Arizona

I’ve been in Arizona for a few days, en route to Utah for the summer–lots of sun and lots of touristing. Some pictures:

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/Arizona

Arizona

Video Update

We’re safe and sound in Connecticut, preparing to leave for the UP, and still getting over jet lag. Two overnight flights in a row is a special kind of travel torture, and one I’m not eager to repeat. Now that I have a respectable internet connection, I was able to put up videos from the trip.

Lee and I stumbled across a performance by the Gustavus Adolphus Choir in Florence:

A cappella performance at the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur:

The sound in this video comes from thousands of birds in the trees:

We stumbled upon some afternoon karaoke while waiting for the train in Hat Yai, Thailand:

Every bus ride was accompanied by this type of movie on the bus TVs:

A guy talking about the VC tunnel coverage in Vietnam–the red area on the map is covered in tunnels:

Our guide at the tunnels, who called himself John Wayne, shows one of the VC’s more brutal traps. Note the bamboo spikes in the bottom.

John Wayne shows more traps.

“Singing” in Hoi An during the full moon festival. Yikes.

Cute Singaporean choir singing Lady Gaga.

Jumping for joy

Leaving for the airport in the morning–this is how I feel about it:

See you later, Southeast Asia.

Around the world in 90 days

As always, I am behind in posting–this time, because I have been struggling to find something, anything, positive to say about Southeast Asia. Here’s what I’ve come up with:

1. The scenery is lovely (the cities are not)
2. Hoi An, Vietnam is lovely (favorite stop of the trip, aside from Angkor Wat)
3. Pad see ew is delicious. (If you try one Thai dish in your life, try this one.)
4. Angkor Wat (speaks for itself)
5. Malaysia was friendly and wonderful

Obviously, I’m reaching.

The thing is, I do not like Southeast Asia. It’s too chaotic. It’s too crowded. It’s too filthy. There are too many people who will tell you too many outright lies to scam you into buying something. It’s often difficult to get to the lovely scenery and out of the cities. (Too much city time hurts my Yooper soul.) The pollution is unbelievable. There’s no breathing room. Vietnamese food is a big disappointment. The motorbike drivers will run you over without a second thought, and you’re no safer on the sidewalk than you would be in the middle of the road.

I could go on all day, but this guy expresses pretty well what it’s like to travel in Vietnam and many places in SE Asia. (Except for his assessment of the intelligence of Vietnamese people and their language, which I suspect was written in a moment of frustration.)

It’s difficult for me to accept this level of dislike for an entire region–it’s like admitting defeat, in a way. There’s a propensity among people writing about travel to idealize the local lifestyle and culture, to wax poetic about the simplicity of the people who live there–but I can’t do it. A passage in one traveler’s blog made me feel better about it:

“But while we’re on the subject, I want to address this silly prevailing notion that a foreign culture is immune to criticism by Westerners; the idea that we should accept flaws simply because “that’s just how things are here” and “we can’t expect to understand their ways.” That is romantic exoticism and it is bullshit. Criticism does not equal misunderstanding. … Unpleasant people, places, practices and beliefs do not get a free pass merely by virtue of being foreign.”

Granted, he was talking about things like blatant racism and basic human rights violations, but it made me feel better about having negative things to report. Between this trip and the last time I was here, I’ve spent more than three months in Southeast Asia–enough to make a fair assessment, I think. (For myself, obviously. Plenty of travelers adore this part of the world.) Just like you can’t like every person you meet, you can’t like every country you visit, and that’s okay.

And the good news–I’m coming home! We booked flights that leave Saturday and arrive at JFK a good 30+ hours later. Oy. Funny how something as simple as pushing the Purchase button can make me feel so much better.

For now, pictures from lovely Hoi An, where we spent a relaxing and entirely uneventful week. Lovely.

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/HoiAn1?feat=directlink

Hoi An 1

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/HoiAn2?feat=directlink

Hoi An 2

Good Morning, Vietnam

I once read somewhere that people who are descended from groups that live in cold climates are genetically predisposed to be heat intolerant. If you’ve ever had the misfortune to hang out with me in temperatures above 90 degrees, you know it’s true.

In Southeast Asia, the median temperature up until last week was about 95 degrees with high humidity. Misery. Absolute misery. The heat turns me into a surly, headachy monster who can barely function, much less enjoy the experience of wandering through a foreign country. No matter how much water I pour down my throat or how much I stay in the shade, my body feels like it is trapped inside a sauna.

The photo below is what most Southeast Asian towns look like. Through a heat haze of misery, I’m unable to see the bizarre things they’re selling on the street or appreciate the community that exists around these little carts or notice the little shrines that sprout up on corners. Instead, all I can focus on is the chaos and the heat waves and the noise and the beeping tuk-tuk drivers and the people screeching, “You buy somesing? You beautiful. Buy somesing!” When I reach my heat limit, it’s all I can do not to scream at pushy tuk-tuk drivers or take a swipe at a motorbike that passes too close.

Clearly, I belong in cooler climes.

With that in mind, we escaped up to the central coast of Vietnam, where it has been a blissful 60-70 degrees. But more on that later.

We spent two nights in Saigon before flying up to Danang, and during our full day we took a tour of the Viet Cong tunnels from the Vietnam War. They are near a village called Cu Chi, and the tunnel site itself is lovely, all jungle-y and shady (thank goodness). It was fascinating to hear about the war from another perspective–here in Vietnam, it’s the American War. There doesn’t seem to be any lasting animosity, but it was strange to hear Americans referred to as “the enemy” (in a past tense, of course). One video we watched said, “Like a crazy bunch of devils they [the American soliders] came and shot into women and children and Buddha statues.”

The villagers, having no other defense, retreated into the tunnels they had built during the French war. They lived in underground bunkers, because the jungle had been flattened by bombs and Agent Orange. Guerilla fighters came from all around Vietnam to help in the 250 km of tunnels.

It was surreal to walk around the place, particularly because the noise of gunshots and machine gun rounds at a tourist gun range echoed through the jungle, just like we were in a war movie. We saw some of the absolutely brutal traps that the VC set up with bamboo spikes, climbed around on an old American tank, and tried the tapioca sticks that were the main staple of VC life. The VC fighters had several types of entrances–tiny ones that allowed them to pop just their heads up and check directions, bigger ones called “war doors” that could fit a man and a gun, and entrances in the bunkers. The doors were pretty much invisible (see pictures).

The coolest part of the day was getting to go through the actual tunnels. They have been left as they were, and they are just tall enough for me to walk through bent over. Cal, on the other hand, had to do an awkward crouch and waddle. It’s hot and pitch black and the tunnels suddenly drop into holes for lower levels. A few minutes was fun, but I can’t imagine spending so much time in them. Both sides must have felt like they were in hell.

But it’s kind of wonderful how things come around. Even in a place where there was so much brutality and unhappiness, people from all over are able to come and learn in peace. At least one of my uncles was in the war (though I’m not sure where) and less than 40 years later, I was able to visit the same spot without worrying for my safety in the least.

Pictures from the tunnels, and an album I forgot to post weeks ago from Thailand into Cambodia:

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/Saigon

Saigon

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/BangkokToCambodia

Bangkok to Cambodia

Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge

Aside from mysterious Angkor Wat, one of Cambodia’s top tourist attractions is the killing field outside of Phnom Penh. In 1975, the Khmer Rouge army marched into the city and ordered it to be evacuated–all of the residents were moved into the country and forced to do hard labor in the fields. According to a video we watched, they got people to move by telling them the Americans were planning to bomb the city (we had been doing some serious bombing on the border with Vietnam, so it was a powerful threat).

Over the next four years, the Khmer Rouge killed over a million people. We heard several different numbers, but that was something like 1/5th of the population. What’s worse, they targeted intellectuals because Pol Pot, the leader, wanted to create an ignorant population. Anyone who knew how to read, was educated, held a high position–plus kids, babies, families. People were accused of being CIA or KGB and killed for the tiniest of offenses, like singing out loud.

We went to visit the killing fields, where the Khmer Rouge took prisoners from the Tuol Seng prison and other places around the country. It’s a peaceful field now, but between 1975 and 1979, the Khmer Rouge killed 20,000 people there. There’s a museum that tells about it, and it was the quietest, most somber museum you can imagine. The army didn’t want to waste bullets, so they forced people to stand on the edge of an open pit and then they clubbed them to death with all kinds of horrifying weapons.

We walked around the fields, which do not have a sinister sense at all–it’s peaceful, somehow. There are pits where bodies were exhumed, and signs that tell you about the buildings and places people were murdered. The most horrifying thing was the “killing tree.” Instead of using bullets and weapons on babies and small children, the soldiers would take them by their feet and bash them on the tree. I read about it in the museum and when we got to the tree, I could only glance at it before moving on–even though it’s just a tree, the idea of it was too much.

We also went to the Tuol Seng museum, which was once a high school and was turned into a torture prison during the Khmer Rouge years. Where the killing fields were calm and quiet, this place just oozed horror–partly because the bloodstains are still on the floor, partly because of the photos of tortured people with blood spilling from their bodies, partly because of the room after room of mug shots of people who all were sent to die. Women, men, babies. Horrible.

All in all, a sobering afternoon. What’s worse, the leaders of the Khmer Rouge got off scot free. Pol Pot died under house arrest and the other leaders just melted into the jungle. Only one has ever admitted responsibility; the others denied all knowledge of torture and mass murders. Lies, of course. And this was all less than 40 years ago.

Pictures below. The government of Cambodia asks that people see and tell about what happened to reduce the possibility that it can be allowed to happen again.

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/PhnomPenh?feat=directlink

Phnom Penh

Country #37: Cambodia

We’re in Cambodia! (There are pictures at the bottom of this post.) I’ll skip right over Thailand except to say that we spent four unremarkable nights in Bangkok. I didn’t like the city the first two times I was there, and this time was no different. In comparison to the people in Malaysia and Laos, the Thai people are downright surly–land of smiles, my arse. The bright spots were watching True Grit, eating AMAZING pad see ew on the street for less than $1, and hanging around our hotel’s rooftop pool.

We paid a total of three dollars for two tickets on a third-class train–our only option–to the Thai border town of Aranyaprathet and spent a horrifying five hours in a hot, smelly car that was packed with people. Four hours into that ride, I began to long for the relative luxury of a Greyhound bus, crazies and addicts and all. There came a point where the ash and grime worked their way all over our skin and the car was filled with the stench of body odor mixed with the aroma of an over-full toilet, accented with smoke and diesel exhaust. When we finally pulled into Aranyaprathet, an hour behind schedule, I was ready to collapse.

Transit days are the most demoralizing part of long-term travel. Inevitably, they are accompanied with “I want to go home” moments and disgust for the host country’s culture/people/standards. Thankfully, this all goes away after a shower and a nap.

I’d read horror stories about the border crossing into Cambodia–how people dressed as fake cops would try to rip us off for three times the actual visa cost, how we would be misled and mugged, and how the tuk-tuk drivers would refuse to take us to the actual border gate and we would instead be forced to fight off touts and seek directions from a 7-11. We left our hotel armed with advice from other travelers and prepared for battle–but the actual crossing was completely anticlimactic. A tourist helper approached us as we got out of the tuk-tuk and magically reappeared to point us in the right direction after each step of the exit from Thailand, visa-buying process, and entry into Cambodia. Aside from a halfhearted attempt to extort an extra 100 baht (about $3) by a bored immigration agent–I stubbornly pointed to the sign that said clearly, “Tourist Visa $20″ and refused to play ball–we sailed through with minimal hassle. There was a handy, free tourist shuttle waiting to take us to a transit hub where we could buy tickets for a shared minivan to Siem Reap for $9 or a shared taxi for $12. Ticket windows are a godsend because they mean no haggling with drivers who are out to fleece tourists with ridiculously high prices, no waiting around dirty streets, and no arguing about being dropped off at the wrong guesthouse because the driver says it is full/closed/dangerous and instead, let’s go to the driver’s friend’s/cousin’s/girlfriend’s guesthouse. (A common scam.) For the developing world, it was downright amazing.

On the two-hour drive to Siem Reap, we chatted with the other passengers, a quiet Polish guy who seemed alarmed by the typical Asian chaos and a chatty Australian who referred to the Aboriginal population as “Abbos” who “get free housing, ruin it, and then ask for more.” He was decidedly un-PC and an absolute hoot.

Perhaps it was the benefit of a full night’s sleep and a pleasant transportation day, but I was immediately taken with Cambodia. Even in the poorest of poor shacks along the side of the road, the “yards” were neat and well-kept. Unlike many poor areas in Southeast Asia, there was no garbage littering the side of the road and even the shanty towns were organized and clutter-free–no piles of garbage, no filthy lean-tos, no puddles of trash-soup water. It feels more dignified, somehow, like the people might be poor but they haven’t given up their sense of pride. It’s missing the tangible desperation that’s common in so many developing countries…and I read somewhere that many Cambodians live on less than $1 per day. (Don’t cite me on that, as I didn’t research it any further. ) People harass you to come into their restaurant or take their tuk-tuk, but it feels like a business strategy rather than a pathetic plea. At a rest stop, some girls came out to try to sell us something, but were more interested in comparing arm skin colors with me. One of them wanted white skin like mine (I wanted to say, “Hey, this is tan for me!) while another said she loved her brown skin. They needed to sell things to make money, but they were unwilling to prostrate themselves at the feet of tourists to get it. There was a definite feeling of self-respect and pride that is so often missing in places where people are so desperate to provide for their families that they will do pretty much anything (that may be the most heartbreaking part of traveling).

I like that sense of dignity, particularly in a country that’s had such a horrifying recent past. It wasn’t that long ago that Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge genocide decimated the population, or that the people were being bombed during the Vietnam War, or involved in a brutal civil war. (More on that soon–we’re in Phnom Penh now and will be visiting the torture museum and the Killing Fields this week.)

–

Transit days and sad local history aside, things are good! We saw the temples at Angkor Wat yesterday, and they were mind-blowing. Health-wise, we can’t catch a break. It seems that we can’t go a day without Cal or I getting sick/uncomfortable/heat stroke-y/injured. Cal has had a terrible cough since we got to Asia, I’m just getting over a cold, and one of us always seems to be feeling off. Chalk it up to long transit days, the heat, the dust, the food (some Indian food had me doubled over in pain the other day), the unfamiliar germs. And my shins are bruised and swollen–I tripped up the stairs the other day and got a huge lump on my shin, and this morning, I fell halfway down a flight of stairs wearing my huge backpack and bruised both of my shins and one of my fingers. Grace on legs, as always.

At this point, our loose plan is to hang here in Phnom Penh–which we like better than Siem Reap, Bangkok, or KL–for a week and then head into Vietnam. (Halong Bay, here I come!)

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/AngkorWat1?feat=directlink

Angkor Wat 1

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/AngkorWat2?feat=directlink

Angkor Wat 2

Bangkok bound

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/Langkawi?feat=directlink

Langkawi

When I travel, I often stop to marvel at how the situation is like a scene from a movie. Sometimes, it’s downright magical: sitting on the steps of a Tuscan villa in the sunlight and listening to a friend play the classical guitar, standing alone on the glacier at Everest Base Camp, or getting swept up in a crush of traditional dancing in a Balkan club in Istanbul. Other times, it’s bad: being threatened by thugs in South Africa, dealing with an attempted mugging in Quito, or hiding behind an ancient Mayan pyramid to escape a creepy worker in Tikal.

(Incidentally, it was difficult to think of three bad memories–either I’ve been fortunate or blocked some of the miserable moments. Probably a bit of both.)

Then there are the times where the language barrier hides the reality of a situation–times when it could be a charming travel experience or a terrifying travel nightmare.

This morning was one of those times. All over Malaysia, Cal and I have been impressed by the widespread use of English–that is, until we popped into the bus station at Penang this morning to catch a bus to Hat Yai in Thailand. In Southeast Asia, bus agents race at you the second you come into view, hoping to lure you to their company. (It’s fun to watch when you are not the target.) We had a ticket, and were passed from one agent to the next until we got to a scruffy little man who chattered loudly at us in another language–Malay? Chinese? Impossible to tell. He gestured for us to follow him, and, having no other option, we did. At the end of the station, he waved us vaguely across the street and shouted some more. So we wandered across the street and handed the ticket to a woman at a travel counter (when in doubt, a ticket usually gets you pointed in the right direction). Instead, she showed it to a passing man and they both laughed. We had no idea if we’d been sold a fake ticket, if there was no bus, or if we’d missed it–and no way to ask.

There’s a point in these situations when you realize you are no longer in control, and you can choose to go with it or search for another option. It was early in the morning, we don’t speak Malay or Chinese, and we needed to get to Hat Yai, so we sat obediently when the woman barked at us and pointed to a bench.

When my brother was working in China, he asked me how I deal with not being able to speak or understand the language when I travel to Asia. This morning illustrates the process–you smile a lot, state your destination in the simplest way possible, and go with your gut. If it feels like the person is going to lead me down a dark alley and kill me, I walk away; if not, I trust that they’ll tell me where I need to go.

Ten minutes later, another man shouted from across the street and the woman motioned for us to run after him. We did, and he led us around the corner away from the station and to the side of a highway. A van pulled up and we were instructed to load our bags and get in.

That, I suppose, would be the turning point in a movie scene–in the horror movie, the hapless travelers get into the van and are sold into a human trafficking ring or driven to a deserted lot and robbed.

In reality, nothing so terrible happened. We were shuffled in–Cal squeezed into an uncomfortable space, as usual–and waited patiently to find out where we’d end up. There was an old couple and a young woman in the van, and I thought I recognized “Hat Yai” in the stream of chatter the driver directed at us. A few hours and a border crossing later, we were deposited in the middle of Hat Yai.

Which means, of course, that we are safely in Thailand. As I write, we’re on an overnight train to Bangkok for a few days of recuperation. Cal is sleeping in the bottom bunk; I am wide awake after several creepy bug sightings earlier in the evening. First class compartment = miniature roaches? The horror. After traveling for 12 hours straight, I do not have the fortitude to deal with jungle bugs and may end up standing in the corridor playing Angry Birds until my phone dies.

**On a side note, if you ever want to use your air miles, they’ll go a long way in Thailand–my measly 11,300 soon-to-expire American Airlines miles got us four free nights at a nice-ish hotel in Bangkok.

Malacca

We’re in Malacca now, which is a two-hour bus ride south of Kuala Lumpur and a world away in terms of cleanliness and serenity. KL is a chaotic mess of people and dirty sidewalks and cramped vendors mixed in with mysterious ruined buildings, standard cinder block construction, and super-modern skyscrapers. Malacca, which is apparently popular with Malaysian tourists, is clean and quiet, with lovely cafes, low buildings, and a gorgeous river walk. After an exhausting week in KL, it’s exactly what we needed.

Each time I visit a new country, I find myself wondering if I could live there, as though all of these travels are simply to find a place that feels like a second home. Scotland, absolutely. South Africa, yes. But as much as I like visiting Southeast Asia, it doesn’t make the list. The constant crowds, chaos, heat, and lack of personal space are anathema to my inner Finn. No one moves quickly in this part of the world (except for vehicles, which are out to pluck off wayward pedestrians), and it can be overwhelming to be stuck in the middle of an impossibly slow-moving crowd. One day, I’m going to lose it and start plowing through packs of tiny people like a giant, pale beast, like the Godzilla of Southeast Asia.

I’ve added another photo album below, but first, a video from this evening’s Chinese New Year parade:

*If it doesn’t work, try this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jf2mOpT1sVM

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/Malacca?feat=directlink

Malacca

Kuala Lumpur

A few photos from our first few days in Kuala Lumpur…if we ever manage to adjust to the new time zone and stop sleeping until 2pm, I’ll take more.

https://picasaweb.google.com/eekauppi/KualaLumpur?feat=directlink

Kuala Lumpur