Not All That Wander Are Lost...MPI Ecuador

MOvember

2010-11-24T19:48:00.000-08:00

With MOvember coming to an end, here is a tribute to all those men out there (and ladies who support them) who grew a 'mo' this month in support of prostate cancer research and other men's health issues.

Stay classy.

Go Giants!

2010-11-18T12:21:00.001-08:00

So, I’m in the jungle walking down the street in the rain, looking for a place to watch our beloved Giants potentially win the WORLD SERIES, and I find some chicken place that has the game on. I sat down with a friend of mine (Brock) and promptly began stressing out. Several beers later, I jump up, run outside and start yelling my face off. I’m running up and down the street making an ass out of myself and I don’t even care. A friend of mine that I live and work with, who wasn’t up in the jungle with us, calls me to share in the moment and I was so excited and emotional that I couldn’t even talk. “Are you crying?” he asks, “…maybe,” I blurt out. I teared up for sure. I still cant believe this happened.

As I walked back into the chicken place, my buddy is still sitting at our table. Everyone in the place is looking at me with big smiles. I get a few “congratulations” and a few looks of concern. Apparently, when I took off running, everyone in the place looked at my buddy with great concern. All he did was point to the TV and say “Champions”, in Spanish. They laughed I guess and watched me run around in the street for five minutes. What a beautiful thing sports are.

It was an amazing weekend, Giants aside. Amazing and weird. We get into a cab in our neighborhood, headed for the bus station in Quito at about 1 in the morning. As we are getting into the car, there are two people in the middle of the street. One is on top of the other just laying into the other face with his fists. There was blood everywhere. We urged the cab driver to drive on, but he insisted on watching. Not too long after that, we are driving down a long, dark and empty road, when we see a truck, with many people in the back, stopped up ahead. There is a man trying to either get in or pull people out. We aren’t sure what’s going on. The truck drives away, leaving the man in the middle of the road. Was we get closer, the man positions himself directly in front of the car. As we get even closer, we see him, arms stretched out wide in a gesture suggesting he wants us to stop the car, in his full glory. He is bloody from head to toe. I mean, it was gruesome. It was hard to tell where the blood was coming from there was so much of it. He eventually gets us to stop, and wiping his blood all over the hood, he gets to the car window. All he can say is ‘help. Please help.’ We didn’t know what to do, and seemingly, neither did the driver. Once the bloodied man wasn’t holding onto the car anymore, the driver burned out and got out of there as soon as he could, giving us no explanation. This would be the start of our five day weekend.

The bus we thought would leave at 3, turn out, doesn’t exist. So we spent the night at the bus station and left on a bus a 5:30 AM. When we got to the Tena, we refused to sleep, and instead, we went caving in what would be one of the coolest things we did all weekend. Basically, we payed a guy a few dollars to take us a few hours into this network of caves. In the cave, we encountered a terrifying insect called a spider scorpion. It was much larger than my hand. Pretty terrifying stuff. We also came upon a section of waterfalls and pools. The pools were in a succession of three. The first was roughly 15 feet deep and as wide as a large human body. The goal was to jump in and get to the bottom and bring up rocks. The other two pools were not as deep, but it was still fun jumping it. It was a pretty wild experience. When we exited, we exited into the jungle. In amazing how much the jungle here reminds me of what it was like back in Southeast Asia. I miss those adventures so much.

One of the other days, we went river rafting. It would be one of my favorite times on the river that I can remember. It started with a hike into the jungle where we would find a massive waterfall…naturally we wanted to jump off of it. That was even before we got on the river. Once we finally got on the river, I got to be in the smaller boat with my two buddies (Brock and Jack, with whom i live and work, actually) I went to Tena with and this English guy. The good thing about the smaller boats is that you get rocked all the more! It was a blast. At one point, we are going through a slow section and up ahead we see a bridge doing across the gorge, over our heads. It looks like something straight out of Indiana Jones. Like one of those one person wide bridges that you know you shouldn’t ever use. It has old bits of wood falling off it and jungle growing through it. I remember thinking, man that would be cool to jump off of if the water were deep enough. Just as I finished that thought, our guide (and now friend) looks at me and says, “Hey, you wanna jump off that thing?” I didn’t even skip a beat. Next thing I know I’m walking tenderly across this crazy footbridge thinking, how did I get myself into this. It was awesome. AND THEN (!!!!) we had burritos for lunch! It was quite a day on the river, filled with people flying out all over the place and some great near saves, not to mention we got to jump off of a sketchy bridges and a waterfall into water…oh yeah, and burritos. Pretty cool stuff.

We had made friends with the guide and part owner of the rafting place, so we asked him if he could take us around in a few days to some cool places around Tena. He agreed, asking only that we pay him a few bucks for him missing a day of work. We were cool with it, but very confused when we pulled up to the place where we were going to start our journey into the jungle, only to find about 25 Ecuadorians waiting for us. He explained that over dinner the previous night, be had mentioned that he was going out into the jungle with some friends. They asked if they could come along, but it turns out that they meant their families and family friends’ families. Tim (who is Irish, but actually grew up in Tena, Ecuador) assured us that we would only have to help then part of the way and then we would be off on our own…not true. We had to literally Sherpa these people into the jungle under the pretext that we (my two buddies and I, who have never been here before and know nothing about the jungle) were jungle guides. It was such a mess. We were belaying these people up rock cliffs and canyoning them up/down waterfalls. There was a time when I was the person receiving people at the end of a waterfall, helping them unclip their climbing harness, while having a rope tied to my waist so that people could climb down the rest of the water fall OFF OF ME! It was too bizarre. I have this lasting image of my buddy jack with his head underneath this really large women, trying to push her up this rocky area. It was hysterical and probably not safe.

The thing is, if it was just us, we would have cruised up this area in no time, but it took these people all day. It wasn’t because they were all out of shape either, it’s just that they had absolutely no hiking or climbing sense. In the end, Tim apologized a million times and insisted on sharing the tip that they gave him with us. It was so bizarre, but I wasn’t made at all. We had a blast, even given the circumstances. It was merely tiring. They were nice people though and very grateful for our help. I guess we pulled off the guide thing because everyone believed that we were and didn’t question it at all. The only really bad thing was that some sort of bug destroyed my legs. I had divots in my legs for weeks. They hurt and were itchy and were definitely not mosquito bites, unless they were super mosquitoes with unusually large mouths. Ouch.

We did a few other things when in the jungle, like take a few hour boat ride that led us to an animal refuge. It was pretty cool. Other than that we just sort of cruised around on our own before heading home.

Other than that, I haven’t had to many adventures lately. Just working and trying to enjoy life. We had a Dia Day Los Muertos party at our library, which was a big hit. Everyone loved it. English classes are about the same, sep we haven’t had as many students lately because of all the rain. I teach Children’s Art classes now, which I love. A friend of mine and I took the teens from our teen center, and some teens from an orphanage we work with, hiking the other day. I got some barbed wire stuck in my leg. That was fun, especially when Ashley started freaking out. That never really helps. It wasn’t a big deal, but it was a funny circumstance.

OH, and I’ve grown a pretty substantial mustache because it’s MOvember, a month dedicated to raising awareness and money for prostate cancer, testicular cancer and depression in men. Its so long I can curl it up at the ends pretty seriously. It’s a lot of fun. If you want to join my MOvember team, please let me know because we are only about 5 deep. You CAN be a women on our team as well, it just means you show support and are technically called a ‘mo Sister.’ Check out my official team on movember.com. otherwise, all you men out there, start growing a stache if you haven’t already. It’s a lot of fun.

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about what it will be like to come home. It will be weirder than I can even imagine right now. It will be a year and a half since I have been back. Pretty interesting stuff. I’m so excited to see everyone, nut I have to admit im a little scared and nervous. I guess I have some time to let it sink in a bit more, so I will wait….less than a month!

Anyway, hope that was interesting enough. Hope everyone is going well wherever people are.

Stay classy

Oh My GOD!!!!

2010-11-03T12:38:00.000-07:00

DID THE GIATNS REALY WIN THE WORLD SERIES!!?>?!?!??!?!?!?

YES!

i embarrassed myself in public. teared up a bit. made some Ecuadorians in the jungle think gringos are as crazy as they thought....all worth it.

Update coming soon...need to sit on this one.

Giants baseball. hurts so good.

No Conosco

2010-10-07T14:47:00.001-07:00

Well, its been a long time since I’ve updated mu blog….im sorry for that. Part of me wasn’t sure if anyone was reading it anymore and the other part of me was, well, a bit distracted with this grand transition. Either way, I’m sorry. If you are still reading, thank you. I hope this update suffices.

So, how to explain the past few months? Not really sure where to start. I guess starting with the attempted coup would be a good idea. I was sitting in the living room of our new house (we moved, but that is something I will explain later), when my buddy’s phone rang. It was Christian, who runs one of our partner organizations. I answered expecting him to tell me about the concert that we were all supposed to be going to later, instead, I had to try and gather everyone in the house to break them the news that we shouldn’t leave our house because the president was ‘kidnapped’ by the police, who were holding him in a hospital in Quito. The next few hours were confusing and frustrating. We would find out much more, which became rather concerning. We contacted our boss, who was in the States, who also said that we shouldn’t leave the house. Turns out that in the few hours after the police decided to go on strike (they went on strike because the President cut down on benefits to higher officers, essentially), three banks in Quito were robbed. Later, there would be two grocery stores (the ones that we get food from) robbed just down the road from us. We would find out that Quito, along with many other cities around Ecuador, were rioting and becoming more and more unsafe, to say the least. We also learned that, LUCKILY, the military supported the president, so they were entering Quito to take back the President from the police, who were holding him against his will. All we could do was wait…so we got some beers, water, sandwich meat and started watching Dexter…you know, cling to the essentials, right?

It was a few days of house arrest until things went back to normal. The military recovered the President (who apparently told the police before they took him that he would either leave their presence as a dignified leader of a respected country or in a body bag—paraphrasing of course) and restored relative order. It’s been a week now and things are still not back to normal. The police are not out in full force and people are still a little nervous, but there isn’t any civil unrest. Technically Ecuador is still in a State of Emergency, but it is generally business as usual in the Valley where we live. We opened the Centro (our library where we run most of our programs out of) and are all back to work. We have been given the green light to go into Quito, which is nice. As much as I love our new house, it’s nice to no longer be on house arrest. I missed the local food around the corner.

It’s been weird, hard and fun down here. Much like in my travels, there has been a lot of weird. One of the cool things about working/living down here is that the group that I live/work with (you can see who they are at http://mannaproject.org/ecuador-team) also enjoys getting out and seeing what Ecuador is all about, when we aren’t in the middle of a country wide crisis. Ecuador has some interesting things to offer. About a month ago, our barrio had a ‘bull fighting’ festival. The funny thing is that it was nothing like I thought it was going to be or like a bull fight is supposed to be, which is why I put it in quotes. It was set up in a stadium that was made only a few days before the festival. The stadium was made out of bamboo and large 2x4 planks of wood that were tied together with cloth and rope. It was set up in a circle, stacked about three boxes high, each about as tall as I am. It felt as though if a strong gust of wind came by that it would crumble in a large heap of human and wood. It was quite the scene of food, drink and debauchery. When I finally got close enough to the front of my so called box, I came to find that there was not merely one matador in the stadium antagonizing the bull, but well over a hundred drunken Ecuadorian men, with a few on horses, antagonizing the bull. It was pure madness. People were getting slammed into the sides of the stadium by bulls, pants were getting ripped off by bulls, and even one horse was impaled by a bull. That was all before the lightning, thunder and rain. It was quite the cultural experience.

Not too long before the bull fighting festival, I went with a few friends to a cockfight (male chicken fighting, for all you pervs out there) in the barrio we lived in at the time. I had been to a few cockfights in my life, but none were set up like this. The ones I had been to in Asia were outdoors, dirty and as sketchy as you might imagine, but here, there was an actual indoor stadium, with stadium seating, a concession stand and a digital scoreboard. It was pretty wild. Our Ecuadorian friends thought it was hysterical how amazed we were, but come on; we were ‘ring side’ for cockfighting—getting feathers all over us.

Sometime after the cockfight and the bull fighting festival, we moved to a different barrio called Sangolqui. It’s about another 20 minutes into the Valley, but it is actually a much more populated and lively city than Conocoto, except we haven’t figured out whether they have a night basketball league. Moving was a mess. When you live in a third world country, you have to do everything yourself because there aren’t really movers. It took an unbelievable amount of time to sort most everything out, from cleaning, to painting to fixing everything to the actual move. Once we got into our new house, which is most definitely an upgrade, I didn’t even have a room. The new property has a yard, a stand-alone house, and two casitas (small two bedroom houses) on the side, connected to our outer walls. I share one of the casitas with Luke. The other casita is where my boss lives. I was staying in my boss’ casita while the one I was to live in was being finished…turned out that my boss would move in over a week before my casita (which we call the ‘Man Den’ because Luke and I are decorating the common space between our rooms with ridiculous things like camouflage paint, a Hulk Hogan poster, a Jackie Chan poster and a number of other ridiculous things—ridiculous I know) would be ready enough to stash my bed in. In the meantime, Luke and I slept in the common room of the main house for a while. Now our ‘Den’ is finally finished and I have my own space. I love it. Right out my door is the lawn where we have a massive avocado tree. Back behind the house we have a garden and a chicken coop, which will be stocked with chicken by Saturday. We have a lava rock that we can heat up to cook meat on. It’s a pretty sweet place and it costs less than our other house. It’s pretty cool that we get an upgrade in space and quality of life, while paying less. In this house I have my own room, a lawn, chickens, an avocado tree, a ‘Man Den,’ and a place literally around the corner called ‘The Hangover Clinic’ (La Clinica del Chuchaqui) that has an amazing fish and potato soup for $1.75. It’s a pretty sweet new situation. The only real issue is that the house has some work that needs to be done on it, such as the work needed on my casita. We also don’t have internet, but I don’t mind so much because we will eventually. Everything will be worked out eventually.

As for my recently passed birthday, well, that was interesting. It’s my second year being pretty out of touch. It feels weird, but it’s no big deal. I do miss everyone in times like those, but I won’t be away forever, so I keep solace in that. At least this year I wasn’t anything like last year’s. Aside from the weekend that we spent celebrating (my birthday fell on a Monday this year so celebrating on the weekend was the only choice), I had an interesting surprise at work the following week. Once everything calmed down in the country and we got back to work, it was a Tuesday, which is one of the days I teach English. I prepared all day with my co-teacher and showed up to class ready to get my English on. I’m standing at the front of the class when I see my students enter the library with peculiar looks on their faces. I saw that they were holding a cake, but I was utterly confused because my birthday had long since passed, but they were all looking at me. I then looked at some of my coworkers/friends faces and realized that the already started birthday song and cake being carried my way was for me. Slow, I know, but I’m not really one for surprises. There was cake, soda, chips of many kinds, and even hotdogs. They had a little balloon popping tradition of their own. One of my students gave a pretty emotional (for me) heartfelt speech, just before I was eagerly encouraged to give one of my own. Needless to say, we didn’t have a very long class that day. It was a pretty neat experience.

I realize this is a long update, without even saying much about what I do, in terms of work. I have a lot of responsibilities, but I will leave it at this for now. Hope that was entertaining. I know it is a little different than the rest of my posts, but I tried to sum up a pretty long period of time where a lot of pretty crazy events passed.

I hope that all is well. Thanx for reading.

Some Pretty Wild Stuff

2010-10-02T09:51:00.000-07:00

So i was going to update, but we havent really been leaving the house bc things got a little nutty. Here is a little info on whats going on :

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/americas/09/30/ecuador.unrest/index.html

http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2010/10/01/romo.ecuador.pres.rescued.cnn?iref=allsearch

i WILL update soon.

Sorry

2010-09-29T13:03:00.000-07:00

I have to say, if anyone is still out there reading, that i am incredibly sorry for the radio silence. we have been moving houses and starting programs. i just started teaching English, among other things. i will have an update up by tomorrow or the next day.

thankx for those who are still reading. keep enjoying life, if you are, and if you arent--get on it!

Solo Hablo Un Poquito de Espanol

2010-08-04T19:20:00.000-07:00

So I’m sitting in the emergency room where Hanna, one of the other Manna volunteers with whom I live and work with, is face down on an emergency table. Her mane of blonde is hair so bloody that she almost looks as though she is a red head. This was our first week in the Manna house.

That night was basketball night, where we go play at a local gym with a bunch of Ecuadorians. When we showed up, the gym was being used for something, but some locals invited us to go to some local park to play with them. All five of us pilled in the back of their cars and off we went. It was a lot of fun, until Jack, another volunteer and housemate, went down really hard with a BAD ankle injury. He would later need a cast. We promptly called a cab and decided to call it a night and head home for some much needed spaghetti. While we were waiting for the taxi, however, one of the Ecuadorians suggested we continue the game. SO OF COURSE I offered to step in for Jack until the taxi came. It was only a few plays later when some kid decided to bowl through Hanna when she was under the basket like he was playing football. She went down pretty hard, but popped up pretty quickly to her knees, grabbing her head. The only thing she said for a solid few minutes was “Foul” in Spanish—with a little chuckle. I remember hoping, its ok, she only bumped her head…it was a few seconds later that blood started dripping down her forehead…oh shit—I remember thinking. Her head went hard into a stump that was under the basket. We sat around for a while trying to find the cut through her hair and trying to decide who had the most authority on head wounds. In the end it became very apparent that she needed a doctor. With the battery dying on our one phone, we were able to contact our Manna doctor. The locals who invited us to play were amazing and drove us to the clinic where Hanna, who was a major trooper considering her head was split open in the back, would get stitched up. They also drove us back home. We rolled back into the house pretty late that night to a very confused group of people.

The house is quite a situation. Right now there are about 13 of us bc a few of the old Program Directors are still living here. In a few days it will be down to the nine of us. We are a pretty random group of people. Pretty soon our ‘Bios’ will be on mannaproject.org, so you will be able to get a better idea of the group we have here. We live in an area called Conocoto in the Chillos Valley. It’s a beautiful area. Socially there isn’t a whole lot going on, as it is a little town and its sort of a poor area, but I love it. In the living situation right now, we are sort of on top of each other in the house, but it works bc our personalities seem to mesh really well. Currently I live in the ‘apartment’ of the house with half our group.

As for work, it’s been really hectic lately with moving in and people moving out and work starting. After we moved into the Manna house and language classed were over, we promptly went to work. Basically, right now our responsibilities revolve around running the library, teen center and three week camp. Soon, I will be helping to start English classes for adults, among other programs. I’m most excited about my role as grant coordinator, however.

Its all pretty exciting. We take the bus to work when we head there and when we head home we ride in the truck bed of a ‘camioneta’, which is just a standard truck. It nice to have a semblance of a routine and a community I feel a part of. Things are starting to feel a bit normal. We have a chores list, program roles and a cooking rotation. Which is funny bc I am an awful cook. Hopefully that will change soon or people will start to get pissed. We have a solid crew of good cooks so im trying to play it off as an understudy for the moment. It’s funny to be living with a group of people after being on my own for so long. So far it’s been a solid experience.

So there is a little update. I will try and be better about it. Hope all is going well at home and that you enjoyed the little story.

Remember to donate if you can!

Sam

Trece Meses

2010-07-24T13:32:00.000-07:00

I’m on a plane in going from Columbia to Quito, Ecuador, and I realize that I don’t really have a whole lot to say to my host family when I arrive at the airport. I have never actually studied Spanish and they apparently didn’t speak any English. Luckily there were some backpackers on my flight that helped me with some basic phrases.

These past few weeks have been a whirlwind. As I mentioned before, after an 11 month journey that took me to places around the world that I never dreamed of being, I decided to volunteer my services to a non-profit called Manna Project International (www.mannaproject.org). Manna Project International (MPI) is a volunteer driven 501(c)(3) non-profit organization serving international communities through holistic development. The MPI network is made up of three international sites (Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Guatemala), nine university campus chapters, and a growing base of volunteer alumni. I am volunteering at the Ecuador site, in the Chillos Vales, which is to the southeast of the capital city of Quito. The team in Ecuador has adopted an asset-based development model. This model focuses on the skills and interests local residents have rather than on what they lack. It looks past the temptation to meet short-term needs or offer temporary assistance and instead seeks to be a matchmaker between residents and local organizations, to foster job opportunities, and to increase community pride and involvement.

Our international sites are run by 13-month volunteers called Program Directors (i.e. me!), who currently come from twelve different universities across the US and Canada. Each current Program Director is responsible for raising $7,500 by February, 2011. This money will go to helping run our many programs, from Women’s Health to Children’s English, as well as helping to maintain and improve our library from which we run our programs and connect with the community. If you want to help out there is a link near the top right of the blog. Click on the link and follow the directions and you will be helping a community in great need more than you will ever know.

Anyway, these past weeks have been a mess of learning and adjusting. I was only in the States for about five days. I spent a few days in DC with friends from college before heading to orientation in Miami, where I met the eight other people I will be volunteering with for the next 13 months. We went through the standard orientation ‘getting to know each other’ drills and went over, in more detail, the site and organizational information necessary before heading to our sites. Then it was off to Ecuador!

The family I’m staying with for two weeks is amazing. They try their best to help me along with my Spanish without laughing at me too much, even when I say very silly things. I have a really big family so the house is always moving. They are all so nice and accommodating. I wish that I could communicate better with them, but after only a week, my Spanish is still pretty poor, to say the least.

Our days right now consist of four hours of Spanish (ouch!), with afternoon meetings and night activities. It’s a busy life, but its only going to get busier. It’s interesting being in a routine after not really having anything like that for such a long time. I am loving it, though. Quito, which is where we are right now before we move into the Manna house together, is a beautiful city nestled in the mountains. It’s a nice walk to school in the morning. There are lots of nice little restaurants and plenty of things to do all over the city. The other night we went out for one of the old Program Director’s birthdays on a bus called the Chivas Bus. It might have been one of the most embarrassing things I’ve ever been a part of, but it was still a blast. It was like being on a flat bed truck with an awning, a DJ and some bizarre alcoholic drink that was 99%juice. They also handed out whistles, so even though we were already about as annoying as we possibly could have been, they found a way to step it up a notch. It was a great bonding session for our group and a nice way to get to know the old Program Directors.

A few days later we went to a soccer game between the major professional rival teams in Ecuador. We all bought jerseys and learned the song for the local team so that when we showed up, we weren’t just any gringos, we were Liga gringos. Some kids working for Manna even got themselves in the local paper. It was a pretty crazy scene. Latin American soccer at its finest—flares, riot gear and everything.

It is going to be a fun year. I finally got to see the community in which we will be working and it made me all the more excited. I can’t wait for the challenges that lie ahead. It is going to be a difficult, but amazing road. This will be whole new adventure and it will go by entirely too fast. That is just the way it is though….

Hope all is well.

And So It Ends...Sort of...

2010-07-05T07:20:00.000-07:00

Ive been trying to write this post for a while. Its not that I didn’t want to write it, its that this post seems to be the hardest one to write. The more I pushed it back, the harder it got, now I am stuck and don’t know where to start.

It was an epic journey that Tanner and I had through East Africa. It was filled with adventure, trouble and amazement. We went on a safari that was a disaster, hung out in dive bars in Zanzibar, broke up a fight between Africans, and got blasted by the water of Victoria Falls. We saw many animals, and a lot of them were not when we were on safari. Sometimes they were merely walking down the street. It was a test of patience (we had a 12 hour bus ride turn into a 22 hour bus ride bc the ‘night bus’ dindt actually have headlights and needed to pull over for the whole night in the middle of Zambia) and problem solving skills (the Lonely Planet was virtually useless for this overland journey).

When Tanner and I finally arrived in South Africa, it was just in time for the games to begin. We made the journey to the US-Eng game. We somehow got a ride with a crew of Americans there and back, and picked up tickets for face value when we got there. Then it was down to Durban to meet up with my brothers and a few of their friends. I ended up seeing a few more games (Spain v. Switzerland and Chile v. Switzerland), drove along the ‘Garden Route,’ which is along the coast, all the way to Cape Town. I shaved in a ‘victory mustache’ with a bunch of Americans, got pepper sprayed by police, went shark cage diving, jumped off a perfectly good bridge (e.g. the highest bungy jump in the world), and climbed Table Mountain, all before heading back to Johannesburg to fly home. I had a great time with my brothers—more than they could ever know. That is generally the short list of activities. It was a great month in South Africa.

There are many stories to be told, but I feel that going through these last few months in a detailed step-by-step account will not only be boring, but it won’t do the end of my trip any justice. It’s weird being at the end. A lot comes to mind. Sitting in the airport after 11 months of backpacking to some strange and amazing places, trying to conceptualize what this whole experience means to me and how to move forward from it is a pretty difficult thing. People told me it was going to go by fast, but I never believed them. Even six months in, I didn’t believe them. Now I am a little mad bc they were SO RIGHT. This trip almost doesn’t seem real to me, now that it’s over. I will miss the adventure very much. I am very grateful I had the opportunity to have such an adventure.

Now I am in the US for a few days until I fly to Ecuador to volunteer as a site director for a non-profit. It will be a new 13 month adventure, but in a very different way. I will learn Spanish and become close with an Ecuadorian community. I will finally be stagnant! I look forward to this new challenge and this new part of my life. If you fancy looking up the non-profit, it is called Manna Project International and you can visit their website at www.mannaproject.org.

I will still keep my blog, though I will probably rename it, and continue chronicling my adventure. It might not be as exciting as some of my past posts, but nonetheless.

Thank you all so much for the support and the nice messages or the past 11 months.

To the next adventure!

My Bad

2010-06-26T02:32:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of update...i will try and get one up before i leave South Africa on July 4th.

hope all is well

sam

You're a Mazungu!

2010-05-16T01:03:00.000-07:00

Seems that everywhere I go now, when I have my longer shaggy hair, people are saying I look like Chuck Norris. I’m not really a fan, but it does allow me to drop a few jokes. The night Tanner arrived in Nairobi, we went out with some volunteers and their Kenyan friends (to celebrate the birthday of one of the volunteers), and sure enough they were all saying I look like Chuck. I was vigorously protesting when Tanner, in a MAJOR ego boost for me, says that I look like Brad Pitt when my hair is short. Its ok, you can laugh. Though he wasn’t serious, the rest of the group wanted to find out….so over the next hour or so they took turns cutting off bits of my hair. That was my second night in Kenya.

In the end, it didn’t turn out so well. Apparently, at one point, I it looked nice. Then SOMEONE took the beard trimmers to the front and side of my head, and well, it looked like I got in a fight with a lawn mower or something. I spent the next few days wondering around Nairobi looking like I had some sort of disease.

The reason I’m talking about the ‘hair’ incident to begin this entry is because this sounds a lot more real than the rest of our experience in Kenya. What we would experience next is by all accounts ridiculous, and thus, one of the coolest things I’ve done on this trip.

Im sitting on a hillside next to Tanner, eating goat meat that was brought to us on a spike, straight out of the forest, with the village elders of apparently the most remote Maasai community in East Africa, and I’m wondering, how did I get here and what is going on. Well, this is generally the story of how that happened.

Whilst staying at the Wildebeest in Nairobi, waiting on Tanner to arrive, I met a very interesting lady named Becca. It turns out that she and her family are living deep in ‘Maasai Land’, volunteering in the most remote Maasai community. We got to talking and she told me that eventually, they are attempting to set up an eco-tourism camp, but that it is very much not set up quite yet. Well, it turns out that Tanner and I would be the first guests they had at the camp deemed ‘Walking with Maasai.’ It’s difficult to explain how far out in the bush this place is and how much it is NOT a tourist venue or touristy experience. I will do my best in describing the experience to give a better view.

It took nearly four days of email communication to figure out whether it was even possible for us to visit this area. The ‘camp’ wasn’t set up yet and actually getting out there was going to be, let’s call it, tricky. Tanner and I made the first move by getting on a Matatu (a sort of van used for local transport, stuffed with 20+ people) to head to a dusty little town called Narok, about three hours away from Nairobi. When we arrived, we jumped on the internet to find that we could catch a Matatu into Loita Hills, which is next to the famous Maasai Mara. After waiting four hours longer than expected, fighting away touts and trying our best not to be taken advantage of, the Matatu finally started making moves into the bush. It was a four hour adventure through the bush. Part of the time we were traveling on ‘roads’ that only a Land Rover should be on, and the other part we were either not on the road or half off the road. Driving like a bat out of hell, the Matatu weaved its way through villages, creeks and mud traps on its way to a village called Entesekera. Mind you, the entire time, we weren’t sure if, once we arrived, that someone was even going to be there to meet us. We sort of jumped in the ‘car’ hoping that all would work out. The one thing that sort kept our mind off the fact that if we arrived and no one was there to pick us up, we would be four hours away from anything resembling a town (e.g. an area with a petrol station, telecommunications, accommodation or internet) was four hours away, was the fact that along the way we were seeing Africa’s amazing landscape—plus herds of Zebra and Antelope, some monkey (I don’t know what kind) and Wildebeest. Sure enough, after four hours of butt numbing terrain and utter fascination, both on our part and the part of everyone who saw us, we arrived to find someone waiting for us to take us another 18k to the camp where our tent was.

When we arrived at the camp, we got acquainted with Andre, the South African who is running the volunteer work with the Maasai, and our Maasai guide, Layoodi (I have no idea how to actually spell it so I spelled it sort of phonetically), who would be leading us around Maasai land for the next four days. The camp is just an area where there are a few nice tents set up where a friendly Bush Buck wanders through from time to time, a social area set up around a fire pit, a kitchen tent and a bathroom with an elephant jaw as a toilet seat. We were very happy to have arrived. After grilling Adre about what he is doing with the community, what ‘Walking with Maasai’ is all about and his personal history (He is an amazing person and what he is doing is nothing short of incredible. It would be nice to elaborate more on it and how he came to spend 16 years working with the most rural Maasai community in this area to create a Maasai driven development and cultural preservation project, but the entry out be MAASIVE—well, more massive than it already will be), we discussed our plans for the next few days.

The next day, we woke up and went down to the river to spend some time trekking with Layoodi, mostly waiting to see if we could go to a circumcision ceremony, which is a great honor and an incredible insight into Maasai culture. Eventually, we found out that we were welcome and set off for our first serious immersion into Maasai culture. Tanner and I, to this point, had seen tribal individuals walking around in a number of places, including Nairobi, but hadn’t yet experience true Maasai culture. Now we were setting off to see one of the quintessential traditions of Maasai culture, in deep Maasai Land, with a real tribe that lives today as they lived a thousand years ago. Not exactly things you get to do every day. This was the real thing.

On my trip, I often find myself amazed at what I get to experience, looking wide eyed all around me, trying to soak all of it in. It is a completely difference experience entirely, when you look around and realize that people are staring at YOU wide eyed, amazed at the sight before them. Those are the times when you are so alien to the people around you that YOU are the spectacle. Its times like these that I appreciate even more how lucky I am to be able to do what I’m doing. Showing up to this ceremony was one of these experiences. This whole trip into Maasai Land was.

When we arrived to the ceremony (thankfully we didn’t actually see the circumcision because we arrived later) two different groups of Maasai warriors were dancing, singing , jumping in two different circles, women were singing in a group outside one of the huts, people were strewn across the landscape being social, and tea was brewing next to a tree. It was like nothing I had ever seen. Layoodi walked us around. We shook hands with many people, but obviously couldn’t really communicate. Layoodi translated for us occasionally, like when the ladies were enamored with how much leg hair I had. I told them it kept me warm in the winter but they didn’t believe that. We sat in a traditional hut, which is an incredibly dark, hot and cramped experience, drinking tea, eating Maasai pancakes and fighting off flies. I jumped with the Maasai warriors because David, an old warrior and school teacher with whom we spent time in his school house earlier that day (e.g. a shack that fits 60 adult students who were not lucky enough to go to school), insisted I jump with them. Later, when the warriors realized I was taking pictures, I then had to take a million more and show them the photo after every time I took one. It wasn’t so bad because it allowed me to make a million photos, but it was something else being surrounded by a huge crowd of Maasai warriors eager to see what they looked like. Do they look amazing. They are covered in their paint, and have an intricate selection of jewelry on their heads, hanging from all parts of their ears, and from their necks. The young warriors have their hair meticulously prepared. The women, young and old, have incredibly elaborate decorations of beaded and metal jewelry hanging from their necks and ears. Everyone had extremely stretched earlobes, from which hung decoration. The pictures will do a much better job painting the picture. In the end, my shirt was covered in red ocher and cow fat, which is what the warriors and young women use, to paint themselves, and I had visual evidence of this amazing scene.

After being smothered by the warriors, we were invited to eat meat with the elder men on the hillside. We were brought a small distance from the ceremony, to the side of a hill, just up from the forest. As we sat there, a man emerged from the forest with a rack of ribs on a wooden spike. When he got to us, he slammed the spike into the dirt and Layoodi pulls his sword from his side (every Maasai carries one, seemingly at all times, but it looks more like a machete) and begins carving up the ribs for us to eat. Moments later another man emerges with a goat’s leg…these are moments that are hard to describe. It was at this point that it all seemed to hit Tanner and me at the same time. We sort of looked at each other, heads nodding, acknowledging what a special moment and day that was.

After we wiped our hands with the leaves that served as our ‘napkin’ and ‘plate,’ we returned to enter one of the huts once more to try some of the local brew, made from aloe root, sugar and some other things I’m not sure of. Though we were warned of its potency, it crept up on us rather more quickly than expected. It was then when we realized, or rather, we were informed that we didn’t bring a goat for the ‘master of ceremonies’ and that that was an issue. No longer sober, we were soon ill at ease. Traditionally, as it turns out, people bring a gift; however, because we were not informed before hand, we were eventually let off the hook. It was sort of tense for a while though.

You know how sometimes you hear a story and it’s so ridiculous you think the story teller must be adding details? Well, on our way back to the camp, we took a Land Rover. On the way, Tanner and I were discussing how there really wasn’t anything else that could happen to make the day more ridiculous…then the car broke down. However, in congruence with the vast amount of luck we had been having, the only other car out this far in Maasai Land, the mobile clinic, rumbled around the corner up ahead to come to our rescue. I know all of this sounds ridiculous, but—well, I guess there are no ‘buts.’ It is ridiculous.

The next day would be much of the same, but in a more tame fashion. We would go with the mobile clinic to the farthest village it services. It was an interesting journey because we weren’t using roads and got to speak with the nurse and driver about the clinic. Our major concern this day was the weather. It was drizzling on our way out there. We were going out to the far reaches of this area to trek to a viewing point that over looked Natron Lake, in Tanzania. A stone’s throw away from the boarder—literally—we sat on a hilltop waiting for the weather to clear up. Eventually it did and we had an amazing view into Tanzania. It was the type of view they put on postcards or desktop backgrounds. We sat with Layoodi, making tea and joking around for a few hours before we went to visit the village.

On our last full day, we woke up early and went to spend time with Layoodi’s family in his village. After a small trek, we arrived to find his father wasn’t there, so we sat in his parents hut, drinking tea with his mom. When his father arrived, we were eager to speak with him, as he is an incredibly important figure in the community. In fact, he is rather important for the history of the Maasai, so we were eager to pick his brain and hear his story, which is why it was partly disappointing and partly hysterical when he showed up drunk off his face. Recently, a major ceremony that only happens every twenty years occurred. Since then, there have been a number of fallout ceremonies, and being a very important elder, he is often the ‘master of ceremonies’ and is called upon to bless things. Part of being an elder, however, is that at these ceremonies the elders often get pretty drunk. Regardless, it was a lot of fun. After doing our best to communicate and hear some of his life story, he busted out his shield and showed us some battle and fighting tactics, told us some fighting and hunting stories and his scars from actual battles. We then walked around his village, talking about the introduction of farming (It was only introduced to the Maasai nine years about by Layoodi’s father. Up until then, the Maasai diet was essentially only meat, dairy and blood from animals and farming was sort of blasphemy) and meeting people. We met a man named ‘White Lion’ who was named as such because he killed a white lion. It was nice spending time with Layoodi’s family and getting more insight into the Maasai society and history.

Later that afternoon, walking back to the camp with dinner (the goat), we ran into the warriors we were trying to get to come help us with cooking the goat in the traditional fashion. They were just sitting in a field waiting. We walked with them to the camp and then the festivities began. We took the goat below a tree in a field very near the camp. There we got to see some very intimate Maasai traditions. For one, they litterall drank the blood from the goat out of a cut they made along its neck. They took turns drinking as much as they could. You might think that they were putting on a show for us, but you’d be wrong. We were just going to help slaughter the goat, but they insisted that we would waste precious blood that they ‘needed.’ It is apparently one of the main reasons they agreed to join us. Later, they made a soup out of boiled organs and fat, blood and herbs. It actually tasted rather nice. It was certainly better than tasting lung. They also gave us goat neck or throat. That wasn’t so bad. This definitely goes up there on my list of peculiar things I’ve eaten.

The meat was done up just as it was in the village ceremony. It was put on wooden stakes next to a fire to cook for a while. We all sat around the fire while they sang, jumped and danced in their traditional style—waiting for the food to cook. Sitting around the fire, passing meat around, it occurred to me that is Becca and her husband Hennie hadn’t showed up with a salad and potatoes. One of the best parts of the whole thing was how utterly amazed, more like disgusted, the Massai warriors were with our eating ‘goat food’ and ‘white rocks.’ Never had they seen people eat salad or potatoes! How bizarre is that. Incredibly reluctantly they tried them both and immediately spat it out. It was quite an interesting contrast, us being amazed that these warriors would stick their faces inside a freshly dead animal to drink its blood and they seemed to be equally amazed that we were eating goat food.

This was an amazing experience. In those few days we learned so much about the Maasai culture and Kenya in general. The traditions in this culture are intricate and intimidating. Here’s a big one: when the men get circumcised, while stone cold sober, they can’t even flinch or they shame themselves and their family for the rest of their lives. Another random one: when you are not circumcised, you have to greet those who are by lowering your head for the circumcised person to touch with their hand. It was sort of weird when boys that were bigger than I am were lowering their head for me to great them.

Even though it was a relatively short period of time, it was a lasting experience. It was amazing getting to know the volunteers as well as some of the Maasai. It was a true adventure. We were out in the ‘boons’ where, according to the volunteers and judging by the reactions of the locals (including the children who ran away from us because they were terrified), only but a few Mazungu (white people) have ventured. All told, it was a great leap of faith and turned out to be a great choice. Luck seemed to be with us until the end, even when we braved the soggy trip back in a 4WD two car convoy through the rain soaked terrain. Somehow we didn’t get stuck. Arriving back to Narok with the Maasai walking sticks (Emudi) we’d been given by Layoodi, Tanner and I were all the more ready to tackle this African journey.

Sorry for the brevity….

No Baksheesh!

2010-05-02T07:37:00.000-07:00

I woke up to a lot of yelling. It was pretty clear that there was a bad situation occurring on outside my door, involving either the police or security and two of the six people I was crashing with (which was also worrisome because we were not really supposed to be there), but I was running on one hour of sleep and couldn’t really be bothered to wake up and deal with it, so I decided to wait until the morning and find out what went on then. Turns out that the girl I was going to be traveling with for the rest of Egypt almost got arrested for skinny dipping in a Muslim country. Hearing this hysterical and offensive (because its not really cool what she did) story, I was thinking to myself, ‘Am I really going to go traveling Egypt with a girl who nearly gets arrested for getting naked in a Muslim country and a dude who was held in prison in Jordan for trying to take pictures of Iraq?’ In the end, the answer was yes.

I had a great last few days in Dahab, minus fighting with Mr. Samir about payments. Man, that dude was awful. He ran Seven Heaven, the hotel/hostel/dive center I was staying in and he goes back on every single deal he makes and tries his best to screw every person/customer/employee over. Aside from that, it was a great last few days. We went up in to the mountains and had a night around a fire with Bedouins, music and good company. It was really one of those travel moments that you hope to hold onto forever. A friend of ours got up and did her belly dance routine to the live music of the Bedouins and guitar playing of another friend. We all sat around in circle in the desert, drinking and being merry and enjoying every minute of it. This among many other great moments was why leaving Dahab was so hard.

I left Dahab with a few friends to go on one last diving excursion to the south, in Sharm El Sheik. Finally I was a customer again and with three other Dive Masters, so we were with a solid group of divers. We hopped in this boat as the only divers, which is a rarity—and amazing. Two beautiful, long and secluded dives and then an attempted night out in Sharm, that resulted in a near arrest (of my friend, NOT ME) and it was off to the rest of Egypt. It was really hard leaving everyone, but it was a good send off.

Next, it was a 16 hour haul to Luxor on a ‘local’ bus. I guess I’ve gotten used to these rough trips because it wasn’t all that bad. It allowed me to finally finish my book (I think that everyone should read it if you haven’t already. Its called Shantaram. It’s an international best seller, so I’m not the only one who loves it, and its truly an amazing book) and catch up on some much needed sleep. Luxor itself isn’t such an impressive city. However, a walk through the local market and you feel like you are transported back to the Middle Ages—meat hanging everywhere, hawkers selling everything from silver to spices, dirt or cobble stone paths no wider than a car. I love things like that. When we found it, it was clear that we weren’t really supposed to be there. It wasn’t really a market for foreigners.

The First day there we went to the Karnak Temple complex and the Luxor Temple. They were my first encounter with the ancient ruins of Egypt and they didn’t disappoint. Luxor temple is right in the middle of the city, literally, and just off of the Nile. It was impressive and beautiful, but it was Karnak that really makes you sit down for a break to say ‘wow.’ Ramses II (1391-1351 BC) began building Karnak, though I'm not sure if he got to see it finished, and it is now the second most visited site in all of Egypt, next to the Pyramids at Giza. It is a massive structure, with an imposing hall of pillars that still have their many thousand year old paint on them, and dawns impressive obelisques all over the place. Every inch is incredibly detailed with hieroglyphics and other images representing all sorts of things. It is scary and exciting walking through history like that; my imagination sort of goes on overload. On the side of the complex, there is a sacred lake that is lined with large stones, designed to make it look sacred and important….so my buddy decided to have a swim…no I did not join him. Surprisingly it didn’t really stir up any fuss, so he congratulated himself on swimming in a 3-4 thousand year old sacred lake and we moved on. I didn’t want to leave to complex. It was like nothing I’d ever seen. I knew that I would be seeing more, much more, like it as I moved around Egypt, but it was so moving.

That afternoon we took a felucca (type of traditional wooden small sail boat used on the Nile) up the Nile to an island and then watched the sunset in the felucca on the Nile. The island was fun. We walked around for a while, helped some kids use a type of water well as a merry-go-round (we were the engine) and ate a bunch of bananas. The sunset on the Nile was really the ‘thing to write home about.’ It was also like being shot back in time. You are sitting there on this old wooden sailboat, on one of the most famous rivers in the world, watching the sun go down as other boats are off in the distance, making it look like some old port with all the masts and sails jetting up into the air. There are farmers and animals lining the river on one side and the up-and-coming city of Luxor on the other…wow.

That was merely the first day of traveling ‘real’ Egypt. The next day we visited the Valley of the Kings, the Tombs of the Nobles and a few other tombs. If I went of describing everything it would get quite dull and boring and LONG, I’m assuming. However, there is a bit of a story in my trip to the Valley of the Kings. Deep inside one of the tombs tucked higher in the valley than the others, my friend and I were the only two in the tomb. Now, these tombs are not small, and this one in particular is quite a hike once you get inside. They are hot and eerie inside and get your imagination going. Anyway, I am inside the burial chamber with my friend when suddenly, the lights go off. We are standing there, in the burial chamber of a once pharaoh, deep inside a mountain, with NO LIGHTS. Well, there were a few minutes of fumbling around before one of the ‘curators’ came in with a flashlight to help us find out way out, but there was a moment there when I thought some bad thoughts, especially because I took an ‘illegal’ video a few minutes earlier from within the tomb. Scary business.

Aside from that little scare, the tombs were fascinating. It felt a bit wrong being inside a tomb that was meant for someone’s burial, for their journey to the afterlife and their return from the afterlife, but it wasn’t enough to keep me from paying some baksheesh to one of the curators of a tomb to take me into one of the closed parts of the tomb. These tombs are impossibly decorated from floor to ceiling (well, the floor isn’t really decorated, but everything else is) with detail that is unreal. It is truly beautiful. I wish I understood more of what was written inside. I know that much of the decoration is from out of certain afterlife books that they had, and things of that nature. We would often stand near tours and read from our Lonely Planet after every tomb to get the gist of what was going on, but still, it’s not as much information as I would like. Maybe I will become an Egyptologist…not really, but still. It was a good day. Plus, we were able to get everything for half price because of our fake student IDs that we had made the day before. After an impromptu photo shoot with the very weird dudes at the passport photo place (they made us pose for them in hysterically odd ways), we took those photos to some little shop that made us fake student IDs. It’s a great way to save money because you have to pay at every site.

OH! I got to see Tutankhamen’s mummy and his tomb! Sick…

After Luxor, we took the train down to Aswan. Aswan is a smaller sort of town that is a nice place to stay before making a day trip down to Abu Simbel. Our stay in Aswan was uneventful, I guess. One of the days we took a ferry out to ‘Elephantine’ island and spent a lazy day walking among ruins and swimming in the Nile. I SWAM IN THE NILE! I didn’t even get a disease…I think. One of the guys with us drank from it, but he is from Mexico, so his stomach is ‘special.’ Abu Simbel really lived up to its marker as one of the most, if not the most, impressive sites in Egypt. The only thing that almost ruined it for me was that UNESCO and Egypt had it moved so that they could have the biggest artificial lake in the world. All they did was move it up the bank, but it still feels like cheating. Either way, the site was still fascinating. Built into the side of a hill, two massive renderings of Ramses II sit on each side of a door, welcoming you into one of the ‘Nubian Monuments’ that reside next to Lake Nasser. The ‘Temple of Ramsses, Beloved by Amun,’ as the temple is known, was started in around 1244 BC and seen by me in 2010. How cool is that? I know that all of the sites are like that, but still….Anyway, the other temple in the Nubian area, or southern Egypt, was made for Nefertari, the wife of Ramsses II, and it is also very impressive. It was a long day of travel, with a few let downs (such as going to see the dam and the ‘unfinished obelisque’), but Abu Simbel was really worth going to the southern tip of Egypt.

After Abu Simbol, we got back to Aswan to take the night train up to Cairo. In Cairo, I did the normal Cairo things. The group of three became two (Maria went back to Dahab) and then became three again bc Leo’s cousin showed up. I walked around Cairo on my own one day for something like four hours, getting lost in its massive sprawl. The city changes so much from neighborhood to neighborhood. One day we spent in the Egyptian Museum, which is where some of the treasures and mummies (I saw around 20) that are no longer in the tombs reside. Then it was the big Pyramids day. It was so amazing I don’t really know what to say. We went first to Dahshur. There are three pyramids there, but you really only visit one. Its called the Red Pyramid. We went inside. It was a long and tight walk down a corridor that was steep, with a very low roof, so you had to walk crouched. Inside it was dark and smelt of ammonia. It was freaking amazing. Next we went to Memphis, which was at one point the capital of Egypt. Then we went to Sakkara, which is where the ‘Step Pyramid’ is—the oldest complete hewn-stone building in history. From here you can also see THIRTEEN pyramids. It is a pretty amazing site. Last, we finally made it to the Pyramids at Giza. There is nothing like standing at the base of one of these things. We stayed there until the guards kicked us out because I didn’t want to leave.

After Cairo, I went to see and sleep in the White and Black desert. It was a quick side adventure, but it was fun all the same. Sleeping in the desert is something special. Now its off to Kenya to meet Tanner. Can’t believe that is happening already.

Egypt was a good experience, in general. People hassle you everywhere, but I had some good practice with that in India and parts of Southeast Asia, so it wasn’t anything I couldn’t deal with. Things like that just prevent you from actually getting to know many locals, which is disappointing. Outside of Dahab I didn’t make any local friends. The only thing that was really tough, much more so than everyone trying their best to rip you off, was traveling with a girl and having to see what they go through. It seems difficult being a western girl (I’m being specific about that bc I don’t really know what it would be like for an Egyptian lady) in Egypt. Even when I was pretending to be my friend’s husband, fake wedding band and all, she got harassed (i.e. gawked at, groped and verbally harassed) everywhere we went. I can’t really imagine what that would be like. Leo, the other guy traveling with us, and I had to block and ‘run interference’ so many times it was infuriating. It’s really too bad. It really wasn’t something I expected.

This might sounds a bit negative. I’m sorry for that. I really did enjoy Egypt; otherwise I wouldn’t have stayed here so long. Two months…that’s a long time. I love the people I met and the history I finally got to see. There is nothing like seeing 4, 5, 6 thousand year old temples and ruins, and real actually mummies that are (almost) JUST AS OLD. I’ve wanted to see many of these things most of my short life and I finally got to see them. I wasn’t disappointed—at all. It was crazy walking around in a country where, for the most part, women everywhere wear burkas, or have their hair covered at the very least. I don’t think there is a single Egyptian man who doesn’t smoke. You hear the five daily calls to prayer every day, no matter where you are. It seems like there is always someone on a loudspeaker talking about something. All around you there is a clash between ancient history, the third world and the developing/developed world. It is a very unique place and I am glad that I came.

How’s that for a long and detailed post!? That should generate some comments, no? Hope everyone all is well back home. Thanks for reading.

Kolo Tamam (all good/okay)

2010-04-16T03:11:00.000-07:00

“Help! Help! I lost my buddy!” Jenny came running into the diver center yelling and holding her arm, panic stricken and seemingly in great pain. Jenny was a DMT (Dive Master Trainee) and had left the dive shop unbeknownst to me a little before I arrived. That was quite a long day.

The culmination of my Rescue Diver course was a mess of a day—everyone pretending to drop dead all over the place, choking, bleeding and so on. After dealing with Jenny’s pretend injuries, I organized a rescue team and headed out to find the ‘unconscious’ diver, surface him and bring him to shore. It was a pretty involved process. After the rescue course, you really do feel like a much better diver. So far, it’s been the most fun course I’ve taken part in. Luckily you do learn a lot because only a few weeks later, we actually lost a diver on a night dive and had to go through the whole process. It turns out that the diver surfaced after one minute because he lost his ‘buddy’ (that IS the proper procedure, actually) and proceeded to the entry point. The only issue was that the entry point was different than the exit, so it took us a bit to figure out what actually happened. It was an interesting way to start as a Dive Master Trainee.

I’ve not posted an update in a long time and I feel bad about that. Basically, I have actually been rather busy studying for this Dive Master course. I showed up here in Dahab, Egypt planning on diving a little, but didn’t really plan on staying here as long as I have. The Diver Master course, however, was incredibly alluring and there was a solid group of people already working on theirs, so I decided to stay.

Dahab is a blast. It is a different sort of place. Most people who come here didn’t plan on staying as long as they have. It has a certain appeal that keeps you here. My life consists of waking up in the morning, wondering down to the dive shop and waiting to get on a dive. I’ve been diving pretty much every single day since I have been here and have really fallen in love with it. With the Dive Master course, I can jump on almost any dive if there is space, and now that I am done with the course, I actually lead dives. I’ve lead dives in some of the most famous dive spots in the Red Sea, which are some of the best dive sites in the world. I don’t really know how I could go about describing the dive sites. I don’t really have the writing skills to do so, so I’ll just say that it really is everything I hoped it would be.

Aside from the dive sites around Dahab, I went to a wreck dive called Thistlegorm. It was a three dive trip to allegedly one of the world’s top two wreck dives. There really isn’t much to say about that dive, other than to say that dives like that are why you dive. You drop down on this massive World War I ship at about 30M. It is full with all sorts of cargo, such as train cars, trucks with motorbikes still in their truck beds, all sorts of weapons and so on. Unbelievable. I was in a group of all Dive Maters and Instructors, so it was a long and comfortable dive. It was unreal. At one point we even lost the instructor leading the dive because the ship is rather massive and it was sort of a mess (as in there were divers everywhere and the ship was sort of confusing to navigate), but it really wasn’t a big deal because we had a whole group of experienced divers, so we just continued the dive and met up with him later. Swimming around a 70-ish year-old war ship, bombed from the air, just rusting away underwater with all of its cargo was pretty surreal.

I don’t really do much else than dive. When I first arrived here, there was a larger DMT crew, so basically we would dive together in the day and go to one of the few places in town at night. Essentially, it’s always someone’s birthday or last day here, so there are a lot of impromptu celebrations. It is a good place to make friends, even though people are always coming and going. It’s weird having been here so long. The restaurant people don’t bother me as I walk by anymore, people don’t try and sell me things all of the time, and I’m a regular at a ‘meat pie’ shop. It’s a nice gig. When you first show up, you really notice the bonds that everyone has formed and wonder if you are going to be forming similar ones as your time goes on here. Then, you look down the table at dinner a month later and realize that YOU are the “old timer/long stayer” welcoming new people to this little town. Soon it will be my turn to take off and leave this place. I have to say, I am pretty ready to see the rest of Egypt. This town, and this dive shop in particular, is rife with messy politics and sketchy operating procedures. So, even though I have loved my time here and the people I've met, it’s really time to take off.

Other notables:

*I have somewhere around 100 dives now.

*I finished my snorkel test (it’s the last thing you do when you finish your Dive Master course. You have to drink a vile alcoholic concoction that everyone helps to make, which is about a litre of liquid, through a snorkel while you have a scuba mask on) in one breath!

*I spent an overnight at Ras Aboogaloom (sp?), which was this little nomad camp. We took a camel to carry all our food and gear (e.g. snorkel gear, alcohol, musical instruments) and spent the night in the desert around a camp fire in the middle of nowhere, right on the Red Sea.

*I played my ukulele in front of a whole crown of people for the first time…I was not sober

*I am now a Dive Master, a Rescue Diver, and will probably have my Nitrox certification and possibly some others before I leave.

*I have more than three T-shirts now.

*I spent a night in the desert mountains.

*I stayed in this one little town for longer (much much longer) than any other place thus far on my trip. So long, actually, that I had to go to waste a day (12 hours of travel and embassy logistics) getting my visa renewed.

*I witnessed a naked dive, finally saw a Spanish Dancer and passed a physics test in one try!

*I helped teach a bunch of local children how to play Frisbee.

*I’VE FINALLY UPDATED MY BLOG!

Hope all is well at home. Thanks for reading. Stay in touch.

UPDATE TO COME SOON!

2010-04-11T06:11:00.003-07:00

Sorry i havent updated for a long time. ive been in this town called dahab for a long time working on my Dive Master and possibly getting an Assistant Instructor and Nitrox cert. i will update this week.

hope all is well

Habibi! Habibi!

2010-03-05T06:44:00.000-08:00

Upon leaving the plane in Amman, Jordan, I realized that I had done no relevant research for the place—as in where to stay, how to get from the airport to the city center and other things of that nature. After all this time on the road, I totally flaked. So, I sat in the airport baggage claim and searched through the Lonely Planets on my computer (thank you, Matt) for a while before heading out into the unknown—well, slightly known after my computer session, but still not really.

It was night when I arrived. I went out for a few drinks with some randoms before heading to bed. I proceeded to spend the the next few days in bed trying to get healthy. I had a cough for nearly three weeks (still working on it) because I hadn't started taking antibiotics yet. I was planning on saving the antibiotics that the doctor gave me in England in case of a REAL illness later in the trip, but plans don't always work out.

On day three, hacking up a lung, I woke up and headed to the citadel in Amman (previously known as Philadelphia, interestingly enough), so as not to wake everyone in the hostel. Jabal al-Qal'a was located on a mesa type hill in downtown Amman and provided an amazing view of the areas below (e.g. the Roman Theater). Amman isn’t an aesthetically beautiful place, per se, but its interesting nonetheless, with its busy streets and colorful alleyways. The five daily prayers echo off the surrounding area, which is littered with an endless supply of houses, the exact same desert color and all seemingly connected. Atop the citadel area, the echo of the 'call to prayer' makes for a beautifully serene experience, while standing amongst ancient ruins. I tried to take a video, but I dont think it will do the experience justice. It rarely does. This was not only a interesting site because of the setting, its also amazing because there is archeological evidence that the sight is one of the longest continuously inhabited places on earth, it was inhabited in the Neolithic period (which is something like 9,000-ish BC—a.k.a. really really really OLD) and fortified during the Bronze Age (1800 BC), and I got to see some of the Dead Sea Scrolls!

Later, while relaxing in my 'dorm,' a new person entered and introduced himself. Logan was his name. It was clear right away that he was North American, so I inquired whether he was American or Canadian. Usually, Canadians get pissed if you ask if they are American, but Americans don't seem to mind if you ask if they are Canadian. Its rather funny, I think. Anyway, he was from Seattle and had just arrived in Jordan under interesting circumstances. The vague nature through which he was answering questions, naturally, lead to more questions, until I found out that he was a 'war tourist' and had just spent the last thirty days in a prison in Iraq. For those of you who worry about me, just know that there are people far more reckless and idiotic out there traveling than I. This might have been one of the most interesting, albeit insane, people I've met thus far. Basically, this dude went to Kirghizstan and made his way into Iraq and one of the most dangerous cities on earth —not to help—just to observe. Not a journalist. Not a writer. Not a doctor. Just a nut. He was quickly picked up, beaten and imprisoned with his translator (who was some poor kid he was paying peanuts) and another random traveler. His translator got the worst of the beatings, which is incredibly sad. Poor kid. As for the 'war tourist', he spent his time in prison learning Arabic and making friends. Allegedly, he even got the phone number of the guy who threw a shoe at GW a while back. He was full of bizarre stories like that. This dude tried to follow me down to Petra, but I avoided that bullet by getting up unreasonably early to leave. He wasn't exactly the sort of guy you want as a travel partner. Good for a story, but that's where I checked out.

I've wanted to see Petra all my life, well, at least since I saw the Indiana Jones movie that uses the sandstone wonder as a gateway to the Holy Grail. Built in the first century BC into hidden cliffs, the 'Treasury' (i.e. the structure seen in Indiana Jones) , renders you awestruck. Its like wandering up on an ancient hidden treasure. You have to walk through a tunnel like corridor to reach it, an enormous tomb that looks like the front of an ancient Roman building cut into a red cliff face, 40 m high and 30 m wide. However, the best part is that Petra is actually an entire town/city, complete with everything from tombs to a theater (built in the 1st century AD and could seat 7,000 people) carved into sandstone cliffs. It was amazing. The 'rose-red city' was like nothing I could have imagined. I didn't want to leave. I spent something like eight hours there, wandering around and could have spent more. There are actually Bedouin people that still live in the 'city' of Petra, but it is a very protected and controlled thing. I would have set up a tent in there and stayed with them, but I'm not interested in spending time in jail, plus I'm not so sure I'd be welcome.

After a few days in Petra, where I had to inform some Jordanian guys of the English names for certain body parts, and endure some passive aggressive anti-American hostility from the hostel owner's husband, I got on the public bus to Aqaba. A sort of beachy vacation spot that is meant to rival Elat in Israel, there isn't all that much going on. There were a few sights and ancient ruins, but mostly it was a place for me to get a ferry to Egypt. I was stuck there a few days because of the weather, but it wasn't a terrible place to be stuck. After the weather changed and the ferry boats were allowed to leave, I hopped on a boat to Newieba, Egypt. The trip was mild. I only have to fight through lines to get stamps and a ticket for the boat for a few hours. Some people said it would take 3-4 and that the boat would take a lot longer than it did. The only really concerning part of the experience is when the fire alarm went off just as we started out trip on this ferry and we were forced to put on life vests and congregate in a particular area of the boat. Ultimately, we just looked silly and everything was fine. From Newieba I took a bus with someone I met on the bus to Dahab where I am thinking of staying a considerable amount of time. I would like to take my Emergency First Presence dive course, my Rescue Diver course and possibly continue on to get my Master Diver certification. It will take around a month and a half. I probably won't have that many interesting stories for a while because I will be stagnant in one town for considerably more than I have been so far on my trip. For some reason that feels weird now, but it is a beautiful place, right on the Red Sea with an amazing mountainous backdrop and the people here are seemingly awesome. Should be a fun time.

Lion's Milk (a.k.a. Raki= 45 % alcohol) and The Crowned Lion

2010-02-20T05:37:00.000-08:00

Well, another day another country. I get off the plane in Istanbul and find my way to the hostel via public transportation. On my way to the hostel, I sat down on a bench in a park (on my right is the enormous Blue Most and my left is the elegant and imposing Hagia Sophia) and let it all sink in before heading to the hostel. It was cold outside, but the sun was coming up and it was sunny and relatively nice. When i got to the hostel, I sat down on the bed.... and proceeded to passed out until the next day...only to wake up to over a week of shitty weather (I.e. rain and snow). Bad move.

Turkey has been rather uneventful, with the exception of one big night. When I showed up at my hostel in Sultanahmet (the old city), there were literally no other people staying in the dorms. This stayed the same the first three days I stayed in Istanbul. It wasn't until my last day in Istanbul that people showed up and I had “meal buddies.” The worst part of traveling alone are the meals you eat alone when you string a few days together by yourself. Istanbul truly is a beautiful city, however. Its been named the European Culture Capital 2010, and you can really tell wondering around its cobble stone street and bustling markets. Once the capital of the Roman Empire (Constantinople), the center of the known universe and a gateway between Asia, Europe and Africa, this place has a lot of culture to offer. I liked Istanbul mostly because after five months in Asia, I really started to miss it, but in Istanbul you can walk to Asia any time you want. There is a bridge in Istanbul where you can stand on both Asia and Europe at the same time. How cool is that? Anyway, I ate plenty of kabobs and tried my hand at the “lion's milk.” Wow that is a strong drink. Nothing really exciting.

Upon leaving Istanbul, I met some kids who said that their hostel was a “party hostel”...sweet. Next time, I guess. Anyway, we had all hear about this place in central Turkey called Cappadocia and decided to take the overnight bus there. It was even colder (!) in Goreme (Cappadocia). Already covered in white, it was snowing my entire time there, though it was a very interesting place. It was littered with these rock towers jetting out from the ground, the product of erosion delayed by volcanic ash. They were quite phallic, and om not just being a perv! The guide we had on one of our tours told us that they called one of the valleys the 'love valley' because of the appearance of the rock formations. How funny is that! Anyway, while the valley erodes at a relatively even level, the erosion of these towers is slowed by deposits of volcanic ash...apparently. The people of this area, Christians actually, build churches, pigeon sanctuaries/nests and houses into these pillars, or “fairy chimneys.” There was also an underground city (actually there is a netword of several underground cities, but we only had time for one), far more impressive an the Cu Chi tunnels in Vietnam. The network of the underground city is difficult to actually wrap ones mind around. They connect villages and cities great lengths apart. These cities offer a fully sustainable way of life, complete with their own wineries, and dive eight or more levels below the surface. Used to hide from and defend against the Ottomans, Byzantine, Romans and many other waring groups, these underground cities were impressive.

Later I would head to a town called Selcuk, where the ancient ruins of Ephesus lay. Spent a few days round there, taking day trips and exploring around. Other than wondering around incredible ancient ruins and the calcium formations of Pamukkale, I had an interesting night out in Selcuk with a crew or 40+ year old Turkish dudes. They showed up to this bar with two or three bottles of Jim Bean (that later turned into five or six) and slammed them on the table. The barman didn' even flinch and offered then mixers. It was a weird night dotted with undercover police, fights, lentil soup and a really old and fat Turkish dude who was really into prosties. I recommend going out on a big night with some Turkish dudes one time in your life...weird things happen.

Turkey really wasnt all that eventful. It was a beautiful country, both architecturally and naturally. The history was astounding. It was quite a serious transition from the rest of my trip. I was glad that I made it my transition country though.

I've been having a hard time writing this blog because it seems I am in a little bit of a funk. I got rather sick in England and am having a hard time with making this transition in my trip. Its been a long way and I have a long way to go and its difficult for me to wrap my mind around sometimes. My side trip to England was good for my mental health though, even though my physical health sort of deteriorated. I spent about a week visiting friends, both old and new, and doing very little sight seeing. I did, however, visit 'Portobello road, Portobello road, street where the riches of ages are stowed. Anything and everything a chap can unload, is sold off and borrowed in Portobello road. You'll find what you want in Portobello road.' It was nice having that time to sort of recharge and deal with the things I felt I needed to deal with. I know it probably sounds weird, me complaining like that, but I really did need to get my head right before heading back out again. I'm pretty sure I'm ready for the road ahead. I had a great time with friends in London. I got to introduce an old friend from high school to people I traveled with, which was funny because they know me from such different points in my life. Really the only thing in way of a 'story' that happened in London, though, occurred when I was leaving. I was given bad 'tube' directions to the airport (thanks, Bridie!) and had to figure that out, only to arrive at the airport and find out that United Airlines had ONCE AGAIN not actually issued me a ticket. This time it was a lot easier to work out than the time in Kathmandu, but STILL! Once again, thank you mom for beating into me the notion that I need to get to the airport unreasonably early. That has saved me twice now!

Hope all is well at home.

Vacation from My Vacation

2010-02-02T02:33:00.000-08:00

The half way point....weird. It seems to be going by so fast. I remember wondering what it would feel like at the half way point, this marking a major regional transition as well as chronological achievement in my trip and now I'm here.

My time in Indonesia has been quite a contrast to the rest of my trip. Its not exactly a hardcore backpacker scene, but its fun nonetheless. The Bali traveler scene is populated mostly by Australian vacationers. There are so many Ausies, in fact, that all the Indonesians in the Kuta/Legian area called me “mate” when I walk by. Weird, right? I sort of hated it. I stayed in a hostel initially to meet people, even though the hostel was really expensive and, as it turned out, had a serious case of bed bugs. I obviously didn't know this when I showed up. It took a few nights and a LOT of bites that lined my sides and chest for me to figure that one out. I changed beds a few times, but they sort of followed me. Eventually I had to bag up all my clothes and leave them in the hot sun for a few days as well as wash and dry them at extreme heat a few times to salvage them. The hostel ended up giving me and a few of the other kids, one who'd been bitten to a far greater extent than I, some private rooms in order to shut us up—basically. It was a good way to start making some new friends bc it gave us something to commiserate about, I guess. Now that I think about it, Bali was pretty rough on my health. Not only did I commence battle with a serious bout of bed bugs, I was also subject to “Bali belly” (Not nearly as bad as getting Delhi belly, which is typically a parasite. This was merely a bacteria, or so I think) for over a week, in addition to a cold and an ear infection. All told this month was tough on my health (brain cells included), but who lets that get in the way of a fun vacation? Not me.

One of the main reasons for me coming down to Indonesia was the scuba diving. I went diving the second day I was there, bed bugs, “Bali belly” and all, though I did throw up during and after one of the dives. That was an experience. Some of the diving was pretty average. I think part of it was, for most part, because I was diving with newbies. I am not an amazing diver (though I am an Advanced Open Water Diver now!), but some of the people who sign up for dives are extremely tough to dive with to say the least. So many of my dives were cut short because of people running out of air thirty minutes into the freaking dive—it drove me nuts. When we came up from our night dive at the US Liberty wreck at Tulamben, one of the kids looks at me and said, “You look bored down there.” I wanted to yell at him 'No dude, its called conserving energy! That's why you ran out of air thirty minutes into the dive and had to fucking use the dive masters air because he didnt want to cut the dive short on your behalf!' Over some drinks later that might the dive master told me he felt pretty bad for me that day. These kids would run out of air and I'd have like 150 PSI left. It was an amazing dive nonetheless and my first wreck dive. Freaking phenomenal, especially when you do it at night. A friend who recommended it to me said it felt like you were an explorer making a groundbreaking discovery when Tulamben was dove at night, and I have to agree. Even though its the most frequented site in Indonesia, at least I think it is, when you dive it at night you really do feel like you've stumbled upon this great find that no one has ever seen before. Its really a breathtaking site full with a diverse array of fish, big and small, as well as the excitement of an old rusty war ship. I dove in the Gilis as well, but once again my dive was cut short when a friend of mine forced the group to come up when he was left with 20 PSI...i had 120....damn. It was a nice dive as well. Also a wreck dive, Bounty—as its called—is an old military dock that fell off an American ship at some point. It wasn't until I went to Nusa Longbongan that I got paired with some real top class divers. This time I felt like a newbie, though I did fine if I must say so myself. From the moment we exited the boat, I could tell I was with the right crowd. Everyone was just bobbing in the water, calmly getting their gear in order, spitting in their goggles, checking things and relaxing before the dive. It turns out that the ensuing dives would easily be the best dives I've ever been apart of, so you can imagine how stoked I was that I was with experienced divers and didn't have to cut the dive short. The first of the two dives was a drift dive, and if I've done a drift dive before it was nothing compared to this. It was like being in a car, watching the reef pass by at a serious clip. It was AWESOME. Ive never seen coral so colorful and vibrant, not to mention it was like swimming in a fishbowl—no exaggeration. I'm so glad I came down to Indonesia for just that day. Seriously.

I did do other things when I was down there. If I hadn't I would be pretty broke by now. Turns out diving is not a cheap hobby. Who knew? After a long week in Legian, which is right next to Kuta (both are on the island Bali), trying to get over the “Bali belly” and bed bugs, I decided to head out to the famed Gili islands (as mentioned before) with some friends. It was a seriously long journey. A journy that was supposed to take a mere 8 hours turned into a dangerous 14, in which a lady allegedly died while trying to get out to the islands bc the weather was so treacherous. When we finally got to the last dock on Lombok that was supposed to be our launching point to Gili Trawangan, our final destination, we arrived to find our boat sunk and forty villagers trying to drag it to shore and another quickly sinking out at sea. After some laboring, we convinced the Indonesian guy, who drove us the hour and a half from where the ferry dropped us off on southern Lombok to this point, to find another way for us to get out to Gili that night. After driving us down some eerie dirt roads, we finally found a boat, piled on and made it to our destination. The arduous adventure was soon forgotten because of how incredible Gili T was. It had everything you would want on this tiny little island and it even lacked the things that you would want there. There were no motorbikes, only “push bikes” and horse (more like donkeys or mules) drawn carriages. The food was amazing a cheap. There were big parties thrown every other night. There were quite beaches to relax on. The snorkeling was amazing, not to mention the diving. There were no police and so...well you can imagine the rest. There was even an abandoned restaurant for those who are interested in scary stories. A few years earlier, at the secluded 'sunset point', a man died at his restaurant on opening night. It was abandoned as a sort of memorial. We made a little excursion out there one afternoon and spent something like four hours there...its a long story. Gili was a great place. What started as a small crew of almost strangers when we first arrived, but quickly turned into a large group of solid friends by the time we left. Needles to say, when I left, I took the fast boat back.

Once back on Bali, after a few nights of fun and saying goodbye to some friends, I headed out on a motorbike trip to check out some of the rest of Bali. As one might have been able to tell by this point, I love motorbike trips. This one didnt disappoint. In our attempt to find Ubud, we asked an Indonesian guy for directions, instead of merely informing us of the route, be drove us through the country side. We drove by some sort of ceremony or something, where ladies had all kinds of things on their heads, as well as a number of different temples. It would have been cool to stop, but it was sort of important to follow this guy. Ubud was nice, but nothing special. We did the normal tourist things there, such as visit the monkey forest. There were lots of monkeys....there we ran into some girls on a tour who let us follow their car to the rice terraces and then pointed us in the direction of the volcano. The volcano was a spectacular site, with a lake in its shadow. We went to the local hot spring, but it appeared more like we were intruding on bath and laundry time, so we hopped on our bikes and headed back to Ubud. We also went to a place called 'Dreamlands', which was a beautiful beach, with an awesome pool that we sort of snuck (or sneaked, if you like it better) into. There we met some Christian Evangelicals, which was interesting. They didn't seem to approve of our lifestyle. We were just swimming....i didn't get it. On our way back into town, i got pulled over for 'driving while being a tourist'...that sucked. Basically, this officer just starts yelling at me to come over to him, for no reason in particular, in an attempt to extort money from me. They do this to tourists quite often apparently, so i was relatively prepared. When he took me to the police station, i decided to play the role of pissed off tourist who was greatly inconvenienced by the officer, once he introduced me to his superior officer. Somehow this worked. They took my California drivers licence and told me it wasnt valid in Indonesia. It isnt, but I went into some tirade about how I went to the US embassy before I left home and 'they told me it was valid EVERYWHERE.' They asked me where i was staying, so I made up some story that I was following a friend to find a place to stay when the officer stopped me, and that bc I had lost him I didnt know where I was staying and had no way of finding him. They started to get really uncomfortable, thus, I avoided spending time in jail and/or paying a lot of money to get out of it. Dont know how that worked out, but I'm really glad it did.

Later I would head out to Nusa Longbongan, which is like a bigger Gili, with a few old friends (Simon and E)--only to run into another (Robin) by chance. There were beautiful beaches, incredible diving and a really angry Indonesian who accused me of being lazy and a girl (!) bc I didnt want to rent a motorbike from him. Interesting. I wish I had more time out there, but it was at the end of the time in Indonesia and I had to head back to Bali for my flight, which, as it turns out, I changed. I decided not to head to Germany. I might still make a trip to see some friends in London, but I figured I would just fly to Turkey instead.

Its weird trying to reflect on my past six months. I dont think I can legitimately do it yet. So much has happened that it almost seems as though it didnt even happen. I dont like that. Its going by so fast. It feels like just yesterday I was huddled in my tent in the snow with Matt and Flip at 5,000 M in Tibet. Didn't Tanner just take Matt and I to the airport? Onto the next one I guess. I do feel a desperate need to slow things down, but that's not really possible. Oh well. Now I'm in Turkey. Its cold—very cold. Its raining. Tomorrow it will be snowing. Its a beautiful city, Istanbul, domed mosques everywhere.

Hope all is well at home. I'm trying to upload some pics. Hope everyone enjoys them.

Been a While...

2010-01-08T01:45:00.000-08:00

There are many reasons I haven't updated in so long. One is that I havent really found time to sit down and write about my adventures in a long time. Once the stories start piling up on one another it becomes difficult to catch up, or to even want to catch up. The other is that I just couldn't figure out what to call this blog entry. I wanted to call it “A Nervous as a Long Tailed Cat in a Room Full of Rocking Chairs,” which is apparently southern saying (I have it on good authority from an English girl in Cambodia). And while is seemed like a perfectly clever saying at the time, it doesn't seem appropriate for my time in Cambodia. I also wanted to call the entry “ The Pursuit of Happiness” bc I've been listening to this awesome song lately, or “In My Head it Sounds Like OOOOOOoooooooooo,” but I figured since it had “Been A While” that this title might be most appropriate. Plus those other titles might seem rather obscure and throw people off. So, here we go....

How do I start talking about Cambodia. It is really a rather weird place. A mix of emotions. Here you have the most amazing temples I've ever seen in my whole life, coupled with a history that will make you cry like a baby. Then you head south to the secret (sort of) beaches that are not yet completely overrun by tourists. Damn tourists. We, I mean they (!), ruin everything. It was a good trip, and thats only part of it.

I first made my way to Siem Reap from Bangkok to see the Temples of Angkor. Though this was my second time, it was still mind blowing. These are things that you don't think exist. Its like finding yourself in the Jungle Book or something. I was wandering around looking for Mogley. It is truly amazing the things that our little world has to offer and the temples at Angkor are one of our little treasures. Sounds lame, I know, but whatever. Pretty neat stuff. Though in the past two years, it is clear that people are catching onto the wonders at Angkor, which makes it quite less of a personal or private experience with the temples, it was still worth the trip. This time it was nice to have more time to leisurely explore the area. The second day I was there, I rode a bicycle around the complex after seeing the sunrise at Angkor Wat, which turned out is something like a 35-40 K loop or something. I am NOT in shape and I was riding this one-speed bike with no freaking brakes around all day the farthest, BY FAR, I have ever ridden a bike. I am so proud of me. Yeah I said it. Whatever. It was nice to get to other, less popular temples, because there were fewer people there, which made the experience more enjoyable.

After a few days of wats, you sort of get wat'ed out, so I headed to Phenom Penh to meet up with my buddy Tom, whom I met in India. This is a pretty emotional city. With the Killing Fields and S-21 Prison (with only 7 survivors, its more like a concentration camp), serving as testament to the crimes of the Khmer Rouge and their genocide, I felt a weight on me during my time in Phenom Penh. After a period of time that felt like it was too long, I made my way south to Sihanoukville. This place had quite the reputation, however, a storm had taken the beach a few weeks before we got there and we were rather disappointed. Whilst talking about our disappointment in our guesthouse, we made friends with a group of kids who eventually turned and asked each other, “Should we tell him about paradise,” to which I interjected, “Yes! Please tell me about paradise!” Paradise was an island off of Kep, which was several hours drive from where we were. It was called Rabbit Island. We got a long boat out to this island the next day, which took quite a bit of effort on our part, and as we rounded the corner of the island, hoping that it wasn't going to be a disappointment, I opened my eyes to paradise. I guess that depends on what you are looking for, of course, but it was just what I needed at that point. We were something like an 30 min to an hour by boat to shore, and another 1-2 hours away from a bank, internet or anything that resembled modern society as we know it. On the island, there were roughly 5 restaurants, which were in the form of bamboo huts. In fact, the island was entirely populated by bamboo huts. During the day there might have been 30 tourists on the island and at night you might have seen 10-15 of them. There were approximately 4 hours when there was electricity and there was a hammock with my name on it. Those were some good days. If we didnt set an end date for leaving I don't think I would have ever left. There was this very odd older British dude that did that, bought a hut and only leaves to keep his finances in order. Not that he was someone I'd like to emulate, but I could see the appeal. Basically, my days were spent reading, playing chess, and enjoying life. The beach was pristine and the water warm (with fos fluorescence at night!). The people were nice and the food good (and cheap!). That was a hard place to leave. It was one of the few places on my trip that I didn't feel like I arrived several years late. It was almost like discovering something.

After paradise we headed to Battambang, a quaint little riverside town, actually Cambodia's second largest city, to explore the bamboo train, abandoned Pepsi plant and abundance of temples and French architecture (blah). It was a funny place. More than a week after those nice people told us about Rabbit Island (so generously) we ran into them in this sleepy little town. Its funny the travel trails you get on. It isnt that all uncommon for things like this to happen, except this route was particularly odd, so go figure. Battambang was great though. We rented motorbikes and drove around quite a bit. The abandoned Pepsi plant from the particularly cool. It was all burnt up and grimy. We suck in the back to check out the shut off bottling area. It was rather creepy. In the front there were thousands of old bottles with the classic label on them. It would have been cool to take one, but I'm not exactly going to travel around with an old Pepsi bottle in my backpack for the rest of my trip. It was abandoned in 1975, so it brandishes a very faded Pepsi logo on the front of the building. It was a very eerie place to be. After, we rode through the countryside, got lost, found where were were going again and kept moving. We drove through a village that made spring roll “papers” and had them out drying in the sun before arriving at a very large Buddha. It was a very pretty place. The second day we were on bikes we tried to find several different wats and a memorial, before heading to the bamboo train to get back to town. We had red dirt all over us bc the roads were a burnt red color, not to mention Tom took his first spill. So proud of him. Everyone has to fall once on a motorbike in Asia. Its just a rule. It was really late by the time we had a villager draw us a “ghetto” map that was supposed to help us get to the bamboo train. We were riding through the jungle, with a village here and there (filled apparently with ex Khmer Rough soldiers and officers), as the sun was coming down, trying our best to find this train. It was beautiful, watching the sun come down over jungle/rice fields....that was until we realized that we should do our best the get out of there before there was no sun anymore. Sadly we had to give up on finding the Bamboo train and head back to town. Sad. If we hadnt already bought a ticket to leave the next day I would have tried again, but that wasnt the case.

The next day we took easily the coolest boat trip I have ever taken in my life. It was from Battambang up to Siem Reap. I wanted to go back to Siem Reap because I had heard about this place called Koh Ker (pronounced Koh Kay—silly me) that is north of Siem Reap. This boat trip took us though canals that were barely wide enough for our boat to fit through. It was like nothing I'd ever seen. Trees jetting out of this lake that go on for what seems like forever into the distance. At times we would be confronted with fishing boats coming the other direction, which caused obvious issues. I dont really know how the person driving the boat navigated his way through that mess. It was amazing. From time to time (it was a LONG 8 hour boat trip) we would encounter a floating village and I'd find myself wondering how in the hell people actually lived out there. It was truly amazing. Whole villages—schools (they had floating playgrounds that were all fenced in so that they wouldn't lose kids or toys into the water), bars, alligator farms and everything—just floating in the middle of this vast expanse of water. It was a long day though. I got to teach some Cambodian kid ABCs, while baking in the sun on top of the boat. We werent very smart about being in the sun, which incidentally isn't good for you when you try and go out drinking later (sans kid/recent ABCs expert), incredibly dehydrated. When we finally arrived, I arranged to get up to Koh Ker (after hours of no one knowing where I was talking about bc I was saying it the wrong say) for the next day before we went out—hard. The next day we woke up at 6 or 7, after only a couple hours of sleep, to back 5 kids on a little taxi (one in the trunk) to drive the 3 hour dirt, pothole infested, hell-ride to Koh Ker. We were all struggling pretty hard. We had to stop the car a few times on the way. However, when we finally arrived, it was everything I had heard about and more. Koh Ker is an Angkorian site and one of the old capitals of the Khmer empire. In essence, it was like the temples outside Siem Reap (Angkor Wat, Angkor Tom and such), except there was no one there. We literally saw maybe ten tourists the whole day there, rather than the thousands wandering Angkor Wat and the surrounding temples. Really, the only down side is that you really cant stray from the paths because there are “Danger Mines” signs everywhere, and those are things you don't mess with. Apparently, much of the fighting when the Khmer Rouge were retreating, ended up in this area, where they have uncovered something like 2,000 mines and 1 millions exploded or unexploded ordnance as of 2008. Basically, you aren't supposed to wander off already trodden paths. Fun stuff. Things like that made it a much more authentic place though. It was truly amazing. Beautiful temples, engulfed in jungle and lost to the forest, that cost less than a day visit to Angkor Wat (and a night out drinking at Angkor What? for that matter), with no one around? Not a bad way to spend a day. It didn't take long to recover from a seemingly devastating hang over.

I felt like Koh Ker was the perfect climax to Cambodia, and decided to leave on that note. Tom and I parted ways with our new found friends and headed south the Koh Chang for a few days on the beach before Tom headed home and I headed to Hong Kong for the holidays. Nothing really important happened here, well, except a story that would probably embarrass Tom and a fight I had with a bush in my attempt to find my beach hut. I still have a scar on my arm from that. After a few days of chilling out on this beautiful mellow island, it was off to Bangkok. It took us 12 hours or something for what should have been a 4 hour bus! Shitty. It was okay though bc I was there in time for some food (i.e. we ate some scorpion and other weird bugs as a celebratory send off thing), some drink (yes, I went to the airport to sleep, drunk, which actually made sleeping on the tile easier), and to run into our friends from Cambodia completely randomly before heading to the airport. It was a great send off. It was sad to leave Tom. We grew rather close over our month together. That's a hard thing about travel. You meet people and get so close in such a short period of time, only to head in different directions eventually. Such is life, I guess. I've always wanted to write that!

I know that there is a strong lack of detail, but it was a while ago now and its difficult to decipher what sort of details are important now.

As for Hong Kong—what a zoo. It was nice having an actual Christmas. When my best friend from high school emailed me and said I better not spend the holidays in some hostel and to get up to HK for Christmas, at least, I was sort of skeptical at first. It was rather out of my way. Then I realized I hadn't seen him in five years (!) and that it really would be nice having a real Christmas in a house with an old friend. I excitedly wolfed down three turkey dinners and they even gave me presents. His family was so nice and accommodating. Chris had me living a fully nocturnal life style, which was pretty nuts. It was like nothing I'd ever really done before. Quite a different life style in Hong Kong. The sunrise in Hong Kong was something new. The next thing I knew I had been there ten days or so. It was time for me to leave. I was off to Indonesia on the 5th of January 2010.

A Girthy Beard And A Lot Of Weird

2009-12-01T00:15:00.000-08:00

More adventures have come and gone and another country is behind me, at least for now. Thailand was a great adventure. I immediately headed north once I arrived in Bangkok. Bangkok isn't the type of place I wanted to spend too much time in—as a backpacker and sleazeaphobe at lease. I met back up with Flip and Tom (whom I met in Goa, India) and we headed to Chiang Mai to see what it had to offer. After a few days of sight seeing, a cooking course and a “monk chat”, it was time to look into our next move. Rather than doing the treks that everyone seems to do in Chiang Mai, that get rather mixed reviews it seems, Flip and I found this placed called “Something Different” to tour around with. Man, it was something different. We took motorbikes into the jungle to access remote villages. They were crazy “roads.” We ate mole, rotten meat, and frogs (that we HUNTED ourselves one night, while narrowly escaping a King Cobra attack...seriously). It was really an experience staying with Thai families. It was a great time filled with waterfalls and, well, actual falls. I got pretty torn up, but it was totally worth it. Its difficult to describe the “roads” we were on bc it would be generous to even call some of them paths. It was pretty insane and a great time, with random and memorable experiences. One of the days we drove up to the tallest mountain in Thailand (not that impressive) and ran into a monk, with a pretty high status I guess, and he was literally passing out money to us—making it rain, as they say. That was weird. Anyway, the people who ran the tour were so nice they let me sleep on their floor for free and held onto my bags for free when I left Chiang Mai.

When we got back to Chiang Mai we met up with Matt (the friend I began my trip with) and he suggested we do what is called the Mae Hong Son loop through the more remote north. Fresh of an awesome motorbike adventure, Flip and I didnt skip and beat. The next day we grabbed our day bags, asked the “Something Different” people were we could rent some bikes for this adventure, and we were off. Basically, we would pick out a city/town/village on the map and head there. Along the way we would take little side adventures to waterfalls, caves and villages. When we were in Pai, we woke up relatively early and drove to some random waterfall. When we were done with that I suggested we go see the village down the way. When we got there we sort of stopped and wondered what to do next, so someone suggested we drive down this dirt road...okay...After a time we stopped again and asked the same question...this happened several times until we flipped a coin to decide whether we go on or go back...the King (the king of Thailand is on all their money) said to continue, so we did. Eventually we started running out of gas charging up these overgrown pot-holed dirt roads, but we charged on. I guess we figured that we must have been getting closer to a village that would have gas and would help us get back. Finally, after the petrol situation started to become a real concern (and after an epic bloody crash from Matt), we ran into some farmers when we got out of the thicker jungle and asked where we could find some gas, got a solid point (of the finger) and some gestures that suggested it was really close, so went there. It was cool riding into this little village with kids going nuts waving and smiling and following us. There were many little adventures like this on this trip. We made a trip up to the Myanmar boarder and almost drove in bc the boarder was so budget. We eventually found a spot that had two soldiers manning their post with wooden signs signifying the Thai and Myanmar sides. They even let us stand on the Myanmar side. A few days later, after Flip completely randomly got up in the middle of lunch in Sopong, which is over 240 K from Chiang Mai (the nearest legit train station and airport), and declared he wasn't himself lately and needed to get to the beaches to figure out what was wrong, we had another noteworthy adventure. After much hesitation, Matt and I decided we did want to see the “Long Neck” tribes. So, on our way to the next town we took a detour to find this village. After almost driving into Myanmar (again!) and getting lost several times, we finally arrived on the opposite side of the river from this village with no way of getting across. After a long time of considering swimming across (dumb), we see a a long boat pull up to the village with a few people that look rather familiar. In Pai we frequented this Bar called Nacy's, and sure enough it was Nancy, her boyfriend and their two dogs. I dont really know how to statistically work out those odds, but that has to be pretty insane. Anyway, they were Thai so after yelling across the river for a few minutes, they talked to the villagers and helped get us across the river. Though we did have to pay more than I would have liked, it was a pretty crazy thing to have happen.

After that we went down to a sleepy little town called Khun Yuam, we decided to not head all the way down the backside of “The Loop”, so we cut across the loop using back-roads (many were deemed “wet season impassable”) and dirt paths that led us straight through the mountains and jungle. I dont even know how many times we stopped to figure out what village we were in (definitely A LOT of time) to make sure we were heading in the right direction. Sometimes we weren't....a lot of times we werent. It was interesting being such a spectacle again. I hadn't felt like that in a while. In one village we stopped and asked several different groups of people where we were, quickly accruing a crowd as we walked around trying to figure out it out. The people were clearly more interested in our map and us that they were sort of missing what we were asking them. We finally went to the school in the village, thinking that the teacher would be of help. I felt sort of bad because the whole school stopped and came out to watch the teacher helping Matt figure out where we were. These are the moments I wish I had a video camera for or a small camera that I could pull out really fast. It was quite the scene—then we were off again. We finally made it to a main road and then to Mae Chaem after a long day of bad roads and good adventures.

After a few more days of relaxing and recuperating in Chiang Mai, I headed back to Bangkok with Matt to then headed to Cambodia for round two, though this time will be much longer. Matt is off to Bali. Flip if off to Bali as well, so this means that I am officially on my own. Should be an adventure. Thats what its all about right?

Please Send a New Pair Of Underwear

2009-11-12T02:41:00.000-08:00

It was something different walking across the India/Nepal boarder. you'd think there would be more security or look something like the Mexico/US boarder, but no. there were a few signs and two little rooms where i got my stamps on either side of the boarder. It took me two full days to get to Kathmandu from Varanasi. Apparently four people died on the road into Kathmandu, on top of a Maoist protest that stopped all cars getting into Kathmandu Valley all day. What a start, huh? it gets better.

Rather than try and figure out a hotel situation when i got to Kathmandu, i figured it was smart to work something out ahead of time because i was getting in so late. I talked to some guys near the boarder and worked out a room for that night for a SPECIFIC price and figured if i liked the place i might just stay there for a few days. well, when i got there it seemed nice, all thing considered, so instead of looking for a new place, i just decided I'd stay there until i left Kathmandu. A few days later, I decided i really was going to go up to this "Last Resort" place and toss myself off this 160M bridge, so i booked it and then went to my hotel to pay for everything because i was leaving Kathmandu at 5 AM and figured it would be best to work everything out the night before. However, when i went to pay for the room, the bill they presented me with was, well, not what i owed. After getting messed with in India, i think that my tolerance for these sorts of situations was getting low bc my reaction wasnt as calm as i would have liked. I started yelling at the guy, insisting that this wasnt the price we agreed upon (bc it wasnt!), but i wasnt really getting anywhere. After a lot of "name-calling" I haggled them down to a reasonable price, but i was still pretty upset....so i sort of pulled a really lame move and threw my money at the guy and yelled some form of "give me my change." Well, he didnt like this much, and after another exchange, he kicked me out of the hotel at 10 PM. I was followed up to my room and watched as i packed, doing my best to keep my things and these people where i could see them. when i left i was followed down the street and into the main drag of Thamel, so i had to figure out a way to lose these guys in order to get some sleep that night...oh, and not get stabbed in some alley. anyway, i did some sneaky business and finally lost them. i checked into a hotel under a fake name and passport number, something which i did the rest of my time in Nepal, and tried to sleep a little before my bungy.

The rest of my time in Nepal was insane, but for very different reasons. I had an amazing time at the Bungy Jump place. Its really not worth me trying to explain what its like launching yourself off a 160M bridge into a gorge, with a river running under you...three times! it was amazing. actually the bungy wasnt nearly as scary, exhilarating, and terrifying as the canyon swing. the swing allowed 7.5 second of straight up free fall, where as the bungy was only 2.5. i actually did the swing backwards once, which was INSANE! falling 100M looking up at the bridge getting farther and farther away while you are plummeting to the ground is like nothing I've ever experienced. it sounds crazy. It is! There is nothing natural about it, but I have pretty much decided that, after doing the largest bungy in asia, i have to conquer the largest one in the world when i get to South Africa. not sure if that means something about my sanity...

Anyway, I like the people i was hanging with and the area in which the bungy was so much that i decided to stay the night and do some canyoning the next day...then some river rafting the next day before heading back to Kathmandu. both were great fun, mostly because of the group we had together. the rafting was quite different than any ive done before bc half the people on our boat were literally deaf. somehow it worked though. we were a rowdy group.

Kathmandu was a wild place and very different from India. Nepal is a serious trekking location, so I have fully committed to coming back one day when im healthy to really "get after it." Seeing the Himalayas like that, just within your reach, is just too tempting. The people were all very nice (with the exception of that one hotel, of course) and werent really on top of you all of the time. It was a nice transition from India and felt quite a bit easier. I know that will sound weird, given the stories I've just told, but its true. actually the hardest thing was showing up at the airport and not having a ticket bc United Airlines is...well, im not very happy with them. it all worked out though bc my mom always insisted we show up a the airport like three hours ahead of time. so, out of habit, i was there early enough to work everything out. thanx mom...

Now I'm in Southeast Asia and will be for some time...

Part II - Flam TAke Over India: Going Going Goan (copryright Lonely Planet)

2009-10-28T01:28:00.000-07:00

i believe i wrote before that we were never going to ride in the "standing room only" part of the train again.... well, never say never. after leaving Udaipur and trying our best to get out of Mumbai as fast as we could, we bought some train tickets and BEHOLD--they didnt have seat numbers. this time flip didnt even make it up into the luggage racks because, well, flip is not that aggressive and you have to be pretty agressive in india if you want to get anything/anywhere. but as they say--no chipoti, no chai, no woman, no cry?

after 11 hours in the luggage rack and a few chess games later (and MY FIRST WIN!!) we arrived in Goa and headed to Jonny's Place, which was in Baga/Calagute. here we met up with Susan (!), a friend from college and the REAL india veteran. she is living in Pune (pronounced Poon-uh or Poon-A for all you jokesters/pervs out there) and working for a non-profit. we hung around for a bit there, but were rather disappointed considering that we heard of this great paradise on the beach. eventually we rented motorbikes and decided to drive around the state (i.e. jungle mixed with chaos) and see what we could find and im pretty sure we found paradise in the form of a beach hut on a cliff overlooking the beach for half the price as Jonny's and a millions times the atmosphere. arombol really was amazing and im pretty sure i would still be there if we didnt set a deadline for ourselves. it was laidback, with no hassle (comparatively of course) and had an amazing falafel place. i know that sounds weird to be eating falafel in india, but it was freaking amazing. plus, it turns out that out British friends from Udaipur were staying in the same lazy town and soon we were a crew about 10-12 deep. they were such good people and a lot of fun. many hours were spent talking about the cultural and linguistic differences between Americans and the British. it was sad to leave because we had a good group together in an amazing place, but sometimes you just have to keep moving. and so, many falafel later, and a trek into the jungle to find the "Baba" tree (where there was a very poignant engraving on a stone that read "give if you can/take if you must"), we sadly got on a bus and left Goa all together.

Side note: Mickey (the watch i picked up in Tibet for a dollar) died a sad death in the surf of Goa. im still wearing it though...people give me silly looks when i ask for the time.

Pune (Poon-uh) turned out to be more of an errand trip than intended. Susan was incredibly accommodating though, marching around with me trying to get my camera fixed and mail things off. we got our fill of southern cuisine ... and some homesick cuisine as well. we also went to see the Pune soccer team (Pune FC), which was pretty budget, but still quite the experience. Susan's apartment is also in an area where there is a Osho ( i think thats how you spell it), which is basically a sex spa masked in spiritual enlightenment rhetoric...at least thats how i understand it. i didnt look into it too much. still, it was funny seeing people walk around in their funny red outfits knowing they are heading to an orgy or something like that. i also got to see my frst Bollywood movie! the only way i can describe these films (ive seen two now) is that they are like live action Disney, where there are some things that dont quite work or make sense, as in physically and plot wise, there are random outbursts of song and dance, and its all PG, with the exception of the risque dancing. the second movie i saw actually had a dude in black-face, which was sort of disturbing. your guess is as good as mine as to why thats ok.

after Pune (laugh it up) Filipe Edwardo Martinez Gonzalez Mohammad Wagner Myerson decided he wanted to go island hopping and i HAD to go see the Taj Mahal and veranasi. so, i took my two day journey to Agra and i wish i were an english major or a poet for places like these. agra itself was average to dull. however, waking up to see the sunrise at the Taj is something i hope i never forget. i spent 5-6 hours there just wandering around, sitting in random spots, trying to convince myself i was actually there. i even snuck back in later to get one last look. it is just amazing and awesome and i have no other words for it. you see pictures of it all the time--then you are standing there looking up at it, or inside it, or sitting ON it and its still just doesnt seem to compute that you are actually there. up close, what i thought were just carvings and indents, are actually thousands of semiprecious stones creating beautiful designs and displaying passages from the Koran. i was pretty awestruck. i didnt want to leave, but i was desperately hungry and needed to check out of my guest house.

then it was off the veranasi, one of the longest inhabited citires on earth. of veranasi, lonely planet writes, "Brace yourself. You are about to enter the ost blindingly colorful, unrelentingly chaotic and unapologetically indescrete p[laces on earth. Veranasi takes no prisoners." Man, they nailed it. intimate rituals of life and death (and bathroom behavior/activities) happen right in public. Never thought id see a burning body...now ive seen enough for several life times. this was a tough city to navigate on my own. no one wanted to tell you the truth unless it benefits them in some way, whether its how to get to your guesthouse or to where a particular ghat was. once you are able to get past the difficulties though, it really was worth the trip and definitely on the list of favorites. i did the sunrise boat trip up the ganges (ganga) twice because it was by far the most amazing people watching i've ever take part in, even though the occasional death body might float by. whats still baffles me is how in the world these people can dunk and wash themselves in the ganges, put its water in their mouths, as well as swim and play in it and not die immediately.

it really was a beautifully colorful place. i was lucky to be there when i was because there was a mini-festival going on to get the city ready for a Diwali festival (not the main one though), so the city was lively and especially chaotic. i also made a good friend in a guy named Jean, so i didnt have to fight off the endless rickshaw, boat, silk, and flower wallahs on my own the whole time.

india was an insane adventure. the great punch in the face. it'll wake you up. however, being able to take the issues with a bit of humor and commiserate with others about troubles that you run into seems to help all the frustration melt away, and all that remains is the feeling that you just experienced something incredibly unique and amazing. thats how i felt at least. some of the stories you hear of the things that other backpackers run into would just blow your mind. in the end i am so glad to have gone and seen the things that i did. ive learned a lot and india has left its mark of me for sure.

then it was off to Kathmandu (overland) to hurl myself off the highest bungy jump in asia (as of 2007 when the lonely planet i picked up was published), which is 166M, and things of that sort before heading to thailand.

Part I - Flam Take Over India: Insha Allah

2009-10-28T01:25:00.000-07:00

First, thanks to everyone who coments on and/or reads the blog. just thought i would give a little "shout-out" to my fans. actually i didnt know anyone read it other than my mom, so thanks.

story time:

Ring ring. my emergency phone rigs for the first time just three minutes after i turn it on for the first time all trip. a very concerned voice on the other side of the phone asks, "Sam? Are you in India?" Oh yeah, im in india. its 2 in the morning and it is HOT. the next few hours are sort of a blur and, well, not our proudest moments. long story short, a rickshaw tried to drop us off in a dark ally. we werent having that, so we went with this random guy to the "tourist office" where we somehow ended up arranging to go up to Srinagar, Kashmir that day. its a long story and not all PG.

our experience in kashmir was a mixed bag. we stayed on this house boat on dal lake, which is the largest lake in the world--not (!)--though thats what the "travel agent" told us. haha we got scammed so hard. when we finally got our hands on a guide book, which wasnt until we left kashmir bc Raffi "couldnt find one" (yeah right!), we found that the guide book warns against just about every issue we ran into, from being held virtually hostage on the house boat, to being pressured into buying outrageously expensive trips. we did do some fun trekking in the Himalayas, but even that was ridiculously expensive. after fighting off Raffi, who was trying to sell us a $900 (not including food or entrance fees into places) two week trip through Rajistan (which is an absurd price) for several consecutive days, with the help of some freaking weird Belgians who had been there like three months, we told him we wanted to travel our own way the rest of our time in inda. this did not make him happy and he bassically kicked us out of the house boat bright and early the following day. our time up in srinagar was quite the learning experience, both cultural and travel-wise. it is a muslim state and according to bill clinton the most dangerous place in the world (something we found out AFTER we were there--among other things), and like nowhere i have ever been before. you would hear over loud speaker the 5 daily prayers. it was a beautiful setting with the himalayas right there. we heard "insha allah" a lot and i prolly shoot Raffi's hang a billion times. we were definitely glad to get outa there in the end and start our real adventure, which began on the 28th of september at 6 in the morning.

after an 8 our van ride, we found ourselves in the obscure little city of Jammu trying to find a ticket to Jaipur, Rajustan, which according to Raffi, we wouldnt be able to travel on our own bc it was a "triangle state" BUT also a "puzzle state." i do not miss that guy. in Jammu we ran into a small problem. there were no more seats on the train to Jaipur, only standing room tickets...we didnt skip a beat and hopped into the standing room only section for our 16 hour adventure, and oh my god was it an adventure. we got invited upto the luggage racks (where there are signs that say "for luggage only") by a group of young indian guys who ended up being the most annoying people in the world. clutching onto our things, packed into the luggage racks with 6 or so other people, we began the long and hot journey to jaipur. it was like being packed in a cattle car from the 40s or something. if there was space to be found, someone was quickly in it. that was a long night.

when we finally arrived in jaipur we got our hands on a giude book and had a good laugh about what it said about Srinagar. these guide books are so useful, we have come to find. they warn of "gem scams" in jaipur and we completely ran into this guy who was trying to run a gem scam on us. thanx lonely planet for that heads up.

Rajistan, the "triangle state", is nothing like raffi made it sound like. its been relatively easy getting from place to place and a BILLION times cheaper than he was trying to sell us on. we have been staying in places for 1-2 dollars a night that are safe and clean and good enoughy for me and flip, who arent so picky.

jaipur was beautiful with its many different forts of sandstone and the marble "royal ghetto." it was our first real city experience in india and it didnt dissapoint. there were all kinda of animals all over the place, in the streets, on the buildng--everywhere. there were camel drawn carts, elephants, monkies, dogs, cats, cows, buffalo, oxen, donkies, horses and you name it all amongst the crazyness of cars, rickshaws and motorbikes. the "pink city" really was worth the trip. we had this great guy named Soni driving us around showing us everything and making life pretty easy. he would come in handy later on as well, which was nice.

after jaipur we headed to Puskar, which would have been amazing if the lake were still there. Rajistan didnt get any rain for monsoon season and so the lake was completely dried up and made for a rather sad scene in a once bustling tourist town there is nothing like walking down to the ghats, looking for a beautiful view of a lake, only to find a mud pit with bulldozers working in it.

next we went to jaisimer, the "crwown of the desert" or "golden City" or any number of names. this place really was out in the desert, with a living fort made of sandstone. this is the city out of which we went on our camel safari. basically i went out into the desert with just flip and our guide, slept on sand dudes and didnt see anyone except the random desert man for about four days or so. ive never experienced anything quit like being in the desert like that in my whole life. the silence you experience is awesome. the only real downside is that the camels smell pretty freaking bad. it was a great experience though. we learned a desert village game that you play in the sand (its strategical, like chess and games like that) and ran into a desert man who wanted to play us. that was an experience, playing some random desert man in a sand game as we sat benieth a tree hiding from the midday sun. when we got back to jaisilmer, i made sure that we went to the Sam Sanddunes. its actually an incredibly touristy place, but i just couldnt pass up going to MY sanddunes.

After some serious Shinanigans in the desert, we headed to "romantic" city of Udaipur, where there still IS a lake. this place was quite a change of pace. when we arrived in Jaisilmer, the bus people made us get off the bus at the wrong stop knowing that we had a pick of at the correct bus stop. the they proceeded to "give us a free ride to the center of town" because our ride was not there to pick us up. lies. they took us straight to their guest house and suggested that since we were there already we should have a look. luckily our ride followed them and we eventually sorted everything out. in udaipur, we didnt have to deal with things like this. it was easy and mellow. we met some awesome Brits that we will meet up with later in Goa. it was a beautiful city as well, with an amazing City Palace thats right on the water and a "Floating Palace" that is IN the water. mostly flip and i just picked a spot with a good view and played chess or just hung out.

there are so many moments while traveling that are just indescribable, but the really hard ones come from seemingly insignificant moments that arent really big stories. like sitting in the bus, in my "sleeper", just looking out the window watching India go by. OR in Udaipur, we sat across from the City Palace near a Ghat and had a beer while playing chess watching the sun go down, meanwhile there is a temple just out in front of us and a tree full of monkeys to my left. Or in Jaisilmer, watching the sun come up in the desert. in Goa, the view from our beach hut. OR having to explain to 9 grown adults what a douche is...its the little moments...

China/Tibet

2009-10-02T04:38:00.000-07:00

SOOOO china blocks things like blogs and facebook so thats one reason why i havent really updated by blog recently. the other reason is i am now in india...so that's a whole other beast i guess.

that said i will do my best to depict a general idea of what happened in that month or so in china and tibet. first, we flew to the wrong city. tianjin....beijing...same same , right? no big deal. after we finally got to beijing and figured out how to get the money we needed for this tibet trip (it took all morning running from bank to bank to figure that one out), we stuffed our money down our pants (prolly the safest place for that amount of money) and got on a train to Xining...in the STANDING section only. so, this wouldnt really be an issue if the train ride were only a few hours or so, but this was a special train--a 25 (!) hour train. AWESOME! i would LOVE to go in to describing what this was like but the story would take waaay too long. needless to say it was truly one of our biggest tests up will that point. if you are reading this and wanting to ask me why we did this, well, let me tell you it wasnt to be stared at like we were aliens (or celebrities if you want to be nice) for 25 hours. we actually had to be in xining on a certain date and wanted to take the train bc it is considerably cheaper and these were the only tickets they had left. fun fun fun. in the end it makes for a good story and really gives you perspective on tough travel experiences.

in tibet we met up with Kalsang, who is a friend of a friend, as well as our guide. it feels cheap calling him our guide bc in the end he was really our friend, but...he WAS our guide. we also met up with Mr. Tong, the driver (thinks he is a professional race car driver and drives accordingly even though we were on potholed dirt roads most of the time) who got us into all kinds of trouble.

basically, we spent three weeks in tibet traveling, trekking, camping, and homestay-ing...trying to sum it up will be very difficult. the camping was amazing. we camped in all sorts of places. one night we camped by the side of the largest salt late in all of china/tibet. contrastingly, a few nights later we camped next to a road on the other side of a dirt wall so no one could see us drinking and playing cards. ive never been so close to the stars in my life. it was as if you could reach out and touch them. the milky way was so thick and distinct and you could actually see stars twinkle. i guess that's what its like at 5000m. it was truly surreal. the one night of camping that really wasnt so much fun was when we had to pay "protection" money so we wouldnt be mugged by nomads in the night. whether we were being extorted or not, it was sort of important to cover that base. the fact that Kalsang's buddy got f-ed up and mugged in that same area for looking foreign was good enough for me to pay the 3 dollars. ha it was a long night dealing with the people we paid for protection, though. another long story.

what else? we visited the two largest monasteries in the world, where somehting like 10,000 people study, live and..be Buddhist. we had to sneak in bc they are restricted to foreigners, but it was so worth it. freaking china. we all came away very frustrated and upset with how china is dealing with things in tibet. it is just incredibly sad seeing in person how they are actively trying to kill tibetan culture. nomads and nomad culture are a big part of tibet and they put up fences to try and stop them from being nomadic, among many many other things. they also confiscated their guns, granted i got to see a pack of wolves take down a yack before we could get there to scare them off (insane), but that really is a serious issue for the nomads. nomads cant protect their animals bc china thinks they are going to over throw the government with a few guys and some yack? hmmmm

one night the chinese police bust in our room (5 or so of them) and harassed us about what we we're doing and who we were FOR SO LONG. oh yeah, they didnt speak english either. i tried to take a picture of the scene bc it was sooooo ridiculous, but that turned out to be a really bad idea bc they already thought we were undercover reporters . that prolly added an hour or so onto the saga. they marched flip and i all around town looking for kalsang to help prove we were who we were and that we were basically NOT reporters. flip and i were sure were were going to spend the night in a chinese prison because we couldnt remember where kalsang was. luckily we found him and the police left us alone. flip was a bit disappointed bc he was hoping to be able to say that he spent the night in a chinese jail, but i was understandably relieved.

one of my favorite parts of the trip was staying with Merritt's friend Jimpa's family. they were so amazing. his brother and niece took us trekking up this mountain that was close to their village. i guess its the holy mountain for that area and about 4,000m. it took us about 8 hours to reach top. we had to hustle to get everything set up though bc it was starting to rain. i remember waking up in the morning and sitting in my tent writing in my journal (yeah im keeping a journal of this trip....whatever) and listening to Jimpa's brother and niece chanting prayers (in Tibetan) while the wind and weather shook our tent. for hours i sat there hoping the rain would stop before matt calls to me and says that we are probably going to try and head down. i said to him, "that's going to suck in this rain," and he replies, "haha its not raining man, its snowing." i guess it had been snowing all morning and we had like ten feet of visibility, but we need to head down or it would be too dark when we reached the bottom--so off into the snow we went. man i was glad i finally found some decent shoes and rain jacket that worked. it i didnt have that gear for this trip it would have been ROUGH. it was still an amazing experience being on top of that mountain when it was snowing. you dont get views like that very often. as for the family, well, they were so amazing. it was incredibly interesting getting a real taste of village life not two days after arriving.

there are so many stories id love to add, but there is not enough time. it really was everything i had hoped for and more and i was very sad to leave. when it came time to leave, Matt went his own way to western china (long story), flip went back to beijing bc he was desperate for a more metropolitan area (i.e. toilets that you can sit down on, showers, internet, kfc, you know, stuff like that) and i tried to go to Xi'an to see the terracotta soldiers. the reason i say "i tried" is bc i was pretty ill at the time and couldnt b too far from a bathroom, if you know what i mean. eventually, i sucked it up and made it on a train to xi'an, but let me tell you, being on these trains in the cheap area when you are sick is not the best place to be. there is literally just a whole in the train and you can see the moving ground below caked in...well you can imagine the rest for yourself...Xi'an was great though. it really was totally worth seeing these incredible historical pieces. i didnt know much about the history before i went there and was blown away when i left. each piece is unique (purposefully so) and so detailed, and thats JUST the soldiers. apparently there is a whole city buried upon the order of the emperor at the time bc he wanted to be buried with everything he wanted in the after life. it was a trip well worth it. it was sort of weird being around other foreigners again though (non-tibetan and chinese) and speaking english. in the places we were traveling in tibet we were real novelties. we got stared at everywhere we went. people would go get their friends and families to come and look at us. we would have to take pictures with people. it was pretty funny sometimes. we joked about charging money. when we would play pool, you would have thought we were professionals or something (we totally such by the way) bc there would b crowds of people just there watching us. Xi'an was not like that. there was a freaking McDs right as i got off the train. quite a snap back to reality i guess.

time in beijing was short and sweet. we had already seen the sights so we mostly just hung out and got the things done that we needed to. then it was off to india, which is where i am now. that update will have to wait until i get back from a trek into the desert on a camel safari.

enjoy

South Korea

2009-08-20T04:00:00.000-07:00

After a long night of sleeping in the airport in order to save money, we got on a plane and left Japan. it is pretty interesting going to sleep in a deserted airport only to wake up with hundreds of people all around you. Leaving Japan was very sad though. it seems as though we are destined to always be wishing we were able to spend more time in that country. even though japan was quite the "money suck", it really was truly the amazing japan you hope to see when you go there.

when we arrived in Korea we had to start all over again, trying to get to know a place and figure out what the hell is going on. somehow we got on a bus heading for Hapjeong (the station near the area we were staying called Seokyo-dong or something like that). after walking around for quite a bit, asking random people if they knew where particular landmarks were that could possibly help us get there, we finally found our place (Backpacker Friends), which we would later find out has only been around for five weeks. exhausted and hungry we asked one of the ladies who was working there if there was a cheap Korean food place near and rather than just telling us, she walked us there and ordered for us. the food in korea has been awesome. plus its been cheaper so we have been better able to indulge. id like to say which dishes in particular i loved, but i have a hard enough time trying to say them in Korean, so trying to spell them seems far too intimidating.

the people at backpacker friends are so amazing, helpful and nice. they welcomed us in like we were family (literally one of the guys, after quite a bit of soju the second night we were in Seoul, now insists that i call him "older brother" in Korean. and when he found out we were leaving in the morning, his girlfriend told me he was so sad he was going to cry after we left. i gave him my bracelet from vietnam as a and he and his girlfriend burst into tears. it was really heart warming), which totally makes up for the incredibly odd set up. you walk in and there are people just passed out on the floor at all times of the day. the staff really makes it. the first night we were here we came back from a long day of walking around and the staff was eating a meal and drinking soju and beer in the living room. i was just going to walk by and put my stuff away and one of the guys (my new older brother, who told us his American name is Sam) stopped me and invited/insisted we join them. cant refuse free local food and drink right. man they love to drink. we have actually had a few nights like that where they invite us to eat a meal they cooked, we drink with them and then they take us out after.

the people in the hostel have been great too. not only did flip finally arrive from america, completing the trip tripod (i woke up at five AM to wander the streets in hopes that id find flip bc, like a bunch of jerks, we didnt actually give him directions to the hostel and i freaking found him just as it started raining walking down some alley!), but we also picked up a stray Belgian named tom who is a really cool guy. he has been hitting all the sites with us as well as helping fight off preaching religious fanatics in itewon with us. no joke, when i was looking for shoes that will hack it in tibet (one of a few equipment issues i have had already), some america missionaries confronted us and asked if we have found jesus. that was interesting.

as for the sites, we have been trying to get around to see as much as possible. i dont really want to just list all the sites, but i'll give i few highlights i guess. we were sort of cheap and didnt pay to go to the JSA and only went to the DMZ, which we totally regretted. the DMZ was interesting though. there was a lot of propaganda, an awesome video that was truly ridiculous with how it dramatized the DMZ, and a train station that was completely modern but completely empty/deserted bc it obviously cant send trains up into north korea. it was weird how much they tried to hammer in to you that the tunnels found beneath the DMZ (they have tours and you go down into them) were REALLY build by North Korea in an attempt to invade South Korea. it almost made you want to question whether they really were built by North Korea bc of how hard it appeared they were trying. anyway, we also went to the chaggyeoggung palace and the gyeongbokgung palace, both UNESCO sites, and spent quite a lot of time there walking around, taking pictures and enjoying the scenery. they were almost like wandering through a giant park in how expansive they were. it was a nice time of day when we got to both of them bc it was later in the day, so fewer people were there and the sun was going down, making everything much more beautiful. describing the palaces is quite difficult so im hoping that the picture posted will b good enough. the scenery is just difficult to paint for me. i can say that standing in the face of that sort of history really makes you feel small. we also got around to the N Seoul Tower, which was WAY to expensive to get up. once you are up there is does provide an amazing view of the city. on each window there are city names with how far they are away from that spot. it was an cool thing to do. on our last day we went to the world cup stadium in Seoul for a while and just walked around. they let you into the locker rooms and media area and places like that. it made me really excited for being in south africa....that is if i can find a place to stay. finally, mid week we went to a city about an hour from seoul called Sewon so see the UNESCO site there. it was good to do something outside of Seoul for a day bc we sort of just decided to post up here. on one hand it has been nice being less mobile, but you also end uo feeling like you are missing a lot. most other days we spent walking around trying to find random places, such as particular streets that were recommended, markets and stuff like that.

its been interesting being in this country. coming here you think that people are walking around scared or that there would be a palpable tension, but i havent really felt that at all. actually, in talking to the people who work at Backpacker friends, they dont really seem to view North Korea as this evil country. a bunch of them said that kim jong il seemed like a "nice guy" and joked that many Koreans think that the tunnels (the ones N Korea allegedly built to invade S Korea) were built by the S Korean government to scare people. the people here really are so nice as well. when we look lost trying to figure out the subway, which im sure is most of the time, people go out of their way to help us and in some cases ACTUALLY take us to our stop. that has been nice bc the subway system here is apparently the 3rd busiest in the world.

side note: figuring out (cheap) transportation has been a really fun and crazy aspect of traveling so far. another interesting aspect of our travels so far is trying to work out my gear. it started pouring down rain the other day and i busted out my "trusty" rain jacket that chattie gave me a while ago and 10 minutes in i was soaked all the way through. then there has been the saga of trying to find shoes. its taken me two weeks to find shoes that fit, let alone a pair that could hack it in tibet. man they are not cool, but they will do the job. i guess people in asia only have 10 1/2 size feet and smaller. so if anyone with an 11 or up shoe size is planning on traveling through asia, you better get your shoe situation figured out before you leave.

it will be really sad to leave this country. just when we are getting comfortable in a place and have a group of travel friends, we have to take off. we've got the subway figured out, the bus, the train, and the food (the food is freaking amazing by the way) and now we are taking off. normally we will be able to extent our stay in a place if we want, but trying to work out this whole tibet thing has been such as disaster so far and we found out only a day ago that we have to be in Xining in like two days. haha good luck, right. its been quite a large source of stress and has sped up our departure from Seoul. are Belgian friend keeps joking with us saying, "come on guys, if you've gotta chose btw Tom or Tibet its got to be Tom." no offense to Tom but i am not missing out on this Tibet experience for anything. tomorrow we actually get on a plane instead of doing the 24 hour ferry thing (we actually only pay 30-40 USD more for the plane) and fly to Tianjin (not Beijing) bc the hostel guy helping us out didnt understand me in my incredibly hung over state. it was totally his fault to bc he was the one helping get me drunk the night before and keeping me out all night. ooooooohhhhhh travel issues...really, its no big deal though. we are just going to take the train from tianjin to beijing after we land and then another INCREDIBLY long train to Xining to start our three week adventure through tibet.

hope everyone is well at home. pictures to come soon.

Japanese Shenanigans (Takayama, Nara, Kyoto, Hiroshima, Kawaguchiko, Tokyo)

2009-08-11T09:04:00.000-07:00

Takayama

We arrived in this little town after escaping Tokyo and were so happy to be here. Takayama is in the Japan Alps. With picturesque views of the mountains, this little town was just what we needed. It was a great way to jump into Japanese culture. we visited a few small villages. one was a world heritage sight. its straight out of a movie. we hiked a lot into the surrounding parks that alleged to have castle ruins. turns out that when the Samurai lost power, most of the castles, with the exception of like 12 or something, were sold, torn down, burned down and so on. it was still pretty cool wandering through the forest in japan. we ended up pulling out Matts ipod speakers when we got lost and walking around like a couple a dorks from the 80s with speakers on our shoulder.

takayama is where we had our first awesome hostel experience. it was a pretty quiet hostel when we arrived, but we joined forces with this Brit named Mike for his birthday and "made it happen." after buying about 40 beers, one huge carton (litterally like a giant milk carton) of sake, one of shochu, and a ukulele--it ended up being a pretty fun few days. oh yeah, i bought a ukulele and am learning to play. its a fun thing to have on trains or during down time.

leaving takayama was sad because we made some friends and really delved into the area as much as we could. i dont want to say its the most i've ever walked, but i kinda want to. we also became regulars (as best you can in three days) at this hole in the wall "restaurant." it was like this guys living room. we were the only tourists we ever saw there, which was nice bc you often get caught up in that crap--everyone going to the same plaves. and the guy freaking loved us. he kept hooking us up with free fruit and things like that. sad to leave, but it was time for us to go.

Nara

So we ended up going to Nara because, as it turned out, that Kyoto had no hostel openings. we really shoulda freaking figured this out before hand, but it makes for good adventure. Nara was some kinda place. when we arrrived, we knew that there were two hostels and were hoping that they would have openings, but we werent sure. so after almost 45 minutes of walking around with all our gear (and my ukulele of course) we walk up to this building that looks like it belongs in eastern europe or something like that. it was quite and deserted looking and nothing like our previous hostel experiences. it turns out that it had a no exceptions closing time of 10:00PM and a check out time of 8AM. not exactly a social hostel, but it was good for a place to sleep. the next day we tried to see as much as possible of Nara, a bizzare little town with deer roaming everywhere among the temples and shrines. they are so used to people being around that you could litterally walk right up to them and pet them. one, HOWEVER, tried to bite my "man parts" off. that wasnt cool. its really hard to explain how out of place we are in this country and how different it is. In Nara, we were walking along this little path next to a park and there was this little cookie stand...or so we though. Mattt bought some cookies and we started munching on the most terrible cookies you have ever tasted. we have been kinda eating like poor kids so we figured it was a cultural thing and we should just suck it up. however, at about 3/4 through my cookie we walked up on this group of japanese kids feeding these same "cookies" to the deer next to another booth that had pictures of people feeding the deer these cookies...thats how out of place we are. we ate freaking deer food by accident.

Nara was amazing though (sorry if i say that too much). there was an enourmous buddha called the Great Nara Buddha or Daibutsu. it was something like 80 feet high and bronze. later that evening there was a night show all throughout Nara that lit up the entire area, including the temples and shrines. i tried to capture it on my camera, but its so hard.

in interesting side note, we saw this old man get hit by a car. lying on the ground whimpering, no one was going to help him. it was rather bizzare bc we have found that the japanese are almost overly helpful and gracious. perhaps it was because he was trying to cross the street not in a cross walk or perhaps it was because he was japanese, we arent sure why it took so long for anyone to help him. we were going over to help, not that we woulda known what to do or where to take him, and finally these two women came running from behind us to help. it was truly a weird experience though.

Kyoto

we finally found a place to stay in Kyoto and headed off as soo as we could. it was a really backwoods type hostel, but they had some nice perks. the only REAl issue was actually finding the place. turns out it wasnt far from the train station...if you exited the correct exit. otherwise you wondering miles and miles out of the way trying to find it with 40lbs on your back in hot hot humid japan. we have sort of done that a lot bc we are too cheap to get a taxi ride or anything like that.

Kyoto was a more lively hostel scene. we werent planning on going out to same some money and finally get some sleep, but we met these guys who were looking to have some fun, so why not participate. one was a canadian teaching english in Korea, which is huge bc now we for sure have someone to meet up with in korea to show us around. it was also this japanese kids bday so we thought it was a good reason to celebrate. he turned 20, which is the big
'coming of age" in japane i guess. we bought a bunch of alcohol and went to an abandoned floor on the building we were in and all taught eachother our respective drinking games. it was quite a group. we had a spaniard, a canadian, a japanese, a korean and a few americans.

the weather wasnt so great but we knew we werent going to be there that long so it was important to us to try and see as much as possible anyways. we grabbed bicycles the first day and rode around in the rain. i dont have much in the way of pictures bc of that. Kyoto has some amazing temples and shrines though. one in particular just blew me away. it was this golden three story "house" that was set by a picturesque pond that had a sort of eerie look to it. with bonsai trees everywhere and fog rolling through, it was really a beautiful place. a few castles, temples and shrines later we made our way to find some food that was unique and not touristy. sometimes this is a bad call. either way, it was so much fun riding around kyoto on bikes in the rain. you sort of look around in amazement, wondering if you are really doing what you are doing. im sure we will have many more of those moments, but its early in the trip so it seems much more profound i guess. for example, at one point we rolled up on this temple looking fow another temple and no one was there except this one munk who went out of his way to show us around. just in the courtyard, as if it were no big deal, there were these Buddhist statues that were 1,400 years old. people just road by, never knowing this place was there, never stopping to visit. it was quite the gem. i sort of wish i had my camera for that.

the other day we spent in Kyoto we tried our best to figure out the subway system. we did a pretty good job i must say, without any help. it was a lot of guessing but it totally worked. the only real bummer was that most of the places we wanted to go to were closed. freaking tuesdays! i guess the Japanese dont like tuesday. we did however get to this one particular shrine called Fushimi InariTaisha. i guess its one of the oldest (711 AD) and most revered shinto shrines. there were thousands of these doorway type things (shrines) set only inches from each other so that they made these tunnels. pretty cool stuff.

Hiroshima

we took a day trip to Hiroshim, spending aout 8 hours there. its hard to explain what this was like. it was pretty emotional and frustrating and sad. here is a city that didnt exist but 64 years ago and now it is alive and thriving. Matt i didnt talk much until later in the afternoon bc we were sort of off in our own directions with out thoughts. after we spend a long long time in the museum (like four hours or something), had some time to let it sink in, we got back to talking. its just so heartbreaking walking through, hearing the stories and seeing exactly what a weapon like that really does to actual people. you can conceptualize it when you learn it in class, and think intellectually about why we did it and so on, but actually seeing the carnage and effects of something like the nuclear bomb at its place of impact was something that i will carry with me forever. these are the times i wish a kept a journal because i had so many thoughts after that experience that would have been nice to write down. it was a truly valueable experience.

Kawaguchiko (Mt. Fuji/ Fuji san)

Getting here was ridiculous. What we thought was going to be a few hour simple train ride turned into a five our maze of train hopping. For the first hour on the first train we were standing in the areas between the two cars with 15 to 20 other people who didnt have seats either. Then we finally got some space on the ground to sit and we busted out our respective instruments (Matt with his harmonica and me with my ukulele). You meet interesting people this way i guess. a prospective diplomat for Botswana talked with us for a while. Now i have a free place to stay in Botswana. Some random Japanese girl just sat down and listened to us goof around for a while. the next few hours werent as fun. train hopping when you dont know exactly where you are going is pretty weird. random people try and help you out. this one particular guy thought he wanted to help us, but after he realized we had no idea what he was saying he just started pulling porn mags out of this trash bin he had with him and showing us pictures. man that was weird. the funniest thing is that we have seen, on numerous occasions, guys looking at porn in public. guess its no big deal here. anyway, after five hours of traveling we arrived at our destination, find our hostel and head off to bed at some god awful time in the early morning.

Mt. Fuji

so we head off for Fuji San around 6PM ish. the goal is to hike the beast and be at the summit for the sunrise. its a big time tradition i guess. we begin the trek up the 3,776 M mountain around 7:50 PM. first problem to arrise, about an hour into our hike, i really tweaked my knee, so for the next five hours of our night hike i was battling. there was no freaking way i was turning back though. the climb was full of switchbacks that go on and on and on. and once the fog settled in there was no way of knowing how far you needed to go until the next station. it was just a lot of up. there were times when the fog would clear and you could see that you were above the cloud line. man, what a cool feeling. Matt and i were sort of cruising too, even though i was a cripple. when we finally hit the summit, the fog/rain was hitting so hard that it had soaked through my jacket and the wind was so hard that it would blow you over if you didnt have your shit together. on the top there were these hut like buildings (and a vending machine of course) that are sort of what i think of when i think of nepal, but i havent really been there so dont take my word for it. obviously everything was closed and the few people who were up there at that time were huddled anywhere they could to hide from the wind and rain/fog. when i say it was cold, im not really sure the actual temp but it really may have been in the 40s. i mean it was freezing. so, by this time, matt and i have like three or so hours until the sun rises, no shelter and no warm clothes that were remotely sufficient (im actually in shorts...i know im a retard, but we got some faulty information) . we decided to huddle between this tractor and a pile of wood. it was pretty pathetic. i really cant describe how misserable it was, but in the back of our minds there was a glimmer of hope that i might end soon. then, when we were getting to our breaking point (seriously, there was a point when matt's leg hit mine and i asked him to leave it for the body heat bc i had been shaking uncontrolibly for the past two hours), matt hits me and i come out of my ball. by now there was actually quite a large gathering of at the summit, all huddling together and hiding in corners outside the buildings. a light had gone on in one of the building (I actually didnt believe matt when he told be bc 1) i was sort of losing any hope and 2) i was too fucking cold to even lean over and look) and people were quickly gathering outside in hopes of getting into what was basically a glorified mess hall...but a hut...and no tables...and the most expensive but MOST AMAZING romen you will ever have--though thats prolly a product of our particular perdicament. it look them far too long to let anyone in. we were all huddled outside this builindg begging them to let us in while they set up. finally, after i got my hands on the first food id had since 9 PM the previous day (and even that was one of these japanese nutrition packs that tastes like mashed up jello and is clearly not supposed to be a meal) i walked outside and the sun was starting to come up. Matt and i found this spot up the way from where everyone was gathering that was less crowded and shielded the wind and just took it in. it was beyond amazing and in a very sadistic way i guess, totally worth it. as misserable as we were just thirty minutes earlier, it really was all worth it to be standing there, above the clouds, on the the top of the highest peak in Japan, looking out at the most picturesque sunrise i have ever seen. maybe it was because i felt like i earned it or maybe it really was that beautiful. who knows. all i know is that i forgot everything in that moment and just let it sink in. pretty cool stuff.

we spent some time up at the summit during the morning. sent some post cards from the little postal shack. ran into some random people who asked if we would send some postcards for them. they payed us extra and i was planning on going there anyways, so we obliged. took some pictures. i sort of ran out of room so i didnt get that many. then we began out long trek down. matt was really nice about my whole knee thing. i was walking at a crawl bc it was in pretty bad shape and he didnt complain and would offer to stop a lot. it look us a lot longer to get down than it should have, but i am glad i powered though that. it was truly amazing and now, next to my snake heart/hai phong story, one of my favorite stories. i think i need to let it sink in a little more. im writing this portion of the blog literally right after i got back to our hostel from Fuji San. i feel like a retard. i havent slept yet or showered or anything for over 36 hours or something. so, ill end this here, and head to do those important life things.

tonight we are going to an onsen and tomorrow we are heading to tokyo. im just going to post this now bc i am too lazy to add tokyo stuff and i might not do much in tokyo bc of my knee.

This might b the most detailed blog i write bc i am using free internet right now. i am adding some photos on picasa or flikr so that you can see some photos of what we are seeing. hope everyone is well. next time you hear from me noght be in korea or china.

Tokyo

2009-08-03T05:34:00.000-07:00

Sooooo funny story...guess it was best we started off the trip with a serious adventure. we landed in tokyo with loads of confidence and almost immediately had to come to the realization that we dont know shit.

after figuring out the Japan Rail system, we arrived in the city of tokyo thinking that we could just find a hostel by walking around. not so easy. we ate at some noodle place (through a vending machine no less)...had no idea what we were eating, which we came to realize will happen a lot considering we have no grasp on the language past `hello` and `thank you.` then we embarked on our journey to find a place to stay. thats where the adventure really starts.

turns out that every hostel was booked for some reason and we were not wise enough to book in advance, something we will learn from i hope. however, this was only realized after FOUR hours of trucking around with our backpacks through the streets of tokyo, learning how to harass locals and use japanese payphones. cool right? finally, after several hours of walking aroubd like lost children, it started raining on us! interestingly, rather than braking us, this was sort of rejuvenating in a weird way. and finally, when we were standing in the rain, looking out at this river (no idea of its name) from a bridge we had decided was a good landmark for helping us find our way, a moment of clarity (as alcoholics like to call it) arrived and we decided on sleeping in this capsule place or the street if there were no capsules left. luckily there were and we spent the night in a dorm of tubes that were maybe six feet long, three feet wide and three feet high after being up for over 24 hours. very japanese apparently.

we woke up to an amazing view, took showers in this bizzare japanese tradition (i.e. sitting on stools in a room with a sauna and a hot tub like things with like four other dudes in there) and took in the most amazing view of the city while doing so...and decided that we were done with tokyo for now. we got on a train later that day for the japan alps.

as im writing this i realize that i might not b updating as much as i wanted to, but i`ll do my best.