"Hello Ladeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!"

One again, I'm a country behind.  I'm currently in Vietnam, and have been for the past few days, but unfortunately you guys will have to wait for the gory details of the Vietnamese transportation system, because first I need to address my time in Cambodia.  That leg of the trip was added on once I realized that it made no sense to visit Thailand and Vietnam without checking out one of the countries in between.  I knew I wanted some serious beach time, so Cambodia won out over Laos.  I think I made the right choice.  Cambodia is an active contradiction.  How can a place that suffers from such extreme levels of poverty also manage to exude voluptuousness?  It's a beautiful, mixed up place, and it certainly dragged me into the confusion.

I was ushered across the Thai border with another US traveler ( a New Yorker, no less!) by one of the ubiquitous Cambodian "helpers".  You need a visa?  They'll show you where to get a visa.  You need a cab?  Oh, they've got cabs.  And tuk-tuks.  And motobikes.  Hell, they'd probably give you a piggyback ride to the next town if asked nicely.  Our Helper saw us safely through all the visa checkpoints and into a dusty Toyota Camry.  After a quick stop at a gas station (aka, a kid at the side of the road ran over with a jug of gasoline and poured it into the tank) we were on the Road to Siem Reap (yeah, there's really just the one road, paved as of 2009). The two hour long car trip immediately set the atmosphere.  There was such an impossible amount of green.  Stretching in either direction I could see crisp fields of grass, palm trees, rice patties, and emerald mountains in the distance.  There was the occasional shack, either tin-roofed or thatched, and plenty of livestock.  This is kind of area where you break for cow crossings.  As the sun set, I started to wonder where the hell we were going.  We had been on one straight road for two hours, and I could see nothing that looked like a city in the distance.  Darkness fell, clouds rolled in, and the vista was lit up by noiseless flashes of lightening.  We seemed to be outside of time and space.  Finally, we reached a crossroads, and this was the signal that we had arrived in Cambodia's third largest city.  My traveling companion and I were deposited in tuk-tuks (the tuk-tuk: a motobike pulling a cart-like thing containing one or more overly priveleged foreigners) and went our separate ways.

While my time in Thailand was delightfully organized by Cory, this marked the start of just a tiny bit of chaos.  Or not chaos, really.  More of a haphazardous wonder.  I just kind of decided to dive in.  Luckily, Angkor Wat was there to catch my fall.  Okay, just a bit of clarification, feel free to skip ahead if you already know this: Angkor Wat is actually just one of about 25 temples in the area.  It is, however, the biggest.  As in, the biggest religious building in the whole frickin' world.  So it's understandable that the whole area just sort of gets lumped under that title.  I spent three days touring the temples at Angkor, no guide, just me, a tuk-tuk, and a gazillion big eyed children trying to sell me things.  The structures are truly astonishing.  Massive sandstone slabs interlock to form monuments to ancient god-kings.  The obvious questions arise: how on earth were these materials transported?  How did they accomplish such uniform, detailed artistry?  And what the hell was up with king Jayavarman VII?  He oversaw the creation of a temple with 216 faces of a "god" who supposedly bore more than a striking resemblence to the king himself.   I mean, self-glorification is one things, but that's just ridiculous.

 

 

Perhaps one of the most amazing things about the temples is that they still exist. When the Khmer Rouge came to power they slaughtered the monks at the functioning temples, but left the structures standing.  The temples weren't left undamaged, but given the insanity of the regime it's hard to believe that more wasn't destroyed.  I guess they were too busy killing Cambodians for the good of Cambodia. While the temples have mostly escaped human destruction, they are slowly being pulled back into the jungle, wall by wall, stone by stone.  Monolithic trees have wrapped themselves around the temples, found their way inside, and are simultaneously dragging the buildings into the ground amd ripping them up into the sky. 

Since this is the rainy season the tourist hoards were slightly diminished.  Oh, they were there, but I was able to steal a few moments for just me, the jungle-temples, and the monkeys.  Outisde the temples, however, the place was mobbed with peddlers and beggers.  I knew ahead of time that this was the situation, but the scope, especially at Siem Reap, was overwhelming.  I'm not sure there's any real economy aside from tourism in the town, and the desperation for survival has led to a particularly twisted kind of child labor.  Before going to Cambodia I had made a decision not to buy anything from children - in most cases the money goes to a parent or a handler, and the more money they make, the less likely they are to be allowed to go to school.  I hadn't realized that children are basically the only people selling things around the temples.  There are children selling you water, food, scarves, bracelets, guidebooks, genocide memoirs, toys, postcards, paintings, and magnets.  These kids can count to ten in multiple languages.  They have been trained not to take no for an answer.  And this isn't even the most heartbreaking thing, no, that would be the children begging so insistently for money that they almost push you off the road, and will follow you repeating the same plea over and over and over again.  There is no good response.  You can't possibly buy from every one of them, give to every one of them.  And then there's the knowledge that it may actually be doing them more harm than good.  So you end up repeating the litany, "I'm sorry, I can't, I'm so sorry, I just can't," all day long.  To which they respond, "Why?  Why can't you?"

I don't know what else to say.  I also ate, and ate some good things, but  I think I'm going to save that for another post.

And that was Siem Reap.  Breathtaking.  Exhausting.



 

 

Bangkok Part 2: The Search for Ladyboys

People said it couldn't be done.  That I couldn't tour Southeast Asia with only a tiny, dragon-bearing backpack, and without suffering some sort of food-related intestinal calamity.  Well, they were half right.  Petite Bertha and I have been very successful on our travels so far.  So succcessful, in fact, that I've been frequently mistaken for a 26 year old NGO worker living in Cambodia.  I choose to take this as a compliment, rather than as a criticism of my hygiene.  But sadly, my culinary luck ran out.  Let it be known: my last night in Phnom Penh I did select a resturant based on the advice of a dirty, pot-addled backpacker.  And furthermore I did eat a small portion of mystery meat.  I neglected to trust my solid gustatory instincts.  If something doesn't taste good, don't eat it!  But I was trying to prove something, I guess.  And prove it I did, to my toilet, at 5am.  Ah well, such are the vagaries of travel.

I was going to postpone my trip down to the coast to give myself a day to recover in the solitude of my guesthouse, but I was done with Phnom Penh at that point.  So I soldiered on through a 5 hour bus ride (the bus drver was playing weird Cambodian karaoke the entire time) and I made it to Sihanoukville.  Yesterday it was rainy and bleak, so I stayed inside my bungalow, pounded the imodium and cipro, and awoke today to a perfect tropical paradise, and a reasonably recovered digestive system.  And now, with the competing sounds of reggae and Otis Redding, I'll wrap up the Thailand trip.

After Cory and I departed Our Jungle Treehouse we headed back to Bangkok for 1.5 days of temples and mayhem.  The mayhem was compounded by the fact that my ATM card had stopped working at the start of the trip, and after numerous calls to my bank, during which I was assured that everything would be sorted out, I discovered that the people at TD Bank have their heads placed firmly up their asses, and that no amount of pleading and/or threatening would give me unfettered access to my account.  Ah well, such are the vagaries of incompetent Canadian banks. 


True, I flipped out a bit, but with Cory by my side I was able to rally and enjoy our jam-packed 36 hours.  We did a whirl-wind tour of Bangkok that included every Wat in the country, I think.  We saw palaces.  We saw Buddhas.  We saw decorative monkeys (I'm still not entirely sure what the deal is with the monkeys in Southeast Asia, but they seem to play a really important role in a number of religious stories.  I guess I could have asked our guide about this, but she was busy telling us about the Buddha's seasonal wardrobe, and I thought it would be rude to interupt). We did a whole lot of sweating.  And finally we ended the tour with a boat ride through the canals of Bangkok.  The boat ride was spectacular, and I'm not just saying that because we were dead on our feet at that point.  The parts of Bangkok that we had seen were so congested and they were all starting to blur together.  The boat ride allowed us to get a different glipse of the city: we saw villas next to shacks, floating noodle shops, and monks feeding catfish!  My mind is still trying to wrap itself around all that it saaw in Bangkok, but for now I'm perfectly content to hold onto this particular nautical memory.

Of course, our trip to Thailand would not be complete without a bit more curry.  Up until now I haven't truly appreciated the lure of yellow curry.  I always considered it the "mild" curry.  The also-ran.  But after brutalizing my tastebuds with a bit too much righteous chili action I was ready to mellow out.  Also, Cory made some amazing yellow curry at our Chiang Mai cooking class.  Far from bland, it was a delicate mix of spices and coconut that sort of caressed your mouth, rather than attacking it with a hot poker.  To indulge in this revelation I decided to make my last Thai meal deep-fried, soft-shelled crab in yellow curry.  Sure, I could go on and rhapsodize about the meal, but do you really need to hear more?  Deep-fried.  Soft-shell crab.  In yellow curry.  Yeah, it's exactly as good as it sounds.

 

Cory and I also had planned on checking out some of the more "risque" things that Bangkok has to offer, but every place that we came upon seemed hell-bent on selling us into white slavery, so instead the trip ended the way it began, with Thai cover bands.  We came across a bar that had only a few prostitutes and a band of middle-aged Thai men doing surprisingly good versions of such classics as "Smells like teen spirit" and "My Sharona".  Cory and I are both fairly uninhibited dancers, so we got right down to it, and joined a dance mob that included Italian lovers, Irish backpackers, Australian sugar daddies, and Spanish senior citizens.  Our moves were so groovy that they drove the few prostitutes right out of the bar. 

So Cory and I finished our trip with a dancing bang.  All items on the spreadsheet were addressed.  And thanks to her patient ministrations I also managed to make it my bus the next morning, and over the border into Cambodia, which is where our story continues.  But right now my drink is almost empty, and the beach beckons!!

Jungle Boogie

I had three categories I wanted to indulge in during my great Southeast Asian Adventure: architecture, nature, and food.  So far it looks like each country I visit will more than satisfy all three.  I should pause for a moment to mention that while my next two posts will be about Thailand, I am in fact already in Cambodia.  Too much is happening everyday, and I can't keep up; I've only been in Siem Reap for two days, and I already feel overwhelmed, full.  But I cannot move on from my discussion of Thailand without a description of the jungle.  The Jungle!!!!

 

 

Cory and I left our colonial paradise in Chiang Mai after four days and began our trek into the wilderness.  The destination?  Our Jungle Treehouse Resort in Khao Sok National Park.  We were promised the jungle, and we were not disappointed.  Tucked away at the end of the road, right against a cliff, Our Jungle Treehouse was a rare experience.  It's basically a collection of bungalows and treehouses on the river, with a clubhouse/restaurant/bar at the front of the property.  Yes, we had a bathroom and a cold trickle of water that served as a shower.  Yes, we came into contact with all manners of insect life.  Yes, there was a bat in Cory's mosquito netting the night we got there.  But more importantly, we had unbelievable food, met wonderful people, and saw parts of nature that I don't know we'll ever experience again.

 

 

You'll have to forgive me, but I really don't have too many pictures of the food.  This is not for lack of trying - the main issue is that my camera does not work well in darkness, and there's suprisingly little light in the jungle after the sun goes down.  But no matter.  You can walk with me down culinary memory lane.  First of all, we once again had excellent options for classic American breakfast.  I have accepted that despite my huge appetite for culinary experimentation, when it comes to breakfast, I want eggs.  And toast.  And most likely bacon.  But while American breakfast is certainly important, but it is by no means what I came to Thailand for.  I came here, primarily, for curry.  In Chiang Mai I had the incomparible opportunity to make Thai-Burmese curry: pork belly!  pickled garlic!  more chilis than you can shake a stick at!  Thai-Burmese curry is not coconut-milk based, but the addition of pickled garlic and peanuts add almost as much richness.  And really, have you ever known me to argue with pork belly?  But I digress.  I want to talk about Our Jungle Treehouse's addition to my curry repertoire: Panang Curry.  WHY HAVE I NOT HAD THIS BEFORE?!?!?!!?  It's criminal I tell you, criminal.  This is thicker than your average red curry, using more of the coconut cream, rather than the milk.  The curry paste has the main ingrediants such as chilis, galangal, etc.  But then, peanuts!  These delightful legumes are toasted until fragrant with coriander and cumin seeds.  Coconut cream, curry, and meat blend together to form a velvety, spicy concoction.  The dish is garnished with lemongrass leaves, their herbal acidity a lovely note to the decadent curry.  What can I say?  This is the kind of curry you want to bath in (and then lick off yourself).

 

 

Luckily, however, prudence prevailed and I did not bath in said curry.  That might have had unfortunate consequences during the jungle trek.  On day one of our totally awesome jungle adventure Cory and I got right down into it and hiked the jungle.  Our guide was a helpful, knowledgable, yet almost incomprehensible Thai man.  He felt very strongly about preparing us for jungle survival.  And bamboo.  The man loved bamboo.  Cory and I learned all about what kinds of bamboo you can eat, drink, use to build shelter, and use as kindling.  This last item was one of our guide's favorites.  Have I mentioned that it's rainy in the rainforest?  As we trekked through the mud our guide continuously pointed out the specific type of bamboo which, no matter how wet on the outside, remains dry on the inside.  And proved this to us.  Again, and again, and again.  Every now and then along the trail he would grab a piece of bamboo, break it in half and say, "See?  still dry".  He was kind of like the Thai answer to the Slap-Chop guy, except in the jungle, and without a police record. 

 

 

 

Our guide also schooled us on the various forms of wildlife we could potentially encounter during our hike.  He gave us an excellent primer on what to do when bitten by a cobra (wait seven seconds and then die painfully).  He pointed out elephant footprints.  He alerted us to a squirrel-chipmunk death match, which our corrupt Western ears were unable to detect.  And of course, he showed us monkeys.  But really, the wildlife highlight of the trek had to be the leeches.  Que the thell!  The jungle is teeming with leeches!  Why, during no part of my indepth shoe research did somebody say, "hey, get closed shoes, cause the jungle is teeming with leeches, I tell you, teeming!"  Actually, I should confess: I remained leech free during the hike.  Poor Cory bore the brunt of our leechy escapade, and with aplomb.  The only "good" thing about Thai Jungle Leeches is that they bear no resemblance to the leeches from that memorable scene in Stand by Me.  Had that been the situation I would have uttered some very unladylike language and then forced Cory to give me a piggy-back ride the rest of the way. 

 

Okay, so sometimes nature sucks.  Literally.  As in, your blood.  But at other times nature is stunningly beautiful.  Sometimes nature seduces you with its blue, bath-like waters. 

 

 

 

 

Sometimes it humbles you with its unexpectadly gentle magnificance. 

 

 



Despite the discomfort, our time here felt like a gift.  Here is this amazing corner of the world that invited us in, let us hang out, and let us pull back just a little bit of the curtain. 

Oh, and did I mention that we rode elephants?  Elephants!!!!

"Snake meat not have enough chew for me"

Wow.  Thailand.  Ladyboys.  Curry.  Jungle Paradise.  Tons, and I mean TONS, of prostitutes.  All these, Cory and I have conquered. 

So when I last posted, I believe it was to tell you that I was incapable of finding my way down a New Jersey street, let alone a Bangkok neighborhood.  Luckily, I was rescued by Cory, the Spreadsheet Goddess of Long Island City.  Cory and I had similar childhood misadventures, and while they have turned me into a free-wheeling, bus-taking, foolhardy traveler, they have turned her into the ultimate Modern Woman.  Cory puts together a trip like nothing I have ever seen.  I may ask her to book all future events in my life, just to be on the safe side.

Spreadsheet Item #1: Cory and I meet at the Bangkok airport to fly together to Chiang Mai.  This went off without a hitch, since I had accepted the fact I will need to take a cab everywhere, all the time.  And it's worth it - the trip from the aiport by multiple buses took 3 hours and cost $2.00.  The return trip to the airport by cab took half and hour, and cost $6.  Best $4 I ever spent.  Cory and I arrived safely in Chiang Mai, and proceeded directly to our lavish colonial estate.  Seriously.  I spent three days feeling just like Meryl Streep in out of Africa, except without the Academy Award.  Or Robert Redford.  Or the Syphillis.  But we definitely had more prostitutes. 

The Chedi Chiang Mai is a teak outfitted, olympic swimming pool owning, delicate candlelight offering, little bit of Thai paradise.  I felt like a Communist refugee seeing a supermarket for the first time - the shades are automated!  We have a balcony and a foyer!  There's a phone in the bathroom!  Our hotel guide's name is Oily!  And, best of all, breakfast is included at the Chedi.  And breakfast involves fresh baked bread and REAL CHEESE.  I almost lost my mind.  Cheese and I have been parted for so long.  We had that one fling at the hotel in Taipei, but that was merely a teaser.  I needed serious cheese satisfaction, and the Chedi provided it.  Brie, gorgonzola, manchego, and two emmentaler-esque cheeses that struck just the right note of both salt and cream.  Cheese, our love will continue to be thwarted for much of the next year, but please, promise you'll wait for me. 

Obviously we've also been eating Thai food like it's our job, which at this point it kind of is.  I would like to draw special attention to Khao Soi, the unofficial dish of Chiang Mai.  You start with a vegetable broth flavored with coconut milk, and then, after simmering it for an extra tasty amount of time, you add two pieces of marinated chicken and wheat noodles.  The dish is then topped with a fried serving of the aformentioned noodles.  Because noodles are apparently an art, my Khao Soi was served on artist's palete with various accoutrements: shallots, pickled cabbage, sugar, fish sauce, chili, coconut milk, and slices of bananas to cool the inevitable heat.  It was street food, comfort food, and also a magical journey into the mysterious capabilities of curry.  Oh curry.  You and I are going to have a very good month together.

When not suffering the curry sweats, Cory and I took in some of the non-prostitue related Chiang Mai sights: driving up a mist covered mountain  and exploring Doi Suthep, one of the most important temples in Thailand.  While there we received sacred Buddhist wisdom about what our futures hold, why long hair can be an asset when starting a new religion, and why Lady Monks fell out of favor (strangely, some of the men didn't like women holding positions of authority.  Shocking).  All of these things were imparted to us by James, our tourguide.  He was accompanied by our driver, Mr. Cloudy.  James was so much more than your average tour guide.  He was, in his own estimation, the tour guide who told the truth.  He did not shirk from telling us that Chiang Mai women were so beautiful that wars were fought over them, or that cannibalism is still practiced in Indonesia and Papau New Guinea (roasted Shaman is a particular delicacy).  He was also a fount of knowledge regarding local medicines: for example, did you know that you can extract the oils from the horn of a certain type of antelope and "rub on man banana to make big"?  Well, now you know.

James and Mr. Cloudy also took us to the Night Safari, where we were able to frolic with Zebras and feed giraffes by hand.  It must be said, giraffes are AMAZING.  No joke.  When a giraffe sticks his head into your safari tram, you best believe that you're going to give him all your bananas and carrots, no questions asked.  As wonderful as the animals were, however, they were slightly overshadowed by the Chiang Mai Night Safari Cabaret show that closed out the evening.  How can you argue with poorly performed magic tricks, long-haired Thai men on unicycles, racy balloon tricks, and the most appallingly boring interpretation of Gloria Estefan known to man?  It was, in a word, hilarious, and of course the appropriate ending to a viewing of noble beasts.  You can just see the tigers thinking, "You moronic humans.  If we had opposable thumbs we would bust out of these cages, kick all your asses, and cook you up in a curry pot with a side of roasted Shaman".  Lucky for us that nature favors the silly. 

During the thrilling Gloria Estefan finale, James educated us further by confirming our suspicions as to which of the dancing girls were girls, and which were ladyboys.  I will tell you this: the ladyboys were much more committed to their performance, and much better dancers.  Just saying.  After this James and Mr. Cloudy dropped us at the Monkey Bar, where Cory and I listened to sensitive Asian pop with women who were most likely not prostitutes, but still dressed like them.  And then it was back to the hotel to rest up for today's adventure: a six hour trip into the heart of, well, not quite darkness.  More like rastafarian twilight.  Yes, we are now snuggly tucked away in the Thai jungle.  It has occurred to us that neither of us has ever camped.  And we're both made extremely uncomfortable by bugs, bats, and snakes.  But we will keep stiff upper lips and hike the jungle, visit coral caves, and ride elephants.  And get lots of massages.  Cause a girl's gotta relax after all this hard vacationing work. 

Stayed tuned for the next jungle update - we'll have true tales of scams evaded, and a description of our new cooking skills!  Until then, I leave you with this pictorial representation us as bowls of curry.  Try to guess who's who.