Boy Meets World

Sorry for the long absence, it's so easy while on the road to succumb to apathy when all you really care about is your next meal, next bed or next near-death experience, which surprisingly and unfortunately comes all too often in Asia.

Scuba diving is my new favourite thing in the world, it's official. I never thought I would enjoy it so much and immediately be so infatuated with it. But seriously, the crazy crap you see down there is just so unlike anything I've ever seen before. Not to mention the fact that breathing underwater is fun as hell. So I did my 3 day open water diving in koh tao and then decided to stay and do my advanced licence as well, so i am now certified to dive to 30 metres/100 feet. We saw the craaaziest shit down there. Most notably, while we were sitting at 30 metres getting a nitrogen narcosis test (this is apparently when you begin to act extremely drunk and do such funny things as rip your regulator out of your mouth or forget to breathe) from our instructor, 2 3-metre gray reef sharks swam by about 5 metres away from us. We also saw a school of barracuda, angelfish, clownfish, cuttlefish, a teenage mutant hermit crab, etc... the list goes on and on.

Of all the 9 dives though, the unequivocal highlight was the night dive. Just as we arrived at the dive site, as the sun was setting, a ridiculous storm blew in and it started to thunder and lightning. This didn't seem to perturb our guide (named Ant, easily the most excitable person on earth, especially when speaking about either diving or the number of thai children he has fathered on the island) and we went down amidst the lightning. We were down about 18 metres and every few seconds the whole ocean would light up. We spent about half of the dive with our flashlights off, guided by the indescribable phosphorescence. Amazing experiences, I actually have a bunch of pictures we got with an underwater camera, will post those later....

After our 5 days on Koh Tao, we took a boat over to catch the infamous Full Moon Party on Koh Phangan. Every single traveler you meet in the preceding weeks is heading to this party, and this one was supposed to be especially notable as it was the 20th anniversary party and the King's birthday (the King of Thailand is a demigod in his country. He is a mix of a politician, a playboy and a rockstar. Everyone worships the ground he walks on, to the point that it is rumoured if you step on a Thai coin that has his face on it, you get arrested. One day a week everyone wears a yellow shirt to honour him. Every morning the national anthem plays in public places and everyone stops and happily sings along. Of course, nobody told the stupid white guys who were not wearing yellow shirts, not singing and after finally stopping for the song, noticed they were standing on coins and were probably going to get sent to jail. Sorry, I digress).

Anyways, the party was incredible, with somewhere in the neighbourhood of 20 000 people on one small beach. However, it was like fuckin Flanders Field out there, with bodies strewn about every few feet. Dave and I had a great time running around for half the night with a stretcher, transporting nearly dead idiots to the "sleeping area" while I screamed that I used to be a lifeguard and that my dad is a doctor so shut up and listen to me. It was great fun. Thing such as the "sleeping area" are actually really needed to protect the partygoers from themselves, as apparently some of the dumbest people in the world attend this party. For example, several years ago, 3 guys were tired of the party and decided to go for a swim....to Ko Samui, which is very very far away. They didn't make it.

Anyways, while that all night party took 3 days to recover from, we made our way up to Bangkok via boat, bus and overnight train to meet up with the glorious kate taylor and co. to celebrate the shit out of Canada Day. While they were extremely proud of themselves for paying only 25 dollars for a bottle service, we one-upped them by buying an 8 dollar bottle from 7-11 and smuggling it into the restaurant. From there, most of the rest of the night was spent badly singing O Canada on Khaosan Road and forcing people to buy red t-shirts to honour our wonderful country, exactly what our forefathers intended.

After the next night, in which I distinguished myself with my impressive ability to deal with the daterape drug slipped into my drink by a thai waiter, we took a long and painful bus ride to Cambodia. The road from Bangkok to Siem Reap has never been fixed-or finished for that matter- because Bangkok Airways apparently pays the Cambodian government to keep it in disrepair. This is not a rumour, it was a really really shitty road. We arrived in Siem Reap, where I was to find that my unfortunate experience in Bangkok wasn't the end of unfortunate experiences for me. I got food poisoning on our first morning and attempted to battle through it to bicycle to Angkor Wat. This was a terrible idea. I spent the rest of the day lying on the bathroom floor in unbelievable pain. The lesson here...cambodian cheese is the worst thing in the world. The next day was much better as we went and explored all of the temples around the city. Unfortunately we got caught in a giant rainstorm. And unfortunately, that giant rainstorm caused half the roof in our room to collapse on my bed and onto all of my worldly possessions.

Aaanyways, we also made it to Angkor Wat for the sunrise. This was a very cool experience marred only by the weather and the island of Japan and half of its citizens. Angkor Wat itself is absolutely unbelievable, massive and impressive in every possible way. I highly recommend seeing it.

Cambodia overall was an extremely intense experience that I wasn't entirely prepared for. After we left Siem Reap we went to the capital city of Phnom Penh. Cambodia is of course famous for the Khmer Rouge genocide of the 1970s, a lot of the major events of which occurred in this city. Thus, most of the tourist sites arise from this horrible period. While we both felt we needed to see some of the things, it really put us in a terrible mood. We went and saw the infamous Killing Fields as well as the Tuol Sleng prison, which was used to torture and interrogate suspects. Seeing shelves of skulls, before and after pictures of victims, the actual places where it all occurred, etc... was very difficult to deal with. On top of that, the poverty in Cambodia is like none I've experienced in that it is very in-your-face, even exploitative in a way. People are always around you, demanding money and making you feel like an asshole if you don't do something. It's hard to blame them for doing so, but I guess it's just the way it is there.

Overall, especially in Phnom Penh, I felt that you could really feel the continued resurgence and pride that the people have in their country (despite the fact that everyone is trying to sell you opium at all times). I enjoyed being there, but wouldn't really recommend it for your next feel-good vacation destination. Some pictures of Cambodia below....

From Phnom Penh we embarked on a longass boat ride down the Mekong River to get to Vietnam. After more boats and buses, and some incredible scenery, and some even more incredible rainstorms, we made it to Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City. As far as Asian cities go, this one might just be the prototype for crazy driving. Apparently the best method, or atleast the one all our cabbies and moto drivers use, is to speed up and honk your horn as you enter an intersection, without looking to see if anyone is coming. works like a charm. We spent our one day in Saigon walking around, touring the War Remnants museum (which has an entire room devoted to artifacts and posters which proved the rest of the world was pissed at the States for even coming to Vietnam, pretty funny), being accosted in markets and marveling at the large statue in the middle of the city immortalizing the first Vietnamese man to use carrier pigeons.

We have now been in Mui Ne for a day and are heading up to Nha Trang tonight, moving very quickly. Mui Ne has been great. We spent the day sandboarding in massive sand dunes, getting dominated by fishermen in arm wrestles, chilling on the beach and watching two old Vietnamese women try to kill each other with their pointy straw hats (i'm not even joking).

Thanks for emails, etc.... hard to believe only 3 weeks to go in this absurdly amazing year. Already looking forward to getting home though. Good luck Lev, keep biking baby. Hello to my new niece Amelia, talk soon everyone....

the monument at the killing fields, full of human skulls, didn't really feel like posting a closeup, you get the picture...

a torture room in tuol sleng prison

typical of many authoritarian regimes, the khmer rouge were extremely methodical with their killing...these photos of victims are found all over the tuol sleng museum.