Last 40 Days

The last 40-50 days or so have been busy; from jetsetting to entertaining guests, I have had little time to respond to emails or be even a half-way decent friend. I will use this post the best I can to give an update of my recent travels and probably wont have much energy, or desire, to throw in many of the stories. Please understand that when traveling, especially in 3rd world countries or far off lands with entirely different cultures and ways-of-life, stories are made by the hour and rare sites are seen far too often; so spending time to even try to justify which stories are worthy enough of furthering my carpal tunnel while typing is tough to do.

In brief:

In Mid August I had a lovely guest touchdown in the scorching heat of SouthEast Asia. It was her first time in Thailand and her first time in Asia, also our firs time seeing each other in 4 months or so. My wonderful girlfriend made the around the world visit to come see me and show her love and support during my travels, and, more importantly, to eat some damn good food. We spent our first day, from the hour she got off the plane, with a bit of pampering--massage/pedicure/manicure, the likes. Only a portion of what is needed/deserved for a 26 hour flight-taker! After that we took 6 of my lucky students/friends out to dinner and a movie and let them all meet. THey are learning english and are from Burma, the country at the center of Human Rights abuse and under serious civil conflict. THeir stories are amazing, sad, or just plane funny; they loved meeting a foreigner and someone they could practice their English with. We saw an action movie and ate dinner and then some dessert. THey all wanted to take pictures with her for their scrap books, they took turns with different patterns, then switched for the 1 on 1 photo op with the "vewy beautifl giwrl". THe next day, me and the beautiful girl went to an island about 5 hrs out of the city, called KOH CHANG- Translated: Elephant Island...where elephants are sometimes caught roaming free and the water/atmosphere trumps any beach I've seen in America/Hawaii. We got a Bungalo on the water and enjoyed eachother's company for 3 days. On the 4th day, we returned to central Thailand to pick up my next special package arriving from the west: MOMMA!

She arrived early as well, around 10am. I did my best to get her a good massage, finding out that it was her first massage dissapointed me a bit, but also excited me to know I was going to be at the hands of fixing her up with her newest addiction. Two months later I can already picture the meetings, "Hello my name is Nick's Mom, and I'm a massage addict". Funny cuz when I was younger, my mom's name literally was Nick's mom...atleast I thought. Who knew mom's had names?....

We first did a tour of the local temples, and of the grand palace where the reigning king once lived. These are, at the least, breathtaking. Beautiful in all ways that the overcrowded city would allow. Crap, I shouldnt have used the word "breathtaking" yet cuz now I may over use it and I wanted to save it for the next leg of our journey:

Cambodia.

Probably one of the few people who visited Cambodia and fell in love right away. But I have never been awed much by the man-made craziness of modern cities, I prefer rich culture and seeing life in its' purest form. I opted to take the misses and the mother on this trip because of the experience, the culture shock, and the 7th wonder of the world: Angkor Wat. Ill get to that in a minute. So I wanted them to understand/experience the full marvels/immersion of the trip, so I steered away from flights or vip buses and went with the gold ol' 50 cent, 6 hour, train ride down the Thai Coast and onto the border of Thailand/Cambodia. We were approached atleast 6-8 times each, all with some different scam or trick, sometimes by one of the 30+ children begging in the street. It break their hearts to see all the abandoned kids living/eating/working on the streets, whether it be in the sex trade business, begging, or pickpocketing...the kids take A LOT out of you when visiting 3rd worlds. We were then scammed a few times with some visa-tricks and fake consulates; from the 6 hr train ride we took a 3 hr shared taxi(aka guy's car we just met) to the city of many of my thoughts the past few months: Siem Reap, the city that holds the coveted Angkor Wat. Everything about Cambodia screams Angkor Wat, from the countries flag to the national Beer, this monument impressed us already and we hadnt even seen it yet. On the ride over, I tried to give my guests a crash course on Cambodia, the Khmer Regime(one of the deadliest bloodsheds of its time, basically Cambodia's Holocaust), and also of the temple systems and of Angkor Wat. I was learning a lot, but sometimes it is possible to enjoy a site even if nothing is known about it at all.

The next morning we wake at 4 am, again, to catch the sunrise over the Angkor Wat temple. As we pull in and park, I am floored. 7th Wonder of the World. The Monument dating back over a thousand years, was right in front of me as the sun was just starting to light up the surroundings. I took a few minutes to catch myself, then immediately started taking pictures and getting mad at them for not having already ran through a roll of film already. We missed the sunrise because of the clouds, but even a monsoon couldn't make this site un-inspiring.

We walked the grounds for about 2 hrs, it was early and a "low-season", so very few tourists were there. Much like most of Cambodia, the only foreigners there were either in Phnom Penn, the capital, or working in the human rights field. Cambodia also has some great beaches I hear, but we didnt have the chance to see them. As we walked the grounds, I loved the amount of freedom we had, there were no guards or workes controlling where you could or couldnt go and what you could or couldnt do; and for a guy with curiosity and a camera, this spelled disaster. I creeped into old temples and we crawled up and down very impressive stairs and around the buildings. It was incredible, and so well set. In the front the lake was set perfectly to reflect the entire Temple, and then it was built almost like a fortress with grass and palm trees seperating different sections. And the king had built a 200-300+ yard walkway up to the entrance that was made so that he could enjoy the view when atop his elephant walking towards his thrown. Impressive. Id imagine something like that of the pyramids in Egypt; just in terms of the scale of work and creativity that went into the project...over 1000 years old! I have met many grandparents and I thought they were ancient when I found out they were 90....but 1000+ years old...

Anyway, Ill save the enthusiasm-energy for the next few sentences. After a full day of temple-viewing and sunset/sunrise chasing, we ate at the local market, my mom got extreme food poisining and we canceled our next leg of the trip which took as six hours east t Phnom Penh and to the Vietname border. We instead hung with mom and made sure the Magic Mango Shake wouldnt have us end up with a microphone under us saying, "She was such a good woman......it was only a mango shake, how could we have known?" THe funny part of the whole thing was that me and my girlfriend had 4 the same night, and felt better than ever. We felt bad for her, but luckily it was just a 24 hr thing and we were able to get back on the road back to bangkok.

Once in Bangkok I took them around toa few more sites and pamperings. Nothign extravagent, but it doesnt take much in a foreign city to "shock" someone who has never been. We visited Jakujak, the world's largest outdoor market; a few other markets and went on a short safari.

Next step: Hong Kong.

We stayed here and also went to the neighboring country, Macau, for a few days. I had already been but wanted them to see a bit of China. My girlfriend flew out of Hong Kong and me and my mother hten went back to THailand. Hong Kong is amazing, but I dont want to write about it since I already have in early blogs...

Next stop: Chiang Mai. Chiang mai is many visitors/locals favorite city of Thailand. It is one of the northernmost of Thailand, rich with culture and even better massages. "Hello my name is Ann's Son, and Im a massage addict." We had a nice time here and did a cooking course where we learned how to cook some of my favorite dishes; it was from 9am-4pm and we were ready to explode by the time 10am hit.

From there we checked to see if my mother could extend her 3 week vacation onto another 3 days so that we could hit the beach prior to her departure. Its always a good relaxing ending to a go-go-go nick-lead-country-hoping freeforall. We went to Koh Chang, and as Im writing this, we just got back. Here we just relaxed and soaked up the sun. Avoided a rainstorm by staying inside to read, but still had a chance to relax and really enjoy our last few days together.

Now, in about 15 hours and 38 minutes(not that Im counting it down or anything), my mother leaves to return to the states after over 3 weeks of traveling.

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I have more than enjoyed my guests and it was nice to speak non-broken english for a few weeks. Hopefully my next blog will give more than just a itinerary, but hopefully this will steer away some of the "what have you been up to??"s

I love you all and appreciate your reading.