Honeymoon post 2

First a bit of informational news:

After the ludicrous suggestion by Gmail that my new email address be "cara.carawest.west6" I finally found a suitable 'west' related email address for myself. So from now on please send emails to: cara.a.west@gmail.com!

Okay, now, back to my update on the last 'moon' of our travels - this one spent mostly in Thailand, with little adventures into Laos and Cambodia. And unfortunately....once again I am afraid that this email has reached an unnaturally long length...so grab that drink again!

We flew into Bangkok and met up with a couch surfer named Ond. Little did we know that we were there just in time for Onds' 30th bday! So lucky us got to be there as him and his friends celebrated by ...wearing fake mustaches? The night turned out to be one of the funnest bday parties we have ever been too, with a small handful of us playing American style card drinking games.

We left Ond (luckily leaving the massive felt rug we bought in Kyrgyzstan in his spare room, which was a much better alternative than carrying the 40 pound bag with us for 2 months...) We hopped on a local train heading North, which is how we travelled for the next 4 weeks. We loved the rickety trains, with their (sometimes padded) bench seats, wide open windows, and vendors selling local grub - sticky rice grilled over fire in bamboo tubes, entire chickens skewered with bamboo, pad thai served in a quaint pyramid shaped banana leaf bowl - and cold beer. In this fashion we snaked our way through 4 or 5 towns, including Kanchanaburi where we discovered our love for Thai street food - falling in love with the green curry at a roadside cart with simple plastic stools, metal collapsable tables and bowls heaped with fresh mint, basil and bean shoots to help cool your mouth - Lopburi with its troupe of monkeys who hang from the power lines and use the temples and other old relics as their playgrounds, and Sukothai which was Thailands first capitol, all the way up to Chaing Mai, enjoying finding the best food by only eating at places with the most locals queued in front. In Chaing Mai we joined an adventure called "flight of the gibbons" where we zip-lined our way through the canopies of trees in a rain forrest, and spent most of our other 3 days in town tracking down several different Wawee coffee shops which originate in the area as the mountains provide the best climate for bean growing (and, let me just say, that if you choose to read the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series...make sure you can readily find good coffee and maybe a lamb roast...because both are mentioned quite frequently, and even though food was our FAVORITE part of SE Asia....coffee and lamb aren't terribly easy to find, which left both of us craving both for an entire 2 months).

From Chaing Mai we took the local bus through the mountains to the little hippie haven that is Pai, Thailand over a road that mainly consists of 726 curves (someone counted...personally my sore tummy would have guessed closer to 934). We spent 5 days in Pai, loving the feel of the artsy town specializing in t-shirts and postcards because someone somewhere along the line decided that both can be an art statement in and of itself. Most of our time was spent with Toff sitting in a tattoo parlour (sadly not getting one of Thailands famed bamboo tattoos...although I do think that one day he will warm up to tattoos, and get one himself...) this time he was there to have his dreadlocks worked on. He was concerned that they weren't dreading at the base, so Neng, a dreadlock expert!, thought it would take 6 hours to redo them all to try to tighten them up. It took 26 hours over 3 days. So Toff sat, and I wandered - deciding minute by minute that I would let my dreadlocks go (because yes! I did have dreadlocks, for a glorious 3 months! and loved them, but was not prepared to sit for that long to have them worked on, when they would probably have come out by the next American summer anyhow). We did take some time to enjoy a Thai cooking class - which was so much fun that now we both want a wok with one of those cool little propane-tank stands. Luckily here in Aus asian cooking ingredients are pretty easy to come by, so we'll try to track some down.

Sadly our 30 day visas were close to expiring, so we began making our way to the Thai-Laos border. Before we got there we stopped in Chang Saen to see the 'golden triangle' where Thailand, Myanmar (or Burma) and Laos meet, and which used to be completely covered with opium-producing poppie plants. So we visited the opium museum. And, I must say, this town was one of my favorite places....solely based on the fact that there was a buddha with a metal slide protruding from his big round tummy, and when you climbed the set of stairs in front of him, and put a few coins into the top of the slide, they slid down into his belly and he yelled "Muahahaha! Hap-py Bud-dha!!!" And I fell in love with all of my little 8-year old heart :)

From there we crossed into Laos by a longtail boat, just in time to catch the 2 day slow boat down to Luang Prabang, Laos. Sadly, the boat was way overcrowded, and all with tourists ....or should I say 'backpackers.' Until this point I, foolishly, was under the impression that Toff and I were backpackers because, well, we were traveling just with our 2 backpacks.....but apparently the new generation claiming the title "backpacker" prefers to go from town to town, finding the best bars and continually running into the same crowd of booze-loving westerners. And as our new friend Renee was told by a set of giggling Swedish backpacking girls, "You are a tourist. We are backpackers," when she elected not to join them on another binge drinking session. Back to the boat - we decided that, instead of joining the fray inside the boat, we would simply sit out front. And before long a few others joined us, because we did, in fact, pick the best seats on the boat! Open air, fresh breeze, best view, a little sun....and no drunk Englishmen.

After 2 days (stopping to spend the night in a little town that seems to have cropped up solely for the purpose of hosting the boat travellers) we arrived in Luang Prabang - a gorgeous town with heaps of crumbly French colonial buildings. We spent almost a week here, but most of that was because of a monk named Joy.

We met Joy when we were simply wandering around town. He asked if we had crossed the river (Luang Prabang is situated on a penninsula, and half of the year there are bamboo bridges to cross, but the other half the river is too high and the current too strong, so they simply remove the bridges and cross by boat) we hadn't, so he asked if we would like to share a boat with him and go to see his temple. So we did.

Joy showed us his temple, and taught us that it is dangerous for monks to talk to tourists, because if the "tourist police" see you they will fine everyone (including the monk....who doesn't have a cent to his name) because it is "not the monks job to show tourists around." But the truth is, they don't want monks doing for free what the tour companies charge hundreds for, and also that the monks are some of the most educated men in Laos - most of their time is spent praying to Buddha and going to class. And most of them speak such great english and really love the opportunity to speak to foreigners. So we joined Joy, and saw his room (which doesn't look too far off from a western teenage boys dorm room, 2 boys to a room, doodles on covers of school books, and even American rap music heard through the thin wall) and learned so much about temple life! Joy came to the temple when he was 15, and was a novice for 5 years before becoming a full fledged monk at the age of 20 (which is when Buddha says you can become one). He is now 22, and wears bright orange robes, and can't touch women at all, including their belongings. He wakes up at 4am everyday to pray for an hour, then walks the village barefoot with the other monks and novices to collect their alms, which is the only food they all share for the day. They eat 2 meals, one around 7 when they get back from collecting alms (the villages give them food such as rice and vegetables and in return have a prayer said for them) and another at 11am. They aren't allowed to eat after noon. Then he spends most of his day in classes, and is free to do what he wants after 2 when his classes end.

Joy visits his family at his home village 2 hours outside of town about once a year, and in November, he hadn't yet paid them a visit this year. So he asked if we would like to go with him. Excited, and a little nervous, we said yes! we would love to.

So that is how, at 8am the next morning, we ended up in the back of a tuk tuk with Joy the monk, on the way to the bus station to go meet his family - trying the entire time not to appear as if we knew him at all, so he wouldn't get in trouble with the police. We arrived at the bus station right in time to jump on the back of a pick up truck, lined in the back with 2 benches perched on top of the sides of the truck and covered by a flat roof. In thailand these are called "sawng thaus" which literally means "two rows." It always amazed me, in SE Asia, how they can always seem to fit more and more people onto public transport. So we rode for 2 hours, pressed snug against our bench-neighbors and trying not to trample the goods at our feet - bags of rice, bamboo baskets of fresh greens and other covered baskets with fresh produce from town (Joy sat in the cab of the truck - this kind of transport can be tricky for monks as everyone is touching everyone, and they can't touch women. They also can't pay, but room is always made for them) We arrived at Joys' village, creatively named "Ban Tinkeo," or, "Village 8," and were welcomed into his mothers bamboo hut - a 2 room shack raised on 3 foot high stilts to avoid the mud during the monsoon season. Inside were his mother and his grandmother, both frail women who sat with their knees and elbows folded and tucked into and under themselves, so that they appeared even smaller when sitting, and a little girl who burst into tears whenever she saw us, she was so terrified (turns out we were the first westerners to visit, instead of just pass by). Joy showed us his village - a series of about 2 dozen raised bamboo huts, with chickens wandering between on dirt paths and a large pig sty. We visited with a group of local women, who, Joy said, would like to talk to me (if only I spoke Laos!) and would like to touch my skin, and I should touch theirs too, as this is a sign of respect. With Joy translating, we learned that they were all around the same age as us - and they were all amazed that I didn't have children by now! ("You have such gorgeous skin and such gorgeous hair!" they would say, slowly rubbing my arm, then patting my belly, "why don't you have children?") They have all got at least 3, and have been married since they were 16. Joy asked what animal we sacrificed at our wedding (maybe a kangaroo?) and how much my dowry was (a few plane tickets to Aus for family members?) He also showed us the fields the villagers use to grow a grain called Jobs Tears which they harvest and sell to a nearby distillery. Toff joined the women using curved machetes to hack the stalks off at knee height...I gave it one swing and decided just to take pictures instead of help....before I could have the chance to take off my knee cap...they made it look so easy! And then Joy showed us what plants they use for medicine, and which for string - they grow everything they use, and rarely eat meat. They heard that us westerners only eat meat, so Joys mother had his uncle kill a chicken for us. The WHOLE thing was served in a soup, which we ate by grabbing a walnut-sized piece of sticky rice from its little bamboo steamer basket, and dipping it into the broth. I am afraid that for the 2 days we were there, this is really all that I ate (along with an assortment of greenery) as the sight of a chickens head in the bowl was enough to make it quite an effort for me to eat only that. Toff was a little braver, and ate the head of the chicken (gah!) Joy thought it was funny that we don't eat the heads of animals, since we eat all the rest. I'm sure he is right...really it is no different....but I just couldn't do it.

We spent the rest of the afternoon walking to a waterfall, about an hour away just beside "Village 11." We met a friend of Joys who used to be a monk, but had to quit to go help his family with their farm. He also has a girlfriend in his village, but has no way to raise the 500,000 kip dowry (around 300 dollars). Walking back we were joined by a flock of children who loved just to giggle at us and run along beside us. 3 young girls walked along behind me for a while, and would dissolve into giggles when I smiled at them. They were happy to let me take their picture, but when I tried to stand beside them and have Toff take a picture of all of us, they all look terrified! That night we slept in Joys' Uncles hut (or at least he said it was his uncle....relationships in this part of the world can get quite confusing...so we were never quite sure what they meant when they called the same person their brother/cousin/friend.) And at 5am woke up to try to make it to the top of a mountain (which we only have to cross 2 other mountains to get to!) in order to see the sunrise. We made it up one of the mountains in time, with his brother/cousin/friend all the while darting around our path checking the traps he had set the day before to catch rats (and yes...rat soup is what we had for lunch that day) and shoot small birds with his long skinny rifle.

When we reached the top, with the golden sun illuminating the mist that had settled over the village the night before, one of the men from the village caught up with us to tell Joy that his mother was ill, and wanted him to return. We all trudged back down the mountain (how steep it seems climbing down! can you believe we climbed all the way up here?) to join the other dozen villagers who were crowded into Joys hut. Illness here is not a private affair where you get to close your door and return to the world healthy again. The entire village watches. And we watched too, as Joy told us that his mother had been ill, she had been to see someone (I don't want to say doctor...but someone with some medical background who fixes minor problems for all of the villages nearby) and that they had said there was a problem with her liver. Joy wanted her to go to the hospital, but how? There is no ambulance to call, and no money to pay with if there were. We wanted to help....but just felt as if we were intruding. She wasn't getting better, and she wasn't responding to people anymore. We think she will die. But if she does so in the hospital, and not the village, they won't have any way of getting her body back for a funeral....and in the end, the whole process would be very bad for the village. So what do we do? What if it was our mom? In the end, and without trying to push our western ideas onto Joy, we gave him money - as much as we had with us - for him to pay a doctor to come visit her. We decided to leave Joy, feeling that, as long as we were there he would continue to worry over our comfort and if we ate enough and if we enjoyed our visit. So with a bushel of bananas (the best I have ever tasted!) and Joys email address written down, so we can email him what might be the only photo he has of him and his mom together, we flagged down the bus on its way back to the city and climbed back onto the benches, next to the locals and all of their bundles.

We tried to email Joy the photo, and to find out how his mother is doing. But somewhere along the line, something was lost in translation and the email won't go through. Now we just wait, and hope that he still has ours. Toff has since posted the photos to the CouchSurfing website, imploring any fellow traveller who finds themselves in Luang Prabang if they would perform a random act of kindness and bring our photos to Joy at his temple.

Whew. How do you recover from that? How do you see ANYthing that even compares? We didn't. And don't think we ever will.

So we continued our way South through Laos, and into Cambodia. We were at a run now - running out of time, and wanted to spend our last week relaxing on a Thai island before coming back home to Aus and getting busy with work and Christmas.

We spent 3 days in Cambodia, visiting Angkor Wat for sunrise (and the temple Tomb Raider was filmed at) and unfortunately getting so tired of being ripped off (only $30 luckily) and lied to that we had to get out of "Scambodia" as a fellow bus-traveller deemed it. We were upset about it, but really, over traveling for 4 months we were ripped off once....so we were probably due for a little bit of bad luck.

We made our way back to Bangkok to stay once again with Ond, and leave another bag of belongings with him, as we needed only bathers and sun screen where we were going. We took the night train (a highly recommended form of travel!) 15 hours south, then caught a ferry to Koh Lipe, an island only a 1 hour boat ride from Malaysia. Here we spent our last week in a bamboo hut on the beach, swimming in the crystal blue water and hiding from the sun in the shade of our porch, enjoying a gin and tonic while swinging gently in our hammock.

And that was that. We returned to Ond's to retrieve our belongings, and join him for a final Thai meal - which was amazing! He brought us to an all-you-can-eat Thai BBQ place where you cook the meat yourself on special bundt-pan shaped tins resting over fire. We were joined by Anna and her French boyfriend Bruno, who also joined us at our FIRST meal in Bangkok as well (I love bookends like that!) Also notable: Bruno would like to marry Anna, but as her family is wealthy her dowry is 20,000 EUROS...who else thinks Toff got off easy?? :)

So on Monday, November 30, we climbed onto a plane (the 11th flight we have taken) that would carry us to Australia - thus ending our honeymoon that took us to 12 countries in 131 days.

Love to all!

Cara West