"That is something that I will never do. I will never puke on a chic." -AJ

It was a crazy night. AJ said this and then within a few hours puked on me. Seriously. I got puked on. I don't know whether to blame flip cup or Carnie Station. So here is the story:

There was a going away party for one of our co-workers last weekend. The festivities started with beer pong, which later turned into flip cup. Some people consumed a little too much thanks to generous pouring on AJ's part. AJ had woken up drunk that afternoon and proceeded to drink more thoughout the day. Later, Paco and I ended up in a cab with Greg and AJ on our way to Carnie Station, an all-you-can-eat/drink place. Somehow I instigated the boys to hug random Koreans in the street when they got out of the taxi. They were pretty wasted at that point. Using the help of a Korean translator, Greg then convinced a guy on a forklift to let him drive it on a busy street in Seoul. I don't know how/why that happened, but it did. We made it to Carnie Station and drank more beer, and AJ started looking pretty woozy. I told him not to puke on me and that's when he made the statement about not puking on a chic. Then I tried to help AJ home so that he didn't pass out and die in the middle of the street. On the way to the taxi, he fell and hit his head on a car, leaving a dent in it. On the way out of the taxi, he fell in the middle of the street. I helped him into his apartment and got him to lie down, but he promptly fell out of bed and puked on himself and me. So there you go. I was trying to be a good citizen, and I got vomit on my jeans as a reward.

Is That for real???
Sometimes in Asia you find a pot with seven orchids in the garbage closet. I am not really sure who thinks it is Ok to throw away beautiful blooming orchids, (I would value them at over $200 in the States) but there they were in the garbage closet. Is that for real??? Even though I don’t have the best track record with plants (I definitely killed the Bonsai plant my sister gave me and multiple others) I decided to take them to my apartment. There was no way I was going to watch them get thrown away, first I’ll torture them with my bad plant care skills. No I am really going to try and not murder them and keep them out of the garbage closet…I’ll keep you posted on how that goes. Meanwhile I am really hoping that there is no cultural misunderstanding occurring, such as Korean people sometimes store their orchids in the garbage closet, and I just stole them. I am betting that stealing someone’s orchids sends really bad karma your way…which is the last thing I need right now. So next time you see orchids in the plant nursery think to yourself: “In Korea people think it is OK to throw 7 of those away, is that for real?”

"It must be karma. What did we do wrong?"

We have been saying this for at least the past week. Does anyone have any ideas what we did? At the moment, I am not only being killed slowly by Yellow Dust but also from whatever chemicals they are using in the renovation of our office (our teacher's office area has now been reduced to a fraction of its normal size so that they can put in a glass wall- yipee! I always wanted to work in a fishbowl). So my runny nose is not getting any better...

Does anyone have any suggestions of things to do to get GOOD karma? Let us know.

I was thinking that I had profound things to say today, but in actuality, I do not. Instead I will leave you with a few quotes to describe how my life is going.

"We're going to like Korea dammit!!!"
-This was said after we heard numerous horror stories about Korea from everyone we encountered. We are determined to like it here, and so far it is working out for us reasonably well.

"I wrote it in pen, so I couldn't change my mind."
-Paco said this when she was telling me about her essay written at the Andy Prep interview. It turned out to be foreshadowing. Andy Prep told us they only had enough hours for one teacher so we took a job at another school. Four days later, Andy Prep offered us two positions due to increased enrollment, but we had already signed a contract with our school so we couldn't change our minds.

"Don't tell the school, they might not hire me."
-I felt a little like I was playing a part in a school play when I went on job interviews. I had on a costume and makeup and delivered the same lines about why I had come to Korea over and over.

"Who invented that?" -AJ "Invented what?" -me "Drinking..." -AJ
-This was what one of our co-workers said about the first night that we went out to the Owl (local bar) and stayed out until 5 a.m.

The "Is that for real?" column is born

So oftentimes in Asia I notice random things happening and think to myself "Is that for real?" So I have decided begin contributing to our blog and start a column entitled "Is that for real " to share these moments of confusion, bewilderment and/or awe with you.

"Is that fore real" by Paco
Article 1: Korean men carry purses
For some reason men in Korea carry around purses. When I say purses I don't mean the cool looking sachels you see in other parts of Asia and Latin America, but regular women's purses. It is quite commom to see a full grown man with a stylish black leather purse with silver buckles slung around his arm. For awhile I just thought Korean men were real gentlemen, carrying their girlfriends purses. After awhile I began to notice that many of these purse carrying men are not accompanied by a woman and the ones that are, have a lady friend that is carrying her own purse. I guess a bag is a bag and we all have stuff to carry around the city, but seeeing so many men sporting stylish purses made me say "Is this for real?"

Rachel reporting... I just wanted to add a little something. You may be wondering what a guy is carrying in that purse of his. Personally, I thought it was just all of that crap that guys carry around in their pockets and then empty onto the table every time they sit down, but it is a little more than that. Today at lunch, I watched a guy take out make-up and touch up his face. So he might be carrying the exact same thing in the purse as his girlfriend. You certainly can't have your boyfriend looking better than you, which is probably why women here are so obbsessed with their appearance and subsequently look so nice. Sometimes I feel like a slob since (1) I have no purse and (2) I never carry make-up with me.

Ok, so I was teaching a class on various health ailments today. I was explaining runny nose, stuffy nose and then nosebleeds. Literally within two minutes of explaining this, my nose started bleeding out of the blue. I don't normally get nosebleeds (even though I am a huge dork) so this was very unexpected and awkward for me. I pointed to the blood that had dripped on the floor and said "See. That is a nosebleed." And then I ran out of the room. How is that for a teachable moment? Good thing I wasn't explaining diarrhea...

So I think that the bloody nose may be from Yellow Dust, which is dust that is blown over from Mongolia or something like that. It can kill you, at least that is what they say. I don't know who they are, but if they claim that you will die, maybe we should all listen to them. They also say that fans may kill you. For all of you uniformed folk (that being any person not from South Korea), fan death is something we should all think about before going to bed each night. Simply ask yourself these two questions: Are the windows and doors closed? Is there a fan on in the room? If you answered yes to both questions then you will not wake up in the morning. In Korea, there is a widespread belief that if you sleep in a room with the windows and doors closed and a fan on, then you will DIE!!! Don't ask people to explain the physics of this to you because they won't have an answer, but they surely believe it.

There are things that are killing me slowly, that I think they should look into. First off, there are the parasites that I am 97% positive have been inhabiting my intesstines since New Year's. Then there is the lack of soap in the bathroom at work (which is really bad when you have snot-nosed kids hanging off of you all day long) and the lack of variety of vegetables and nutirents in my diet (you mean that eating cabbage, rice and eggs everyday is not good for you?!?!?!!?). Let's see, that was the Yellow Dust, worms, non-existent soap and nutirents. Yup, that about covers my health right now. Oh yeah, and my washing machine has also been sitting in the middle of my kitchen (not hooked up) since I moved in so I haven't had clean clothes in two weeks.

Korea is great. I can't blame any of my ailments on the country. Or can I?

Home Sweet Home

Yes, I now live in the third largest city in the world (by population), following Tokyo and Mexico City. This city is ginormous but it is nearly impossible to get totally lost in it. If you are confused, hold up a map and look around quizically. Within a few minutes a nice Korean person will stop and offer you help. If you don't want to bother the nice people, all you have to do is look for a subway station, and the place is littered with them like China was with garbage and shit. From the subway, you can always find your way home.

My new home is in a place called Daechong Tower, which has 26 floors, a subway station in the basement, two convenience stores, a cafe that only has one table, a gym that has a golf area, a quilting store, a dentist, a dermatologist, a bar, a bakery and a floor of restaurants that smells unappetizingly like fish. My apartment is a studio with a murphy bed (that means that it can fold up into the wall if I want more space) and a bathroom the size of a very small closet. I also have a small gas range with a little drawer of an oven. Ovens are almost non-existent in Asia. We made cookies in our guesthouse and the owner looked at the oven with shock, like she hadn't known that you could cook things in it. Since we like to make cookies, we tried to do this in my oven the other night, but something went wrong. I am not sure how, but the cookies caught on fire. I went to check on them and found them in flames. It literally took about 15 minutes to get them to go out. So there you go, flaming cookies in a mini-oven. Lesson learned: don't try to cook in the "oven" because that is not what it is meant for. I don't know what it is meant for, but obviously it's not for making cookies.

Down by the River

So unlike the rest of Asia, people in Korea are active. This activity can be best viewed on a weekend (read Sunday as most people work on Saturdays) down by the river. People are biking and roller blading, and maybe even doing a little urban camping. There is a fabulous path and along the path there are exercise machines. That's right, public exercise machines. A nice man named Mr. Kim (coincidentally 23% of people in Korea are Mr./Mrs. Kim) showed us how they all work one day. I think that I wrote about Mr. Kim before. Anyway, there are also places along the river to play games, like bocce ball or baseball or kicking volleyball. I don't really know what kicking volleyball is actually called, but it is played like volleyball except that you can't use your hands like soccer (or football if you are from any country other than the US). This game is played all over Asia. I don't think that I would be very good at it...

It's funny to me the silly things that trigger homesickness for me. Today I was hit with that feeling of distance and separation on the subway. I saw a woman talking on her mobile phone, and she suddenly grinned and then burst into laughter. That was enough to send a pang of homesickness through my body. When I was in Thailand, seeing a movie in a theater did the same thing to me. In contrast, there are times when I have to remind myself that I am in a foreign country. When I first arrived here, I was snoozing on a bus and I thought to myself I should really look out the window and see what Korea looks like. Oh yeah, I am in Korea!! I don't know how it's possible to forget that I am a strange land at one moment and in the next moment be struck by the realization that I am not, in fact, at home. I don't particularly understand the things that bring on the homesickness, and I think the surprise of the onslaught of emotion makes it feel more intense than it should be. However, the year in Korea is just starting so I had better suck it up and get used to it.

I had my first day of work teaching English today. I think that it went well.... well, sort of. I ended up teaching a class, but prepped the wrong lesson, which meant that I got to lead a discussion on a reading passage that I had no idea what was about. One thing I will say about these Korean kids is that they are damn smart, and cute also. I keep forgetting that English is the second language. They are probably on par with kids in the US speaking in English (or maybe even better), but English is not their native language. I guess that is what happens when kids go to school all day long- literally until about 10 p.m.

Destination Korea

After numerous hours of traveling overland (it's over a hundred), we made it to Korea. I was so excited that I took a picture of the first sign telling me that I was in Korea. Since being in Korea, I have been trying to get a job, which involves me sitting at a computer, swimming through a sea of emails of employment opportunities. It's insanity. So far we have had one interview with a school in a posh part of Seoul. You know it's posh because you pass two Starbucks (yes, that's right, two) and then turn at Hooters to get there. We put on our new suits and heels for the first time and went to an office with hardwood floors and leather chairs. In a conference room, we had an interview and then we were led to a room full of binders with titles like Yale, Harvard, Brown, etc. on them and asked to write an essays on how to improve English and what it means to be a good teacher. I left like a kid playing dress-up and make-believe. I think that we may have convinced them that we are not dirtbag travelers.

Today we escaped the computers by going for a run by the river, which somehow ended in drinking beer. Korean people are really active. They like to hike, walk, run, bike, and rollerblade. There are also public workout machines everywhere. We were exploring these workout machines and probably looking like idiots when Mr. Kim approached to show us the ropes. He showed us how to use every machine in several ways. He was so friendly and sweet that he let us ride his bike and then took us down to a stand and bought us drinks. Who doesn't like a beer after exercise? I must say that I LOVE Korea so far. To all of those wankers out there who said negative things to us, I can only shake my head in bewilderment. Every single time that we have been lost/confused some Korean person has walked up and offered to help us. People have been wonderful and inviting. Paco lost her to-go tea mug at a restaurant and we went back there two days later and they recognized us and brought it out to giddy Paco. Yeah, Seoul is a huge city, but it is clean with well-planned transportation and the people I have met have been wonderful. I heart Korea.

Saying Goodbye to China

We found ourselves on a 40 hour train ride from Kunming to Beijing. What do you do on a 40 hour train ride? Lots of things like wander up and down the train looking for a food cart (wait no, you aren't supposed to do that. I got yelled at in Chinese for doing that, at least I think that is what I was being yelled at for). I slept and read an entire book. I slept and played Scrabble. I slept and watched China go by the window- China is crowded, really crowded. There really are hordes of people everywhere. There were a lot of people on our train. We had a hard sleeper, which means that there are three bunk bed levels, and you can't actually sit upright unless you are on the bottom. Unfortunately, we were not. There were Chinese businessmen on the bottom. On the top were teenage boys who proceeded to get drunk and smoke on a train with windows that don't open. Other highlights were buying a bowl of rice and veggies in a ceramic bowl at a train stop and realizing that the ceramic bowl was disposable and to be thrown away after single use, and well, sleeping. We did that a lot.

What's the one thing that you have to do when you go to China? And no, the answer is not eat dog. The correct answer is visit the Great Wall. So in Beijing, we went to see the wall. We had met a woman from LA at our hostel who was going there in the morning, and she provided us with a free ride (and entrance tickets and a guide too) because a friend of a friend of a friend was showing her around. We had been hoping to go to one of the less touristy sites, but we went wherever we were taken, and it turned out to be a very interesting experience (as everything in China is). From Badalang, you can either go north or south on the wall. Our guide took us up the north side, where all of the Chinese people were going. There were lots of ginormous tour groups. The throngs of people were going up to the Hero Stone, which is this rock at the highest point with a Mao quote about not really being a man until you have climbed the Great Wall. It's pretty obvious that this means something we don't understand to the Chinese people. At the top we were surrounded with enthusiastic Chinese people yelling as usual (they yell A LOT in China). People were posing for all sorts of pictures so then I started taking pictures of them too. I justify it by thinking about all of the random people that were taking pictures of me because I have blue eyes (which happens a lot). Then we walked to the south side of the wall and we were met considerably smaller crowds but of western people not Chinese. Since this apparently is where all the westerners go, so do the Looky-looky-people trying to sell you things. It was an interesting contrast to see. Chinese tourists and then western tourists.

After that, we left China. We said goodbye to the constant lugies, the pollution, the yelling, the masses of people. Goodbye China. I am glad that I went there, but I was glad to leave.

"Well, that was..... interesting."

Back at CIMI, we grew tired of hearing 12 year old girls shriek "eewww gross" when dissecting squid. To prevent having to hear this, we informed students beforehand that instead of saying eewww and gross, they were to pause, think like a scientist, scratch their chin (if their hands weren't covered in squid guts), and thoughtfully remark "....interesting." Thus the squid were no longer disgusting and slimy but instead something new, different and interesting. While in Asia, I have tried to apply this concept of interesting to the cultural situations that I have encountered. I see a man scrubbing his sidewalk with soapy water and I pause, have an open mind, appreciate that that sidewalk will remain clean for about two minutes before the nearest mangy dog dumps out the nearest uncovered garbage can all over it, and I say "well, that was interesting." A woman holds her baby over the sewer while it poops, and I pause and say "well, that was interesting."

China is a place full of "well, that was interesting." From the moment that we crossed the border, we have been uttering that phrase. We wander around not knowing what is going on about 95% of the time, but that may be because our China guidebook was confiscated at the border for having a map that didn't include Taiwan as part of China. Maybe it's because we don't speak a word of Chinese. Whatever the reason, we are in the dark in China and cannot find the light switch. Sometimes we are permitted to do things, and sometimes we are denied. I am sure that people tell us the reasons behind these things, but we have no hope of understanding them. The first night was interesting since we took our first sleeper bus and I thought that I might die. Picture the night bus from Harry Potter, but with three rows of bunk beds that don't move and picture me on the top middle bunk. Basically, there was nothing for me to hold onto and I was expected to sleep in that position while the bus careened around corners on narrow dirt roads while motorbikes whizzed past in the other direction. I coped by practicing meditation. Breathe in, breathe out. I knew that meditation would come in handy someday.
Toilets in China are interesting. If you are lucky, it's a squatter, but it likely wont' be clean. The smell of urine radiates from the "toilets." If you are unlucky, there is simply a channel that you squat over with very short cement dividers (or maybe none at all) so that you can watch everyone else doing their business also. If you are in one of those, whatever you do, don't look down because the channel may not get washed out very much. If you are a small child, then everywhere can be a toilet, including the nearest farmer's field. That is right, human feces = fertilizer in China.

Since we always seem to things the interesting way, we thought going overland wasn't enough. Perhaps it would make a better story if we say... rode a water buffalo overland to Korea. Then we thought about how much you would have to feed a water buffalo and what you would likely smell like after the experience and we decided against it. Our next plan came in Lijiang when we decided to rent bikes to explore the town. We were about to head off on some rusty mountain bikes when we spotted a tandem. We have always wanted to ride a tandem, so we quickly traded in our two single bikes for one very long and heavy and unstable tandem. Maybe we could ride a tandem across China we thought. It sounded like a really good idea until we tried to actually ride the tandem down a hill. Somehow we managed to ride around, get lost and find cute little villages, which was really fun. Ok, so no water buffalo and no tandem bike. Anyone have any brilliant ideas of how to make traveling overland fun?

In Lijiang, we stayed at an amazing guesthouse recommended by our British friends who inspired the trip to China. The owner is the wonderful Chinese woman who directs you around and talks loudly and makes you eat way too much food. You get to call her Mama, and that is exactly what she is like. From Lijiang, we visited the Snow Jade Mountains and rode on a gondola. We made the mistake of not having Mama arrange it for us, and so it was much more confusing than anything in life ever should be. Our efforts were rewarded with a very cold and cloudy view of some beautiful snowy peaks, and it was worth it. The next day, we had Mama send us off to Tiger Leaping Gorge. TLG is this amazingly huge gorge (I think it's one of the biggest in the world, but our guidebook got taken from us so I am not sure), and you get to hike for a couple of says to see it. Along the way, we stayed at pictuesque guesthouses in the mountains and drank lots of tea. I highly recommend Tiger Leaping Gorge if you like to hike and are ever in China.

Now we are in a small town called Dali, where cute old women in the streets ask you if you want to buy ganja. There are tons of yummy places to eat and we are resting up here for the long train ride to Beijing. Ok, I am stopping now because I think that the people who own the hotel want to go to sleep and I think I am in their bedroom. They are hovering so I must go.

Hoi An

We had clothes made. Lots of them. So many that we had to ship them to Korea. We were measured in any and every way you can possily imagine. We liked our tailor so much that we took her out for drinks afterwards. I wish that we could take Quyen home with us. Oh yeah, we like pointy hats that they wear in Vietnam. I am even carrying one around to send home to Max (but it is getting a little smashed...). Ok, too many things have happened since then so I can't think of anything else to write here.

Vietnam

It's funny how different cultures work. We do things one way and other people do them some other way. Sometimes you look at something and think to yourself wow, that is a great idea. why don't we do things like that? And sometimes you look at something and think what the hell were they thinking? that is completely illogical. And then there are times when something is just different, not better or worse, just different. Like garbage pick up in Vietnam. The garbage trucks here drive around blaring music like the ice cream man but louder and more annoying. When the truck stops, people rush out, rubbish bins in hand, and throw it into the truck. Then the person on the back picks out the recyclable items like bottles and cans. We watched all of this go down yesterday morning at breakfast and we suddenly realized why we could never find garbage cans on the street. They just bring it out when the ice cream man, wait no I mean the garbage man, comes around. That way the mangy dogs don't get into the garbage like they constantly did in Thailand (a simple closing lid would solve that problem but maybe they wanted the dogs to spread the garbage out on the sidewalk- that is the thing about culture, I may be missing the whole point by wanting lids on the garbage).

Ok, so we made it to Vietnam, where tourism is much like herding cattle or sheep. They get you onto tour buses and just shuttle you around from one place to the next. They are really nice about it. They tell jokes and sing to you, but the whole experience feels a lot like Disneyland and not traveling. It's like we are on the Jungle Cruise and we can't get off. We went to Saigon and went on our first organized tour to tunnels the Viet Cong used during the Vietnam War. Once again, I felt like a total asshole for being from the US, but it was very educational. There is this strange phenomenon here (and in Cambodia also) of going to sites where loads of people were killed and having a shooting range where tourists can throw a grenade or shoot a rocket launcher. I don't understand how people can walk around and see the devastation and destruction that those very weapons did to actual people, and then want to go fire one off. It's bizarre. The next day we went on the next, and also our last, organized tour where we went on a boat to visit some islands. The snorkeling was phenomenal with amazing corals, interesting fish Ihave never seen before and warm water. Paco and I enjoyed the snorkeling while the rest of our boat got drunk. I don't think that organized tours are a good idea for us...

Now we are in Hoi An having clothes and shoes made, which will need to be a new blog so I will save that one for later.

Cambodia
First of all, I would like everyone to congratulate Paco for finally putting something up on our blog. Nice work, Pacster!!
Ok, so after trials and tribulations we made it to Cambodia. Upon arrival, we were forced to pay more for our visa than we were supposed to, and then forced onto a free bus to take us to the bus station, except the bus says on it "tourist shuttle"and the bus station is labeled "tourist lounge." It was all a bit dodgey. Then we spent the next two hours negotiating with people to get a minibus ride to Siem Reap, which is where Angkor Wat is located. Our reward for that: a six hour ride on the worst road ever. Seriously, the worst road I have ever been on. Asia Airlines paid off the government to not fix the notoriously bad road, which inspires people to buy plane tickets. On the way, our driver stopped to get drunk. Seriously. We stopped and he downed about four beers (at 8% each) before continuing on the worst road ever. Somehow, we made it to Siem Reap.
We rode bikes around Angkor Wat the next day. There are all of these amazing ruins and lots and lots of tourists. It was a pleasant day biking around, getting lost, and watching tourists do stupid things- like taking posing for pictures with a sword on a horse. My favorite part was watching the eight year old girls selling things mob Paco. I don't know why she claims that she doesn't really like kids, because the is the biggest sucker for them and they know it. They practically attack her when she walks by. I walk by and nothing happens. Paco walks by and it's a mosh pit. They try and sell you all sorts of things, and they are scary. Seriously.
After the ruins, we traveled to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, to visit some Australian friends from our TEFL course who are teaching there. They have been showing us around the city and giving us all sorts of useful information. One night we went to this amazing bar that looks like a tropical resort with a pool. It was pretty sick dog (that's right Chris, it's sick dog not bird). Last night we went to a place where you cook your food in a pot or a barbaque at the table, which was interesting as well. Yesterday we saw a very depressing side of Cambodia from the Khmer Rouge. In case you don't know about it, in the mid-1970's, Pol Pot wanted to make Cambodia a communist nation and so he decided to exterminate all of the intellectuals and their families (about two million of them). We went to the Killing Fields where they brought people to execute and bury in mass graves. While walking around, you stumble across torn shreds of clothing poking out of the ground, and then you realize that there is a human bone inside that clothing. then we went to Toul Sleng (S-21), which is an old school where they detained and tortured people. It was not an uplifting day.
Now that I have written all of this, I realize that I may not have painted the best picture of Cambodia so I need to inform everyone of how much I love this place. Sure the city is dirty, and the taxi drivers are pushy and constantly harrass you, and the sidewalks are not for walking on, and I was inches away from being run over by a motorbike the other day, but this country is amazing. People are so friendly and wonderful. The guy who owns our guesthouse drinks beer with us and tries to use as much slang as he can, which makes us giggle our Wilma and Betty giggle. We really do love it here, but tomorrow we are headed to Vietnam.

What is going on with all of the sepia pictures? I don't really know. For some reason both of us started taking them quite frequently. I can't explain it.

Hello everyone! Spent the last few days in Phuket picking up our luggage, hanging out with our TEFL instructors and eating in our favorite restaurant, known as "chicken place". I cannot even convey to you how amazing this place is. For less than a dollar you get the best chicken meal ever, Rach and I ate there at least once a day (sometimes for breakfast) while we lived in Phuket and have been talking about it since. Being reunited was greatm, the owners remembered us and tried to convince us (through our huge langauge barrier) we should move to Phuket Town. Rach and I printed out this picture for them, framed it and wrote "best chicken in Thailand" with a Thai translation for them. The woman actaully started crying when we left . So if we don't return to the states we may be at "chicken place" trying to learn the secrets of perfect chicken.Now we are back in Bangkok...had a freakout moment today when we could not figure out a good way to ship our teaching stuff to Korea and realized we either had to carry it all overland or buy a plane ticket to Korea. We were pretty close to abandoning the overland plan even though we have been really excited since our British friends planted the idea in our heads. Luckily we came across a very nice UPS man, the only helpful person in the entire Thai shipping buisness, I am sure of it, we talked to a lot of them. After a couple hours we figured everything out, handed over a wad of cash and our stuff will be in Korea in 3 days, way ahead of us. Our plans were not crushed and so we decided to celebrate and relax (which is all we wanted to do after days of going non-stop) by going to see a movie at the mall. We had some time to kill before the movie and so we decided to eat some crazy food. First stop: KFC ( in Thailand it serves rice instead of mashed potatoes with meals. ) You can also find quite a concoction on their menu: Corn Sundae...whoever thought that was a good idea was wrong, but we had to give it a go. The sweet salty thing is good at times (like mango sticky rice) but corn and ice cream should never be served together. After that experience we decided to cleanse our palat with a MC rice burger....basically a burger with a bun made out of rice. McDonalds is never good (I actually cannot even recall the last time I ate there) and I wouldn't say this was any different...but how can you not try a burger with a rice bun????Tomorrow we are out of here, I am ready for sure...I wonder if Cambodia puts corn in their sundaes???

Climbing Again in Krabi

The climbing was amazing, the crowds were not. We woke up early each morning to try to avoid the inevitable clusterfuck that would happen. Early mornings also saved you from the suffocating heat and constant sweat dripping from you while on the rock. However, nothing could save you from the monkies. At times, I would be near the top of a climb and they would start jumping from tree to tree all around me, making crazy monkey noises. I got the impression that they didn't want me there. It is crazy to watch them fling themselves into space, completely trusting that they will land on something. I had one hurl itself over my head one day. Monkies also really like bananas. Enough that they will break into your room in the middle of the night. Our friend Chris (the guy in the picture-he is from Durango, Colorado) woke up one night to crashing noises in his bungalow and found himself face to face with a monkey stealing his bananas. Another guy in our bungalows woke up to a 16 foot python in his bed. Fortunately, the worst that happened to me was a gecko dropping on me in the bathroom. It scared the shit out of me, but luckily I was in the bathroom already. Animal encounters, fun times.

We were sad to leave Ton Sai, especially because it is being turned into a resort next month. But our visas are running out and we needed to make a move towards Korea, so we left. I don't know if we will ever go back. With a tear in our eyes and a tightness in our throats, we bid farwell to the limestone cliffs, the longtail boatmen who screamed Ao Nang Ao Nang Ao Nang every few minutes, the Pyramid Cafe where we ordered coffee from a guy named Chai everyday, the bars where we drank buckets on the beach, and our fellow climbers from around the world. We move on to another place, fill our minds with more memories, and hope to see the friends that we leave behind again someday.