Back in America

Because of the continuing protests, my mother decided that it was time to pull me out of the country and bring me back to America. I fully disagree with her decision. Bangkok is perfectly safe as long as you are smart, just like most cities in the world.

For my last day in bangkok we went to the Pata Department store to go see the private zoo that is on the top floor and roof. it was surprisingly nice. I even got to see a bearcat. We then went to the restaurant Cabbages and Condoms to have dinner with Johnny and Louis. It was a safesex themed resturant, and gave out condoms instead of mints at the end of the meal. unfortunately the condoms were 'thai sized'. The meal, however, was delicious. We ate Thai-style (which is family style) and ordered a whole chicken, 2 whole fish, and a bowl of curry. It was fantastic.

After the delicious dinner we went to Emporium, a luxury mall, to get some supplies for the going away party that was to happen on the roof that night. Steve, Johnny and Louis bought fancy cigars, Steve going for a pricey Cuban, and i purchased a bottle of Johnny Walker Green Label to share. (i have no appreciation for the different tastes of the rum as it goes up in expense, but I knew other people would).

A good handful of people were out traveling but called us to wish us a farewell. We partyed into the night untill around 3am when Steve and I had to leave for the airport. It was a good and proper send off.

Pai

Pai is a small town (2000 residents) in the mountains of norther Thailand. Being on the road about half way between Chaing Mai and Mae Hong Son it soon became a favorite waystation for backpackers, and now has grown so that the number of tourists there at any one time generally equal the population.
This lead to an aesthetic that I wasnt quite a fan off. Getting off the bus we saw mostly other tourist wandering the streets. Along the sides some thai people were setting up oil drums to be filled with water for the upcoming festivities while some little kids ran around with their waterguns. Many of the buildings were obviously constructed to appeal to tourists who want things to seem 'thai' but still have the needed comforts.
Luckily we found a guesthouse for a reasonable amount that was down a quiet soi off of the main road. It put us in walking distance from anything we might want, but still allowed retreat.

The town as a whole reminded me alot of the backpacker district of Chaing Mai's Old City. My issue with the town is thats all there seemed to be. We walked around taking note of where the bookstore was and the motorbike rental shops. Coming into town we had seen a Mexican restaurant. Being a rarity in Thailand, we hunted it down.

It turned out to be a Tex-Mex restaurant run by a gregarious, if odd, expat from Texas. The food was great and the owner talked to us about the issues of importing guac to a far flung region. If anyone goes to Pai I would have to say that this place is one of the highlights and is at least different from the usual nondescript backpacker bar and resturant with overpriced thai and international food. (I dont actually have anything against said establishments, they have just lost the original charm and novelty).

Our day consisted of some chilling in our rooms (We all had books at the ready) exploring the town (rather quick given the size of it) and trying a couple of resturants. The club sandwiches...not good. As it got dark we werent really in the party mood, so we tried to find a veiwpoint that Geoff had seen a sign for. After walking across the river and down an unlighted road for quite awhile we decided that it was probably further away than we had thought.

The town surprised us with how chill it seemed at night. There were plenty of bars that were obviously built for partying but although a couple places had a crowd there was nothing really going wild into the night. Fine for us as we were hitting the road the next morning.

Songkhran Holiday Part 2

The bus we got to Pai was a local bus, over filled to the point of people sitting and standing in the aisle. Luckily the ride was a scenic drive through the precarious twists and turns of the mountainous switchbacks. The bus wasn't air conditioned, so windows were down and the door was open. I was fortunate enough to have a seat right behind the open door so i both got an unobstructed view of the fantastic countryside, but I also got a continuous breeze.

At first i took no note of the little kids playing by the road with buckets of water. We were passing through a small village and it was nearing the songkhran holiday. Then I noticed the meniacal gleam in their eyes, and when you are close enough to see a gleam in someones eye, it is too late. Within a second I was drenched with water that flew through the open bus door. Suddenly I didnt seem so lucky to have gotten the seat that I did. Although the day was warm and the sun was bright, when the bus started getting up to speed the wind was cutting through my soaked clothes. The countryside, while beautiful, suddenly became oddly hostile as my eyes went from admiring the mountains and valleys to checked the upcoming road for kids with hoses and buckets.

The sound of closing windows. Thats my cue to brace myself. I close my window but theres nothing I can do about the gaping hole that is the open door.

Eventually the bus fills as we pick up more passengers and someone stands in the stairwell leading off the bus. After getting drenched a few times he starts shutting the door when he sees what I came to think of as 'songkhran checkpoints' as the kids often flanked the bus on both sides of the road. Nonetheless the water still sometimes made it through before the door was slammed shut.

Songkrahn Holiday Part 1

As the mercury rises in April, waterguns go on sale all over thailand. These are signs of the impending songkrahn holiday and more importantly a week long break from school.
Songkrahn started out as a holiday that involved sprinkling water as a blessing on the elderly. It has progressed into and all out country wide water battle.

Combined with the redshirt unrest, mass transit to the northern provinces was packed with people going north for the festivals and to return to thier hometowns. This forced the group I was heading north with to take the dreaded Khao San buses.

I usually go to bus depots to book my buses. You go there, tell someone where you want to go, they direct you to a ticket counter. usually in less than an hour the bus leaves ontime (within 20 minutes of schedule) and you have a reserved seat on the bus, and the bus arrives at the bus station in the city you are going to.
Khao San buses on the other hand are for transporting backpackers and tourists who dont do enough research to find where the bus depots go. In this case we were some of the stupid who didnt book in advance. A shame to end up like the backpacker hoards that I both am part of and resent.

The travel agency says 'the bus leaves at 6' that does not mean the bus leaves at six. haha. of course not. That means show up at the travel agency at 6. at 6:30 someone will direct the group of people to follow him. He will then go to a few other travel agencies on Khao San to pick up more backpackers. By 7 he has the whole group and walks everyone to a curbside waiting place. Hopefully at 8 the bus will arrive. Fearful that the bus is overbooked everyone rushes to get a seat and creates an annoyingly pointless bottleneck at the bus door.

The ride is no worse than a normal bus ride...expect there are no thai people. Please excuse this next rant on why i have grown to resent the average backpacker. Actually, ill do an impression.
"Oi, names Jim. I'm either from Australia or western Europe. Ive been traveling for about 5 months now. Yeah Ive been to lots of cool places and met tons of cool people. Oh yeah I met these Swedes in Cambodia, and some great Brits in Laos. Have you been to the Full Moon Party? oh you gotta check it out, its wild. Nah, I havent met any Thai people really. Oh, thailand? been here about 3 weeks now, but Ill be leaveing soon to go to Veitnam. yeah im going to meet more Europeans while im there and gawk out the bus window at real people. Oh I'm booking my trip through a group tour thing. its too hard to travel like the locals. I mean, i would have to think for myself and might encounter situations that arnt listed in my Lonely Planet. Thats just outside of my comfort zone. Oh hey, do you have 30 minutes. I want to tell you about all the things i did that ill use to impress people at home."

Now i know that ive not been the greatest traveler, but its no surprise that lots of locals laugh behind the backs of backpackers. (in fact some do it right in front of them, they just speak the local language). I know that my experience in a foreign country is more of an immersion type, that some people just cant do. But the whirlwind trips that so many people take while traveling and 'seeing the world' are just to collect stamps on the passport and find the best spots that other foreigners party. and if you only see the world with the people that you had at home, why the hell did you come? I understand that sometimes all someone has time to do in a country is see a few of the tourist attractions...but if all you ever do is see tourist attractions and not actually experience the country, then you shouldnt have wasted the money coming. There are great coffeetable books that have real nice pictures.

(i think its my greatest fear that next time i travel abroad ill end up like the hoards that i bemoan)
Some loud people who were apparently in med school sat behind us. They were proud that they had finished a bottle of Hong Thong (a thai whisky) in two hours. We laughed at them for being amateurs. (no, i dont drink that heavily, but we were pretty certain that it was the taste of rice whiskey that slowed them down). Also, when they talked medicine...well lets just say I really hope they never graduate med school because they sounded like malpractice suits waiting to happen. And when they talked about thailand...simply ignorant of anything that was going on or the culture. I never bothered correcting them. I doubted they had the intelegence capacity to remake the neural connections needed to change a thought.

The other problem with Khao San buses is that they dont go to the bus station. Our bus stopped in a gas station on the outskirts of Chaing Mai. There was of course an overpriced Songtau waiting for the backpackers to get out of the bus and need a ride into town. I dont play that game. its simple logic that the rates would be jacked up for a bunch of white people getting off a bus and needing a ride. So I didnt give a second glance to the driver trying to get me in his vehicle, and walked over to the road. There was a driver parked there. I asked him his rate and asked him to take ten baht off of it. Then I walked over and told my friends the rate i had got and they all came over and got in, but not before the rip-off driver tried lowering his price to match, but his truck was already crowded, so we went with the honest businessman and let all of the other backpackers realize that they were being taken for a ride. (Hey, i cant save everyone).

We had our driver take us to the bus station and then looked for tickets to the town of Pai. We found one that left in a few hours and bought tickets on that bus. We then were pretty hungry, having not had breakfast yet. in the mood for Khao phat gai (fried rice and chicken) we asked a nearby tuktuk driver where the best was and he directed us to a nearby restaurant. And it was quite yummy

Holiday in Cambodia Part 9

In the morning our tuktuk driver was there right on time. We told him everywhere we wanted to see and he started us on our way.

First stop of the day was the shooting range. A ways out of the city, down a few side streets and past some fields we entered an army compound and were directed towards the range. An army officer brought us out a 'menu' listing the weapons and the prices for them. The prices had gone up since the research i had done had been published, but i figure i dont often get a chance to fire weapons of this caliber. We decided to shoot an AK47 and an M-80. The M-80 especially on automatic mode was deafening. Also they both were very fun to shoot. We were offered a chicken to shoot for $15. we declined.

After that it was off to more somber destinations. the Khmer Rouge took over Cambodia and created a genocide that was as bad, if not worse than the holocaust. We first visited the killing fields, where many Doctors, artists, lawyers, and anyone educated was taken to be killed brutally by the Khmer Rouge soldiers. There were pits where the mass graves had been dug out, and some areas that the graves were left undisturbed. It was an eerily peaceful place, with the centerpeice being a large pagoda with the bones of the deceased on display.

Our Next stop was S21. Formerly a school, S21 was turned into a prison and one of the most notorious torture centers in Cambodia. Some classrooms were subdivided with simple brick and mortar into cells smaller than a twin bed. The Khemr Rouge made many records of thier prisoners, so rooms were filled with the mugshots of the prisoners who went through the prison, the majority of whom were then killed at the killing fields.

After those somber destinations we went to the National Museum. It was full of statues and relics that were rescued or returned from the Angkor ruins and other ancient temples around the country. As pretty as they all were eventually stone statues of Hindu Gods and Buddhas just blend together. The real highlight was the very impressive looking teak building that it was housed in.

By now it was already midafternooon and seriously time for us to have some lunch. Our driver took us to a place just around the corner from the Museum. Very good Khmer and Thai food selection.

There was one last stop to make for the day. While we were in Siem Reap we noticed that the gas station had Mountain Dew. MD is not sold in thailand, so this was a big deal. I bought 4 cans but they said that was all they had, and I hadnt seen any since. It took some explaining but we were able to get our driver to take us to a supermarket. There in the back, under cans of Dr. Pepper i found the jackpot. 24 packs of Mountain Dew. Was it very expensive? ungodly so. Did I still buy 2 twentyfour packs. Yes.

They were a hassle and a half to get accross the boarder. Not because it was hard to get past coustoms, but because everyone thought it was a fancy beer and wanted a free handout. It was incredibly frustrating and it really caused me to have a bad taste in my mouth in regards to the Khmers and their desperate begging and touting.

Jennifer

Those of you who follow the blog alot will no doubt notice the absence of Niffer from my blog posts, as she has been my travel companion for much of my trip. Due to circumstances that im not at liberty to post on my blog she had to return home a bit early. Worry not, she is fine, other than currently getting her ass kicked by allergies.

Holiday in Cambodia Part 8

The lady at our guesthouse was a bitch as we were checking out to go to Phenom Pehn. She was telling us lies about the buses so that she could get us on a bus that got her commission. Eventually we got a tuktuk to the train station (not much more than an empty lot with buses) and onto a bus headed to Phenom Pehn. The entire ride the TV on the bus was playing Khemer Karaoke Music videos. They were horrible.
When we got to Phenom Pehn we stopped in what just seemed like a random street, no bus station. We were immediately hounded by tuk tuk drivers (which is how it is getting off of any bus in Southeast Asia) We told them all that we had a guesthouse and that it was a short walk. We walked around the corner and had no one harassing us, it was awesome. There was a guy taking a nap in his tuk tuk, and we woke him up. He asked us where we wanted to go, we told him to take us to a cheap guesthouse.
5 minutes later we arrived at the 'okay guesthouse' It was alot more than okay when compared with the last guesthouse we stayed at--this one wasnt run by scum. We had an air conditioned room with 3 beds and a TV. (the beds were jammed in tight so it was as if it was one really wide bed)

However, whenever we left the guesthouse we were assaulted with offers for tuktuk rides. Steve went to go find an ATM (few and far between in the town) and was able to find a driver that spoke passable english. He also wasnt a brute about getting passengers, so we took a liking to him. He offered to drive us the next day and said "then you can tell everyone you have a driver" We thought that was a wonderful idea and told him to pick us up at 10 the next day.

Holiday in Cambodia Part 7

Welcome back to our Holiday in Cambodia series. We last left our 3 heroes as they came to the end of thier exploration of the ancient Angkor temples. Haveing daylight left and not wanting to waste it they asked their trusty guide for ideas on what to see next. He said they should go see the floating village. We rejoin our protagonists as they board the boat.

The area around the docks did not look very promising. There was construction surrounding us (im not sure what for) and the water was stained with the mud. Although we were on a lake, this part of it was a long skinny bay and seemed like a river to and from nowhere untill we entered the lake proper. along the shores were many houseboats. At first I thought that this was the 'floating village' and was mildly disappointed.

As we neared the end of the bay a small boat, which looked like a canoe with an outboard motor attached pulled along side our boat. A little girl was standing in it with a basket full of soda while her father drove the boat. Then she lept, soda in arms, onto our boat to sell it to us. We were all duly impressed. Steve and Johnny were impressed enough to buy soda from her.

We were boarded by another kid not long after. We had to turn him down however, despite his impressive jumping from boat to boat.

By this time the lake had widened and we saw what looked like a village on the far shore. But the lake is too big and we shouldnt have been able to see the shore....That was the floating village.

There were actually two villages, one for Cambodian citizens and the other was made of illegal Vietnamese immigrants.
We floated into one of the villages. It was compleate with houses, gardens, convenience stores, gas stations, and even a resturant/gift shop which we stopped at to look around. While we were there, we saw they had a fishery full of catfish and an area that they raised alligators in. A young boy paddled up in a large basin and had a snake around his neck. It was adorable, but he was charging for pictures.

We didnt eat at that restaurant, however, it was turtle meat night.
After the boat ride, Panna took us to his favorite turtle meat shop. It took a while to prepare, but it was quite a treat when it arrived. It was as if just the shell had been removed and all the innards cut up and cooked. The legs and head were still there also. Everything on the plate was edible and tasty. I would compare it to that of frog legs.

Back in Bangkok

At 5am today I arrived back in bangkok. I'm not sure if I'll ever catch up on the blogging, but I will do my best as I am continually surprised by how many people read my posts. I am currently having a bit trouble with Internet here, for my NETbook refuses to connect to the NET. Luckily for me Steve has destroyed any semblance of haveing a normal sleep schedule durring songkhran, and is still asleep at 4:30pm, leaveing his computer open for me to peruse Windows tech forums online. My frustration is mounting, however, and the klong that our balcony overlooks is a more and more tempting destination for me to send the laptop.

I must appologize in advance for my lack of pictures of the songkhran holiday. Please understand, it is a water festival, and its nearly impossible to get pictures without risking the camera--and i just got a new one.

I went down to the money changers on Khao San Road today (none of whom changed Kip (lao money) into baht) and the effects of the red shirt violence were clearly evident in the emptyness of the road. what was usually a bustling pain in the ass to walk through was a leisurly stroll. Even the usually annoyingly eager suit salesmen seemed resigned to the fact that business was going to be tough. I only had one approach me (usually i get about 5 or 6 durring a walk down the street).

While I was in the area I thought I would stop by the Democracy Monument and see what damage had been done. When I got there there was a small press conference going on with the Deputy of Fine Arts talking about what restoration was needed. Although I couldnt understand what he was saying, he pointed out all of the graffiti and bullet-holes on it. Ill have pictures to post if I ever get my netbook working again. Which I am losing hope for rather quickly given that I just ran every applicable update I can find and its still nothing more than an expensive paperweight

"This cold war just got hot"

Im sure many of you have seen the news coming out of bangkok about protests turning violent and at last count 20 people haveing been killed. Unfortunately this is no exaggeration.

Luckily both Steve and I are safe.

I am currently in Chaing Mai celebrating the songkram festival. It is ridiculous. At one point I got chased down a soi by novice monks with buckets and waterguns as they yelled warcrys. Taking the bus from Pai to Chaing Mai caused me to become drenched in water as children in the villages set up checkpoints to splash the buses from all sides. Note, i was near the door of the bus, which is usually left open due to the heat.

Steve is still in Bangkok, but our side of the river still hasnt seen much violence. The day of the killings he was at the mall and ran into one of our Ajans (professors). Ajan took him and Johnny out for beers. One of the main bridges that we would use if going to school by motobike or taxi has been blocked off because of the violence. This nicely isolates the area we live a little bit.

Its definitely an odd feeling to know that the place that you live is considered relativity unsafe. Luckily theres a whole lot more country to explore, but even if it did get bad enough that i would have to leave early (which i dont think will happen, and i really hope doesnt happen) id still have to go to bangkok to get all my stuff and fly out of that airport.

Contest: 20 Baht note to whoever can name the movie, starring a cast member of Friends, that i quoted in the title of this post.

State of Emergency

Today the redshirts stormed parliament and the Government declared a state of emergency. This will affect me and Steve very little for three reasons
1) the state of emergency just gives the government slightly more enforcement power. But really, they havent been using all the power they had to start with with the Internal Security Act. The state of emergency could just be more posturing by the government.
2) both red and yellow shirts love farang. Unless we were to actively enter some fray it would take some serious bad luck or stupidity to put us in harms way for now.
3) A week off school is comming up, and that means traveling. Right now its looking like im heading back into the northern mountains and then to laos. Steve is looking at possible island options and then also intends to meet in laos.

So really the question will be what kind of Bangkok will we return to.

(and yes i know im way behind on the cambodia posts, but eventualy ill catch up...but likely not before this next bout of travel)

Holiday in Cambodia Part 6

Day two of seeing the Angkor temples started off with the namesake temple Angkor Wat. We arrived a bit after all of the sunrise photographers left and before the main tourist groups crowded in.

Almost as big as Angkor Wat was the walkway to the main building. Upon entering and delving deeper and deeper we soon became surrounded by nothing but gray stones in varying shades.

Exploring Angkor Wat was a fun experience because I got to see all those pictures from National Geographic come to life.
Hours more were spent looking at many of the minor temples surrounding Angkor Wat. Unfortunately i dont have time to write about them all, so here is a selection of pictures.

Holiday in Cambodia Part 5

As we were hiking through the temples and talking with Panna I mentioned that there were less stray dogs in Siem Reap than there are in Bangkok. He joked that it was because Khemers eat dog meat. I said id like to try it. He offered to take us to a dog meat shop. So after we were done seeing the temples he took us to his favorite "Sai Besse" (Khemer for 'special meat') store. We sat down and were handed small platters of cut up cooked meat, and bowls of gravy.

Not knowing what to expect, we jumped in head first, grabbing our chopsticks and tossing the bits of meat into our mouth. For me, at least, the taste was very unusual. It took a few bites before I could even describe it. All 3 of us described the taste in wildly different ways. Steve says its a gamey red meat. I say its a cross between turkey and deer. It took a bit of acclimation to the taste before I could enjoy it, but halfway through the meal I was as happy as if I was eating a nice juicy hamburger.

Panna ordered a second plate, and this one had dog intestine on it. I joked that this was an actual hot dog. This I did not care for.

Steve noticed that the other tables were drinking some dark liquid as shots out of a water bottle. When he inquired Panna explained that its local rice wine. We ordered a bottle, as I always like to try the local homebrew (The lahu whisky from chaing mai is still my favorite brand, and I'm saving the last bit for a special occasion). The rice wine was surprisingly smooth, and surprisingly high proof. It had an almost coffee like taste to it, and went down with very little burn. The fact that I could soon feel the effects makes me certain that its alcohol level is deceiving high. All of the other patrons of the resturant got a kick out of seeing a trio of Barang (as forigners are called in khemer) eating dog and saying the traditional Khemer cheers 'Jul Muy' as we took our shots of rice wine.

When we finished Panna invited us to his house to meet his wife, child and neighbors. The thought of turning down such an offer did not even cross our minds.

Panna lives in a modest apartment that consists of a main room (for living and sleeping) and a utility room and a bathroom. Cooking is done in the small yard of the apartments. He has a lovely wife and an adorable little daughter. He introduced us to his friend Nhit, who sat down with us and through Panna translating asked us some questions about America during dinner. Oh yeah, dinner. yes, we did just come from the Special Meat shop, but that didnt stop Panna's wife from going to the store to grab a bag full of beers for those who wanted to drink and then proceed to cook a delicious spread of curries, and fish, with rice, of course.

We sat and ate and chatted for a while. Panna and Nhit showed us a car that they use to smuggle teakwood. They had reinforced it and modified the shocks so that it could haul 200 kg of wood. He said it was the easiest way to get ahead because it can run a profit of a few hundred dollars for a load. They use the car rather than a truck because it costs less to pay the bribes. Interestingly Panna didnt know that Teakwood was a valuable and popular wood from everything from tables to floors.

Eventually we felt it became late and Panna drove us back to the guesthouse with our stomachs quite happy.

Holiday in Camboida Part 4

After lunch it was off to see...MORE RUINS!

First stop, the Elephant Terrace. Its about 100 yards of immaculate carvings on the side of a raised ritual platform. The predominant motif is elephants. Panna told us that once a year the population would gather at this structure and clean it from top to bottom. In the following picture you can see a bit less than half of the length.

Then we continued on to another of the more famous temples: Bayon.

Every tower of the Bayon temple has the kings face looking out in all 4 of the cardinal directions. Bayon definitely was able to create an otherworldly feel. The temple was made out of a very light colored stone, and the temple lacked any overgrowth. This gave it a very different feel than the previous temples we explored. Walking through the ruin everything is bright, and yet the colors are cool, in defiance of the actual temperature. The enigmatic smile of the Bayon towers is everywhere and at every turn, looking out in a fatherly way. Eventually every part of the temple blended into one and it was conceivable that as we walked through it we were only spinning in a circle taking the same view in again and again, but it was not monotonous, only majestic.

While we were leaving the town (Bayon, along with a few other minor temples is in an ancient city called Angkor Thom) we went through the south gate, which is done in the style of the Bayon temple with the road lined with demons on one side and gods on the other.

Next we went to an outlying temple called Banteay Srei. Banteay Srei is a temple dedicated to female deities of Hinduism.

The temple was made of a red clay colored brick. The carvings were very well preserved, and was a deeper engraving than most. The entire time we toured the temple we heard tradition Khemer music coming from somewhere. It really added to the atmosphere of the place. There were number on some of the blocks on the ground for the reconstruction process.

As we finished walking through the temple we found at the back a group of musicians playing the music that gave us such an authentic feeling atmosphere during our exploration. These bands are found around a few of the Angkor temples, and are comprised of landmine victims. We put some money in their bowl to end our templeing for the day with good merit.

Holiday in Cambodia Part 3

6 am is far to early to wake up on vacation. Unfortunatly most people think that also, so in order to beat those tourists to the temples, thats what we had to do. Then at 7am it was downstairs to meet Panna, our guide.
While we were waiting for steve and johnny (who durring this trip made me seem like a morning person they were so slow) Panna and I discussed what temples we would plan on seeing durring our two day tour. The Angkor area is made up of dozens of temples, so it would take more than a week to see all of them. We decided on an itinerary and eventually Johnny and Steve were ready to go. We got in Panna's car and headed out.

The first temple we went to was called Beng Meala. The cool thing about Beng Meala is that it has not been restored. The only work on it was done to stabilize it to prevent blocks from falling and killing tourists, but other than that, it was left as it was found.

The most amazing part of it was that despite being able to clearly see the layout of the temple there were still massive piles of blocks everywhere. I wasnt sure what they all were for, but it was quite evident that this temple was simply magnificent in its time.

The Jungle had slowly but surely exercised its dominion on the temple. Without anyone to tend to it for hundreds of years mosses, trees and bushes grew everywhere. The temple was a study on Chaos and Organization, with it expertly laid out by its builders, the stones cut with precision, the temple plotted perfectly to the cardinal directions, and the entire thing in shambles, taken down by natures apathy.

Panna provided us with a wealth of information throught the temple. Most of it i have already forgotten, but it added to the experience.

When we had finished we that temple we headed out to the next one. On the way we passed rows of stands selling sticky rice. I had Panna pull over so I could purchase some breakfast. I told him to stop at the best stand, he said "we will stop at the one with teh best looking girl selling". The rice was cooked in bamboo and served this way. The bamboo was ripped off and the rice exposed to be eaten. It was pretty taste.

The next temple was to be Ta Phrom. This is the temple that was featured in the movie Tomb Raider (in the scene were she follows the giggling little kids through the ruins). It had been cleared to make it easier to navigate than Beng Meala, but the forest was still left to slowly digest the temple. This one was a bit more busy than Beng Meala (which was an hours drive away from the main mass of temples) but we were still there at a good enough time to really avoid the hordes.

The temple is full of iconic views that are used on countless brochures on Cambodia and angkor wat. What I didnt expect was all of the walkways, and platforms built for the photo ops. I suppose I was just not thinking about it, since its not really surprising, but I felt it slightly ruined the magic.

Despite the extra people and the blatant signals of where the best photo-ops are (i think people should have to figure that out on their own. and if they couldnt figure out that standing in front of a tree swallowing a temple is an awesome photo, they really shouldnt be at angkor in the first place) walking through the temple was a magical experience. There were carvings of ancient religions, with deities staring out at us as we wandered thier sacred grounds and marveled at the the fruits of their followers labor.

The yellow crane was a bit of a jarring sight, cutting straight bright lines in this world of earthtones and beautiful deterioration. However it was a magnificent testament to the people who built the temple with their hands when now we use technology to do the same.

As we were finishing up with Ta Phrom it became increasingly busy, so we went off to the next temple. Its interesting that all of the temples have peak times, and we were simple able to ask our guide to avoid the peaks and i think we had a much more fun experience. I dont know why this works, because i would figure everyone would make the same request of their guide.

Before getting to the next temple, we stopped for lunch. Our guide suggested a place that was a bit pricey but had good Khemer food. (the country is Cambodia, but the main culture is Khemer).
We invited Panner to eat with us, but he turned down our offer. It was evident that he had a free meal in the back whenever he brought them costumers, but that is a common way to do business in southeast Asia. Everyone gets a kickback.

Holiday in Cambodia Part 2

As much as I disliked the way the Guesthouse was run we were unable to check out the next day, given that we were all exhausted after dealing with food poisoning for the night, and still having it effect us to different extents the next day. Other than a few short excursions to get food, we stayed in the room. I rationalized that as long as I was reading a book the day was not wasted. Steve mostly slept and Johnny watched TV.

We went to bed early so that we could be ready to go at 7 am the next day.

Holiday in Cambodia Part 1

Well, we dont get a spring break in Thailand (although we do have newyears in apirl) but i wanted a spring break trip anyway. Also, my visa was running out and it was either go and fill out paperwork or leave the country. Plus, I felt that angkor wat was a nessecary sight to see while i was in southeast asia, so cambodia it was.

Steve, Johnny and I woke up early thursday morning and headed to the bus station to take a bus to Aranapotet. or something that spelt similar to that. Searching for the actuall spelling would take to long in this internet cafe. In the boarder town we were dropped off near a market that was almost right on the boarder. Of course comming out of the bus we were greeted by touts, but i had expected to be dropped off by the busstop not the market, so i was unsure of where to go and followed the touts.

One of them lead us to his little travel agency where he said that we could get our camboidan visa. Now i knew that we could get it cheaper at the boarder, but i had no clue where it was, and any tuktuk around here would charge me up the ass, especially because this guy would follow us and tell the tuk to charge us high so taht we wouldnt take it, so i reluctently relented.
The good part of this arrangement was that we handed them our passports and they filled out all of the forms for us while we just chilled. Then we looked over the forms and signed them. Then they came back with the visa after a short wait.
Then we were taken to the border. It was about 100 meters away around a corner. Someone from that travel agency probaby literally walked with our passports over there to get the visa.
At the boarder they offered us a taxi to Siem Reap for a reasonable cost, so we took that. The extra fee for thier troubles was 200 baht each, which actually wasnt too bad.

To make sure we got in the correct cab, there was also a guy who walked us through the entire border process. He waited on the other side while we waited in line to get our Thai visa stamped. He then walked us past all of the casions (there are a ton in the neutral zone between the two countries. On the weekends its full of people, espeically thais) We then had to go to fill out the health form (no, i do not have H1N1) and get a stamp on our Cambodian visa.
We then got on a bus that took us to the bus station. At the station there was a money exchange (Dont do it, the exchange rate in Siam Reap is better) and a small convience store. We then got hearded into a taxi.

The taxis in cambodia are not like the taxis in thailand. They are not really taxis. They are just normal cars that are for hire. So we got in and settled for the couple hour journey to Siem Reap. They had built a new highway within the last year, and the trek used to take a full day.
Our driver went to fill up and stopped at a gas station...kind of. There were many stands on the side of the road that sold pepsi bottles full of gas. I dont know how the system works, but thats how you fill up the tank. So he had some guys pour that into his tank and away we went.

Cambodia is FLAT. Its flatter than Iowa. Sure once every 45 minutes to an hour we saw a single mountain in the distance (not mountains, just one) but other than that it was just one vast plain.
About halfway through the drive i noticed that although the driver was on the right side of the car we were driving on the right side of the road(unlike thailand) this made his passing slower vehicals rather epic.

When we got to Siam Reap he had us get out at a guest house, that of course, wasnt the one we asked him to take us to. (because he wanted his kickback from this place). I would like to take the time to point out that I thought we should take a tuktuk to the planned guest house (we already had a room booked there. Not showing up would only cost some 200 baht, which is an okay thing to just call a sunk cost if we need to). As we were talking amongst ourselves an employee came out and started smooth talking steve and johnny. So we went up to look at a room and saw that it had air conditioning 3 beds, a tv, and a fridge, so they wanted to stay there. I went with the flow and relented.
We got settled, and then went out to get some food. We found a pizza place nearby and it was quite good. When we got back to the guest house the air con wasnt working anymore. So i went down to tell the front desk. We were then informed that we only paid for a fan room, so they turned off our aircon and that the aircon would be 7 dollars more. I told him that they said that we would get aircon for 10 dollars (Cambodia likes US money and works on a system of useing both US and Cambodian money. Its wierd to get used to). He said that i was wrong. I said tomorrow we would be finding a new guest house.

Camera and Ice Skating

Today I finally purchased a new camera. (you may recall me losing my first one in a cab the second week of me being here). I also then went ice skating with Steve and Jennifer. Neither of them had really ever been ice skating, so it was fun seeing them flail. it was also a bit humbling to see people who live in a country that cannot have natural ice skate better than us.

Its sad you cannot see the level of flailing that steve's arms did.

Eventually 'Niffer was able to skate without assistance. I was proud.

She also used the penguin for help. its an apparatus to help young children learn to keep their balance on the ice. a Thai guy offered for her to use it.

Needless to say, Steve got in on that fun.

Ice skating was great fun, and I just may go back again before leaving Thailand.

Cobra Village

Some might say that planning an entire weekend around going to see what ended up amounting to a roadside attraction is silly. They, however, are wrong, for seeing a man fight a cobra is anything but silly.

The cobra village, called Ban Kok Snga, is an hour busride outside of the city of Khon Kean, which itself is 6 and a half hours from Bangkok. So after Thai Language class we packed our things and headed to the bus terminal.
Our taxi driver apparently needed to fill up gas before he took us to the station, but left the meter running, we were sure to pay attention to it and deduct that from the total we paid him when we got out of the cab. Luckily there wasnt any disagreement about this.
The bus ride started out rather unpleasant as we were quite crammed into the back, but eventually one person was able to move into a different open seat and it made things easier.

Eventually we pulled into a bus station, but not everyone got out so I could tell we werent at the end of the line yet. It felt like we stayed at the station forever. Now, its not uncommon for busses to stop for as long as 15 minutes before heading off again. But this felt like it was going on an hour. I bought some chicken and rice from a lady (at lots of stops people jump on the bus to sell food and other wares) as the light waned, making it hard for me to read my book. Finally we got moving and someone asked me where I was going. Khon Kean i told them. They looked confused and said "This Khon Kean". I figured it was about time to get off of the bus.

We hopped off of the bus in the middle of traffic and scampered to the side of the road. Since we werent by the bus station there were no taxis conveniently standing by to take us to our guesthouse. So we started walking down the road, not sure exactly where we were going, but heading towards what looked like civilization. Eventually we came upon a gas station and asked the attendent where Thanon Klang Muang was (Klang Muang Road). He said that it was the direction we came from, but it was rather far. So we asked him to call a taxi.
After a little while a motorcycle with a handmade sign that said "taxi" clipped to the front. Given that we didnt really have many other options we both hopped on.

When we got to the guest house he told us the charge was 100 baht. This was def too much for the distance we went (It should have been a 50 baht ride at the most) but we really had no choice.
We checked into our room (250 baht per night, 2 beds, private bathroom, fans, no hot water) and got settled and then headed onto the street to find a noodle stand to eat. After that we both read for awhile, and then turned in for the night.

The next moring we woke and headed to the bus station. It took a while for us to get them to understand where we wanted to go, because Ban Kok Snga is also writen as ban kok sa-nga, and either way is pretty tough to pronounce. Finally they figured out what we wanted and put us on a bus.

About an hour into that busride the conductor motinoed to us to get off and pointed down a long dusty road. Luckily for us there was a Tuktuk that we were able to share with a family heading back to the village.
A few miles down the road we arrived. The village was dusty, and was pretty small. They had a new temple that they had just built and were very proud of it. They asked for a donation towards food for the snakes, and then showed us all the snakes that they had in their little zoo.

Then it was time for the show. First they had some girls doing thai dance with snakes on thier shoulders. Then the little boys fought non poisonous snakes as training, and then the cobra was brought out and his handler taunted and fought him. After that...a BIGGER cobra was brought out.
On the side of the ring was a picture of someone who had died from a snakebite while doing a performance similar to the one we were seeing. A thai person sitting next to us informed us that it was the brother of the man who just performed.

Blood Will be Shed

My title for this post was stolen from an ominous Bangkok Post headline. But its not quite what you would think.

Sunday was the first day of the rally. Obviously, i went down to check it out. The official number for the people attending the rally was put around 43,000. The redshirts took over a large feild and over a kilometer of road from the feild (called Sunam Luang) past the Democracy Monument, to a stage they have set up.
On Sunday the mood was jovial. I brought my camera to get footage of it, and people were smiling and waving at the camera, while speeches and protest music pumped through speakers set up all along the boulevard. People were dancing, selling massages, selling food. It was like one big monochromatic party. Some older thai ladies beckoned me and steve over to share papaya salad with them, while one of the more educated of them came to talk to us about their fight and what they stood for. She encouraged us to get red shirts ourselves.

All around bangkok there were people wearing red in support. many people are from hours away from bangkok and cant usually afford to come on vacation so they were evidently seeing the sites and making merit at the wats for themselves and for the movement.

Ive headed down to the rally site almost every day, (because the food is good plentiful and cheap) and it seems like each day the numbers have dwindled significantly. Its painfully evident that just protesting like this every day wont get the government to budge. School was cancled monday and tuesday, but its open again on wednesday as people are becomming more and more certain that nothing bad will happen. (its worth noting that at the rally the redshirts have hung up signs saying "violence is uncivilized" and other such slogans)

Upping the ante, and getting back to the title of this blog, the redshirts have devised a most interesting tactic. They convinced thousands of thier supporters to donate 100ccs of blood. This was all then put into bottles and spread on the ground infront of parliament by a Brahman Priest in a ceremony to curse the government and those who walk through the blood of the people.
The ceremony went off without a hitch.

It seems like the redshirts cannot gain anything without there being chaos. But they cant be the ones to throw the first punch, so i expect this all to calm down to nothing soon.

The Red March

Yesterday was the start of the Redshirt influx. The police in military were out in force, standing guard on bridges and there were officers in riot gear in front of almost every bank. There was an noticeable increase in people wearing the color red, but there didnt seem to be anything big going on.

At 5pm I got in a Workpoint studio van to go film a reality show for the weekend. We were originally going to fly to the south of thailand, but because of the redshirts they decided to avoid the airport and drive. Its a long drive, but the Workpoint people took good care of us. They had soda and water in the back of the van and we stopped every couple hours to eat and/or use the bathroom (all food purchased by them) it was becoming pretty fun. At Hua Hin we stopped at a night market, and i could tell that the producers were stalling for something. Soon we found out the bad news. The support van, carrying the cameras and crew, broke down and there was no way to find a replacement van or a mechanic. We had to turn around and head back to Bangkok.
They hope to try to film again in another 2 weeks or so. It was a major bummer, but on the bright side i did get my headshot and resume infront of a few different people at the studio, which never hurts.
The producers of the show felt really bad that they had to cancel on us, and durring the ride back Tong, the producer, discussed the different credits on my resume, so hopefully it worked to my advantage since i got a free interview out of it.
Comming back into bangkok there were police checkpoints to check vehicles for anything suspicious with the rally starting. Out of the three checkpoints I saw, we got stopped at all three. When the van got flagged to the side about 20 security workers surrounded the van and had us open the doors and roll down the windows. Once they saw farang in the back they quickly waved us on and even joked about it saying "oh you can put your red on now".

Luckily my weekend isnt completely blown as Brette is in bangkok for the weekend (you might remember her from my posts on The Trek). She arrived early afternoon today, and it was really fun to show someone around. She wanted to see the malls, so we took her on the grand tour of MBK, Siam Discovery, Siam Central, Siam Paragon and Central World.

taking the taxi through the city we saw tons of redshirts, and military. There were roads blocked off, and people waving flags. It was kind of exciting. When we were walking from Paragon to Central World an ad hoc parade of Red Shirts drove by the malls, honking their horns and waving flags and yelling. They came on motorcycles, in the backs of pickup trucks, and even full buses. The mall managers and security stood nervously outside watching the passing commotion, obviously hoping that they would not stop in front of their establishments.

Durring the ride back to the apartment we saw even more redshirts congregating. So far nothing bad has happened in the city. Tomorrow is the day of the big rally. It will be interesting to see how it goes.

Political Update #2

I woke up today to a little thing called martial law.

If you dont remember my first political update, go back and read that so that this all makes a bit more sense.
Anyhow, Thaksin was found guilty of corruption and more than 50% of his assets were seized by the government.
Although many people were unhappy with the ruling there was very little unrest the night of the ruling. One group of redshirts burnt a spirit house, but that was it.

In the week after the ruling they got back to throwing grenades at branches of the Bangkok Bank. I think its kinda pathetic when you throw 4 gernades at 4 different branches, only 2 go off, and only 1 actually does damage. No one was hurt. And the suspect was arrested.

Meanwhile we found out that the army lost a bunch of weapons from an armory. At first it was thought to be a robbery, but later realized that they have been slowly removed for a longer period of time. We dont know if they are going to the southern insurgency or here to bangkok.

Starting tomorrow Red Shirt supporters from all over the country are coming into Bangkok. Some of them are even going to be docking at one of the piers that our ferry goes to every day to get to school. There will be checkpoints on all major roads comming into the city to check for weapons. The Redshirts were calling for one million people to show up, with the goal of forcing the government to dissolve parliament and having a snap election. However the most generous estimates put them at getting 600,000 people.
On the 14th is supposed to be the mass rally, that will be able to last up to 5 days. If there arent changes by then the Redshirts will run out of money and need to try something else.

Because of all this happening the government approved use of the International Security Act, which puts the military in charge of all of the security and puts the police under the military's purview.

How to get perscription meds in Thailand

Steve hasnt been feeling that well lately, so he went to get some painkillers. Now in America to get prescriptions you need a script from a doctor, then head to the pharmacy.
Thailand cuts out the silly middle-man of the doctor.
In thailand you go to the Pharmacy, describe your symptoms and they sell you the meds. Does this mean you can get morphine by just describing an injury that needs morphine. Well...yes.
Steve didnt get morphine. Im just pointing out the possibilities.

Bat Temple

Not that there is anything wrong with Lonely Planet, but i always find it exciting to travel to places that are not in the guidebook. When looking into heading to the bat temple I was pleasantly surprised to find that the entire provenience that its in, Chachoengsao, is absent from the guidebook.
The first step of the trip, as with most trips we go on, is to head to the bus terminal. At the terminal we found a window that said Bang Khla (the town we were going to) and tried to buy a ticket. There was a lady there who did not speak english, but didnt seem very willing to sell us a ticket. After about 5 minutes of talking with her, Jennifer and I figured out that the bus actually did not go all the way to Bang Khla, but to Chachoengsao City. With a shrug we said 'okay' and bought the tickets.
It was a bit tough finding where the bus was located, and a bit of a surprise when we did find it. Chachoengsao must not be a very popular destination, since it was a 10 passenger van. Unfortunatly I was the 10th passenger, making Jennifer the 11th. It was a bit of a squeeze, but we dealt with it. ((Steve and Johnny were not along for this trip for they rolled back to the apartment at 6am that morning and were PTFO when we left for the bus station. Thai bars are quite awesome, so i cannot blame them))

The van ride took about an hour and a half. Luckily magazines were on hand for reading. When we arrived we asked around for how to get to Bang Khla. At the ticket window it took a bit of effort to get them to understand that we wanted Bang Khla, not Bangkok. I suppose we probably just looked like lost tourists since farang are rather uncommon in these parts. Also English speaking was near zero and we were forced to use as much thai as we knew.
When they figured out we wanted Bang Khla we were lead to a Songtau (pickup truck with benches in the back). It was crowded, so i was very chivalrous and let the ladies sit down while stood on the back and hung on. Okay, Ive been looking for an excuse to do that since i found out what a Songtau is, but I still looked chivalrous.
It was an enjoyable ride, probably taking about an hour. We stayed on untill the end of the line which was at a small market in Bang Khla. Jennifer bought some grapes and we asked the lady selling "Wat Pho Bang Khla Yuu Tee Nii?" which means "Where is the town temple?". She told us the way, and suggusted we take a tuktuk. He offered us a price of 30 baht, and thats the lowest ive ever been quoted by a tuktuk so took it without hesitation.

Upon arrival at the temple i looked up into a tree and saw what i had come all the way to see. The tree contained waht looked like a hundred Giant fruit bats. It was crazy. It was everything i had hoped. But then i looked around and noticed that it wasnt just one tree full of bats. There were at least a dozen trees on the temple grounds teaming with the winged rodents.

As with most Wats in thailand there were people selling food and other small items. As we walked by them we said "sawatdii" the standard Thai greeting. These people had had thier eyes on us since we arrived, probably wondering how we had found our way to the Wat and they just lit up when we spoke to them in Thai "Pood Thai Dai!" one exclaimed (can speak thai!). They appreciated so much every word that we knew how to say. It was rather wonderful and a nice break from the city where broken Thilish is the standard, even if communication was more difficult in only Thai.

The Wat was situated scenically on a river. We walked over to the waters edge where there was a boat dock and an old man selling boat trips. We declined for then and explored the Wat a bit more and admired the huge bats.

They all were in the trees, hanging upside-down in true bat fashion, but they were not asleep as one might expect during the day, but they slowly fanned themselves with their wings. Once in awhile one would fly from one tree to another, which was just really cool to see.

When we were done exploring the temple complex we walked over to the boat man to see what his rates were. I hoped he would be able to take us on a trip all the way back to Chachoengsao City. He quoted us at 2000 baht, which would have been reasonable if we had ten people with us. He pointed to the opposite shore and made a circle with his hand and said "sam roi baht" which we took to mean that that was an island which he would drive us around for three hundred baht. This we agreed to, and the ride was most pleasant. We passed high class resorts on the island, and small fishing huts on both shores.

The ride took about 45 minutes. When we got back there was a small boat full of coconuts on the dock. He offered me and Jennifer some, but, thinking he was selling them, we declined. He bid us to wait anyway, and cut two open and handed them to us. Apparently they were part of the boat trip experience? Im not sure. However, it was teh first time ive had fresh coconut milk before. I cant say it was the best thing in the world, but it was interesting and a bit of a Thailand must try.

We said goodbye to all the ladies who were selling things, and went to walk back to the market. We didnt know the way exactly, but it wasnt far and it was nice to walk through the town. We got a few strange looks from people, but thats rather par for the course here in thailand.

Then it was just a songtau to a van back to bangkok and into the taxi to ride back to the appartment.

Lop Buri

Awhile back i mentioned we went to Lop Buri to see some monkeys. Here at long last, is the video. You will notice an angry monkey at one point in the video. He is chasing steve for getting too close when taking a picture. Steve kept about a yard and a half bubble between him and any monkeys after that.

Work Point Studios

One of the classes Steve and I are taking this semester is Media and Society. On friday we took a fieldtrip with that class to Work Point Studios. Work Point Studios is the company here in Thailand that produces 80% of the prime time television. Its about an hour away from our campus, near the campus that i did the Rice Harvesting festival at.

Workpoint is a very modern looking building. We meet our tour guide, who is an old friend of our Ajan, and studied in Texas and lived in the states for a few years. He explained to us about how big of a market share Work point has, and showed us around the studio. We first went to see the loading docks and sound stages. There were some big sets up on some of them. One was of a train station, one was of a bus stop (there were others but those stood out to me). It was really neat to see that the construction techniques were the same or similar to what we do at school. It was also really neat to stand on a set again.

We were also there to watch the filming of a TV show. The title of the show would be translated as 'Oh My God' and has won numerous awards. It is a variety show and it showcases different Thai artists. Most episodes start with a interview of an artist such as a painter or architect, or even someone who is just influential in the community, and then a performance of some kind of classical Thai art. Often if it is a musical performance they will first have the classical thai, and then they will mix it with some kind of western music to. While we waited for the show to start in the the studios very nice green room (It had windows overlooking the stages, plus aerobic machines, a badminton court and a ping pong table.) they put in DVDs of last season for us to watch. It was really neat.

When it was time to film the segment we were going to watch, we filed into the studio and sat down. One of the hosts of the show is American, and has been living in Thailand for many years. He explained that todays show was part of a series of shows honoring the 9 artists that were chosen this year to recive awards from Thailand. (nine is an auspicious number in Buddhism). We were to witness a Khon dance. The Khon dance, a highly regimented and stylized style, is made to tell the story of the Ramakien, which is an epic story that is akin to the Iliad and Odessy of western culture. Because of the length of the story, we were only going to see an episode of it. (in fact, most 'full length' performances only show a small part of the story) We would be seeing the battle between the Monkey-Gods and the Giants. The performers (there were about 30-40 of them) were all students of the master who was being honored, who themselves went on to become teachers of the dance themselves.

While the performers did a few runthroughs of their dance, the master offered to show us how it was done and asked for a couple of volunteers. Of course Steve and I, who had been salivating at the thought of performance since we entered the studio volunteered and were shown the positions, with the Master repositioning us. It was not the day to have worn bluejeans. The positions were much like advanced ballet positions, requiring both strength and flexibility. Being inflexible as I am he made the comment that i had 'buffalo legs' but if i studied under him he could fix it.

We sat down for them to do another runthrough, this time with cameras. Afterwards the American asked for volunteers to be brought on stage during the actual filming. Steve, Johnny and I were chosen. They said they would bring us on stage, teach us a little of the dance and then ask us do show something that we were good at to the audience, so we were quickly put on the spot to come up with something that all 3 of us were good at. The decided upon talent was that I would beatbox and Steve and Johnny would dance.
The cameras started rolling and we were seated off to the side. The dancers danced, and then the master was brought onstage for an interview. After that 4 students of his students were brought on and they did a small sample of dance. Then we were brought on and taught the students dance. We did our best. :D One of the hosts is considered to be Thailands best commedian, and ran us through our paces, having us do our best imitations of the different characters in the Ramakein dance. They then asked us what we had to share, and gave me a microphone. This part I had feared because all of the microphones used in the show were direct feed, no monitors. Which works fine for just speaking, but i was worried about not knowing what the mic was picking up from the beatbox. Luickly they gave me a mic that was pumping through the speakers so i had no problems. Steve and Johnny danced and then the hosts started joining in also.

The episode will be showing on Channel 9, at 3pm Bangkok Time, on either the 20th or the 27th.
And needless to say, I left two copies of my headshot with different people during the tour.

Erawan National Park

It seems I'm a bit behind on the blogging, I could blame it on midterms, but we all know that I am far to good of a student to need to study. So I suppose I'll go with the excuse that I'm to busy living life to write about it, which I can hardly be blamed for.

Anyway a week ago me and Jennifer were at Erawan National Park. Erawan is the most visited National Park in Thailand, and host to a 7-tiered waterfall. The best part is that unlike at Khao Yai National Park, at Erawan the waterfalls are swimable. The 7th tier is a bit over a kilometer from the bottom of the 1st tier and thats where we decided to start our fun. (that way we could experience the waterfall the same way the water does...minus the falls). The top fall was very awesome. The water was a bit chilly, but not as bad as I had thought it would be. There was a primary waterfall, which was a few meters tall, and off to the side of that there was a kind of secondary waterfall, which was a small flow of water over rounded limestone, making what looked like convex giant stairs. We were able to climb around and play on the stairs, it was great fun.
I'm not sure how they decided that this was a 7-tier waterfall, because between the tiers there were other small waterfalls and pools, that could easily be counted as a new tier. Anyhow, tiers 6 and 5 were beautiful and I could go on writing purple prose about them, but I'll wait till Jennifer posts her pictures and just show you those. (I really should get around to buying my own camera).
Waterfall #4 was really a stellar one that I enjoyed, because it had a waterslide. No, not a garish blue plastic one with a ladder, but a natural made waterslide made of rock. Following the lead of some Thai people I hopped in the water (its rocky near shore, but drops off almost immediately) and swam over to the waterfall and climbed up on the side of it. On the top, I sat down, at the start of the slide. It was evident where people had been sliding for there was a streak where no algae grew even though they covered most of the rock with a fine coating of sliminess. (luckily only the front of the rock, so climbing was not exceedingly dangerous).

You may have heard about Fish Foot massages before. I know some places in the states offer them. They are not for the ticklish. At the Erawan waterfall, there were many many fish similar to the foot massage fish in all of the pools. The difference is that the foot massage fish are rarely more than an inch long. Some of the fish nibbling at my feet at Erawan were a foot long, with most being around 6 inches.

After we got our kicks sliding down the rock we headed to the 3rd tier. On our way, the path diverged, and we decided to check out where the path less taken goes. It went across a dry river bed and into a bamboo forest. the path quickly disappeared, and although I was willing to get lost for a little bit, Jennifer wasnt, so we stayed in view of the path and walked around admiring the way the forest transitioned into all bamboo, and how much of a change in atmosphere there was.

Back to the waterfall we went to the 3rd tier, which seemed like the largest. It was fun because I was able to swim over to an opening under the water and let it fall down on my head and back. It kinda stung. But it was very fun just to swim around in the water. It was chilly, but it was very refreshing.

The 2nd tier was nice, but since it is one of the closest to the parking lot (and tier 1 is kinda lame) it was very busy.

When we were ready to leave, we asked the information desk when the next bus would be leaving. She said that it would be an hour and a half. So we did like any Thai person would do, and killed time by going to eat. Unlike Khao Yai, which had very few food options, Erawan had a row of about 6 different resturants/minimarts, so we just went into one that looked good and sat down to chow down.
When we finished eating there was still time to kill. We pulled out the newsweek and TIME magazines, which are perfect for trips that involve bus rides, and read those untill the bus showed up to take us back to Kanchanaburi, where we then caught a bus back to bangkok.

Rice Festival

Last wednesday a few of us who were lucky enough to have seen the signup sheet earlier that week were able to leave class early to go to Rangsit Campus (an hour away) to participate in the Thammasat Rice Harvest.
Rangsit campus is quite alot fancier than Tha Prachan (where i go to school), however it is quite removed from the city, so I'm glad to be at the city campus even if it has far less amenities. Also the dorms there have a midnight curfew, which is one of the stupidest things I have heard. The idea is that you will go back to your room in time and study or sleep. In reality, lets be honest, everyone either finds out what friends have nearby appartments or they just say "well its past midnight, looks like we have to party till 5am. we have no other choice, WE CANT GO HOME" I get frustrated just thinking about such an inane rule.
Anyhow, we arrived at the rice field which was about the size of the NWU greenspace and have to sign in. It turns out each 'faculty' (which is like a college when a university is broken into different colleges of study) sent 10 people to harvest the rice. Rice is a big deal in Thailand, its in about half of all thai dishes (the other half use noodles...rice noodles usually), and the harvest is done as a community. The festival started out with speeches by some important people in the university who I did not know. Some bits and pieces were translated for us exchange students. Next we got a folk music performance, not translated, but we got to yell syllables during the call and response part. Im sure we were actually saying words, but i didnt know what i was saying. Then the hand held sickles were handed out and we were shown how to harvest.

It was really easy actually. The rice grows in a clump, so you grab the stems with your left hand, and then with the sickle in your right hand (or vice versa if you are a southpaw) you pull towards you and then you throw the rice into a pile that gets loaded into a truck and processed later.
All the groups spread out across the field and started working across. I started off working near a bunch of Thai students. They kept showing me how to do it. Often when they demonstrated they had more trouble than I did. After the first 5 people showed me how to do it I thought to myself "If one more person shows me how to do this very simple task I'm going to stop trying to integrate and go work by the rest of the foreigners." I relocated nearby my classmates within ten minutes of starting the harvest.

Perhaps it was just to prove that i knew what I was doing to the condescending Thai students but I felt like I worked at a very good speed. But the rest of our group was cutting their way across the field quite rapidly as well. As we worked the band continued to play Thai folk songs, giving us an appropriate soundtrack for our work. After what i would estimate was about an hour, but i really have no clue, we made it to the end of the field. One of the Thai professors came over to us chuckling. "how is it," he asked "that the Farang harvest rice faster than the Thai?" Looking over the field, some groups were only halfway. The area that was trying to tell me how to do it right was not that far behind, us but it was still noticeable how far ahead we had finished (and didnt do anything incorrect) so we all felt proud and I felt personally vindicated.
This also put us first in line for food. the ever appropriate Pad Thai was served, wrapped in a banana leaf. It was quite good tasting.

As we ate, the band and speaker did some closeing ceremony stuff that was lost on me since it was in Thai. Then the MC came over to all of us exchange students and said they wanted us all to sing a song. We figured out that most of us knew Stand By Me, which we got up and sang.

It was then requested that we do another. Most people had sat back down so i performed Lean On Me with the band. They didnt know the song but were able to follow the key that iw as in very well, even when i changed it up without warning at the end. It was great being back on stage, it whetted my appetite for more. Unfortunatly, I dont think that will happen here.
Soon afterward, we helped them stack the chairs that they had set up, and got back on the bus for the trip back.

Khao Yai National Park Part 3: The Departure

The second nights sleep was a bit better. I woke up before the others (we were down to just the four of us as everyone else had left the day before). Since light was pouring in from the open windows on the tent, I grabbed my book and read a few chapters, unti Jeniffer woke up and I had someone to go to breakfast with. At breakfast we met two people, Sam and Sam, who were both working in a small, ethnically Burmese village with some NGOs. They were on a weekend vacation at Khao Yai. They were fun to talk with, when we got done eating we went to go wake up steve and Johnny, and sent them to go clean up and go eat while we took down the tent.

When we were checked out and ready to get going we walked over to the road to start hitchhiking and ran into Sam and Sam, who were also on their way. At first I feared that a group of 6 would be too big and no one would stop to pick us up, but my fears were proven wrong when an extended bed pickup pulled up and said they were headed to the park entrance. In fact they were headed to the park entrance...and through the park entrance and on down the road. We werent sure if they were taking us to town or had forgotten about us, but we were down for the adventure.
About halfway to town the truck pulls over and the two guys just get out. Across the road their are some food stands under thatch roofs, but other than that there is nothing but the road. The driver says some stuff to us in Thai, but we dont understand, and think that maybe there is a bus that goes past here for us to catch. We all grab our bags and hop out, and he looks at us confused and tries to explain again. We eventually figure out that he is waiting for a friend. We tell him that we are students at Thammasat, and he says that his friend works there. Pretty soon, the language barrier slows the conversation till it is no more.
After a few minutes of waiting a pickup truck pulls out and the driver hops out and start chatting with our driver. We ask him if he works at Thammasat, and he laughs like its the funniest thing in the world. I guess not. We stand around waiting some more and a car pulls up behind us. The driver of this vehicle comes up and talks to his friends, and then tells us that he is an Ajan of Sociology at Thammasat. As we are talking to him (he has the best english of the group) another car with a family inside pulls up. At this point we have no idea what is going on, and figure that These people want to know why a bunch of Thais and Farang are chilling on the roadside. We wai to the mom and she smiles Wais back and drives off.

After a little more chitchat between the thais we all jump back in the back of the truck. The Ajan says that they will take us right to the bus station. Perfect. As we drive back into town we notice that the mom we saw earlier is actually leading the caravan into the city, and then when we get in the city limits another driver pulls into the front. As we pull up to the bus stop (and really in this town its a bus stop, not station, just a little roadside stand) there is a bus about to leave, but it waits for us to buy our tickets and board and it was smooth sailing home from there.

Khao Yai National Park Part 2: Waterfalls and Hitchhikes

By the time I awoke some people were just comming back from haveing seen the first waterfall. I was kind of disappointed that i missed it, but with a group of 20 of us they werent going to bother rousing everyone to see if they wanted to come with. A nearby shop was sold breakfast, and i walked with a group over there and got Fried Rice with chicken and a Fried Egg on top(and i ordered it in thai).

As I finished breakfast people were talking about starting to hitch down to the visitors center and see the 5 tiered waterfall, but at this point neither me nor Jennifer had seen Steve or Johnny. We found them still asleep in thier tent and roused them and told them to go eat breakfast. By the time they were ready to start the day most people had gone down to the visitors center (#5 keeping track of everyone). We decided to splinter off from the large group and check out the nearby waterfall that people had seen earlier in the morning.
We thought it might be fun to hire a guide to show us the way and maybe point out things that we wouldnt notice. Our guides name was Yai. He looked about 12. and spoke no english. It was a bit of a waste of 300 baht.

Anyhow, off we set on the clearly marked trail to the waterfall. After a bit of a hike, we reached the first waterfall, which wasnt exceptionally awesome, but had rocks that were quite fun for us to climb on. Midway up I pulled out some of my oranges that I didnt share the night before and shared them.

Before we made it to the top, however, Yai beckoned us to continue on a trail. We grudgingly descended and continued onwards. Eventually we emerged near a different campsite, he took us accross the site to another bigger waterfall that was nice to look at.

We walked back to the campsite and sat down at a pavilion. After a while Johnny asked me what happened to my foot. I glanced down and saw a bit of blood on the top. No worries. I shrugged it off. Johnny then asked again "no, dude, the other side". Taking off my sandal and looking at the outside of my foot i saw it was covered with blood and still bleeding. It was at this point steve had taken off his shoes and noticed he two was bleeding from the top of his foot. We hobbled over to the souvenir shop and purchased water, soap and bandaids, and patched up our leech wounds. We also thought i had wounded the bottom of my foot, but that was the leach. I smashed him. Serves him right for drinking my blood.

We were offered a ride arranged to take us back to the campground for 200 baht. It was only 3km so we walked back to the campsite (Steve and Johnny were able to hitch a ride, which seemed to upset our guide who was hoping that we would buy the ride so he wouldnt have to walk) When we got there and regrouped we decided we should head down to the visitors center and figure out how to get to the cave to see the bats at dusk. We walked along, and no one seemed interested in helping us out. Then when we were close to giving up hope a badass pickup truck with an engine snorkel and lift kit pulled up. We asked if he was going to the visitors center. He said he was goign to a big waterfall. We hopped in.

This dude liked to drive. He flew accross the national park, and the hills kept getting bigger, and the speed greater. At one point we had to slow to a near stop because there was a troop of monkeys in the road, but after that it was back to adrenalin inducing cruising. We pulled into a parking lot, hopped out and headed down the path. The path was a nice walk through the woods, crossing a bridge that had seen many repairs, causeing its surface to be uneven with the boards tacked ontop of the originals that rotted away. As we walked we saw many people returning from the waterfall quite out of breath, and we werent quite sure why. Then we came to the stairs. Many many steep stairs going down to the viewing platform. But the sight was totally worth it. It was the biggest waterfall in the park. The sight was awesome.

Going back up the stairs took a bit of effort, but didnt seem as hard as the people we had passed made it seem. We saw the guys from the white pickup get ready to leave, and asked them where they were headed now. They said the visitors center and we hopped aboard. Another joyful ride later we were at the visitors center with our stomachs rumbling and grumbling. Luckily they had a variety of vendors, and we went to order some noodles and meat (possibly because we can order it in Thai). After chowing down we went to ask a ranger about the batcave. He told us that the bats will emerge in a half hour, and taht the cave was an hour away. Although this was a major bummer we decided to instead sign up for a Nighttime spotlight safari. (the greater bummer was that the ranger was wrong and teh bats dont show up till 630. hes not on my good list anymore)
We had a few hours till night fell and the safari began, so we thought we would take a quick hike to the small waterfall only 100 meters away. Well, as it turns out their are two trails, and we ended up taking the more scenic of the two, that was over 1000 meters. After enjoying that for a little bit, we sat for about two hours in a gazebo waiting for the night tour. Steve succeed in calling a deer over to say hi to us, he stuck his head right into the gazebo.

The night safari was...disappointing. We saw 67 deer. and a porcupine.

After the safari a lady who had safaried with us offered us a ride back to our campground, where at we studied Thai for a bit, and then passed out.

Khao Yai National Park Part 1: The First Night

Last weekend we decided to tag along with a large group going to Khao Yai National Park. After class on Friday we met in the lobby of our apartment at 1pm. and then hailed taxis to take us to the Bus Station. We would meet a bunch of people already at the park who hadnt had classes on Friday. We had to take two cabs to fit everyone in. Our cab seemed to go really slow, traffic was not cooperating (which is how it usually is in bangkok). It was interesting to see armed guards around government buildings and institutions. Many buildings in bangkok are fenced in and have a guard or two at the gate. This is a normal sight. Now those guards are in battle fatigues and are holding automatic rifles.

When we finally arrived at the Bus station we looked around for Emily, who was meeting us there. We called Jeff, who was in the other cab to see if he was there yet, and he said that he had had to turn around and grab something from the apartment that was forgotten. (reason i dont like big groups #1. More waiting). After a while all 8 of us were finally together an organized we bought tickets and headed to the bus. Somewhere along the way to the bus we lost someone, and the bus had to wait. (#2. more waiting) A short time later he showed up and the bus went on its way.

Whenever the bus would stop to pick up more passengers, people would get on the bus to sell us food. I had stocked up well at the train station 7-11 so i didnt need to buy anything from them, but this was the first time ive seen people boarding a bus to sell things.

When we arrived at Pak Chang, the city from which we would travel to Khao Yai from we were told that the public transport to the park stops at 5. Unfortunately we had arrived after 5. Therefor we had to go find a songteau to hire. Jennifer went into the nearby 7-11 to ask where to find one, and was told that there should be some at the other 7-11. Off we went, in the direction that we were told, asking other people every so often to make sure we were going the correct way. As we walked down a backstreet we were greeted with the surprising sight of an elephant sauntering through town with his Mahout riding leisurely on its back. It was a very Thai sight.
We walked through a market, that seemed to be shutting down, but there was still a fruit vendor open, who some of us purchased fruit from.

When we arrived at the second 7-11 we took some time to stock up on supplies, and then went to bargain with the driver. I let everyone else do the bargaining, when the price was settled on, we all clamored into the vehicle. All but one of us. who had to use the bathroom. So we waited. (#3).

As we rode to the park, the darkness descended on us. Eventually we could only see outlines of treelines dark against the black sky. Our driver stopped at the park gate, and we pulled out our student IDs so that we could get in for 40 Baht instead of 400 Baht. We paid up and then our driver started driving accross the park to our campsite. Mist started to swirl around us, and gave us an interesting show as the headlights from corners behind us would be outlined by the waterdrops floating in the air.

Eventually we arrived at the campground and walked over to the ranger station to purchase tents. As we headed towards the other tents we heard the voices of our friends who had arrived a few hours earlier and started setting up. It quickly became evident that not everyone was all that prepared for camping. Many of the other people asked how much food and alchohol we had brought with, since they had assumed there would be a 24/7 convenience store on the campground, and there seemed to be no more than 3 flashlights for a group of twenty. (#4 babysitting). It wasnt too much of an issue and luckily most people were willing to share.

After we went to bed, most of us awoke to sounds of a thunderstorm bearing down upon us. Luckily the tents were in good enough shape to keep all of the water out of the tent, but that combined with the hard ground made for a fitful nights sleep.