Post SIT Travels: Day One - Chiang Mai, Thailand

Traveling does not always goes according to plan, even if you think you have organized everything and are prepared for anything.  Like when you think you're headed to the international airport, but realize once you arrive at the airport it's the wrong one (because you can't find your airline) and the international airport you need is 40 kilometers away (this is why you should be early for flights).  Or when you pay $15 for a eight hour bus ride that ends up taking twelve.  Or when you lose the key to your locker that holds all of your luggage and your bus is about to leave.  Through it all it's important to remember "just breathe" and that everything works itself out in the end.  You may even just laugh about it later, eventually.

On our way to the airport to fly to Chiang Mai we were all in a good mood talking with our taxi driver.  I was holding a copy of our ticket information so when our driver asked me what time we were departing, I glance down just to clarify what I thought I knew.  "We leave at seven oh sh*t!" Everyone's heads in the backseat snapped up as I read and reread our ticket time.  "Why does it say we were supposed to leave at 7:30 a.m.?"  The taxi driver looked mildly amused as we all figured out what to do.  We decided to continue onto the airport and try to buy tickets for the 7:30 p.m. flight.  We were all to blame for not checking over our tickets.  We bought our four tickets at one time with one card to guarantee we would be on the same flight.  I was paranoid that our names wouldn't be spelled right or someone's passport number wouldn't match so I was compulsively checking that.  I guess it should have occurred to me that the time should have read 19:30 not 7:30 since Thai airlines use military time.  Anyway, we got to the airport early and had plenty of time to buy new tickets.  I kept consoling myself by thinking "Well remember how cheap those tickets were to get from Cambodia to Bangkok? Now you can use the money you saved to travel quickly in a big, clean, fast airplane".  It was definitely worth it.

Anna had reserved all of our spots in hostels before our trip started, which was very smart and a huge help.  If you are thinking of traveling, www.hostelworld.com is a great resource.  Anna found some of the best hostels through the site by reading people's reviews.  In Chiang Mai we stayed at Bunchun (translates to "my house") hostel.  We walked into a big room where there were two tents, a bed frame with a mattress, and at least five mattresses with sheets laying on the floor.  Guests had written thank you notes in sharpie all over the walls and someone had created a huge artistic tree on a middle pillar of the room.  There were also two Chihuahuas running around.  One was so small it could fit in the palm of my hand.  The owner and all of the other guests who were staying there greeted us enthusiastically.  Since we were only spending two nights, Vee, the owner, helped us decide what we wanted to do.  He had a lot of brochures and gave his recommendations.  We decided that we would trek the following day then take a cooking class on our final day.  He made the necessary calls and registered us for each program.  That night (December 16), we went to the Sunday night market with some of the other guests.

Photos courtesy of Anna.

The night market was very crowded and we didn't even make it to the end of the street to see all of the vendors.  People were selling embroidered pillows, t-shirts, lanterns, food, scarves, shoes, jewelry, paintings, and much more.

 For dinner, we had pad thai omelets, one of the most brilliant culinary inventions ever.  The cooks made the pad thai right in front of you in a giant wok.  In a separate pan they poured in eggs (that had been whisked together) to form a thin circular layer around the pan.  Then they put a huge serving of pad thai in the middle and folded the sides of the cooked egg around the pad thai to make a perfect bundle.  We were able to add extra peanuts, lime, and hot sauce.  While in Thailand, pad thai became one of my required meals of the day.

Omelet pad thai

The following morning, we woke up early for our trek.  The pamphlet said we would get to ride elephants through the jungle, interact with locals, trek to a waterfall, and go bamboo rafting.  We did do all of that, it just turned out different than I had imagined it to be. 

In the morning we were picked up by our tour guide and a driver.  We stopped to get two more people who would accompany us the rest of the day.  First, we went to the elephant sanctuary.  A big group of people had just left with the elephants so we walked around and saw a baby elephant with its mother.  (Fun fact: Elephants are pregnant for around 2 years.) 

The mother elephant and its baby were strong! The mother broke branches in half just with her trunk and the baby could easily push an adult human around.  The baby's hair felt very bristly.  I have heard elephant hair described as feeling like toothbrush bristles, but it was more stiff and at least two inches long.

The elephant is reaching its trunk up to get bananas. 

Sarah and I were able to ride on an older elephant.  She was fifty-three years old and throughout her life she had given birth to four babies.  The elephant followed a well-worn muddy track up a hill, through a wooden area, and back down another hill.  The whole time I was hanging on for dear life; it felt like I would slide out of the seat at any moment.  A young man sat perched on the elephants neck and directed it through the trail.  He started playing Taylor Swift on his phone and said, "American".  Talk about globalization, I was not expecting to hear "You Belong With Me" on top of an elephant in northern Thailand.  I really think that the elephant knew the route by heart and would have been fine without prodding.  The young man actually made Sarah and me feel really uncomfortable because of the way he treated the elephant.  We were fine going slowly along the trail, but the man kept whacking the elephant on the forehead with a pole and grunting at it loudly while shoving his heels into the elephant's neck.  Sarah had traveled to Botswana to do research on elephants over the summer so she had a special attachment to the animals.  We kept telling the guide it was okay that we were going slow, but I think he was trying to show off and act macho and in control.

That part of the trek made me think about the negative effects of tourism.  We had heard from another backpacker that they took a trek where the elephants were hit and abused and she had not recommended paying money to any tourist program that centered around animals.  The hostel owner told us that the company we used had a good reputation so we decided since we were in Thailand, we would see the elephants.  Tourism helps to keep the elephant sanctuary running, but also puts the elephants in a vulnerable situation where they are subjected to carrying tourists around the same route day after day.  Before embarking on a tour in any country that includes interacting with animals, I would recommend researching the company to see how the animals are treated.  I also think that more research programs should find tourist attractions where the animals are not treated well and try to educate workers about how to handle the animals and be in control, without using brute force.

Waterfall

After seeing the elephants we drove to a place where the native northern Thai people were selling their handicrafts and doing weaving demonstrations.  None of us had brought any money so we didn't buy anything.  I'm not sure the people believed that we didn't have money and I'm sure a lot of tourists say that if they don't want to buy things.  We went to a waterfall and had the opportunity to swim before lunch.  The water was freezing, but all of us jumped in.  We had a very simple lunch consisting of soup and fried rice then went bamboo rafting.

Our guide was a little eccentric and had joked with us the whole day. So after he had a beer at lunch then told us he would going to guide us on the bamboo raft down the river we thought he was kidding. Turns out the other guide cancelled so he had to step up and steer, which made me really nervous, especially after I saw the "rafts".  The bamboo rafts were about three meters long and one meter wide.  Ten long, dried bamboo shoots were tied together.  The guide stood in the front with a long pole to try and make sure we wouldn't hit any rocks.  Sarah, Anna, and I sat spaced out evenly on the rest of the raft.  Jenny and the two other people went on another raft with a different guide.  When we got on the raft our guide warned us to keep our hands in the raft.  "There are big snakes!" he said, grinning at us.  The rafts were very unsteady and we all sat with our legs crossed on the bamboo.  Our guide did not help to calm my nerves when he proceeded to say that he hadn't had to guide a boat in months so he hoped our journey down the river would go smoothly.

The river was cold, but luckily not flowing too quickly.  In a few places there were small rapids and our guide had to steer us around rocks in our path.  He did almost fall off the front of our raft once and I honestly don't know what we would have done since the water was fast in that section.  After about an hour we made it to the end and I could finally breathe knowing that I had survived.

Bamboo rafts.

That night, one of Sarah's friends, who was working in Chiang Mai teaching English, met us for dinner. We ate street food at an outdoor market.  It was hard to decided what to eat, but I finally settled on red curry for dinner and mango sticky rice and a fluffy steamed egg custard bun for dessert.  After dinner, we shopped and went to a Lady Boys Show.  It was free, you just had to buy a drink.

This Lady Boys Show is famous in Chiang Mai.  All the performers are men who dress as women who dance and lip sync to a variety of songs.  The performance set to Madonna's song "Vogue" was by far the best.  It was really incredible watching them dance.  First, they are all in much better shape than I am, they can dance in tall heels like a pro, and their makeup skills are far beyond my own.

Photo courtesy of Sarah.

Photo courtesy of Sarah.

Photo courtesy of Sarah. 

Post Lady Boys Show.  Photo courtesy of Sarah.

We packed in a lot during our first full day in Chiang Mai and I enjoyed every minute of it.

End Note: Sarah shared some of her photos with me so I added a few more pics to my post about Cambodia.  Check them out!

Post SIT Travels: Bangkok, Thailand

After seeing the magnificent sunset at Angkor we finished the night by shopping at the night market and  having Chinese food for dinner.  The next morning we took a bus from Siem Reap to Bangkok for $15.  Now my uncle had warned me about the buses from Cambodia to Thailand saying to be really prepared for the bad roads and bad service.  Looking back, I should have listened to his advice.  

The first part of the trip went okay.  We started out at 6:20 a.m., twenty minutes later than planned, and an eighties karaoke video was playing for the first half hour (luckily the video player soon broke).  After we arrived at the border everyone on the bus was given a small red sticker.  We had given them our tickets so that was all we had to prove we were on the bus.  People started unloading our bags and I grabbed mine right away.  Some boys were putting bags onto a trolley and when my friend tried to take hers off they said something in Cambodian, shaking their heads.  "But that's my bag!" she said and took it off anyway looking confused at them.  I do not know where her bag would have ended up if she had not taken it.  Everyone on the bus lined up at the customs office leaving Cambodia.  We were all fingerprinted again to make sure our arrival and departure prints matched.  Once we made it out of Cambodia we still had to walk about 300 meters along a road where there was a casino before we arrived at the customs office in Thailand.  Entering customs in Thailand there was a huge sign written in English and Thai that said "Transportation of Drugs Punished by Death".

We filled out immigration cards and obtained our free 15 day tourist visas.  (If you arrive by air, you get a free 30 day tourist visa.)  After exiting the building my friends and I were told by a woman, "You have red sticker? Keep walking".   About 100 meters further along the road, where trucks filled with goods were driving by, we arrived at a pickup truck with seats in the truck bed.  They luckily saw our red sticker and instructed us to get in the truck while we waited for the rest of our group.  Once the truck was full we were driven to a small rest stop area where we thought we would meet up with our coach bus.  We were very wrong.  After 45 minutes of waiting, we were told to go into a very small van, that we somehow fit fifteen people into.  "Okay 4 hours to Bangkok", the driver said and everyone squished in the hot van looked shocked since it was already close to the time that we should have been arriving.  Maybe it could theoretically take four hours, but every hour we had to stop at a gas station and wait in a long line of cars to refuel.  Finally, we made it to Bangkok, much later in the afternoon than we had anticipated.  Moral of the story, you can't buy time so maybe consider flying if you only have a few days to travel.

We went directly to our hostel, Lub D, which was an amazing place.  It was very clean and had a very artsy/modern feel to it.  We were lucky because the dorm rooms we had booked were filled so we got two double rooms for the night for no extra charge.  Since we were in Thailand, we went to find pad thai for dinner and it did not disappoint!

First pad thai in Bangkok. Thanks again to Anna for letting me use her photos.

We explored the night market in Bangkok and went on a hunt for mango sticky rice.  For those of you who have never tried mango sticky rice, let me explain.  First, sticky rice is a different type of rice than say jasmine rice.  Sticky rice has to be soaked for several hours then drained and steamed to obtain the perfect texture.  Each grain of rice should still hold it's shape so it should not be mushy, but when properly made the grains still stick together.  After the rice is steamed, coconut milk is poured over and it's left to soak in.  To serve, you put a mound of the coconut sticky rice on a plate, slice a ripe mango, place it over the rice, and top it with more coconut milk and crispy mung beans.  It's one of my top favorite desserts (it might even beat Magnolia's banana pudding and that's saying something!).  After asking over ten people in English and broken Thai we finally found a street vendor who sold it.  It was well worth the hunt! 

Mango Sticky Rice

 Since we had spent most of the previous day on a small, hot bus, we decided to spend the day in Bangkok and fly to Chiang Mai, a city in Northern Thailand, later in the evening.  Previously, we were going to take a train, but we could not bear the thought of being on a train for ten hours instead of an hour and a half flight.  We had almost the entire day in Bangkok until our flight left so we decided to sleep in and explore Chinatown.

 Bangkok is a huge city so we had a taxi drop us off on a street in the heart of Chinatown.  Chinatown was mobbed with people selling steaming food and bright juice, bartering in cramped stores, cooking on the street, and buying everything imaginable.  We found a dim sum restaurant and ordered a large assortment that included pork and shrimp dumplings.  The restaurant we ate at, and many others in the area, also sold shark fin soup and birds nest soup, which are controversial dishes in the U.S.

Dim sum

We also had black bean steamed buns, bbq pork steamed buns, and (my absolute favorite) egg custard steamed buns.  In Vietnam, banh bao, a steamed bun filled with different meat, vegetables, or eggs, was one of my favorite snacks.  After eating we walked through an indoor market and the surrounding streets.  I could have spent all day going through the spices, identifying the vegetables, and trying the fruits.  Instantly I fell in love with all the foreign smells, the bustling people, and all of the food.  I am convinced you could buy any ingredient imaginable there.  They even sold sea cucumbers!

Hanging pork belly and crispy duck. 

Grilled and fried bananas.  

A big dried fish. 

Spices, flowers for tea, dried berries. 

Sea cucumbers

Chinese lanterns.

While walking around, we came across this woman who was making what appeared to be mini taco-like treats.  She spread a thin layer of batter in an oval shape over a heated griddle.  Then she put a dollop of what appeared to be creme fraiche.  Half were topped with a stringy yellow substance that I recognized as a version of fios de ovos that is used in Portuguese desserts.  It kind of looks like cooked spaghetti squash and is made with egg yolks and sugar.  I found another food blog that discusses how it's made and the countries it's made in, Thailand included! You can read that here, http://www.oohmummy.com/2010/04/i-wanna-eat-keiran-somen.html. The other half of the ovals were topped with a sticky orange substance.  Both varieties were piled into a small plastic bag and sprinkled with sesame seeds and green onions.  The "tacos" were bite sized and packed a punch.  We think the orange substance was made of dried fish or shrimp, but it was still surprisingly sweet and had a kick of chili at the end.  It actually paired really well with the green onions creating a perfect bite of food.  

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Larger versions of the "tacos". 

 On each street there was also at least one person selling freshly squeezed orange juice and pomegranate juice.

The most perfect pomegranates. 

Decorated paper that families buy to burn during the New Year. 

Purple yucca

Colored steamed buns. Don't they look like Easter eggs? 

Bangkok

After our exciting day in Chinatown, we packed a small bag and headed to the airport to fly to Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand. 

Post SIT Travels: Cambodia

I know it has been over a month since my last blog post and I apologize.  My program ended on December 11 and then from December 12 to December 20 I traveled throughout Cambodia and Thailand with three other students on my program.  I returned to Vietnam and spent two nights with my host family in Ho Chi Minh City before departing to NY.  It was a lot of traveling, but I was use to it after already living out of a suitcase since the end of August.  My adventures in Cambodia are below and the rest will follow shortly.

 After a couple rounds of tear jerking goodbyes to some of the students on the program who were leaving to fly to different countries, I was off to start my own post-SIT adventure.  (After the program ended, the eleven students on my trip were in seven different countries: Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia, U.S., England, Israel, and Thailand.)  I met up with three other women who were on my program and we boarded the Mekong Express bus at 8:30 a.m. to travel to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. The coach bus was actually really nice.  It had air conditioning ( a must since it was about 90 degrees outside), there was a Jackie Chan movie playing, and we got some pastries for breakfast.  It cost around $11.  Once we arrived at the Cambodian border we had to get visas.  When entering and exiting Cambodia, people are fingerprinted by an electronic pad.  Some people had obtained their visa's online (it cost $20), but I did not so I had to pay $25 at the border for my visa.  After passing customs, a man holding passports asked for mine.  Once all my friends got through, I panicked that I had given my passport to a random person when I saw that they had their visas with them.  After picturing myself stranded on the border without my passport, I realized that it was because they needed to put my Cambodian visa in the passport.  (My friends had gotten the e-visa online.) We stopped for lunch and arrived in Phnom Penh in the late afternoon. 

*A quick note about the pictures to follow in Cambodia and Thailand... My camera was stolen in Vietnam right before I left on my trip, but it was my fault.  Vietnam is a very safe country.  Civilians are not allowed to own firearms (I read that shotguns are excluded, but I'm not positive), handguns, or assault weapons.  When I was in Vietnam, I was never afraid for my safety at any point (well maybe at the beginning while trying to cross the street, but I soon got the hang of that).  As a young woman, I was not afraid to walk by myself or take public transportation alone.  I never saw any violent crimes, but petty crimes were rampant, especially in the big cities.  iPhones, laptops, and apple products in general were targeted.  I once saw a woman talking on her iphone on the side of the street then heard her yell as a motorbike driver zoomed away clutching her phone.  When my camera was stolen I was out dancing and I think I forgot to zip my purse, which I had moved behind me to dance.  The next thing I knew my camera was gone, but at least no one was hurt, and really it was only a camera.  So I must give a big THANK YOU to Anna for letting me use the photos on my blog that she took during our trip to Cambodia and Thailand! 

Jenny and I in the tuk tuk that took us to our hostel, The Mad Monkey.  The covered seating area was attached to a motorbike. 

We only had one night in Phnom Penh so we decided to go to the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum.  Each of us had very little knowledge of Cambodia's history.  We had heard of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, but that was all we knew.  The Genocide Museum was very eye opening.  The museum was in a former high school that had been used by the Khmer Rouge for the Security Prison 21 from 1975-1979.

A classroom used for torture in Security Prison 21.

An estimated 17,000 people went through the prison.  Once they were brought there, prisoners were interrogated.  After they admitted the crimes they were charged with (however false the accusations were) prisoners were executed.  There were rooms upon rooms filled with black and white photos of prisoners that were all photographed upon their entry into the prison.  The photos were very powerful.  Some of the people stared back at the camera in defiance, others looked into the distance, and some looked defeated.  Only 7 people are known to have survived the prison.  

After visiting the prison, we decided to walk around the city and have dinner.  Cambodian food, like Vietnamese food, focuses on balancing flavors, using seasonally appropriate ingredients, and the presentation of the dishes.  Amok is a typical Cambodian dish that is usually prepared with fish, spices, coconut milk, egg, and peanuts that is steamed in a banana leaf.  Lok Lak is also popular.  It consists of stir-fried, cubed beef served with onions, tomatoes, lettuce, and a rich brown sauce.

Phnom Penh at night. 

On the morning of December 13, we left Phnom Penh and bordered another Mekong Express bus to travel to Siem Reap.  A friend of our last tuk tuk driver met us at the bus stop and dropped us off at the Siem Reap hostel, which only cost us $6 per night.  We explored the night market and Pub Street, which is a street with lots of restaurants.

Pub Street

The morning of December 14, we woke up at 4:30 a.m. to meet our tuk tuk driver who drove us to Angkor, the largest Hindu temple complex in the world, to see the sunrise.  Before we entered the World Heritage Center we had to purchase a $20 one day pass that allowed us to enter the site multiple times throughout the day.  Once we received entry, our driver took us outside perhaps the most famous temple, Angkor Wat.  It was still pitch black when we arrived and I was glad that the other tourists that surrounded us walking towards the temple had thought to bring flashlights.  The sky started to get lighter around 5:30 a.m. and the sun completely rose around 6:20 a.m.

Sunrise over Angkor Wat. 

Sunrise over Angkor Wat. 

Sunrise over Angkor Wat. 

After the sunrise, we walked around Angkor Wat temple and explored the brilliant architecture and carvings.  Construction on Angkor Wat started around the 12th century.  Some of the scenes depicted battles with people riding elephants carrying swords and shields.  We ate some noodles for breakfast near the temple and went to find our tuk tuk driver.  The Angkor World Heritage site is made up of more than 1,000 temples, though many are in ruins. We spent the rest of the morning driving around to the large temples that are still standing and walking throughout the buildings and the surrounding area.

Notice the face carved on the left of the tall column.

There were reconstruction projects occurring at many of the temples. 

The temples were HUGE! Our tuk tuk driver would drop us off in front of the temples and leave us to explore.  We went through about six and were exhausted by the end.  They would seem small, then there would be a lot of doorways that led into new bigger sections with more exits into different sections.  We also were able to see the temple where the film Tomb Raider with Angelina Jolie was filmed.

Photo courtesy of Sarah.

In the tuk tuk.  Photo courtesy of Sarah.

The four travelers.

An impressive tree over a temple door. 

Photo courtesy of Sarah.

After walking through the temples, we went back to our hostel to go on a food tour of the local market. Remember how I said I will eat anything?  Well if you're eating now, finish your meal before you continue.  The first place our guide took us to was a stand that sold fruit, vegetables and bugs.  Now I had seen fried bugs before and swore I would never try them.  But, it's an experience, right?  So, I tried a wide variety just to say I did it.  

Fried frogs.  Fried snakes are in the upper left corner. 

Fried crickets. 

Fried grasshoppers and big black beetles.

Most of the bugs like the grasshoppers and crickets tasted like grease, as did the fried frogs and fried snakes.  Our guide told us that they were caught in the rice paddies, so I guess they're fresh...?  They were not as bad as I was expecting until I tried the big black beetle.  As you can see from the before and after pictures below, it was not good.  Actually, it was probably one of the worst things I have eaten in my entire life since it tasted exactly how cow poop smells.  I somehow managed to swallow and almost begged for some of the fried snake to get the taste out of my mouth. 

Before eating the black beetle

After eating the black beetle.  I'm in the upper right hand corner.

After the bugs, we moved on to try really delicious crab, meatballs, and vegetables and an indoor market stand.  

 We finished that off with dessert. It was similar to Vietnamese "che" where you could choose your own combination of beans, sticky rice, pudding, coconut milk, tapioca, banana, and ice to make your dessert.

Dessert 

Leftovers anyone? 

We rested after the food tour and took the tuk tuk back to Angkor to see the sunset at 5:30 p.m.  We hiked up a small mountain to reach a temple we had not yet been to that provided an excellent view of the setting sun.  There were hundreds of tourists and the view was spectacular.

Walking up to the top of the temple.  Photo courtesy of Sarah.

Photo courtesy of Sarah.

Photo courtesy of Sarah.

Photo courtesy of Sarah.

Our group with our Norwegian friend that we met at our hostel.

Notice the hot air balloon to the left.