Day 98 and counting...

So, I am 98 days into my travels and am stuck in Chaing Mai, Thailand due to timing and money. I am beginning to realize this is a probably a good thing. I have been in a bit of a funk the past few days, but I am starting to realize it is because I have been traveling so fast, jumping from one place to the next, riding a high of new experiences and new friends, without taking the time for self reflection and sorting through all the changes and growth I have been doing.

I can't say that I have figured anything out, but I am working on it instead of letting myself wallow. I miss my family. I miss my friends. I don't want to be traveling alone right now, but that is where I find myself. I have not made any new friends here, but that is my own fault. I am going to try and embrace this part of my journey and hope to have some sort of answers, or the start or answers soon.

Until then, I love everyone, I am safe and healthy and wishing everyone a Merry Christmas.

p.s. I know this all sounds so very cryptic, but I am doing ok. Just have a different sort of journey to embark on for a bit and have only just realized it. I love you all.

Giving Thanks

It is Thanksgiving Day and I am sitting on a Beach in Bali, hanging out with amazing friends and soaking up the sun. Is it possible to even try and explain all the things I am thankful for in my life? Don't think so...but I can try.

I am thankful for my family.
Even though they all might not understand my insatiable need to travel, they are supportive. Even though they may be jealous of the experiences I am having, they are excited. My mother is the most amazing, loving, intelligent, understanding, supportive, thoughtful, caring and courageous person I know. She is my ultimate role model in life and probably the major reason I am who I am today and like who that person is. My father is the best life lesson teacher I know. He is amazing at pushing me to me better, encouraging me when I fail, understanding how I work and knowing that I have to go through the wall sometimes, even if there is a helping hand over. He taught me about work ethic and success, and that understanding a person is the greatest gift you can give your self and them. My siblings are all inspirational in here own way. Each one a remind of different ways to walk through this journey of life. They are all intelligent, thoughtful, special people that at times I wish I knew better as friends, rather than as siblings. They have each impacted my life enormously, and taught me that although we may not always agree or get along, we will always love each other and be there for each other. My stepmother and stepsister have only been in my life for a short time, but they have greatly enriched it with their kindness, generosity, outlooks on life and personal successes. I am lucky beyond words for the family I have.

I am thankful for my friends back home.
Even if I don't get to see some as much as I would like, I know I have a strong bond with each and every one. My friends are the richness in my life, the smile on my face that changes an ok day into something special. They are how I measure my wealth, and let me tell you...I am one of the richest people on the planet! I cherish the many conversations over a glass (or bottle) of wine, listening to incredible music together, dancing the night away until we collapse from exhaustion, sharing food, memories, stories, and everything else around a campfire or dinner table or while driving in the car. I am thankful for knowing there is a large number of people who would do whatever is needed if I am ever in trouble or in need. I love being able to share my current traveling experiences with them and know that even though I may travel alone most times, I am not ever far from someones thoughts. I am thankful that I may come back a changed person, but they will still love me. I love knowing that I am loved by the most incredible people I have ever met, and that they chose me to be counted amongst there friends.

I am thankful for the friends I have met while traveling the past 71 days.
Even if I never see them again, I count them as close personal friends. Even if they live on the other side of the planet and speak a different language, I have bonded with some amazing folks. Sitting around campfires sharing life stories, getting lost in the jungle, climbing volcanoes, skinny dipping in the ocean, sunbathing on the beach, trying crazy fruits in a night market, zooming around on motorbikes, dancing the night away at clubs, watching the sun set and then rise again, counting stars in an unfamiliar sky, swimming in waterfalls and sharing 24 hour bus rides from hell are only a few of the amazing moments I will cherish for the rest of my life. I am thankful for the random moments where I desperately need help, or someone to talk to, or a shoulder to cry on...and this amazing person walks into my life with just the fix. Being picked up from the train station at 4 in the morning my the random guy I met before getting on the train in the previous city, just so I have somewhere to go for the few hours before the bus station opens for my next ride. Having a traveling partner for the first time I am desperately ill while traveling, who brings me noodle soup and makes sure I don't have to go to the hospital. Meting a group of folks when I first hit Malaysia, after traveling alone for almost a month, and instantly adopting me into their pack and making me feel loved.

I am thankful for all the "bright light" moments that put a smile on my face throughout the day.
Sitting in a bus in Thailand and smiling at the woman and child that sat down next to me, who then shared their snacks and we taught each other words in our native language. The random Chinese family at Borobudur, Indonesia that wanted to take pictures with me and each one (including the 80 year old grandma) that hugged me like a long lost child. Walking through the night market in Mersing, Malaysia and seeing a bunch of catfish flop around on the table (don't ask me why but it made me grin in a dirty, boring town). Campfires in Cameron Highlands, Malaysia and discussions about god, religion and life views. Amazing sunsets on deserted beaches. Roti Bom and Martabak in KL, Malaysia. Ten cent McDonalds ice cream cones. Funny looks driving a motorbike in Lankawi, Malaysia with Joonas on the back. Watching 5th graders in Cianjur, Indonesia perform a Pencake Silat demonstration for us while volunteering at their school to help teach English. Feeding monkeys by hand in Railay, Thailand. And so many, many more.

I am thankful for my life and hope everyone that is a part of it knows how much I love them and wish them the best on this day. Thanksgiving - 2009.

The dolldrums of monsoon season and hopping around SE Asia

I am now in Indonesia =] How did that happen you ask? Well it is an interesting story of woes and hardship (not really). I spent way too much time in Melaka, trying to decide what my next move would be and where I wanted to go. Option 1: Fly to Bali to met up with The Wolf Pack (Sheryl, Nick, Jeniffer and Nicole). The problem was, if I were to met them I would need to spend another 4 days in Melaka before flying to Bali, and the flight would be expensive since I would be flying on a Saturday. Option 2: Catch a ferry to Sumatra and travel south/east through Indonesia. Option 3: Catch a flight to Jakarta and skip Sumatra and travel through Java and south/east through Indonesia. Option 4: Give South Malaysia one last chance to impress me and head to the east coast to Tioman Island for a bit of beach time during the start of the monsoon season.

In the end I was so tired of stressing about timing and money and planning, that I decided to just head to Tioman Island and de-stress for a bit. Wrong Move Heather! After a hellish 8am bus ride out of Melaka to Mersing (so I could catch the ferry to the island) I get there and find out I missed the last ferry of the day by 10 mins.=[ So me and Taylor (another American I met on the bus) had to spend the night in dirty, filthy, boring Mersing. There is nothing, and I mean NOTHING, redeemable about Mersing. Crappy food, crappy rooms, crappy sights...very few redeeming features. The night market was fun...and that was about it. Bright and early the next morning we headed to the dock to catch the ferry and headed out to Tioman Island. When we got there...we were the only folks to get off on the beach we chose, and upon checking into the hostel I saw in the registry no one new had checked in for over 2 weeks! After a cursory exploration of the beach we soon realized most places were closed because of monsoon season and even finding an ATM would require a 45 min walk to a different beach.

I ended up getting horrible blisters on my feet because I was walking around in plastic flipflops. Wwe went swimming in the ocean and only afterward realized where we chose to swim was right next to a water runoff point, which basically meant all the random water runoff from houses (i.e. toilets, sinks, showers), restaurants and basic drainage from the buildings were mixing in the ocean water we were swimming in. 30 minuts later my blisters started to turn red and hurt and I started freaking out about infected feet! Two antibiotic pills later and finally finding the one place on the beach that everyone goes to eat at we settled down for some really good pizza. The owner of the bar/grill told us that the next day they were closing up shop for the season and we decided it was time to get the hell off the island least we get stuck. Apparently, once the actual monsoons start the ferry is hit or miss for weeks on end.

The next morning we packed up and headed out to the dock to catch the 7:30 am ferry. It was pouring down rain. The kind that after 30 seconds you are soaked to the bone and your shoes have been turned a soggy mess with more water inside than out. The ferry was late....and hour late! and once we finally board, the A/C is running at high and I am freezing. I ended up having to sit outside at the back, in the rain, because it was warmer. Finally got back to Mersing and hopped on the first bus to JB (the Malaysian town bordering Singapore). I end up staying the night in JB because it is a bit cheaper than Singapore, book a flight to Jakarta just to I could get the hell out of Malaysia, and catch a few hours sleep. The next day I spent on a bus ride to Singapore, dealing with immigration, trying to find the right transportation to the airport, and eventually spending 5 hours sitting at the airport waiting for my flight at 6pm. I arrive in Indonesia, have the immigration lady try and hussle me out of money by saying I could not get a visa without proof on a flight leaving the country...but for only $25 US dollars she could look the other way. I played ignorant and eventually got my visa approved. 2 hours later I was checked into my hostel and sitting down for a wonderful meal of dim sum. I was already in love with Indonesia.

Funny Fact

I am in Melaka, Malasia now and had a blast today exploring the food and shops in Chinatown. Funny conversations abounded! I found out while I was in Georgetown that my tattoo has a meaning I never knew about. Aparently in Chinese Astrology three rectangles in a row means "man"; however, the right arm is your female arm and the left is your male. So I have man tattooed on my female arm! I think that is best representation of tomboy you can get! heh. In relation to today, I was stopped no less than 5 times by folks who wanted to comment on this interesting fact, and I overheard several people walking by start talking about man and female arms. =] Good day.

Jungle Trekking

I had a wonderful day trekking around the jungle in the Cameron Highlands with a couple other travelers. It all started with a group of us talking over breakfast about the various trails through the hills and jungle and our desire to see one or two before we moved on. With little more planning then, "ok, I have a map out of my guide book" we headed out. We stopped off in town for a couple bottles of water and headed to the trail head.

The path we chose started out quite nicely, from a garden of a local couple that had landscaped and terraced a large section of their property. It quickly turned into an easily distinguishable jungle path that was quite a bit more up hill than my poor, recently ill body was happy about.
The signage for our pathway also left a bit to be desired.

Once we reached to top of the climb, the views were impressive and well worth the effort. Plus, it felt good to finally be healthy enough to do some actual physical exertion, even if it did feel like I was dying. After taking in the views, our day took a turn for the interesting. We decided instead of backtracking down the path we came up, we would follow a different route home. The problem was there were absolutely no trail markers or signs, and several potential paths to take. Looking at our trusty torn-from-a-guidebook map, we chose a path and headed off.
What followed was an interesting adventure of slipping down jungle hills, wading through streams to find lost trails, backtracking numerous times, hacking our way through spiky vines and huge bushes and following a concrete drainage ditch for a while. We were finally able to see a road and started heading that direction along any trail we could find.

We eventually ran into a power station and we so excited to see civilization! We were on the opposite side of the station from the road and could see someone inside the fence, so we waved and waved trying to get their attention so we could ask directions. All we wanted was to confirm how to get back to town, but he would not come near us, just waved us away and indicated we had to walk around the power station. So we had to shimmy our way around the fence of this huge power station, with the jungle grown in right next to the fence. So much for those really helpful Malaysian folks! We finally got around and headed up the road looking for a sign indicating where the hell we were. After walking about 20 minutes we got to the main road and were able to hitch a ride back to our guesthouse. After a hot shower, copious amounts of soap and the few cuts and scrapes we had gathers were fixed up we all enjoyed a round of beers and a good laugh over our jungle adventure.

On the docket for today: tea plantations, honey bee farms and strawberry picking...lets see what sort of adventures we can get into today!

Thailand Recap

Wow...I have been traveling in SE Asia for over 30 days now! and the experiences are starting to pile up. I really do want to apologize for updating so infrequently but it is hard to sit down and write about what I have done after the fact - especially since it means I am not currently doing something new.

I loved traveling through Thailand - beautiful places, wonderful locals and a few interesting experiences thrown into the mix. Some of the highlights include: going rock climbing in Railay with a Thai named Tex (he was so excited to take a Texas girl climbing he personally took me out for 4 climbs and wouldn't let me pay a dime!), watching the most amazing sunset I have ever seen in my life on Koh Lanta where I had the beach entirely to myself and the sky looked like it was on fire, and hissing at a troop of monkeys that were harassing me on my walk back to my room and having the dominant male look at me like I was the craziest human he had ever encountered. Being proposed to on the beach by a local Thai Rastafarian man who wanted to "take care of me for every day of the rest of my life", riding on the back of a motorcycle in Bangkok with my full pack on my back trying to get to the train station on time, and being the only traveler on a packed bus to say hello (in Thai) to the Muslim woman that got on with her 7 year old daughter and being given the most grateful smile and half the cookies she brought for her little girl while I taught them how to say hello, thank you and good bye.

Something that has taken some getting used to is the assumptions most people (travelers and locals alike) make about me. 1: I am American - this has lead to some fun and frustrating conversations and interactions. In Thailand, if someone knew only 1 or 2 words in English, one of them was guaranteed to be "Obama" (always delivered with a thumbs up and a big grin). Other assumptions included that I must be rich, I hate everyone not American, I am stupid and several others that I forget now. 2: I am traveling alone - this usually lead to at least one of the following assumption - that I need help, don't know what I am doing or where I am going ever, I don't have any friends, I can't make friends, I am stuck up...and so on. 3: I am female - I will fall for every scam in the book, I can't learn Thai, I can't count money, I need help picking anything up, I want to shop all the time, I hate local food, I love cocktails and want to drink copious amounts of them and I can't play pool. 4: I am female and traveling alone - so I MUST want to sleep with everyone. Locals and travelers alike all think that I am just itching to get into bed with them. Lord knows I am not a prude, but it is extremely frustrating to have every male, and most females, think that I am constantly on the prowl and easy to bag.

But enough ranting: I loved Thailand, and I love traveling and learning about the world, its people and myself.

p.s. I am going to try and start dedicating every other morning to updating my flickr and blog. Shorter blogs with a bit more current and spur of the moment info. Wish me luck!!

XXOO
Heather

From Bangkok to Railay Beach

I have made it to Railay Beach, a small peninsula off of southern Thailand that is only accessible by boat. The trip down here involved my first ever train ride followed by a bus trip and finally a small speedboat. The train ride was so much fun. I left the Bahi'a school late Wednesday afternoon after spending a very peaceful day recuperating from the hectic pace I have going at since arriving in Bangkok. Scott, a fellow I met that arranged for me to stay at the school, had one of his Thai friends drive me to the train station on his motercycle. What an experience! Driving a motorcycle here is nothing like in the states. Lanes are disregarded, and zipping in and around traffic is common place. Add me carrying my 25 lb. pack to the mix and it was quite a fun ride. I think we only came to a complete stop twice during the 15 min ride, and a few times I had to make sure my knees didn't get caught on either of the two cars we were slipping in between. Scott's friend did not speak much English, but he insisted on stayed with me until the train I needed came and that I was all situated before returning home. I very kind fellow =] Once on the train, I immediately met two of my fellow passengers when they saved me from dropping my bag on my head trying to get it onto the storage rack. Dominick and Andy are from London (actually a small town outside that I can't remember the name of) who were traveling to Samui for holiday. We struck up a conversation and ended up talking and hanging out for most of the train ride. They taught me how to play Beanies (a type of Rumy that has a rotating wild card) and we played and drank beer in the Buffet car until they kicked us out. It was tons of fun, and I got a lot of great advice and recommended places to see all over SE Asia from them. The car we were staying in was a 2nd class sleeper car, which meant the seats folded down to make beds and an upper bunk was folded out of the wall. I paid a bit lower price for the upper bunk, but really enjoyed it. It was an surprisingly comfortable night, with the rhythmic sound of the train on the tracks and the smattering of rain on the roof lulling me to sleep. We awoke at 5:30 in the morning, hopped off the train at Krabi and grabbed banana smoothies for breakfast while waiting for our buses. (the shake cost only $1.20 by the way) =]
We three ended up getting on the same bus after breakfast, but after half an hour I swapped to a different bus and bid farewell to the two blokes from England. Unlike the first bus, the bus I joined had no other tourist or English speakers, so I just had to hope that the driver was looking out for me and would let me know what stop to get off at. After a few hours, a bit of napping, a frantic search for a toilet at the one rest break we had, and numerous drop offs and pickups I was getting a bit worried I had missed my stop. Luckily I soon saw a sign for Krabi and new the ride was almost over. I was the last to get dropped off, and felt a bit apprehensive as the bus drove to a remote, secluded group of buildings and stopped with no other people in sight. It turns out I was actually at a spot where I could get a van ride from here to any of the three docks providing rides to Railay Beach. For only 159 baht (and no other options for a ride) I headed over to one of the docks. How quickly I was able to leave Krabi was dependent on the boat taxi finding enough passengers, and since this was low season I ended up waiting for almost 2 hours. The 45 min ride was pretty bland; except it starting raining halfway there and we only had a rough tarp spread over piping for cover, so we all ended up a bit damp. I am sure I made quite a sight, with my fedora pulled low, sunglasses, a bandana covering the lower half of my face and my rain jacket pulled halfway on to cover my arms!
I finally waded onto East Railay beach (luckily the rain had stopped for a bit) and went searching for a room for the night. Let me say this about Railay, I am going to be in such good shape after staying a week or two here! Everything back from the small beach is steep walkways and stairs, and there are no cars and only a few motorcycles here, so I will have a bunch of hiking to do. It is also amazingly beautiful. A picture perfect tropical rainforest mixed in with amazing sheer limestone cliffs and emerald green water. After a few minutes of hiking around, I finally found a bungalow in my price range (300 baht which equals $9). I grabbed a quick shower and then headed out to explore the area and find some food. I didn't make it far before the smell of Pad Thai and the smiling face of a lovely Thai woman drew me into a Rastafarian Bar right on the beach. I ate my fill and hung around for a bit because the skies had opened up again and were dumping a tons of rain. Here I met Job and Laura, two travelers from Ireland, who recommended I stay at Railay Cabanas (cheaper and nicer) and invited me to hang out while I was on Railay. Job has been coming here for the past 4 years and has really gotten to know the locals and where all the best food and atmosphere is. I didn't reconnect with them later in the evening, because I went back to my room for a nap and ended up sleeping the whole night through.