this is what happens when...

2008-08-20T19:18:00.000-07:00

...i've been home for a week. re-acclimation has been... interesting. my yoga class feels great. my street is as much fun as it has always been. the food is as amazing as i remember and the subway in my City... still runs all night. BUT, there's a whole bunch of shops that are gone and have been replaced by frozen yogurt stores, i can't really afford the food, and i have consistently been getting on the wrong train or the right train going in the wrong direction.

my apartment is the same, except there's a guy named John living in my room rendering me bedless. this is good for my wallet; bad for my sleeping. however, my couch is just as good for sleeping as it is for napping and there is no one sleeping in my tub, which doesn't require i wear sandals to shower, so who can really complain.

i also now have a phone and can meet people spontaneously... in previously undisclosed locations. ahhh, the luxury.

and i've hit the ground running on the job search, which may or may be a good idea. in truth i shouldn't be allowed to speak to professional people yet as i'm still working up to "social" speed, which in New York, is significantly faster than any place in the Souther hemisphere or SE Asia and significantly slower than "work-place" speed. after venturing out of my house to meet with a headhunter, staring at him a number of times with my best deer-in-headlights eyes, AND referring myself in the third person, i managed to get home without embarrassing myself any further except for the fact that i keep bumping into other people on the street with both my body and my bag, most likely because the space allotted to me here suddenly seems so much smaller.

re-entry, successful. re-acclimation... in progress.

this is Cheryl in New York. signing off.

phooooootooooooos...

2008-08-15T18:24:00.000-07:00

photos!! nothing even close to chronological order!!

Red goes to London
http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157606755619241/

London (and more London)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157606752019332/

Laos (Luang Prabang, Vang Vieng, and Vientianne)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157606752001248/

Cambodia (Phnom Pehn, Siem Reep)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157606751789538/

Vietnam (Hanoi, Halong Bay, Hoi An, Ho Chi Min City)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157606751761988/

Thailand (Bangkok, Ko Tao, Chiang Mai, and Bangkok again)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157606755039701/

my fantasy...

2008-08-13T08:07:00.000-07:00

...involves showering without flip-flops on after taking a long hot bubble bath, then pulling my clothes out of a dresser and getting dressed (without covering every exposed part of my body with either sunscreen or bug-repellent first) in a fancy, strapless dress and putting on shoes that are NOT conducive to walking long distances. then going to a nice Italian restaurant where i can eat a real pizza and drink at least a few glasses of excellent wine before heading home to my very own bed with my own sheets and my own pillow and sleeping until the noise of New York wakes me up.

Sir Dan Pires of... London!

2008-08-12T03:02:00.000-07:00

as it turns out, Sir Dan Pires (known to some as the owner of my left arm) is now living in London town and contacted me to tell me so a few days ago. we got together last night for a few drinks and a few laughs at the expense of London food, weather, and subway system (the last only because it doesn't run 24 hours) and made plans to get together (along with Orley and Warren) for dinner tonight.

and while my initial admiration for the London tube has waned, i have a new obsession, namely, London cabs. whoever is in charge of the NYC fleet really should come over here and take a few notes. they look nice. they smell nice. they have four seats (two facing two) and leg room like you only see in business class on Emirates Airlines.

yesterday and today are my tourist days. i am so excited to fly back to New York that i've had to make myself an actual list of things to see here (some of which i don't even really care to see) just to occupy my mind and my time instead of sitting around plotting all the things i will do, wear, and eat when i get back to the City.

and i'm off...

retraction...

2008-08-10T15:21:00.000-07:00

i would like to retract my previous comment about the London tube. i mistook London weather for air-conditioned platforms. and while i am thoroughly enjoying the perpetual autumn that is London summer, there is no substitute for a thoroughly air-conditioned subway car a la NYC.

on Wednesday i am flying to Dublin. on Thursday, i am flying back to good ol' NYC. Orley has been keeping me more than busy and i've met loads of really wonderful Orley-friends, at least three of which are moving to New York in the next few months.

the last five months have been amazing, but i am incredibly excited to get back to my City.

more pictures to come when i get back to my own computer in my own apartment, down the hall from my own bed, my nice (clean) clothes, and my own tub.

SE Asia highlights...

2008-08-07T06:17:00.001-07:00

http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157606593924639/

London

2008-08-06T02:39:00.000-07:00

even though i've never been here before, this place feels like home.

it took me a few hours to realize that even though i feel at home here, to everyone around me (even though i no longer stand out like a sore thumb) i am still just another inconvenient tourist. but that didn't stop me from being so excited to be here as to be a little emotional when i saw western housing tracts as we were landing.

after exiting the behemoth warehouse Thai Airways calls a "plane," i said "hello" to the man at passport control, filled my water bottle for the first time in two months, used the lady's room and threw my tissue in the toilet, and hopped on the tube to Orley's house.

New York's metro ain't got nothin' on the London tube. it has cushioned seats, announcements that you can both hear AND understand, and air-con'd platforms... i repeat: air-con'd platforms. after a bit of a ride, an easy transfer, and a short walk, i arrived at Orley's house, picked up my own personal key, unpacked what is left of my stuff (i've been shedding bits of it for the last week), took a shower, and headed out to meet Orley for lunch.

Orley is as fantastic and friendly and generally wonderful as she's always been. we had a quick lunch and then i walked along the North shore of the Thames river to the Tower bridge and then back on the South shore to the Millennium bridge, had a tiny snooze on the green patch next to St. Paul's, followed by an overpriced cup of tea in Cafe Rouge, and then met Orley and Warren for dinner and drinks (and an amazing chocolate cake from a place that could easily rival Magnolia's) to celebrate a friend's birthday before heading back to their house, blowing up my bed, and passing out with the fervor applied to sleep only by travel-weary backpackers.

today i am doing laundry. i also planned to do some grocery shopping and maybe a little site-seeing in the afternoon, but being the bright young thing i am, i washed everything at once and Orley's poor dryer couldn't handle it, which means everything is now hanging to dry and i am sitting in her apartment in my one pair of clean underpants and my surfing shirt.

but i'm catching up on correspondences, uploading some pictures, reading some good books, and drinking tea, so really, worse things could happen.

another party tonight. a barbecue of sorts. should be fun if i can wrangle some dry clothes. seven days and counting. :)

Vientianne

2008-08-02T08:04:00.000-07:00

after a rather torturous four and a half hour bus ride, Jimmy, Kelly, Adam, Mani, Brice, Thea, Laura, Dawn, Benny, Max, Hugh, and i arrived in Vientianne, managed to find a guest house that was willing to put ten people in two rooms (Benny and Max are too good for guesthouses and stay in hotels) that were each supposed to fit four, rented every bike the guest house had to offer and wasted no time getting out to see some of the sights.

there really aren't a lot of sites in Vientianne. it's a very mellow, very quiet, comparatively sparesly populated capital, but we hit what sites there are to see and then stopped by the old fairgrounds which are now nothing more than a set of rickety old buildings with a moat (containing two drowned clowns [pictures to follow]) and an old bumber-cars (dodge-ems') rink. we took loads of creepy pictures, then headed back to our neighborhood for some food and drink, before passed out in our over-populated rooms and waking up this morning to grab a few tuk tuks to the Buddha Park about 20 mintues out side town.

on the way back to the guesthouse, we dropped Brice at the road to the Friendship bridge that crosses the Mekong and then the Thai boarder.

at 5pm, Hugh left on a bus headed for Bangkok.

at 7pm, Jimmy, Kelly, Adam, Mani, Brice, Thea, Laura, and Dawn hopped on a bus for Pakse.

tomorrow at 2:30, Benny and Max will get on a Hanoi-bound plane.

tomorrow at 4:30, i will fly into Bangkok, and spend one more night in my second home before a late-night London-bound departure.

it feels very strange to be preparing to leave SE Asia though i'd be lying if i didn't say that i am very excited to part ways with all the hippie clothes i've aquired here in order to battle the heat. i can also think of no better way to end my time here than to have been able to spend the last week with such an amazing group of people. my eyes cried a little when the big group left tonight, but it's looking like i might actually be able to meet up with a few of them in various places before i fly back to New York and in the meantime, Benny, Max, and i are still managing to rip it up and eat too much in Vientianne.

might actually be able to upload some pictures in the next two days... we'll see how the innernets feel in Bangkok.

twenty-four

2008-07-31T02:46:00.000-07:00

after one lazy day wandering around Luang Prabang, i decided to sign up for some of the activities offered through the SpicyLaos guesthouse. after three days, a low, wide waterfall, a narrow, tall waterfall, a birthday party, and a few rounds of bowling later, i was signed up for a bus trip with 24 other backpackers to Vang Vieng.

the cast of characters is a little long. the list of reoccurring faces includes (but is not limited to):

Jimmy and Kelly - fellow backpackers that have been working at SpicyLoas since it opened a few months ago. if we were a team, they would be our leaders. both of them eternally have smiles on their faces and are the best informal tour guides... ever.

Adam and Mani - a pair of friends from the UK. Mani is traveling for five weeks, Adam for a year. Adam is the spitting image of my roommate Geoff so much so that if i walk into a room Adam is in, or see him walking down the street, i have to catch myself from running over and asking what he's doing in Laos.

Brice - 25-year-old graphic designer from San Francisco. amazing hair. one of the nicest, funniest, easiest people to travel with that i've met on this whole adventure.

Thea - 19-year-old student from the UK. a little bad-ass. totally hysterical. gorgeous in the i'd-have-to-hate-you-if-you-weren't-such-an-amazing-person kind of way.

the guys - four guys from the UK. i never have found out all of their names, but as a collective unit, they are an absolute riot and no one ever refers to them individually anyway. it's always, where are the guys? has anyone seen the guys this morning? which one of the guys drank too much last night?

Pong - the owner of SpicyLoas. we added him to the group when we arrived in Vang Vieng.

on Monday morning, all 24 of us piled into three mini-vans and headed up into the hills of Laos for a six-hour journey to Vang Vieng. if we'd been able to travel as the crow flies, it probably would have only taken an hour or so to get to Vang Vieng, but we wove in and out of the mountains, down into valleys and back up into and around the hills. it made for a slightly green hue in some people's faces, but the scenery was absolutely worth it: stunning in every way. we had amazing weather, and the sky was clear enough that Jimmy said they could see twice as far as they had been able to in previous trips.

when we got to Vang Vieng, Jimmy had the vans drop us all off at a guesthouse where Pong was staying. they didn't have room for all 24 of us, but Jimmy, Kelly, Adam, Mani, Brice, and i ended up i a big, en suite room with three queen beds. after a group dinner, we all went to bed early in preparation for the next day.

a word about Vang Vieng. the town itself is extremely small with one main road and two intersections. it's located in a beautiful part of the country with limestone cliffs rising up out of the Nam Song river on one side and a seemingly endless span of green hills stretching out into the distance on the other. for whatever reason, Vang Vieng has been designated a backpacker mecca. activity of choice: floating down the Nam Song river in a tractor tire and stopping at river-side bar/restaurants, to drink Lao Lao, eat larp, and test your monkey skills by grabbing a rope-swing and hurling yourself through the air off seven-meter platforms before dropping into the Nam Song. stopping in Vang Vieng has been described as a right of passage in SE Asia though it is generally agreed that it's best if you're traveling with a good group of people. i figured with 24, i couldn't go wrong.

Tuesday morning, we all met for breakfast, walked across the street to rent tubes, hopped into a few tuk tuks, and headed down to the river. six hours, five river-swings, two platform jumps, a zip line, and countless bumps and bruises later, we arrived back in town, muddy, exhausted, and ready to do it again the next day, which, despite the persistent rain, we did.

we've all spent the day today lounging around one of Vang Vieng's restuarant/bars, watching Friends (every restaurant here plays an endless, high-volume stream of Friend's episodes), eating baguettes (thank you, France) and drinking fruit shakes. i can't really remember the last time so many different parts of my body hurt. between running into underwater trees, mud-wrestling, swinging like a monkey into the river, slipping and sliding all over the river-side huts, and attacking each other's tubes (and persons) at every available opportunity, every muscle in my body is sore and most bits of me are covered in bruises of one shape or another, but all of it was worth it, and if i could lift my arms over my head, or sneeze without my stomach muscles spasming, i'd totally do it again tomorrow.

over the last few days, various individuals and groups have slowly peeled off the original 24, so we're down to about 12 now. tomorrow, most of us are getting on a bus to Vientiane, Laos' capital, before everyone really starts splitting off in separate directions. Brice and i are both flying out of Bangkok on Monday and will probably stick together until then, but i will most likely have to say goodbye to everyone else Saturday night. it's been absolutely amazing traveling with such a large group. it's like having a a transportable community and it's been wonderful to have spent only a day or so asking the prerequisite questions (where are you from, where have you been, where are you going, how long are you traveling) and then being able to just sit back, relax, and enjoy everyone's company.

Laos

2008-07-24T06:56:00.000-07:00

Luang Prabang. i got here around 3pm, hopped in a tuk tuk just as it started to pour and was dropped off in the city center just as the rain stopped.

Luang Prabang is a sleepy little city. nothing like the chaos i've been in for the last three weeks. everything and everyone seems a little slower here. in the six hours i've been here, i've already managed to gorge myself on the food here... twice. first fruit (mangoes, pink fury fruit, and dragon [DRAGON!] fruit, and later mystery foods which i have, for convenience, designated by number (1. spring roll-esque items numbering four; 2. half-moon items filled with taro [?], numbering three and one half; and 3. spicy noodle soup with unidentified meat). no digestive repercussions as of yet. i had considered adding stick-of-mystery-meat to my gastrointestinal onslaught, but in walking by the meat stalls, i saw a woman raise her meat clever and take a healthy, flat-sided whack at a VERY large wasp that had landed on one of her hunks of unidentifiable meat (that is NOT a euphemism) and decided better of it.

there are markets everywhere here. it's like someone knew i was coming and organized the whole town into a giant market just for my arrival. the persistent gloomy weather i've encountered everywhere i've gone for the last week or so was starting to get me down a bit, but there is nothing that cheers me up faster than walking through a public market and people watching.

i'm staying in a youth hostel called Spicy Laos. the room i am in is the size of my bedroom in New York and contains four bunked beds and four lockers. we also have a small bathroom (which thankfully is not included in the above-described space) and i'm paying 8 USD a night. to be honest, i'm not sure my spoiled little behind can handle it. i know there are guesthouses in town that would offer me my own room and my own bathroom for roughly the same price, but i'm giving myself three days here to try to work on my social skills (they have gone decidedly downhill in the presence of my solitude over the last few weeks) and maybe make some friends for a change.

our hostel, among other perks (i.e., free breakfast, free internet, cool people, free DVD watching, laundry on site, a mini mart on site, and rad tunes playing on the radio) also has an overwhelming number of kittens that sneak in your room when you are not looking and hide behind your pillow or bag to jump out and attack you when you least suspect. as far as i can tell, they are disease free (they weren't hiding behind MY pillow anyway, so i suppose it doesn't really matter) and cute as anything. i secretly hope they will sneak in the room every time i open the door, just so i will have an excuse to pick them up and cuddle them before i toss them back outside.

the hostel is organizing a trip to one of the many waterfalls in the area tomorrow. supposed to be lovely. hopefully i can drag my rear out of bed early enough to take part.

welcome to Laos!

a week.

2008-07-23T05:25:00.000-07:00

after my last post, i really had no idea where i was going next. i had narrowed it down to Ko Chang, Southwestern Thailand (involving a few different islands and a handful of cities and beaches), or Rangoon.

Ko Chang wasn't really high in the running because it involved either seven hours on a bus, or a $200 plane ticket, neither of which was appealing to me. Rangoon got booted out of the running shortly afterwards because it required a visa that would take at least three days and $100 to acquire (and even if i could have managed all of that, i love my father, and i think a trip to Rangoon may have killed him), so Friday afternoon, i hopped on a cheap Air Asia flight down south.

the Southern Thailand sun is killer and despite my attempts at protection (refer to sunscreen references and shameless hippie dress mentioned in previous emails) i got a bit of a burn. i'm doing ok though, only slightly lobster-ish, and after a week of fun on the sand and in the sun, i'm back in Bangkok (what did i say about this place starting to feel like a second home?) and i'll be flying to Luang Prabang, Laos, tomorrow afternoon.

more when i get there...

today i fell in love...

2008-07-16T09:26:00.000-07:00

...this time, instead of a city, it was a dress.

in truth, i fell in love with this dress the very first time i came through Bangkok. it is in the Expensive Mall, on the third floor, it is black with a white pattern on it, it hangs to the floor, it has a peek-a-boo thing happening in the front, and it has pockets. POCKETS. it also costs about eighty-nine hundred Baht, which is why i did not purchase it in the first place.

clearly, i am back in Bangkok, and as i am in a holding pattern until Friday (even though it is not the high season, some of the things i am looking into doing are booked until Friday), i figured i'd kill some time today and go look at my dress (in the hopes it had gone on clearance in the last four weeks).

to make a long, boring story short, not only was my dress not on clearance, they also didn't have my size; however, the moment when i told the sales girl that the large was too big and she handed me the extra-small and told me to try it did provide some comedic relief to the tragedy of the cost and ill-fit.

i had actually started the afternoon at the Medium-priced Mall and bought a pair of orthopedic sandals (they're cute... really) so that my knees and feet will stop hurting. on my way to the Expensive Mall (for the dress viewing) i had lunch: an Auntie Anne's pretzel, street-fried chicken, and (when i arrived at Expensive Mall) pralines and cream ice cream.

after the dress viewing, i still had hours to kill before dinner, so i treated myself to a movie then left the mall to catch the 14Baht bus back to the Kao San area...

i waited for forty minutes and finally made the executive decision to catch a cab. the first two i stopped wouldn't even GO to Kao San, let alone offer me a reasonable price. the third one asked for 200 Baht. i laughed at him and waved him on. thinking a tuk tuk would be a more reasonable mode of transport, i started hailing them only to get a similar response to the taxis. after another 15 minutes of standing in the dust and smog of the traffic passing the mall, one tuk tuk driver stopped, offered me a reasonable fee right off the bat and i hopped in.

this tuk tuk driver was either the best or the worst tuk tuk driver i have ever encountered. he had a nervous tick that seemed aggravated by speed. in truth, the tick was pretty cool (the tuk tuk tick - as my friend Mike from NYC has deemed it). if you put him on a dance floor and played some James Brown, no doubt he'd fit right in. he was also determined to get me to Kao San as fast as possible and was undeterred by things like lights, oncoming traffic, speed bumps, and trucks. other than almost being dumped out twice and the torrential downpour that let loose on the way back, it was a very entertaining ride (and in truth, even the downpour was fun).

when i got back to my guesthouse, i ran into Mike (mentioned above). i had met him in the airport this morning after accidentally cutting him in line to get our passports checked. he also lives in Manhattan (the first Manhattanite i've met) on Broadway and West 4th. we both checked into the same place this morning, but his room wasn't ready and he had to run a time-sensitive errand, so i stored his bag for him for the day. after returning said bag to rightful owner, we ran out for some food at Mr. Yims on Rambutri (possibly the best street stall... ever), and then parted ways so for the evening with plans to get together tomorrow for lunch.

Bangkok is officially my second home. while at times it is loud and smelly, it is also familiar and friendly (and lets face it, New York isn't exactly a rose-scented oasis of peaceful bliss). in two weeks, i'll be flying through here for the last time. amazing how fast time flies. in the meantime...

cat nip

2008-07-13T07:38:00.000-07:00

i am convinced that the Khmer put the human equivalent of cat nip in their food (which, i guess would be opium... or maybe crack). every time i eat Khmer food, i get this kind of light-headed, happy feeling. it may also be the heat. at any rate, the food here is outrageous and i am eating as much of it as possible.

i am still feeling a little site-seed out (forgive my blatant word-fabrication), so i've been taking it kind of easy since i got here. after an adventurous six-hour bus ride from Phnom Pehn to Siem Reap, i checked into a LP recommended guesthouse, only to discover that the only room they had left was a windowless attic that you had to walk through the laundry room to get to. the bathroom was designed such that you had to sit side-saddle to use the toilet, and shortly after i had put down all my things i noticed A. that there was no insulation in the walls (you could see right outside to the underside of the roof), and B. i had both flying cockroaches AND mosquitoes in my room. i was too tired to really care, and before i had even put down my stuff, the guy said he could move me to a room with a window in the morning, so i grabbed the key (for the padlock that wove through two metal loops to keep my door closed) and went out to get some food.

on my way back up to my room-closet, i asked the guest house owner if he had a mosquito net (in all seriousness, i could care less about the cockroaches, i just didn't want to get bitten). he told me i didn't need one. i told him i saw mosquitoes in my room and i would like one. he repeated that i didn't need one. i asked if he had ANY other rooms available. he said no. and said that he had two girls stay there the night before and there was no problem. left with no options short of checking out of that guest house and into another, i shrugged, went upstairs and went to sleep in my hole.

i had a nightmare that a swarm of mosquitoes attacked my left arm and left me with a ring of bug bites around my fingers and wrist.

when i woke up, i had a ring of bug bites around my fingers and wrist. i packed my stuff, checked out of the mosquito den, and checked into a lovely place called the Ivy Guesthouse. i have my own, spotless, new bathroom, a king-sized bed, a balcony, French doors, and a decided lack of bugs. score.

i spent most of the day Saturday just wandering around with relative aimlessness, reading my book, and (gasp) watching TV. by brunch-time today, my day today was quickly shaping up in that direction when a tall, red-ish-haired Kiwi guy sat down next to me and we started chatting. meet Rick. he has a degree in economics and political science, but teaches PE at a school in Tokyo. he's been traveling for three and a half years and he is my new travel companion.

after brunch, we did some wheeling and dealing and got a tuk tuk to take us around to a list of wats that Rick had put together and i was all too happy to tag along to. after four hours of wat-viewing and 45 minutes of sunset watching, we headed back into Siem Reap and sat down at a road-side food stall, ate for two dollars each, wandered around until we found the closest equivalent to chocolate cake available, at that too, then parted ways with plans to meet up again tomorrow morning for another watful day.

i am now writing a book and trying to get some of my pictures onto my memory stick so i have memory on my camera to take more tomorrow. fun times.

my four-month anniversary passed the other day, unnoticed until a few days later. time is flying. i can't believe it's already the middle of July. miss you all! hope you're well. :)

a city like no other...

2008-07-09T04:53:00.000-07:00

Phnom Pehn

(correction to previous pronounciation guides: Phnom Pehn is pronounced, p-nom pen)

as mentioned in previous emails... i was getting a little weary of the pampering and ease involved in traveling around Thailand. so i asked myself: what better way to give yourself a challenge than to go to Cambodia?!

i've actually been plotting to go for a few months now. i've also plotting (to no avail) ways to trap someone into coming with me, but in the absence of a partner in crime, i just decided to suck it up, book my flights and go.

you hear a lot of mixed reviews about Lonely Planet. what it's doing to the traveling community. what it's doing to the communities people travel to. whether or not it actually has any helpful information in it. etc. etc. etc. but every now and then, LP gets it spot on. and with Phnom Pehn they really hit the nail on the head. it's a city of opposites: beautiful and repulsive. joyful and tragic. there are lush green parks with glittering gold monuments right next to small streets littered with garbage and inhabited by Khmer people with missing limbs. my time here reflected these contradictions.

the city itself is not really like any other place i've been in SE Asia. the closest place i can compare it to is Hanoi. in reality, it's not really much like Hanoi at all, but in my limited experience, that is as good as i can do. the buildings are all relatively short (i haven't seen any over 6 stories. most roads are narrow, only two lanes, if that, and the traffic is pretty intense (though nothing can compare to the insanity in Vietnam).

day 1: i've learned that whenever i go someplace new (scary or otherwise) it is best for me to arrive in the morning, or at the very least, during daylight hours. when i was with Kathrine, we arrived in Hanoi around 11pm and if i hadn't been with her, i may not have left the airport.

the only flights to Phnom Pehn from Bangkok were at 7am and 5pm, so i flew into Bangkok last night and headed back to Rambutri street (which is starting to feel like my second home) and then flew out of Bangkok this morning at 7am. yes, that means i dragged my rear end out of bed at 3am this morning, packed up my bag, hopped on the airport minivan (just discovered that cheapy this time around), ate an entire medium pizza for breakfast, and then flew just under an hour to Phnom Pehn.

a little background on me and Cambodia: i've been crapping myself over it for weeks now. everyone that i talk to that has not been to Cambodia has looked at me with skepticism when i tell them i want to go. when i tell them i am going alone, the response has been, across the board, ÿeah, good luck with that." the people that have been to Cambodia, have been much more reassuring. they all really enjoyed it, but caution to "watch you stuff. stay alert. stick to touristed areas." but i don't particularly consider myself a savvy traveler and despite reassurances from other female friends who had come here alone, i was nervous.

arriving at Phnom Pehn international airport and awaiting the appearance of my bag on the conveyor belt, i was frantically (without giving the outward appearance of being frantic - at least this is what i am telling myself) looking for someone else that was either single or looking like they wouldn't mind a third traveling companion.

no singles.

loads of newly weds.

i ended up hopping in a $5 (way overpriced) tuk tuk with a med student from Chicago. he was looking for a bus station to get to Siem Reap, so we only chatted on the way into town and then he got his bus and i headed off to find a guesthouse.

after a short, but entertaining search, i found a reasonable place to stay, unloaded my bag, stripped down to my skivvies, and tried to stop sweating long enough for my trousers to dry off so i could put them back on. then i armed myself with my Lonely Planet, a water bottle, my money belt (which i actually wore all day for the first time EVER), some cash (Khmer ATMs dispense USD, which was oddly strange for me), and my camera, and headed out for a wander.

i started off the morning with a walk down the river and ended up eventually looping back up through the National Museum and then grabbed a tuk tuk to Tuol Sleng.

Tuol Sleng literally translates to "a poisonous hill on which to keep those who bear or supply guilt" and it's the prison the Khmer Rouge used to keep and torture those who opposed them. it was originally a school, but was divided up into literally hundreds of cells to house the prisoners. of the literally tens of thousands of people that were imprisoned there, less than 20 survived. it is an extremely sad and weary place and left me feeling more than a little shell-shocked.

afterwards, i had my tuk tuk driver drop me off at the Central Market, possibly the largest public market i've been to. the whole thing is set up around a clock tower (which more closely resembles an airplane hanger than a clock tower) and radiates outward through four indoor legs that are full of stuff inside and surrounded by stuff outside. it took me about five minutes to get lost. twice. i finally ended up exiting the market at some unknown spot and then just walking around the outside of it until i saw something i recognized again. by that time, it was dinner time, so i ate my way through a few stalls (i have NO idea what any of it was, but it was all delicious and i have yet to have any negative, digestive repercussions) and then tracked down an internet cafe to do a little writing.

day 2: day two was much like day 1, but different activities. i woke up a little later than intended, and after breakfast, grabbed a tuk tuk to The Killing Fields. this place is, in every way, as dismal as it sounds. the killing fields are located about 15km outside of Phnom Pehn. they are the place to which prisoners were taken to be executed when the folks at Tuol Sleng were finished torturing them. there is a small, clock-tower-like building dedicated to them at the center that is filled with the skulls of the people executed there that have since been excavated. around the building you can actually walk around the mass graves, but have to watch your step as there are still scraps of clothing and bits of bone in the ground. after another bleak hour, i pulled myself together and climbed back into the tuk tuk to head back to the city.

i spent the rest of the afternoon in the Royal Palace, a vast and glittery place that is opposite to where i spent the morning.

traveling around SE Asia (with the exception of when Kathrine was here) is an entirely different story than traveling around AU and NZ. accommodation is different (dorms are not nearly as common here) so unless you actually actively seek out other people, you end up spending a lot of time with yourself. for the past week or two, this has not been a problem for me. i've felt a little on the anti-social side and haven't wanted to meet anyone. but last night, i wanted to talk to someone. someone who could understand what i was saying and talk back. so i parked myself in an outdoor, loungey area, and when a normal looking person walked by, looking for someplace to sit down, i gave him the stink-eye until until he got the hint and came over. his name was Manuel, and he was from Munich. after a few minutes, i recruited Robby from Canada (Red Horse [or something], Susan, it's like 20 minutes from Innisfail!). Manuel went to bed at a reasonable hour and Robby and i ended up staying up until the wee hours of the morning talking Philosophy and sharing travel stories.

at about 2 (that is LATE here), i promised Robby that i wasn't trying to pick him up, but asked if he would please walk me home, which he did and i was out by the time my head hit the pillow.

day 3: in truth, only half of this day was in Phnom Pehn. well, actually only a few hours. i woke up. packed up. ate breakfast. and hopped on a Siem Reap bound bus... stay tuned.

Pai Pai Pai

2008-07-07T01:27:00.000-07:00

after eating my way through the Sunday Night Walking Market in Chiang Mai, today i am in Pai (pronounced "bye") a hippie, little town about three hours Northwest of Chiang Mai.

i was starting to bore myself with the endless rounds of delicious food and daily massages, so i decided to mix things up just a tiny bit and head up here. from everything i've heard, Pai is a good place to just chill out for a bit (not that that's what i've been doing for the last week) and enjoy a little bit of rural-esque-ish Thailand. so this morning, i said goodbye to the woman at my favorite restaurant, said goodbye to the landlord of my guesthouse, packed up my stuff, and climbed into the back of a pickup truck to go to Pai.

as i mentioned, Pai is about three hours away from Chiang Mai and i wasn't uber jazzed at the idea of riding in the back of the truck the whole way, mostly because i couldn't see forward and was starting to feel ill before we even left Old Town Chiang Mai, but also because it tends to rain on and off at random intervals here and though i am almost constantly hot and sweaty, getting a shower of pelting raindrops hitting me at 50km/hour wasn't exactly appealing. fortunately, the pickup truck was only transportation to our air-con'd minivan, which we then piled into for a harrowing (as harrowing as one can have in a minivan) three and a half hour trip on windy, hilly roads, punctuated by fallen trees and water buffalo.

Pai, and surrounds, is not like any place i have ever been. it's jungle, meets mountain village, meets East Village, meets small town USA, meets rice paddy. if that sounds like a strange combination, it is, but it's also extremely welcoming and comfortable. it even has a night life (evidently... though i'll believe it when i see it).

i managed not to vomit on, in, or around the minivan and we arrived in Pai around 1pm. by 2pm i had walked the entire town. at 2:30 i was sitting in a restaurant with Suzanne (another minivan survivor) having just received my food, when a man armed with an oozy/leaf-blower hybrid marched by blowing a smokey cloud all over me, Suzanne, my food, my tea, and everything else on our side of the street. evidently, this is part of the Thai government's daily routine for mosquito control. it isn't DDT, but it is something similar. the owner of the restaurant came over and made a joke about just having had a year of our lives cleanly snipped away and suggested we sue the Thai government. evidently there is a problem here with Dengue fever and the oozy-blower guy is their attempt at controlling it. nice.

after eating my DDT-laced food, i realized that there really isn't much to do in Pai besides eat, lounge, shop, and get massages (unless you want to travel out of town and then track down and harrass the people of the mountain tribes). i will therefore probably pass the remainder of the afternoon in a Thai massage place, then drink some more tea, gorge myself on more mangoes and sticky rice, pick up a book from one of the various bookstores, maybe get a cool cocktail at one of Pai's night-cafes while listening to live jazz, and then head to my bungalow bed. it's a rough life. someone's got to live it. might as well be me.

Chiang Mai

2008-07-02T04:16:00.000-07:00

the love affair i had planned to have with Chiang Mai got off to a bit of a rocky start. no one, including the cabby, the hostel that gave me the recommendation, or any of the fifty people i asked on the street, knew where i my hotel was.

11:30pm finds me walking down dark and deserted streets in Chiang Mai, loaded down with my pack and travel bag. at best, someone could have easily just run by and tipped me over. i had no desire to find out what could be worst-case, so i found the first open hotel, chatted with the very friendly manager from Munich, and checked into my room.

i use the term "room" loosely. it had walls. i think they might have been made out of the big brother of cardboard. i had lots of windows, which is good (and rare) but in this particular case, all it succeeded in doing was letting in the smell of burning garbage from the street outside. i put down the sleep sheet that Ms. Mott was kind enough to bring me for just such an occasion and did my best to fall asleep.

at 8:30am, i woke, checked out of Dump, checked into Nice, and went for a wander.

at roughly 10am, a dog peed on me.

however, from the moment i left Dump (other than the dog incident), i've been having an amazing time. i really love Thailand. it's all glitter and gold everywhere you look. the people are friendly. i can subsist on Thai tea and mango with sticky rice if i want to, and you can't trip without falling into a cheap Thai massage place.

i spent all of yesterday just wandering the streets, visiting watts, and getting a sense for old town Chiang Mai. part of the plan was to get a Thai massage at the women's prison (they're trained in Thai massage as part of their rehabilitation and the proceeds are used when they are released), but evidently the ladies were too popular yesterday and had no time for me, so they sent me to another massage place where, after pummeling me for an hour (for just under five dollars), one of the girls asked to have her picture taken with me. i'm not sure if she thought i was famous or if green-eyes, light-brown curly hair, and white skin is just so unusual she wanted a picture with the freak to show all her friends. either way, she was sweet about it, and afterwards i kept wandering for a few more hours before having an absolutely amazing dinner.

today i signed up for a cooking glass. it finished about three hours ago and i am still full to bursting. i learned how to make (and ate) SIX courses, including spring rolls and mango with sticky rice (be still my heart!). i had someone standing over me the whole time telling me when and how to put everything, so as delicious as it was today, i think i'd be hard-pressed to reproduce it, but the fee for the course also armed me with a cook book, so i think i might have a fighting chance.

i am presently in a 15 baht(50 cents)/hour internet cafe, backing up photos (which i will probably not be able to upload until i arrive in New York - sorry) and getting ready to meet up with Louise and Barry, fellow cooking classers, for drinks later.

there will hopefully be a visit to Pai (pronounced "bye") and a one-day mahout (elephant trainer) course later this week or early next. we'll see. every time i try to plan things, the plan has seven or eight completely different iterations before it actually comes to fruition. so... one day at a time.

hope you're all well!

HCMC - sans Kathrine Mott

2008-06-30T04:34:00.000-07:00

day 1: nothing to see here. i slept most of the day. when i did finally manage to wake up, i found a cafe and sat in it for almost three hours reading. Kroy plumb wore me out.

day 2: woke up early again to catch a tour bus to the Mekong Delta with Inbar and friends Seamus (Irish - obviously), Kate (also Irish), and Sune (Danish). the delta has a population of 17 MILLION people. the two seasons of Souther Vietnam (wet and dry) create an agricultural system that works with the silt washed down from the mountains by the rain that then fertilizes the soil. they get some ridiculous amount of water in a period of six months (i think they said around four meters).

we spent the day bouncing around four of the islands in at the closest point of the delta to Siagon. the four islands are called Dragon (power), Pphoenix (intelligence), Unicorn (i forget), and Turtle (longevity). on Unicorn we got to watch the process for making traditional coconut candy (also go to eat some - pretty sure i have five cavities as a result). then went to Turtle for lunch, a horse-cart ride (a disturbing experience that felt more like riding behind an asthmatic skeleton than a horse), and some traditional dancing and singing (also python holding - i officially want a pet snake). afterwards, we paddle a boated down the canal, got back our on our tour boat, and headed back to the city. dinner. drinks. sleep.

day 3: the day Kathrine left, i discovered a charming little cafe called Le Fenetre Soleil about a fifteen minute walk from my hotel. you enter through a nondescript door, climb a ware-house looking set of stairs, walk down a dark, decrepit hallway, and enter into a welcoming, relaxing space of lounging goodliness and delicious food. today, after lunch, i headed back to the neighborhood to wander around.

i've been staying in the backpacker enclave since i arrived in Saigon. the neighborhood i was in today is also clearly a tourist haven, but much higher-end and there is nothing like seeing people in Western clothes to make a girl realize her appearance has taken a sharp turn for the worse.

i tend to have no qualms compromising my appearance for whatever degree of comfort i can achieve, so upon arriving in Bangkok i willing allowed myself to transform from a normal (if perhaps plain) looking person, into a shameless hippy. Amber, if you could see me, i'm sure you'd have something not too nice to say.

my clothes and shoes have been strategically selected to maximize coolness while simultaneously minimizing sun exposure, the appearance of sweat, and the discomfort to my feet and knees. today that translates into a cotton pair of Thai fisherman pants, a long-sleeved, white, cotton shirt, and my Clarks (read: granny shoes - no offense to any grandmothers reading this). in short, i look like i'm wearing pajamas with a sad and unfortunate choice of shoe. as long as i am surrounded by other backpackers or even as long as i remain in less well-to-do parts of town, i blend relatively well. most other backpackers are just as willing to compromise aesthetics for comfort and most of the locals wear something similar to my choice of attire, but today, i was back in the world of Western style and acutely aware of just how grunge i've become. i'd be lying if i said i didn't like it. woe be the day i have to put on a pair of jeans.

day 4: took my sweet time getting up, packing up and checking out. then headed back to the window of sun for a long lunch and some reading before catching a cab to the airport. after two relatively uneventful and short flights, i arrived in Chiang Mai, checked into my guest house and, as usual, passed out. i think it's the heat.

a word about Cheryl

2008-06-28T22:22:00.001-07:00

traveling around SE Asia has been an adventure in countless ways. i did not anticipate my name being an issue.

the only sound in my name that is not difficult for the SE Asian people to pronounce is the "e." the rest of it is lost and usually comes out sounding something like "Sara," which i have taken to answering to. knowing my name is challenging for others does give me comfort when i dismember whatever word (Thai or Veitnamese) i am trying to say, and i've actually considered making people try to say my name after i mangle a Vietnamese "thank you" just to even the score. i've even had a few people roll their eyes at me, as if to say, "good lord, why on earth would anyone name their child that."

so Mom and Dad, thanks. i am officially the new kid at school with the stupid name. ;)

Ho Chi Min City.

2008-06-26T01:59:00.000-07:00

depending on who you're talking to, we are either in Ho Chi Min City, or Saigon. Ho Chi Min City is actually made up of three districts, Saigon being one of them. in the 1970's, after reunification, Siagon was combined with two other suburb districts and the whole thing was newly dubbed Ho Chi Min City. the area i am in is actually part of the original Saigon district, so i suppose any way you slice or dice... i'm in Siagon.

day 1: the day of fantastically awful things.

we woke up around 8, wandered through a fantastic (and awefully stinky) market, located a decent-looking place for breakfast and got ready for a long day of sight seeing. first stop: the Reunification Palace.

five minutes into the 20 minute walk to the Palace, it started to rain. we bumped into a really sweet Israeli girl named Inber (pronounced een-bar - possibly the most directionally challenged person i have ever met) and brought her along with us.

the Reunification Palace is a very 1965 building that was constructed... in the 1960's. in the 1970's an American tank crashed through the gates, and instead of fixing it, the Vietnamese left it as was so tourists (and i suppose Vietnamese) could visit and see it. in truth, there wasn't much to see (we never did find the bit of the gate that the tank crashed through), so after about 45 minutes of listening to the tour guide, we slipped out to get lunch, said goodbye to Inbar, and headed to the War Remnants Museum.

the War Remnants Museum used to be called the Museum of American Atrocities and it takes a strong stomach to go through the whole thing. a large portion of it is dedicated to victims of Agent Orange both from the initial contact and the effects on the next generation.

after an hour and a half with a lump in my throat, i had to call it a day and was waiting for Kathrine on a bench outside when a youngish guy with an American accent came over and asked me if i new how to get back to the backpacker enclave. i said that i didn't, but whipped out my map and started to explain to him how to get there. i gave up after about three minutes of babbling and told him if he wanted to wait a few minutes he could just come with us.

youngish-American-guy was Elliot and was traveling on his own around SE Asia before heading back to Chicago for a job. we all headed back to our neighborhood, said farewell to Elliot and went up stairs to take our third shower of the day.

we didn't have an plans for the evening, but there is a massage school for the blind here, and after emphatically declaring that she didn't want a massage from a blind person, Kathrine decided she really had nothing better to do, got on board, got me on board (i wanted to take a nap), and we headed over to the school.

there are no words... Kathrine's masseuse gave her a pummeling that was audible from my table and my masseuse spend the hour spasmodically rubbing her hands over my skin and poking her finger into my forehead in what can most closely be compared with an spot-on impression of a grotesquely large, epileptic spider. we managed to contain ourselves long enough to get out of the massage school and then burst into fits of laughter agreeing that you really do get what you paid for, and at two dollars and fifty cents, who could complain.

we crashed in the hotel for a few hours before venturing out again around 11 for dinner. Kathrine said she would vomit if she had to so much as look at another Asian noodle so we found an "Italian" place and settled in. after about ten minutes, out of the corner of my eye, i noticed a cat coming down the back stairs. when i looked up, the "cat" ran back up the stairs and i was able to get a good look at a very large rat that (along with one of his friends) continued to run up and down the stairs for the remainder of our time in the restaurant.

i had ordered pizza, and both Kathrine's appetizer and meal had came out long before my pizza finally arrived. hoping that the time it took to prepare it was directly proportional to the goodliness of the food, i dug in, but found it, at best, fantastically awful. Kathrine wisely observed that it had been a whole day of fantastically awful things and we had a good laugh over it before heading back to the hotel, watching some fantastically awful, dubbed movies and falling asleep.

day 2: we got up early to catch a tour bus to the Cu Chi (pronounced coo-CHEE [accent on chee]) tunnels and just before the bus pulled away from the curb, Inbar hopped on.

the Cu Chi tunnels are a system of underground tunnels ranging from 3 meters to 10 meters underground. the original tunnel system was built in as defense system against the French, but the system was significantly expanded during the Vietnam war of the 1970's and at it's largest, covered a total of 200 meters. in the 70's the tunnels were used by soldiers and supporters of the North for hiding and military strategy, but after the good ol' US sprayed the better part of the area with Agent Orange (stripping the land of all foliage) the people of Cu Chi relied on the tunnels for everything (including eating and sleeping - they actually had underground kitchens).

the dimensions of the original tunnel system were only 30x80 centimeters, making it nearly impossible for anyone that wasn't slightly malnourished to pass through them. the tunnels used in the 70's were slightly larger, and have since been expanded further so that fat Western tourists can bumble through. even with the expansion, i walked through them bent over at the waist and in spots, on my hands and knees.

i am not a claustrophobic person. but the first two minutes i was in that tunnel i had to talk myself down from flipping out. even if you wanted to get out in a hurry you can't. it is not possible for two people to pass each other without a serious compromise of dignity, and though they've been kind enough to install lights for us, there are spots where it is so dark, you don't know the tunnel has turned until some part of you runs into a wall. can i just restate that people LIVED there. for years. crazy.

if you're interested in learning a little more about them outside of what my sad little memory can retain, go here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cu_Chi_Tunnels. the ingenuity of the Vietnamese people (both with the tunnel system and with the very simple but wildly affective traps they set) is absolutely fascinating.

after finishing the tour, we headed back to Saigon, cleaned up, and went to a very, VERY fancy dinner about a 20 minute walk from our hotel. Kathrine actually ate some meat (she has been refraining since she arrived, mostly on principle but with a legitimate concern for the source of the meat) and spent a grand total of about thirty bucks for appetizer, dinner, drinks, and dessert.

Kathrine went home to pack and i met Inbar (and a few other Cu Chi tunnel friends) for a drink before heading back to the hotel to find Kroy already asleep.

Kathrine had to wake up around 4am to catch a cab to the airport and make her 6:30am flight. she woke me before she left. i flung out my arms from my bed, hugged her, told her i loved her, and was out again before she shut the door.

Hoi An

2008-06-23T01:50:00.000-07:00

Hoi An, day 1: everyone raves about the charm of Hoi An, but after getting a cab from the hot, sticky, train station, into the hot, sticky center of Hoi An, and then checking into our hot, sticky room, and going for some food in a hot, sticky restaurant, K-roy and i were not feeling too impressed.

we parted ways for the afternoon and explored the little city separately, then got together for dinner and a drink and went back to our hot, sticky room and did our best to sleep without sweating too much.

Hoi An, day 2: we checked out of Hot and Sticky and checked into a cool, air-con'd, swimming pooled, hotel about ten minutes from the river front. there is something about knowing you have a cool place to relax and sleep that gives everything a fresh and lovely glow. we spent the day wandering around the beautiful little city, marveling at how charming the cafe's, restaurants, people, and merchandise are, had a fantastic French breakfast, an even better Vietnamese lunch, and then did the Hoi An thing... and went to the tailor.

Hoi An is famous for a few things: the My Son (pronounced Me Son) ruins, China Beach, the Marble Mountains, Old Town Hoi An, and shopping.

as someone wisely said, you can't swing a dead cat here without hitting a tailor. everything is custom made and dirt cheap. among other items, i got a floor-length dress made, custom cut and designed for thirty USD. it's just silly how much money a person could spend here. K-roy and i managed to restrain ourselves to a reasonable amount of clothing before heading back to our hotel, swimming in the solar-heated pool, eating another fantastic meal, having dessert in an old tea warehouse and passing out in our immaculate room.

Hoi An, day 3: chaos ensues.

our new hotel included a buffet breakfast. after consuming too much of it, we stopped by the desk to book another night.

flashback two nights.

Hoi An, evening one: in an attempt to escape Hot and Sticky, we had wandered up to New Hotel and asked if we could check in there, accepting that we would lose the six dollars we spent at the Hot and Sticky and not caring one bit. the woman said they had a room, that we could have it, and we told her we'd be back later. however, by the time we got back to our hotel, it was late, there was no transportation, and we were both exhausted. so we opted to suck it up and sleep at Hot and Sticky and then move in the morning.

flash forward to day 3: the woman we spoke to about extending our stay was the same woman we had encountered two nights prior. evidently, in not returning to the New Hotel that night, we had forced the woman to not only stay up late waiting, but also turn away another guest who stopped in, effectively making her lose a lot of face. in Vietnam, losing face trumps everything, including making money, so when we attempted to book another night with this woman, she said the hotel was booked. knowing full well that all the rooms on our floor were empty the night before, we asked her to clarify, and she said the hotel was booked because we had said we were coming back and didn't. as i started to fly into a rage, Kathrine said thank you, walked away, and whisper-shouted for me to follow. educated me properly (i had only a cursory education at that point) in the ways of saving face and we both decided to drop it.

in the meantime, we were trying to book flights to Ho Chi Min City, either that night or the next. for some reason you couldn't do it online and when we stopped into the Vietnam Airlines office the night before, it was closed. we were also trying to get to the My Son ruins and had booked a car to take us there at 8:30. the Vietnam airlines office opened at 8. so we high-tailed it over to the office booked our flights for later that night (figured as long as we had to switch hotels, we might as well switch cities) and waited about 15 minutes for the car, which didn't come.

i headed back to the travel agent office while K-roy waited for the car, and then we all (K-roy, the travel agent, the driver, and i) did a stupid little communication dance that ended twenty minutes later with K-roy and the driver in front of the travel office with a car with a donut on the back passenger side tire. evidently this is why the driver was late and we had to stop at a garage where they changed the tire without a pneumatic pump before taking us out to My Son. we had also planned to go the beach that day and checkout was at 12, so this was cutting into both our My Son time and our beach time and my head was starting to spin because for the last three months i have NOT been moving anywhere near this fast.

we arrived at My Son (the trip took 45 minutes instead of 30) and fortunately, though interesting and mystical, there really wasn't much to see. we had hopped in a shuttle to go the 2 kilometers from the ticket office to the ruins, but the shuttle was no where to be found on the way back down, so we hitched a ride with some Korean tourists, who promptly forgot we were in the back of the van and were all too happy to keep driving right past the ticket office, past our car, and out the gate. they only stopped when from the depths of the back of the van, Kathrine and i started shouting (as politely as possible) that "here was just fine!" and everyone in the car (tour guide, family, 147 year old grandmother) got a big laugh out of us, dropped us off and headed on their way.

we hopped back in our car, got dropped off at the beach, spent an hour or so swimming and enjoying the breeze (it was 38 degrees Celsius today - that's 100.4 Fahrenheit [with humidity] for you folks back home), then stopped by the tailors, and picked up our clothes. afterwards ,Kathrine headed to the hotel to arrange a cab to the airport and i headed to the post office to mail my new clothes home (who really needs a suit and winter coat in Vietnam?).

the post office doesn't accept cash and the ATM in the post office gave my card the finger. i got a similar response from the ATM at the hotel next door and was forced to tap into my secret stash just to get the stupid thing mailed. there was also a small problem with an item i had purchased for my Grandmother (you should be getting it in about four weeks, Gram). it defied any packing logic and almost required a stupidly, and otherwise unnecessarily large box. but the lovely ladies at the post office worked their magic, got everything in one box without crushing the Gramma-present and i almost RAN back to the hotel to meet Kathrine.

we hopped into a cab, checked in at the airport, ate a cup-o-noodles for dinner, hopped on the plane, and arrived in Ho Chi Min City just after 8:30 pm. bargained/flirted with a few cabbies at the airport and fenangled a metered cab to the city, checked into our hotel, took a shower (no chance to rinse off after the beach), and passed out.

oh Vietnam. how we love you.

Halong Bay

2008-06-21T01:31:00.000-07:00

Kathrine's only request for our trip to Vietnam was Halong Bay, that beautiful, emerald green bay with towers of green-capped islands that seem to be the poster children for Vietnam.

when we arrived at the backpacker, we dropped off every article of clothing we both owned (i hadn't done laundry in a week and Kathrine hadn't had time before she left) with the exception of the clothes we were wearing, to be washed. this was a brilliant idea until we decided to go to Halong Bay and all our clothing was still in the wash. but we both managed to scrape together a decent two-day wardrobe (my primary garmets consisting of a sarong and bathing suit), and booked our tour.

after paying the tour man, we boarded a bus with fourteen other backpackers and drove three and a half hours through some stunning mountains, rice paddies, and villages to Halong Bay City. from there we boarded a beautiful, remarkably stable, old boat and spent the next twenty four hours eating amazing food, chatting with some very fun fellow travelers, swimming, kayaking, and absorbing the stunning beauty that is Halong Bay.

there were loads of other travelers and tours, but instead of detracting from the experience, it actually added to it. all the boats were beautiful and at night, with the full moon on the water and the other boats lit up and twinkling, even the most stubornly unsentimental person would have been charmed by the romance of it all.

the next day we headed back into the chaos of Hanoi, showered, picked up our laundry, and boarded an overnight train to Da Nang with Hoi An as our destination. the orange moon-rise reflecting off the rice paddies rivaled the romance of Halong Bay, and Kathrine and i, rocked by the train, both fell asleep.

Hanoi

2008-06-19T04:07:00.000-07:00

sooooo, since i was already in SE Asia, and because Kathrine has been wanting to go to Vietnam for ages, it seemed to only make sense to stick around the area and check out some of the rest of the neighborhood.

Kathrine met me in Bangkok on Tuesday evening. we spent Wednesday wandering around Bangkok and then hopped on a 6:30pm flight to Hanoi. a driver from our hotel was waiting to wisk us off to our home for the night and and after about a 45 minute ride, we arrived at our hotel. kind of.

the best we can guess is that our hotel was full, so they gave us some song and dance about why what they charged us was more than what was listed on the website, and then walked us to another (actually nicer but more expensive) hotel.

we woke up Thursday morning, enjoyed a free breakfast and some free internetting, and promptly packed up and headed a little less than a kilometer south to a youth hostel that is about half the price with loads more young people and much more centrally located.

our the first stop for the day was the "Hanoi Hilton" (officially Hoa Lo) a former prison that housed Vietnam rebels in the late 1800's and Americans (including John McKain) in the 1970's. it has been converted to a museum and offers a a poignant viewpoint and account of the history of Vietnam during those two periods.

afterwards we took in a Water Puppetry show and walked around Returned Sword Lake. the former a lovely and entertaining traditional performance art that was originally performed in rice paddies. the latter a lovely respite from the army of motorbikes and minibuses that is Hanoi.

a word about Hanoi traffic: traffic lights, cross-walks, stop signs, lines in the road... these are more are not rules per say, so much as guidelines. therefore, whenever navigating a street crossing, Kathrine and i have instuted the Law of Perpetual Motion. the Law of Perpetual Motion is as follows: when crossing a street, simply start walking and keep walking. the cars, buses, motorcycles, bikes, and scooters will go around you. this was particularly hilarious when we encountered a veritable WALL of traffic. a bus actually stopped for us and motioned us past, but on the other side of the bus was a parade of scooters and motorbikes. Kathrine, undetered, bravely and simply stepped into the frey (and i sheepishly shadowed on her not-traffic side). when we safely reached the opposite curb having lost neither life nor limb, i applauded her bravery and she commented that she had had visions of her flowy pants becoming lodged in the foot pedals of a passing bike rendering her both run over by said bike AND pantsless. i laughed so hard at the prospect of a pantsless Kathrine that my nose actually ran.

welcome to Hanoi.

Ko Tao.

2008-06-17T08:31:00.000-07:00

Friday 8:30pm: depart Bangkok after navigating the circus that was the travel agency check-in and bus boarding points.

2:30am: arrive at what i think is the equivalent of US highway service stations, which, in Thailand, roughly translates to a few food stalls, a bunch of knick-knack card tables, a few remarkably charming (read: utterly foul) toilets, and one woman on a microphone spewing a constant stream of words that i can't understand.

5:00am: arrive Champone, the port town from which we will depart to Ko Tao. it is still dark and rainy, so it is a half hour before we even realize we are right on the water. at 6:30 we brave the longest, most rickety pier i have ever seen and board the catamaran for a two hour boat ride to the tiny, beautiful island of Ko Tao.

9:30am: arrive Ko Toa and make it to the pavilion (where the driver for Coral View resort is waiting with a dry-erase board with my name on it) just in time for the sky to open up and drench everyone and everything that wasn't under a roof.

10:30am: after waiting out the rain, five of us (six including the driver) pile into the cab of a pickup truck and brave the red-headed step-child of the Screaming Highway of Death, more specifically, a dirt road that has been subject to innumerable monsoons and now resembles a miniature version of the grand canyon.

10:45am: arrive at Coral View resort and check into my own, private bungalow.

Ko Tao is the kid sister to two larger islands in the area, but has enough going on that it is relatively easy to find things to do, if that is what you want. i however, wanted only to totally veg-out for three days, which is exactly what i did.

my private bungalow was set on a hill overlooking the rest of the resort and the sea. i had a full bed all to myself, my own bathroom (which was really just a tiny, tiled closet containing toilet, sink, and shower head (meaning the toilet was constantly wet), a porch, and a fan. all for the 10 dollars a night.

i spent my days lounging, sunbathing, swimming, snorkeling, and reading, and my evenings chatting with other travelers and generally having a phenomenal and relaxing time.

after three days of having every meal deliciously prepared, getting pampered, tanned, and rested up, i got back on the catamaran, crossed the rickety pier of death, boarded the bus, and am now back at Lamphu house. i'll be departing Bangkok tomorrow afternoon for a new adventure.

i'm not sure what innernets access i'll have in transit over the next few days, so until then, have a great week!

Bangkok - day 4

2008-06-12T22:37:00.001-07:00

nothing exciting or death-defying today. i am getting some things done (i.e., laundry, a massage) before heading to Ko Tao this evening.

Ko Tao is a lovely little island off the Eastern coast of Thailand, famous for sea turtles and scuba diving. i'll be vegging out there for three days before returning to Bangkok for a day and then departing Thailand in early part of next week.

not sure how well the innernets work on Ko Tao, so i will most likely not be able to give any updates on my gastrointestinal near misses. until next week...

hope you're all doing well!

Bangkok - day 3

2008-06-11T06:32:00.000-07:00

because i had managed to neither kill myself, nor disintegrate my lower intestines, i decided to really tempt fate this morning and ordered fruit for breakfast. and THEN i brushed my teeth with SINK WATER! the former worked out in my favor (i.e., most Thai restaurants and hotels in Bangkok cater to our poor Western stomachs and know how to not poison us with food). the latter also worked out in my favor as there were no negative digestive repercussions, but the water truly did taste incredibly foul so i've gone back to brushing with bottled water.

today was a good day. i met up with my side-kick again and we rented a long boat for a breezy hour on the river. Bangkok continues to take my breath away both with it's extreme beauty and extreme poverty.

after the boat ride, i ventured off by myself in search of a dress (which i never did find) and some lunch. at some point i passed a small restaurant filled with Thai people and decided to settle in. the "chef" turned out to be the mother of the real chef, and, as she told me later, it was her first time at the wheel. after eating, we chatted for about 15 minutes in pigeon English and she declared that i should come back tomorrow so she could teach me Thai and i could help her with English. i thanked her for the delicious meal, for expanding my pathetic Thai vocabulary, and headed home.

after passing out for two hours (i seem to do that a lot in the afternoons here), i woke up, got dressed, and met Ole for another delicious dinner then drinks at the most expensive (drinks are about ten dollars), fanciest (too bad i sent my heals home) rooftop restaurant in Bangkok. i honestly didn't think i would be impressed, but the view (and the restaurant itself) were so spectacular, all i could do was giggle for the first ten minutes we were there. we ordered a round and were later treated to two rounds by a charming, wealthy, lonely, UK business man who wanted nothing more than to talk about his kids to someone for an hour. afterwards we headed back to the chaos of Ko San road and i to the respite of my bed.

back in my room i noticed, for the third night in a row, that my ankles were swollen to about twice their usual size. i don't know if it's the heat or the salt in the food, and i certainly don't know what biological benefits there are in having grapefruit-sized ankles, but thus far, they have been shrinking back to normal by morning so i am not overly concerned.

Bangkok - day 2

2008-06-10T01:16:00.000-07:00

i got an early start as i need to make copies of my passport, book some travel for next week, and mail the better part of the contents of my backpack home. i grabbed a late breakfast at a Lonely Planet recommended cafe (though i still couldn't bring myself to eating the raw lettuce and tomatoes that came with my omlet) and then met up with Ole to go to... THE MALLS!

there are three malls in Bangkok with varying degrees of expense and chaos. we started at the cheapest and most chaotic, proceeded straight to the most expensive and well-managed, and then settled at the middle-of-the-road mall where we grabbed lunch in a roof-top dining room overlooking the business district of Bangkok (and another fantastic thunderstorm), and went to see Sex and the City with an escort to our seats, free popcorn and drinks, reclining chairs, and a blanket. the movie was hilarious and heartbreaking, the latter mostly because it made me so homesick.

for dinner, i had decided i wanted to go to another Lonely Planet recommend, but it was not identifiable on the street it was supposed to be on, so we wandered ten more feet, found a restaurant with lots of people eating at it and settled in. i ordered bottled water and it came in a glass jar (be still my heart!). i popped off the lid, poured myself a glass, took a sip, and immediately regretted it.

the water tasted funny.

a second look at the bottle was not reassuring as it was pretty clear that the bottle had been around the block a few times. in a span of five seconds, i started to panic, realized there was nothing i could do, resigned myself to spending the night (or possibly the next two weeks) either sitting on or bent over the toilet, and casually mentioned to Ole that the water tasted a little strange. he asked if he could try it. i looked at him like he was crazy, but he tried it anyway and agreed that it was a little odd, but was confident that Thailand water (when it's water you're not supposed to drink) tastes distinctly like you're not supposed to drink it and concluded i would live. since i had no alternative, i decided to hope for the best, enjoy my meal, not further poison myself by drinking more of water, and forget about it.

after dinner (and two very long days), i decided to call it a night relatively early and got a little bit of reading done before i passed out, slept like a log, and found myself in the morning, both alive and with a sound intestinal tract.

Bangkok - day 1

2008-06-09T09:16:00.000-07:00

i woke up at 7:30 and for the first time in 12 hours was actually NOT sweating. the fan in my room is good enough to not only battle the heat, but actually make me cover up with a sheet.

after laying in bed for an hour, pep-talking myself into getting up and going out into the world, i went to the restaurant downstairs and ordered breakfast. it came with (GASP!) fresh tomatoes, which i quickly shoved to the side of my plate before they could contaminate anything else. there was also tea. TEA! made out of WATER! i shoved that aside as well and contented myself with toast and eggs and a small taste of jam, reminding myself that you have to heat fruit to make jam and it was probably safe.

as i ate, much to my surprise, i noticed the Western girl next to me was eating salad. SALAD! with TUNA (that is a FISH!!)!!! either i had been misinformed or this girl was tempting fate and wishing a long, slow, diarretic death upon herself.

i wasted no time getting online (for less than a dollar an hour) to write to my friend Becky (you remember Becky... the girl from Chicago that i met in Wellington, who i wanted to take home with me - of course your remember) who's been traveling SE Asia for the last few months and i asked her to clarify just exactly what i could and couldn't eat. she responded almost immediately, cleared up the fuzzy bits, and wished me luck. shortly thereafter, Ole arrived and i ventured out into the chaos that is Ko San road in particular and Bangkok in general.

i had anticipated some serious culture shock upon arrival here, so i had planned to just wander around Banglamphu (a relatively small neighborhood resembling the East Village-on-crack) and get the feel of the place before venturing out into the rest of Bangkok, but Ole suggested we go to the Grand Palace and Wat Pho, and i, in congruence with a pact i made with myself a few months ago to say "yes" to suggested activities, agreed to go.

Ole's Thailand Rule Number 2： marked pedestrian crosswalks are really just extra paint that the city had laying around. cars neither stop nor slow if they see you standing at the side of the road. the only way to cross a busy street is to wait for a relative lull in traffic and just, well, cross.

Ole's Thailand Rule Number 3： Ole's Thailand Rule Number 2 does NOT apply to buses, which stop for nothing.

to get to the palace, we had to cross what i have affectionately come to know as the six-lane, Screaming Highway of Death.

refering to Ole's Thailand Rule Number 2 and because we couldn't even FIND any wasted paint, let alone cross on it, Ole decided the best place to cross said Screaming Highway of Death was at the spot at which we reached it. Ole's only concern was that the police might see us and either fine us for crossing the SHD where was clearly no wasted paint, or for some other concocted discretion (and then pocket the cash). we cross successfully, encountering neither police nor death-by-bus and proceeded along the park to Wat Pho and the palace.

Wat Pho is a small temple just south of the Grand Palace. it's a small, quietly beautiful place famous for the reclining Buddha that resides in the central building. the Buddha itself is covered in gold paint and is massive with the bottoms of its feet easily exceeding the square footage of my bedroom in New York. Wat Pho is also well-known for the traditional Thai massages that can be had for just over eight dollars an hour.

a word on traditional Thai massages: they are a cross between yoga and wrestling. contact yoga if you will. my masseuse twisted my body up in various positions, pushing and prodding my leg, arm, and back muscles with everything from his elbows to the heals of his feet. after a glorious hour of pummeling that alternately had me falling asleep and feeling my eyes involuntarily cross, i stumbled back to the reception area to meet back up with Ole and head over to the Grand Palace.

the Grand Palace is a collection of stately building, but also houses Wat Phro Kaew. there are no words to describe the Wat Phro Kaew, though since i am writing about it, i'd have to go with breath-takingly, heart-breakingly beautiful. some might call that a bit dramatic, but short of Gaudi's La Sagrada de Familia, i have never had such an intense reaction to a collection of buildings. from a distance, Phro Kaew is all glitter and gold. up close, it is a maze of tiny mirrors and glass that sparkle and glow in the sunlight. around the entire interior wall is a mural of a Thai legend roughly the Eastern equivalent of the Iliad. the center building of the compound contains an Emerald Buddha, the Emerald Buddha, sitting atop a veritable mountain of gold platforms and trinkets. when entering temples you have to remove your shoes and be careful not to point the soles of your feet at the Buddha. you also have to be quiet, which is not a problem because the Thai people know better and most tourists are too stunned to say much of anything. after a few minutes trying to soak everything in, we finished the tour of the Grand Palace and headed back to Ko San road for lunch.

the afternoon passed quickly. a delicious lunch, some shopping to buy clothes that would not leave me stewing in my own sweat all day, a shower, a nap, and then i met up with Ole and friends for dinner and drinks.

dinner was delicious (and cost lest than 75 cents) and drinks were at Hippie Bar, which, to my dismay, was not full of hippies but it did have outdoor seating so we had front row seats to the lightening storm that lasted for almost two hours. after ordering and receiving my drink, i unhappily noticed that there was ice in my glass. ICE! DEATH ICE!! even the greenest tourist knows you always ask for drinks without ice. disappointed, i pointed out my ordering-error to Ole, who, after making fun of me for five minutes, assured me that ice in Bangkok is safe and took a sip of my drink to prove it. after swearing that i would shove a kilo of ice down his throat and throw him onto the Screaming Highway of Death if he was wrong, i put the death ice out of my head, drank my drink, and thoroughly enjoyed the rest of the evening.

three hours later, i wasn't dead, but i was tired, and so we all departed Hippie bar for our respective guest houses to rest up for another day.

i am sweating

2008-06-08T21:45:00.000-07:00

after seriously debating the merits of simply NOT getting on the plane in Melbourne (and instead finding a job and hunkering down for an AU winter in the Nunnery), i did decide to board the plane and spent nine and a half hours with four seats to myself on my way to Bangkok. i watched two movies and slept for four hours.

i'd heard horror stories of the overwhelming chaos in the Bangkok airport. people everywhere, everyone yelling and shouting. your basic new traveler's nightmare, but Bangkok airport, not surprisingly, is just about identical to every other international airport i've been in. clean. organized. sterile. i did have small amount of trouble sorting out which baggage carousel my bag would come out on, but i bumped into another backpacker that i'd seen on the plane and together we located our bags and headed out. Plane-backpacker-guy ended up being from Denmark and this was his his third trip to Bangkok.

Danish Guy's Bangkok Rule Number 1: never pay more than 300 baht (roughly seven dollars) for a cab from the airport to the city center.

Danish guy and i agreed to split a cab, he took me up to where the honest cabbies wait, and offered one of them 300 baht to take us to the city center. the guy countered with 400, the Dane said no, and walked away. the cabbie yelled "ok three!" to which the Dane replied "and you pay highway," the guy said ok, and we hopped in.

fifteen minute later, we were dropped off on the West end of Koa San Road, which can only be described as the love child of Times Square and Chinatown. after some quasi-disoriented wandering around we (and by we i mean the Dane) walked in the correct direction of my pre-booked guesthouse. i checked in and introduced myself to the Dane (Ole), who then departed after giving me his email address.

i was hungry, but in all honesty, was too overwhelmed to venture out to the street to get food, so instead i plopped my stuff down in my single room (first time i've had a single since Kowhai - it costs roughly five dollars), stripped down to as little as possible, and passed out.

welcome to Bangkok.

uploading... uploading... uploading...

2008-06-03T21:23:00.000-07:00

too many hours in the Peter Pan travel center on the internet and here are six weeks of photos!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157604774801733/

what day is it?

2008-05-31T22:03:00.000-07:00

what's the date? what time is it? where am i?

this is the game i play with myself at least three times every day. it's also fun when someone asks me where i was before i got here (wherever "here" happens to be) and i can't remember. seriously... there are days that i've been in three different towns in the previous 24 hours and i can't remember where i was eight hours ago. i'd be lying if i didn't say that i like it.

so now i'm in Melbourne. i spent three days (i think) in Agnes Water/Town of 1770, surfing, snorkeling, and absorbing the totally mellow atmosphere that was that little, old town. the last day i was there, it rained all day so the entire hostel just packed into the common room and watched movies all day.

on Wednesday (i think) i took a bus to Rockhampton, stayed overnight and hopped on a plane to Cairns on Thursday morning. i didn't really want to go to Cairns. i had booked a flight from Cairns four weeks ago, assuming that i'd easily make it all the way up there with time to spare, and wanting to book head so i could save a few bucks instead of buying the ticket last minute and paying more. but as i traveled up the coast, i stayed in a few places a few days longer than i had intended and kept hearing that Cairns was a backpacker-run party town with not much else to do besides go see an overcrowded portion of the Great Barrier Reef, but it cost more money to cancel or change the flight than to just go for a few days so i decided to suck it up and just do it.

Corina (the girl from Germany that i traveled around Noosa with) had recommended a hostel called Travelers Oasis, so i called ahead and Dan the van man picked me up from the airport Thursday afternoon. the hostel was fantastic, as promised, and full of fun friendly people that i ended up dancing with until the wee hours of the morning Friday night after having gone one a tour of the table lands in Gus the Bus with a crazy Ozzy driver named Fin, 17 other backpackers from various parts of the world, loads of chocolate, and lots of swimming. Saturday i had a chance to walk around and actually SEE Cairns before my flight left for Melbourne at approximately 8pm.

i got into Melbourne just before 12 and stayed at what i am coming to recognize as a "city" hostel. they're huge, unfriendly institutions that engender neither good feelings nor good smells. i checked out promptly at 9 this morning, leaving my bag there fore the day so i could go investigate another hostel called the Nunnery in Fitzroy, a neighborhood just Northeast of the city center.

the Nunnery used to be, you guessed it, a convent. there are still statues of the Virgin Marry in some of the alcoves and the whole building is old, creaky, and full of character. it's got high ceilings, fireplace-adorned common areas, and a million little cubbies to tuck into and read a book on cold days (which seem to be happening in abundance now - Oz is in full-fledged winter). it's also located in a fantastic little neighborhood, right across the street from a beautiful park and the Australia Museum. i absolutely love it.

once i was checked in, i wasted no time heading back out to the Queen Victoria market, a really impressive and very LARGE public market that sells everything from fruit to plastic baby-doll heads. so i spent the better part of the day doing some fruit and veggies shopping and eating entirely too much market-y junk food (i keep telling myself that my body is still recovering [four weeks later] from all the weight i lost in NZ).

now i'm headed back to the place i stayed last night to pick up my pack and transfer the rest of my belongings to the Nunnery before exploring Fitzroy a little more. i'll be heading to the Great Ocean Road later this week for some last-minute hiking/down-time in AU before heading out of the country next week. so much to see, only a week to do it in.

for those of you troopers still following along, i miss you and i'd love to hear from you! hope you're enjoying the Northern hemisphere. i'll be back up there soon. :)

alive

2008-05-30T03:02:00.000-07:00

i am alive and well, but incredibly short on internet hours. more later.

halfway

2008-05-27T20:04:00.000-07:00

Saturday morning, i packed up my gear, burned my pictures onto a CD, explored the mystery staircase which had been calling to me all week from next to my hostel's driveway, then climbed on a bus followed by a plane to Rockhampton.

upon landing in Rockhampton, i remembered that smaller-town hostels don't have 24 hour reception and, it being almost 10pm, i had no idea how to get to my hostel. so when i saw a group of three guys milling around, i asked where they were staying and without much difficulty, convinced them to stay at my hostel and split a cab with me to get there. i had, on a whim, emailed the hostel earlier in the day to tell them i was coming, so they had left me a key. after heating up some leftovers, i passed out early so i could wake up in the morning to catch the 7am bus to Agnes Water/Town of 1770.

the bus trip down was uneventful, and a shuttle dropped me at the door of Cool Bananas, my favorite backpacker so far in AU. Cool Bananas, despite it's cheesy name, is a wonderfully laid-back, comfortable, homey place strewn with hammocks and serving delicious, generous, home-made, five-dollar meals every night. for some reason, it's only a stopover for most people, so you make friends one night and they leave the next, but the place is comfortable enough that it is company all by itself. Sunday i met a girl with red, curly hair from Ireland named Shanade (what else would her name be) who took me to a festival in the Town of 1770 and then hiking. when we got back to the hostel, she departed on the evening bus and i spent the evening with three hysterical 19-year old British kids and one very intelligent 23-year old Jewish kid from NY.

Monday, with my roommate Laura in tow, i rented a surfboard and did my best to stand up in the beginners waves that are all up and down Agnes beach. evidently the board that i learned on four years ago was super long and designed to help people stand easily. Monday i was still on a soft board but the board was significantly shorter and it took me a while just to get used to sitting and laying on it, not to mention standing. but it was crazy fun and after two hours i was completely worn out, so Laura and i took the board back and headed home. she jokingly said something about all the bruises that would turn up that i didn't even realize i was getting and sure enough, later that day in the shower i noticed a really angry bruise on my right hip and a nice matching set of bruises on my rips. war wounds. i wear them proudly.

yesterday, i went on a cruise to Lady Musgrave island, an entirely coral island about and hour and a half boat ride from the 1770 marina. i was fortunate to have taken two sea-sick tablets before we departed and i sat upstairs on the boat. when we got to the spot where we were snorkeling, i found out half the population of the lower deck was vomiting on the ride over(the day was a bit overcast and the sea was pretty choppy) and the day was a little bit of a bust because it was so cold and cloudy, but i got to see a few tornados and the reef was beautiful even without sunlight.

today it is colder and rainier than yesterday, so i am stuck inside watching movies with the entire population of the hostel, who also have nothing to do. tonight i'll hop on a bus to Rockhampton and tomorrow onto a plane to Cairns. will probably have another update at the beginning of next week. until then, i'd love to hear how you all are doing. ;) hope you're well!

Agnes Water and 1770

2008-05-25T16:49:00.001-07:00

i am in Agnes Water, a teeny tiny little town a few hours North of Bundaberg. the hostel is crazy fun and nice, but they have a bit of a monopoly on the internet, so it's expensive and i won't be using it much this week.

getting here was a bit of an adventure and i unknowingly cashed in on a bunch of my traveler's luck. i'll have more details on that later when i'm not selling a kidney to pay for internet.

lots of surfing this week... maybe some snorkeling too. :)

you broke my heart, cause i couldn't dance.

2008-05-23T20:44:00.000-07:00

the love affair is officially over. Noosa can't dance and i am having none of that, so today i am back in Brisbane (again!) waiting for a flight to Rockhampton so i can spend a handful of days surfing in the Town of 1770 before heading up to Cairns for a fly by visit and then down to Melbourne for a week-ish. lots of traveling. sleepy girl. more later.

Noosa, Noosa, Noosa!

2008-05-22T00:07:00.000-07:00

i love, love, LOVE Noosa. i want to live here. i know i've said that about every place i've gone, but i really mean it about this one. within a five minute walking radius, there is a beach, a national park, a grocery store, and THREE icecream shops. on Wednesdays and Saturdays, in a town about 20 minutes away by bus, there is a phenomenal public market with every manner of food, clothing, jewelry, massage, soap, or gadget you could ever fathom never wanting or needing. the beach here is beautiful, the water is warm. other than being exorbitantly expensive in every way, this place is fantastic (minus the thieves - more on that later).

i arrived Saturday night and the hostel i wanted to stay in was booked so i ended up checking into another, not quite as nice, but still good hostel down the road. to my surprise there were two other Americans in my room (it's not that common to run into folks from the US) and one of them works for Facebook and thereby knows Jason White, who has spend time on her couch when he is traveling for work. small world.

Sunday i checked into Halse Lodge (the hostel i wanted to stay in originally - and the one i wrote about in the last post) and walked into my sun-drenched, six-bed dorm room, just down the hall from the kitchen, bathroom, AND laundry AND it has an electrical outlet. it's like Christmas.

one of the German girls in my room, Corina, seemed like a reasonably sane and fun person, so i asked her what her plans were for Monday and she said she was going to head over to the National Park, so on Monday morning, i tagged along and we had a lovely hike through the trail that followed the beach, up hill, through Alexandria Beach (which Corina and i have lovingly and appropriately nicknamed "Naked-with-cowboy-hat Beach") and down about 500 steps to Sunshine Bay. after a lovely lunch in one of the cafes there, i convinced Corina to stay another day and go to the zoo with me on Tuesday, so we went back to the hostel, booked another night for her, and another few for me and went for ice cream.

the zoo was an experience. the animals in Australia are pretty unreal. if they're not trying to kill you, they're just plain strange looking. i have many pictures. i also have had enough of Steve Erwin to last me a lifetime. the Australia Zoo was started by Mr. Erwin in an effort to promote knowledge and understanding of wildlife to better protect it, but as the zoo's benefactor, there are videos, pictures, life-sized cutouts, tributes, and recordings of the man EVERYWHERE. it seriously is a little creepy, and if i hear the word "crikey" one more time i may jump out a window.

yesterday, after saying goodbye to Corina who is heading down to Brisbane, i went to the Eumundi markets and was in heaven for four hours. after walking through the whole market twice and getting a pot of chai from one of the local cafes, i found a nice table in the shade next to an acoustic, emo-country-ish guitarist and just soaked everything in. when i got home, i threw some elbows in Halse's tiny kitchen to make dinner and then watched my first ever AU rugby match on the big screen in the common area with a few fellow backpackers.

today, i woke up tired. i've given up trying to figure out why i'm tired when i'm tired and have finally started to just accept it and act appropriately. so i slept in til 10 and then had a lazy breakfast before heading to the beach. well... i managed to make it almost two and a half whole months without getting anything stolen. after a five minute dip in the water, i came back to find my bag missing. i had the presence of mind to not have anything of any significant value in the bag, but the bag itself had sentimental value (and a handy map of Manhattan on the side so i could just point to where i live when people ask) so i am feeling a little heartbroken over it. live and learn (and be grateful that everything of value is currently still in my possession).

tonight i'm headed to a little cafe on Hasting's street that claims they have loose-leaf chai (with soy!). why they don't do this in the states, i have no idea. it is heavenly. there's another German girl named Jasmine who just checked into my dorm today, and i've talked her into coming with me.

i'm headed up North to Rockhampton this weekend and then to the Town of 1770 for some cheap surfing before heading up to Brisbane. the next week or so is going to be busy (though hopefully less expensive) so i may be re-instating radio silence for a while. hope you're all doing well! miss you tons!

Noosa!!!

2008-05-17T19:13:00.001-07:00

i'm in Noosa (about two hours North of Brisbane) and getting ready to get my surf on (can you say that?).

it's cold and windy (and the water is flat) so there will be no surfing today, but my hostel hires out surfboards for free and i'm five minute's walk from the beach, so as soon as it warms up, watch out.

Noosa is like Byron, but without the hippies. it's a little more yuppie and therefore seems a little less laid back, but the beach is stunning (the most beautiful one i've been on) and Australia's best ice cream store is just down the street, so i am in love again.

the only downside to Noosa is that it is expensive. there are chi-chi restaurants and clothing stores and markets, blah blah blah, which makes it a fun place to go if you have a lot of money (which, let's recap, i don't). but there is a grocery store about ten minutes down the road and the beach is free (as is my surfboard!) so i will be happy to stay here for a while.

internet i also stupidly expensive here. as a result, there will be few (if any) updates the rest of the time i am here. so until i reach a cheaper location... enjoy spring!

what day is it...

2008-05-16T18:41:00.001-07:00

i've spent the morning trying to figure out what day is what. it doesn't help that foxywheaties is set to New York time.

anyway...

i met up with Katie's friend Lucy last night for a function she put on for work. free drinks. free food. really, really fun people AND...

we went DANCING afterwards! i was wearing not-happy shoes, but the colorful, tasty drinks they provided served as a nice cushion for the discomfort. it was so much fun and totally freaking awesome to dance around like a fool for a few hours. Lucy is awesome. loads of fun. super friendly. and she says i remind her of Katie, which i take as the highest of compliments.

the hostel i stayed in last night was a bit of a hole, but it was walking distance from where i met Lucy, it had surprisingly nice bathrooms, all the people were really cool, and there was no one else in my dorm, so i essentially had a private room for the night.

Lucy's really busy for the rest of the weekend, so i'm headed up to Noosa in about a half hour. there will be much surfing, tramping, and sleeping in the sun. oh... it's a hard, hard life.

the end of another love affair.

2008-05-15T19:21:00.000-07:00

i've left Byron behind me. after three days in the surf and sun, and meeting some really amazing people, i left Byron this morning and am in Brisbane again for a few hours before heading down to Surfer's Paradise to meet Katie's friend Lucy for a nice night out.

Lucy's weekend is already pretty crazy (i didn't give her much notice) so unless a hole opens up somewhere in her schedule, i'm heading up to Noosa tomorrow via the zoo.

it's nice to be moving so much after so much down time in Bondi (as much as i loved it), and i've decided that bus/shuttle trips are my favorite part of traveling. it's the easiest place to meet people (you have a captive audience) and if you don't like the people you meet (it happens) it's easy to part ways when you exit whatever mode of transportation you're on (unlike roommates, which you are usually stuck with for a few days).

so a busy day today and tomorrow. not sure how i'm getting to the zoo (or Surfers for that matter) but there is a FREE shuttle service from the zoo to Noosa, so at least that part i have covered.

in the meantime... lunch!

my new love

2008-05-13T22:48:00.000-07:00

it's so over with Bondi Beach.

Byron Bay is my new love. after checking in (and then promptly checking out again) from one of the YHA's, i checked into a beautiful, airy, open, light-filled hostel just across the street from the beach.

when i checked in the only resident in my dorm was Johnny and he greeted me with a big smile even before i was through the giant, sliding-glass door that is our front door. Johnny is a 22-year-old surfer from Israel who loves Harry Potter with an intriguing degree of fervor. he was delighted to find out that i had read the series and didn't waste any time asking me what i thought of every episode he could conjure up in memory.

after marveling at our porch and private bathroom (pristine shower and toilet, with a SKYLIGHT!!) i emerged from the bathroom and was greeted by Maria and Laura, two new arrivals, originating from Paris. Maria is actually from Argentina, but she lives in Paris and she and Laura have been traveling a little longer than i have. they are both tri-lingual, well-traveled, and beautiful, so that's not at all intimidating, but they are also incredibly friendly so i tagged along with them to the beach today and tried my best not to look like a uneducated cow. it was surprisingly not difficult and i had a wonderful time.

this afternoon, i bought a dress (because neither jeans nor hiking pants are acceptable to wear around Byron). you can't walk more than ten meters without tripping over a jam band, an organic [fill in the blank] store or a beard-clad, dread-locked hippie. there are no traffic lights in town. only round-abouts, and most stores use biodegradable plastic for bags. they also have an excess of yoga studios and at least one cafe that makes loose-leaf Chai.

you can see why i am in love.

in about an hour i'm headed to a 5:30 yoga class tonight and am hoping it is warm-up enough for the 8:00am one (which supposedly is more difficult) tomorrow morning.

did i mention i love Byron Bay?

tomorrow i'm also planning to do some tramping out around the lighthouse. it's a 4km-ish walk and i haven't hiked anything in a solid week, so i think it's about time to get moving again.

peace. love. Chai.

Amber Choe...

2008-05-12T17:54:00.000-07:00

...and Byron Bay. they rhyme.

i am in Byron Bay on Amber's recommendation (so it better be good!). it's a hippy little town (though expensive - isn't that against hippy rules?) and right on the water. hence the name.

i left Lorin's house yesterday afternoon and through a series of mishaps that worked out in my favor, ended up paying only 2 bucks for a cab to the airport. the cab ride came with a bonus non-stop, one-sided conversation from a very interesting taxi driver originating in Romania.

the flight was quiet and uneventful i arrived in Brisbane, checked into a hole of a hostel (10-bed dorm with a bunch of smelly boys that made the room look like it had exploded with clothes and travel crap), woke up this morning at 5:30 and hopped on a bus to Byron.

it is BEAUTIFUL here. sunny. warm. looks pretty cute, though i've spent my time here so far attempting to identify where i am sleeping tonight. i think i've got a winner and am off to find my new home for the next few days.

more on Byron after i see it. ;)

the love affair...

2008-05-11T20:27:00.000-07:00

...with Sydney in general and Bondi Beach in particular is coming to an end.

tonight i fly to Brisbane. tomorrow morning i will catch a bus down to Byron Bay.

and it goes on...

leopard print...

2008-05-10T22:31:00.000-07:00

last night after a few hours of raiding Lorin's closet for both her costume and mine i managed to scrounge together an outfit, that, while not exactly ho-ish, was at the very least satisfactorily pimipin (lord i'm white).

being from New York, is awesome. most of the time it's like being a celebrity without having to actually do anything, and when you go to a party where everyone is trying to dress gangster, you immediately become the resident expert of what is ho/bro-ishness and what is not. i didn't have the heart to tell them no one calls anyone "bro."

i declared that the guy from Germany came the closest to nailing the look, but he wore a fanny pack which he claims would be used for drugs in Germany and was therefore appropriate. i told him in the states the only people sporting fanny packs are those over 60 who wear white sneakers, but he was undeterred.

there was also a slutty nurse, a slutty maid, and some girl that just plain looked slutty. also a few girls that hit the hood-nail so squarely on the head that if i didn't know that NO one in AU dresses like that, i would not entirely be convinced they don't wear those clothes all the time.

i tried to keep it simple with a black and gold shirt, gold earrings the size of my head, and the famous, Lorin Blumenthal, leopard-print, fake fur coat. the coat, evidently, made the outfit. everyone (guys and girls) raved over it and claimed that they knew i was the girl from New York because of it. after a while i gave up telling them it was Lorin's and just started trading it for whatever pair of sun glasses, hat, or bling they were wearing. everybody wins.

everyone was fantastically friendly and we only blew one amp over the course of the evening. i spent as much time dancing as possible (don't people DO that outside of New York?) and got to eat a lot of free food. i have no idea what time i went to bed last night, but i've already taken one nap today and am ready for another. must eat first though. mmm, food.

Bondi, Bondi, Bondi

2008-05-09T18:12:00.000-07:00

still alive. :) still in Bondi. enjoying the bed, bathroom, beach, and beautiful little suburb.

heading to a Ho's and Bro's party this evening with absolutely nothing that could pass as ho-y, though Lorin has promised to dig something out of her closet for me (i have not expressed my doubts as to the fit of her clothes on my body), so it should be fun.

more later.

MY OWN BATHROOM!

2008-05-08T00:43:00.000-07:00

i met up with Lorin yesterday afternoon, she handed me a key, said "guard it with your life," and we were off.

Lorin is as fabulous in day-to-day life as she is in party mode. she's a paralegal and in law school and is generally brilliant and loads of fun. her apartment is also beautiful. evidently real estate in and around Sydney is almost as insane as real estate in New York, but they got lucky and are in a beautiful two-bedroom with lots of light, lots of space, a balcony and TWO bathrooms. that's right. in the absence of Lorin's roommate, i have my own bathroom. it's big too, with a whole wall dedicated to a mirror and a giant bathtub. i didn't even have it this good at home. i am also sleeping in a queen bed and sunlight comes in my window in the morning. color me spoiled.

when i woke up this morning, it was only 8, but Lorin was already at work, so i sat on the porch in the morning sun for a bit, made some breakfast, and did a little yoga. the last bit was mildly unpleasant. with all the hiking i've been doing, my legs have gotten really strong. however it seems the rest of me has turned into a soft-yet-inflexible mess. things just weren't bending and folding the way they used to and they weren't as steady or balanced either. sigh. i suppose that will come back eventually. nothing hotter than a chick with lumberjack legs and no other muscle to speak of.

there wasn't a cloud in the sky today, so i decided to walk along the cliffs to Coogee Beach. about five minutes after i left Lorin's apartment and about 7 blocks down the street, i realized i had no idea what her address was and probably couldn't remember the street name with a gun to my head, so i walked back up the hill, wrote it all down, and then started back down. i am such a flake sometimes.

on the way to the beach, i passed a cupcake place. by "passed" i mean i stopped in and bought a cupcake. strike two for Australia though (strike one was all the spiders, sharks, bugs, and plants that try to kill you here). the cupcake was tiny, and undelicious. i ate the whole thing just to be sure, but no good. fortunately, the beach was not a disappointment. i'd been there at night last week both with Tami and Lorin, but as romantic as night-time beaches are, it's definitely better in the day.

i think it's only about 3km as the crow flies from Bondi through Tamarama and Bronte Beaches to Coogee, but with the twisting coastline it took me about an hour and a half to get there. Bondi seems like a very health-conscious little town (though that could just be Lorin) and the walk is suitably peppered with both exercising people and simple exercise equipment for sit-ups, pull-ups, dips, lunges and the like. good to know. might help the soft bendlessness.

i managed to get an hour or so in the sun and a riveting conversation with an Ausie banker and a student from California before i was ready to gnaw off my arm with hunger. on the recommendation of the student, i went to a charming little middle-eastern place and got a leg-sized kebab before packing up and walking back to Bondi. i rounded the last bend just as the sun was setting and had the privilege of watching the town turn gold. lovely. lovely. lovely.

moving again...

2008-05-06T17:04:00.000-07:00

i've been in the Blue Mountains (about two hours West of Sydney), specifically Katoomba, since Sunday (it's Wednesday now) and it's been wonderful. i had hoped to come up here and bump into someone to hike with, but by Sunday evening, no such bumping had occurred, so i asked the girl at reception how stupid it would be to hike alone and (bless her younger-than-me soul) she said she always hikes by herself, and that if i sign out and back in from the front desk before i leave, they will make sure i don't disappear forever. done.

so Monday, after a brief visit to Katoomba's fruit market, i was back in the boots, the pants, and the Merino wool top, setting out for a short (2-3 hour) hike.

it was very clear very quickly i had overdressed. something close to wearing hiking gear in Central Park, though not quite THAT bad, but there were definitely people on the same trail wearing flip-flops and walking their dogs. it was a nice hike, and i got back to the hostel pretty early. made dinner and lost myself in a book for five hours (THAT felt good).

yesterday, i had a bit of a slow start, but decided to do a longer walk (5-6 hours). about two hours into it, i changed my mind and stopped to have lunch with the intention of turning back, but a guy named Chris from my hostel (my dorm room actually) walked by, and said he was also thinking about turning back, but that there was another staircase out of the valley just a half hours walk further, so together we kept going. when we got to the staircase, we ran into a pair of girls that had just returned from the Castle (both mine and Chris's original destination). the girls said it was only an other 40 minutes to the base of the rocks and then another 15 up it, so we decided to press on. 45 minutes later we were on top of a giant rock on top of a reasonably large hill with 360 degree views of Jamison Valley. pretty sweet.

so four and half hours after i had planned to turn around and go home, i was cresting the last hill to the hostel. my blood-sugar was pretty low and i felt a little dizzy, so i crammed some biscuits in my mouth, changed my clothes and went out to dinner for the first time in over a week. had some delicious Italian food, a few glasses of wine, and then came home, read a little more, and slept a very hard sleep.

today i'm headed back down to Sydney and Bondi Beach to meet up with Lorin and relax for a few days before heading up to Brisbane on Monday. moving, moving just keep moving.

the Blue Mountains

2008-05-05T17:37:00.000-07:00

just toodling around the Blue Mountains for a few days. doing some hiking, lots of reading, and lots of cooking. :)

nothing new or exciting to report, just enjoying the cool, fresh air and sunshine.

the most amazing everything in the world...

2008-05-03T06:33:00.000-07:00

so after walking up to Hyde Park, meeting a lovely nurse from Minnesota who's working in Sydney, and riding a VERY packed bus to Bondi Beach, at five of eight on a Saturday night i find myself sitting in a bar called Revissis, alone, with a glass of wine, waiting for Dave's friend Lorin. the minor problem is that i have no idea what Lorin looks like (i forgot to browse through her facebook page before i left the hostel) and i have no way to contact her (also forgot to write down her phone number from my email).

Bondi is a very populated, easily navigable place, so the only real problem is finding a bus to take me home in the event we don't connect, and even that isn't a problem, rather more of an inconvenience. but, i haven't gone out since i left the City and i am so stubborn that i refuse to go home without finding a good time SOMEWHERE, so as i'm sipping my wine, i imagine i am my roommate Geoff (who can always either find or make fun anywhere) and wonder what would he do (WWGD). shortly, i am debating the merits of wandering from bar to bar looking for entertainment or enacting a plan involving the internet, a pay-phone, a pen, and maybe some chicken wire to locate Lorin. either way, i am determined to make myself a party. damn it.

at 8:15, there is still no sign of her.

by 8:25, i've asked at least five people in the bar if they are or know a blond girl named Lorin, which is really rather useless because MOST girls here are blond.

did i mention this is one of the swankiest bars i have ever been in and i am wearing a black turtle-neck, jeans, and orthopedic/granny looking flats (no offense Gram). my hair is a disaster, i have no accessories to speak of, and i am carrying (as my handbag) the wallet-sized, fruit-colored, little zipper number i got for free from a Clinique promotional give-away.

at 8:30 on the dot, a short version of Uma Therman walks into the bar, wearing skinny black trousers, a frilly lace top, four inch heals, a leopard-print fur coat, and a large, heavy-looking bobble on a long chain around her neck. she has a phone in one hand, an expensive looking bag in the other, and both her hair and her face are done to perfection.

lady's and gentlemen, Lorin Blumenthal.

i eye her, like i've eyed every other blond in the bar, hoping that it's Lorin and that giving her an unintentionally creepy stare will let her know it's me and not some crazy American looking for a good time (oh wait...). it works. she hesitates, then approaches me, asks if i'm me (to which, i respond, maybe a little too enthusiastically, that yes, yes, i am Cheryl!) and then proceeds to apologize profusely, with wild hand gestures and offering of drinks for making me wait and have to drink alone for one second longer than absolutely necessary. we chat for a few minutes (she is intensely interested in EVERYTHING i have to say) and then head upstairs to her blond, twin cousins' birthday party.

Lorin does a quick scan of the room before deciding that there are at least five fabulous people she MUST introduce me to, and then buys me a drink to celebrate my arrival, our connection, and life in general. i don't know what the drink was. something with the word Wiki in the name, but it was the perfect combination of sweet, sour, and refreshing and came with a flaming half of passion fruit in the top. Lorin falls in love with it immediately and continues to rave about it for the rest of the evening.

after meeting Lorin's cousins, two other girls whose names i can't remember, two guys who's names i also can't remember, a pilot named Ken, a very nice guy named Gideon (who's having a costume part for HIS birthday next Saturday), and all the other extremely well-dressed, well-groomed patrons of Revissis (can i just restate that i am in a cotton turtle-neck and glorified penny-loafers), Lorin got it in her head that she wanted a chicken burger from a place called Oporto (kind of like a Burger King, but with chicken), so we left Revissis and walked to the nearest Oporto, ordered and then inhaled our individual chicken burgers, topped the meal off with some really fantastic Swiss ice cream, and then hobble/walked to Lorin's car so she could drive me the ten minutes back into Sydney central.

after a harrowing ride, with only mild attention paid to traffic rules, like stopping for red lights and breaking, Lorin drops me off right in front of my hostel, raves some more about our drinks, the chicken burger, the icecream, and the general gloriousness of the universe, swears to see me next week before i depart Sydney, and then drives away in a blaze of enthusiastic glory.

i think i have a new favorite person ever.

moving on...

2008-05-03T01:39:00.000-07:00

soooo, what can i say about Sydney. i've got about a half hour to kill before i'm meeting Dave's other friend Lorin in Bondi, and about 10 minute to kill on my internet card.

yesterday i had lunch with a friend of a friend who happens to work in the Sydney office for Imagine Software (my old company) and got a free meal out of the deal. :) Free Food Friday still reigns supreme.

also yesterday, Valentina left. off to Vietnam with Pablo, Veronica, and Aila who i accompanied to the aquarium (and the rad shark tanks) two days ago.

last night i realized there were still tons of things i wanted to do here and hadn't mustered up the energy to actually accomplish, so i made a list, did a bunch of them today (went to a few public markets and took a ferry to Manly beach) and will be doing a few more of them tomorrow before heading up to the Blue Mountains. i'll be back in Bondi for a few days later this week and then flying up to Brisbane, Noosa, and further North where i can hopefully live in my bathing suit and/or hiking boots for the three or four weeks.

i am still exhausted. rest and relaxation are evidently difficult to attain in the midst of a bustling city. just have to wait for Noosa.

flights

2008-05-01T01:17:00.000-07:00

i decided so long ago to return to New York in August, that until about halfway through my time volunteering, i thought that i'd actually already changed me flight (yes, i am a flake sometimes).

after doing some research and talking to some flight counselors, i discovered that in order to change my original flight, i'd have to pay a change fee AND the difference between the original flight and the new one, all of which came out to something over two grand. um, no.

so i canceled (and am getting a refund for) the original flight and have spent the last three weeks trying to locate a resonably priced flight home.

as of two days ago, the best i could do was 800 dollars.

today, i found a flight from Dublin to JFK for just over 600 USD and then checked Ryanair to see what they could do to get me to Dublin from London. turns out they're offerring a deal on August 13th. flight from London (Gatiwick, but really, who cares) to Dublin... 0.00 GBP. there are some taxes and some fees (Ryanair loves their fees), but it all comes out to about 40 USD.

so i will be arriving in JFK, on Air France, fresh off the boat, er plane, from Dublin on August 14th, 2008 at approximately 11:30 am.

in the meantime...

Sydney!

2008-04-30T17:04:00.000-07:00

i have decided that if you take the lower half of mid-town, the Village, and Park Slope, cram them all together in one place, and crown them with a really spectacular opera house, you'd get Sydney. i love this city. and wouldn't mind living here (don't worry Dave, i'm still planning to bring back your phone).

despite the fact that my body has been close to physically incapable of getting out of bed for the last three days, i have managed to walk around a bit and see some of the sites. the harbor is incredibly refreshing and the opera house is as beautiful and magnificent as everyone claims. no one talks about the botanical gardens, but they are pretty sweet too (despite being literally trimmed [like a Christmas tree] with bats).

yesterday, after sleeping until 3 in the afternoon (a short break around 11 for food), Valentina turned up at a hostel down the street and together we went to Bondi to meet up with Dave's friend Tami. had dinner at a sweet little place called Bondi Cafe and then got the full tour. worked out well for Valentina, who (with her insane schedule) is only in Sydney for three days and after arriving at 5 in the morning yesterday and going on a 7 hour walking tour, just couldn't muster the energy to go to Bondi alone. i don't know how she does it. Friday evening she's off to Vietnam and then Cambodia and then Thailand, and i lose track after that.

so today i'm meeting up with her and a few of the other girls traveling with her group (there's 400 of them in total - i will explain that some other time) and going to the aquarium. i like big fish. should be fun.

banana thief!

2008-04-28T18:55:00.000-07:00

i realized last night i am suffering a tiny bit of culture shock. Sydney is a lot like New York, but not familiar, so coming from NZ where you can leave your bag leaned up against a building for two hours without someone touching it and information centers actually ADVISE you to hitch-hike instead of taking buses, to Sydney where there are constantly announcements on the backpackers loudspeaker to watch your bags and people steal your bananas (who does that!?) is a bit of an adjustment.

i am giving myself a few days off traveling.

this means ignoring my budget and taking whatever measures are necessary to relax and recoup (in lieu of a bathtub and a bottle of wine, today i am eating chocolate).

so Sydney can wait. it will be here in a few days. then i will take pictures of it and wander around it, but in the meantime, i am curled around a cup of tea with chocolate in one hand a a book in the other.

cheers.

pictures!

2008-04-28T01:33:00.000-07:00

after spending an obscene amount of time and money in an internet cafe...

last week of GVN:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157604769413634/

the South Island:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/52417396@N00/sets/72157604769436260/

new country

2008-04-27T02:15:00.000-07:00

i am in Sydney in what may possibly be the world's largest backpacker. it's nine floors with a rooftop pool. it's like a college dorm mixed with a hotel. expensive too. sigh.

i spent yesterday walking around Christchurch (really beautiful little city) with Valentina from Uruguay (she pronounces it ooo-roo-gwhy) and had a lovely time. she flew out to Rotarua this morning around 5 and after doing some much needed laundry i flew out around 2:30.

i am now fourteen hours ahead of you folks in New York.

heading into Kings Cross tonight with my new roomates to some place that evidently has a cheap pizza deal on Sundays. i am still constantly hungry and have to talk myself out of inhaling food whenever it comes my way. i'm in Sydney for at least a week though, so hopefully i'll be able to do some cooking for myself, save some money, and put on a few pounds. :)

new experience.

2008-04-26T00:36:00.000-07:00

i slept in a 38-bed dormitory last night. it was a cubicle farm of bunk beds. i woke up at some undetermined hour of the night and had the pleasure of listening to a veritable concert of heavy breathing and snoring.

am sleeping in a five bed dorm tonight.

a new adventure

2008-04-25T02:29:00.000-07:00

so almost exactly a week ago, in the hut on the last night on the Heaphy track, i was chatting with three guys from Israel who said that i should NOT spend four to five days in Christchurch because you can do it in one and instead i should go down to Fox Glacier and hike the first leg (6-7 hours) of the Copeland track up to the natural hot pools at the Welcome Flats hut. it sounded like a cool idea, so i told Hannes about it. Hannes is obsessed with spa pools and so he became immediately obsessed the the Copeland track and finding a way to get me to come along.
then i got sick.

but somehow we managed to get from where ever it was that i was the last time i wrote on foxywheaties down to Fox Glacier on Tuesday evening. Tuesday night we pretended we weren't on a budget for dinner and i started formulating a plan to go back up to Greymouth on Thursday and over to Christchurch, but Wednesday morning when we woke up, the weather was beautiful and somehow, still not sure how, despite having promised my feet at the end of the Heaphy track that i would not hike on them for at least two weeks, Hannes managed to get me motivated to do Copeland.

by the time we packed and were ready to go, we'd missed the bus, so we hitched a ride to the glacier park with a nice girl from the UK and then a second ride from the park to the start of the track with a lovely older gentleman on his way to Queenstown for a 55th reunion with the volunteer firefighters crew he worked with when he was Hannes's age.

and then we started the track.

it was 12:30 already and a little math will tell you we were risking hiking after dark, so we practically RAN for the first two hours until we overtook two other hiking groups and decided we'd make it to the top before darkness closed in.

i was in my day pack with nothing but my sleeping bag, toothbrush, food for the night, and a warm, dry change of clothes so hopping (dancing really) over the large rocks and boulders scattered over the first half of the track wasn't bad at all. i'd even go so far as to say it was fun.

it took us four and a half hours to get to the top and the last hour was nothing short of spectacular. even Hannes (reminder: from Switzerland) stated emphatically that the mountains we were hiking in were real mountains.

when we got to the top, we (along with everyone else) wasted no time in stripping down and suiting up and climbing in the hot pools where we floated and soaked and watched the sunset. it was incredible.

there were two minor snafus: 1. we hadn't anticipated that there would be no stoves in the hut. each Heaphy hut had a gas stoves, so after waiting for an hour and a half for the coal stove to heat up (which it never did) we took up the offer from an Estonian kid named Ats (i have NO idea how to pronounce it) to use his mini gas cooker (i'm sure there's a more technical name) and then went to bed around nine, woke up at seven and 2. after an hour or so of sheer panic (someone had accidentally picked up Hannes's boots and we were both having visions of him hiking back down barefoot) we set back out for Fox.

it actually took us longer to come down than it did to go up.

we had another night of pretending we weren't living on budgets and this morning we said good-bye.

i hopped on a bus back up to Greymouth and then took the Transalpine Railway over to Christchurch, which is where i am now, sitting next to Valentina of Uruguay, whom i met on the bus and had dinner with this evening. we picked up a German guy too, and the three of us checked into Charlie's Backpacker and are sleeping in a 38-bed dorm. it is a cubical farm of beds and totally hilarious.

tomorrow is Christchurch and Sunday i fly to Sydney, where hopefully i can stop moving for at least three days in a row and just relax. loads to do and see there too though, so who knows.

and ps, thanks for the overwhelming response in emails. i loved it.

on the move.

2008-04-21T02:45:00.000-07:00

left the rainbow-colored, radio-stationed, fire-bathing, volunteer-run, hippie backpacker in Karamea this morning.

had tea with a few cool people in Westport at noon.

arrived in Punakaikai (poo-nah-kye-kee) around one.

checked into the coolest, most beautiful backpacker around two, passed out for two hours (i am still sick... and very snotty). went to buy some super expensive, mildly disgusting food (in Punakaikai you're lucky if you can find food so i didn't complain, too loudly). watched the sunset from the beach. took a long hot shower (energy and water saving be damned, my sinuses needed it). and booked a bus to Greymouth tomorrow morning for after we've viewed the water-spewing pancake rocks (google it, it's cool).

ultimate destination for the day tomorrow is Fox Glacier, but transportation is proving difficult. may end up just heading through Arthur's Pass to Christchurch, but Fox Glacier would be Hannes's and my last adventure tramping adventure together and he's determined to get both of us down there regardless of minor details like bus schedules or how much snot my face is producing.

if you're reading this, i want to know what's going on in your life too. comments and emails welcome and appreciated. seriously.

the Heaphy track.

2008-04-19T02:58:00.000-07:00

we last left our haphazard heroine in Nelson, on her way to Takaka (prounounced Tah-keh-kah, not te-Kah-kah as i had the misfortune of saying to a bus station attendant)...

the beginning:

it starts to rain as i board the bus to Takaka and only increases in intensity as the evening wears on. by the time i arrive at the Takaka backpacker, it is coming down in sheets and the van driver (we'd transferred from the bus to a van to get over the "hill") tells us that he'll be taking us to the track in the morning as well and warned us that if the rain kept up, he might have to drop us off before the start of the track (6 kilometers before the start of the track) because there are three fords that the fan is unable to cross when the creeks flood, "worst case scenario."

six hours later, it's still pouring.

Day 1:

i am a 200 pound woman.

it's 7 in the morning, and after wrapping or zip-locking the contents of my bag, including food, in plastic (at the time this actually seemed more intelligent than getting a rain cover for my pack), i get on the scale, first without my pack and then with it. after some elementary math, i learn that my pack is just under 20 kilos. Hannes's weighs in at 23. the DOC (department of conservation) recommends hiking the Heaphy with no more than 14, but clearly they are not talking about me. i am strong. only ordinary people need to pay attention to recommendations like these, so with a grunt, i heft my pack onto my back and head out to the van.

did i mention it's still raining?

we pick up three German guys, and a German couple, only one of whom speaks slowly and clearly enough that i can understand him. as we pull up to the first "creek" it's immediately evident that the van will not be driving through it, but the farmer who's land we have to drive through to get to the start of the track has lost his electricity and has nothing better to do that drive his tractor (towing us in the trailer on the back) through the fords to the track start.

we all pile out of the van, onto the trailer and are completely soaked in less than three minutes. we cross FOUR creeks not three (not sure which one was the new one, but there was supposed to be one less), and start the trek already drenched. fortunately, once we're under the trees, there's enough of a canopy that my pants start to dry out and i am plenty warm as the whole first day is entirely uphill.

at hour 2, i manage to get my pack settled squarely on my hips so the weight is where it's supposed to be (instead of on my shoulders) and am relatively comfortable.

at hour 3, my legs have decided they don't like the weight i've gained in the last 24 hours and putting one foot in front of the other becomes a challenge.

the DOC says this leg of the trek takes five hours. but this clearly does not apply to me. i am strong. so at hour 3.5, i expect to come upon the hut at any moment. and we do. A hut. not OUR hut. we don't arrive at OUR (called Perry Saddle) for another two hours and by that time, i am so happy to be there, i almost start to cry when i take off my pack.

the coolest part of the day... feeling like someone was pulling me around and lifting me up stairs after i put the pack down.

belly-aching aside, the hike itself is pretty cool. the mist makes everything look mysterious and spooky and the torrential downpour flooded everything including the small streams that flows over the track. you hear the waterfalls before you see them and then you round a corner and see these beautiful rapids tumbling down the side of the mountain.

everyone is in bed and sleeping by nine and once the aching in my legs stopped, i sleep like a log.

Day 2:

short day. thank god. we only have to hike three and a half hours today. and there's a nice pit stop along the way at a smaller hut.

it's still raining.

we leave the hut and wander out onto what looks like a giant field with gracefully swaying reddish-brown grasses and mountains in the distance, but when we round a corner, there's a huge, forest-filled gorge with a raging river at the bottom. we also come across a pole covered in shoes.

when we reach the small hut, there's a pair of people leaving that have started a fire, so we settle in for lunch, and then settle in for awhile longer to dry out our socks and wait out the torrents that continue to persist. after three hours, we decide the rain has waited us out and head back out, through a spectacular grotto, another field, and finally to the Saxon hut.

my legs are starting to get used to the weight, and other than the ongoing battle against vomiting whenever i use the loo (read: outhouse), the evening is very pleasant. we are all in bed by nine.

Day 3:

SUNSHINE! we can actually see the sun. we get a little overzealous and pack away our raincoats and put sunscreen on. ten minutes into the walk it starts to rain. but it is short-lived, and the rest of the day (another short one) is sunny and beautiful. we can actually see the sea (it's a long way off, but visible) and the landscape is breath-taking the whole way.

we stop VERY briefly for lunch. after only two minutes, we're swarmed by the sandflies that had left us alone when we were walking, and we finish up our food pacing around to avoid getting bitten. when we arrive at hut number three (James Mackay), i am distressed to find that it is virtually overrun by sandflies. i double layer my socks (they bit me through a singe layer), tuck my pants into my socks, my shirt into my pants, my hair into my shirt, and put on my gloves, then swat the flies away from my face until the ranger comes and builds a fire, which (hallelujah!) keeps them at bay.

i am in bed by 8:30 and sleep like a baby.

Day 4:

this is the long day. six hours. as we are heading out the door, it starts raining... again. the clouds moved in last night about an hour after we arrived and we haven't been able to see farther than fifty yards since.

i have a plan today. for the last two days, at about hour 2, Hannes's shoulders and my feet start to hurt. i decide that if we hike very quickly, we can get maximum distance out of the time we are loaded down before things start to ache.

the day is amazing. we're coming down the other side of the mountain, and at some point, round a corner and can instantly smell the sea. once we're at sea level, we cross a number of rather rickety foot bridges (crossing one of them, i had visions of the whole thing flipping around, sending both me and my stupidly heavy pack careening into the river below) and then round another corner and we come upon our hut (Heaphy), located at the mouth of the estuary that leads to the sea.

in less than 20 minutes, i've got my bathing suit on and am running (literally running, so much for sore feet) over the beach, getting blasted by sand in the gales coming off the ocean and heading to the water. when i actually get there, the sea is entirely too rough to go swimming, so i settle for wading in the water that is surprisingly warm, and then swimming in the estuary, which is surprisingly cold.

at night we play cards with the two Germans we met in James Mackay and three Israeli guys we met in Heaphy hut and go to bed at eleven (scandal).

Day 5:

we spend the entire day hiking along the water and it is nothing short of spectacular. the sea is so strong, there are spots where you can hear rumbling and look down to actually see giant boulders rolling around like pebbles.

the trek today is four hours, and i have a cold. the fresh air and beautiful scenery get me through the first two hours and thoughts of my friends and loved ones (seriously, i had to go to my happy place to keep from sitting down on the track and refusing to budge another inch) get me through the second two.

at the end of the track a shuttle picks us up and drops us off in Karamea at Rongo's, a rainbow-painted building and Karamea's only backpacker.

i empty the contents of my pack. put most of it in the washer, put myself in the shower, and spend the next six hours, trying to stay awake until an appropriate time to go to sleep, which seems like it might be right about now.

more on Rongo's later.

i am alive.

2008-04-18T20:22:00.000-07:00

more later.

Christchurch...

2008-04-13T00:38:00.000-07:00

...this is not.

i am in Nelson. i spent the morning yesterday taking care of some biznas and doing some last minute chatting up of friends, then hopped in the Red Barron for the last time and headed to the camper van party lodge with Hannes and the Dutches. then it was off to the ferry, and over (yes over, not down) to the South Island (specifically, Picton) where Hannes and i had about a half an hour to kill before catching the Naked Bus (name of the bus company, not description of bus or passengers) for a two and a half hour ride to Nelson.

Hannes studied in Nelson for nine weeks before he came to Kowhai house, so he knows his way around, -ish, and even if he didn't, Nelson has fewer establishments in the entire town than can be found on Saint Marks, so it's a nice place to relax a little (we went to the beach today) before the five days of hell i'm about to experience.

by five days of hell i might mean five days of beautiful scenery, completely fresh air, and skies totally devoid of light pollution. also millions and millions of sand-flies (notorious in the South Island, but a topic for a different post). when hiking Heaphy, the DOC recommends your pack not be heavier than 14 kilos... i think mine exceeds that. without food. this is confusing to me because i am (i think) a light packer, so i'm wondering how people that pack normal amounts of underpants do this trek without abandoning all of their belongings at the start and repurchasing everything anew at the other end.

as an aside, i would just like to offer thanks to all of you who chastised me for only planning to bring two pairs of underpants. i ended up with six, and even still i feel i am washing them all the time.

this morning i went grocery shopping for the hike. i can say with confidence that by this time next week i will vomit if i ever see another packet of Uncle Ben's rice. of all the dried dinner options, Uncle Ben was the only guy who's ingredient list included items that i could pronounce. i'm also wondering if i am going to get to the other side of this track without losing ten pounds.
i am rediscovering that when i travel, i am constantly hungry. it doesn't matter if i had a salad or an entire kilo of chips, i am forever wishing i had something to eat and, it seems, never in a place (i.e., on a five day hike) or state (i.e., with money) to get it. there is a small part of me that fears i will waste away to nothing, but i caught a glimpse of my backside in a store window the other day and decided i'll probably be just fine until August.

in unrelated news, i am now a card-carrying member of the YHA (Youth Hostel Association). i am hoping it will save me at least a few bucks in the long run and has already saved me six.

tomorrow, i check out of Nelson, take a bus to Takaka, stay one night, and catch an early bus to the start of the Heaphy Track.

catch you on the other side.

and...

2008-04-11T03:37:00.000-07:00

...it begins.

well, it begins tomorrow.

Hannes and i are leaving with the Dutches a little before 10am tomorrow morning to pick up their camper van and head to the ferry for a three hour ride to Picton on the South island. after saying goodbye to the father and son duo we'll move on to Nelson for a few days of resting and relaxing and then on to the Heaphy track

the Heaphy track is one of New Zealand's great walks. its a four to six day trek (we're doing it in five) dotted with DOC (department of conservation) huts, spaced evenly along the way. each hut is staffed, and equipped with bed, a stove, and running water. this will be the first time i've hiked a multi-day trek and the first time i've ever hiked with all my gear (plus food). should be interesting (read: fraught with sweating and hyperventilation). i anticipate having thighs of steel by this time next week. i told Hannes he has to carry all his own food as i have no intention of carrying any more weight than absolutely necessary, and as a 19-year-old kid, he eats about twice as much as i do (you wouldn't think it possible, but it's true).

after Heaphy, i'm on my own and will be working my way South and East until i hit Christchurch. i fly from Christchurch to Sydney on April 27th.

this departure has kind of snuck up on me. living in the Kowhai house is even cushier than being in the City. i don't have to worry about rent, food, transportation, or even finding a laundromat. and while i anticipated (and over-analyzed) my departure from New York, i didn't realize how comfortable i'd gotten here at Kowhai until a few days ago, which makes it a little weird to all of a sudden be faced again with the prospect of travel plans, sleeping accommodations, food acquisition, and (gasp!) lack-of-free-internet.

needless to say, i won't be writing as much from here on out. with other things to occupy me (i.e., basic survival and NOT getting sold into the sex trade - kidding, Mom and Dad) i won't have the luxury of detailing the number and location of my bug bites, plant-inflicted injuries, or poultry encounters.

this should not, by any means, deter YOU from writing to ME. i miss you all and would love to hear any details of your lives that you are willing to share.

so until Christchurch... peace.

pictures!

2008-04-07T21:37:00.000-07:00

http://www.flickr.com/gp/52417396@N00/ys6c2v

(thanks again, Audrie!)

300 trees

2008-04-07T04:21:00.000-07:00

we planted today. no traps. no weeds. just straight up planting. two and a half hours and three hundred trees.

we were working in the Pauatahanui (prounounced pah-wah-tah-hanoo-ey) Wetlands today with another volunteer organization that is roughly synonymous with the Sierra Club in the states (only these guys are all over 65).

the survival rate (of the trees, not the members of the organization) is only about forty-five percent, but they just keep raising, potting, and then planting these scraggly little trees, and over the last twenty-five years have made some intense progress.

a lot of wetlands (a lot of New Zealand, really) have been converted, or at least attempted to be converted, into farmland (grazing, not planting). just recently, the government has started making a concerted effort to convert these wetlands back to their natural state.

in theory anyway.

the progress is slow (perhaps particularly so with this group), but diligent, and it's incredibly rewarding to hoe out a lot of dirt and asphalt and stick a little tree into the ground (we questioned the nutritional value of asphalt for trees, but were told the plants are hardy and if they could survive the frosts - there's about three here per winter - they'd do ok).

so after a particularly gratifying day, we returned to Kowhai, where Hannes and i spent about four hours cooking a very stubborn dinner. ate. drank. computed. and now sleep.

the new cast of characters.

2008-04-07T03:59:00.000-07:00

Toby is still around, though we've only seen him once in the last week and a half. Hannes is still here also (obviously) and has become my new partner in crime.

Gijs - (prounced Hice, where the H is a hacking sound) 30-year-old, Dutch, neurological researcher (son of Kees), currently living in Switzerland. quiet. brilliant. always has a concerned, almost startled look on his face. very laid back. fantastic sense of humor. excellent chef.

Kees - (pronounced Kase) 60-year-old, Dutch ex-pilot, currently living in the mountains in Eastern Spain. father of two (one of them is Gijs). typically-cheesy dad with a lot of lame but endearing jokes. always smiling. always positive. always kind.

Eugene - 20-year-old kid from Cali. spending two months with GVN (one of which will, collectively, be spent on the internet). studying marine biology at UC Santa Cruse. doesn't know which state borders California to the North.

Libby - 29-year-old GVN communications employee from Denver. mostly invisible, but pretty cool when she's in the house.

Stephan - thirty-something Swiss journalist. traveling with his wife and four-year-old daughter. not actually living in the house (they're staying in a bed and breakfast just up Normandale Rd). quiet. brilliant (seems to be the trend). arrives every morning EXACTLY at the time requested (the first day, he arrived at 9:30 on the dot; when i commented on his punctuality, he flashed a brilliant smile, didn't miss a beat and responded simply and emphatically, "i'm Swiss!")

Dan - 32-year-old team leader. originally from the UK. went to school in AU and has been living in NZ for the last five years. just got back from five months in Rota where he was trying to convince (though ultimately ended up bribing) the locals not to kill an endangered species of black bird. doctor of ecology. wise-ass.

and me.

my hairs are too long...

2008-04-07T03:31:00.000-07:00

...this is Hannes's way of telling me he needs a hair cut.

language barriers.

there're a lot of them here. currently, the problem is mostly Swiss-German to English, though it is just as likely to be an issue from UK-English to American-English.

today, for example, when i asked Dan the name of a particular bird and he replied, "spuh-winged bluvah." it didn't help that i wasn't looked at him when he spoke (so the task of understanding him was made that much harder by my general inability to actually hear anything). "Spa-winged glover?" i responded, confused. after repeating himself no less than three times, during which i was able to gather that the damned thing was spur-winged, but (still unable to see his face and therefore read his lips) had no idea what "bluvah" meant. Hannes finally offered some assistance by saying, "plover, like "lover" with a p." Ahhh, of course. a spur-winged plover. obviously.

in my defense, Dan doesn't really speak UK-English either. "Duck" for example, in Dan-language (a mangled, British/Australian/New Zealand hybrid of an accent) is "dook." Libby speaks the same English as i do. so does Eugene... sometimes, though more he's more likely to speak straight up American, with a lot of shouting and "dude"s.

the Swiss folk (and there's a lot of them in the house right now) speak Swiss-German to each other and, to the rest of us, a much higher English than we speak to one another. there is only the occasional slip-up (e.g., "pulling weeds isn't very funny" - translation: "pulling weeds blows"; or describing the rice-cooker as "wery comfortable," i'll let you try to figure out what that one means) and most are welcomed fodder for ridiculing each other when we are all tired from a long day and have little energy to do more than sit around and stare at each other after dinner.

daylight savings time!

2008-04-06T02:40:00.001-07:00

only i'm in the other hemisphere!! so i just lost an hour!! AGAIN! nooooooo!

that is all.

after...

2008-04-04T00:13:00.000-07:00

...three weeks of killing rats, weasels, stotes, hedgehogs, ferns, thistle, Canadian Fleabane, and Beggars Tics, today I GOT TO PLANT A TREE.

a few of them actually.

we were back at the Te Hapua wetlands today. in th rain. pulling weeds and hacking away at thistle. i spent the better part of the day destroying Fleabane and fighting the lethal (seriously lethal) razor blades that they call grass here. the fingers (and, most unfortunately, that soft fleshy bit between my figures) on my right hand are now shredded to ribbons and decorated with a particularly stubborn form of dirt that refuses to come out of what is essentially very nasty paper cuts. suddenly Joy (land owner, wetland preserver, and all around fabulous woman) appeared and said she needed three people to plant.

armed with my waders (as the only, girl, i was the only person with feet small enough to fit in our only pair of waders) and my rain jacket, i forded a small river to a smaller island, spread a little mulch, dug a few holes, and gently put tender, new plants into the ground.

soggy raincoat, squishy waders, squishier mud, bleeding hands, and water dripping in my eyes, but hot damn, i got to plant a tree. color me happy.

it's raining men...

2008-04-01T01:38:00.000-07:00

...hallelujah.

of the seven people in the house (plus Toby) i am now one of only two women and the only female working in the field. Libby, the other girl, is a GVN employee and only staying in the house for a week or so before a visit home to Denver. so when we go out now, it's just me and the guys: Hannes and Toby (whom you know), Eugene, Kees (pronounced Kase), Gijs (pronounced h-[hack]-ice), Stefan, and Dan.

Eugene is a college student from central Cali. Gijis and Kees are a father and son team from Amsterdam. Stefan is from Switzerland. and Dr. Dan, our house advisor and resident ecologist, originates from the UK (but has spent significant time in both Australia and New Zealand, rendering his accent a muddled mess that i am completely incapable of deciphering).

this morning we all piled into the Red Baron (my new, quasi-lame nickname for our fire-engine red, eleven-seater van) and went out to a fur seal colony on the Southern-most point of the North island to count seals.

the fur seal was effectively extinct on the North island until 1991 when they moved back in and started mating again. the point of the survey today was to attempt to determine the population growth by counting both the number of seals and the number of pups. if we could identify which were male and which were female, that was an added bonus (though difficult, because, as Dan put it "they don't have any external bits and bobs to go by").

Dan wasn't really sure why, but the two colonies we surveyed are more than a little male-heavy in population, so although we saw quite a few females and a number of totally freaking adorable pups, the majority were male (like my house).

seal-counting is a little trickier than you'd think. the wind on the Southern-most point of the North island is intense, and if you happen to climb to a high rock to get a good view of the seals, you may also happen to get blown off said rock by an unexpected gale-force gust of wind. furthermore, seals are remarkably agile, especially considering they don't have things like arms and legs and when they are frightened, they will run, or rather, um, hop-ish/tumble towards the water. this is great, and fun to watch, unless you are between the frightened seal and the water. and while it sounds simple to not get between said seal and water, imagine rocks... lots of them... short ones, tall ones, all with cracks and crevices and stretching from the water to about fifty yards inland. now imagine seals that are the same color as the rocks and like to hide in all these cracks and crevices. it makes staying on the land side a little more difficult.

fortunately there were no casualties and only a few near misses when we scrambled to the top of a rock only to find a seal laying there, so after about four hours of counting and trying not to get blown away we headed home.

over the river.

through the woods.

past Rivendell (yes, Rivendell, you nerds).

back to Kowhai house. the house of men.

night terrors...

2008-03-31T02:42:00.000-07:00

i dread going to bed. not because this house can get kind of creepy and squeaky at night. not because there are spiders everywhere just waiting to crawl on my face while i sleep. not even because of my dreams, which, since i have been traveling, are even more graphic and bizarre than usual.

it's because of the mosquitoes.

in truth, the going to bed part is not bad. it's the waking up part that gets me. i wake up every morning smacking myself in the side of the face trying to extinguish the life of the hated thing buzzing in my ear. i have only been successful once, but continue waking up this way because while i rarely get them, they also rarely get me (this probably has more to do with getting out of bed after i slap myself into consciousness than it does with the effectiveness of hitting myself, but whatever).

the bites on my legs from our hikes are finally disappearing (brain kicked in and suggested PANTS would be a better idea than SHORTS), but i took a few nasty hits at Bushy Park. when we returned to Kowhai house i was sporting bites on my arms, hands, and back... also my butt. did i mention i have a mosquito bite on my butt? because i do.

this particular bite makes me particularly unhappy, in part (as you might guess) because of it's unfortunate location, but also because of the extenuating circumstances under which i received it.

the second night we were in Bushy Park, we roasted a leg (seriously, a whole leg) of lamb, necessitating four hours of very hot oven in very small cabin. the options for sleeping were therefore to bake ourselves in a lamb infused room or open the windows. we opted to open the windows and the onslaught began.

in an attempt to keep the mosquitoes off, i zipped myself up in my sleeping bag and pulled the draw-string around my face so that only my mouth and nose were sticking out. unfortunately, i found, in a very short period of time, that i was very hot (did i mention we'd roasted a lamb for four hours?), so after sweating profusely for about 15 minutes, i was compelled (forced really - i saw no other option) to take off my pants. the process of doing this rendered me even sweatier as my sleeping bag is more of a giant, un-stretchy, body sock than a real bag and though the pj's came off the rear pretty easily, balling up enough to get them off my feet was an entirely different story. after 15 more minutes of sweating (without pants), i gave up the ghost, unzipped the whole thing, put my pants back on and decided the best course of action was to put on socks, tuck the pants into the socks, tuck my shirt into my pants, put hair-ties around my wrists, and zip up the long underwear shirt i was wearing with my hair tucked in. Toby was up at that point, and watching all this, but said nothing. this left only my face and my hands exposed but i think the mozy must have gotten to my butt whilst the pants were off because next morning... bam. butt bite. when i was scratching my ass later in the day, i tried to explain what had happened, but the other volunteers are so used to me being weird and gross that i don't even think they cared or noticed.

the battle begins again in t-8 hours.

and then there were two.

2008-03-30T03:47:00.000-07:00

our house (that sleeps ten) is currently sleeping two. everyone has moved on and Hannes and i are left to entertain each other until the next batch of volunteers arrives tomorrow night.

it's a little late to introduce the cast of characters, but a few of you have been asking, so here they are:

Toby: team leader. native New Zealander. Toby doesn't actually live in the house, but we spend all day, every day with him, so he might as well. at 6'2", Toby weighs in at about a buck forty. this is of particular interest because there is rarely a time of day when Toby isn't eating. Toby follows a very strict diet, the rules of which i haven't entirely deciphered yet, but the diet necessitates constantly referencing various lists detailing the origin and effects of hundreds of additives and preservatives. also eating nothing from China.

Angela: the girl from the Plains (or maybe just Minnesota - do they have plains?). twenty-six years old, 6'2", x-basketball player, and possibly the nicest person i've ever met. blonde. wears lots of pink. is capable of ripping trees out of the ground with her bare hands. seriously.

Erin: resident hippie. eighteen years old, from Denver. Erin researched the flora and fauna of New Zealand the way i researched restaurants and is forever lagging behind on our treks collecting all manner rocks, twigs, leaves, and feathers. she lives in a plaid, cotton, button-down shirt and has a Choco tan.

Phine (pronounced Feena, short for Josephine): German. enjoys potatoes, lamb, carrots, potatoes, sausage, noodles, and potatoes. currently at university, studying physics.

Hannes (pronounced Hah-nes): nineteen-year-old, brilliant, shy kid from Switzerland. his English is impeccable and his accent is just strong enough to make statements like "we are killing weeds today" hilarious. my favorite of Hannes's many wonderful attributes is that sometimes he mixes up "v" sounds with "w" sounds. i enjoy this most when he is talking about how very small his village is.

Todd: the entertainment. Todd is a 19-year old kid from Boston who has encyclopedic knowledge of almost everything, a compulsive need to clean, and the attention span of a puppy. he climbs rock faces, sails ships, and bakes pies all while offering stimulating discussion on the current state of the US economy, the Tibetan political environment, and the ecological subsystem of New Zealand wetlands. in summary: i am totally crushing on Todd. sadly, Todd left Wellington for the South Island this morning.

Erin left yesterday afternoon.

Phine left yesterday morning.

Ange left Thursday evening.

and Hannes just went to bed.

then there was one.

week two.

2008-03-29T13:33:00.001-07:00

http://www.flickr.com/gp/52417396@N00/M9C451

(thanks, Audrie!)

another day in the GVN life...

2008-03-28T05:08:00.000-07:00

...takin'r easy.

our work (or lack thereof) pattern is continuing in the same manner as last week. i had attributed this pattern to team-leader Toby time (a measurement consistent only in its disregard for clock time), but after working with other New Zealanders both in Bushy Park and East Harbor, it appears this may be a country-wide phenomenon rather than Toby-specific peculiarity.

in New Zealand's defense, Toby takes it to the extreme, but in general, it seems that most people here are superbly laid back about actually accomplishing anything. if you don't finish something today, you'll get to it tomorrow... or maybe some other day. in the meantime there is lunch to be eaten, tea to be had, and naps to be taken... outside... in the fresh air.

after three and a half years in New York where there is always a better, faster, more efficient way to do something that will allow you to find a better, faster, more efficient way to do the next thing in a long list of things that need to be done in order to create a new list of things that may or may not eventually lead to the development of something important, New Zealand-time, at first, offended my sensibilities and, to a certain extent, disrupted the general order of my universe. but then i realized i get to nap outside. in the fresh air.

did i mention i'm outside and there's fresh air?

color me converted.

pellets.

2008-03-28T04:11:00.000-07:00

today we were back in East Harbor Regional Park, this time counting fruit.

this fruit is not fruit like apples and oranges, but fruit like tiny, nut-like pellets that, when ripe (and not gnawed upon) resemble Kalamata olives, but tend (with gnawing and shriveling) to more closely resemble squirrel poop. evidently you can get a pretty decent possum count for an area by analyzing how much and in what condition this fruit is found. so for seven hours today we tramped up and down the river valley sifting through forest debris in three-foot wide circular plots (three per tree, nine trees) for fruity pellets.

this day is notable for the following two reasons:

1. we broke a new napping record, clocking in around four over the course of the day.

2. in my first attempt at pellet-gathering, i picked up a number of the wrong kind of fruity pellets as well as a few possum pellets (read: actual poop). after two nights of not sleeping (i was attacked [mauled really] by mosquitoes the second night in Bushy Park, and last night i just plain couldn't sleep), discovering that i'd picked up a possum pellet instead of fruit was more than enough to make me giggle. by the time i regained some semblance of control, i was crying, my nose was running, and i'd drooled on myself.

i think i have a chemical imbalance.

the uneventful remainder of the day was spent sifting, eating (lunch and tea, not pellets), tramping, and napping. in equal measure.

rooster attack

2008-03-28T03:03:00.000-07:00

i narrowly escaped a rooster attack on Monday. i've been told (by our resident animal-guru/hippie) that when attacked by roosters it is acceptable to kick them... gently. i wish i had known this Monday. i could have left the scene of the incident with more pride than i did after having sheepishly retreated to the opposite side of the road to avoid said unexpectedly-aggressive male chicken.

the rooster-attack occurred at the tail end of a "low-key" hike in Belmont Regional Park. you can't get anywhere on the North island, including Belmont (and, you know, a grocery store) without hiking. those beautiful hills that afford such spectacular views to each and every house can be, lets be honest, a pain in the caboose when you are sans-car. so after hiking for twenty minutes up the hill to GET to the park, i hiked for about an hour through the park before i ran into the rooster.

Belmont is beautiful. it's like stepping out of suburbia into some prehistoric landscape with giant trees and endless, green ridges of hills. i didn't hike very far or very long since two of the previous three days were hike-filled as well. on Friday we'd gone to East Harbor Regional park for possum and rat trapping maintenance (translation: an eight hour hike up and down a river valley counting and changing poison pellets in about thirty-five traps). this might not sound exciting, but East Harbor is just as beautiful as Belmont and i'm still totally jazzed to be outside and not in an office chair translating Computer to English. on Sunday, Todd, Hannes and i hiked a track on the opposite side of the bay from Wellington. that was another six hours in the New Zealand sun that left all three of us dusty and exhausted, so Monday's hike was meant to be more of a stroll, but after the hike TO the park, an hour IN the park, and a brief encounter with the rooster, i found myself climbing (and cursing) yet another hill in an effort to get back to the house.

in all seriousness, i love it here.

did i mention that my thighs are starting to look like well-shaped tree trunks? they are. it's hot. and useful for things like picking up lumber jacks... also kicking roosters.

heading up North...

2008-03-24T11:26:00.000-07:00

...to Bushy Park. back at the end of the week.

pictures...

2008-03-20T21:46:00.000-07:00

despite the (literally) hour and a half it took to upload these, and Flickr telling me that of the 75 attempted, only 40 uploaded successfully, here they are...

http://www.flickr.com/gp/52417396@N00/97Y8Dz

and

http://www.flickr.com/gp/52417396@N00/538h80

a day in the life...

2008-03-19T18:52:00.000-07:00

i wake up around 6am, however i refuse to get up that early so i either go back to sleep or lay in bed listening to the bird that sounds eerily similar to R2D2 until i it's time to get ready to go.

when i do get up, i try not to look at anything in my room as the morning light makes the yellow paint, purple curtains, and red bedspreads particularly painful on the eyes. leaving my room i head to the blue bathroom (not the brown bathroom because there are rumors that a fist-sized spider lives in the shower; i have yet not seen said spider and have no intention of doing so). when i flush the toilet, the water spins counter-clockwise.

our team leader will have called last night to say we should be ready to leave the house at either 6:15 or 9:15 for a day of "tree releasing" (a fancy, New Zealand science way to say "weeding"). he tends to arrive 15 minutes after we are supposed to leave and we depart 30 minutes after he arrives.

leaving the house requires a seven- point turn. driveways here are long, narrow, and generally non-conducive to our red, eleven-seater van. we also have to be sure to buckle our seat-belts because there is a $150 fine for anyone found not wearing one, and yesterday a cop on a motorcycle pulled up next to our van while we were driving down the highway and yelled to our team leader to make sure all his passengers were wearing belts.

the drives here are beautiful. there are mountains everywhere so each house has it's own spectacular view of the other mountains and the abundance of rivers and open water in the area. there is also a spectacular type of pine tree that is extraordinary in how little it resembles pine trees in the states and how much it looks like it belongs in an art deco painting.

depending on when we left the house, we arrive on site sometime between 8 and 12, either way, we stop for tea at 10.

at 12pm we stop for lunch.

around 3pm we break for afternoon tea.

depending on where we're working, there is either a lot of work to be done, or none at all. at the farm, most of the work has already been done by other volunteers, so there's a lot of wandering around looking for weeds to pull and trees to release (granted, this does not sound difficult, but when you are surrounded by large, surly plants and are looking for a weak, stick-like tree, it can get challenging). in the wetlands, most of the trees we need to release are marked with boxes and most of the weeds are so tall, you don't even have to bend down to pull them. today, in a period of about 30 minutes, we pulled out a pile roughly the same height and twice the size of my bed.

New Zealand is actually suffering a crippling drought at the moment. the wetlands, which, as you can imagine, are supposed to be, well, wet, are at best only mildly soggy, and about a sixth of the trees we released today were either dead or dying from lack of water. the people that own the land we worked on are also currently fighting legislation that will subdivide their property to put a road through it. it's kind of depressing and more than a little frustrating that there is such blatant disregard for a component of our environment that is so important to and such a good indicator of the health of the ecosystem, but that is a soapbox i will not climb onto... at least not today.

somewhere between 2 and 4:30, we all pile in our red van and head home.

"home" is the Global Volunteer Network's Kowhai house. Kowhai is the Mauri word for a small, native, legume tree. i don't know why our house is named this, but "wh" in Mauri makes an "f" sound, so it's pronounced koh-fye (not cow hi! as you might expect). when we get home, i pick a few vegetables from our garden (fertilized by our own food garbage - be still my heart!) walk in the door and sit down at the computer.

the connection here is a little slow and whenever someone tries to upload pictures, everything crashes (hence, no pictures uploaded). after a group dinner, some more internet, a little book reading and/or journaling, no less than three cups of tea, and an excessive amount of general silliness that can be had only with folks under the age of 20 (there's three of them in the house right now), i start getting ready for bed.

i always have a tiny bit of trouble with this as it's dark and lighting is required but i haven't quite adjusted to the fact that in New Zealand, up on a light switch is off. down is on. there are also an excessive amount of light switches here both for lights and appliances. so, faced with the prospect of turning on a light in the kitchen, you may turn on the kitchen light, the porch light, the dining room light, the oven, the stove, the garbage disposal, the electrical outlet, or the dish washer. oh, and "dishwasher detergent" does not mean "detergent to put in the dishwasher," it means "dish soap," as i had the misfortune to learn this morning when i discovered the dishwasher filled with soap suds.

after dodging the brown bathroom again to take a shower and brush my teeth, i say goodnight to my house-mates put on the pajamas i commandeered from the GNV volunteer's rejects closet and crawl into bed to dream my crazy dreams and wake up again at 6 to start a new day...

a word on Brendan O'Brien

2008-03-18T02:54:00.000-07:00

it has become evident that there needs to be a post solely to acknowledge one Mr. Brendan O'Brien.

not only did he gift me "The Alchemist" (the gift that keeps on giving; after i enjoyed it thoroughly, it made me the cool kid in the house as there is literally a queue of people waiting to read it), but he also exhibits pure genius on a daily basis in his application of the word "foxy." i have him to thank for the naming of this blog.

so i just want to take a moment to say, dude, you're awesome. next time you're at the House, get one to go with na'an for me.

konichiwa.

2008-03-16T03:24:00.000-07:00

i am aroused from slumber at 7am by a whining in my ear. after smacking myself in the face, i remove a now-dead mosquito from my pillow and get up for the day.

around 12 our team leader arrives to take us to a special volunteer project just down the hill: Lower Hutt's annual Teddy Bear picnic. Teddy Bear picnics, as i come to understand, are parties at which children bring Teddy Bears, play games (involving Teddy Bears), and, at least in NZ, enjoy a good, old-fashioned lolly scramble. for the lolly scramble i am handed a giant basket of candy, positioned on a decent expanse of lawn, and watch twenty-five children flock like ducks or pigeons chasing bread crumbs in whatever direction i hurl fistfuls of candy.

for reasons never clearly explained, the Teddy Bear picnic has an Asian theme, entailing a prize for most Asian teddy (?), and a polka-dot kimono dress code for the volunteers.

tomorrow, we're sailing. i'll let you know what the actual volunteer work is when we start doing it.

bed.

i am in New Jersey...

2008-03-16T02:34:00.000-07:00

...obviously not EXACTLY New Jersey, but living in Lower Hutt is kind of how i imagine it must feel to live in New Jersey... without a car.

yesterday morning, a fellow volunteer and i got a lift into the town of Wellington and spent the day wandering around and getting to know the place. i managed to exchange some USD (crap) for some NZD (less crap) with only a few brief moments that rendered me close to sitting down in the middle of the road and crying (aside from clothing stores and restaurants, most things in windy Welly are either closed on Saturdays or close just prior to you wanting to enter them).

i also managed to corner a Local and ask for the best cheap eats in town. three hours later, nine of us were crowded around a bunch of tiny tables in the back of what appeared, from the front, to be nothing more than a bakery, but was in fact a delicious, cheap, Taiwanese restaurant. Tasty Thursdays NZ. what!?!

after dinner, we crowded around another few tables in front of a beverage-serving establishment for a few hours before i was faced with a decision: leave early (enabling me to catch a $4 bus home) or leave late (necessitating a $50 cab ride)...

at 12am i was on a bus. after riding (and snoozing) for an indeterminate amount of time, we arrived at the Normandale Road bus stop, located approximately a bridge, two blocks, and a very long, steep hill away from where we actually live. time from bar to bed: 1.5 hours.

welcome to Jersey.

The Global Volunteer Network

2008-03-13T22:10:00.000-07:00

i have arrived.

after almost losing my small bag in the transfer from Auckland to Wellington (i really should not be charged with keeping track of more than three items at a time), i have made it to Wellington in general and the volunteer house in particular.

i still don't know what i'm going to be doing here.

and i have a few more days of suspense since we don't start working until Monday. the other volunteers have been in the Northern part of the North island for the last two weeks, so Hannes (another newbie) and i arrived to an empty house (save the house advisor).

Wellington is beautiful. it's a walking city and the mountains rise right up out of the ocean, speckled with houses and office buildings. the volunteer house is actually in a small town called Lower Hut, just North of Wellington and just South of Upper Hut. there are (or will be by the end of the evening) nine of us in this house, which is lovely and modern with two full bathrooms, four bedrooms a fantastic view of the sunrise (i hear) and... free, unlimited, glorious, INTERNET ACCESS.

it's sad that i've been without this luxury for only six days, and i'm already feigning for it like a fat kid feigns for cupcakes (does that make me a fat kid too?), but i'm trying to think of it like a step-down program. sharing free easy access to the internet with nine other folks for a month before it is ripped away from me for four.

so now the battle begins to stay awake for three more hours, twenty-six minutes, and forty-seven seconds. game on.

here it is... an update.

2008-03-12T22:22:00.001-07:00

Day 1

a six hour flight from JFK to LAX. treated to dinner (In & Out Burger - sounds scandelous) and a view of the Pacific courtesy of Snowboard Mike, then back to the airport for a 10 and a half hour flight to Fiji. said flight is notable for two reasons.

1. small child, by name of Jack, is sitting behind me. i know his name is Jack because from hour two through hour eight of the flight, Jack's mother is whispering (somehow in a shout) for Jack to stop whatever he is doing and go to sleep. did i mention Jack is about 2? i never did deduce what Jack was up to. i neither heard nor saw him for the entire duration of the flight. whatever it was, it evidently necessitated the repetition of his name no less than three times a minute... for six hours.

2. my feet and ankles swelled up to the size of my calves. hot.

Day 2... er, 3... er, 2 (we've crossed the Date Line)

Tuesday.

at the baggage claim, as i am waiting an inordinate amount of time for my teeny tiny backpack to turn up on the conveyor belt, a skinny, brown-haired girl with no fewer than five bags, one of which looks like it could carry a cello, rolls a baggage cart over to my bench and sits down next to me. meet Martina. she's from Northern Ireland and i can hardly understand a word she's saying, but i do manage to understand that she is also traveling alone and doesn't know where she's staying. after we chat for a while, she asks if she can come along with me. after a harried hour with a travel agent, Martina has reservations at a resort on the other side of the island where i'm staying and we're told she can get a bus to my resort so we can hang out. she hops on her boat and two hours later i hop on my van, which takes me to my boat, which takes me to my island.

the van, has not one, not two, not even three or four, but FIVE couples in it. i am the only single traveler. whenever there is some kind of checking-in to be done (you'd think this would only need to happen once or twice, but it happens five or six times), they ask me who i am and i respond by giving them my name. they then proceed to look at me blankly, notice (and comment) that i am alone (this, evidently, identifies me) and check me off on their list. no one really seems to mind that i'm alone though, and one of the older couples, over the course of the next three days adopts me as their kid, gives me a book, and invites me to stay at their house if ever i am in Bristol. but back to the boat...

the boat ride is about two hours. and it's lovely. when people describe places as emerald isled with sapphire water, i think they must be talking about places like Fiji. everything is beautiful. we're serenaded as we arrive to shore and then fed... well. the food at Octopus Island Resort (where i'm staying) is amazing and it's all from the island. after lunch, a few hours in the sun, a fabulous sunset, another amazing meal, and an international hermit crab race, i go to bed at 10 and sleep like a baby.

Wednesday

for some unknown reason, i've signed up to go on a hike. i like hiking. i like hiking when it is 75 degrees Fahrenheit with a fairly reasonable level of humidity. on this island in Fiji, it's about 95 degrees and so humid i can't tell if i'm sweating or the water in the air is condensing on my skin. 45 minutes into the 4 hour hike, i've almost finished my 32L of water, have sweat through both my "wicking" shirt and my "water-proof" pants (MUST start calling them trousers so as not to freak out the abundance of Brits), and i'm seriously considering how they will get me back down the mountain when i pass out. stubborn as i am, i press on, manage not to swoon, and by the time we reach the top i am so happy that i decided to go on this hike that i forget all about the sweat and hyperventilating that happened on the way up. we can see most of the islands in the Yasawa group, as well as the mainland, and the ledge we've climbed to is so high, and so narrow, that one of my climbing companions is getting vertigo, but doesn't care because it's so beautiful. two hours later, we're back in time for lunch, and i find Martina (who despite the lack of roads, and therefore buses, has managed to get to my resort) in the pool.

another fabulous lunch, napping in the sun, amazing dinner, movie night (with popcorn) and i pass out again at 10:30.

Thursday

one of the couples at the resort (Laura and Tom) are photographers from the UK. Laura loves Thailand and the idea of (she's never been to) New York. so she makes a list of places i MUST go in Thailand and i make a list of places she must EAT in New York. i also throw in a few other details about visiting buildings and stuff. i want her to be my permanent friend. i want her to come with me to New Zealand, but, alas, at two o'clock pm, i board the boat again, and head back to the "mainland" where i sign on to foxywheaties, and write a book.

the remainder of the day will be spent attempting to stay awake until a time i deem reasonable for me to crawl in my bed and go to sleep.

next stop... Wellington, New Zealand.

...you're leaving in a week.

2008-03-02T08:37:00.000-08:00

you've bought your tickets, paid the volunteer program to allow you to do back-breaking work for them for four weeks, and begun planning the details of what you will bring and where you will go.

you start realizing how valuable each moment is between now and when you leave because maybe you won't be coming back. maybe you get sold into the sex trade. maybe you become interminably lost in the outback. maybe your plane crashes and you find yourself stranded on a strange island where quasi-invisible-yet-deadly smoke monsters attack people and no one ever ties up the 15 thousand loose plot threads that have now become an indiscernible knot. in an effort to take advantage of each remaining second you have in your city with your friends you make a spur of the moment decision to go on a snowboarding trip that leaves you, three days later, with a broken arm and two impending surgeries, effectively grounding your trip for the indefinite future.

fast forward a year.

you've re-purchased your tickets, convinced the volunteer program to use the money they wouldn't refund you last year instead of making you pay them again, bought your pack, PACKED your pack (and walked around your apartment for 3 hours testing it out, worrying about whether or not you have enough room, and irritating your roommates), declined all last-minute snowboarding trips, quit your job, and shit your pants no less than 35 times in the last week.

you find yourself behaving like a manic drunk person, giddy with anticipation one second, short-circuiting on overload the next, and constantly weighing the merits of telling, on an hourly basis, each and every person you know how much you love them.

i will only be gone for five months. i know this. intellectually i am perfectly capable of grasping both this fact and the relatively insubstantial amount of time that five months actually is. emotionally... sometimes not so much. these last few months have been an exercise in living in the moment because trying to think about all the things you can do in five, structureless months is both unbearably exciting and remarkably overwhelming.

so today i am sitting in my living room in my yoga clothes, skipping yoga class, and enjoying the familiar, usually pleasant smells of my apartment and roommates, and setting up some last minute travel details (i.e., starting a blog, writing to-do and to-get lists, and packing on a few extra pounds in the form of chocolate chip cookies to prepare for five months subsistence on crackers and oatmeal).

7 days until departure.