Category Archives: Words

{This was an email I sent out to my contacts when I returned from South America in 2003}

Most of you don’t actually know that I was gone in the first place. I’ve just arrived home from a three week expedition to South America, and got a chance to see both Ecuador and Peru.

My father was doing business in Ecuador, so I was lucky enough to accompany him, providing companionship, photography and inadequate translation services. We spent a week in Ecuador and then flew to Peru and met Pippin at the airport. The three of us then checked out Cusco (the center of the Incan empire) and Machu Picchu. After a week, Dad went home and Pippin and I went on to the Amazon rainforest.

A few things we learned: The Incans were far more advanced architecturally than the Spanish. Their structures have survived numerous earthquakes, while the Spanish churches have been rebuilt many times. And all this without the use of any sort of bonding material like concrete. Their rocks were stacked, and shaped in such a way to fit together like puzzle pieces, with nothing but fine sand in between to allow for movement during a quake.

Their celestial skills impressed me, and they were keen enough to know that there are two norths — true north and magnetic north! They leveled tops of mountains and brought rocks the size of our apartment from valleys away — using their own strength. They didn’t have access to large animals like cows and horses until the Spanish brought them.

While the Spanish were greatly inferior architects, they did have superior firepower. They managed to ruin almost everything Incan and convert everyone to Christianity, losing all previous knowledge. The Incans did not have a written language, so there is nothing left to learn from, other than their structures and the writings of the Spanish. The language itself did survive hundreds of years of being banned under Spanish rule, and people in rural areas still do speak Quechua.

I got a chance to cross the Equator again. I actually got the chance to stand on a painted line directly on latitude zero. I played on it a bit, jumping from the northern hemisphere to the southern, and putting one foot on one side, and the other on the other side.

We went to many outside markets, and bought a few local crafts. The weaving is exceptional, using mainly llama and alpaca wool.

We saw many volcanoes. My dad and I stayed in a town called Baños at the base of one which was active. It was strange to go to sleep, knowing that any day now the town may be covered in lava and ash like Pompeii. note: the volcano erupted in August of 2006. not sure if Baños is even there anymore.

Another thing I learned: If you are lost in the middle of the Amazon rainforest, there is no way you’re getting out. There is a reason why they call it ‘The Green Inferno’. It’s huge, it’s hot, and if you got lost, kiss your mosquito bitten ass goodbye.

The rainforest is the harshest place to be alive that I’ve seen. If you’re a plant, good luck trying to get what you need. The soil’s not very deep, and prone to complete flooding. The light is limited, due to the sheer amount of leaves that have beat you to the light overhead. The nutrients are scarce because the other plants are already making use of them to create their leaves and other bits. And, if that’s not enough, everything else either wants to eat you or make a nest out of you.

It’s great to see the adaptations that various living things have made in the jungle. There were leaves which were brown while young, possibly to resemble dead leaves, so bugs would leave them alone. There were trees which have a paper thin outer bark, which sheds frequently, so vines and creeping plants don’t climb and choke it. There are other trees with spikes 3-4″ long coming out, so animals don’t climb or push over the tree for it’s fruit. There are trees which ‘walk’ by moving their roots and leaning towards the light. There are others which grow entirely around another tree, using it as an easy quick way to get to the source of light, and cover it completely.

The bugs are insane, really neat looking. I saw butterflies with clear wings, strange shiny green beetles, stick bugs, and so many different ants that I can’t even tell you how many species. They have ants who not only bite you, but also sting you at the same time! They are called ‘bullet ants’ because apparently when they do this, it feels like you’ve been shot.

There are so many different sounds in the jungle. It seems as though everything has it’s own noise. Each bird and bug and monkey and whatever else has a distinct sound, and they all seem to be making it the whole time. We woke up to howler monkeys. They have that name for a reason. The sound is similar to wind whipping through cracks, that spooky oooooooohhh sound of ‘ghosts’. Really weird way to get up in the morning. There was this really strange bird that sounds like someone was playing an xylophone. The macaws and parrots were very loud.

We got a chance to see the largest eagle in the world, the Harpey Eagle with a wingspan of 7-8 feet. We also got to see the largest otters, the Giant River Otters (6 feet long), and the largest rodent, the Capyberra. Have you noticed a pattern? *Everything* is bigger there, the trees, the bugs and the animals.

The air was thick, and smelled very musty and earthy. Pippin commented that it smelled like, “somebody threw a bunch of plants into a blender.”

I have four separate pages of photos, about 100 photos in total.
Here they are:

Ecuador
Cusco, Peru
The Sacred Valley of the Incas & Machu Picchu, Peru
Rio Tambopata, Amazon Basin, Peru

Enjoy!
/Cee

PS: Many people have asked about the anti-American sentiments overseas, so I will answer your questions.

The South Americans, like the rest of the world, are upset about the war and the current state of United States politics. People everywhere were friendly, but as soon as we told people we were from the States, many found a way to quickly, (and politely) finish the conversation.

The graffiti painted everywhere, and the protests in the streets told of people’s opinions. It’s amazing to see people so involved in politics which don’t affect them in any way. I can’t imagine the average American being so active about another country’s problems.

Every traveler we met from other parts of the world were wary of us. Only after we explained that we were, in fact, against the war, did they warm up and ask us what was going on. I had heard reports from other travelers about going abroad (Mexico, Europe and even Canada) and the anti-American sentiments overseas, but I was a bit unprepared for it. When we were in Asia, people were still very warm due to 9/11, but now there is no more sympathy. I am fearful now to be back in the country, knowing that so many people around the world hate us, more than ever before.

{This was an email I sent out to my contacts on my first trip to Asia in 2002}

tokyo is a giant city built entirely for shopping. the subway stations are giant malls that span miles, with everything you’d ever need inside. everywhere you look you see girls walking around with huge shopping bags… and from what i’ve heard of the size of tokyo apartments, i wonder where they put all this stuff?

the station we stayed near was underneath the biggest mall i’ve ever seen. it was 16 stories high and spanned at least 4 blocks. they even had their own subway line named after the store.

when you walk outside everywhere you go there are random vending machines on the sidewalk selling drinks. each vending machine is run by a different company, so when one vending machine company sets up a vending machine on a certain corner, its 25 competitors also set up their vending machines next to it, creating an endless string of vending machines all selling teas and crazy drinks of neon colors. (the machines spit out hot drinks as well as cold). there are drinks to energize you, drinks to up your dose of vitamin c, drinks to make you feel better, and drinks to diffuse your aggressive mood, as well as coffees, milk teas and green tea, cold cocoa and sodas. some also sell beer and others sell cigarettes.

everything is automatic. there is very little human interaction, and what human interaction there is is very polite. the ticket machines and pay phones have little animated graphics of women who bow at you when you are finished with your transaction. the doors all open for you by pressing a panel on the door. things chime and talk to you everywhere. little sensors by doors greet you as you come into shops and thank you as you leave. toilet seats are heated and play you little synthetic flushing and water sounds to make you feel more comfortable. there are little lcd panels in the subway cars that display helpful information like stock quotes and this week’s weather.

the japanese all look good and are well dressed. they all have the same cellphone with little dangly bits hanging off which they send text messages to each other on the subway. when it rains they all pull out the same clear umbrella with a white plastic handle.

some strange things we noticed:
pippin and i would come up to a street crossing and the crossing sign would be red, and there would be some people waiting for it to turn green before they crossed the road, which is perfectly reasonable, except for the fact that there are NO CARS on the street ANYWHERE. so pippin and i would just cross the street, to look back and see some confused japanese people looking at each other like, “should we cross?” i fear for the japanese tourist in vietnam where there are no street lights to have walk signals for!

the japanese also ride their bikes in the sidewalk. i almost got run over on a few occasions. i don’t really understand this at all, especially after seeing the traffic situation. everyone drives politely and fairly slowly, and it would be much easier to ride in the empty streets, where there are (again) NO CARS, rather than riding in the sidewalk and navigating through the hordes of people.

i had a really hard time eating in japan. the japanese word for vegetarian is “begetarian”, meaning its actually english, meaning the entire concept is foreign to them. we mostly ate at foreign food restaurants, thai, indian and italian. it was hard because i generally like japanese food, and i know pippin likes it a lot, but it seems that vegetarian japanese food is a new york city only thing. most japanese would just laugh at me when i told them i don’t eat meat, and refuse to serve me all together. we did manage to eat japanese three times, once at a revolving sushi conveyor-belt restaurant, once at a teppanyaki/okonomiyaki place where we cooked the food at the table, and again at a restaurant on the 11th floor of some building where i had bland mixed vegetables with soy sauce.

the subways close at 12:30, which is unbelievable considering the amount of people that live in tokyo. i heard that its a big conspiracy, the subway is owned by the same people who own the taxis, which is the only rational explanation for this madness. we managed to catch the last train back to our hotel every night except once. we asked some japanese guys how to take a night bus to the neighborhood we stayed in, and they told us there was no night bus there, our only bet was to take a taxi. they were really nice to us and offered to split a taxi, even tho they were not going in that exact direction. they turned out to be ramen chefs who work in a noodle shop in shinjuku, and had a good laugh when i told them i’m vegetarian, after they offered us some fried squid balls. “begitarian???!?? oHHH? no meat??? OOHHH? no fish???? OOOOOOOHHH? WHAT DO YOU EAT??!?!?”

out of all the places we’ve been so far, tokyo was the least english-friendly. it was surprising for me, i assumed everyone would speak english and it wouldn’t be a problem. it was also the first place we’ve been that’s economy wasn’t largely supported by tourism, and the language of tourism is english, so that might explain it. it seemed near the end that people actually could understand english a bit more than we thought at first, but seemed wary of speaking it, maybe they were afraid of mangling it up in front of english-speakers, for fear that their english was a bit rusty after school. maybe its just the general shy-ness and not wanting to attract attention of the japanese people.

another thing i was surprised about was the amount of women i saw wearing kimono. i didn’t expect to see any, except maybe if we took a short trip to kyoto. each day at least i would see a woman fully geared up, buying drinks from a vending machine or shopping for video recorders at the sony store. i think kimono are beautiful, and it was a nice surprise to see.

tokyo is not as expensive as i was told it is. it could be due to the economy crash in recent years, or due to the fact that i’m used to new york city prices. i think its on par with new york, in similar ways. you can go out for a 200$ dinner in tokyo as well as new york, or a 20$ dinner. you can spend $2000 on a hotel room or spend $50 like we did. its not the $5 hotel rooms we were getting in vietnam, but i think it would be hard to get a $50 hotel room in new york or london. impossible i think to get a nice clean room like the one at our ryokan with tatami floors and a comfy fouton.

tokyo is also one of the safest cities in the world. we passed numerous high tech bicycles sitting on the sidewalk with no locks or chains. i passed a sign on a lamp post reminding people not to leave their purses in the front basket of their bicycles when they left them on the street! they might get stolen! there are something like 100 registered handguns in the entire country. our friends were asking us if we liked our neighborhood we were staying in.. apparently its a “shady” neighborhood. pippin and i were hysterical about this, shady??? it looked fine. but apparently for tokyo, it was shady. i bet the japanese freak out when they leave japan. everywhere else is not as safe. for us, it was a nice break in a way, to not have to watch your back every second.

i really liked japan. at first i didn’t, but now that i look back at it, it wasn’t japan i didn’t like, but it was the first taste of a modern city i’ve seen in months. the things i was scared of i would have seen in new york or paris or london as well. the order scared me, it seemed so robotic.

we ordered two chocolate croissants and the clerks put them in wax paper, then proceeded to put them into two separate small clear plastic bags, then another larger bag, and tape it closed for us. all this trash for something that was to be eaten right away. it was unbelievable. we created more trash in a single week than in a month of being in south east asia.

{This was an email I sent out to my contacts on my first trip to Asia in 2002}

we flew into hanoi, the capital city of vietnam. our first impression was the traffic – it was amazing. our taxi charged down the road honking while the people on motorbikes and bicycles scattered, missing the car by inches.

there are no traffic rules in vietnam whatsoever. the biggest vehicle wins, meaning pippin and i had to dodge everything because we were just walking. there are no crosswalks or traffic lights, and to cross the road you have to put your life into the hands of the vietnamese. you walk slowly across, and they go around you with their motorbikes and bicycles.

there is a roundabout/rotary in the center of hanoi with a fountain in the middle. it has blue arrows informing you that you should go counter-clockwise around the fountain. the vietnamese go in whichever direction is closest to the turn they are taking.

hanoi is beautiful and has a lot of character. it is one of the prettiest cities we’ve seen in asia. there is a large lake in the middle of the city with a pagoda in the center connected by a red bridge. people wake up at 4-5am and head down to the lake to do tai-chi and exercises while its still dark.

everywhere you go in vietnam people try to sell you something. this is true in most everywhere we’ve been so far in asia, save hong kong and japan, but in vietnam it is much stronger. people will swarm around you if they see evidence that you actually bought something. if you are carrying bags people will be much more aggressive. (grab your arms etc.) you have to walk down the street not looking at anything in the stores because people sit by the entrance and yell to you to come inside if they see you as much as look up.

women walk around the street with large baskets on their heads filled with baguettes and try to sell them to everyone. (for 3c each). women walk around with two large baskets hanging by a pole over their shoulder with all sorts of stuff inside: fruit, ceramics, clothing, raw food on one end and a stove on the other… and set up shop on every street corner.

the taxi drivers also are very aggressive. they consist of typical car type taxis, motorbike taxis (anyone who owns a motorbike and sees a tourist and stops and says, “motorbike?”), and cyclos, which are seats attached to the front of a bicycle large enough for two people.

there are also tons of street kids who make a living by selling postcards and photocopied lonely planet guidebooks. if you do talk to them they will follow you for hours.

with all these people everywhere trying to get you to part with your money, you cannot walk more than 5 steps without someone yelling *something* at you. it can get frustrating and overwhelming.

its very hard to be a vegetarian in vietnam. when you can finally get across that you don’t eat meat to the vietnamese, they usually say how wonderful that is, (“very good! very good! buddha!”) and then feed you some cold, wet spinach. pippin said the food was good in vietnam, i’ll just have to take his word for it. i thought it was awful.

we spent four days in hanoi then took a 3 day, 2 night trip to halong bay. halong bay is about three hours away from hanoi, on the ocean. it has thousands of small limestone islands jetting out from the sea, similar to krabi in thailand, but on a larger scale. we spent the first night on the boat and the second in a hotel on the largest island named cat ba.

there are many little fishing villages scattered around the bay, not attached in any way to land. little floating wooden houses with floating wooden yards anchored to the bottom of the sea. some people have strung their houses together, but many live about a house’s distance from one another. they have kids and dogs and chickens running around everywhere. they go out every morning and fish the bay and sell the fish to make a living.

we saw some giant jellyfish in the water of the bay, maybe 20 of them. they were at least the size of watermelons. the bay is an emerald green color and you cannot see through the water more than an arm’s length. we never saw the bottom.

we took a trek on our second day that crossed 12km of cat ba island’s interior, through the jungle, over three mountains and to a village for lunch. we did it in flip flops. all the other travelers thought we were crazy, but we managed better than the people in high tech mountain hiking boots. i was even wearing a skirt. i realized that living in asia for so long has helped me pick up on certain things, like 150$ hiking boots will not make you a better hiker, balance and choice of step will.

the trek was beautiful. it was thick, wet jungle, unlike that of thailand, laos and cambodia. it was more “rainforest” than we’ve seen so far. it had a nice sweet smell to it, very thick and alive. we saw life as well, tree frogs and snails and snakes and spiders. we saw some strange bugs that i don’t know the names of and have never seen before. i saw tiny little red bugs and daddy-long-legs spiders with striped legs. we saw lots of giant broad leaves with perfect 2cm diameter holes cut out of them, evidence of leaf cutter ants!

we took a 10 hour overnight sleeper train to sapa, in the mountains 10km from the chinese border. sapa is the highest area in vietnam and overlooks the highest peak. you are up in the cloud level, and sometimes the view gets blocked by a cloud as it rolls in, leaving you in a wall of mist. when we left our hotel window open we could watch the cloud roll into the room.

sapa has many hill tribe people who live close by. mainly the black h’mong and the red zao tribes, but if you go a bit farther away you can find flower h’mong and others i don’t know the names of. the second you walk out the door you are followed by about 20 black h’mong young girls ranging in age from 5-15 asking you if you want to buy some homemade clothing or bracelets their mothers made.

the kids were great. their english was surprising and they learn it all from foreigners. they would trade little “western” things they’ve learned with us, like paddycake and various things adults try to trick children with. (the trick where you grab the kid’s nose and hold out your thumb and say “i’ve got your nose!” and the other one where you say, “what’s this?” as you point somewhere on their chest, and when they go to look you whack them on the nose.)

i taught them a new version of paddycake where you also use the backs of your hands, and saw the same girl that evening teaching it to another girl. its great to see how information travels.

the children also had a great time lifting up our pants legs and pulling on our leg hair and calling us monkeys. the h’mong people don’t really have any body or facial hair and they find it quite amusing that we do.

the road that links sapa to the town where the train comes in leads you through the mountains. it is not paved, and was under construction when we went. it rains a lot in sapa, due to the mountains trapping the clouds there, and the roads were all slippery mud which made getting to and from sapa a bit difficult. at one point an entire village came out to watch the spectacle of a few buses loaded with tourists trying to drive down the road and spinning around in circles.

{This was an email I sent out to my contacts on my first trip to Asia in 2002}

we’re currently sitting in steamy bangkok in the hottest time of the hot season. its about 100 degrees fahrenheit out during the heat of the day, with 100% humidity. this helps the smog to be more oppressive. we’re waiting for our visas for vietnam.

we’re staying at a guesthouse on khao san road, which is the backpackers road. its a bit annoying, full of fresh untanned kids falling for all the tricks, and thais who think you’re fresh and try to pull all the tricks on you. it also happens to be the cheapest place to stay. unfortunately you get what you pay for though, and service is not really understood here. you have to pay daily at our guesthouse, and every morning the owner here politely wakes us up by pounding on the door and screaming at the top of her lungs, “EKKYOOOU-ME YOU STAYONEMORENIIIIIIGHT? 405! YOUSTAYONEMORENIIIIIGHT?!?” when you answer yes she says, “HHUUUHH? WHHHHAAAAAAAAAAT? YOUSTAYONEMORENIIIIIIGHT????” and then proceeds down the hall doing the same to each door.

the thais are getting ready for songkran, which they celebrate the 13-15 of april. songkran is buddhist new year, when young kids would traditionally pour water over their elders’ heads and everyone would wash their buddha statues. over the years it has turned into an all out squirt gun fight in the street that lasts a week. if you go outside this week you will get wet. i’ve noticed the vendors have started replacing the general wares they sell on the street with the latest and greatest plastic squirt guns.

aj and mandy have graciously taken our big bags back to the states for us, so all we have now are small backpacks. this has freed us up to leave thailand for good and not have to lug around anything. (we had been storing our bags at a hotel for $3 a week). thank you aj and mandy!

we went to chiang mai with aj and mandy. chiang mai is the second biggest city in thailand, but its small compared to bangkok. its in the north, near myanmar and laos, but not as north as chiang rai. its an old walled city, with a moat around it. the wall is still there, parts of it at least, and it gives the city an old charm.

chiang mai is filled with foreigner backpackers, and its a fun city to spend some time. it has something like 35 vegetarian restaurants and we found a really tasty one. it has the biggest night market i’ve ever seen, biggest in thailand, maybe all of south east asia. its insane — it goes on for miles. we went two nights, spending maybe 6 hours there total, and saw about half of it. its filled with the most amazing amount of stuff. i bought three chinese style buttoned thin cotton shirts with long sleeves.

we took a cooking class in chiang mai where we learned to cook 4 dishes, tom yum tofu (or gai if you eat chicken), spring rolls, red curry and mango with sticky rice. we each had our own wok and were given a cook book at the end. we got to take a trip to the market at the beginning to get the ingredients, which was cool. i could name almost all the herbs at the stall already, and i realized how much i’d grown used to thai food.

we met some nice people at the cooking class, and invited one girl who was traveling alone to hang out with us that night and go to the market. she is irish, and has been traveling now for 15 months. she spent a year in australia on a work visa, and is currently traveling all around asia alone. she’ll be heading back to ireland after she does vietnam and cambodia.

we had originally planned to spend one or two days in chiang mai, then take a bus to the border with laos, and take a boat down the mekong river to the first city on our lao itinerary, loang prabang. we picked up the lonely planet laos book in bangkok and there was a “warning” section stating that the speed boats crash once a week, and are really dangerous, not to mention uncomfortable. you have to wear a helmet and the motor is very loud. they cram as many as 7 people in the thing, so you are sitting with your knees up to your chest as the little boat rockets down the river, disturbing the slow quiet pace of the mekong. we decided against it and were left with three options:

1. fly on bangkok airways. this is expensive, and only left on sunday, meaning we’d have to spend longer in chaing mai, and have to speed through laos.

2. fly on lao aviation. this is cheaper than bangkok airways, but apparently lao aviation planes do not use radar and find the airport by memory. sometimes they cannot see the airport due to clouds and circle the area until they find a hole in the clouds to descend through, as to not hit one of the mountains in the area. they’ll do this until they a: land, or b: run out of gas, and are forced to land at a different airport.

3. or take a slow boat which would be the same as the fast boat, but not as fast. (8 hours a day for two days down the mekong, versus one day for 7 hours).

we flew bangkok airways.

loang prabang is commonly referred to “old asia” meaning the asia before cell phones and western television. its quaint.. there are no street lights. the city closes down at 9pm and everyone goes to sleep. at dawn everyone is awake, old women in conical hats and sarongs sweep the streets with brooms made of grass, the monks go out and take alms and people set up shop.

songkran seemed to have started early in laos, at least in loang prabang. kids were waiting for us on the street, and timidly shot water at us out of little plastic water guns. mandy decided she’d join the fun and took her water bottle and punctured a hole in the cap. when the kids came up and shot a bit of water on us, she turned around and drenched them. they were a bit surprised!!

the first day, water bottle in hand, we took a boat ride down the mekong to this cave that has been used for centuries as a buddhist shrine. it boasts some three thousand buddhist sculptures. its basically two large caves with tons of statues of buddha. we stopped at a village before we got to the caves which originally used to produce whiskey or baskets or something before tourists got dropped off there on an hourly basis. now the village depends on tourists buying hand woven fabrics and cold drinks. i bought a 100 kip note from when laos was part of french indochina. the note was written in french, but had no date on it. it stood out to me by its sheer size, its height actually, imagine two one dollar bills standing on top of each other, the bill is almost square.

after the caves we went across river to another village and had some food. an old man came around and gave all us foreigners some local whiskey made with herbs, which tasted like pure alcohol. (if you opened your mouth you could feel it evaporate). it tasted pretty awful and i only had a sip.

alot of the people still speak french. when the french ruled over vietnam, cambodia and laos the people who wanted higher education had to learn in french. now young people learn english, but many of the older gentlemen we met would ask us if we could speak french, for they knew that better than english.

the local currency is the kip. it used to be worth something at one point… but now the biggest bill, the 5000 kip note, is worth about 50c. that means if you want to actually buy anything, you have to carry around a wad of kip 8″ thick. its similar to cambodia, but people still use the kip here, versus in cambodia people prefer the u.s. dollar over the riel.

we left loang prabang on bus heading to vientienne. we planned to break up the 12 hour bus ride with a stop somewhere in the middle – overnight in vang vieng. we’d heard about the busses in laos, but were unprepared for what awaited us…

we were advised to show up a few hours before the bus was scheduled to leave, for they leave when they are full. the bus left at 5:00pm. we took a tuk tuk (rickshaw meets motorbike) to the bus station and twice were dumped on by large buckets full of water. (the second time was from a construction site, the water was full of cement.. fun)

we arrived at the bus station at 3:30. think dirt parking lot with an chalk board with lao written all over it and a counter where you buy tickets. we bought our ticket to vang vieng, which was about $4. we were told somewhere the ride would be about 5 hours. our bus is already there, so we decide to board it and get a seat.

all the seats are already taken except the back seats. we were warned not to take the back seats, for the suspension on these busses which were built in the 50′s wasn’t so hot, and the ride was a bit bouncy, not to mention you would be sitting right above the engine, which can get quite loud.

we sat there in the bus, which was about 10 degrees hotter than the outside, which was about 100 degrees, for 1.5 hours watching the bus fill up. and fill up it did. we watched people load large boxes on the roof and cram them in every possible square inch inside. we watched a guy haul a motorbike onto the roof. the bus filled up so every seat was full, then they brought out the stools and sat people in the aisles. there were about 40 seats on the bus, and about 60 people on the bus, and about 5 more sitting on the roof when we finally left loang prabang at 5:00 pm sharp. we pulled out of the lot and took the next right turn directly into the gas station. why they didn’t think of filling up the gas while the bus was sitting there for 3 hours i do not know. they filled up the tank, and 3 large containers which they put back on the roof. i guessed there would be no gas stations along the way.

the ride was cramped and hot, but after an hour or so it got a lot cooler. we went up into the mountains and had a dramatic view of craggy peaks and hill tribe villages before the sun went down. at night in the mountains it gets quite cool, and the fresh air coming in through the windows was wonderful. the air in the valleys is thick from smoke from the slash and burn techniques the locals use to tend to their land.

the road was a pure “S”. turn to the left, slide in your seat, sharp turn to the right, slide the other way, sharp turn to the left.. every now and then you’d look down to a steep ravine on the side and a valley below, with the driver thundering along on the wrong side of the road, because it was easier to take the turns. we almost got into an accident twice. the first was some kids who were playing in the road outside their village, our driver went to the wrong side of the road to avoid them, while a large truck was turning around the blind corner. the second i believe was due to a heard of cows.

we stopped many times along the way. once at a guy’s house who answered the door in a towel to greet all 60 of us on the bus. i believe he accepted a package. i think the bus also acts as the postal carrier, for there are no trains, and this is the major highway (think paved road) that runs from the two biggest towns in laos. we stopped a few times on the side of the road for everyone to pee. people climbed out windows because it was easier than getting out the aisles. we stopped in the chill air at a village where there was an open air restaurant on the side of the road. people jumped up and proclaimed “kin kow” (eat rice). and people got out of the bus and ate hot bowls full of noodles and meat with sticky rice.

there were speakers taped to the metal walls with wiring strung along the side of the inside of the bus which they blasted lao and issan music out of the whole ride.

when we finally reached vang vieng 8 hours later we were exhausted. we found a guesthouse and slept well. until the chickens started up at 4am. then the ducks at 6, and finally the neighbors decided to hack down a tree at 7. then burn it at 7:30.

we walked around vang vieng when we got up and had some food at a vegetarian restaurant. all of their vegetables are from an organic farm, about 10 km away. if anyone is interested in learning organic farming techniques, you can go live on this farm and have free food, and pay 1$ a night for a bed, in return for 3 hours of work a day, and they will teach you all about organic farming. you can also learn lao, and teach english. they’re doing a lot to help teach the villagers that its not a good idea to burn everything in site.

we walked over to the bus stop and caught the remaining bus ride to vientienne. this was similar to the other ride, but more people this time. no stools in the aisles, you had to stand. and there were three people per two person seat.

we stopped many times and picked up and dropped off people on the street. to catch the bus here, you just walk over to the road and wait. when the bus drives by you flag it down and get on it. when you want to get off you yell and it stops. in towns while the bus would stop and people got on, vendors would walk over with plastic bags full of drinks and eggs on sticks and shove them in the window and yell at you telling you to buy.

we arrived in vientienne 4 hours later and were welcomed by scores of tuk tuk drivers asking us “where you going” from outside the window, following us even as the bus was making its way into the lot. they pushed their way onto the bus to try to get customers, and harassed us so that we had to duck into a nearby restaurant.

we ended up at a guesthouse nearby that charged way too much for their rooms and were rude to us. we stayed for two nights. in vientienne we checked out an old temple that the siamese decided not to wreck when they invaded laos a hundred years or so ago, because its architecture was so similar to thai. inside was about a million little buddhas inside cubby holes in the walls. there was even a section of buddhas that had been broken during the various wars.

we were asked for money by a group of 3 street kids around 6 years old on various occasions. the first time they asked us we blew right past them because the girl in the bunch had blonde hair. we figured she was the daughter of the restaurant owner or something, and the kids were just playing around, looking for candy money or whatever. on closer inspection we noticed she had a very asian face, and i wondered what her story was, how she managed to get the northern european genes, and how she became a street kid, and if anyone was actually looking after her.

we left vientienne on a took took to the “friendship bridge” that connects laos and thailand over the mekong, about 20km away from vientienne. this is the only bridge laos has with thailand. we crossed the bridge and took a bus to nong kai, and a minibus to udon thani. (ooo-don tah-nee). we flew to bangkok from udon thani, saving about 60$.

we hung out in bangkok for aj and mandy’s last day. mandy is small, and was really excited about being able to shop for clothing in a land where everything fits her. she bought a bunch of new clothes at the local mall where the cool kids shop.

now we’re waiting for our vietnamese visas. we’re flying into hanoi, in the north of vietnam on friday. we’ll be there until the 25th, when we fly back to bangkok to leave for tokyo on the 26th.

{This was an email I sent out to my contacts on my first trip to Asia in 2002}

we flew back from hong kong to bangkok and met up with our friend gabby. we spent the evening in bangkok and then flew south to phuket and rented a car. the touts in the airport were insane.. “excuse me where you going?” following us around everywhere. one of them would not leave us alone and started reading our guide book over pippin’s shoulder, saying “thats a nice place, i take you there, 400 baht”.

we drove around the island, on recommendation that the far south of the island is the cheapest place to stay. phuket has become one of the “world class tourist destinations” — meaning too many fat farangs and outrageous prices, as well as making the island completely overdeveloped. the food is really expensive too.. compared to the rest of thailand. they even want to charge you 2 baht per minute to use the internet at the cafes — its 15 baht per hour in the north.

the first hotel we saw that i figured would be cheap enough, quoted us 198 US dollars! i laughed a bit and asked the girl if she might know a cheaper place, around 400 baht, (7 US dollars) and she laughed a bit and said of course, head down the road a bit and stop at the next guesthouse.

we hate phuket – its been overdeveloped and its very touristy. granted the beaches are really nice, the water is like 80 degrees, and crystal clear, its tacky and way too western. unfortunately its another place that has been ruined by tourism.

we left phuket after 2 days and drove onto the mainland. phuket is connected to the rest of thailand by a bridge. we drove north, to phang nga. phang nga and krabi are famous for these huge limestone formations that stick out from the sea. its quite surreal. we got on a tour for a half day to check out phang nga bay and a muslim village that is built over the sea, all over water.

we took a longtail through the mangrove forest first, then off into the bay to james bond island (spelled here “jame’s bond island”). its where “the man with the golden gun” was filmed. i’ve never seen the movie, but maybe some of you have, and you’ll know what type of scenery im talking about? we saw some caves, and drove the longtail into them, some had prehistoric painting inside, then off to the muslim village.

the village was great. its been almost totally corrupted by tourism, tons of tour groups let tourists off at the main dock and give them a half hour to “explore” the place… which means pretty much walk down the main “road” dock and buy crap. we immediately walked past that and walked waaay over to the other side of the village, where people were muttering “farang farang” to each other, they were surprised to see farangs so far away from the “farang section”. kids were waving and saying hello, one even did a cannonball jump into the water for me. “HELLO(splash)”. when pippin and gabby were waiting for me at the dock at the end a kid came over with a stick with a chicken on the end of it. gabby took a picture of him and he held out his hand for some money. gabby gave him 10 baht. he then ran back and they were inundated with kids with strange animals asking for handouts. when i arrived at the dock i followed a little girl with a squawking chicken down to the water, and reached the end of the dock where kittens, cats, chickens, birds, and reptiles awaited me.

we drove from phang nga over a hilly road through the jungle to krabi province. we ended up at a beach called ao nang. we hired a longtail to take us out into the ocean to another beach which is not accessible by road, thinking it would be much less busy — we needed a break after phuket.

when we got there it was expensive, the beach wasn’t so hot, and everything was booked. we left pippin at a coffeeshop and walked over to the next beach to check our luck there. we walked down the beach with no luck, then up the back and found a place for 400 baht a night. we stayed there one night, then took a longtail to an island gabby had read about, poda island. we could see it across the bay, the beach looked nice, and maybe there would be less people.

we arrived on poda island and the place was packed. we found out later that a tour boat had dropped a bunch of farangs off for the day, and later on they all left, leaving us alone on the island, which was nice. there was only one choice in accommodation, so they charged us pretty much whatever they wanted. (700 baht, i talked them down from 1200). the food was really expensive too. the beach however, was amazingly beautiful. super soft sand, like silk, and clear water. we stayed there for three days. anyone who thinks they’d like to live on a quiet island with a beach is crazy, because we went nuts after only three days.

we took a choppy longtail boat ride back to ao nang, hopped in the car and drove to krabi city where we hung out for the day and then drove back to phuket.

we had signed up for a 4 day, 3 night dive trip on a boat on the similan islands before we left, and got picked up the next morning. the similan islands are a marine park 20km (10 miles) out to sea, meaning no people can live there, and you cannot fish or otherwise hurt the environment. people haven’t really been going there, so the reef was pretty intact and alive, and there were tons of fish.

it was great living on a boat, you get used to the rocking of the waves after a few hours and it doesn’t bother you at all. the thai staff were really cool, and after i explained to them i only eat vegetarian food, they made me a separate meal each day than the rest of the people, which i thought was really nice. all the dive staff onboard were really cool as well, mostly scandinavian.

i was surprised to find so many americans on board. it was really hard to take. at one point i mentioned to a canadian that i sometimes tell people im canadian, and an american overheard me and said, “huh huh yeah sometimes i do too – especially when there is someone wearing a turban in the room”. he didn’t get it at all — i tell people im canadian to not be associated with ignorant people like him!

anyways, the diving was amazing. i did 12 dives in 4 days, and saw every fish imaginable. sea turtles, sea snakes, unicorn fish (they’ve got a horn), lionfish, stonefish, jellyfish, sharks, huge starfish, soft delicate corals, hard corals, tube sponges, sea cucumbers, damselfish, moray eels, crabs, parrotfish, aggressive triggerfish (one kid got bitten pretty badly on his hand), tunas, baraccuda, giant travelli… tons of fish. i even got to do a dive at night, where the crabs come out and i saw phosphorescence. (glowing plankton).

pippin got stung pretty badly by a jellyfish, but he’s alright now. note: if you ever get stung by a jellyfish, put vinegar on it. if you don’t have vinegar, you can pee on it. (the kitchen had vinegar).

corals take years to grow tiny amounts, maybe 5 years to grow one inch. i saw people bang their tanks and fins into corals, years and years of growth broken. i keep distance, for fear of harming anything, but it seems people just don’t care. they don’t do it on purpose, but they don’t have much control underwater, and they don’t recognize their limits. i know i’m not so experienced, so i keep farther away from the corals, in case the current changes or whatever. its hard to see this stuff happening, and continue diving, though i know i am careful.

on the last day we saw a fin come out of the water near the boat, and the divemaster said it was a dolphin. i asked her if we could jump in with it. we all jumped in off the boat with mask and snorkel and fins and swam over to the dolphin, who played with us for a good 15 minutes. it made noises at us and swam around us, and quite close to us, checking us out. it was really cool, definitely the highlight of the trip. dolphins are really smart… it would cock its head to the side at us, cluck and wait for our reaction, then swim away to come back seconds later and do something else.

we came back to bangkok and saw gabby off, then picked up some more friends from the airport, a couple from massachusettes, aj and mandy. now we are all up here in chiang mai, and we’ll head to laos in two days.

{This was an email I sent out to my contacts on my first trip to Asia in 2002}

its been awhile since the last update and a lot has happened.. i’ll try to fit in as much as possible..

we left our little place in koh samui a few days before our lease was up to meet some friends of ours in the very north of thailand, chiang rai. they were in thailand for a few days and we had fun with them. we went up to the golden triangle, which is the spot where myanmar (burma), laos and thailand meet at the mekong river. we crossed the border into myanmar (somewhat illegally, they didn’t stamp our passports, and we didn’t get a visa) for the day and did some shopping in a little border town. we also checked out a great flower show, which was all orchids, some amazing flowers! of course there was also some partying in the evening with a beauty pageant and some traditional thai dancing.

we we invited to go out to eat with our friend’s family. it was really nuts to eat with so many thai people. there were maybe 15 people and 50 plates on the table. we went to a restaurant over the kok river, where the kitchen was on one side of the river and the restaurant was on the other. they had two little raft boats that would cross the river with the food (and the dirty plates). it was a flurry of passing plates and so much food!

while out to eat we met a family member of our friend, i think a nephew or something, who invited us to go to “poo chee fah” with him and his friends the next day. poo chee fah is basically a small mountain that you can climb to the top of with an amazing view once you get there.

we’d heard how cool poo chee fah (lit: mountain pointing to heaven) is, so we happily agreed to go. he picked us up the next day in his pickup with his girlfriend and her sister. (25, 25 and 21 years old – i think). we stopped at a market and they picked up a bunch (tons) of pre made food in little plastic bags. we bought a pineapple.

we then had dinner. we were the lone foreigners among maybe 10 thais. all of them could speak a few words in english, and 2 of them knew more, and our host knew the most. (enough to translate what we would say for the rest of the group). on a picnic table outside we emptied all the little plastic bags out onto plates and began eating. thais normally eat with a fork and spoon — no chopsticks here. they eat with the spoon, and load the food onto the spoon with the fork. its considered rude to put a fork in your mouth here.

in the north there is also another method, and that is sticky rice. sticky rice is not average japanese sushi rice, its super super sticky, like glue. its moldable, you could make a sculpture with it. in any case, its done like this: pull off a bit of sticky rice with your hand, form it into a ball, squish it up so its a solid mass, and dip it into the bowls of food, then eat.

our hosts then informed us that they’d wake us up at 5 am the next morning. we thought they were joking. at 4:45am we found out they were definitely not joking. we then proceeded to hike up this mountain trail through the jungle in the middle of the night with a flashlight. after about an hour’s walk, we get to the top of this mountain, right as there is a little bit of light starting to show, and watched the sunrise. we were greeted by stares and giggles by the groups of thais that were already up there, maybe 60 in all. its a popular activity for people to watch the sunrise up there, and we went on a buddhist national holiday, so people had the day off to go play in the park. as the token farang, we got our pictures taken by random people, had kids running up to us and saying “hello!” giggling and running away, and had our every move watched like we were in a zoo. a very strange feeling.

after we watched the sunrise we hiked down (and hitched a ride on the back of a pickup truck with the park rangers) and drove off to a waterfall and had lunch. they ordered som tom jeh for me, and proceeded to watch and test how the farang dealt with spicy food (just fine thank you very much). very amusing.

i really liked hanging out with our thai friends, it was the first time we could really hang out with kids our age. there was a lot of joking around and making fun of people in a kind way, very fun. they liked to practice their english a bit with us, and one of the jokes was to say “thank you ka”, and “hello ka”. (in thai, you end each sentence with “ka” if you are female, and “krup” if you are male).

a few days later we went on a jungle trek (hike) to visit hilltribes and check out the jungle. it was for two days, one night. our guide, simon (he pronounced it seeMUN) was great. it cost 30$ and we slept in his house, and his wife cooked for us.

hilltribes are small groups of village people who have their own culture different from thais. there are many scattered around thailand, myanmar, laos, vietnam and china. we visited the akha, karen, and lahu peoples, all of whom have their own language, culture, and belief systems.

jungle trekking is pretty popular now in northern thailand. you spend all day walking through trails to get to various things in the jungle. our trip stopped by a few villages, rice fields, a hot spring, and a waterfall. at night we stayed in simon’s house, and played cards with him. there were two other people in our group, a couple from canada who we really enjoyed the company of. we will meet up with them in a week or so when we all happen to be in the south of thailand. they’re in burma now, and are travelling the world over a 9 month period.

i guess in the morning before we woke up one of simon’s neighbors got into an argument. the wife had woken up to finding out that her husband had sold the family pig the night before to go out drinking. when she found out, they got into a very loud argument (which apparently is not something uncommon to the two) and marched off down the street together to get a divorce.

we flew back to bangkok and then off to cambodia for four days. we decided to go visit the ancient city ruins of angkor wat. the city was built between the ninth and fourteenth centuries, and left to rot around the 1600′s. the jungle took over and for three hundred years was allowed to cover all the structures with vines and trees. now they’ve gone in and cut back the jungle and cleared out all the land mines and are charging tourists US $20 a day to go take pictures of it.

cambodia was really difficult to take, a real eye opener for me. i hated it and loved it at the same time.

everywhere you go you are harassed. every person you pass wants to somehow get money off of you. children beg, parents wait across the street, they figure the kids will have better luck. one legged men on crutches, mine victims, follow you around. crazy people, walking down the street muttering to themselves. filthy children everywhere, wearing tattered clothing. but the smiles! the children were so genuine! waving at us, huge smiles, hellos.

everyone has a scam. the guesthouse called a taxi driver that had been recommended to us, and told us he was busy for the next three days and recommended another driver. we said sure, trusting the woman. funny how he was busy for three days, and we left three days later. we found out later they get commission from drivers – and our driver was not one of their “preferred drivers”. they said we needed a guide, so a guide showed up, asking for money to show us around. we declined, he left. he was back again when we got back that evening, asking if we’d changed our mind. it was really strange, to see people so desperate to make money. our taxi driver from the airport was waiting for us the next morning asking us if we’d like his services all day, he’d give us a deal.

the prices were really high for southeast asia, aimed at package tourists. people would wait outside the temples and say, “cold drink madam!” one quoted me a dollar for a can of tea that you can buy in a store for 10c. children follow you around trying to sell you postcards or flutes or little buddha amulets. their mothers trying to sell you scarves or drinks. children follow you around the temples telling you random bits of information about the temples then demand you give them money. the scamming starts early, 8 year olds would easily lie to us to try to get money.

the local currency is the riel, but they use US currency. everywhere. it is really strange to be so far away from the U.S., geographically and culturally, and have people use dollars. whats even stranger is watching the tourists go to the exchange booth and get dollars, and use them while on their trip. imagine older japanese people paying for dinner, while in asia, in US money! we went to the exchange booth to convert baht to riel to have them tell us they do not even have riel, they only give out US money.

the amount of violence was appalling. i saw many examples of kids whacking each other, whacking their parents, beating each other up, etc. one group of kids followed us around a temple came at us and were really really angry with us for not giving them money. (we even offered to give them some money but they said it was not enough). the level of anger really shocked me, coming from someone so young. lots of pent up anger and frustration. understandable, considering what’s happened here.

it would have been a pretty sad trip if we had not met our friend san pork. pork is a taxi driver — well a fashioned taxi type thing. its more like a 2 person chariot that hooks onto the back of a motorbike. we hired him to take us to a temple and really liked him, so we hired him all day the next day to take us on his “grand tour”.

we had told him about our tour guide experience, so he surprised us the next day by bringing along a tape player with a tape of angkor wat history that he played for us. our free tour guide he said.

imagine for a minute going down a road in the back of a chariot rickshaw type thing attached to a motorbike blaring angkor wat history in english with villagers walking and riding bikes and motorbikes around you. imagine the looks you’d get. everyone was laughing – it was great.

he took us to some pretty far away and deserted temples, and he was a great guide. he was really friendly and real and we enjoyed his company. we took him out to eat last night after our trip, and he freaked out about the cost of his $3 dish. we told him about the west, explained what it was like to have four seasons, what the cold is like, what snow is like, the concept of ice skating… what are subways… how there are no chickens running around everywhere in new york. he told us about getting malaria when he worked for the UN as a radio operator by the thai border. (how he saved up enough money for his motorbike). he told us about his country, and what it is like to live there, and how he really wants to come to the west to visit.

on a positive note, it is getting better, each year is farther away from the madness that was cambodia in the 70′s and 80′s. more and more landmines are removed with the help of the US and england. (apparently the world superpowers can do positive things as well). but i do think it will take generations before cambodia is healed. pork tells us each year is better than the last, that it has come very far since he was a child under the khmer rouge regime. unfortunately, the khmer rouge is still a heavy force in cambodia, still fully tangled into the government, and people are predicting a huge problem in the next election in a few years… i hope nothing happens..

in any case, we fed children, we avoided scams, we even fixed computers at an internet cafe. we didn’t get hit by any moving transportation, and didn’t step on a landmine or get malaria. i definitely suggest going to check out angkor, it was amazing.

im currently in hong kong. its a really great city. im at an internet cafe / gaming room at 4 in the morning and there are at least twenty kids here playing games like quake, diablo 2, and what else. there is one of these on every block.

i will write more about HK and send some HK pictures soon. tomorrow i leave and head back to bangkok to meet my friend, then we’re all heading south for some diving!

{This was an email I sent out to my contacts on my first trip to Asia in 2002}

so far we’ve been exploring koh samui. we’ve rented a jeep with no suspension and have been bouncing around the island. i must explain that in thailand there are no road laws. or, possibly there are, but no one seems to know or follow them. there are these signs everywhere that say, “please remember to drive on the left”. maybe they should have the signs written in thai as well, for the thais drive on the side of the road which has the least amount of cars/bikes/animals, no matter if it is the left or right side.

a few days ago we were exploring the southwest end of the island when we came across the royal meridian. we stopped and had dinner while watching the sunset. it was the most expensive dinner by far we’ve had in thailand, the bill was about $20. pippin had a mai-tai drink served in a whole pineapple, with a hole for the straw, decorated with orchids. they even had an entire vegetarian menu!

i have to tell you about the ants. i dont mind ants at all, in fact i kinda like them. i used to play with them when i was a kid, blocking their paths and seeing what they’d do, flattening ant hills and coming back the next day to see if they’d rebuilt.. but the ants here are from another planet… they’re unbelievable.

my first encounter was on koh tao, after a rainstorm had washed out the sandy walking paths. it was about an hour later and i saw no one had walked on the path yet, but the ants had already rebuilt their hill. and what a hill it was, maybe 10 different entrances along a line about two feet long, and about a million ants scurrying from entrance to entrance. the line between was about one inch deep already from the ants walking back and forth. i was impressed…

well… the ants found our trash can about a week ago. they love our leftovers. i followed their trail over the side of the can, to the floor, around the back of the fridge, around the corner, in front of the door, up the wall to the side of the door and out through a hole about eye level.

i figured i’d had them, i’ll just block up the hole with some tape! right… the next day there was a hole in the tape i put there. a hole!! they’d eaten through!! i couldn’t believe it. i figured i’d just have to be a bit cleaner in the kitchen, we couldn’t leave any scraps out. but it was too late, they’d found us, they were here to stay.

yesterday i outsmarted them. i filled a large shallow bucket with water and placed the trash bin inside — an uncrossable moat surrounding the trash. the ant line has disappeared.

{This was an email I sent out to my contacts on my first trip to Asia in 2002}

we’ve left koh tao and are back on koh samui in our apartment. i think we’re just going to stay here one month instead of two, we really loved koh tao and want to spend a month there instead.

we’ve rented a jeep for the month we are here to explore the island. there are some great waterfalls and hidden coves and beaches that are impossible to get there without a jeep, so we’re going to be checking those out soon.

tomorrow we are enrolled in a cooking class. we’re to learn how to cook four dishes: steamed tofu in banana leaf (hor mok), green papaya salad (som tum), massaman curry (gaeng massaman) and pad thai (pad thai). the owner of the place is vegetarian, so it was a welcome relief from struggling to explain what exactly i can and cannot eat.

on my second to last dive in koh tao i was on the boat getting ready for my dive, suiting up and getting all my equipment together when i noticed that my bcd was moving. (the bcd is the jacket type thing that the tank of air straps to, it can inflate with air allowing you to hover at certain depths, like an air bladder in a fish)

i jumped back when i realized what it was that was moving, the biggest spider i’ve ever seen. bigger than any tarantula or anything. it was brown and with its legs it was about the size of my whole hand, fingers extended. its largest body segment was the size of a golf ball, and it had these huge fangs! i brushed it off me and it ran the width of the boat faster than my cats could. my diving instructor grabbed one of my fins and tossed the thing overboard, while the thais on the boat were doubled over in laughter at our overreaction to the situation.

i thoroughly checked the pockets before i put that thing on again.

its the tail end of the monsoon season here, and every now and then these dramatic black clouds roll in and it rains for about 20 minutes. its the hardest rain i’ve seen, sheets of water pouring down, knocking coconuts out of the trees and palm fronds to the ground. it washes out the dirt roads in minutes, leaving huge ravines in the road. if you go outside during one of the rains you will be thoroughly soaked in under five seconds. it leaves the air refreshing afterwards, and lowers the temperature.

{This was an email I sent out to my contacts on my first trip to Asia in 2002}

hello from the small island of koh tao, thai for turtle island. this island is one of the better scuba diving areas in the gulf of thailand, and the cheapest diving i’ve ever seen… i just finished my padi open water diving certification course, and went on two dives already, and are going on two more tomorrow… its really cool to breathe underwater!

i was able to see some great fish today. i saw this little anemone fish which stays inside of the same anemone its whole life, guarding it from other fish. it was tiny, but when i put my fingers near it it got all defensive! the anemone was really beautiful too, its arms were a reddish purple, and its foot attacher was this crazy iridescent blue/purple, i cant believe some of the bright colors underwater. i also saw a giant clam, which was big enough to fit my head inside!

there are two different types of geckos on this island, a small kind, about 4-5″ long and a large kind, about a foot long. the small kind make a funny sound, like “eeek eeek eeek eeek eeek” and are everywhere. (in the ceiling of the bathroom, on the wall of the restaurant…).

the big ones hid from me until just a few minutes ago. i hear the first one the first night we were here, it makes a really loud noise, starting with a sound like a sheep, baaah baaah..then this crazy loud “eh-kogh eh-kogh, eh-kogh eh-kogh”.

pippin and i had laughed in our hut, trying to envision an animal which could produce such an absurd noise… maybe its a dodo crossed with a goat? my dive teacher told me what it was the next day, but i hadn’t actually seen one until just a few minutes ago, when one ran in the window of the room im in, ran up the wall and out through the roof.