To the jungle and beyond

Even though you're not worrying about me, I'm still alive and well in northern Thailand. My adventures in Bangkok were generally enjoyable, but I kept feeling a lot of anxiety about getting hustled and about being sans-wallet and being uncertain of the travels ahead. There could be a million different reasons why, but I've found my comfort zone now in the north.

Bangkok is a gong show. Hustlers all around the Khao San Road area are attempting to swindle you out of your money in a million different ways. I'm fully aware of Khao San was dubbed the "backpacker ghetto", but nothing really prepared me for that dirty little strip in central bangkok that swarmed with sweaty farang (the Thai word for foreigners). Whether I looked like I needed a new suit or maybe I was interested in an elicit, uhhh, let's say "performance", I (along with the rest of the sweat soaked population) was constantly the target of people wanting the money in my pockets.

I met up with some awesome people in Bangkok (some fantastic friends-of-friends, along with a teacher or two from China), but for some reason I was really glad to escape it after 4 days. Immediately after leaving the city, my anxiety began to subside, and a calm state of mind found me. While I was there, though, I got the chance to check out Avatar with Mr. McRann, saw the King of Thailand's Grand Palace, met a police officer who told us all about the royal family, and was nearly attacked by a rabid dog. I guess it wasn't too boring, anyway!

I headed north to Ayuthaya and Sukhothai (two of Thailand's ancient, historical cities) where I ended up meeting/befriending both a Buddhist nun and a Buddhist monk. Very cool, intimate experiences with both. I met the nun (I think her name is spelled Nong) where she told me a bit about Ayuthaya and gave me a bag of bananas as I got off the train, and I met the monk at one of the more secluded monasteries in the Historical Park in Sukhothai. Very cool way to really experience this strange and beautiful country.

I've spent the last few days splitting my time between Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai this past week. So far I've done some rock climbing, tonnes of exploring and spent the past two days trekking through the hill tribe villages and jungle around Chiang Rai. I'm just on my way back to Chiang Mai to spend a few days before heading to Malaysia. I've got some yoga planned for the morning and maybe an overnight at a Buddhist monastery Sunday night. I've been meeting tonnes of great people from all over the world and feel like I'm back on my trip to Europe from 8 years ago, as I just keep finding great people to hang with and experiencing some fascinating things. I think I've met half of Europe in Thailand... five or six people from Germany, three or four Dutch kids, a couple of funny Austrians, a couple from Albertville, France and a few Brits and Canucks as well. Always fun meeting the world while exploring it.

And the food. Sheesh. SOOOOOO good. I've developed a 6 meal-a-day diet right now because there's so much food and they pretty much give it away because it's so cheap. But I've eaten more curry and pad thai and other delightful things in the past week than I can even describe. Which is part of the reason for the activity... no need to get fat while vacationing!

For now, the bus is calling. As is more coffee. I'll be in Chiang Mai for two more days before flying down to meet the Seaths in Kuala Lumpur for some more hiking adventures. Hope you're all well back home and wherever else life finds you right now. From the land of the biggest smiles in the world and the place where everything is "yes" and always, "same same"...

T

Hong Kong and south...

I arrived in Bangkok early this afternoon. I almost didn't make it.

 

Since I lost my wallet, I was trying to limit the amount of money I exchanged, as all of it was withdrawn from my chequing account with the help of Mr. Seath. So I had my lifeline in Chinese RMB. Over the few days in HK, I did my best to be frugal (even though a massive and delicious Mexican dinner proved to be the opposite), and limited the amount I changed into Hong Kong Dollars.

 

Last night, after paying the remaining tab for my guesthouse, I had just enough money for breakfast before flying here to Bangkok. In an attempt to make sure that all was well, I kept the money and told myself I'd get a small breakfast at the airport. Unfortunately, I neglected to consider the cost of the Airport Express metro ride into the equation. So, I got to the correct metro station with $40HKD and my metro pass. I was denied at the turnstile. So, after inquiring the cost of the ride ($100HKD), I realized I only had $9HKD left on my "Octopus" card (used for the Metro system). You do the math. $40 + $9 does NOT equal $100. So, the deposit on the Octopus card ended up being worth $50, giving me $99HKD. Still not enough. After digging through my pockets for the remaining part of the fare, I found one last coin buried in a pocket, paid my ticket, and, full of shame, got on the train.

 

I didn't go hungry, if you were worried. All was well, the flight was smooth (I had booked a meal that I had totally forgotten about), and made it to the world of a muggy 31 degree heat without any problems. Now I'm just awaiting the arrival of some friends-of-friends from Canada who are meeting up with me for a night on the town.

 

Hong Kong seems a long way away already. It was fun for sure, and I even got some sun while hiking the entirety of Lamma Island yesterday. If you're ever in HK, check out the Bookworm Cafe... awesome hippy food for decent prices. Sooo good, and a great start to the hike. I also got to check out a few small temples, a tonne of markets (including a bird market and a goldfish market) and a laser light show on the Victoria Harbour downtown. Met some cool people, as is typically the case when backpacking.

 

But enough stories for now... gotta get the streets so I can dare myself into trying some deep friend tarantula or scorpion (and yes, they do sell them openly in the street... so nuts!). Much love from SE Asia...

 

T

Part 1 (just a tidbit)

It's 8am and I'm just rousing from another restless sleep. But don't misunderstand... the first few days of my adventure have been really good. But the hostel sleeping is a distant memory from Europe 8 years ago, so it's not quite as relaxing as previous experiences would've suggested.

I'm currently on Day 3 in Hong Kong. This is one brilliant, bustling and nutty city. I absolutely love the cosmopolitan nature of it... since being in Dalian, I've become accustomed to a sea of Chinese faces with few surprises or variations. But here, not only is there people from all over the world shouldering their way through the busy streets, but I think the Hong Kong government is attempting to keep the beautiful people ratio at an all time high. Wow.

I don't have much time for an update now, but I've got another 2 days in Hong Kong before Bangkok on Saturday, so I'll hopefully update more then. For now, though, off I run to see the sights.

T

Redefining "moronic"

The first definition of the word "moron" I found is as follows: "a person who is notably stupid or lacking in good judgment." Now, this might not be me most of the time but it sure feels like me right now.

After grading 150 exams on Friday, I was pretty spent and ready for vacation. Since I needed to do some running around and wanted to meet up with a couple of the fellow Harbin travellers to exchange pictures, I left for Kaifaqu yesterday morning to hang with Darren and accomplish these tasks. 

After meeting up with D and doing some trip planning, we headed back to his place. I picked up the tab for the taxi back and headed up to his apartment. What, you may ask, did I do to garner the "moron" title?

TWO DAYS BEFORE I'M FLYING OFF ON VACATION, I LOSE MY WALLET BY LETTING IT FALL OUT OF MY POCKET IN THE TAXI! 

Ridiculous! As I'm sure you guessed, I've spent the past two days furiously attempting to: a) find my wallet and, b) sort out some way to still go on vacation with no debit card(s), no credit card, no secondary ID and no direct access to any of these banking funds.

Luckily, I'm friends with some of the most wonderful people on the planet, my family is particularly amazing, and after cancelling my Visa and transferring some money electronically, I was able to get my hands on some funds for the first leg of the trip. The rest of the money will have to be acquired in a similar fashion, and although it's going to end up being costly, I'm still going to be able to pull it off. I'm sure you can also guess that this little episode has added a bit to the pre-adventure stress. It's going to be a bit tricky booking hostels, etc., but I'm gonna do my best to figure it all out as I go.

So, on that note, the clock is currently chiming for 11pm on Sunday night, and I'm packed. Just a few last-minute cleaning tasks remain for the morning, and I'm off to south-east China for leg one of the 6 week trip. I'll likely have a limited amount of time to write and post, but I'll do my best to keep everyone up to date. In the meantime, take care, all.

T

Counting down

180 Grade 7 and Grade 9 Exams: Marked.

New flight to Shenzhen for Monday: Booked.

Old flight to Shenzhen: Cancelled.

Plans for Mr. Pete to meet in KL: Confirmed

Mental Vacation: TAKEN!

My frontal lobe is throbbing. I'm famished. But my work is officially done for the semester, I've bid farewell to my boss and the ladies of the ESL office, and I get on a plane from Dalian to Shenzhen on Monday morning to begin my SE Asia adventure. "Epic" is a good adjective, methinks. I still have a lot of crap to take care of in the next 3 days, but I'm just pumped that my responsibilities are now done and I can focus on the scramble to get ready for the trip. 

I'll likely have limited access to the internet while I'm away (or at least I'll be avoiding it for a while... it'll be a good dry-out time for my online addiction). I'll probably drop in one more post before I head to the airport Monday, but in case that doesn't happen, thanks for keeping in touch and reading my rants about the past few months... it helps me feel like home is with me wherever I go. The homesickness has been rare because of the people who read this and email me to let me know how life is back home. So... thanks. See you at the beach...

T

Bievenue, 2010 (My, how the cold winds blow)

The title is literal. There is no attempt at a metaphor or hyperbole or other form of descriptive writing. The wind is thrashing against the windows, demanding to be admitted to the limited warmth of both school and apartment (okay... that was less literal). Just when I thought I'd escaped it...

I arrived this morning in Daheishi after about 15 or 16 hours of travel. We departed from Harbin on the train at 5:15pm last night and stepped off the train this morning around 5am. We were part of the "lucky" group who didn't get stranded. Because of the snow and cold that blew into Dalian this weekend, many of the people who decided to fly home from Harbin were stranded at a few different airports because the airport here closed. I say "lucky" because the over-night, non-express train through NE China isn't exactly the most luxurious ride in town. Still, though, a good time was had. After the train ride, though, it took me nearly 3.5 hours to make it to Daheishi in time for class. Next time, I think the school's gonna get a sick call from this guy!

I'm now sitting at home after a tiring weekend that involved two nights trains, a limited amount of hotel sleep, and a lot of time spent out in the smoggy-fresh, cold air of northern China. I got through my 4 classes today and immediately came home for some couch time. There are things that need to be done, but I've decided it can wait. I'll take care of them later. For now, I need to just relax and re-centre myself.

Harbin was a really good time while also being a really crappy time. Definitely more good than bad, but there was an obvious balancing act taking place. Although the sites were interesting and the city was neat, the city seemed to have a fair share of hustlers who were trying to rip off the visiting Laowai (slang for foreigners). The cabs were the worst... even though the city has a million cabs, they loved to either drive off before even asking us where we were going or they'd attempt to hustle us for 3 or 4 times the actual cab fair. I haven't encountered much xenophobia so far, but this felt like one of those instances. Anywho... onto the better stuff.

We spent New Years Eve on the train heading north. We sat around telling stories and enjoying some food/drink in the cramped space of the sleeper train and went to bed well past midnight. Needless to say, not a lot of sleep was had. After arriving early on Friday morning and checking in to our hotel, the hockey boys headed to the rink as they were playing in a tournament. I joined the boys at the rink to watch their first game and also tagged along to their banquet that night at
a nearby hotel. The free food was delicious and we ate and drank until movements slowed to a snail's pace. D and I ended off the night with a trip to a local bath house, a massage, and a sleepy cab ride back to the hotel. Did I mention that it was colder than -30 this whole time? It was.

The next morning saw D and I head into downtown for some breakfast and touristing. After eating, we met up with a couple other teachers from the high school and toodled around for the afternoon, stopping as often as possible to get coffee and snacks and look at a whole variety of Russian nesting dolls (along with strange Russian war memorabilia) so we could stay warm Harbin is pretty far north and has a massive Russian influence historically. There's a beautiful (but run-down) Orthodox cathedral in the city which acts as a museum for the local history. After Darren left to head to the rink for another game, I took off with Amanda, Kristin, Nico and Emilie to the annual Harbin Ice Festival (which was my main purpose for making the 10 hour train ride). I was wearing two pairs of socks (with those instant heat packs that don't work wrapped around my toes), velour-lined long johns, pants, 5 layers of shirts/sweaters, a scarf, two toques and a pair of mitts (with my hood). I was still cold. The Festival, though, was amazing. This year's theme was the "Wonders of the World" which featured everything from the Taj Mahal to the Coliseum to the Sphinx to the Great Wall and Angkor Wat. All of it was carved and built from huge blocks of ice. I took tonnes of pictures and will post some in coming days. After 3 hours of awesomely cold amazingness, we noticed the lack of feeling in our extremeties and decided it was best to move on to food and drink someplace that wasn't built on an ice rink. After the bellies were filled and fingers and toes were de-numbed, I returned to my hotel and hung with the hockey boys for a while before turning in. Three hours of cold, outdoor fun makes a guy tired.

I met up with Kristin and Amanda at their hotel again on Sunday before Kristin caught her plane home, and Amanda and I spent a bunch of time just eating food and drinking coffee before packing up and watching the second half of the guys' hockey game. We took a few more shots of the frozen city before making a mad dash to the train station.

And now, I return to an equally frozen town with snow and wind.

This leads me to one final thing... I bit the bullet and cancelled my flight for the 15th to Hong Kong, and I'm now going on the 11th. I thought that, since my purpose for coming here was to travel and experience all I could, it was the only reasonable decision (even if I'm losing nearly $100 for cancelling my later flight). Pictures will be coming soon. For now, Xinnian Kuaile... meaning, Happy New Year!

T