TravelStream™ news feed for member ericablair on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/ericablair en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Tue, 16 Sep 2008 12:01:49 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ericablair/1/1221580680/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ericablair/1/1221580680/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ericablair/1/1221580680/tpod.html Tue, 16 Sep 2008 12:01:49 -0400 NEW BLOG ADDRESS http://ericamblair.blogspot.com

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Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

ANNOUNCEMENT:

I don't like the format of TravelPod.com so I have a new blog address.

http://EricaMBlair.blogspot.com

Info about photos will be posted there.
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Yangon (Rangoon), Myanmar

We flew to Yangon (formerly Rangoon), the previous capital of Myanmar (formerly Burma) early in the morning on August 1. Both names were changed in the 1960s, when a military junta took control of the country and replaced the names of almost every city in order to erase what they saw as the stain of the British colonialists, who had reigned over country since 1885. In 2005, in a move that baffled many, the government moved the capital from Yangon to a tiny village called Naypyidaw, which means "Abode of Kings," and proceeded to build a town solely consisting of modern government buildings. For people in Yangon this is a touchy subject, since it meant the city lost a lot of its wealth, and accordingly the impetus toward development that had long made it the country's premier city. According to other travelers we met who had been to Yangon before, the effect is noticeable, and the city has not been well kept-up for the last three years.

In regards to nomenclature: in the West it is politically contentious to call the country Myanmar; many people there prefer the name Burma, saying that to acknowledge it as Myanmar is to be complicit in the human rights abuses of the ruling government. Yet "Burma" itself was a colonial name of sorts: the country is actually made up of a number of self-identified peoples, such as the Shan, Karen, Kachin, and the Burmars are just one of these. But to most people in Myanmar who we met it's a non-issue these days, and they refer to the language, people, and state as "Myanmar," though they don't mind if one calls it "Burma" or "Burmese"--they just see this as the old way of referring to the country. Lonely Planet (the guidebook company that reigns supreme among the backpacking crowd) toes the line by referring to the country as "Myanmar" but the people, language, and culture as "Burmese," so I'll do the same in my writing.

Myanmar has an extremely bad image in the West, especially in America, and has gotten a ton of bad publicity lately. First, in Yangon in September 2007 there was a large protest of monks against the government, which was violently suppressed. And in May 2008 a devastating cyclone hit the southern coast of mainland Myanmar, destroying vast swathes of property and killing an untold amount of people. Yangon was affected by the cyclone but has recovered almost completely; we saw no signs of damage upon visiting three months later. But the once-popular beach resorts of the Irrawaddy Delta, such as Chaungtha and Ngapoli, are now closed to tourists (presumably because the government wants to cover up the extent of the destruction in these areas), which is a shame because Myanmar is known for its clear-water and white-sand beaches, similar to those in Thailand. In fact, large tracts of the country are closed to foreigners, include entire provinces--not because of the cyclone but because the government, it seems, has something to hide about the way people there live and are treated. At certain roadblocks we were stopped and had to present our passports; if we had been traveling to closed areas, we would have been turned around.

The good news is, there are still many places for tourists to visit, including the main tourists sites--Yangon, Inle Lake, Bagan, and Mandalay. Additionally, for the average tourist, the government's visibility is extremely low. We hardly even saw traffic cops during our stay in the country and we never felt as if people were on guard or as if we were in any sort of danger. In fact, compared to China, the military presence was almost nil: in China we'd seen soldiers marching on a regular basis throughout all parts of the country, we'd heard rumors about the large number of plainclothes police officers stationed throughout crowds, and there was a far greater sense of being watched, since all Internet activity was scanned and monitored and many web sites--including Facebook--were blocked. In Myanmar there was also an extensive firewall, which blocks e-mail sites like Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo, but it was extremely easy to get around. Every internet café and hotel simply ran a program on each of their computers that disabled the firewall and allowed easy access to blocked websites (this was not possible in China). And in both places people are afraid to talk badly about the government, but we found a far greater number of people willing to do so (albeit in a hushed whisper) in Myanmar--perhaps because there seems to be much less surveillance, commensurate with the country's lower level of technological sophistication in general.

In fact, the main arena in which we noticed the effects of the government was its negative ramifications on the economy. Many people in Myanmar are very, very poor and have little opportunity to accumulate greater wealth, since there is very little to go around. If widely cited statistics are to be believed, about half of the national GDP goes straight into the pockets of government officials, whose coffers include large amounts of public funds (most of which are culled from the sale of natural gas, timber, gems, and other resources of which Myanmar is chock full). This is one of the reasons that tourism has been discouraged in Myanmar in the past: pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi (who has been under house arrest from 1989-1995 and 2000-present for her efforts) called for tourists to boycott Myanmar in 1996, a year the government declared "The Year of Tourism," in order to avoid supporting--financially and on principle--the government. But I believe this has only increased the suffering of people there greatly. If one is careful, one can avoid spending money that goes to the government nearly altogether, and instead support the hundreds of thousands of small businesses in Myanmar that are struggling to survive. It's difficult to describe how greatly people in Myanmar need tourists' money. In most of the places we visited, there were between one and three dozen tourists at generous estimate, yet there were hundreds businesses who depended on tourists for survival: hotels, restaurants, travel agencies, trekking guides, boat drivers, small shops, and so on. The infrastructure is there to handle a large number of tourists in very comfortable accommodations, but there is almost no one to take advantage of it. Nearly every single Burmese person we met lamented to us how terrible their business had been, particularly over the last year. They often told us how much they were hoping more people would come: "October, November (the beginning of the high season)... maybe then there will be more tourists. If not, we don't know what we will do." Thus people were incredibly appreciative of our business, which made us extremely glad that we had come to Myanmar. The whole experience--repeated over and over with each person we met--made us want to encourage everyone we could to visit the country and support these people in their struggle. So many people work so hard to keep their hotels, restaurants, and stores running and their families and employees fed, but it's difficult without any customers.

The fact that there were so few foreigners in the country made us quite a sight to behold for many people. No matter where we were--even in the places most commonly visited by tourists--nearly every head turned, gawking, in our direction as we passed by. Most people, shocked at first to see us, were quick to smile or say hello. We found ourselves in many more conversations with local people than we had experienced anywhere else; everywhere we went, people asked us where we were from and wanted to stop and talk with us. They told us about their lives, their families, how poorly their business had been doing, how much they needed more tourists and a change in governance. We made a number of Burmese friends in every town we visited. It was shocking at first to us how well literally everyone spoke English: we had expected that because there weren't many tourists, and because English had been banned in schools for over twenty years (as a result of the anti-British backlash), it would be difficult to communicate with people--especially after our difficulties in China, where there is far greater occasion to communicate with foreigners. But even in the tiniest store on the random back street, we were always encountered people who both spoke very good English and were eager to practice with us. It made it possible to gain a lot from our travels, since we learned so much about the people who we met.

As we traveled, it was surprising to see how different Myanmar was from Thailand, despite the fact the two countries are right next to each other, offer similar natural attractions, and have been linked by religion and cultures throughout the centuries (the Shan dialect, of Myanmar's Shan state, is the same language as Thai). As far as tourism goes, Thailand is Southeast Asia's sparkling gem, whereas Myanmar is still a diamond in the rough. Despite the fact that they are both ruled by military governments that seized power through coups, the economy is really what makes the difference, and the Thai government hasn't done much to meddle with the effects of capitalism. Bangkok is a huge metropolis with 100-story buildings and a Sky Train; Yangon is home to crumbling facades and doesn't even have so much as a highway. Throughout Myanmar there is practically no car more recent that a 1995 model, and even old junkers cost US $30,000-40,000 each, so almost no one can afford them. Cell phones cost in the range of thousands of dollars; the typical person in Myanmar makes less than $1 a day, working seven days a week at a salaried job, so those, too, are simply out of reach. In Thailand, foreigners are shuttled in what they call "VIP" charter buses from destination to destination at high speeds; in Myanmar ancient buses creep along pothole-ridden roads, with people sitting on plastic stools in the aisles, frequently breaking down along the way. It is illustrative of the effects of government on development, and the impact of tourism on the economy of small countries.

But on the other hand, the lack of highly frequented tourist routes has positive impacts on our experiences as well. As I mentioned before, Burmese people could not wait to talk with us, and other tourists were curious to know what had brought us to Myanmar, meaning we easily made friends everywhere we went. Thai people are also extremely friendly and willing to chat, but their constant exposure to tourists has made us less of a novelty and therefore less intriguing to them. And the travelers in Thailand are possibly the least friendly in Southeast Asia: deluged by other foreign faces everywhere, most tourists just try to ignore everyone else so they can relax on the beach. Disappointingly, the majority of travelers in Thailand won't even return a smile. To me, the most interesting and exciting part of traveling is meeting both locals and other people on the road; without that, it's difficult to get the most out of one's travel experiences. So after a month in Thailand I appreciated the change.

Another major--perhaps the most noticeable--impact of Myanmar's relative insularity is the way that cultural traditions have been maintained there. From the instant we stepped off the plane, it became evident. About 90-95% of the people there, both men and women, wear what is called a longyi, a long, tubular, ankle-length skirt, generally of a dark fabric, that is knotted in the front. It's a sort of symbol of Burmese identity, and pants are sort of a strange Western style taken up only by a handful of teenagers and bourgeoisie. Altogether, people in Myanmar are generally very modest: they don't dare show even their knees, women don't ever wear low-cut shirts, and everyone wears short- or long-sleeves, no matter how hot it is. After becoming accustomed to Thailand, where the standard of style is very different, I had almost given away my short-sleeved shirts, but after arriving in Myanmar I was extremely glad I had kept them!

Another obvious difference in styling in the make-up people there wear, called "piu," which means white in Burmese. It's worn by almost all women and children of both genders, and some men. The number of men wearing it increased outside of the major city of Yangon, and from what we could tell no bourgeoisie-type people wore it, making us think that it has taken on a gendered and class-related meaning among people with greater exposure to Western ideas of beauty. In fact it's not so much white as pale yellow, made from a type of root that is ground and then mixed with water so it can be applied to the body. It's not make-up in any sense to which we are accustomed: there's nothing subtle about its application, which is done in a thick swipe across each cheek, almost haphazard-looking to an unfamiliar eye. Many people also apply it to their nose, chin, or forehead, or in a mask-like coating all over their face. Some put a thin layer on their arms as well. Against dark-brown Burmese skin it stands out very boldly, in a way that most Westerners would consider ugly--like clown's make-up--but which the Burmese consider beautiful. Piu serves as a type of sunscreen, but also as a face paint, a sort of home-made foundation that enhances the appearance of one's whiteness. We didn't ever (maybe couldn't ever) understand exactly why the Burmese perceived to be so beautiful about it, but we grew used to it so that even people wearing a splotchy yellow mask of make-up seemed normal to us.

One more physical difference that is obvious upon arriving in Myanmar is the fact that many people--usually men--have reddish-colored teeth. This is the result of chewing betel, a type of stimulant similar to caffeine that Burmese also believe helps to quench thirst, which dyes the chewer's teeth red (particularly when combined with poor dental hygiene). Betel consists of a type of nut mixed with chalk made from limestone, cardamom, and a few other spices, wrapped in a leaf from a betel plant. According to Dave, who tried it at a provincial market (the surprised vendor refused to let him pay!), it's actually very tasty, but the limestone chalk cuts your gums slightly when you chew it. One must spit out whatever remains after it's no longer chewable, so everywhere you walk in Myanmar you can see huge red splotches on the ground, the remains of a giant lugie hawked out by a betel chewer.

After taking some time to become accustomed to the differences between Myanmar and the other places we had traveled, we visited the primary sight to see in Yangon, the Shwe Dagon pagoda. Shwe Dagon, meaning "Golden Pagoda of Yangon," is the most famous, and perhaps the most beautiful, pagoda in the country. It's actually a complex of 87 different pagodas, but it's known for its huge central stupa, made out of some ridiculous amount of gold and topped with a huge ornamental spire of diamonds and rubies. It towers over Yangon and is the symbol of the city. Even Burmese Buddhist is meant to visit Shwe Dagon at least once in their life to worship there. We had a wonderful tour guide there, who explained many of the different facets of the pagoda to us. We learned that to Burmese people, the date on which you are born is less important than the day of the week. They use these days of the week as a type of zodiac, each represented by a different planet and different animal, and each supposedly corresponding to personality traits and compatibility with other days of the week. On one's day of the week, it is customary to come to the pagoda and participate in certain festivities. In different locations around the pagoda, there are small statues symbolizing the planets and animals for each day, next to a tub of water. You are supposed to pour water over the statue eight times for good luck. Dave and I were both born on a Tuesday (also both in June of 1986, except exactly two weeks apart--most auspicious circumstances, according to Buddhists!), so we found our statutes--Mars is the planet and a lion is the animal--and did the water pouring. We had a lot of fun for the rest of our time in Myanmar, so I guess it worked!

We spent the rest of our time in Yangon walking around the city and hanging out with the various people we met there. One night we ate at a Japanese restaurant and became good friends with our waiter, Sai. We spent the next few days visiting him every day, sometimes to eat, sometimes just to drink tea and talk. Sai gave us both our very own longyis--which, when we wore them home that day, drew many confused stares and laughs from passersby. Later, after we had returned to Bangkok, Dave wore his longyi down Khao San Road, the heart of the backpacker district, and we discovered from dozens of cries of "Mingalaba!" ("hello" in Burmese) that maybe half of the vendors on Khao San had actually emigrated from Myanmar (the other tourists didn't respond as friendlily--one American passed Dave and exclaimed, "This dude's wearing a dress!"). Happy to see a farang ("foreigner") in a longyi, the Burmese vendors chatted us up about our experiences in Myanmar, and we gave them cheroots, a type of cigar wrapped in leaves that we had brought back with us. Most of them hadn't been to Myanmar in years and were really excited to have a taste of home.

There is another large pagoda in the center of Yangon called Sule Paya, and two days in a row we ran into a monk outside the pagoda who invited us to his monastery. We accepted his offer and the next morning we boarded a public bus for one hour out to Insein, in the far reaches of Yangon (what would be called the suburbs, but is actually quite rural). There we found a small monastery with about eight monks and twenty young students, between the ages of eight and thirteen. They were extremely excited to see us and lavished us with food and presents (ranging from bananas, to toothbrushes, to washcloths, to a book called "Myanmar's Endeavour Against Narcotic Drugs"--which the monk, not really being able to read English, told us was "a story"). After stuffing ourselves with one meal, they offered us another, and then another, until we couldn't help but refuse the things they put in front of us, lest we burst.

Dave and I had been thinking that it might be good to use our relatively hard-to-procure visas to do a bit of volunteering while in Myanmar, and once we arrived at the monastery we knew we had found our opportunity. We gave a quick lesson that day, and offered to come back for the rest of the week to help with their morning English lessons. What we found was a relatively difficult situation for teaching. The style of instruction in Myanmar is very different than that to which we are accustomed in America. It's done mostly through repetition, so the students repeat a short story in English, not really understanding the grammar or the meaning of the individual words, and then the teacher tells them the answers to the questions that follow, which in turn they repeat out loud in unison. It completely lacks any effort to make the students be creative or produce any spontaneous responses to questions or scenarios. The result is a general boredom and ineffectiveness in learning. Furthermore, the monks repeatedly called students "stupid" and smacked them on the head if they didn't provide answers quickly enough, which I could tell embarrassed them, even if they stared straight ahead trying to keep their pride.

I tried to use a more holistic approach to teaching, attempting to provoke students to create their own responses, but ran into difficulty because the monks just shouted out the answers to my questions and the students repeated them in turn. I wanted to snap them out of the general academic funk they were in, so I told them to stand up, arranged them into evenly spaced lines, and taught them how to do jumping jacks. They couldn't believe that a teacher would actually have them do something so silly and fun and began smiling and giggling. I could see that it was working, so I acted as if it were all planned, telling them that "in America, this is what teachers do when the students are tired." I proceeded to lead them in all sorts of crazy games, such as Freeze Dance and Follow the Leader. It was so rewarding to see their faces, which had always been dull and bored up until then, light up as they had the chance to be active. They were all laughing and teasing each other, having a sort of fun that is foreign to school time in Myanmar. These kids were from poor families and had been sent to study in the monastery for one or two years each, so I could tell that they had had to be serious almost all the time. It was great to see them to have the chance to be kids, even for a short while.

We had already spent a week in Yangon, far longer than most tourists stay in the city and longer than we had intended to stay upon our arrival, so even though we had enjoyed our volunteering, it was time to get going. We said goodbye at the monastery, checked out of our guesthouse (the wonder Motherland Inn 2), and boarded an overnight bus for Inle Lake on August 7. Since the only international flights are in and out of Yangon, we knew we would be back in not too long.
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Koh Samet, Thailand

We left Bangkok early on July 29 to go to Koh Samet (sometimes written as Koh Samed). We arrived to find a nice little island, with bright, blue-green water and the softest sand we'd encountered in Thailand--it felt like flour when we pinched it between our fingers. We stayed at Ao Hin Khok beach, in a budget bungalow operation called Tok, which was very cheap but offered the most run-down facilities we'd stayed in thus far. Unlike the majority of the southern islands, Koh Samet had relatively deep water with waves, which made it fun for swimming.

Also unlike most of the other islands we'd visited, on Koh Samet the various beaches are within walking distance of one another, which was nice because it allowed us a greater variety of food and entertainment options. We spent much of our time on Koh Samet sunbathing and eating. At night, a bit up the beach, many of the bars had spectacular fire shows. One place had eight separate guys doing fire-dancing all at once; at one point they even stood on each others' shoulders, swinging blazing balls of fire all the while and never once missing a beat. It was a pretty impressive display.

Our second day in Koh Samet, we decided to seek out a different corner of the island, so we walked across to Ao Praow, on the western side of the island. The waves there were even larger than on the eastern side, where we were staying. They increased in ferocity and we realized a storm was brewing as the clouds grew darker and thicker. We hightailed it back to Ao Hin Khok before settling down for some dinner and a second good-bye with Charlotte (this time with Nikki as well).

Again, it was sad to say good-bye, but this time we had an entirely new adventure ahead of us. We returned to Bangkok on July 31 for an afternoon of last-minute errands before our early morning flight to Yangon, Myanmar. We will be in Myanmar probably for about two to four weeks before heading back eastward in search of jobs in Southeast Asia. Updates will follow!
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Railay, Thailand

We arrived at Railay Beach West by ferry just before sunset and began looking for accommodation immediately. Railay has an interesting geography: it's a very thin peninsula surrounded by searing limestone cliffs all around. You can walk between Railay East and Railay West, where most of the family and luxury accommodations are, in about five minutes. But just next to Railay West is another beach, Ao Ton Sai ("Ao" means bay in Thai, so it's usually translated as Tonsai Bay), which is separated by about 100 feet of rocks jutting out into the water, where most of the young people and budget accommodations are located. There's a passage through the rocks that involves some pretty intense hiking (verging on rock climbing) which most people use to get back and forth. We were fortunate enough to arrive during a period of very low tide, so rather than paying for a taxi boat or making the treacherous hike we were able to trudge through the water, which varied from ankle- to knee-deep. With our backpacks it was moderately difficult but we felt very accomplished once we reached the other side.

We checked into a room at the Tonsai Bay Resort and had a relaxed evening. The next day the rainy season finally caught up to us (for the first time since Koh Chang two weeks before). It poured all day long, which was a little dreary since nowhere on Tonsai has electricity between the hours of 10 am and 5 pm and it was pretty dark indoors without sunshine. During the high season (October to March) there is a lot of activity on Tonsai, but since it's low season, many of the bars and bungalows further down the beach were closed, so there were fewer things to do. Fortunately there was a great place called the Chill Out Bar really close to our place that was open, and we quickly got to know the Thai owners and their friends, most of whom drive longtail taxi boats in the area. We quickly became friends and spent a lot of time hanging out with them, which was a great way to spend our time in Railay.

One unique point about Railay, and Tonsai in particular, is that the whole area is crazy for rock climbing. Most of our fellow travelers were rock climbers and they spent time scaling the huge rock faces that surrounded the bay. Charlotte and Dave both wanted to try it, but I'm not a very confident or enthusiastic climber (I've always been terrified by it, even in small trees), so I knew right away I'd be happy abstaining. On our second full day at Tonsai, however, I got a bit more than I'd bargained for. It was a bit overcast but not raining so we decided to go for an adventure to a lagoon we'd heard about. We hiked through the passageway between Tonsai and Railay West, which was quite a steep and rocky climb in and of itself, before joining the trail to the lagoon. The turn-off wouldn't have been obvious if there hadn't been a sign pointing to the first obstacle in the course: a nearly vertical climb up a 100-foot wall of mud and tree roots. Once we'd made it up, we realized it had only been a sign of what to come. At one point we were forced to make it down a steep hill of slippery mud using knotted ropes to steady ourselves; it probably would have been easier to slide straight down. As we approached the lagoon, the going got really tough: at several points, the trail required us to abseil down 15-foot vertical rock faces. The moment we got there, the sky opened up and poured down a brief tropical rainstorm, making it even slipperier. As I said before, I'm not much of a climber, so I decided to hang out in the jungle for a bit and leave the more hard core stuff to Charlotte and Dave (we had also met up with a Dutch guy along the way, a more experienced climber who gave us encouragement on the trickier parts). After they returned from the lagoon, we hiked back up to a gorgeous viewpoint where we had an amazing angle from which we could see the entire Railay peninsula. Then it was back on down the mountain, a feat we completed (fortunately) without incident.

Our last night at Tonsai was also supposed to be our last night with Charlotte, who was headed back to Bangkok to meet her sister before setting off for Cambodia. To mark the occasion we ordered a bucket for the first time--all over Thailand you can order a super-size cocktail, served in a bucket (the kind a child would use in a sandbox) and containing a whole flask of rum, usually with a Red Bull and a Coke. They even sell pre-packaged bucket kits in stores around Thailand. We had laughed about all the tourists walking down Bangkok's Khao San Road toting a bucket each, but we had never tried one, so we figured it was time. I don't like hard alcohol, so I refrained, but it was an amusing diversion. The next morning we said good-bye to Charlotte, which was sad, since we didn't know when we would see her (or any of our other friends from the States) again. It had been really great getting to travel with a friend from home.

We were headed for Koh Lanta, another island just south of Railay. But the bad weather the past few days had made the sea extremely choppy, so no longtail boats would leave Tonsai Bay. The delay forced us to miss the tickets we had bought (we were able to get our money back). Since the tide was high and our big bags were too heavy to tackle the shorter but rockier path, we had to take the long way to Railay, which led us through the jungle for about 45 minutes. We were relieved to reach the other side, and after some time we managed to catch a boat to a place where we could hop in a taxi to Ao Nang or Krabi town, the two main departure points in the area. As we were riding in the back of the pick-up truck taxi, it started pouring rain. It seemed like events were conspiring to change our minds about more time on the beach. We had a lot of errands to get done in Bangkok before heading to Myanmar, which was next on our agenda, so on a whim we decided to forgo Koh Lanta (this time) and caught an overnight bus from Krabi to Bangkok.

Once in Bangkok we discovered Charlotte was staying in the same guesthouse as us (the same place we had stayed during previous visits to Bangkok). She had not known we'd changed our minds, so it was a pleasant surprise when we met up. While in Bangkok we checked many things off our to-do lists, and met up with Charlotte's sister, Nikki. We had a few days to kill before heading to Yangon, and they were going eastward to Cambodia with a flexible schedule, so together we decided to spend a few days on Koh Samet, an island three hours east of Bangkok (between Bangkok and Koh Chang). We hadn't wanted to give up the island lifestyle just yet, so it was a welcome turn of events.
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Koh Phi Phi, Thailand

We arrived on Koh Phi Phi (pronounced like 'pee pee') in the afternoon of July 21, and we were a bit unsure about which part of the island to stay on. There is a pretty extensive tourist town there that stretches along a tiny isthmus, but the beaches there are less spectacular than elsewhere. Koh Phi Phi is best known for Maya Bay, where the movie "The Beach" was filmed, but it's expensive to stay there and you're only allowed to be there for one night. Ultimately we opted for Long Beach, which is a five-minute ride away by longtail taxi boat, where there are fewer things to do but a nicer and much less crowded beach to swim at. We checked into the Pearl Paradise (P.P.) resort, where the three of us shared a spacious bungalow near the beach. It was the first bungalow we'd stayed at that was made entirely out of bamboo, which was an experience--I was pretty sure that certain segments of the floor would give way if I stood on them for too long.

The next day we headed into town via taxi boat, where we wandered around doing some errands. We happened to strike up a conversation with some people in one of the dive shops, Barakuda Diving, and semi-impulsively decided to go scuba diving that afternoon off Koh Phi Phi Leh, a smaller, rockier island just next to the bigger Koh Phi Phi Don island, where we were staying. We were planning on doing two dives, so they offered us the option of using one of our dives to get our deep-water diving certificates and we accepted. The first stage of diving certification (called "open water") allows you to go down to 18 meters, and the next stage is the advanced certification, for which you need five dives in different specialized areas, including a deep dive. After our deep dive on Koh Phi Phi, we're now one dive closer to being advanced divers, and we're also certified to go down to 30 meters anywhere in the world. On our second dive our instructor took us to a reef where there are a lot of sea turtles, and it was amazing to get to swim right next to them. It made our diving experience on Koh Phi Phi really memorable.

We spent the rest of our time on Koh Phi Phi snorkeling and swimming in the unbelievably beautiful water, which practically glowed bright turquoise. Unlike the eastern Thai islands, where the tide is high at night, on the Andaman islands the morning and afternoon are the best time for swimming, so we availed ourselves of it. But with our time with Charlotte swiftly running out, we had to move on quickly and after just a few days we found ourselves on a ferry once more, this time to Railay, a peninsula jutting out from the Krabi province of southwestern Thailand.
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Ko Phangan, Thailand

We arrived in Koh Phangan (sometimes written as Pha-Ngan, but pronounced like Pah-nyahn) on July 17, two days before the Full Moon Party. The Full Moon Party is the biggest event on the island-hopping scene, and every month thousands of people flock to Koh Phangan to party all night on the beach. The actual party takes place in an area called Hat Rin on the southern tip of the island, but accommodation there is very expensive and fully bwooked ahead of time. Dave, Charlotte, and I didn't feel the need to be in the center of the party anyway, so we went first to a place called Sea Sunset Resort in the northwest of the island (the word "resort" means something different in Thailand than America--here it refers simply to a guesthouse/bungalow village, typically with a small restaurant). The setting was beautiful--the resort looked out onto a sandy beach, and the water punctuated by rocks that were a great sitting place to watch yet another fabulous sunset. But there was almost nothing within walking distance, so we decided to move resorts and get a little bit closer to the action.

Dave and I rented a motorbike and cruised down the length of the island to Baan Tai, the area just before Hat Rin. There we walked the beach, inquiring about rooms at each of the guesthouses. Given our proximity to Hat Rin, almost all of them were completely full, but by pure luck we happened to stop at a lovely place called Liberty Bungalows just after one of the guests had told the owner he was leaving. She told us we could have the room, so the next morning we hopped into the back of a pick-up truck taxi and rode to our new place. Our bungalow at Liberty more like a treehouse--although made of concrete and wood, it was elevated to second-story level with a winding staircase leading up to the top. We settled in quickly.

The Baan Tai area was more developed than where we had been before, so Charlotte and I set off on an expedition to the small town near our resort. On the way we stumbled upon a tiny bar set back from the road, located in the three-foot space beneath a large bungalow-style house and furnished with pillows and tapestries. Immediately we got to know the owner, Chad, a Koh Phangan local who runs the small bar by himself on his family's land (its serves more as a hang-out place for him and his friends than a veritable business). He was extremely welcoming and we made fast friends, so we promised to return later with Dave. For the rest of the time we were in Koh Phangan the three of us visited Chad frequently, spending a few hours each day hanging out with him in what felt like a sort of secret hideout.

Throughout our time on Koh Phangan there was a building of excitement in anticipation of the Full Moon Party. We were hanging out with Chad on the night of the party, preparing to head off to Hat Rin, when it started pouring rain. Undeterred, we caught a taxi to the party, gritting our teeth as the car pummeled down the steep, wet, windy road that separates Baan Tai from Hat Rin. The rain was still going when we reached the beach, but the party was raging nonetheless, periodically illuminated by huge bolts of lightning that shone a beautiful light on the beach. We got there around 9:30 pm and the beach was starting to fill up with people, many of whom were covered from head to toe in Day-Glo body paint. Each bar along Hat Rin was lit up like Times Square, blaring music out onto the dancing masses covering the beach. With the energy there it was easy to forget entirely about the rain, which lasted another hour or two.

We spent the rest of the night meeting people from around the world, making tons of new friends. As the sun was rising over the ocean, someone we met invited us up to his hotel balcony overlooking Hat Rin. We had a great view of the crowds below and the gorgeous dawn. It wasn't until around 8 am that we actually caught a taxi back to Baan Tai to crash for the next few hours. We spent the next day recovering from lack of sleep in the restaurant at Liberty, watching movies and indulging in the amazing food cooked by the guesthouse manager.

We'd liked to have stayed longer in Koh Phagnan, but not long after the Full Moon Party it was time to move again. Many people continue on from Koh Tao and Koh Phangan to the next (and most popular) tourist spot in that small chain of islands, one called Koh Samui. We had heard that it was a bit untastefully built up and Charlotte had only a week left in Thailand with us, so decided to skip it (for now) and to head to the other side of the southern Thai peninsula. On the west coast--less than two hours away on the mainland isthmus--is the jumping-off point for Koh Phi Phi, in the Andaman Sea. The island is famed for its beauty, so we decided to head there next and see what we found.
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Ko Tao, Thailand

We took a night bus south from Bangkok to Chumphon, where we caught an early morning ferry to Koh Tao, the northernmost major island off the southern Thai peninsula, in the Gulf of Thailand. Koh Tao is known for its scuba diving, and it is one of the cheapest and best places in the world to get a beginning scuba diving certification. Many of the guesthouses offer package deals, where you get free accommodation if you take the course through the dive school. We found a nice place right in the middle of Sairee Beach, the main beach for dive shops and bars on Koh Tao, called Sairee Hut. For about $250 each, we got a three-day diving course and four nights of accommodation in a luxe little cottage near the beach. At first Dave and Charlotte weren't sure about diving, but upon arrival both decided to take the opportunity and get certified. I was certain I wanted to do it, so I was more than happy to have the company.

We began diving that very day and it consumed the majority of our time on Koh Tao from there on out. Our instructor, Simon, was from England and had been living on Koh Tao for nearly a year. We quickly befriended him and had a lot of fun hanging out on the dive boat, sunning ourselves on the second level between dives. Diving itself was a great adventure. Not having given it much thought at first, I was a bit surprised by the heft of the equipment required. Although it's weightless in the water, the oxygen tank and vest (called a BCD) make moving around quite difficult for the few moments before you jump in. But it's pretty fantastic once you're a few meters deep and you can swim freely underwater without having to come up for air. As promised, the reefs in Koh Tao were pretty spectacular. The water is very clear so the visibility is great, illuminating the marine life like a technicolor kaleidoscope. We did six dives in total, focusing on diving skills during a few and just having fun for the rest. Getting to see the island from underwater really enriched our experiences there, and now that we're certified we can dive anywhere in the world for the rest of our lives.

Most of our time not spent diving we passed relaxing near the beach. Sairee Beach faces west, so we were treated to spectacular sunsets every evening. We took to going into the sea at sunset every night, enjoying the view and the warm water after busy days of diving. On islands on the Gulf of Thailand, the tide comes in late in the day, so it's the ideal time for swimming, since the water is ordinarily very shallow on the beach. We made friends with some English guys who had the same tradition, and each evening we met them for another sunset swim, which was a lovely way to end the day.

On our last day in Koh Tao, after finishing the final dive of our course, we rented motorcycles and attempted to drive them to Shark Bay, not too far away on the southern end of the island. Dave and I had rented a motorbike before in Yangshuo and Koh Chang, but we were surprised by how the shops in Koh Tao ran their rental business--it was much less relaxed than anywhere we had been previously. Before lending the bikes, they inspected them extremely thoroughly and marked every single tiny ding or scratch down on their paper, even ones that I would never have noticed. They also handed us a list of every single thing that could go wrong with the bike and how much it would cost us--about $50-300 for any harm that might come (an extremely high sum in Thailand). We were a bit nervous about anything happening--all over the islands we saw tons of people with bandages from motorcycle accidents--but it seemed pretty reasonable until we pulled off the paved main road and saw what we had to contend with the rest of the way to Shark Bay. The "road" could hardly have been called a trail: it resembled a creek bed, laden with huge rocks and gravel and rutted on all sides from water and wear. It climbed steeply uphill, then veered sharply down, continuing this way for a good while. It was a formidable enough obstacle on its own, but with our newfound paranoia about protecting the bikes, it became an even more terrifying natural boundary. Eventually the going got so tough that we parked our bikes at the top of a hill and walked the rest of the way down to the beach.

Like most of the beaches on Koh Tao and the eastern Thai islands, Shark Bay had a flat, white beach with shallow, clear blue water and fringed by a coral reef. We spent the afternoon snorkeling and sunning. Dave managed to see a five-foot black-tip reef shark and a ton of barracudas. Somehow, at the end of the day we managed to make it back and return the bikes without incident, which seemed like a miracle at the time.

We had grown a bit attached to Koh Tao--it was our first taste of true island paradise, and we had had a lot of fun scuba diving and making friends. But there was a mass exodus in swing, with pretty much every backpacker in Thailand heading to Koh Phangan for the Full Moon Party, to be held on July 19. We didn't want to get stuck without accommodation, so as soon as our free stay in Koh Tao was up we hopped down south to continue our adventure.
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Koh Chang, Thailand

While we waited for Charlotte to arrive in Bangkok, we hopped over to Koh Chang, an island in the southeastern corner of the country on the Gulf of Thailand. In Thai, "Koh" means island, so most of the places we visited in Thailand thereafter began with Koh. Koh Chang is the second-biggest island in Thailand after Phuket, but tourism is less developed there, so we were able to enjoy a nice, relaxing pace along the beach for relatively inexpensive prices.

We took a bus to the southeastern coast and then a ferry to Koh Chang, where we hopped into the back of a pick-up truck, which took us to Lonely Beach. There are several beaches on Koh Chang that travelers tend to visit, but Lonely Beach caters the most to the backpacker crowd. We checked into a bungalow village called Magic Garden, which had cool, comfy common spaces and cute little bamboo bungalows with large porches. From there, we went to straight to the beach, which we had been craving after almost five weeks of traveling. The water was warm, which was a nice change from what I had been used to growing up in California, and we were able to watch the sunset from the water. That night we watched a fire dancing show on the beach, which seems to be one of the most popular pastimes for young Thai guys. Everywhere we've been in Thailand there have been fire shows, using poi (fire-lit balls on the end of chains) and staffs (sticks lit with fire on both sides of a handle in the center). It's really cool to watch, especially in such a beautiful setting.

We spent the next day lounging on the beach, taking in some sun. It's the rainy season in Koh Chang right now, so for our second and third full days there it rained off and on. We passed the time hanging out at our two favorite places in Koh Chang, the Treehouse--a restaurant/bungalow village with the most delicious food we had in all of Thailand--and the Ting Tong Bar, a 24-hour bar/restaurant. We became friends with the owners of and frequent visitors to Ting Tong, which was nice because they were the first Thai people we got to know. I became addicted to lassis, a type of fruit shake made with yoghurt. In Thailand they sell fruit shakes everywhere, usually with a choice between coconut, banana, pineapple, mango, watermelon, and a few other fruits, which I love. In fact, the ingredients in Thai food are almost all truly wonderful, consisting mainly of pineapple, seafood, peanuts, coconut, curries, and other good stuff. We've enjoyed eating richly, especially at $2-3 a dish!

On our last day in Koh Chang, it stopped raining around 3 pm, so we rented a motorbike and headed for Long Beach, another more secluded beach on the other side of the island. The roads were pretty scary at some times--there were parts with nearly vertical slopes going up blind corners that made me worry. But Dave was an able driver, and we made it to Long Beach just before sunset. It was a gorgeous little cove with soft sand and tons of beautiful seashells. We didn't stay too long, since we wanted to avoid driving in the dark as much as possible, but we enjoyed the tour of the island and the chance to try out a new beach.

We returned to Bangkok on July 10 to meet up with Charlotte before spending a few weeks in southern Thailand. Koh Chang was a great introduction to island life in Thailand, but it was only the beginning of many more to come!
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Bangkok, Thailand

After landing in Bangkok, we followed in the footsteps of thousands of other backpackers and headed straight for Khao San Road. Khao San is known as the backpacker capital of Asia, and it's where most budget-oriented tourist services are congregated in Bangkok. The street itself is a long block bulging with bars, souvenir stands, clothing racks, and food vendors. It's rumored to be pretty seedy, but by now it has been really sanitized for tourists and is a nice, cheap place to stay in Bangkok.

We checked into a guesthouse on an alley just off Khao San, where we could get a double room for $6 per night. Immediately we went to grab some street food on the main road, where we caught a telling glimpse of how things function in Thai society. While the street vendor was frying up some pad thai for us in her giant wok, a police officer on his motor cycle pulled up in front of her stand and surveyed the scene. Along with half a dozen other street vendors (who aren't authorized by the government), the woman yelled "Police!," threw down her utensils, and pushed her wheeled cart halfway down an alley, all in plain view of the cop. Souvenir vendors started tucking counterfeit items under their stands. When the officer was satisfied that everyone had made an effort to conceal (however slightly) their illegal activity, he rode off. The woman returned to cooking our pad thai as if nothing happened. It was interesting to get a perspective on how law functions in Thailand.

We were leaving Bangkok the next day to go to the island of Koh Chang, so we didn't have time to see everything. Instead we opted for a tuk-tuk ride around to some of the sights, which is extremely inexpensive (about 30 cents an hour) but comes with a catch: you have to go to a retail store (usually a tailor or jeweler), which the driver will take you to, and talk to the salesperson as if you're a potential customer. The drivers claim they get a gas voucher for this. After visiting a giant Buddha, a lucky Buddha, and a couple other spots in the city, our tuk-tuk driver--who was a positively giddy man, overflowing with enthusiasm about everything--took us to a tailor's shop, where a cutely awkward Indian man tried to press upon us that it was "our lucky day!" Needless to say, we weren't buying, but the silliness of the sales pitch made us chuckle about the whole experience anyway.

Dave's brother lives in Bangkok, so that evening we met him at a seafood restaurant by the river. He gave us a few tips about traveling in Thailand and took us to a couple bars. Walking home along Khao San at 10 pm was certainly an experience--thousands of drunken travelers (mainly British tourists) sipping cocktails from buckets, which are the most popular way to sell hard alcohol in Thailand. There was even an elephant on the street available for picture taking. We had an early bus the next morning, so we opted out, but we couldn't help remark about the difference between day and night on Khao San.

After a stint in Koh Chang (which I'll write about in a different entry) we returned to Bangkok to join up with our friend Charlotte from school, who was on vacation in Thailand for two weeks. We stayed at the same place on Khao San, and in the morning went to some of the major temples in Bangkok with Charlotte. First we visited Wat Arun, which is a very tall, thin temple that comes to a quadrangular point. You can climb up nearly to the top, but you have to brave some seriously steep steps on the way up. From the top, however, you get a great view of the city. It was a beautiful day, so we enjoyed that a lot. After Wat Arun we visited Wat Pho, the biggest temple in Bangkok, where there is a giant reclining Buddha made out of gold. The sheer size of it was impressive, and the rest of the temple grounds were lovely as well. Next we headed to the river, where we took a longtail boat ride through the khlongs, which are houses and temples built alongside narrow waterways. Bangkok used to be known as the "Venice of the East," and although many of the canals have been covered up you can still tour through what remains. It was nice to see that side of Bangkok, but a little bizarre since we were basically floating through people's front yards, taking pictures.

We checked out some of the further-flung areas of Bangkok, like Little Arabia, and ate a ton of street food before packing up and leaving Bangkok a second time, heading to some islands further south down the Thai peninsula. After so much time in China and Thailand's biggest city, we were ready for some relaxing at the beach!
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Hong Kong, China

Our time in Hong Kong was relatively brief, which was both sad, because we really liked the city, and merciful, because it was so much more expensive than where we had been traveling! We walked across the border from Shenzhen, got our passports stamped, and took the train into the city. We stayed in Mirador Mansions, a huge building that has been converted into shops on the lower level and guesthouses/apartments on the 15-odd other floors. Although prices weren't the same as in America, it was a shock to our wallets to start paying $25 a night for our room, since we had gotten used to paying $3-8. But we loved the food options in Hong Kong, which were worth the extra cost. We were surprised by how international Hong Kong was--after a month in China, where almost everyone is Chinese or a Caucasian tourist, it seemed unusual to see so many Indian, African, and Middle Eastern people. As a result there is a huge diversity in food and shopping options, of which we tried to take full advantage during our limited time there. Also, the lingua franca there is English, and pretty much everyone speaks it. After a month in China--where practically no one speaks English--it was a welcome change!

We only had one full day in Hong Kong, so we went straight to get some dim sum at a well-known place in City Hall. We are both obsessed with dim sum, but surprisingly there was very little in China since we weren't in the Cantonese areas (outside of very expensive restaurants in places like Beijing and Shanghai). It was also expensive in Hong Kong but worth every penny--dim sum is native to southern China and there they do it best. After lunch we headed to the IFC Tower 2, one of the biggest skyscrapers in the city, where they have an exhibition/viewing room on the 55th floor. From there we looked out onto the urban sprawl and the sparkling South China Sea, getting a great view of the entire city. We puttered around the shopping area for a while before meeting up with Andi, a German guy we had met in Yangshuo who goes to college in Hong Kong. He took us to a really awesome bar area, full of people and lots of cool restaurants and cozy bars, where he introduced us to a bunch of his friends. We had a good time talking about living in Hong Kong with them, since we both felt that out of all the places we had visited so far, Hong Kong was the place we would most like to stop for some time.

We left early in the morning on a ferry to Macau, a former Portuguese colony with a similar independent city-state set-up as Hong Kong. It's full of casinos and little else, so we didn't get to see much since we went straight to the airport. It had been a great run in northern Asia, but we were more than ready to move south to Thailand!
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