A new semester, a new beginning. And NEW FRIENDS!!

(April-May 30)

In between all my adventures during the summer break, I still had plenty of time in Sawankhalok to spend time with some of my favorite people. The girls I was teaching a special class to took me to the mall in Phitsanulok one day, a two hour bus ride (which doesn’t include the time it took for our bus to break down, then waiting at the Sukhothai bus terminal for an hour waiting for a new bus to take us to PhitLok), just to take me out to a sushi lunch. Love those girls.

Also with summer means that Tara and Steven are finished teaching at Sawananan and were heading back to America. Their departure was slightly lightened by gaining a new best friend. There is a woman at the night market who sells rice porridge who I visit regularly to teach her English. My first night in Sawankhalok after both Tara and Steven left and Be was out of town, I was on my own…at first it was a relief because I felt like I hadn’t had time to myself in months. But when I went to the night market to go teach my friend English and her shop was closed, I all of a sudden felt really lonely. I grumpily walked to the end of the market and got the same meal I had the first night I was on my own in Sawankhalok six months ago from the same shop: Pork basil with a fried egg, my comfort food that will always and forever remind me of late night dinners with my dad after working at his restaurant all night. Needless to say, I was feeling a little homesick. I went to the grocery store on my way home, and I was leaving the parking lot, I heard a familiar voice calling “Koriiiin” in a terrible Thai accent. It was BaNee, the woman who sells rice porridge at the night market! I asked her why she closed her shop that day, and she told me she was taking a few days off, and invited me to come with her to a temple the next day in Phitsanulok. Desperate for an outing and a friend, I eagerly said yes and canceled my special class for the next day. She picked me up early in the morning for what I didn’t know was going to be an all day adventure. Our first stop was a temple way up in the mountains of Phitsanulok. I forgot that PhitLok bordered Laos, until BaNee’s friends that was driving us pointed to the mountains we were approaching and said that past those mountains is Laos. I had no idea! The temple was unlike any I’d ever seen. The Buddha shrine was covered in these small brightly colored stones that were carved into Buddhas. Honestly, they resembled clear plastic toys you could get in a cereal box, and just seemed kind of strange.
BaNee’s friend showed me around the temple (he goes there often) and told me the history of the temple and the colorful plastic Buddhas. I wish I could relay this information in my blog, but the whole thing was in Thai, so the little of it I understood, I can’t remember. Sorry. But he showed me this huge collection of colorful stones that were on display all over the temple. He insisted that they were from nature, which I didn’t believe for a second because of their variety in colors. Nature doesn’t make stones those colors. After lunch with the women who work at the monastery, we returned to temple. BaNee’s friend told us that if we “tambun” 500 bhat, we would receive a relic from the monk. 500 bhat is a bit steep…(about 17 dollars), but I was really happy that they took me on this trip so I figured it was a worthy donation. BaNee, her other friend P’Kwang, and myself each chipped in 500 bhat. One by one, the monk handed us each a huge ugly stone in exchange for our donation. We sat there for a minute, disappointed and confused, looking at these plain old rocks you could pick up on the side of any mountain. 500 bhat for an ugly rock?? I was glad BaNee and P’Kwang were just as confused as I was, because that meant that even though the whole thing was in Thai, I hadn’t terribly misunderstood something. Then out of nowhere, this guy that I guess works at the temple came up with hammer, and started breaking my rock!

He hammered at it until it cracked in half! He broke my 500 bhat rock! BaNee and P’Kwang and I just sat kind of helpless, waiting for it to make sense. He brushed off the debris from my broken 500 bhat rock, and showed me a crevice in the middle of the rock…under the debris in the crevice was a shiny…yellow….thing. He took the shiny yellow thing out of the rock, brushed off the rest of the dust, and plopped the perfectly round bright yellow glassy stone into my hand. Then he broke open BaNee’s 500 bhat rock to reveal a purple stone, and P’Kwangs hid a red stone. Soooo everything makes sense. All those plasticy looking Buddhas are made of these colorful stones. They are somehow magically formed inside these rocks that the temple workers pull out from the side of the mountains around this temple. Some woman who could speak decent English (where was she this whole time…?) came to tell me what a yellow stone means. Surprise, it is a very lucky color and will bring me great fortune…but I can’t imagine the other colors differ in their auspiciousness.

So I totally trusted the whole thing. I believed that these rocks have been formed by some mysterious natural process…I mean, it’s Thailand. Crazy things happen here. Gullable? Maybe. But tell me, how would you put a stone like that into a natural rock, that has no pre-existing fractures? It’s not like he tapped it with a hammer and it cracked open perfectly. He had to bang on that rock for a while just to chip it down to the crevice where the gem is hidden. How do you fake that? Well, I went to Chompu’s house for dinner the next night. I told Chompu and Tdi my story and my awesome yellow stone. Tdi interrupted me mid-story, and exclaimed “No Korin, No. People who make these stones are bad people. Trust me, they are bad people. I know because I use to be one of them. I used to make these stones in Uttaradit…” This was a really cute confession by Tdi because 1. He said it in English, and 2. He’s the sweetest man I know and I can’t imagine him cheating people like that. So I still haven’t decided if I believe the temple or Tdi. I still think it’s impossible to get that gem inside a natural rock. But either way, it was a donation to the temple anyway, and so it was 500 bhat well spent.

BaNee and I praying at a temple in Pitlok

Speaking of scams….part of Sawananan being the best school in the region means we are in charge of holding yearly seminars for teachers in Sukhothai. There are only 2 other schools in the province that have farang teachers, so we have become the center for foreign languages, and have to provide training for 50 English teachers from all over Sukhothai. P’Sonya kind of mentioned this to me in the beginning of the summer break, but forgot (?) to mention until a few weeks before our seminar that the training had to be done by farang teachers, AKA, me. With Tara and Steven back in the states, Be and I were put in charge of running a three day teachers seminar. Yes, Be and I with our 4 months of teaching experiences, were going to teach all the teachers in the province, who have been teaching for 20+ years, how to teach English. Legit? Not in the slightest.

The seminar actually went surprisingly well. Overbearing me, I didn’t really let Be do much. Let’s just say this is more my cup of tea than his. Though he stayed by my side throughout the planning and execution of the camp, I ended up running all 10 made-up training sessions over the three days. Oh, did I mention, the seminar had to be about the ASEAN community? Yes, not only do I have to teach how to teach English, but I have to teach about how to teach about ASEAN in English. (ASEAN is the Association of SE Asian Nations…the Asian version of the EU, to put it simply), I know a good deal about ASEAN by now, but how to teach a three day seminar about ASEAN?? Well, I started with asking the teachers, out of the ten ASEAN nations, where does Thailand rank in terms of English proficiency? Turns out, like champs, we are competing with Cambodia for last place. And from my four day experience in Cambodia, making me a relative expert, I met more English speaking Cambodians on that trip than I did 3 weeks backpacking through Thailand. Anyway, that was a good jumping off point for the seminar, to show these jaded teachers, there is a lot of work to be done if Thailand wants to be a strong ASEAN country!! How patriotic do I sound?

After two days of literally making things up as I go to entertain these teachers, I was so exhausted. Being a one-man show for 8 hours straight is not easy or fun. Especially when I have no idea what I'm talking about. But the last day made it worth it, kind of. P’Sonya wanted to have a cocktail party, to show them how “Westerners” socialize. So (my proudest moment of this seminar), I came up with the do’s and don’ts of cocktail parties. Whereas Thai parties are a constant eating extravaganza, with plenty of whisky and karaoke, I had to face an astonished crowd and tell them there is no singing or dancing at cocktail parties. Unheard of in Thailand!! So my advice included (from, you know, all my experiences at cocktail parties) 1. Don’t expect to sit down and eat, 2. Don't expect the food to be delicious, 3. Don’t expect to be full, and 4. It’s always a good idea to keep an empty plate, so when you’re stuck in a boring conversation, you can easily exit by saying “oh those dumplings were delicious, I think I’ll go get some more”. That last one was my favorite, and I really enjoyed sharing that with the Director later at the cocktail party. So in the end, I think the teachers learned something? I was surprised my randomly good stage presence, and I think I actually pulled off being a legitimate trainer, so I sure hope they did learn something from me. I am skeptical any of them will change their teaching habits, but not to worry. The Ministry of Education is forcing our school to have another teachers seminar, of course run by farang.

At least for the next seminar, I will have new helpers. We now have two new farang teachers: Bryan and Kirk! Bryan is from the Philippines, and Kirk from America. Just starting the first week of school, and I love them already. Almost instantly, the four farang bonded together to form "The F Team". We’re still working on our individual super powers, but as a whole, we’re a pretty rad team. It’s nice to have such a tight knit group so early in the semester, and I can see already that this semester is going to be awesome.

Rugby in Hong Kong

(May 11- May 15)

 Just before the semester started (literally days before…), I had the opportunity to go with my rugby team from Bangkok to play in a tournament in Hong Kong. Even though I’ve been spending a lot of money on travel, and should be focusing on the new term, I couldn’t say no to playing rugby in Hong Kong. So the weekend before classes started, I hopped on a flight to Hong Kong. I’ve never had much of an attraction to Hong Kong, and I can kind of see why now. It is so expensive! Before I left, I set aside how much I wanted to spend while there, and changed it into Hong Kong dollars. From arriving at the airport, taking a train and taxi to the hotel and paying for the room plus a deposit, I had already gone through all the money I wanted to spend! And I had only been in HK for an hour. Great. Luckily we were spending the whole next day on the field. We got to the drizzly field on the top of a steep hill at around 9 AM. Going into this whole ordeal, I figured the teams would be similar to our team: older ex-pats living in foreign countries that play touch rugby for fun. Turns out touch rugby is a big sport in Hong Kong and Singapore, so 9 out of the ten teams came from Hong Kong or Singapore, and were young, fit, serious rugby players. The 10th team was from Bangkok, and were about twice the age as most the other players, and nothing near as fit. Yup, that’s my team. As luck would have it, I got really sick the morning of the tournament. Of course, the team’s youngest, fastest player had a fever, headache, chills, the works. I think it was the sickest I have felt since I’ve been traveling. I played through the first game (we lost), and sucked it up for the second game (where I was really close to scoring a try! Inches away from the line.) I had to take some mystery medicine someone brought from Thailand to get through the rest of them, but whatever it was worked because I felt close to fine for the last three games, and played much better! I didn’t score any tries, but I sure did defend a ton of them! I’m still working on my technique when it comes to touch rugby, so I am still a lousy offensive player, but I can defend against any team. The whole day was so fun, but incredibly tiring. We lost all our games in the round robin, so our last game was against the losers from the other bracket. We were competing for the prize of all prizes, the golden bowl! We played a fantastic game against the other losers, and victoriously took the golden bowl, placing 9th out of 10 for the mixed gender teams. Like true rugby players, we noticed that between the golden cup, plate and bowl, our glorious bowl is the most conducive for drinking beer out of, and we assured ourselves it had taken some clever calculations to know how many games we had to lose to win that bowl. And like any good rugby tournament, the day was followed with an outing at a bar downtown, with free food, drinks and a lot of dancing. Day One, and no money spent. Off to a good start.

The next morning, most of the team had a late morning. I suppose ending at a bar called “From Dusk to Dawn”, that is to be expected. I met up with some of the other rugby folks for some very necessary Dim Sum. I must have been spoiled in Chinatown in Philly... despite being in Hong Kong, the Dim Sum in Philly is better, but maybe that was because the food comes out in carts. That seems to make all the difference. Shu mai, Chinese broccoli, spare ribs, and sesame dessert balls later, I was ready to explore Hong Kong. So we started with the most touristy thing (but also the thing I probably most highly recommend doing) in Hong Kong.

We took a cute little tram thing to Victoria’s Peak, Hong Kong island’s highest point. The patio at the top that you have to pay for is a bit over rated and expensive, but from the top you can go on an hour long nature walk for free that circumvents the peak. It was approaching sunset as we started on this path, so we got the coolest views of all of Hong Kong in the best lighting.

 Not only is Hong Kong a beautiful city to see from the peak, but it also has the COOLEST BUGS ever!! A lot of people come to Hong Kong to shop. I would totally come here just to check out the bugs.
 Exhausted of beautiful views of Hong Kong, I parted ways with the rugby folks and headed to Kowloon for the night, where I would meet Dave. Dave and I were dating when I first came to Thailand, but after months of not seeing each other, we have decided to go our different ways. But we’re still on awesome terms, awesome enough to meet up in Hong Kong. It actually sounds quite romantic, doesn't it? Rendezvous in Hong Kong? It indeed was a very cool meeting. I met him at the ferry from mainland China, and we caught up over a few beers and a soccer game in a Western bar. I forgot how much I missed interactions like that- first to drink beer instead of whiskey is weird, and to be at a bar with a television? It felt like we were back in Philly for a few hours. Until we left the bar and headed to our crappy little hostel on the 13th floor of a huge hostel/shopping complex in Kowloon. It's a weird little sketchy place, where all the hostels are run by African immigrants for some reason? But it is right in the middle of Hong Kong’s night life and is super cheap. Dave and I had one full day together before I had to go back to Thailand, so I planned a very full itinerary. Like I said before, a lot of people like to go to Hong Kong to shop. What a lot of people don’t go there to do is hike, and I have no idea why. Hong Kong has endless hiking trails all over all the islands, and they all boast stunning views. So while shopping at Channel and Gucci were certainly on my to-do list (juuust kidding), I opted for a hike instead. We took the subway to Lantau island where we took a cable car to the top-ish of the highest mountain on the island. Towards the top is (not the world’s largest seated Buddha, or the world’s largest bronze Buddha, but) the world’s largest seated bronze Buddha (even Hong Kong has to have some sort of superlative, otherwise who would want to go see a giant Buddha on top of a mountain besides me?)

 And I swear I can’t go anywhere without finding some massive Buddha to take pictures of, so this portion of the itinerary was very necessary.
After my Buddha fill was complete, we started our hike. I pointed to the highest peak and told Dave we were climbing it. He just kind of laughed, and said yeah right. There is no way we can climb that and get back before dark. But when you basically climb vertically for an hour straight…you can get to the top of any peak. I actually didn’t think it would only take us an hour, but we were above the mist on Lantau’s highest peak before we knew it, and saw a bunch of cool bugs on the way!
The rest of my day-long agenda fell through at that point, because that hike took a lot more out of us than I expected (what a romantic I am, right? I get one day to see my ex, and I decide hiking a mountain would be the best use of time. But it was kind of one of the coolest hikes
I’ve ever done).

We took the ferry back to Hong Kong island then headed back to Kowloon to get ready for dinner. We walked inland (away from the awesome waterfront that BBC rated as one of the top five free attractions in the world, Tsim Sha Tsui pier…we stayed less a block away from the pier and I never got to see it. Figures) to where the best cheap food is. Definitely essential for us, Hong Kong is freakin expensive. After checking out a strip of restaurants with signs written all in Chinese and no English menus, we picked a spot with a promising crowd and delicious looking whole duck hanging in the window. We didn’t have duck, but Dave got to show off his Chinese skills and ordered us a feast with chow fun, Chinese greens and squid something. I still like Thai food better, but I totally wouldn’t mind eating Chinese every day either. After stuffing ourselves way too full, we walked it off for hours while browsing though the street stalls. We took an incredibly long walk back to the hostel, through a different side of the Kowloon night life. There were still neon lights everywhere, but under them, outdoor restaurants piled high with dishes covered in fish bones, shells and other food remnants, with a bunch of men sitting around the table with their shirts off, stroking their full bellies and spitting in the street. Dave says that’s what its like everywhere in China. Yeah, Hong Kong is cool and all, but I was happy to head back to Thailand.

Revisiting an old home: 日本

(Disclaimer: the wonderful miss Sarah Lee was the designated photographer of this journey, and has all the lovely pictures. The only ones I have are of myself because they’re the only ones she has sent to me so far. I promise I’m not that vain, and maybe more pictures are coming) [April 18-April 22] Going back to Japan was one of the coolest yet strangest experiences I’ve had since coming to Thailand. First of all, it was so cool to be able to use Japanese again. I thought that after two years of not touching the language, and three years of not really speaking it, going back to Japan would be very difficult. I was surprised, and proud really, to have it come back so quickly. But my four day trip was way too short. Riding the escalator up to departures in the airport in Haneda, I was just coming up with some of the phrases I could have used that day or the day before. My friend Sarah, another Fulbrighter who teaches in Lampang, joined me for this venture. I am very lucky to have Sarah as a travel partner- she will sacrifice her sleep schedule, comfortability, and eating habits to have a good trip. My kind of traveler. So we attempted Japan on an incredibly tight budget- it’s really hard to be in Japan after being in Thailand for six months. My fanciest dinner in Sukhothai can barely reach Japan’s cheapest street food. It’s really hard to pay five dollars again for a snack, when I haven’t paid more than a dollar for dinner in a while. I found out a week before the trip that my host parents from Japan had gotten divorced. I had been in better touch with my host mother, Yuko, and had planned to meet her at the airport in Tokyo. We got off the plane to a surprise greeting by Masakazu!!! the father I lived with when I studied abroad 3 years ago. It was a completely fulfilling feeling seeing my casually dressed host dad in the crowd of Japanese business suits, his hair grown out longer than I have ever seen and a huge grin on his face. Masakazu is just as funny and sweet as ever. After briefly introducing Sarah (my first Japanese speaking test!), Masakazu’s first question was, How is Timmy? I failed my second speaking test. No way I could handle answering that in Japanese without practicing first. Masakazu and Yuko took us back to our old neighborhood for a late night dinner. Our first meal in Japan: tuna sashimi over rice with seaweed, and udon noodle soup. Man, I missed Japan! Masakazu was so enthusiastic, bombarding us with questions about what will we be doing in Japan? How hot is it in Thailand? Korin, will you eat okonomiyaki while you are here? Reaching midnight, our dinner together was way too short. Masakazu handed me a huge bag of snacks “for your students…but you can eat it too”. I was so sad to part ways with him, as Yuko took us to her house for the night. Yuko is much quieter than Masakazu, but an absolute sweetheart as well. She lives in a beautiful old wooden house outside the city with her parents and her only daughter. I woke early in the morning to my little host sister’s squealing laughter. When I was living with Yuko and Masakazu, they had just had their first baby, Maria. Now about 3 and a half years old, Maria is certainly her father’s daughter, the same enthusiasm and cheerfulness, but a little chubbier. I came downstairs, and was greeted with a powerful hug from my little sister. How could she possibly remember me? She was only a few months old when I was living there, but she spoke my name as if she knew me.

I played with her all morning, playing with words she knew in English and in Japanese (a great Japanese review for me!). Then, one by one, she showed me all the gifts I have sent her over the past three years, cleverly ending with the gift I gave her when I left Japan three years ago: a small wooden box with a heart, for her to keep her most favorite possessions. And inside the box is still the charm I got her from Suitengu shrine, the temple down the street from our old apartment. Yuko has certainly trained her well to be a mature sweet girl.

After breakfast and lots of play time at Yuko’s, we went into the city to walk around Asakuza, and older neighborhood in Tokyo. The temperature was perfect. Cold, but sunny with only a slight breeze. Sarah fell in love with Tokyo instantly. It’s hard not to really. And I re-fell in love with the city instantly as well. I had forgotten what it was like to wander around any street, for it to be calm and walkable…unlike my beloved Bangkok. Empty streets are a new concept to me these days. We walked around Asakuza, saw some late cherry blossom bloomers, which every passerby was crowded around for one last snapshot. Our destination for the day was Senso-ji in Asakuza, a beautiful old style temple with the famous 5 story pagoda. At Senso-ji, we met with a friend of mine from Philadelphia, Yuan, who is studying abroad through the same program I did. It was so strange entering the temple at Senso-ji and not Sawatdii-ing a Buddha, and sitting down to pray. Instead you stand and clap twice, then bow your head down in prayer. And you don’t have to take off your shoes! Bit of a culture shock. After walking the shop lined streets in front of the temple, Yuan, Sarah and I parted ways with Yuko and darling little Maria (was NOT ready for that heart-wrenching separation. I really love Maria),

and we meandered on to find lunch. Asakuza is well known for its Monja and Okonomiyaki, so that is precisely what we found. There was a tiny little shop down an alley that we snuck into before they closed for lunch. We had to squeeze through the miniscule dining room into the back room of the restaurant, where we took off our shoes, and sat cross legged on the floor around a table with a built in grill to cook our own Monja and Okonomiyaki.

おいしいですね！ After wandering the old streets of Asakuza, we made our way to the neighborhood north of us, Jinbocho, an area I’ve never been to before. The streets were covered with books! Every store in sight was overflowing with used books, spilling out from one story wooden buildings. It was not the neighborhood we were looking for, but it was a great find, and occupied the remainder of the afternoon wandering through the bookstores, not a single store supplied with anything in English. It was so exciting to hang out with Yuan, to see someone from home. I forgot what it was like to be able to talk to someone about all the stuff going on in Philly, at Temple. She was just finishing her semester in Tokyo, and about to leave for Philly in a few days. I can’t say I wasn’t jealous! For dinner, Sarah and I were on our own, and we spent a very long time exploring Asakusa’s nightlife. I guess when I was in Tokyo I did most of my exploring during the day, so it was nice to wander at night- a scene I’ve never seen. We found a wonderful strip of restaurants, tucked away from the main strip of tourist shops, but attracted a bustling local crowd. There was not a word of English anywhere, so finding out it was all bars took a while. We saw some people eating, but couldn’t find the things we were looking for: sushi, ramen, udon or sukiyaki. We wandered on, and finally found what we were looking for: Kaitenzushi (conveyor belt sushi). The guy behind the sushi bar LOVED us, and checked out each dish we plucked off the conveyor belt. We noticed a glass jar with squirming little guppies going around the belt, and he insisted they were delicious. He told us you have to just drink the water with the little fishes still swimming around, and swallow them alive. It’s fun, and apparently delicious. I considered trying it for maybe a second, but stuck with my tuna and eel sushi instead. That evening, we stayed in a Ryokan- an old-fashioned Japanese style inn. The petite two story wooden house had hardwood floors; everything was an antique, with sliding paper doors, tatami mats as beds, and one bathroom for everyone to share. These Ryokans are all over Japan, but we stayed in a backpackers/budget version. That means no traditional style breakfast and no onsen (public baths), but for our short trip it was perfect and cheap! The next day we had a full agenda. We started with the Shibuya crosswalk, the craziest pedestrian crosswalk in Japan, quite possibly the world. I guess it sounds not that exciting, but anyone who has been to Tokyo talks about it like it is the coolest tourist attraction in Tokyo, and I agree. It is quite a sight. It’s a six way traffic intersection, and every 90 seconds all the cars stop to allow pedestrians to flood the street. And of course, what would this international cosmopolitan hotspot be without a huge Starbucks composed of bay glass windows. Fun fact: this Starbucks has the highest gross sales in the world (and they only sell size “tall” to discourage people from lingering), understandably because its second floor overlooks the coolest crosswalk in the world. Our visit to Shibuya was complete after finding a side alley packed with ramen noodle shops. It took us forever to pick the right one- for Sarah’s first ramen experience we had to find a small shop with a bar that overlooks the chefs and has seaweed, bamboo shoots and pork with the right varieties of ramen broth. Maybe I was being too picky….but we finally found one. And it was packed! We had to wait a few minutes to snag two seats at the bar after using the ticket vending machine to order our soup, which was ready before we even had enough time to take a million pictures. I can’t believe I used to be able to eat a whole bowl of ramen. They are humongous! And full of deliciousness to the last drop, which I unfortunately didn’t get to this time.

From Shibuya, we walked to another popular neighborhood, Harajuku. It was a longer walk than I remember, mostly because I can never remember the right way even though I used to walk it almost every weekend. Harajuku holds Tokyo’s most famous shrine, Meiji-jingu, I love this shrine because it is in the middle of the busiest section of Tokyo, yet as soon as you enter, the city fades away behind the massive trees. It’s about a mile walk to the center where the temple is, and everything is so quiet except for the massive crows flying over head. The temple itself is also very quiet, not flooded with people like the temples in Bangkok.

The quiet temple visit was followed by a walk through the quiet Yoyogi park. This park is not so quiet during cherry blossom, but all of it’s blossom’s have fallen so the park has been forgotten, the water fountains hardly spitting any water only a week or two after the cherry blossom festival. On our way through the park we got stopped by some Japanese boys that were sampling teas. We chatted with them for a little while, the tea warming our cold, unadjusted bodies, and I realized how different the Japanese approach white people. In Thailand, I can’t go anywhere without someone yelling “Hello! Where you come from!” Even in Sawankhalok, its unavoidable. But in Japan, that doesn’t happen! No one even tries English. I was always greeted in Japanese, and conversed in Japanese until I got confused. So strange, because the Japanese speak English better than the Thai’s! They just don’t really want to. Meanwhile the Thai’s want to talk to every farang they meet, but they can’t! So silly, on both their parts! After wandering the second hand shops and craft stores and madness of Harajuku, we made our way to Shinjuku- Tokyo’s busiest business center, that is iridescent at night with all the fluorescent lights. This huge district is the home to the craziest transportation junction in Tokyo, as well as a Yakuza neighborhood (Japan’s infamous gang). I don’t actually know where that neighborhood is in the mess of Shinjuku, but I do know they have really sketchy bars with really cheap beer. Instead we settled for the closest restaurant we could find- being fatigued and hungry. We found a cute little “domo domo” restaurant on the third floor of some 5 floor restaurant building. They didn’t speak English, but had some menu items in English, so it was the best we could do. I forgot to realize this before we got there that Shinjuku is too international and classy to find REAL Japanese food. So our dinner consisted of expensive fusion food, but it was the first time I ate avocado in a long time, so I guess it was worth it. Before ending our daylong adventure, we took a quick trip to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building to go skyline gazing. You can go to the 45th floor of the currently tallest building in Tokyo to see 360 degree views of the city for free! I definitely underestimate how much Tokyo has to offer for free, but this is hands down one of the coolest. Trying to experience everything Japan has to offer, we decided to switch up our comfortable stay in the Ryokan for an adventurous night in a capsule hotel. I’ve seen them on TV before: your room is kind of just a bed that pulls out like a drawer. I was really excited to try it for some reason, but we got there and it was totally anti-climactic. The beds don’t pull out like drawers! It’s more like crawling into a shelf with a shade that pulls down to block the lights from the hall. And actually, for two “shelf” capsules, it was more expensive than a room at the totally awesome Ryokan. Well, learn from my experience- capsule hotels are not worth it. Our stay at the capsule hotel was short lived anyway. Early (early early) in the morning, we headed to Tsukiji fish market, I think my most favorite place in Tokyo, to meet Yuan. Tsukiji is the largest fish market in the world, supplying the archipelago’s demand of fish with daily boatloads of tuna, shrimp, sea urchins, everything.

If you can get there by 4 A.M., you can witness the tuna auction, but I have yet to actually do that. So by 6 A.M., the best thing you can do is wander and witness the massive tuna race through the market on the backs of mini trucks. It is orderly chaos. And so Japanese. Unfortunately they changed the rules since I had been there, probably thanks to tourists like us that get in the way of their order. Now they don’t let tourists in until 9 A.M., after all the fun is over. It’s very smart for them, but sucks for us. But like bad tourists that ruin it for everyone else, we snuck in anyway, and after getting kicked out for the third time, we got the same breakfast I have gotten every time I visit: Fresh tuna over rice and miso soup with green tea. That breakfast in itself is worth the plane ticket to Japan.

The trip to Tsukiji completed our trip to Tokyo. So we parted ways with Yuan and started our journey towards Osaka. Of course no form of transportation is as good as a train, so we splurged on Japan’s famous bullet train to Osaka. Even getting a smoking car in the most discounted train, or ticket was over $100 each for the four hour ride to Osaka. You know what’s funny about Japan…they told us only the smoking car was available, and I couldn’t believe that a 15 car train that departs every half hour would be that full every day. But I understand why now. I walked through the entire train mid-trip, and their version of a “full train” is that every person or couple that buys a ticket gets a whole row to themselves. This way, everyone gets a window seat, I suppose. It seems silly and inefficient, and stuck us in a smoking car, but everyone gets plenty of personal space. The only other thing with the bullet train is that the scenery isn’t that interesting. It’s very suburban and industrial- no jungle trains like in Malaysia. But Japan is 70% mountainous, so they must make use of all the flat land that they can, I suppose. Though incredibly comfortable and efficient, Thailand’s trains are definitely more interesting. By the time we got to Osaka, we had to sprint to see Osaka-jo, the castle in Osaka. It was already closed by the time we got there (Happened last time I was in Osaka too!) but just wandering around the grounds outside the castle is amazing. We met some hilarious Japanese people, and I once again became convinced that I will one day have to marry a Japanese guy so I can live here. And of course, the first thing we had to eat in Osaka is my favorite, the famous Takoyaki: fried balls of octopus deliciousness. After Osaka-jo, I for some reason really wanted to go to Tempozen half an hour outside Osaka to ride the giant Ferris wheel…it was a bit of a random impulse that took us out of our way, but it is the biggest Ferris wheel in the world!! And it was made worth it by meeting this Korean guy outside the train station. I thought he was Japanese, because I think everyone looks Japanese, so I started speaking to him in Japanese. And he spoke back to me for a short while, then said in English, excuse me but I am Korean! Heh I felt bad so started speaking to him in English, but he said he can speak Japanese better than English so we continued our conversation in Japanese. By conversation, I mean very broken phrases and we didn’t really get far in our conversation before we ran out of vocabulary we both understood, but I think it was the first time I have had a mutual conversation in a second language, so it was very exciting for me. We parted ways at the Ferris wheel, because he thought the overpriced aquarium was more worthwhile than the biggest Ferris wheel in the world, with awesome views of Osaka. Poor choice. The Ferris wheel was AWESOME, and it was the perfect lighting just after the sun had set to still see the bay as the night lights started to illuminate the city.

We headed back to downtown Osaka to revisit the night scene that drew me to Osaka when I visited briefly before. There is a crazy pedestrian street, Dotombori Arcade, that is full of restaurant after restaurant of takoyaki, okonomiyaki and yakisoba, with splatterings of the other Japanese specialities. Though we had already eaten Takoyaki at Osaka-jo, we had to help ourselves to another serving at this street vendor that was making the most delicious looking fresh takoyaki, topped with arugula and seaweed. Sounds strange, but it was amazing, and the staff were wonderfully talented. I guess takoyaki is nothing special as it is THE Japanese street food, but these guys were skilled. I’ve never seen such a quick and efficient takoyaki line, and it was supported by a continually growing line of customers. We meandered through the crazy night life streets back to the capsule hotel where we would be staying the night. This capsule hotel had no shower, so instead we had to walk two blocks down to the public baths. It sounds like a pain (and I guess it was), but it was so totally cool. The people at the public bath were phenomenal, and very interested in Sarah and I. We spent over an hour and a half in the onsen, chatting to the old women. The hottest bath must have been close to boiling point, and you are supposed to go from the hottest bath to the coolest bath. It apparently makes your heart stronger, according to the hardy old women in the baths, and will make you live longer. I couldn’t do it. Sorry heart. So I settled on the luke warm bath until Sarah got her fill of exercising her heart. Our night was completed with a bottle of cheap wine we got from the Shinkansen ride (maybe stuck with the smoking car, but we did get discounted cheap wine), and white chocolate from Masakazu, chillin in our kimonos from the capsule hotel. Classsssy. Our last day in Japan, we had debated between Kyoto and Osaka, but my heart is really in Osaka so we stayed in town and explored a bit more. We started with a budget breakfast that consisted of onigiri (rice and salmon wrapped in seaweed) from 711 and vending machine coffee, on the steps of Triangle Park in the heart of Ameri-kura, the micro-America in Osaka that is basically a bunch of hippy Japanese youngsters that got stuck in the 80’s. Then we spent too much of the day at a museum north of Osaka. This is the craziest museum I’ve ever been to, and I think everyone knows I don’t really like museums that much. But this was a culture museum, for the wanna-be anthropologist that I am, and it had a compilation of all the cultures of THE WORLD. My eyes started to glaze about 1/5 of the way through the world, but the museum really makes you realize how connected the historic world really was. There are so many similarities across oceans I had never noticed, such as indigenous tools discovered in both Africa and Southeast Asia, and the colorful costumes of tribes from South America and Thailand. It was an incredibly impressive and humbling display. The culture museum is part of a huge park (in the middle of nowhere, Northern Osaka), and the perfect weather was just begging us to have a picnic. Unprepared, we picnicked in style, with another round of canned coffee and chocolate pocky. Oddly, that was probably one of the most memorable moments from the whole trip.

We made our way back to the city to see a beautiful temple on the other side of Osaka. It had closed already, and was incredibly solemn. I’ve never been to a temple like it. There were upright stone blocks that climbed up like a pyramid, that I am guessing were grave stones. It definitely gave off the feel of a graveyard, but there was no clear indication of such anywhere. The only distinct colors around the closed temple were the little red hats that are fitted onto statues’ heads. I forget where I have heard this story, but these little red hats are part of an old Japanese tale about a man who knitted these red hats to put on the statues’ heads to keep them warm in Japan’s frigid winter. That’s not how the story actually goes, but it’s something cute like that, and you see those little red hats all over Japan. Running low on time (isn’t that always the case?!) before having to catch our flight home to Thailand, we had to race to find a banging Japanese meal. We sprinted to the strip of restaurants and fun we had been to the night before, and ended up going back to the takoyaki masters. This time, we entered the restaurant they are part of to have our last Japanese meal of yakisoba and okonomiyaki. Cooked to perfection, that must have been the best okonomiyaki I have ever had…and I’ve eaten A LOT of okonomiyaki. As we were walking back to the hotel to pick up our bags, we realized we had EXACTLY enough money left to get on the train to the airport. It was quite lucky, but also means we spent way more than we thought we did! How did we spend so much money?! We got to the train station and found out there was an extra transfer we had to make to catch the airport link. Already late, we emptied our pockets looking for enough coins to make the transfer. Sarah the whole time was saying “we're not gonna make it, there is no way we’re making our flight” and I’m just saying, no no it’s fine, we have plenty of time! But in my head, I was totally freaking out, and thought we were going to end up broke in Japan. Amazingly our small change was enough to scrape by and get on the train to the airport, with 100 yen left for a bottle of water at the airport. Crazy ending to an epic (short) adventure.

The Three-Day Waterfight

Thailand has designed the perfect holiday. Songkran festival, April 13-15th every year, is Thailand’s New Year festival. Falling on the absolutely hottest days of the year (it’s really hot here…) the New Year is celebrated by a literal water fight. It’s supposed to only be three days long, but in actuality people have been splashing water on each other all week, just in preparation for the big days. My students have been talking about it for months, and the day before the festival Kaffa said to me, I think tomorrow if you go to the market, you will get wet. I didn’t really know what she meant. My dad gave me a prep talk before hand about what to expect on Songkran, but I realized going into it that there was really no way to prepare.

Luckily I had a wonderful family to take care of me. The day before Songkran, Kru Pet’s niece called Tara and Be and asked them to join her family to go to a waterfall. I have never met her, but she loves Tara and Be and always wants to practice English, and was happy to have me along too. So the morning of April 13th, we headed to Chompu’s house in Sukhothai. This is actually the house we went to for dinner on my birthday, so I’ve met most of her family already. They picked us up from the bus station, the back of their pick up truck already overflowing with a tub of water and nine people, joined by the three of us. Not the most comfortable squeeze, but we didn’t have too far to go. We were going to start our morning in Sukhothai Old City. When Kru Pet found out that Tara and Be and I were going to see his family without him, he got a little jealous, and had his family rearrange their plans to take us to Sukthothai instead, so he could take us to the waterfall the next day. But when we got to Sukthothai city, it was still early, around 9:30, and the first day of the festival, so there weren’t too many people out yet and we only got a little wet. Chompu and her little brother Gao were disappointed, so immediately they said, “Okay, change of plans. We go to Khampangpet!” I don’t know much about Khampangpet, except that they have an Old City there too, and Kru Golf lives there and has told me it's an old hidden treasure, not as cool as Sukhothai but worth checking out. So I was excited. It’s a little over an hour from Sukhothai city, but being Songkran, of course it took us longer than an hour. Every 5 km or so, we had to come to a halt as a group of kids come running up to the car to splash us. And the water fight began. Gao is about 10 years old, and absolutely loves Songkran. He was prepped and ready with buckets and powdered chalk. Part of the water fight is smearing this powdered chalk-goo on each others faces. I think the chalk thing came from what monks used to give blessings, but now it’s just an excuse for teenage boys to touch girls’ faces. We spent the downtime drawing on each other with this chalk stuff. There were 4 of Kru Pet’s nieces and nephews that were about our age, then Gao and Chompu and two other cousins their age, and we had a chalk fight between the 11 of us in the back of the truck, using up so much of it we hardly had any for our targets outside the truck. This chalk thing has turned into such an interesting gesture- when we stop in the middle of the road to get splashed (and splash back), after the storm of little kids with buckets of water passes, there is always a few teenage and up boys that come over with chalk in their hands, and affectionately wipe it on your face, sometimes pinch your cheek or nose. Women do it too, but its really mostly boys.

And you know, sometimes I hate being a farang, sometimes I love it. Songkran was one of those times I loved it. When we got into Khampangpet and got stuck in traffic, our car was the main attraction because I was in it. People came running up to the car to splash water on the farang, screaming “Welcome to Thailand”, “What is your name?”, “Where you come from?” Actually by the end of the day, I had gotten so much sun I must have been blending in more, because I heard some guys coming for me saying “luuk-krung!” meaning, half Thai.

At Khampangpet, we headed towards the Ping River, where hundreds of families were already gathered, playing in the water and picnicking. As soon as we parked, we jumped right in- already soaked from the drive over. We must have played in the river for three hours or more. I fell in love with Chompu’s youngest cousins, Bow, about 6 years old, and Fai, maybe 4 years old. They were absolutely the most sweetest girls, and wouldn’t let go of me the whole time in the water. Meanwhile, Gao was on my back, asking me to throw him into the air, do a handstand, or pull him upstream. Even though they couldn’t speak English, they all call me “teacher”. We took a break from the water to have a feast. Kru Pet’s brother and sister-in-law set up a huge picnic, complete with the must-haves: grilled chicken, sticky rice, papaya salad, mango, and coconut ice cream!

We were reluctant to leave the river, but as the sun was setting, we had a long drive back home and were already soaking wet. We caught a beautiful sunset back to Sukhothai, stopping every so often to get soaked. Chompu invited us to stay at her house that night, which worked in our favor because Kru Pet had originally asked to take us out for Songkran on the 14th, the next day. So Chompu’s parents made us a wonderful dinner, and we fell asleep early, exhausted from the first day of this awesome festival.


Since Kru Pet couldn’t make it the first day because he already had plans with his friends or something, he wanted the same group of people come out with us for the second day of festivities. After having breakfast, and putting on the same clothes as the day before, Kru Pet took us to his village leader’s house while his brother went to check the rice paddies. The village leader’s son was going to be ordained the next day, and they were getting everything ready. They had just butchered a pig and were cleaning it and cutting it to prepare for the ceremony. I think the village leader is actually his cousin. And after touring the village, I am pretty sure the entire village is really just Kru Pet’s huge family. They pulled up a table for their visitors, gave us a morning bottle of whiskey, and started serving our table with pig intestines. Nothing like the village life in Thailand. I’m growing quite fond of pig intestines, even at 9 in the morning. But we didn’t stay long as they continued to cut apart the pig, as we were eager to get started on our second day of the water fight.
(Gao and Chompu making breakfast)


(morning views from Chompu's house)

The same kids came along with us (yessss) but the environment totally changed having Kru Pet around. He kind of helps bridge the gap between us and his family, but he also likes to monopolize our attention, making Gao and Chompu more shy in front of us. Another sister-in-law came with us this time too, and the party changed from playing with chalk to drinking whiskey and singing, using the buckets as drums instead of for water splashing. This day, we went to a waterfall in Phitsanulok (they kept calling it a waterfall, but it was really just rapids). Like the day before, we headed straight for the water and didn’t want to get out. I jumped right in with Bow, Fai and Gao. This time Bow was the center of my attention. After only an hour, I had taught her to swim to me, and then she was all over the place, pointing to where she wanted me to help her swim to. (Be, Chompu, Tip and Tara by the "waterfall" in Pitlok)

After having lunch under the trees, we had to head back home. We decided to stay another night in Sukhothai, mostly because the person who would have to drive us to Sawankhalok (Kru Pet) was not fit to drive. Exhausted and drunk, the adults passed out on the ride back, so I taught Fai and Bow how to say “I love you” in English =)

(My lovely girls, Fai and Bow)

That night was a big party in Kru Pet’s village for the son that was going to be ordained. We had dinner twice at two different parties- one of them being the pig we had watched being butchered that morning at the village leaders house. My perception of Kru Pet’s large family was fully realized at this event- every person we were introduced to was a cousin, a brother’s wife, a sister-in-law’s cousin. Really confusing family. Plus Kru Pet’s mix of English and Thai, where he mixes up as many English words as I do in Thai, made it make less sense.

After two nights in Sukhothai, we were dying to get home (and get some sleep!) in Sawankhalok. Kru Pet drove us home early in the morning, and we got to check out the big hype in our town. All my students have been saying Songkran in Sawankhalok is the best in the area, and I believe it now. Still wearing the same clothes from the past two days, I biked down to meet my friends and students in the center of town for the epitome of the three day festival. The main road was absolutely jam packed with buckets surrounded by dancing kids, teenagers, parents, everyone. I biked through the madness, which turned into walking with my bike because I was stopped every two feet to get water poured on me and get my face smeared with chalk and baby powder, with a cheek pinch here and there, and even a few hugs and kisses on the cheek from strangers wanting to touch the farang. I bounced between seeing Mint, Kauai, and Kaffa and the M6 and M5 students. (My M5/01 boys)

(Loading up on water from the river)

The whole day was filled with music and dancing, and lots of love and blessings. After a huge parade rolled through town, I went out with P’Sonya’s family in their pickup truck to join in the traffic jam of wetness. The sun was already setting, and the buckets of ice water was starting to not feel so great anymore, but I loved seeking out my students and racing them to a source of water to pour on each other. By the end of our elongated pick up truck tour around my town, I was freezing cold. Just as we were coming to an end, one of Steven’s students that I play football with saw me from three cars away. Out of ammo at this point, I was defenseless. He had a huge bucket of water, and came running at me screaming “teacher!” and poured his bucket of ice-cold water down my back. The hottest day of the year in Thaialnd, and I’ve never been so cold!

A month for adventures

The adventures started with a last minute decision to go to Cha-am. Tara and Be and I were planning a trip to Bangkok to do some necessary sight see-ing (Wat Phra Kaew), but it turned into a weekend trip to the beach. Cha-am is close to the more well-known beach, Hua Hin, and was the kind of beach I’ve been looking for. Ko Tao, Ko Pha Ngan and Ko Samui are beautiful, but going to those places, I didn’t feel like I was in Thailand. At Cha-am, I KNEW I was in Thailand. The water may not be crystal clear turquoise, and the beach may not be glistening white. Instead, you get miles of picnic tables covered with umbrellas, packed with Thai families or groups of college kids, all tables covered in food. It was a total party- Thai style. For 100 bhat, rent out a picnic table for the day, and you will have people coming to your table all day with fresh crab, som tam made on the spot, gaiyang, quail eggs, beer, soda, anything you could possibly need for a perfect day on the beach. There are people actually swimming in the murky water, kids playing on banana boats, everyone having a good time. Unlike the beautiful touristy beaches where everyone is sun tanning, not swimming in the perfect water and there is no good food to be found. I also like how on Thai beaches, everyone wears their tee-shirts and shorts in the water, including myself because I was too embarrassed to show off my two-piece.


Tara and Be and their farang tour guide (me) only got to hang out on the beach, Thai style, for one day. We got there at night and walked along the water while rebellious teenagers shot fireworks off from the beach. We spent the next morning exploring Cha-am and a mangrove forest, then the afternoon was spent on the beach, complete with a picnic table and umbrella, food galore.
On our stop in Bangkok on the way home, I took Tara and Be to my favorite rooftop bar near Chula University, where we slowly sipped the one and only cocktail we could afford, and watched the hazy Bangkok sky cover the stars we were able to see in Cha-am.

The next adventure started the day after Tara and Be and I got back from Cha-am. The director wanted to give a thank you to the foreign teachers, so P’Sonya and a selection of other teachers took Steven, Tara, Be and I to Kao Koh, a mountain in Petchabun. It was just a day trip…a really early 5AM day trip. But Petchabun province is a beautifully preserved province. The air in Petchabun is even crisper than Sukthothai’s rural atmosphere. This was the first time I really spent a lot of time with Ahjan Anick, who teaches “social” or social studies. He’s the goofiest guy ever, and makes his way into any trip in any department. He barely speaks English, but loves to try to talk to me anyway. He likes to call me an alien, and asks for a menu for aliens when we go out to eat. Such a goofball.


Our first stop was at this amazing temple constructed completely of mosaic tiles and odds and ends, situated at the top of a mountain. We spent maybe two hours just exploring the outside, and never even entered the temple because the outside was too much to take in. Absolutely breathtaking.


Thennnn the rest of the day was way less exciting. We slowly made our way up Kao Koh. And by slowly, I don’t mean we made frequent stops. I mean the mountain was so steep that the van was crawling at a snails pace. At one point, we had to get out and walk up part of the mountain, because the van couldn’t carry us anymore. At the top of the mountain was a surprisingly lame palace that resembled a deserted tourist center, and an equally disappointing Vietnam War memorial that was poorly designed, and poorly kempt. Not even any striking views from the top. The trip was short-lived, and once we had made it to the top of Kao Koh, we slowly meandered home, stopping at a temple in Pitsanulok on the way.
(Steven, P'Sonya and myself at a rest stop coming back from Kao Koh)

There was one full day of rest until the next scheduled adventure. The foreign language department wanted to go on a trip to Bangkok. I didn’t really want to go because I am sick of Bangkok, but I needed to meet Noah and it was a free ride to Bangkok, so I went along for the ride. I am actually really happy I went because we went to many temples and museums I had never known about. Of course going on a trip with the foreign language teachers means more taking pictures than actually sight seeing. Though now that I finally have a camera, I am more than happy to join in the picture brigade. We stopped at the Golden Mount for a stunning 360 degree view of Bangkok’s old city, then across the street to Wat Ratchanatdaram, the metal palace of heaven, or something. The first of it’s kind in Thailand, the five story palace winds up towards heaven, housing a copper casted Buddha at the top.

The highlight of the trip for me was Suan Pakkad- literally translated to Cabbage Garden. The tour guide really liked having a farang on the tour (only one farang, because Steven doesn’t count as farang) and joked about this being where the Cabbage Patch kids came from. This old cabbage patch-turned palace houses an amazing collection of artifacts, fossils and crafts from every corner of Thailand, as well as from many countries around the world. This prince that collected all of these things was great- imagine going to every museum in Thailand, taking the coolest thing you can find and putting it together into a humble museum in the middle of Bangkok. I think if this prince were still alive, I would strive to be his best friend, or at least have tea with him in his cool pull out table that is tucked into the floor of the worship room.

After that short tour with the teachers, and meeting with Noah, I was on my way to meet Tara and Be in MALASYIA! Even though I went to buy the train ticket two days in advance (usually more than enough time!) the tickets for a sleeper train to Butterworth, Malaysia were sold out. Shoot. It’s a bit of a long story how I got stuck in this situation, but I ended up on a 3rd class coach train to Hat Yai in southern tourism ridden Thailand. I was dreading dreading dreading the train ride I had been so looking forward to… I’ve been dying to take a sleeper train to Malaysia!! I walked onto the already delayed train, and walked further and further back to 3rd class coach….I wish I could say it wasn’t as bad as you would expect, but it was. I sat in a stiff upright chair, a sweet Thai girl across from me with her pet hamster, then a group of rowdy teenagers across the aisle. These boys seemed to know everyone on the train- they had their friends coming to sit on my armrest the whole ride. I offered one of them to sit next to me so he didn’t block the aisle, and he offered me a sip of his cola. No thank you. This was after they were just passing around what I am hoping was just tobacco. I kept my eyes to the window for the rest of the trip.

Luckily, even though it seems like this was a terrible trip, it actually ended up being a really good thing. I had been talking to a Malaysian guy while we were waiting for the train. He is a well traveled, obviously well off guy that speaks flawless English. He tried to help me switch to a better car, but judging by the look of the ticket collector on the train, there was no hope for me. But my new friend, Zanif, at least rescued me for a few hours. We went to the dining car together and had a couple beers while the sun was setting over the rice paddies. The dining car is the coolest thing I’ve ever discovered- windows open all the way, people coming in and out, all sharing tables with strangers. Zanif and I were talking about places we have traveled to recently, when another Malaysian asked to join us. Kris is younger than Zanif, maybe in his late 20s or early 30s, and also speaks flawless English, his style more punk rocker, than Zanif’s pristine big words English. Kris’s first question, before he asked my name, was “Republican or Democrat?” We spent hours talking about American and Malaysian politics, a perfect briefing into a quick tour of their country.

When I returned to my seat, I fell right asleep. For having an uncomfortable upright chair, I slept much better than I do on the overnight bus to Bangkok from Sukhothai. I think it was the rocking of the train and the open window with the fresh air off the coast rushing through the window. There was a slim quiet guy sitting in the seat next to me when I got back. He sat upright the entire time, never moving an inch until he got off the bus at 2 in the morning. His seat was quickly taken by a nomad on the train. I had seen this guy and his friend roaming around the train all evening, looking for free seats. He promptly fell asleep, instantly letting his head fall onto my shoulder. I elbowed him the first few times, and he rocked back upright, eyes still closed, then slouched back onto me, each time allowing a tad more weight onto me. Defeated, I inched as close as I could to the window and turned my back to him for him to sleep on.

Zanif saved me again in the morning. I joined him for a cup of coffee, soon followed by Kris, eyes red and glazed from too much fun the night before. Zanif laughed at how easily I slept- he had a bottom bunk on the sleeper car and couldn’t sleep a wink, while I slept an only slightly interrupted night through. We continued our political discussions from the night before and planned out our different routes to Malaysia. We got to Hat Yai, only three hours delayed, and Kris led us to get bus tickets out of the sad little town. Hat Yai actually just had a bombing two days before we were there- a car bomb that killed 5 and sent I think hundreds to the hospital. The town was quiet- though very clean and not very Thai. I felt like I had entered another country already, but I wasn't yet sure if it was Malaysia or not. With only 15 minutes to get on a bus, I was out of the town quickly, with only enough time to catch a news report about the bomb from a couple days ago.

I thought the bus ride would be low key compared to the eventful night before, but apparently Malaysians like me and I made another new friend. A Malaysian man and his wife showed me what became my favorite Malaysian food: nasi lemak, rice cooked with coconut milk, topped with a spicy sauce, hardboiled egg and salted fish. Amazing, and only cost one ringgit; roughly 30 cents. Every rest stop along the 9 hour journey, this couple was at my side, showing me new food, telling my what to do in Malaysia, and insisting I come with them to Terrengu sometime to go scuba diving. After arriving in Kuala Lumpur, I got the usual bombardment of taxi drivers I get anywhere I go in Asia. This time, I told them the hotel I needed to get to, and the taxi just shook his head, and said sorry I can’t take you there. Annoyed, waiting for some kind of catch, I shrugged him off and went to get my bags and find my new friend, thinking to myself “whatever, I’ll just get there myself”. The taxi driver followed me and kept saying “can't drive there”. I stopped to listen to him, and he just pointed down the road and said “two streets. I can’t drive there, because there is a market. You walk, two streets”. Haha woops. So my new friend escorted me to the street, and easy 5 minute walk to the hotel.

Tara and Be were already waiting at the hotel, having already spent the day in Kuala Lumpur. Our one full day in Kuala Lumpur was indeed a successful one. We went on an adventure to Batu Caves, a Hindu shrine engulphed inside a limestone cave outside the city. You have to climb 272 steps to get to it, a journey well worth it, even in the pouring rain. The inside of the cave is huge, at least three stories tall, and we were there at the perfect time- when the thunder was close enough that it echoed through the cavern into the opening on the other side. Eerie, but so cool.

The venture to Batu Caves was followed by a walk through downtown Kuala Lumpur to see the Petronas Towers, the largest twin skyscrapers in the world. I like this tidbit about Malaysia, I learned it from Zanif: Apparently, the Deputy Prime Minister, Yassin, is a clever fellow and came up with the idea to build the Petronas Towers. At the time of their construction, it was the tallest structure ever built. But Yassin knew by the time they would be finished, someone else would be building the new tallest skyscraper, which Taiwan indeed did, followed by Dubai. So he said to build twin skyscrapers- because no one will want to build two buildings that tall. So though Taiwan and Dubai have surpassed Kuala Lumpur’s superlative of tallest skyscraper, the Petronas Towers still hold the title of tallest twin skyscrapers in the world, and fuel I suppose a decent share of tourism from it. Honestly, standing below the Petronas Towers…they’re not THAT breathtaking. After climbing 272 steps into a natural cave to worship Shiva for free, paying 50 rinngits to go inside the Petronas Towers was really unappealing. Taking pictures from outside was enough for me, especially because my new camera is so much fun. This is the Petronas Towers in “fish eye effect”. And the Petronas towers at night.

That evening, I thought it would be a good idea to go to “Bing Walkway” which is reported to have great sidewalk cafes and live jazz music. I guess I was missing Philly, and not thinking about what sidewalk cafes and jazz music would mean for Kuala Lumpur. It was an incredibly Hi So tacky scene- crawling with rich foreigners and expensive western food. So we hopped a couple side streets down and found an awesome street that our tour book missed out on, filled with endless Malaysian food, with oodles of menus to chose from. We ate like royalty under the street lights- complete with sting ray for 7 ringits…roughly 2 dollars.

Our fun in Kuala Lumpur was short lived, as we were hopping on a train back north the next day. But honestly, I am not that sad we couldn’t spend more time there. I liked Kuala Lumpur- but it’s definitely having some identity issues. Sandwiched between Bangkok and Singapore, I think KL can’t make up its mind. Its transit strives to mimic Singapore's, but it’s as terribly executed as Bangkok’s. Actually that’s not true- Bangkok may not have much public transit, but it works really well, I guess because its so new. KL’s transit is OLD, and desperately needs renovation. While there is some beautiful old architecture in KL, and a wonderful blend of colonial European with modern Islamic architecture, it seems like the whole city is under construction still. The trains, the train station, everything.
It has this feel of being a city still under construction, still being built, yet has incredible history that I am worried won’t be preserved. It’s a little sad really.

At least there is still a train that goes to Butterworth, and we were off first thing in the morning. The train ride was spectacular, but ended in a not so spectacular place. Butterworth is strange! It is a huge transportation junction between Thailand and Singapore, yet you disembark from the train into an industrial wasteland. I don’t know if Butterworth has an actual city, but if it does, it is not within sight from the train station. We took a gloomy walk to the bus station to hop on a bus north to the border. Of the few hours I spent in Butterworth, I could not tell you a darn thing about it other than its creepy.

We spent that night close to the border in a town called Kuala Perlis. The town itself is sad. I thought, being a major seaport to Malaysia’s finest archipelago, the town would at least be a little booming. But we stayed in the only hotel we could find, which had four windowless-make-you-claustrophobic rooms. Good thing Tara and Be and I really like each other, though it was still an incredibly uncomfortable night. We took a walk around the dead town (trying to wear ourselves out so we could quickly fall asleep), and I do have to give some credit to the town. At least more than I give to Butterworth. We walked to the waterfront to find a beautiful (and incredibly expensive) hotel that faced the Andaman Sea. We trespassed onto their private pier that went right into the sea, and watched as lateral bolts of lighting lit up the sky over the sea. We also found the border of Thailand. We decided not to trespass on that one. Instead we snuck onto the grounds of a mosque that we mistook for another hotel in the pouring rain.

The next morning, we were in Langkawi, a 99 island archipelago on the northernmost tip of Malaysia’s border. They call it a “geopark” because it is filled with the most amazing geology that I didn’t have enough time to even start exploring. We gave ourselves only one day to enjoy the island, and paid the same amount of money for a bungalow on the beach as we did in that stupid hotel the night before. We were running out of money at this point, so we had to limit our adventures on the island. Really unfortunate timing. As we were about to head to a waterfall, we discovered parasailing that we had accidentally bargained down to 20 USD. It’s been Tara’s dream to go parasailing, so we took the opportunity, and one by one spent twenty minutes suspended in the air, magnificently viewing the mountains, eagles, and shimmering turquoise water around the 99 islands. Well worth it. I will definitely come back to Langkawi one day.

Despite our lack of money, we had to take advantage of Langkawi being duty free, and got a bottle of Jack Daniels that would have cost twice as much anywhere else (Thailand's love of whiskey in infectious). We found a Thai woman selling beer (Langkawi is almost dry because of the Muslim population, but it is balanced by the liquor depot and occasional Thai selling beer) that would take our baht. Like rebellious teenagers, we snuck our goods onto the beach for sunset. We took a dive right as the sun was setting, but our party was shortlived when Be got stung by a nasty jellyfish. A really nasty one! He quickly jumped out of the water, and he immediately had tentacle shaped slashes all over his arm. I’ve never seen a jellyfish sting that bad, it was kinda scary. I’m still coming back to Langkawi one day though.

After our one day of jellyfish infested paradise, we were heading back up the coast of Thailand to the country’s most popular tourist destination: Phuket. And man, there is nothing worse than Phuket on a tight budget, but we made do quite elegantly. We stayed at a boring hotel in Phuket town, instead of a bungalow on the beach. This was not because the bungalow was too expensive (it was actually also the same price as that stupid hotel in Kuala Perlis), but it was getting to the beach bungalow that was the problem. It cost the same to get there by taxi as it was to stay there for a night, so we made do in town. I was happy with this decision, because then I got to check out Phuket town’s totally rad Sino-Portuguese architecture. Who goes to Phuket to check out the architecture? I may be the only one.

After I had my fill of looking at poorly restored historic houses (poor Tara and Be), we rented a super cute jeep (named Suthep!!! I didn’t name it that either, but it was a sure sign that we had to rent it) and headed to the beach! We hugged the southern coast of Phuket, checking out the local beaches with the best food. We spent our beach time on Kata, which my tour book told me would have stunning limestone cliffsides. I didn’t see any of that, but I did get to swim in the famous turquoise blue Phuket waters, and lay in the pristine white sand. The pristine white sand had spattterings of trash all over it, and was covered in umbrellas and chairs filled with tourists. But it was still lovely. I didn’t get to see any fish though. Sad.

In the afternoon, we headed to Phuket’s newest attraction-in-progress, the Big Buddha. This Buddha is massive, and gorgeous, sitting on top of Phuket’s highest mountain. You can see it from almost any beach in Southern Phuket. Dare I say, it is as stunning as “Christ the Redeemer” in Brazil. Well I’ve never been to Brazil, so I can’t say that for sure, but I bet the Big Buddha comes close. It has only been under construction for the past 10 years, and has quite a few years to go, but it is truly amazing. And somewhere on the Big Buddha, there will be a tile saying our names on it!



For the last evening of our trip, Tara and I had promised ourselves we would go out for a Hi So dinner in Phuket. And we totally rocked it. We dressed the best we have since we’ve been in Thailand, headed up the coast to Hat Surin, and scoped out the most picture perfect restaurant we could find on the beach. We found a perfectly lit restaurant, just far enough away from the water to give us that perfect ocean breeze. We sipped our mojitos and had my favorite deep fried fish on the bone with garlic, with green curry and mixed vegetables. A true delight.


On the way back to Phuket town, we got caught in a wicked storm (what’s with the south and these storms? Why don’t they come up to Sawankhalok?!) We pulled over to watch it come in from the ocean. Sitting in the back of the jeep, I felt like I was in Jurassic Park, waiting for T-Rex to appear behind the next bolt of lightning over the ocean.

The end of our adventure ended up being longer than our stay on Phuket. We took a bus to Surrathani, where we had to wait for 12 hours for the next train to Bangkok! Genius trip planner (that’s me) didn’t think about it being a Sunday night of a three day weekend, that just so also happened to be a full moon weekend (which means full moon party at Koh Phan Ngan, just off the coast of Suratthani), an upcoming major holiday this week, and the King’s cousin’s funeral in Bangkok on Monday. Basically what all that means is I picked the worst possible time to catch a train to Bangkok. So we tried to kill 12 hours in Surrathani, another depressing transfer/port town. We took several buses and taxis to try to find anything to do, but just wasted money on looking for nothing, except a decent seafood lunch on a river. So we spent the rest of our wait time at a coffee shop watching horror movies, then sitting on a mat in front of the train station finishing our bottle of Jack Daniels. Sad.

But it was all totally worth it because I FINALLY got to go on my sleeper train! And it was so totally cool. By the time our hour-delayed train got in, I fell right asleep on my top bunk and slept soundly through the swaying night.