Well, I am officially done with my internship in Singapore. This has been an incredible journey filled with incredible people, fun experiences and lots of traveling. I will be leaving tomorrow morning to meet up with my fellow Duck classmates in China for two weeks before returning to school. I cannot wait to see everyone, I have missed you all a lot. I just wanted to give a special thank you to everyone I have met here that has helped me to have an incredible experience I will never forget. Everyone at the hostel was amazing, even the temporary roommates who drove me nuts, and I would definitely consider staying in a hostel again. It has its challenges, but in the end I cannot imagine staying anywhere else and having as good of a time. The manager SK was incredible and very helpful, I am lucky I got to stay here. Also my American counterparts here Rachel and Prashant have kept me sane (for the most part) and I want to thank the both of you for sharing in this great summer with me.
At work, I have to thank all of my coworkers for putting up with me and doing absolutely everything in their power to make my stay here a great one. Bob, Syed, Lenard, Farah, Jen and the entire crew at SPEX house, you have all been great friends and coworkers and I thank you for everything you have done for me. You are all some of the most genuine and generous people I have ever met. I wish you all nothing but the absolute best and truly hope to keep in touch. To my buddy Matt, who was also there and helpful for anything I needed and took charge of showing me around I will miss you terribly. I never knew I enjoyed British humor so much (or that anyone did) but I wish you the the best at Sports School. And last but not least Sarah, who had the unfortunate task of dealing with me from the moment I arrived in the country. Even though you probably still cannot spell my name, I will never forget how great you were to me. You are all amazing and thank you.
I hope you all have found my blog entertaining, and I hope I haven't offended too many of you in the process. This has been an incredible summer in Singapore, and I cannot wait to see what lies ahead in China. Thank you again city of Lions!!!
Saturday, September 8, 2012
Sunday, September 2, 2012
Bali-wood
Good morning sports fans. A very special good morning to all you Duck fans out there, congrats on starting the season off right! Scoooooooo Ducks!!! Ok so now that that's out of the way, on to the next topic: my weekend in Bali! The most recent stop on the "Ameer's tour of South East Asia" was the beautiful island of Bali in Indonesia. The trip started well with a decent flight, although it seemed like the pilot landed the plane on one wheel... kinda felt like he was doing a trick. I wasn't too happy about that but I was in Bali so who was I to complain?? Turns out you have to PAY to get into the country and to leave! Entry visas into Bali are $25 and Departure taxes are $15. I was already in the hole $40 without having stepped outside the airport. Not good for my cheap tendencies.
Stepping out into the Bali air was shocking, because it was actually breezy and cool! I haven't felt a breeze in over 2 months, I almost wanted to throw on a jacket I was astounded. The airport in Bali left something to be desired, as it was pretty run down but supposedly "improvements are underway." Once waiting forever to get through customs and staring at a sign that read "Smuggling drugs into Bali is punishable by death!" you make your way down an old corridor without 15 people in single foreign currency exchange booths begging for you to choose them. The poor people looked so bored and lonely, but there was no way I was changing money with them. They had all their rates hand-written and I was sure to lose money somehow. We walked outside to find out hostel shuttle amidst about a thousand other drivers all holding up signs. You would have thought it was a red carpet, but instead of cameras people were holding up names. We found ours in a sea of names and maneuvered through the thousands of motorbikes to the road on our 15 minute trip to the hostel. I have been to Amsterdam, and they say there are more bikes than people there. In Bali, it's motorbikes. They are everywhere! And from what I saw there are no lanes or rules of the road, people just cruise on out wherever they like. Don't know how we made it back safely but we did. It was almost 1 am when we got there, so we decided to turn in and head out to the beach early in the morning.
The next morning we hit the beach and it was gorgeous. The sun was out, the water was cool and there were millions of surfers out in the waves. So many in fact that they actually discouraged swimming in a lot of parts of the beach for safety. After walking around the beach for a while we grabbed a spot by the water and laid out ready to soak in all the sun I wasn't going to be seeing for the following 9 months. After applying a generous amount of sunscreen, we were out in the sun ALL DAY. People would come over and try to sell us everything from ice cream, to sarongs, to a cross bow! I actually considered the cross bow. Oh and there was one European lady who decided to go topless. For some reason she became the most popular woman on the beach... don't know why. It was so relaxing and I made sure to ignore the signs and go swimming/bodysurfing a few times as well. It was a beautiful day, unfortunately when I headed back I was sunburned everywhere! My body was on fire, and it did not feel good. The shower after was filled with screams of pain, especially once the gritty towel from the hostel came into play. After going out to dinner I didn't feel up to doing much since I was so sunburned, so we stayed in and watched a marathon of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. It was awesome, I miss TV.
The next day after an uncomfortable and restless sleep, we set out to visit the shops of Bali in the bustling downtown area. Bali was not near;y as cheap as Bangkok, but still plenty of options to bargain or haggle. As long as you don't mind paying more for lower quality products. I considered buying a counterfeit watch, but did not find anything in the price range I was willing to pay. The shopkeepers over there were incredibly aggressive, and even followed you down the street trying to coax you into buying their products. All I gotta say is, if you want to buy a fake Rolex, Oakley sunglasses or beats headphones... head to Bali. You can get all 3 for less than $60. The area we were in was very touristy, so there wasn't much local food available. But the food there was pretty cheap as well, and most of the meals we had were under $5. I could really get used to such cheap food. After the shops we went back to the hostel to lounge around at the pool, get even more tan/sunburned and have pool-service food brought to us. It was really a tough life.
The evening capped off with a very nice dinner at a beautiful hotel restaurant. The view was overlooking the street, and the food was delicious. The fanciest dinner we had there was only $30 total. And that was for steak, lamb, and appetizers. What a deal. Other than the waiters who could not pronounce names, though insisted on continuously trying and repeatedly getting it wrong. I felt like I was watching the skit on SNL when the Scandinavian family can't pronounce the names of people even though its like Scott or Mark. The guy called Rachel Carol, Raquel, Rachelle, and something else unintelligible. It was hilarious, but they really tried.
Overall, it was a very relaxing trip. Lots of lounging, eating, and sun-tanning. I would highly recommend traveling around this part of the world when you get a chance because it is absolutely beautiful. Unfortunately there was no crocodile farm this trip, so we did not get to see anyone else die. Oh well, I will always love Bangkok!
Stepping out into the Bali air was shocking, because it was actually breezy and cool! I haven't felt a breeze in over 2 months, I almost wanted to throw on a jacket I was astounded. The airport in Bali left something to be desired, as it was pretty run down but supposedly "improvements are underway." Once waiting forever to get through customs and staring at a sign that read "Smuggling drugs into Bali is punishable by death!" you make your way down an old corridor without 15 people in single foreign currency exchange booths begging for you to choose them. The poor people looked so bored and lonely, but there was no way I was changing money with them. They had all their rates hand-written and I was sure to lose money somehow. We walked outside to find out hostel shuttle amidst about a thousand other drivers all holding up signs. You would have thought it was a red carpet, but instead of cameras people were holding up names. We found ours in a sea of names and maneuvered through the thousands of motorbikes to the road on our 15 minute trip to the hostel. I have been to Amsterdam, and they say there are more bikes than people there. In Bali, it's motorbikes. They are everywhere! And from what I saw there are no lanes or rules of the road, people just cruise on out wherever they like. Don't know how we made it back safely but we did. It was almost 1 am when we got there, so we decided to turn in and head out to the beach early in the morning.
The next morning we hit the beach and it was gorgeous. The sun was out, the water was cool and there were millions of surfers out in the waves. So many in fact that they actually discouraged swimming in a lot of parts of the beach for safety. After walking around the beach for a while we grabbed a spot by the water and laid out ready to soak in all the sun I wasn't going to be seeing for the following 9 months. After applying a generous amount of sunscreen, we were out in the sun ALL DAY. People would come over and try to sell us everything from ice cream, to sarongs, to a cross bow! I actually considered the cross bow. Oh and there was one European lady who decided to go topless. For some reason she became the most popular woman on the beach... don't know why. It was so relaxing and I made sure to ignore the signs and go swimming/bodysurfing a few times as well. It was a beautiful day, unfortunately when I headed back I was sunburned everywhere! My body was on fire, and it did not feel good. The shower after was filled with screams of pain, especially once the gritty towel from the hostel came into play. After going out to dinner I didn't feel up to doing much since I was so sunburned, so we stayed in and watched a marathon of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. It was awesome, I miss TV.
The next day after an uncomfortable and restless sleep, we set out to visit the shops of Bali in the bustling downtown area. Bali was not near;y as cheap as Bangkok, but still plenty of options to bargain or haggle. As long as you don't mind paying more for lower quality products. I considered buying a counterfeit watch, but did not find anything in the price range I was willing to pay. The shopkeepers over there were incredibly aggressive, and even followed you down the street trying to coax you into buying their products. All I gotta say is, if you want to buy a fake Rolex, Oakley sunglasses or beats headphones... head to Bali. You can get all 3 for less than $60. The area we were in was very touristy, so there wasn't much local food available. But the food there was pretty cheap as well, and most of the meals we had were under $5. I could really get used to such cheap food. After the shops we went back to the hostel to lounge around at the pool, get even more tan/sunburned and have pool-service food brought to us. It was really a tough life.
The evening capped off with a very nice dinner at a beautiful hotel restaurant. The view was overlooking the street, and the food was delicious. The fanciest dinner we had there was only $30 total. And that was for steak, lamb, and appetizers. What a deal. Other than the waiters who could not pronounce names, though insisted on continuously trying and repeatedly getting it wrong. I felt like I was watching the skit on SNL when the Scandinavian family can't pronounce the names of people even though its like Scott or Mark. The guy called Rachel Carol, Raquel, Rachelle, and something else unintelligible. It was hilarious, but they really tried.
Overall, it was a very relaxing trip. Lots of lounging, eating, and sun-tanning. I would highly recommend traveling around this part of the world when you get a chance because it is absolutely beautiful. Unfortunately there was no crocodile farm this trip, so we did not get to see anyone else die. Oh well, I will always love Bangkok!
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| Entrance to the beach |
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| What a view |
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| You can't see the hole in my trunks from here |
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| When in Bali, have fish eat your feet |
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| Bustling sidewalk |
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| Too many comments. |
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| Not a bad room. Complete with LCD TV! |
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| Pool right below the room |
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| Outside our hostel |
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| Bali runs on Dunkin' |
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| Airport surrounded by ocean... |
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| Getting sunburned... |
Sunday, August 26, 2012
Bangkok part 2...
Day 2- After an exciting day 1, we got up early to not only find Prashant sleeping in sweat pants and a sweatshirt (Somone tell this guy its its 90 degrees outside) but to take a boat ride up the Khlong to some more temples. The boat was essentially gondola with an engine. The driver was flooring it and we felt every... single... wave he hit. Thankfully he slowed down to show us around the river as we passed multiple temples and a ton of really poor-looking shed houses. The word "shanty" comes to mind when you see them. It was a really nice ride though and we got to see many people living right near the river, doing their laundry and trying to sell fruit from their "backyard." We even had a vendor ride over to our boat, hang on for dear life and try very hard to sell us some random trinkets we had no interest in. Somehow Prashant had a few in in hand... which only made the guy think he had a chance for a sale. To this day Prashant still doesn't know how they got in his hand. We bought nothing.
After the boat tour we made it to the temples only to find out we weren't allowed to go in because we were wearing shorts (what were we thinking) but if we waited for 2 hours we could pay 100 baht (3 bucks) to rent a cloak to wear. So we took another tuk tuk ride, complete with stops at fashion stores to "browse", to a couple shorts-friendly temples (there are so many temples) until it was time to don our outfits to enter the temples of the infamous reclining Buddha. Totally worth it, because the Buddha was about 40 meters (for you Canadians out there) long and it was laying down! Not sure why this was so exciting but it was. Snapped a few pictures and headed out to Jim Thompson's house.
Now you might be asking who Jim Thompson is... I was too. Frankly I still don't know. Apparently he is ex-CIA or something, then came to Thailand and fell in love with the country so started to get involved in the silk trade. I guess he also disappeared one day in the jungle and never returned. Anyway he has a huge house and its a tourist attraction to buy a lot of nice silk and stuff. If you are into silk or history, great place to check out. If you are me, you are bored. It also didn't help that I ate some under-cooked chicken satay from a stand on the street before walking in... not a good choice. After the silk house I needed anoher Thai massage so we all stopped in to a place close by. It wasn't as nice as the one before, and screamed of happy endings but we went in anyways. We all had female masseuses (masseusi?) this time, although the lady I got was big enough to be a guy. Still, for 7 bucks I am not gonna complain about an hour long massage. It was great, and shockingly no extras offered. I wasn't going to take it if there was! I am just saying I was surprised. Though bargaining for it would have been fun. (I love to bargain)
Rested from the massage we went back to the hostel to change and go back out, making sure not to step on all of the MILLIONS of cats and dogs wandering the streets. Seriously, the ASPCA would have a field day over here, it was one Sarah McLachlan song away from being a commercial. After showering and changing, we set out to go see one of Thailand's great pastimes: Muay Thai fighting! I was so amped, and made sure to throw out any Bloodsport references I could. I wanted to know the fighters back stories, I needed to know if someone was fighting for revenge like Jean Claude. At the peak of my excitement we arrived at the stadium to see that tickets were $100 per person. And that was as close as we got to Muay Thai. Instead, we headed back to Pah Pong to do some more bargaining/running away from trannies. After Prashant and I taught Rachel how to haggle and she successfully undercut a shopkeeper on a souvenir, we proudly headed out to the Skybar lounge.
The Skybar is one of the most famous bars to visit in Bangkok apparently, and it was featured in the Hangover part 2. It overlooks the ENTIRE city on the 64th floor of a very nice hotel. It was one of the best views in my life, looking out over Bangkok at night with the whole city lit up. It was incredible. My camera phone was so bad and couldn't capture the scenery but I tried anyways. We stayed up there for awhile just taking in the view, and then headed over to a very famous street called Soi Cowboy. Soi Cowboy is basically a street full of topless bars and strip clubs, and the street is crawling with ladyboys. I was wondering if there were any ACTUAL women there, but we didnt stick around long enough to find out/get confused. It looked like Vegas, with lights everywhere and a ton of people. The only thing missing was the slot machines. Vendors were selling bugs to eat, girl/guys were begging you to come into their bars, it was basically the grown up version of the donkey island in Pinocchio. It was quite a site. The night was really late by the time we left, and we had to get up early for our flight so we headed back to the hostel to get a couple hours of sleep before we left.
Thailand was great, and it was one heck of an experience. I learned a few things while I was there:
1. If you tell people you are American, they assume you work for Obama.
2. A one hour cab ride should not cost more than $8
3. "Crocodile wrestling" meant to Prashant that two Crocodiles would wrestle each other. "They would be trained to hate each other, and then forced to kill each other. "- not joking that was serious. To which I replied, wouldn't that be Croc fighting? A new sport in Mexico has been formed.
4. It is not strange to think a male masseuse in Thailand is better than a female masseuse. No matter what anyone says.
5. The line between man and woman is not very clear in different parts of the world
6. Thailand is called the "land of 1000 smiles" but I only saw maybe 6.
7. There are some people in the world who do not like Bloodsport references. (I can't believe it either)
8. In Thailand, they don't use chopsticks. This was strange at first, and I now request them.
9. Do not pay full price for anything. If you do, you are giving up.
10. I don't know the rest of the words to the song, "One night in Bangkok makes the heart.... go... huh huh....
After the boat tour we made it to the temples only to find out we weren't allowed to go in because we were wearing shorts (what were we thinking) but if we waited for 2 hours we could pay 100 baht (3 bucks) to rent a cloak to wear. So we took another tuk tuk ride, complete with stops at fashion stores to "browse", to a couple shorts-friendly temples (there are so many temples) until it was time to don our outfits to enter the temples of the infamous reclining Buddha. Totally worth it, because the Buddha was about 40 meters (for you Canadians out there) long and it was laying down! Not sure why this was so exciting but it was. Snapped a few pictures and headed out to Jim Thompson's house.
Now you might be asking who Jim Thompson is... I was too. Frankly I still don't know. Apparently he is ex-CIA or something, then came to Thailand and fell in love with the country so started to get involved in the silk trade. I guess he also disappeared one day in the jungle and never returned. Anyway he has a huge house and its a tourist attraction to buy a lot of nice silk and stuff. If you are into silk or history, great place to check out. If you are me, you are bored. It also didn't help that I ate some under-cooked chicken satay from a stand on the street before walking in... not a good choice. After the silk house I needed anoher Thai massage so we all stopped in to a place close by. It wasn't as nice as the one before, and screamed of happy endings but we went in anyways. We all had female masseuses (masseusi?) this time, although the lady I got was big enough to be a guy. Still, for 7 bucks I am not gonna complain about an hour long massage. It was great, and shockingly no extras offered. I wasn't going to take it if there was! I am just saying I was surprised. Though bargaining for it would have been fun. (I love to bargain)
Rested from the massage we went back to the hostel to change and go back out, making sure not to step on all of the MILLIONS of cats and dogs wandering the streets. Seriously, the ASPCA would have a field day over here, it was one Sarah McLachlan song away from being a commercial. After showering and changing, we set out to go see one of Thailand's great pastimes: Muay Thai fighting! I was so amped, and made sure to throw out any Bloodsport references I could. I wanted to know the fighters back stories, I needed to know if someone was fighting for revenge like Jean Claude. At the peak of my excitement we arrived at the stadium to see that tickets were $100 per person. And that was as close as we got to Muay Thai. Instead, we headed back to Pah Pong to do some more bargaining/running away from trannies. After Prashant and I taught Rachel how to haggle and she successfully undercut a shopkeeper on a souvenir, we proudly headed out to the Skybar lounge.
The Skybar is one of the most famous bars to visit in Bangkok apparently, and it was featured in the Hangover part 2. It overlooks the ENTIRE city on the 64th floor of a very nice hotel. It was one of the best views in my life, looking out over Bangkok at night with the whole city lit up. It was incredible. My camera phone was so bad and couldn't capture the scenery but I tried anyways. We stayed up there for awhile just taking in the view, and then headed over to a very famous street called Soi Cowboy. Soi Cowboy is basically a street full of topless bars and strip clubs, and the street is crawling with ladyboys. I was wondering if there were any ACTUAL women there, but we didnt stick around long enough to find out/get confused. It looked like Vegas, with lights everywhere and a ton of people. The only thing missing was the slot machines. Vendors were selling bugs to eat, girl/guys were begging you to come into their bars, it was basically the grown up version of the donkey island in Pinocchio. It was quite a site. The night was really late by the time we left, and we had to get up early for our flight so we headed back to the hostel to get a couple hours of sleep before we left.
Thailand was great, and it was one heck of an experience. I learned a few things while I was there:
1. If you tell people you are American, they assume you work for Obama.
2. A one hour cab ride should not cost more than $8
3. "Crocodile wrestling" meant to Prashant that two Crocodiles would wrestle each other. "They would be trained to hate each other, and then forced to kill each other. "- not joking that was serious. To which I replied, wouldn't that be Croc fighting? A new sport in Mexico has been formed.
4. It is not strange to think a male masseuse in Thailand is better than a female masseuse. No matter what anyone says.
5. The line between man and woman is not very clear in different parts of the world
6. Thailand is called the "land of 1000 smiles" but I only saw maybe 6.
7. There are some people in the world who do not like Bloodsport references. (I can't believe it either)
8. In Thailand, they don't use chopsticks. This was strange at first, and I now request them.
9. Do not pay full price for anything. If you do, you are giving up.
10. I don't know the rest of the words to the song, "One night in Bangkok makes the heart.... go... huh huh....
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| The happy couple behind me |
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| The real star of the shot |
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| Didn't get the splash on purpose |
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| Talk about waterfront property... |
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| Millions of catfish |
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| Feeding the catfish... tourists... |
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| Boat-side service. |
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| Reclining Buddha! |
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| The rest of reclining Buddha |
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| Jim Thompson House silk |
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| Bangkok at night |
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| Dome at the skybar. And crappy focus by me. |
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| You can't tell... but it was sooooo cool. |
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| Soi Cowboy! |
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| There was a halal kebab cart... seemed out of place. |
Why not? It's Bangkok! Day 1...
Two full days in Bangkok. How do I make them count? Here we go:
Day 1- We arrived after midnight the night before and it took forever to get to our hostel so not much happened that night. Hence, I will start this blog with the interesting stuff. (I try to use hence whenever possible) We start the morning off with a one hour trip on down to a Crocodile farm just outside of Bangkok. Who goes all the way to Thailand to see Crocs? We do, thats who. Although it was Rachel's idea. After bargaining with the cab driver (they don't like to use the meters there, so you have to agree on a set price ahead of time) we made our trip. We finally arrived after the long drive excited to see some animals. Our cab driver asked us how long we would be and said he would wait for us. I was surprised, but I just assumed business was slow. We went in and saw a big pile of crocodiles in an arena style area where they were putting on shows having workers come in and put there head/hands inside the Croc mouth, etc. It was entertaining, and there was a giant field trip going on so there were a million little Thai kids in uniform watching and cheering.
The park also had a zoo, it was not just about Crocs, but there were more Crocodiles than I had ever seen in my life in one place. They had feeding stations where you could hang down a skinned chicken on a fishing line and try to get them to jump up and eat it. While intrigued, I decided against this because just seeing them from far away was enough to creep me out. I dont need them jumping and snapping at me while hungry. After leaving the Crocodile area we walked around and saw the rest of the animals, which was really cool because they were all so much closer to you than a normal zoo. This was primarily for feeding reasons because you could pay 75 cents for an ear of corn or loaf of bread to throw to whichever animal chose. I dont know if I ever want to be that close to a Hippo's open mouth again, but it was cool. While seeing all the animals was pretty neat, I started to feel bad because most of them seemed like they were begging for food, which is probably out of habit from customers feeding them, but still it was kinda sad. They also had a section where you could take pictures with baby tiger cubs and monkeys. Rachel was all over that, and made sure to get her picture taken with a monkey in a dress... don't ask why they were dressed up but they were. Playing with the animals was a lot of fun though. So while Rachel was taking her pictures a woman employee ran by us screaming something in Thai, and headed over to the Croc lagoon. People started going after her and we were all wondering what was going on. I decided to run after her because my curiosity got the best of me, but not before yelling back "A tiger is on the loose! Someone fell into the Crocodile lagoon!" At the time... it seemed funny because I had no idea what was actually going on. Turns out, I was half right. When I got to the lagoon, there was a bunch of people looking out into a swarm of Crocs all thrashing in the water about 100 meters away. No one could really see what was happening because the water was all murky and discolored. Finally someone who speak English said someone jumped in, and immediately we all looked to see if we could see the person. Now in general, I don't want to see someone eaten by a Crocodile. But it was sort of like a car accident, I couldn't look away and I had to see it for myself. Sure enough, a hand came up out of the water... with no body attached to it. Then a foot... and it was just a feeding frenzy. It was one of the craziest things I had ever seen, and then the employees finally stopped watching themselves and started ushering people away. Feeling like we had finally gotten our moneys worth of the park, we left feeling very uneasy about what we just saw. When we left to meet our cab driver outside, he was not there. Typical.
Our next logical step was lunch, so after bargaining for another taxi and taking anther hour long cab ride we headed over to a place called Khao San road, where they had all kinds of little shops and food stations selling made to order pad thai for less than $2. The food was fantastic, and so cheap it made me question my decision not to live there permanently. We walked around the shops and were attacked by tailors and shopkeepers begging us to go into their stores. We decided to take a tuk tuk (tiny bicycle-like taxi) driver up on his offer to take us to 3 temples in an hour for only 10 baht (30 cents). Seemed too good to be true, but we consented anyways. He kept to his word and took us to the three temples. We got to see some amazing buildings, golden Buddhas and beautiful artwork. What he failed to mention is that the tour was so cheap because we had to stop into 2 different tailor shops for 10 minutes and browse the merchandise. Whether we bought something or not, they gave him a gas voucher for bringing them customers. I have never seen such aggressive sales people than in these suit shops, and bargaining with them was hilarious. (I love to bargain with people, it comes up a lot) After driving a really hard bargain and getting it for less than half of what they were originally asking, I bought a custom fit 3 piece suit and shirt for about $160! It looks great, and they made it and delivered it back to my hostel the next day. Talk about service.
After a failed attempt to convince us to visit another shop for him, our tuk tuk driver took us back to Khao San road where we got our first Thai massage! We found a reputable looking school for massage, and went on in. I had a male masseuse for the first time in my life, and I gotta say I was pretty impressed. The strong hands were a plus, and I didn't have any temptation if the question of a happy ending came up (it did not). It was a fantastic massage, and a wonderful experience. For an hour it was only $8... don't know if I mentioned that part yet. Why don't I live there again??? After the massages we got dinner on Khao San, and for 7 plates of food including pad thai, fried rice, fried noodles, green curry, spring rolls, papaya salad and tom yam soup it was only $11! We were stuffed and headed back to the hostel.
It did not take long to realize how little English people in Thailand actually speak. I am spoiled here in Singapore. I figured out that either the phonetic spelling of Thai words is wrong, or my pronunciation is so bad that nobody can understand a word I say. I am assuming its the phonetic spelling. It took us FOREVER to get back to our hostel because the one map we had sucked, and we had no idea how to get there. Once we finally made it back, we vowed to always have directions to and from wherever we were going. This vow was broken fairly early on. After showering and sitting down for a bit, we headed to Pah Pong, which is a night bazaar down a really crowded street. It was a sea of people selling counterfeit bags, watches, clothes, shoes, everything you can think of. It was a bargainers paradise. Thailand is home to probably some of the best counterfeits I have ever seen. Since most of the factories are located there, the quality is pretty impressive. We had some fun walking around and low-balling the shopkeepers until they finally shooed us away. While there, we were also bombarded with men trying to bring us into ping-pong shows. In case you are unaware, it has nothing to do with the sport of Ping pong. The guys were relentless, but we were able to make it through unscathed. We did happen to see an endless stream of "ladyboys" on the streets and outside the bars. There are some who have succeeded in providing some doubt as to their sexuality, but then there are just men in dresses. It doesn't phase the drunk men on the street however, as they are given so much attention. I really worry for some of those guys the next morning...
After a very long day with many ups and downs, we finally headed back to the hostel to sleep since we had to get ready for another busy day 2.... (day 2 on following blog)
Day 1- We arrived after midnight the night before and it took forever to get to our hostel so not much happened that night. Hence, I will start this blog with the interesting stuff. (I try to use hence whenever possible) We start the morning off with a one hour trip on down to a Crocodile farm just outside of Bangkok. Who goes all the way to Thailand to see Crocs? We do, thats who. Although it was Rachel's idea. After bargaining with the cab driver (they don't like to use the meters there, so you have to agree on a set price ahead of time) we made our trip. We finally arrived after the long drive excited to see some animals. Our cab driver asked us how long we would be and said he would wait for us. I was surprised, but I just assumed business was slow. We went in and saw a big pile of crocodiles in an arena style area where they were putting on shows having workers come in and put there head/hands inside the Croc mouth, etc. It was entertaining, and there was a giant field trip going on so there were a million little Thai kids in uniform watching and cheering.
The park also had a zoo, it was not just about Crocs, but there were more Crocodiles than I had ever seen in my life in one place. They had feeding stations where you could hang down a skinned chicken on a fishing line and try to get them to jump up and eat it. While intrigued, I decided against this because just seeing them from far away was enough to creep me out. I dont need them jumping and snapping at me while hungry. After leaving the Crocodile area we walked around and saw the rest of the animals, which was really cool because they were all so much closer to you than a normal zoo. This was primarily for feeding reasons because you could pay 75 cents for an ear of corn or loaf of bread to throw to whichever animal chose. I dont know if I ever want to be that close to a Hippo's open mouth again, but it was cool. While seeing all the animals was pretty neat, I started to feel bad because most of them seemed like they were begging for food, which is probably out of habit from customers feeding them, but still it was kinda sad. They also had a section where you could take pictures with baby tiger cubs and monkeys. Rachel was all over that, and made sure to get her picture taken with a monkey in a dress... don't ask why they were dressed up but they were. Playing with the animals was a lot of fun though. So while Rachel was taking her pictures a woman employee ran by us screaming something in Thai, and headed over to the Croc lagoon. People started going after her and we were all wondering what was going on. I decided to run after her because my curiosity got the best of me, but not before yelling back "A tiger is on the loose! Someone fell into the Crocodile lagoon!" At the time... it seemed funny because I had no idea what was actually going on. Turns out, I was half right. When I got to the lagoon, there was a bunch of people looking out into a swarm of Crocs all thrashing in the water about 100 meters away. No one could really see what was happening because the water was all murky and discolored. Finally someone who speak English said someone jumped in, and immediately we all looked to see if we could see the person. Now in general, I don't want to see someone eaten by a Crocodile. But it was sort of like a car accident, I couldn't look away and I had to see it for myself. Sure enough, a hand came up out of the water... with no body attached to it. Then a foot... and it was just a feeding frenzy. It was one of the craziest things I had ever seen, and then the employees finally stopped watching themselves and started ushering people away. Feeling like we had finally gotten our moneys worth of the park, we left feeling very uneasy about what we just saw. When we left to meet our cab driver outside, he was not there. Typical.
Our next logical step was lunch, so after bargaining for another taxi and taking anther hour long cab ride we headed over to a place called Khao San road, where they had all kinds of little shops and food stations selling made to order pad thai for less than $2. The food was fantastic, and so cheap it made me question my decision not to live there permanently. We walked around the shops and were attacked by tailors and shopkeepers begging us to go into their stores. We decided to take a tuk tuk (tiny bicycle-like taxi) driver up on his offer to take us to 3 temples in an hour for only 10 baht (30 cents). Seemed too good to be true, but we consented anyways. He kept to his word and took us to the three temples. We got to see some amazing buildings, golden Buddhas and beautiful artwork. What he failed to mention is that the tour was so cheap because we had to stop into 2 different tailor shops for 10 minutes and browse the merchandise. Whether we bought something or not, they gave him a gas voucher for bringing them customers. I have never seen such aggressive sales people than in these suit shops, and bargaining with them was hilarious. (I love to bargain with people, it comes up a lot) After driving a really hard bargain and getting it for less than half of what they were originally asking, I bought a custom fit 3 piece suit and shirt for about $160! It looks great, and they made it and delivered it back to my hostel the next day. Talk about service.
After a failed attempt to convince us to visit another shop for him, our tuk tuk driver took us back to Khao San road where we got our first Thai massage! We found a reputable looking school for massage, and went on in. I had a male masseuse for the first time in my life, and I gotta say I was pretty impressed. The strong hands were a plus, and I didn't have any temptation if the question of a happy ending came up (it did not). It was a fantastic massage, and a wonderful experience. For an hour it was only $8... don't know if I mentioned that part yet. Why don't I live there again??? After the massages we got dinner on Khao San, and for 7 plates of food including pad thai, fried rice, fried noodles, green curry, spring rolls, papaya salad and tom yam soup it was only $11! We were stuffed and headed back to the hostel.
It did not take long to realize how little English people in Thailand actually speak. I am spoiled here in Singapore. I figured out that either the phonetic spelling of Thai words is wrong, or my pronunciation is so bad that nobody can understand a word I say. I am assuming its the phonetic spelling. It took us FOREVER to get back to our hostel because the one map we had sucked, and we had no idea how to get there. Once we finally made it back, we vowed to always have directions to and from wherever we were going. This vow was broken fairly early on. After showering and sitting down for a bit, we headed to Pah Pong, which is a night bazaar down a really crowded street. It was a sea of people selling counterfeit bags, watches, clothes, shoes, everything you can think of. It was a bargainers paradise. Thailand is home to probably some of the best counterfeits I have ever seen. Since most of the factories are located there, the quality is pretty impressive. We had some fun walking around and low-balling the shopkeepers until they finally shooed us away. While there, we were also bombarded with men trying to bring us into ping-pong shows. In case you are unaware, it has nothing to do with the sport of Ping pong. The guys were relentless, but we were able to make it through unscathed. We did happen to see an endless stream of "ladyboys" on the streets and outside the bars. There are some who have succeeded in providing some doubt as to their sexuality, but then there are just men in dresses. It doesn't phase the drunk men on the street however, as they are given so much attention. I really worry for some of those guys the next morning...
After a very long day with many ups and downs, we finally headed back to the hostel to sleep since we had to get ready for another busy day 2.... (day 2 on following blog)
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| Croc performers |
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| Wouldn't you want to jump in? |
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| The way this bear was sitting made me laugh |
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| Rachel feeding an elephant |
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| It was cute at first, but it was actually chained to the basket... |
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| I got to pet the tiger, he was cute |
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| Someone had to stay awake to pay the cab driver |
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| Traffic... worse than Southern California |
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| Khao San Road |
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| $2 pad thai and spring rolls! |
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| Random temple |
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| Huge Buddha |
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| Tuk tuk driver aka scam artist |
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| You can buy fake id's on Khao San... |
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| Thai Pepsi. Not as impressive as Mexican Coke |
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| Thai dinner... so cheap... so good |
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| Outside our hostel that nobody knows |
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| Night bazaar |
Monday, August 20, 2012
End of Ramadan and Exercise
Fasting just ended this Saturday! It was a loooooooooong month, but we made it through! I can finally start working out during the day again! ....I didn't say I would but I could! I am sure that was the reason I wasn't working out. Anyways an Eid Mubarak to all those fasting. This was the first year I was not able to celebrate at home with my family, so it was a little sad not to get to go through the usual routine that included Dennys for breakfast. But instead I chose to go through the Malyasian traditions of Hari Rayah, complete with outfit I was forced to wear but still pulled it off, by going to visit my buddy Matt's in-laws house. So Malaysians love to wear these pajama-looking outfits for Hari Rayah, which is their celebration for the end of Ramadan. Families choose to dress in the same color, which is probably so they can find each other after prayers. I chose to go with a vomit-green color suit, because it was the only one I could find for really cheap. I did happen to find some people with my same color on, and considered making it extra awkward and sitting with them and pretending to be apart of their family. Matt's family and I had breakfast together, and I got to try some more authentic food in a day that centers around eating. All in all it was a great experience, and I was happy to get to try something new.
For some reason I ended up getting a lot of exercise this weekend as well. On Saturday I went on a 10k treetop hike, that was around Singapore's reservoir. It was so hot, but worth it because we got a ton of exercise and saw some monkeys as you may have seen in from Rachel's video. What you didn't see however, was the group of monkeys attacking a man as we watched and stealing his bag that had trash in it. They warmed him and ripped the bag right off his back! It was hilarious. They thought they had food, but it turns out there wasn't any in it. We watched in shock and then had to walk through them as they just sat in the middle of the walkway glaring at us. They were not afraid of people at all, and seemed intent on proving they were the boss. I am just glad I didn't have any food on me, because I probably would have been attacked myself.
Today we took a ferry to a small island only 10 minutes from Singapore called Palau Ubin. On the island, we rented a bike and rode around through the trails and coastline. We got to see more monkeys, and a family of wildebeests. This prompted some singing of the Lion King which I do not apologize for. The island was beautiful and very hot, but it was nice to be by the coast and get more exercise. I am pretty sure I broke the bike, which I maintain was already broken when I got it, but I retruned it without the guy checking so I am in the clear! All in all, it was a good weekend and am looking forward to this Thursday when I head to BANGKOK!!! More to follow...
For some reason I ended up getting a lot of exercise this weekend as well. On Saturday I went on a 10k treetop hike, that was around Singapore's reservoir. It was so hot, but worth it because we got a ton of exercise and saw some monkeys as you may have seen in from Rachel's video. What you didn't see however, was the group of monkeys attacking a man as we watched and stealing his bag that had trash in it. They warmed him and ripped the bag right off his back! It was hilarious. They thought they had food, but it turns out there wasn't any in it. We watched in shock and then had to walk through them as they just sat in the middle of the walkway glaring at us. They were not afraid of people at all, and seemed intent on proving they were the boss. I am just glad I didn't have any food on me, because I probably would have been attacked myself.
Today we took a ferry to a small island only 10 minutes from Singapore called Palau Ubin. On the island, we rented a bike and rode around through the trails and coastline. We got to see more monkeys, and a family of wildebeests. This prompted some singing of the Lion King which I do not apologize for. The island was beautiful and very hot, but it was nice to be by the coast and get more exercise. I am pretty sure I broke the bike, which I maintain was already broken when I got it, but I retruned it without the guy checking so I am in the clear! All in all, it was a good weekend and am looking forward to this Thursday when I head to BANGKOK!!! More to follow...
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