai with tofu, green curry with chicken over jasmine rice and sweet and sour chicken with stir-fried veggies.  Thai cooking it seems is more about preparation than cooking.  We spent a lot of time preparing the vegetables and little time actually cooking them up.  We learned all about the chilis which are used in almost every dish.  The amount of spiciness depends on how young the chilis are and how many you put in.  Also there are quiet a few vegetables that they add just for flavoring and not for eating: ginger root, chives, and a bunch more that I wrote down but don't have in front of me.  All in all it was a really cool experience and I would like to try some Thai cooking when I get home.

After the cooking course, I went for a Thai massage.  It was quite different from the Swedish massage technique that I learned taking the bodyworks course at Tufts.  Thai massage is more about applying pressure and releasing and stretching than rubbing as Swedish massage is.  I went to the most legit looking massage parlor I could find where I paid 150 baht (~$5) for an hour massage.  First, the woman washed my feet, then gave me slippers and led me upstairs.  She told me to change into the linen clothes they had laid out for me.  The pants must have been size 46 because I had to tie a knot in the waist to keep them on.  The technique for The woman (nice looking, about 35 years old) started with the legs, stretching and pushing on all my muscles, then went to the arms.  These parts felt great.  When she had me turn over to do my back, the pressure was intense.  She was using her feet, knees and elbows to push on me and stretch me.  I was a bit sore after.  I think Thia massage was more intimate than Swedish as the woman was using her whole body to applying pressure and stretch me.  That's just my opinion though.

The next day we started our trek.  We hopped in the back of a pickup with 8 English guys and a girl and 2 guides (one of which stood at the back of truck bed most of the trip and the rest sat on the top) and started driving north.  Along the way we stopped at an orchid/butterfly farm (which was cool as the orchids weren't growing in the ground but hanging from ropes) and a market (where we bought a kilo of tamerands).  Then we ate lunch at a gazebo and sat around for a while.  At this point we thought we might not be trekking at all, though the English guys had sobered up by this point.

Finally we started hiking up through the jungle.  The surroundings were green and lush and wet and the ground was red with clay.  The hike started off easy, repeatedly crossing a little stream, then got steep and hot.  The afternoon sun was burning us as the shade was minimal.  We stopped often for drinks and to catch our breath.  Hearing complaints between gasps in an English accent is very entertaining.  When we got to the top it looked like we had just hiked through an episode of Lost.  The last half mile was through corn fields and rice paddies that the Hmong villages harvest.  We spent the night at the Hmong village at the top of the mountain (the mountains I found out were part of the lower Himalayan foothills!) in a 3 room bamboo hut.  The village had 35 families and countless chickens and dogs running about.  There was sporatical trash embedded in the clay ground around the village.  All of the huts were made entirely of bamboo: bamboo posts in the clay, unrolled bamboo for the walls and floors and shreds of bamboo layered thickly for the roof.  Each hut had a porch area with clotheslines, pots and pans strewn about and a large solar panel.  The outhouse had a spout of rain water and a squat toilet.  From what I noticed the men and women in the village were mostly separated in their tasks and there was little interaction between them.  That night were ate a good meal of yellow curry and rice and then sang, drank and talked with our guides and a few men from the village.  We slept in one big room in the hut under mosquito nets.

The next day, after breakfast of hard boiled eggs and toast with jam, we started downhill.  The trek down was easier than the day before and less exposed.  Though as we got close to a waterfall for a cool down, I slipped on a rock and sliced my hand pretty good.  I'm hoping it leaves a scar so when people ask about it I can say I got it hiking in the Himalayas!  We cooled off under the waterfall and then continued following the river downhill.  The river was brown with silt and minerals.  After another 45 minutes we arrived at the elephant camp where we rode Wallace for about 40 minutes.  He didn't smell very good and was constantly begging us for bananas, which we didn't have because we had left our money back at the camp.  After the ride we ate some pad Thai and then got suited up for "white water rafting."  I put this in quotes because there was one small rapid and the rest of the time was spent splashing the other boats.  Then we switched to bamboo rafts, which were cool for a little while.  They were hard to keep balanced and steer down the river.  We then took a pickup truck back to Chiang Mai.  It smelled awfully of diesel exhaust the entire time and was a miserable hour ride.

Going out with some peeps from the hostel tonight.  Went for a run today - I'll blog about that tomorrow before we head back to Bangkok.  Sorry this was such a long post.  Will try to keep them shorter from now on.

More Pics

I'm too tired to write about the last few days so I'll do that tomorrow but here are some pictures of cooking and trekking:

Types of rice at Thai market.

My green curry with chicken.

Our cooking teacher setting the kitchen on fire.

Tarik at the butterfly and orchid farm.

English guys that complained the whole way up that steep hill.

Mountain village children playing.

Bamboo hut complete with solar panel.

Village children were fascinated by us playing with candle wax.

Me at a waterfall in the jungle.

The elephant we rode.  We named him Wallace.

First Run!

I finally was able to get out running yesterday.  It was scorching hot.  Running in the afternoon is a terrible idea.  Way too hot.

We are in Chiang Mai now, in northern Thailand.  It is much more manageable than Bangkok.  We took a flight up here yesterday afternoon got in around 2.  Flying in I could see green mountains in the distance and it was sunny, not smoggy and hazy like Bangkok was.  Driving to the hostel was an easy trip only about a 10 minute ride.  We're staying in the southeast corner of old city which is surrounded by a "wall" (it used to be a wall but now it's mostly torn down, but there is a canal around this part of town).

I decided to go running around 5 which was too early as the day was still very hot and the sun was still strong.  But I figured a short run would do.  I set out (carrying a city map and 100 baht just in case) along the southern wall.  I ran along the outside of the canal, on a skinny sidewalk where I was constant ducking and juking trees.  The canal water is green in color and there are hundreds of small fish constantly jumping around.  The sun was strong and reflecting off of the water which made it difficult to see.

I thought I would get a lot of funny looks as a foreigner running in the heat, but only one child in the back of a tuk-tuk seemed to pay any attention to me.  I even saw an Aussie man running, which made me feel less out of place.  I followed the canal to the southwestern corner where there was a park that I ran around the perimeter walkway twice.  The park was very green and full of families picnicking by the pond, girls doing crunches on the benchs, schoolboys playing some game, men playing hacky sack but with a collapsible bamboo ball and a handful of runners.  I'm pretty sure running counterclockwise was the wrong way to go because I didn't see anyone else running or walking that way.  Oops!

The park in general was very peaceful and a bit secluded from the busy road I had run down.  I ran back along the other side of the canal, and was constantly fighting the heat, heavy air and exhaust fumes.  I finally was able to make some sense of the traffic pattern as I weaved in and out of cars and motorbikes while crossing the street a few times.  I think all together I ran about 3 miles, judging by time.  All in all it was a good first run, though my knee hurts today and it took me an hour to stop sweating.  Hopefully for my next runs I'll be able to find more interesting places to write about.

Last night we went to a night bazaar.  It was very much like JJ market but not as big and more open aired: it was all just under one huge tent.  The vendors had anything from handmade wooden items, to clothing, to jewelry.  There was a lot going on but it wasn't nearly as overwhelming as the market in Bangkok.  It looked pretty as the lights were large strings of bulbs almost like Christmas lights.

On the walk back we saw an alley of bars that looked interesting and decided to walk down.  I'm not really sure what that place was but it was crazy.  Each bar was about 15 ft wide and completely indistinguishable from the next.  There was nobody in any of them except for the girls (hookers????) cat calling at us as we walked by.  The whole place was dimly lit and there were some old guys surrounded by girls in the corner of the last bar.  At the end of the alley was a Thai boxing ring.  It was a very strange and uncomfortable place.  We walked back down a different street.

That's all for now.  Going to attempt to stay up to watch the soccer game tonight, though it doesn't start until 1:30 AM here so we'll see what happens.  Going on an overnight trek tomorrow.

Pictures

Here are a few pictures from the trip so far:

Main Rd of JJ Market.  This doesn't even begin to give a sense of how big this place was.

Khao San Rd.  The main tourist drag.  Kinda reminded me of Vegas, it was so busy and flashy.

Tuk-tuk and driver.  These guys are really obnoxious.

Muay Thai fight.  Was to watch but these kids were probably 14.

Eastern wall of Chiang Mai old city.  Most of the wall is gone now and there is just a canal surrounding old city.

Motorbike shop.  There are tons of these and mechanics in Chiang Mai, which makes sense because there are thousands of motorbikes.

Canal aound Old City, Chiang Mai.

Food court where we ate dinner last night.  You buy coupons and cash those in for food at any of 15-20 vendors.  Food was really good, and there were a lot of cute girls here.

Stairway in our hostel.

I'll try to blog later tonight about the last 2 days.  We're about to go to a Thai cooking course so I'm sure we'll be full and lethargic later.