<![CDATA[

Koh Samui, Thailand

From Delhi at 2am, it was two flights and two boats, 14 hours, one Delhi belly and one horrendous flu before we arrived at our resort on the island of Koh Tao.
Two positives: The journey would have been a lot longer if Bangkok Airways hadn’t moved us to a much earlier flight, and I hadn’t eaten in 48 hours so we have saved heaps and and I’ll be bikini ready. Yea right! I’ll be stoked if I can leave our room I’m so sick.

“Dumbest thing at an airport #25: exiting the plane, and airport staff are checking boarding passes to make sure we were on the plane..if I’d lost it, what would I say… I rode a bird here from India?”

For the last 36 days straight we have been on tour, daily sightseeing, on the go and always with people for breakfast, lunch and dinner. We are thankful to have booked a whole 6 days to ourselves before the next 22 day tour starts. Although, we are staying in 3 ports/islands in Thailand over the 6 days! We have been craving this week ‘on holiday’, and not ‘travelling’. The main island of Koh Samui even feels different to the last few months. There’s lots of white foreigners with their bum showing shorts and flat caps. By and large, I haven’t really missed the western culture and am glad we have been travelling off the beaten tourist track. It hasn’t killed us having to wear covered knees and shoulders for two months. I just forgot what all this white flesh looks like.

KOH TAO
Dave was in charge of booking the accommodation in Thailand. I’m very, very thankful he booked us out of the main island of Koi Samui to the smaller island of Koh Tao. As our home for the next 3 whole days is on the other side of the island, we needed to take another boat to get there. Our resort, which has our own private beach has the clearest and warmest water we have ever been in with only two other families staying.Our room is a bungalow nestled on the side of a cliff with breath taking views of Mango Bay. If this is what you get for $50 pn inc breakfast, then this is heaven! Screw you being sick, I’m not going to allow it here!

It’s so good being on holiday, that for one morning, I revert back to old Julia and ordered muesli with yoghurt and fruit – all separated in individual bowls of course! All I can see from our three tiered cliff side restaurant is translucent water. I asked Dave what the huge black section – 12m long in the water was, at first we think its reef, but in fact it’s fish moving in schools. Lucky students! Saying that, I was too ashamed to take a picture of this. Due to a storm with 3m waves the night before it washed a lot of TOURIST rubbish onto the shoreline. At the same moment we started our rubbish collection, 5 big boats and about 150 snorkelers and divers came on to our now not so private bay. Understandably, this bay has the best snorkelling and diving we’ve seen. I’d have liked to have put the tourists in rubbish bags and disposed of them, but we settled for 3 large garbage bags full of rubbish and set fish which were trapped in plastic bags free. ONE of the tourists helped fill u a bag, until the beach was pristine once again. Dave even tracked down their lost jetty and floated it back around to the resort. The best thing about being on holiday and not travelling is those tourists got to enjoy the beach with hundreds for one hour then they left and we got to stay, relax and enjoy our ‘nobodies’ beach, that was now crystal clear for miles.
So, we ventured out for an afternoon snorkel. You know you’re in a place with too many fish when you have to acquire a fish poking stick to get past them. The concept is similar to herding sheep. Swimming in a school of fish so big (20m in distance) where you can’t see behind, in front, sideways or below is fine until they’re getting so close you’re getting fish slapped. Now do you see the need for a fish poking stick? Although I must have looked like a freak to those elegantly bathing on the beach, wearing a life jacket and carrying a defence stick.

KOH SAMUI
After the worst 3 hour bumpy boat ride back from Koh Tao (we have caught the tail end of China’s cyclone so storms this week are pretty bad at times), we ventured out to an Irish Pub for the final Origin game.During game 2 Dave was with our awesome friends in Vietnam. In between beers, we were talking with a Greek, but born and bred in Aussie, who now lives here. I said I was surprised there are only a hand full of Aussies here. He said Russians are the majority of tourists, and lots of Europeans.
The best way to get around the island is by scooter, and it only takes a few hours. You can hire a scooter for a few dollars for the day, yet to go in a taxi anywhere is about $10. There’s also no tok toks or hired drivers. Koh Samui is smaller than I’d expected. It’s not infested with tourists and still has an island feel with beautiful white sandy beaches and palm trees. Couldn’t really do much today though as another storm ripped through. Eating and Thai massaging was what we got out of our day here. Although I couldn’t get a proper Thai Massage as I bruised my spine.. I missed the toilet in the dark and fell on the edge of the seat, then floor. No I wasn’t even slightly drunk, just had a Julia moment. Poor Dave, he was climbed all over by a lady boy, while I had the soft delicate hands of a Thai lady. Speaking of which, I dragged poor Dave unwillingly back across the island to see a ‘must see’ lady boy cabaret show. I absolutely loved it – Dave, not so much. He was the only ‘pure’ male there. I just think it’s so clever how they can transform all of a man into a full lady, even with nipples – I saw them. I can see how easy it would be for a male to be convinced before it’s just all too late.

BANGKOK
We were in Bangkok for one night between Cambodia and Nepal, which is where we ventured out and saw the famous Khaosan Road with Damo and Shazz. Apart from that there was no other sightseeing we could be bothered to do here. It’s a great city but you’ve just got to have the energy to get out and about. The highlight of our trip was catching up with our Aussie friends who moved to Bangkok less than 24 hours ago. Alison, Michael their 2 month old gorgeous baby girl, Emily and Alison’s lovely mum Barb. It was a whirl wind catch up but it was so good to see familiar friendly faces. Makes you realise that it doesn’t matter where you are or how long apart, good friends are there to stay. They’ve chosen one of the best countries in Asia to live. We really like Thailand. It’s safe, its got the beautiful beaches, the vibrant but clean city and the people are welcoming.

As we leave Asia after 2.5 months there is a lot that comes to mind. There is definitely Tourist Asia and Real Asia. Prior to coming here, I assumed much of Asia is very ‘same, same’ but each country is so very different. The similarity though, is many countries have presidents living unreal lives in their mansions while their people are struggling to make ends meet, with no way of escaping a corrupt government. How nice it would be for them to leave their ivory towers and live like a local for a night on a few $ per day.
Interestingly, Asia was the continent we were originally going to skip, but we’re thankful now that we didn’t. The countries where we felt most at ease were part of ‘Tourists Asia’ but the ones we enjoyed the most were a part of the ‘Real Asia’. It’s a bit of a catch 22. A lot of the places would greatly benefit from more tourists but by the same token it comes at the expense of losing the country’s identity and being taken over with bars and souvenir shops.

“Asian food for thought #58: Here’s 3 dishes that aren’t popular and are hard to find in their country: sweet and sour pork in China, butter chicken in India and Panang curry in Thailand. Dumplings aren’t even Japanese and Vietnamese spring rolls in Vietnam are often served in rice paper that is hard, not soft”

…6 flights in 6 days, and we’re off again…

]]>

<![CDATA[

New Delhi, India

]]>

<![CDATA[

Agra, India

Oh I do love a good train trip! This time the 6 bunk sleeper train took us from Varanasi to Orchha. If you are to travel for 15 hours straight, you may as well be laying in your sleeping bag with aircon. Our hotel in Orchha looks like a finished 'Hotel Marigold'. The beautiful Indian architecture and manicured gardens and courtyard is the perfect setting for the 3 hotel staff sitting in the garden singing Indian hymns with traditional drums – at 9pm.

Orchha, is like no other. It's kind of city meets country town. Extraordinarily small and scattered with temples. It's not exactly the tourism capital of India with only one other western person spotted. So few in fact that we were, not discreetly, but obviously stared at. This didn't bother us but was quite confronting and unique at the beginning.

A festival for Lord Rama was on, so many thousands of people from the outer villages came for a day or two. Many of the children and teens had never seen westerners. As our leader walked us around for the orientation walk, we were followed by at least 30 people of all ages. They just stood, often very close, and just stared – wide eyed – and watched our every move. It is interesting seeing it from the other side, we were staring at the Sadhus and the ladies in saris with the same fascination. That night our leader took us into the temple where many thousands gathered and prayed, loudly and openly. Arms were raised, some were laying on the ground and all where chanting and praying. It was quite an experience, it was fascinating for us and for them watching us. While our leader explained what was going on. The crowd around us got so big we had blocked the corridor to the temple. So much for trying to fit in. We felt we were taking the attention away from this important day, so decided to move on. Such an amazing experience to witness and be a part of a Hindu festival in a tiny little town.

Our morning in Orchha we spent visiting temples: Raja Mahal, translates to Kings Palace, built in 1503 and Jahangir Palace built by Bir Sing Deo for his friend Jehangir, the great Mughal ruler in 1605. To top off this morning, we visited an NGO, where they collect dust from around India and make recycled roof tiles – pretty cool right. The organisation is also a paper making plant and was set up to give 'tribal' women from the area a chance to work outside their traditional areas. All the paper is made from recycled clothing and wood pulp. It's good to see this as 32.7% of the total Indian people fall below the international poverty line of $1.25 per day while 68.7% of India live on less than $2 per day.

Dave has food poisoning from the mutton rogan josh, which in India is goat. (Ive seen what all animals eat here and it's not grass, but rubbish, hence I've only eaten vegetarian). So, it's just me going to the Indian cooking class tonight, ironic I know! Although we didn't learn that eggs aren't boiled in the microwave, we did learn to cook 5 vegetarian dishes, chapattis and masala chai tea. the power wasn't on for the first few hours so it was iPhone light and two candles but that just added to the romance of a group dinner. Butter chicken isn't as common in India as one would think. I'm forced to try new things now when I go to an Indian restaurant – I can expand to Dal and Thali in my list of (previously) one thing to order.

The chef also gave the ladies henna tattoos, not something I particularly wanted but peer pressure prevailed. For some reason it was easier for me to eat a cricket rather than art drawn on my hand. I think I was just in a grumpy mood. For the first time in 60 days, Dave and I were separated for a whole 3.5 hours, so It was nice to come home and report something – even if it was cooking instructions..

"Interesting Fact #354: India is theoretically under the Commonwealth and only split from being under the British Empire in 1947. Considering this, for an Indian to visit England they must pay a $3,000 bond (on $1.25 p/d) that they'll leave again! $3,000!!" Ridiculous

You haven't experienced intoxicating smells until you have visited a smaller Indian train station, like Varanasi or Orchha. The toilets are an unbearable sight. Literally everywhere is a strong smell of urine, rubbish and human waste. And that's not a guess, I can actually see all of this scattered everywhere we stand. I think most of the flies around the world live at these train stations. Trackside is used instead of toilets. The actual toilets on the trains don't have catchers therefore waste goes straight onto the track. But as always it could be worse, at least we are in allocated seating, unlike the locals who are so squished in they are hanging out the train's doors and windows. Well sort of, a large family bought only one reserved ticket, therefore there were 10 people in an area only a few metres wide – in comparison this is luxury. Tolerance is the word I need to chant to the little sod kicking me for hours. (The child, not Dave). Everything's an experience.

The Taj Mahal, wow. To actually be there is just like stepping inside a postcard. From every angle this monument is truly beautiful and such a grand statement of love. It is pure symmetry from the gardens, the water features, the mosque on one side is matched with an identical guest house on the other, to every single piece of marble and art on the perfectly designed Taj Mahal. Some observations:

– Inside is an octagon shape, and everything seen is in white marble. It's not solid marble. If it was it would be too heavy for the ground to handle.

– It's located on the river (not the Ganges though) as the all marble structure is better preserved closer to the water where it's cooler.

– The marble is kept clean by the 3 yearly mud baths.

– The only two things not symmetrical are the two tombs for the emperor and his empress: Shah Jahan and his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal. Their actual tombs are in the burial chamber below the surface tombs. It was symmetrical when she was buried there but once he died that put things into symmetry chaos!

– No photographs can be taken inside, no shoes on any marble, no videography and no petrol vehicles in a 200m radius of the entrance.

– The calligraphy around the entrance of the Taj Mahal are verses from the Quran. The calligraphy on the Great Gate reads "O Soul, thou art at rest. Return to the Lord at peace with Him, and He at peace with you." Bet you didn't know that!!

When entering through the grand entrance to the Taj Mahal complex there are seats just off to the left of the reflecting pool. My beautiful Mum sat in that exact spot and waited for Dad 30 years ago, as she was too sick to take the walk down into the Taj. I now posses the same photo. It was a special moment. The other famous picture was the one where Princess Diana sat and of course I had to make my own moment.. In front of many of the conservative type, I jumped high (as you do) but my skirt accidentally flew higher – at least I had undies on!

Yesterday we were so ecstatic about being in a fancy western hotel (with couches and a t.v) we celebrated by having pizza and macaroni cheese in the hotel's roof top revolving restaurant which even has a view of the Taj. It sounds odd but just for one night we missed western comforts. One of the other girls who needed a western day went to Maccas, which doesn't have Big Macs or any beef food on the menu but does have a Mc Masala Burger. – anywho – I'm thankful because everyone who ate the local cuisine at this restaurant is super sick today. I'm also feeling on top of the world this morning after a long Skype date with Mum and Dad over our first breakfast in bed. We are now ready for the Red Fort. Well, Agra's Red Fort was nothing like what I'd imagined this post card setting to be like. Yes it's red and fort like but there are sections of it which are white marble, exactly like the Taj Mahal! The first emperor (Akbar) started building it, with red sandstone in 1565. Then the second emperor Jah

angir added a bit more to the palace. Then prior to the Taj Mahal being built, emperor Shan Jhan added all of the marble elements. He lived there with his third wife, then once she died he built the Taj. Then his son Aurangzeb arrested his other two older bothers and house arrested his dad, Shan Jhan, which then gave him the throne. Until Shan Jhan's death in 1666, he watched out the window over to the Taj Mahal, at his wife's tomb. Their daughter then placed his dad in a boat and floated him down the river to the Taj Mahel where they now lay together in a tomb.

New Delhi is nothing like what I'd expected. It's probably the best 'city' in Asia we have been in when it comes to traffic and cleanliness. New Delhi is modern and has many gardens. We spent the day in a hired taxi, and saw the Raj Ghat, Bahai service in the Lotus temple, Humayun's Tomb and the Lodi Garden. I've come down with a bit of a bug on the last day so I stayed in the car for the gardens bit. Unsure how as I had porridge for dinner last night. 😦 As a positive Dave bought me a Tiger stone to make into a pendent and he bought the star of India stone to make into cuff links. Too poor to buy them pre made. That'll be a job for when we get back I think.

You really haven't seen the whole world until you have been to India. The smaller towns like Varanasi and Orchha were our biggest culture shock but the cities like Agra, and particularly New Delhi weren't what we'd expected. Although there are billions of people everywhere, they aren't pushy and are extremely friendly and inquisitive. India is like no other place we have been to or will go to. It would be easy to "sum up" India by the rubbish, the traffic chaos, the cows and their patties, the smell, and the entire look and feel. But there's so much more to it, something quite special.

To end our stay in India, we went to see a Bollywood film. It was 3 hours long, but due to our train leaving, we only got to see the first half. Hands on my heart, that was the best (half) movie I have ever seen. It didn't matter that there was no English or subtitles, as our leader translated the important bits – then it went like Chinese whispers down the 9 of us. This Bollywood film had the love of Shakespeare, the suspense and romance of a drama and it was a seriously funny comedy! It was set in Varanasi, a city at face value, we wrote off as a dirty town. Without a real concept of what the movie was about, we starting to see India from a different perspective. The ladies in their saris, the Sadhus, the animated Indian people, the energy of Indian weddings, the beautiful temples and the Ganges through their eyes was something else. Not to mention the holy festival. The festival of colours just shone through with coloured powder used to chuck at each other. It lights up the city like nothing I've ever seen. Our leader said this isn't dramatised, it really looks like this with people dancing and singing.

Being in a place that has so much history and culture and then seeing it from another perspective was literally mind changing.Often when travelling you're tired and all of the days merge into one, temples are the same and people's true passion and colour cannot be seen. Seeing this film brought India, its beautiful culture and it's spirt alive.

There's India and then there's the rest of the world. There is no doubt travelling through India was challenging, but what shines through is the heart and soul of the India culture and it's warm welcoming people. We will be back.

]]>

<![CDATA[

Orchha, India

]]>

<![CDATA[

Varanasi, India

Beep beep beeeeep beep beeeeeep beep beep! If I hear another beeeeeep in my lifetime ……. oh listen to that – another beeep…aaaaarrrggghhh. 13hr bumpy car ride from Nepal to our destination Varanasi in India with on average 21 seconds maximum gap between beeeeeeeep. With the dirt roads, sky high in mounds and deep craters I can understand why tractors with trailers are the locals transportation….we are in India driving overland. I get the feeling that this is going to be a country I’m going to find overland travel hard, but I think it will teach me a lot!

Skipping forward, If only words could describe this experience of pure tranquility. As I write this, four of us lay in what they call a sailing boat, and literally float our way down the river Ganges. It’s incredibly peaceful and not at all what I was expecting. It far exceeds that. The wind is the only sound to be heard in the craziest and loudest country I have ever been to. 1.5hrs away from Varanasi, our driver dropped us off on the side of the Ganges.
Three sailing boats are waiting for us – I’d call them dingys with roofs. Only 5 metres in length and 1.8 in width, they are each lined with pillows and a thin mattress, ready for us to do nothing but relax and take it all in. The middle section is ours, and a driver with oars sits at each end. Bamboo holds the plastic tarp making the roof. It’s so still it feels as though we aren’t moving, yet we move quite fast. The only way to tell how fast we move is by looking at the land and cows on the water’s edge.
An hour in, all 3 boats pull up to the foreshore where a 4th boat /dingy awaits. That’s the cooking boat and a decadent Indian lunch awaits our arrival. Obviously there are no toilets on the boat or on the foreshore, so pulling up a tree is really our only option for the next day and a half. At the lunch stop however, the only trees and ground coverage is gorse bush.. Yes and ouch. If you aren’t concerned with 1st world comforts, then you can really enjoy all things Intrepid travel. And I can tell you, money can’t buy an open mind for today’s experiences.
At 4pm, we have a chai tea break. The chai though, is the same colour as the river and I hope that it isn’t made with Indians (it’s the same river that the public cremations happen on). I plan on finding a tree (preferably not a gorse bush) but kids in a local village, consisting of about 15 children, come running to the edge to see us white folk. Our guide must have said something to them in Hindi, like she’ll eat you or ruuuunnnn. So they run when they see me. I obviously run after them and that just startsa game of catch in the mud. More children’s giggles, but no toilet break.
After nearly 6 hrs of floating every which way, we arrive at an island plonked in the middle of the the river. It’s only about .5m higher than the waterline, and scattered with cows and the odd horse. A storm narrows in on us. Thunder has been rolling above for the last few hours. If a full blown storm comes we are sleeping in the boat. While it’s raining, it’s iPad tunes in the boat over a fancy 3 course boat meal. The Ganges is a holy river (as is Varanasi town), so only vegetarian food and no alcohol. It’s by far the best Indian food we’ve ever had. Finally the rain settles, a fire on the sand is started to cook chapattis. Our drivers pitches our tents and we settle in for the hottest night of our lives.
Breakfast and chai is served before another 5 hour float, the sun is shining and the water is still.
40km later we arrive back to the mainland, but not before one more boat lunch. A 10 hr float down stream takes them 2-3 days of rowing up stream.
I have to say, although we throughly enjoyed it, that morning sun and humidity nearly killed us. 99% of the river we went on wasn’t populated at all, but coming into Varanasi was a different story. The River Ganges showed me the circle of life: people washing, cremations, swimming, cows floating, people toileting next to people washing their clothes and drinking the dirtiest water I have ever seen. If we were to get Delhi belly it would have been on our camping and boat trip on the the holy Ganges. But we feel great and are looking forward to an extraordinarily long shower, washing teeth and aircon. This was an experience of a life time.

Normally in monsoon season this part of the 15 day trip is cancelled. In fact as of 48 hrs ago the flooded river and covered island meant it was cancelled. Fortunately, the sun and a miracle pulled through because it was such an amazing 24 hours.

Back into the city life of Varanasi.Rickshaw rides and exploring by foot is definitely the way to go to immerse yourself into this crazy city. 60% are Hindu dressed in traditional dress with paint marking their body and face. A further 30% are Moslem with most in full burka and males in their white attire, with only a handful being Buddhists believe it or not. Cows, goats and dogs scatter the road, while rickshaws weave around the rubbish mounds, animals and people. The smell is out of this world, not to mention the rubbish literally piled high in the Old City. It’s so bad you cringe when walking through to one of the Ghats. A Ghat is a sacred place on the river for Hindu pilgrims to go to bathe and perform rituals and ceremonies, as they have done for hundreds of years.
We leave the streets and get taken to a high quality 40 year old silk and cashmere shop. Tens of thousands of products with varying levels of quality and price are thrown at us. It’s all so beautiful but our budget only allows for a few pieces of the famous Indian silk.
It seems as though this day doesn’t end. Dave’s only had two hours sleep from the camping expedition, so we paste our smiles on and head back down to the Ganges for their daily traditional candle flower ceremony. Hundreds of people line the steps, mantras are sung, a priest is there doing his thing with fire while all pray with him. Fortunately we are able to escape the chaotic river’s edge and enjoy it from a little boat. We set off candles in flax leaves down the river.

To end our visit to Varanasi, the holy city, Dave completed his goal of having a ‘Cut throat razor in India’. It wasn’t hard finding the perfect looking dodgy road side barber – they are everywhere. In a little shed down by the river was a man with two chairs in a tin shed. The in depth hour long episode went like this: first was the lathering up of the face, followed by the cut throat razor to Dave’s neck and face (the barber said ‘your hair is very strong’), then trimming the sides all around the hairline, alum ( a rock) is used as antiseptic and aftershave, pink cream with face massage, followed by yellow cream with face massage, haircut and head massage, talcum powder sponged around the shaved spots. Dave said he was thankful they didn’t find his back hair otherwise they wouldn’t have stopped at his head. All this was less than $1, but when he gave him $10 (5 days wages) he nearly fell over backwards. We were thankful he did not contract Hepatitis as part of their package. The lovely man talking to me while this was happening suggested I needed to see a beauty parlour at some point so my husband will think I’m pretty. Ain’t that the truth! We showed someone our wedding pics and they didn’t recognise us. Even the passport control in India questioned both of our authenticity. Anyway, the experience was definitely worth having. It’s the hottest country we have ever been in, literally dripping wet all day, every day at every moment. Five more days left in India and I reckon that’s at least 40 cold showers. Power and aircon in this state doesn’t go most of the day, due to power shortages.

Biggest disappointment of the trip to date – all of today’s photos have been wiped from the SD card, including all of the cut throat razor pictures.

Varanasi was seriously a hard place to be, it woke all of our senses like no where so far. Hard doesn’t mean bad, far from it. This will be with me for life. I fell in love wth the people and the culture.

]]>

<![CDATA[

Chitwan District, Nepal

A 7am start for the 7 hour ridiculously bumpy bus ride across the Himalayas. My bump-metre has gone up to include getting airborne multiple times. Although we are at the bottom of the Himalayas, it’s still between 1500-400m above sea level. We wind our way down from the mountains on a public bus around the edge of the cliff, so narrow at times its only one way. I finished my two books yesterday and for some reason the Apple book store doesn’t work here. It’s actually too bumpy to read a book even if I did have one. Did I mention there are mosquitoes, its sticky and there’s no air con in this bus? Dave’s listening to music and doing the odd action to keep me entertained. 5hours in and there’s a mountain edge head on collision between a truck and a bus. No cars are moving, neither is the wind. The pollution stuck to my face is slipping off. So glad I don’t watch the World’s Deadliest Roads show.

Chitwan National Park here we are. It was declared a Unesco World Heritage site in 1984. Middle of no where so it seems. We are the first guests at this lodge in 2 months. As it’s monsoon season there’s no one here in this tiny little village but us. We took a bike ride around the local villages, through the rice fields, on the muddy roads. No one around for miles. Buffalo, ducks and goat roam the path. Locals are bareback on elephant as they wander by.
In Nepal there are three types of people, the mountain people (who live upwards of 4,000m above sea level), the valley or hill people including the locals in Kathmandu (2,000-4,000m) and the low land people also known as Tharu (upto 2,000m). There are only 1 million of these indigenous people around the country. Each look slightly different. Out here the locals (Tharu) have nose piercings, wear cloth, have tattooed feet and when the kids laugh it sounds like something out of a World Vision ad – after you give them the dollar of course.

Overnight adventure in the jungle:
Accommodation in Chitwan or in the jungle village of Ghatgai includes cold showers, no air con just a measly fan which works sporadically when the power is actually on (generators). Humidity is upwards of 90% with temperatures in the high 30s, low 40s. Chitwan National Park is one of few places left in the world that you can walk through the jungle, seeing the big 3 animals, without being in a vehicle. 65% of Nepal’s birds are found in the Chitwan National Park.
The safety briefing prior to leaving went something like this: “to get to the jungle there is a two hour canoe ride into the jungle, do not rock or move the canoe or you will be in with the flesh eating crocodiles. Once you get to the jungle it’s a 12km / 6hr trek in dense jungle to reach another river where a canoe will take you across to the local home stay”. Further instructions included “how to escape from the following wildlife in the jungle – from the 503 wild rhino: zig zag running fast and hide behind a big tree. From the 600 sloth bears: make a loud scary sound. From the 60 wild elephants: run really fast. From the 200 leopards and the 125 tigers: stay still, look into their eyes. Whatever you do don’t push someone in front of you or jump on our guides. Both of these things have happened, and it never ends well.” One of our 5 guides said I couldn’t take my new pink poncho. We are only allowed to wear black, green or blue clothing. Any other colours ensure we’ll need to use our newly learnt safety skills. So with all of that in mind and knowing that the national park is 932sqkm, so seeing all animals wasn’t guaranteed, we set off.
Centimetres from the waterline our canoe, ventured down the Rapti river ever so slowly. Metres away crocodiles can be seen poking their noses out of the murky water. No sound can be heard apart from the hundreds of varieties of birds and monkeys jumping from tree to tree along the water’s edge. We arrive at the entrance to the jungle, thick in tall elephant grass you would never have known it was an entrance. Knowing blood sucking leeches are everywhere, we tuck our pants into our socks and move further in. Dave was blood sucked by two. As far as tigers go, we only see a foot print and poo (which is full of what was once a fluffy monkey), but we see many varieties of monkeys (alive). It’s a silent walk for the first half, we listen for the sounds which direct us to the water hole where rhinos bathe. The only elephants we saw are as we come closer to the river and out of the jungle. A family of four are with 2 locals.

I can’t describe how hot and humid it is. We are drenched in sweat. Dave’s new blue Nepalese shirt has leaked blue dye all over him. Finally we see the water’s edge where a canoe awaits to transfer us to the lodge. We are thick in mud, wet from river crossings, and sticky from thick insect repellent (for mosquitos/malaria). It wouldn’t be an adventure if everyone did it – saying that I’d kill to feel cool and clean rather than totally gross and smelly! Seeing a family of 5 elephants bathing in the river from your balcony makes it all worth it.

“Unforgettable moment number #2560: driving through the little farming villages of outer Chitwan, minutes out of the national park but still in the vicinity of the jungle. The locals are all waving frantically at the foreign and rarely seen before, white people driving by in an open air jeep. The driver stops and lets us walk through one of the villages, consisting of only a handful of mud houses with pet buffalo and ground water pumps. An elder showed me (no one else gave it a go) how to pull corn off the cob. There are thousands of dirty corn cobs, each piece of corn peeled off by hand and stored away.
Grubby faced kids with the biggest smiles I’ve ever seen run up to us. We take a photo of them and show them themselves. Their giggles are contagious. We let them take photos of us on our cameras but they all end up of the ground. A gorgeous little girl, all smiles, puts her arms up to me. I grab them and lift her high… Well that just starts something – they ALL want a turn. Then I couldn’t escape, I was short 20 arms for each of them to hold. Wherever we went kids ran out of their mud and straw houses to wave and run after us.
Those are the unplanned special moments we’ll remember, as I’m sure they will too. As we drive off 50 Macaque monkeys play on the road and many more are jumping from the trees above. What a hidden treasure of the world.”

We made it alive. Once again another scary bus ride. From Chitwan to Lumbini is 4 hours across the mountain edge into farmland. I’d have felt safer if he’d done it in 8. Before 11am we’d seen 3 truck-over-the-cliff accidents, nearly killed children and goats playing on the side of the narrow road, radically swerved out of the way of a bike rider who fell asleep and swerved into us and we ONLY had one accident where a motorbike drove straight into the side of us at 50km. Our driver says to be able to drive here, all you need is a horn, brakes and luck – and that’s what I hope we have, to get us through to the other side of India.. I was thankful for a rest stop, even if there were two goats in the cliffside long drop. I have forgotten what it feels like to be a lady. Oh how I miss getting dressed up in the morning, pretty dresses, matching heels and a handbag with 10 lipsticks. Now I wonder what is the point of brushing my hair or finding something that looks semi ok but complies with the strict dress code. I know these are first world problems but today I very much miss feeling feminine and having a handbag for girly things not a bog roll, or wearing 3 types of face cream rather than a face full of pollution, insect repellant, sweat and pimples. I also can’t wear my $20 substitute wedding ring as it’s so hot my fingers are swollen. For the most part, adventure travelling isn’t glamorous. BUT as a positive, I had ‘hot’ toast with melted butter this morning, first time in two months! I wouldn’t be human if some days weren’t harder than others.

The strangest thing we learnt on the bus ride to Lumbini is that in year 2001, the Nepalese royal family (all 9 of them) we
re mysteriously murdered inside the royal palace. With many conspiracy theories out there, no none knows for sure why, how or who.

Lumbini is known for two reasons. One it’s the last town before the Indian border and two, it’s the birth place of Gautama Buddha. And that’s where we visited this afternoon. Within many acres of grassland containing monasteries from countries all over the world, lays a white brick building. The walls of the white building are there to protect the remains of the ancient Maya Devi Temple. These structures are from the 3rd century BC to 7th century AD. The actual birth spot of Buddha lays within that – basically a rock, on top of rock- where Buddha was born in 563BC. What lays outside this building is a lake. Now surrounded by concrete, but it was where Buddha’s mother went for a swim prior to giving birth. Who knew water births were popular then too. Nowadays Buddhists and monks come from all over the world to see the 4 holy places. It’s said in the Parinibbana Sutta that Buddha himself identified 4 places of future pilgrimage: the sites of his birth (located here in Lumbini), enlightenment (in Bodhgaya), first discourse (in Sarnath), and death (in Kushinagar). It waa good to learn more about what’s behind the ‘words of wisdom’ – a beautiful religion .

It’s been a whirl wind of a trip to Nepal. There is so much more to this place than the Everest people know it for;. Thank you Edmond Hillary for bringing this place onto the tourist map. The Nepalese people are so kind and gentle. They say Namaste because they are genuinely welcoming you to their country, not because they want you to buy something. With two months holiday every year, I’d be that relaxed too.
Nepal has a diverse landscape; from being up in the snow capped mountains, to trees in the clouds, to vast farmland, to the rugged jungle. My favourite moment was spending time with the village children and Dave’s was trekking through the jungle. A jungle where one day we will be unable to aimlessly walk through without being in a vehicle. Both of our favourite experiences are because these places aren’t yet populated by tourists.

]]>

<![CDATA[

Kathmandu, Nepal

Our blogs don’t need any more content. I was all ready to tell you about the first hour in Kathmandu, that cows sit peacefully in the middle of the road and how our plane was full of monks and about the Arrivals Form that states “you are only allowed to bring one bicycle and one tricycle into the country”. But that mustn’t have been exciting enough. We arrived at our hotel, sat down and realised Dave’s English passport was still on the plane. Talk about a stressful 30 minute trip back to the airport with the hotel manager. Thai Airways were ****** off and confused when we arrived at their office. They had spent hours looking for us in customs, which consists of a tiny room full of people. They took us into what felt like the principals office for a serious talking to – luckily Dave was experienced with this! They were dumbfounded as how we had left the airport without a passport or how Dave flew in on an English passport with not one stamp. We owed this lovely hotel man so much yet he felt the need to upgrade our room, give us faster Internet and a special flower…. Namaste Kathmandu… Looks as though this next venture isn’t going to have a dull moment!

Just arrived back from our meeting with the ‘new group’. It feels like forever ago we were meeting the last lot of people sitting around, making small talk yet 14 days later it feels like we’re leaving our best mates. As fast as they have come into our world, they’re gone. 12 like minded people put together, to share everything together. It’s impossible not to share an instant bond. This time our group of 12 consists of a Mexican family who own a private school, an Australian who worked in Gillard &amp; Rudd’s office, 2 Brazilians engineers, and 3 English people (social worker and pharmaceutical researchers) and us…. Unemployed Bums.

A side note for those who knew about our China debacle with the visas, the one where we had paid for a trip from Beijing to Tibet/Kathmandu to Delhi but due to the Chinese/Tibet visa issues and the requirement to have 5 people of the same passport type which required us to cancel our trip and do Vietnam and Cambodia instead. Weeeellll, two people from the Beijing to Tibet part of the trip, are in our group. Based on the awesome friends we met in Vietnam we knew we did the right thing doing what we did, but by the sound of it they had the WORST trip. I thought ‘we’ hated China, but after three weeks there, they despised the place. The way the officials treated the Tibetan guide and locals was horrendous. There were black boxes in their private buses and under cover people everywhere so free speech about anything wasn’t an option. Not to mention the 43 hours on a sleeper train, 6 to a room with a toilet ankle high in.. Then there was the severe altitude sickness at Everest at 5,000 ft. BUT the funniest part is there was no regulation for the ‘5 passport’s requirement’ So, we could have gone on our New Zealand passports and obtained a Chinese visa easily. There was a mixture of 10 people from many nationalities and no one was told about the 5 passport thing. Another example of how life leads you in ways you should have found on your own!

Everest before breakfast! We decided to take a tiny plane over Everest as our major ‘optional extra’ for Asia. We were fortunate to be able to go as it’s very weather dependant. From the cockpit and our window seat we saw Everest and the surrounding mountains for 15mins without cloud coverage. Quite apart from the height, 8,848 metres above sea level, you could spot Everest easily as it is very pointy and the tallest. I took a few pics of what I thought was snow covered mountains, before realising they were mountain shaped clouds! Although disappointed we didn’t go to base camp as planned on the Tibetan trip, this was a fantastic second best – and realistically much more ‘Julia style’. A real highlight of sights seen. What makes Nepal so different to much of South East Asia is the types of tourists, I’d say a small percentage of the limited foreigners we saw were tourists. Many are here for trekking, aid/volunteer work and pilgrimages, including a girl we had an hour long breakfast with. We didn’t know her name but she works for an NGO (non government organisation-aid work) doing disaster prevention and training in Thailand, Bhutan and Nepal. The random reason I mention this is, I learnt all about Bhutan. One of the poorest counties in the world but there are no beggars and the country refuses to measure their country by wealth but instead by happiness!!!!! She said although they are poor they are so happy, content and an all round amazing race.
What a fascinating first day. Kathmandu is really quite something. It’s so charming, quaint even. Narrow little streets, women in saris, monks and men dressed in Sikhism, sadhu (see the holy men in the pictures). The people of Nepal are something else. Such a pleasure being in their town of Kathmandu. It kinda feels a bit hippy, but it’s not. The continuous hum of Buddhist chants, coming from the shops and Stupas make for the perfect setting. We are really in our zen here. I’d say mountains surround Kathmandu valley but the locals call them hills. To them Everest and the other 10 sites we flew over are mountains – fair point really. It doesn’t even feel as if we are in Asia here, completely different look and feel to the southeast.

Nepalese are Buddhist and Hindu. Being that it’s the birthplace of Buddha, monks are everywhere. Everyone is calm and relaxed. If I was to convert to any religion, that’d be the one.
We visited two famous Stupas today (similar vein to temples) except you can’t go in them as they are solid stone. We saw the Swayambhunath Stupa (known to tourists as the Monkey Temple) – Kathmandu’s most important Buddhist shrine. The sleepy, all-seeing Buddha eyes that stare out from the top have become the symbol of Nepal. The other was Bodhnath Stupa – the largest stupa in Nepal and the holiest Tibetan Buddhist temple outside Tibet. It’s the centre of Tibetan culture in Kathmandu. Stupas express the nature of the human mind in a perfect way. It symbolises the enlightened state of the Buddha with body, speech and mind. Each is covered with thousands of Prayer Flags inscribed with symbols, invocations, prayers, and mantras. The 5 colours of prayer flags represent the 5 basic elements: yellow-earth, green–water, red-fire, white-air, blue-space. Balancing these elements externally brings harmony to the environment. Balancing the elements internally brings health to the body and the mind. A seriously amazing place to visit and absorb it all.

We celebrated Lauren’s birthday tonight at a local restaurant – the token Aussie in the group. Travelling on your birthday is awesome when ‘Happy Birthday’ is sung to you in Australian, Mexican and Brazilian. Our Indian guide who said they don’t sing happy birthday in their culture has his own culture of arranging birthday cakes for those celebrating. He said the **********e to achieve was on a sailing trip on the Ganges with a 7 hour bus ride prior or a desert safari – both of these required logistical planning to get a surprise cake there in 40 degree heat on public transport! The place we went for dinner last night was equally as awesome. When trekkers arrive back from Everest they can go to the restaurant/bar called Rum Doodle and write on a mammoth-like-footprint, which is hung from the ceiling. Pretty cool thing to witness.
Although we have only been here two nights, we know to take a headlight out to dinner or to bed. Candles are a regular part of a table setting. Power goes out so often. The infrastructure is limited and Internet over the next few days will be impossible.

Travelling is about experiences and being open minded…and that we were when we got out of our van, still in Kathmandu Valley, to have our noses filled with smoke. We were unsure what it was until we passed random cows, on a bridge where a river met the Ganges in India. On the side of the river were stone platforms, maybe 20 of them. Many had what looked like a bonfire on them. But
of course the only thing they were cooking were people. We were there about 30mins and saw it all – all the different stages of the 6 hour cremation process. We saw the start, with a body under a cloth with a little bag of precious things such as money on top. They move the body onto a bamboo platform before putting it onto the stone platform then covering it with straw before setting it alight. Then on to the middle stage, where its just the burning process. You can’t see anything it just looks like a bonfire. Then the last stage, the body is completely gone. What’s left is swept straight off the stone ledge and into the water. Literally seconds later kids are jumping into the water – starkers, while bits float by. Our new guide gave us good advice at our welcome dinner. You travel because you want to see new things, not so you can judge or try and change a place. True dat!

Kathmandu is the largest, and pretty much only, city in the country. In parts it feels like any other developing-world city, but walking in the back streets its completely different again. On day two, seeing a cow in the middle of the road doesn’t phase me!

Kathmandu is a city that fascinates us, It’s one of those places you’re thankful to be able to have visited. This is the point Mum and Dad started their Kathmandu to London trip on the back of a truck when they were younger than us. I can only imagine what a culture shock they would have got first time out of New Zealand. They said it was the people that they remember. I wholeheartedly agree. Based on the last few days, we look forward to the next week exploring mainland Nepal.

]]>

<![CDATA[

Bangkok, Thailand

]]>

<![CDATA[

Battambang, Cambodia

]]>

<![CDATA[

Siem Reap, Cambodia

These full day bus trips are becoming the norm but with a good book and air con these don’t bother me. I got 50% through a memoir of an ‘educated’ 5year old Cambodian girl in 1975. It was a very interesting and sad story of a child’s life during this time. There’s limited tax in this country so books are $3. The bus ride is a great way to see countryside Cambodia. When we got hungry we stopped for a bite of tarantula. Similar to crickets, they are covered in oil so they aren’t too bad – as far as insects go anyway! Insects are a popular food amongst locals as they grew up eating them during the famine.

This time, the 8 hour bus ride took us to Siem Reap. The home of Angkor Wat – if you’re unsure what that is, think Tomb Raider. If you haven’t seen that, like me, think big stone structures.
Angkor Wat temple is the most famous. It sits in the Angkor Complex which includes a few hundred temples and a city. They were built around 1,000 years ago but many were only discovered in the thick jungle in 1850. Some of these temples have been restored from the war and element damage but many are just ruins. Angkor Thom, which is Khmer for “Great City” is a stone city which once supported one million people in the surrounding region. Many of the walls have intricate carvings carved into the 300 billion tones of stone and tell a story of life back then and how this city was created. Each of the billions of stones had a hole drilled in it, to transport the stone 60km from the quarry to the temple. The mode of transport was by 40,000 elephants, each with a sore back. In this city there are temples, libraries, galleries, a stadium and of course a 500mx300m swimming pool for the king.

Have you heard of the expression ‘templed out’….? if not, you’re about to feel that way after reading this. I think it’s only fair we share the pain together..
– The Bayon temple was built in 1100 by the 7th king and is inside the 9sqkm stone city of Angkor Thom. As he was Buddhist, the four faces on each pillar represent empathy, compassion, equality and sympathy. At a distance it looks like any other temple. When you look at it closer, 216 smiley faces look down at you. Each hand carved.
-The other one that’s worth a mention is the Banteey Srey temple built in 967. This is a ‘lady’s temple’ built by the 5th king for his hundreds of concubines (his friendly lady friends).
-Then there’s the Jungle temple, blah blah blah. It does have an Indian name and has been restored by the Indians. But that’s about all I’ve got. This featured a lot in Tomb Raider.
– No temple marathon would be complete without the The Hindu Angkor Wat temple, which represents heaven on earth. It was built between 1113-1150. I think I’d have had more appreciation if I had of watched Tomb Raider. Then I could have followed in Angelina Jolie’s foot steps. Instead, I can say it’s big, with a lot of stairs. 37 to be exact – representing the 37 levels of heaven. And of course there’s a moat 1.5×1.3 km around the temple. Angkor Wat was built by the 2nd king. He had 2,000 friendly lady friends and a wife, so that’s 2001 problems that poor man had. It’s lucky for him child support wasn’t around. It took 37 years, 40k elephants, 7k rafts, and 500k exhausted people to build. The king built it as a tomb for his body, and he died 2 years after it was finished. Personally, I’d have gone with a smaller design house and enjoyed it for longer. Mind you, the 8 swimming pools and 6 libraries would come in handy. In the 16th century it changed to a Buddhist temple but in the 90s all of the Buddhist statue heads were chopped off and sold. Talk about bad karma!

We all have those days – Wednesday the something of June was one of them:
-4am start that morning to see Angkor Wat at sunrise and visit the Jungle temple prior to the 5,000 tourists arriving. My patience was wearing thin that morning and it was only 8am. There are two things that urk me about group travel – the continuous waiting for inconsiderate people. The other is the people who are ‘too cool’ to respect the local culture and dress inappropriately in places such as temples. I had to go back to my room to find my smile, before heading back out for the day. On a positive, Dave got over his ‘Cambodian Belly’.
-5pm arrived home after a long day of those ‘T’ things. Travelling has finally got to me, nearly 50 days straight sightseeing – living in a hotel room, being on tour, living out of a suitcase, no Julia time – this has started to show in signs of frustration. I’m using another “Virtual Sunday” card tonight while Dave is down at the Pub Street watching Origin with Damo and Shazz. 2 minute noodles and Cambodian TV ought to fix me!
I think what is really the icing on the cake to my mood, is experiencing the extent of the issues in Cambodia. We have travelled to many third world countries, but you can really tell Cambodians are doing it tough. With an average income of $5 per day earned in the country and $10 in the city and even less in this place we visited this afternoon. The floating village of Tonle at Sap lake has 1,115 families living on chong khneas. These are basically wooden floating rooms/houses. Many are only a few metres wide, too small to stand up in and barley floating. They are where the poorest of the poor live. As they are on the water they don’t pay anything to the greedy government. This boat ride around the village would have been a nice break from the thousands of beggars at the temples, except here on the water they are so much more intense. Kids and mums on little boats literally hanging off your boat saying “$1,$1,$1,$1,$1,$1,$1,$1,$1”. Kids with snakes around their neck poke their heads into your boat, and a snake head into your face, and want a picture with them for “$1,$1,$1,$1,$1,$1,$1,$1,$1”. Of course you feel for them and want to give them money but Intrepid is very strong, and understandably so, about not supporting or encouraging child vendors or beggars. It doesn’t make it easy though. The final straw in my ****** day (yes, we all have them) was that our guide had the audacity to ask for $1 to tip the driver. This is a pet hate of mine as all modes of transport have already been paid for, yet tipping the drivers for doing their job is a not compulsory but a must? These drivers are already getting paid. Although it’s a low wage I’d much rather give that $1 to someone who actually needs it – like a homeless mother and baby or dad that’s had his legs blown off by the land-mines. 13 days and I hadn’t said anything but this time I couldn’t help but express my frustration. $1 doesn’t sound much but if I had a $1 for every time someone asked me for money I’d be a millionaire – or broke.
Prior to visiting this poor country, I was a firm believer in never using the word ‘lucky’. I believed if you wanted something – get off your ass and work for it. But I tell you what, I feel very lucky to live in Australia. Even though as I write this Rudd has taken over from Julia Gillard as PM, we are still lucky not to have a completely corrupt government that doesn’t give people a fair chance. An extreme comparison, I know, but the corrupt Cambodian government have been in power for nearly 30 years with no way of changing it – even with elections.
……Fortunately, my lovely Allison has just Skyped me and turned my day around. At 730pm, I have found my smile.

After every bad day, there’s a new day…
5 hour bus trip today to Battambang. On the way we stopped at a handmade silk factory and for morning tea we had juicy silk worm. When you start this ‘I’ll try everything game’ you can’t back down when it comes to yucky things – I was the only one out of our group that tried it, but only half of a worm. To save me putting the other half in my pocket, Dave ate the other half.
As mentioned in Vietnam, Intrepid fund one meal each trip. This time it was to a place called Pteu Teuk Dong (PDT). Prior the management becoming corrupt in 2008, it housed 150 people, street families and abused women and children. The centre lost its funding from all the donors due to
money mismanagement. All of Cambodia is poor, but as Battambang is so close to the border of Thailand, there are many parents who say they are going across the border and don’t come back for their kids. The lucky kids live in designated orphanages, others are just open areas for orphans. Then there are poor parents who sell their kids in the trafficking trade. So with all the abuse and sad stories in this area, it’s a shame this much needed training centre has been nearly, completely closed down. A Kiwi couple in their 50s have given 10 years of their life to restoring it back to a once thriving centre. The aim is to improve the quality of life and restore dignity to vulnerable people through a 12 month program. They feed them, educate the kids, teach them vocational skills in agriculture, sewing, weaving and life skills. After the 12 months, the family is given a plot of land and a small wooden house. I thought I’d seen poverty but at least the boat people yesterday have shelter in a safe environment. Intrepid supports this foundation and also matches $1 for $1 each donation given. But what I think Intrepid are missing is having an optional activity for our free afternoon and for us to give $10 to spend the afternoon helping this couple. (Intrepid organises additional activities for our free afternoons, for around $10). After speaking with this Kiwi lady, apart from monetary donations, they just need willing hands to make this severely run down place open its doors again. I’m going to write to Intrepid and suggest just that. On a side note, she mentioned to me that she worries when she goes to hand this place back to the locals, there will be no one to give it to as there is a whole generation of people her age missing from society in Cambodia. There is also an educational gap in the limited schooling for the younger generation.

Every country needs some random facts…
– The capital city Phenom Penh means ‘hill lady’ but all westerners pronounce Phnom incorrectly, we are saying ‘cake lady’
– The former capital city Seim Reap was formally owned by Thailand and called Seim. Cambodia then took it over and called it Seim Reap. Seim means ‘Thai’ and Reap means ‘defeat’. This loosely translates to ‘get out Thai people’
– Battambang, pronounced battambong, means disappearing stick. Bet you didn’t know that – or need to know that.
– Cambodia still has so much jungle that the Royal Palace built in 1802 was discovered only 2 months ago!
– Vietnam looks slightly wealthier than Cambodia, yet the wages in Cambodia are higher as is the cost of shopping, food and beer. They use US dollars as well as local currency.
– Due to war, there are no trains in Cambodia, hence the 30 hours of bus travel we have done this week. There is an Asian train network to be completed in 2015.
– School is “compulsory but not compulsory” here. School is ‘free’ here, except for ‘some reason’ kids have to pay if they want to attend class and pass.. This is the same for the free hospital. If you have no money you may as well stay at home and die. With an income of $5 a day and ‘free’ school fees at $30 per week per child and petrol at $1.20per litre, it makes for an impossible life.

Another border crossing, into another country. Border crossings are so different to arriving on a plane particularly in Cambodia. You’d expect to see with a horse and wooden cart taking our luggage over the border. Except the horses were humans and the border is nearly as obvious as a line in the sand. Within the first 5 minutes of being in Thailand, I twisted my ankle and left the camera in Cambodia and mentioned to my guide quietly that I’d seen two lady boys already. He said “shhh”. I thought that was weird, as the only two people in ear shot was our driver and his wife….or a lady man wife.

With every beginning, there must be an end. 16 hours after arriving into Bangkok it was time to farewell the friends we had made. Some just for a short time – We planned on watching the Super Bowl (on tv) with Nick in New Orleans in February and seeing Rita and Frank in Switzerland in September. Fortunately Damo, Shazz and Stephen live around Australia so with a camping trip planned for next year, that’s something to look forward to. It’s people that make the holiday and they have certainly made ours. I’m going to miss the “what ya wana do”, “I dunno, walk around find a beer”. Life is good.

As I reflect on the last 5 days, it’s very much full of mixed emotion. I had no expectations coming into Cambodia, no prior knowledge what so ever. Like many countries they have a story to tell. In some countries the story is spoken louder than others. I see this country has suffered so much, and is still suffering. What shocks me is knowing the reason for rarely seeing any people over the age of 40. What saddens me is seeing the poverty this country is in with no way of it changing. What brings me hope is knowing the strength the Buddist religion brings to these people.
A wise man once told me (Stephen and it was yesterday): Travelling can be amazingly fun, but much of our world is so so sad it is heartbreaking. Cambodia is an amazing place with amazing people and history. Your sorrow and pity won’t help the locals. Listening to their story and being part of their future will. Much like Vietnam, tourism is a big part of their future.

]]>