It’s chilly in Sydney. People are wearing way too little for the weather. They are running around in tank tops or really short shorts. I wonder if it’s like the phenomenon that happens in Denver in Spring where it’s warmer than it’s been so people want it to be summer and they dress for summer and then pretend that they don’t notice that it’s still too cold for what they are wearing. I went on a whale watching tour on Sunday. It was the very last tour of the season. It was freaking cold. No whales. I met James though. We had great conversation on the boat and it was nice to have someone to have dinner with afterward. Sunday evening, the girls at the house invited me to go to a local bar for live music. I kind of just wanted to stay in, but, hey, I’m not going to get this opportunity again, so I went. The band was good and it was fun for a while. I went home early though.
On Monday I rented a bike and rode around Manly. You know that story about having to walk to school in horrible weather uphill both ways? I think that story was invented in Sydney. Everything is up hill in all directions. It was a real challenge on a bike, but great exercise. There is park called North Head where you can go out to the ocean cliffs. I rode around there and had a very expensive lunch with bad service. I rode down to the beach. There were so many people enjoying the beach and it was actually warm today. I almost went in the beach but decided not to since I wanted to buy a new bathing suit and I remember all the shops closed early. I went in every store. No one sells board shorts for girls that aren’t unreasonably short – it kind of defeats the point of having shorts. I noticed that all the stores have more men’s clothing than women’s. Most of the stores, the men’s clothes were featured in the front of the store and the women’s were in the back. The complete opposite of the US.
My last full day in Sydney I went and had my hair colored. The “red” I got in Thailand has turned to an ugly brown so I just went back to all black. I ate, worked on the computer, had coffee and then went to the Manly Sea Life Aquarium. It’s smaller than the one in downtown Sydney, but features things found in Manly so the highlight was the tiny penguins. Manly has the smallest penguins. They come up and nest under the warf. They are endangered. The aquarium has some of the ones that were rescued and they also have a successful breeding program. I love penguins. I think I was more excited about these than the koalas the other day. Then I had a completely useless massage and dinner with bad service.
There is always one fly on you at all times in Sydney. I thought maybe I brought him from Thailand until my new friend, James asked if I had noticed that there is constantly a fly. I thought I would be rid of constantly having bugs on me. Not yet.
(c) All rights reserved Kimberly Fiore
Rental Bike
Sydney from North Head
From The Great Gatsby FilmManly Beach in the Distance
Here is a blog I wrote quite a while ago. Thailand has very strict Les Majistae laws. You can’t say anything negative about the King or royal family. They don’t have the same laws about other things, Thai, but I still thought it best not to post this while I was living in Thailand.
I’m a bit frustrated with the Thai school system. When half my class failed their exams, I’m told I should let them re-test. I tell the students they can re-test and I’ll average the two scores. I tell them exactly which subjects to study and show them pages in the workbook they can do for practice. Almost all of them got the same exact score the second time. These are supposed to be the advanced English classes. They show up late, they don’t turn in their homework and they are constantly doing some school activity or another instead of having classes. No matter how bad they do on homework, classwork or tests, I cannot fail them. I should give them extra work to make up their marks. This extra work should help them learn, but shouldn’t be too hard or time consuming. This extra work shouldn’t have a deadline and neither should the homework. Basically, the concept of consequences for your actions doesn’t exist. If they misbehave, there isn’t much I can do. I can’t assign extra work. I can’t keep them late even though they showed up 20 minutes late to my class because some other teacher kept them late. The Thai teachers can hit them for discipline. How is any of this preparing them for the world outside school? I guess, if their world is just Thailand maybe it’s ok. But, the country wants to prepare its students for being part of the world outside of Thailand. The world outside of Thailand will eat them alive and spit them out. When I asked about teaching curriculum I was told “up to you”. I have no idea what they already know or don’t know. I have no idea what topics I should be teaching. “Oh just teach speaking and listening”. Thanks. That’s useless. Then two weeks before the midterm exams, I’m told I have to create exams. I create exams, but then I’m told they need to match the objectives in my curriculum, the curriculum I was never told I needed to write. So, I make up objectives. I’m told 3 will be enough. Then after the exams I have to do grading, but everyone tells me a different way I need to report the grading. And now I have 10 objectives I need to use, not 3. They have to be these specific objectives, not the 3 I came up with. Why on earth wasn’t I given these before the semester or before the midterms? None of the objectives match anything I have taught and are all just a random jumble of words on a page that sound like a good plan. Is this the way the whole education system works? Then this week, I find out that final exams are after my last day of work. Who do they assume will grade my exams and fill out my grading sheets? No one notifies me of anything ahead of time, but I’m supposed to jump when asked or somehow miraculously have something ready when asked. Then I’m told I’m taking things too seriously – so teaching students is not important or it is? Apparently reading minds is a skill they think I should have. I spend most of my free time alone working and most people wonder why I would ever want to leave. I see other western teachers posting on facebook about how wonderful Thailand is, how much they love it here, and how much they love teaching. Are they lying or am I the only one having this Thailand experience? Don’t get me wrong, there are wonderful things about Thailand and I’ve met wonderful people. I came for the experience, not to stay forever and I’ve gotten an experience. And I’m pretty sure I’ve been more engulfed in the culture than any of them have.
I got to Sydney exhausted. I guess paying so much for my baggage is just like “Welcome to Australia! Your days of paying reasonable prices for things are over”. My taxi cost $100. I’m staying in an Airbnb because there are no hotels for under $150 a night. Hostels were over $50 a night. I’m staying in some girl’s room while she sleeps on a spare mattress in the laundry room. I got there and she was at work and she failed to tell me she had roommates. I woke one up. She scared the crap out of me because I assumed I was in the house alone. I was so tired from the overnight flight, that I took a nap for a few hours. I got up only to meet another roommate. She has 3 or 4 roommates – I can’t even tell how many. This is really not ideal, but I kind of have no choice at this point. They all seem friendly enough. I spent the rest of the first day wandering around Manly Beach, checking out the visitor’s center and getting food. All the shops closed at 6:00pm. That seems weird. It’s chilly here which I didn’t expect. I have no warm clothes – one hoodie will have to do. Still the chilly air and bright sun is a delightful combination.
Today I decided to do ALL the things in the city. It’s a half hour ferry ride to the central part of Sydney from Manly beach. The ferry ride is beautiful. Firs I went to the Wild Life Sydney Zoo. It’s not Sydney’s main zoo. I kind of wish I had done the main zoo. This place was so small I’m amazed how they fit everything in. But, I had bought tickets on line for a back stage tour. I’m glad I got the back stage tour. It was fascinating to see how they made everything work in such a small space. We went through the kitchens which they share with the aquarium next door. They have half a walk in refrigerator full of eucalyptus for the koalas. We got to see the quarantine areas, the areas where they housed the butterfly chrysalis, the bird cages on the roof where they keep the juvenile birds before they are ready to be released. Many of the animals there are rescue animals. They don’t let you touch the koalas, but you can get close to them. I got to pet a wombat, but only because he was a rescue hand raised there and use to people. The wombat might be my new favorite animal. He’s so much bigger than I expected. They have koalas, wallabies, kangaroos, snakes, lizards, birds, a cassowary, and Tasmanian devils. Everything there was indigenous to Australia. I didn’t get to see the devils as they never came out of their hiding place.
After the zoo, I had lunch. So far this is the 2nd meal I’ve had at a restaurant here and the service was horrible both times. They seat you, but then no one comes to take your order, say hi, bring you water or anything. I almost walked out. After lunch I walked over the Sydney Harbor Bridge. Well, half way over, took some pictures and went back. I walked around the rocks – a shopping, dining area near the bridge. I had seen an ad for a special exhibit at the Museum of Contemporary Art. The artist does pieces with led number counters. It looked beautiful. So I went to the museum. Apparently, I don’t like contemporary art. I don’t like it at all. I didn’t like the special exhibit or any of the other exhibits in the museum. How is any of this art? I watched a contortionist street performer outside the museum. Compared to contemporary art, she was fabulous. Then I walked down to the Opera house. There is an outdoor patio bar, the Opera Bar. This must be the busiest bar on the planet. There had to be hundreds of people there. It was fabulous to see, but didn’t make me want to eat or drink there. It was a zoo. I went to the botanic gardens for about a half hour. It was more like a park than a botanic garden. There was some cool building and a lot of fences. The park is huge and I didn’t go far because I had tickets for a movie. I have so missed being able to see movies so I was excited about it.
I have decided that Sydney must have a City ordinance or regulation that only attractive people can live there. Everyone seems fit, young, and pretty.
(c) All rights reserved Kimberly Fiore
Manly Beach
Manly BeachBeach HairSydney HarborSydney HarborSydney HarborSydney HarborSydneySydneyOpera House
Tiny CrocodileGreen FrogWallabyFood for animalsFood for KoalasEnter a captionBearded Dragon?Dinosaur?Babies
WombatWombatKookaburra
EchidnaTwo Headed LizzardQuokkaQuollBecause Toilets are DifficultThanks GoogleMaps
I didn’t know what to do today so I went to a nearby hotel where I was told you could pay to use the pool. The hotel was the one I wanted to stay at, but couldn’t because I didn’t book it in time. The pool was beautiful.
My flight was late leaving Labuan Bajo, but I figured that was ok. I’d just work on my blog. I was wrong. There are no outlets in the airport so I couldn’t charge my computer. I got to the airport in Bali and had to recheck my luggage because I was going from a domestic flight to an international flight and changing airlines. It took me over a half hour to walk to the international terminal. It took forever to find the Jetstar counter because no where did the counter or any of the signs say Jetstar. I went to check in and pay for my excess baggage. The guy first said I couldn’t take the extra bag. What? Then he decided I could, but told me that because I was going to Australia, it was very expensive and I couldn’t afford it. It would be $500. I just stared at him like he was nuts. Then, he decided he would only write down that I had 20 extra kilos. Somehow that brought the price down to $250. But, I had to pay in cash. This makes no sense, but he now has my bags and my passport. I go to the atm to try to pull that much money out and of course, I can’t. He then takes me to another counter as I’m trying to explain that I can’t get that much money. So, he decides I now only have 15 extra kilos which will cost me $185. I wait forever as the couple ahead of me had two tickets and Jetstar randomly changed one of their flights and canceled the other. I’m crying now as I’m pretty sure something illegal is happening and crying seems to be what I do a lot of lately when things get stressful. I finally get to the counter and explain that because I had to pay in cash, that my credit card is now frozen and I won’t be able to buy food or get a taxi when I get to Sydney because they required cash. Oh, you can pay by credit card. Why did you tell me I had to pay cash? So, I try to pay the fee with my other credit card. My card was declined – now the only two cards I have are frozen. The hysterical crying gets me down to $148 which is still ridiculous and I’m pretty sure still illegal, but my bags have already been put on the belt and are gone and they have my passport and boarding card. Maybe I could cry my way into less money, but I have no energy left.
I did manage to call both credit cards and get them reinstated. But, where’s the line between fraud prevention and you fucked me and now I’m stuck in the airport unable to get my baggage or get on a flight or eat? So, this is a bigger airport and still there are no electrical outlets. How is this possible? Right now I hate Indonesia. I get a bottle of water for the plane and some dinner. I’m waiting at the gate and all of a sudden, a SWAT team descends on the gate. Everyone is roughly rounded up, they section off the gate area and make everyone line up to get their bags searched. Everything is allowed on the plane except bottles of water. How is this a security issue? It’s a 5 hour flight and I’m not allowed to have water. I get on the plane and it has the personal movie screens for each seat. You have to pay to watch a movie or tv or play a game. Jetstar is officially the worst airline – Ever.
The first two days of diving were great. On the first day we did two dives and then went to Rincon, a nearby island to see the Komodo Dragons. The dragons were just lounging around under the park ranger’s buildings. They don’t move much in the heat of the day. That was nice from a safety point of view, but not as quite as nice from the cool viewing or photo point of view. We also saw a nest. They bury their eggs under the ground. The females are quite a bit smaller. We only saw one female sitting next to her nest. I learned quite a bit about dragons, but only three facts stuck with me – 1. If one bites you, you will die within 3 days to 3 weeks if you don’t get medical help; 2. They often eat their babies after they hatch; and 3. The males have two penises. The National Park also has deer, monkeys and buffalo. The dragon trek/tour was not quite what I expected, but it was still neat to see them. As we sat waiting for the boat to come back to pick us up, another small boat got stuck in the mangroves as it was trying to back up. All the park rangers and dive guides got up from where we were sitting to watch the boat struggle. They laughed and heckled the boat driver. It was fun to watch them interact. It was almost as interesting as the dragons themselves. People here are so much less uptight than in Thailand, more relaxed and down to earth.
The staff at the dive shop was great. The coral health and the amount of fish life was nice to see, especially after diving in Thailand. I saw all kinds of wonderful things including a lot of manta rays. This area of islands has a lot of currents. They are constantly moving and changing. In the morning they are moving one direction and in the afternoon they go the other way. They create other currents around the islands including swirly currents. The boat captains have to be pretty good at spotting them and driving through them. Ironically, most of our dives had very little current. I took Scott’s ashes on one of the dives and let him go swim with a very large puffer fish. I was going to take him to be with the Komodo Dragons, but tossing him out under ranger housing seemed unglorified. The other divers on the boat for the first two days were fun to hang out with. I met two guys that were travelling around the world for 6 months – their companies just gave them the time off. Sure beat’s America’s 2 weeks off, but then how does anything get done with 6 months off? There were a lot of Dutch people, two newlyweds from America, and some Canadians. I mostly hung out with Johan and Alex, the other two people travelling alone. I met Johan at dinner at my hotel. He said hi, but didn’t speak after that. The whole first day on the boat he barely spoke. Then the next day he started talking. Turns out he was sick before and was just trying to make it through the day. Alex became my dinner buddy and we tried most of the restraunts in this little town. I use the word “town” lightly. I keep secretly (somewhat secretly) hoping I will meet my next boyfriend while traveling. Oh well, not yet. It was nice to have a couple of other people to pal around with though. Saturday night we went to the local bar. It was packed with locals, backpackers and divers. The big pressing question of the day: is every island town in the world full of nothing but man buns and dreadlocks? Is it the island life or the backpacker life or both that makes men not want to cut their hair?
I took two days off from diving to plan my trip to Australia. One day I did little planning and mostly wandered around trying to find reliable wifi. One place, I could connect, but nothing happened. Another I couldn’t even connect. Another was fine until the electricity went out. It kind of went on like that for most of the day. I spent a lot of time researching tours in Tasmania only to discover that none of the ones I liked left on dates I could go. Finally, after hours of research I decided that trying to go to three places in Australia in 2 weeks was too much. I still can’t do everything even though I keep trying. So now I’m going to Sydney and Cairns. I was able to book all my hotels and flights, but am now brain fried and will have to decided what to do and see in Sydney and Cairns at the last minute.
My third day of diving was nice and relaxing, but of course, the people chemistry on the boat was vastly different. There weren’t as many people. Two older men who didn’t want to talk to anyone and two younger men who were a little friendlier. I still had Alex to talk to and the dive guides I had been diving with before. It was a long day due to boat engine problems. But it was better than sitting in a coffee shop wondering if the wifi would go out. The dives were beautiful. The local bar was not packed on week nights. It has a lovely overlook out to the boats in the bay. There was live music a couple nights and I remember getting this feeling of “home” more than “vacation”. I think the live music and looking over the water reminds me of when I lived in Florida. After growing up in Florida, the beach bar kind of place has never felt like vacation to me. It just feels like weekend.
I had an interesting conversation with Yohan about Europeans and Americans. I had some similar conversations with Alex about this too. Americans are quick to be friendly, talk to strangers, introduce themselves, etc. Most Europeans are not. There was one Dutch guy that wouldn’t talk to me and when he left the bar, he said goodbye to everyone but me. The next night he sat at the bar and talked to me as if the previous night had never happened. Americans find it rude when others are unfriendly or standoffish. And of course, all Americans are not friendly, but those that tend to travel tend to be quick to connect and talk with other travelers. Johan’s response was, “He’s Dutch”. We talked about how the forwardness of Americans is about as uncomfortable to some Europeans as their lack of forwardness is to us. I think this may be part of why we have the reputation of being loud and obnoxious, although most Americans are so loud. So, on the surface, it appears that Americans value connection and Europeans do not. But, I don’t think this is the case. I wonder if Europeans avoid connection until it’s “safe” until they know someone a little better. I wonder if Americans are doing the same exact thing by being overly friendly. Are they avoiding real connection by being too quick to connect shallowly with everyone? Of course this is just generalized and the observation of the moment. I reserve the right to change my opinion later. It is interesting the way we will avoid real contact. You go into any restaurant or bar and the first thing everyone does is get the wifi password so they can “connect” with the world out there, completely withdrawing from the actual world in front of them. I’m guilty of it too. I tried to make quite a conscious effort this week to put the phone away.
My last night here I ate by myself at a taco restaurant. Both Johan and Alex left before me. The food was not great, but I ate there more out of curiosity than the thought that they would get Mexican food right. The bonus was that they had seating on the third floor overlooking the docks. The sunset was wonderful – every shade of hot pink you can think of. Today I went to a higher end hotel where you can pay to use the pool. This is one of the hotels that was booked up when I went to look at hotels. If it had not been booked up, I would have stayed there although it was quite a bit more expensive than the one I did stay at. It was worlds nicer. As much as I didn’t like my hotel, the people were nice, the food was good and they took me to the airport for free.
I took a bus from Tak to Chiang Mai on Wednesday. The people in the Tak bus station were rude again. I’m glad this will be my last Tak bus station experience. While sitting at the bus station, I could see the news on tv. There was coverage of the Loi Krathong cleanup. I’m not sure where the cleanup was happening, but it was heavy equipment pulling buckets and buckets of krathongs out of the water and putting them in trash trucks. Even though the materials are all biodegradable, they aren’t going to degrade for a long time and they are still a massive amount of trash in the water.
I got to Chiang Mai and checked into my hotel then went to By Hand Pizza for my last dinner in Thailand. I had friends that were in Chiang Mai for the festival and they suggested meeting for the parade. Chiang Mai canceled the festival, but it sure didn’t look like it. There were a ton of people lining the road. I found a place near one of the floats and texted my friends where I was. Then the parade started and I discovered I was standing next to a float that wasn’t moving and the parade was happening on the other side of the float. All I could see was the tops of white glittery floats. All the floats were ornate white glittery things with the picture of the King on them. I couldn’t see anything that was happening in between the floats, but I’ll guess it was people dressed all in black. I looked around me and it was 90% tourists, not many Thais at all. This didn’t surprise me, but it just felt wrong. They played the King’s song and no one seemed to notice – how would they – they were all tourists like me. I started crying. This isn’t a Thai festival. It’s a tourist show. This isn’t how I want to spend my last night in Thailand. I couldn’t find my friends and standing in a crowd of people crying and watching a parade I can’t see makes no sense. So, I left to get a massage. I found my friends later. We wandered for a while and then went to a roof top bar. It was a fun bar, but hot and smoky. I didn’t stay long because of the smoke.
Thursday morning, I went and got a healthy breakfast with fresh squeezed juice and a bowl full of healthy granola fruit and other superfood stuff. I tried to find a hotel in Indonesia. The lady at the dive shop had said I shouldn’t book ahead, I could just do it when I got there and it would be cheaper. But that makes me uncomfortable so I thought I would at least look at the options. I wrote down the names of the places I liked.
In the afternoon, I went to the airport. Now I’m traveling with two suitcases. I know I will have to pay extra for the extra suitcase and I’m not looking forward to dragging two through airports, but I don’t see much way around it. It cost me $175 for the extra suitcase. Oh my god I feel violated. It was very confusing that I had to go through the international terminal for a domestic flight to Bangkok. I’m still at the check in desk when my flight should be boarding. The lady said I had plenty of time. I go through immigration and get to the gate and no one is there and there is nothing written on the gate sign. There are a bunch of other confused people on the same flights so I figure I’m in the right place and somehow it will work out. Thailand magic, it does. The flight was delayed so I wasn’t late to the gate. They put stickers on our shirts, put us on a shuttle bus and shuttled us to the domestic flight. Now, I will have less than an hour to make my connection in Bangkok with only a sticker on my shirt to claim I’ve already been through immigration. This would never work in America. I get off the plane and there is a lady holding a sign with the same logo as my sticker. The sign also has two flights written on it with the gate number. One is mine to Jakarta. The sticker gets me easily into the international terminal and I’m at my gate 5 minutes before it boards. Thailand magic.
I remember 10 plus years ago I was sitting in an airport in Taiwan waiting for my connecting flight to somewhere. I had a 6 hour layover and couldn’t leave the airport because I didn’t have a visa. I watched movies and listened to all the flight announcements. I distinctly remembering that I heard flights to Jakarta being announced often. I remember thinking that Jakarta seemed like such a worldly and exotic place, like people more well-traveled than me would go there. It felt like, you haven’t really travelled until you’ve been to Jakarta. I knew nothing about Jakarta. I still know very little about Jakarta. But, I’m going there and even though I will never leave the airport, I feel much more worldly now.
I watched a movie and two Discovery shows on the plane. The Discovery shows were great. Both were about subjects I am naturally interested in and I felt like they were reminders to me of what I need to be doing. One was called “Predict My Future”. It was about an on-going study called the Dunedin Study. They have followed a group of 1,000 people since childhood and kept extensive medical, psychological and sociological records on them over the years. The study group is in their 40s now. A lot of what they discussed is how our childhood shaped our adulthood. It didn’t go into the spiritual side of things, but I bet there is data on that as well. They barely scratched the surface on the amount of data collected, research done and learning gained from this study. As I watch it, all I can think of is ATP. It’s time to make the transition into doing ATP for a living. I have no idea what that looks like, though. By the end of it, I’m crying. The other documentary was about how horrible sugar is. Duh, don’t need to convince me. But, I liked the way it presented the information simply. It’s also time to get back to eating healthy. That documentary was called “Is Sugar the New Fat?”.
Jakarta had the fastest immigration ever. There were no lines and I was through in under 3 minutes. I found the airport hotel pretty easily. The staff was very nice. The rooms are above the terminal so I heard ding ding ding for hours as announcements were being made below me. The lady at the dive shop that I’ve been emailing told me hotels were easy to find and cheaper in person so I didn’t need to book one ahead of time. I thought I’d try this because I was pressed for time and because why not wing it and see what happens. I looked at some of the hotels on line a couple nights ago and found a couple that looked ok. By the time I got to Jakarta I was not ok with winging it. I don’t have a place to stay, I don’t have a plan and I’m not happy about it. My whole body is tight, not that it wasn’t already, but this has definitely added to it. I stayed up late looking at hotels. The two I liked were already booked. Literally every other one on line either had horrible reviews or was over $150 per night. I contacted two, one through their own website and another through airb&b, gave up and went to bed. Thank god the ding ding ding had finished for the evening.
I got up early and looked at my emails. I guess when I had hit the button that said “make booking inquiry” I had really made a booking through airb&b. I was just trying to ask some questions and was going to book one of the two places this morning. So, I guess I inadvertently made a decision. There were several emails back and forth as I was getting packed up. Some didn’t quite make sense, but I figured I’d work it out when I got there. I figured I just had to go downstairs to check in, but left extra time for dealing with the possibility of extra suitcase drama. Wow – so glad I left extra time. I was in Terminal 2 and my flight was leaving from Terminal 3. The hotel had a free shuttle and everyone was very helpful. Terminal 3 is really far away. It took over 15 minutes of drive time. Terminal 3 is a big bright shiny new terminal – very worldly indeed. I only had to pay $25 for the extra bag this time. That’s more reasonable. Right before I got on the plane I figured out why the hotel emails were weird. I was emailing both hotels thinking it was only one. I almost had booked two hotels. The guy at the other hotel was not too happy about my mixup. I got to Labuan Bajo just fine. The guy picking me up from the airport was late so I had to deal with pushy taxi drivers for a while. No matter how many times I told them someone was picking me up, they kept wanting to know where I was going, who I was waiting for, what’s my name. If you were the person picking me up, you would know that. I finally told one where I was staying and that someone was picking me up. He actually called the hotel and put me on the phone. The hotel is asking why I called. I didn’t call you, the taxi driver thinks I’m stupid and that he’s going to harass me into his taxi. My ride finally came. Labuan Bajo is not worldly. It makes rural Thailand look worldly. It reminds me of the rural parts of Bali where there is one tiny broke down road in town. The road is lined with small hotels and scuba shops with 8 or 9 restaurants and some shops. I can see why all the hotels had such bad reviews. Nothing in this town is up to western standards. My room is ok. It is real basic. It has wifi that doesn’t really work, air conditioning that doesn’t really work, hot water for 1.5 minutes, a lot of stairs, a decent restaurant and a very loud water pump behind my room that squeals every few seconds. It’s costing me $41 per night and is probably worth $8. But judging from some of the other places I walked by, I’m doing good. Every hotel review I read complained about the 4:30am wake up call from the nearby mosque. I already heard the evening call to prayer and it is insanely loud so there will be no escaping 4:30am.
Today I did not want to get up. I almost missed the free breakfast at the hotel. I was supposed to get up and take a bus to the bus stop near Sam Ngao. Then Noi would pick me up and take me to school. She didn’t have any classes until 11:00am. I missed that. I guess I don’t really want to go to school. I guess that makes sense since I didn’t really want to go to school when I lived there either. I also didn’t want to deal with getting a bus at the Tak bus station since I had such an unpleasant time last time I tried to get a bus out of there. Eventually I made a new plan. I took the bust to the highway bus stop and Ging picked me up and took me to her new coffee shop. She looks so happy. I spent a couple hours with Ging and Tip there.
Then Tip took me to school. I got to see some of the students, but not as many as I would have liked. I got to see very few of the teachers. A lot of teachers had left for a seminar? Some of the students were making flowers out of ribbon and they helped me make one. Pat explained that you but coins in them and then give them to the boys who are just starting out as monks. I met the new western teachers. Apparently there was some issue with Robin so he is gone and there is a young Filipino woman teaching math and science now. Noi asked them if they wanted to join us for Loi Krathong and they said yes.
Noi really wanted to go to Sukohthai instead of Tak. If she is ok driving – it will be a late night for her, then it’s fine with me. I imagine it’s real pretty since it’s held at the historical park. It was real beautiful. There were so many people it was sometimes difficult to walk. There was no rhyme or reason to the floating of the krathongs, just put them in a lake when and where you wanted. There didn’t seem to be a program either, just food stalls, krathong sellers, people selling other stuff and lots of people taking pictures. The only time everyone seemed on the same page was when they played the King’s song. Everyone stopped what they were doing and stood still. We wandered around, took pictures, ate food and floated krathongs. If you make a wish before you float it, that wish will come true. Since it’s a super moon, the wish is definitely going to come true. I used the krathong that the hotel in Tak gave me. The wick on it was a rope. Within seconds, the krathong became the the floating sun. I could barely hold it long enough to smile for a picture and get it in the water. It might still be lit tomorrow morning. If the krathong didn’t kill me, the pork balls tried to. Once again, too spicy, tried to make my lips bleed. One of the vendors was selling bags of fish, frogs, and turtles. You can buy the bag and release them into one of the ponds. Since you saved their lives, you will get good luck, merit and a long life in return. What? They wouldn’t need saving if someone hadn’t taken them out of a pond to sell so you could save them.
Overall, it was a very beautiful night!
(c) All rights reserved Kimberly Fiore
The bus is trying to be prettyBut it’s all broke downAt Ging’s new coffee shopCoffee shop kitchenSukohthai Historical ParkKrathongs for sale
I went to the Mae Sot bus station, got rushed onto bus that was just leaving with not ticket. This pissed off bus attendant lady. Why didn’t I have a ticket. How was I supposed to know what seat was mine? As she passed out the snacks, she purposefully skipped me. Once again I think about how everyone is constantly telling me that Thai people are the nicest people on the planet. I think they are just like all people on the planet, some are nice and some are not.
My hotel in Tak is nice. I spent most of my time on the computer trying to plan where I’m going in a couple days. Final decision – Indonesia – Flores Island for some diving and a day trip to Komodo Island.
Friday night, Noi came up to Tak to have dinner. She brought Pim with her. Pim wanted to go have Korean BBQ. Noi asked if I had ever had Korean BBQ before and seemed quite surprised when I said I had. She still doesn’t quite understand how big and culturally diverse America is. I think I can honestly say not one restaurant I’ve eaten in in Thailand would pass a US health inspection. This one was right up there. They put charcoal in the table, added a grill thing on top and gave you a teapot of a brownish liquid. I’m not sure if the liquid was water or oil. I’m hoping it was oil. You poured the oil in the bottom part of the grill thing and that became like a hot pot. Instead of ordering what you want to put on the bbq, you went up to a salad bar like thing. There were vats of raw meat and vats of veggies and vats of mystery food. You grabbed a basket and loaded it with what you wanted and went back to your table to cook. It was tasty. I didn’t get sick. I have hardly gotten sick here. After dinner we went to the river to walk on the bridge. Noi was on a roll and was just cracking jokes and heckling kids. Pim was doubled over laughing. I sure am going to miss both of them.
I have too much stuff. I decided to mail some more home. I dragged a bag full of it to the post office just to find the post office closed at noon and it was 1:00. When I got back to the hotel, the staff helped me find a box to put it all in. The next day I carried the heavy box back to the post office and managed to get it sent off all by myself! Hooray – small victory. I will probably make it back to the US before it will. So, if anyone wants to wear panda hats and play Mahjong with me, you’ll have to wait until February or March.
Saturday night I had dinner with Tip, her husband and kids, her mom and sister, Ging, Ton (the student that attended my monk classes) and a Russian lady. The Russian lady is Fai’s English tutor on weekends. I was excited to meet her until 5 minutes in when I realized she was going to talk my ear off to the point where I didn’t get to talk to my friends. She wouldn’t stop talking and she is not a happy person. After dinner everyone went home and I went to the river to see if any Loi Krathong activities were happening. They had the street blocked off and bleachers set up along the street. There were students sitting in the street forming words. I have seen this a lot (like every 15 minutes) on tv. People are forming words, or the King’s symbol or hearts or combinations and then taking photos. It’s kind of like mourning flash mob. Once again, it’s such an interesting thing to see nothing but black (and some white) clothing. It felt weird in the airport, but it was even more apparent here. Even the street vendors and shops have nothing but black. Everyone was in the bleachers or sitting on the sidewalk or standing, waiting for something. So I found a spot and waited too. Tip’s mom was there, saw me and handed me a candle. As quickly as I saw her, she was gone. Ok, now I’m a participant. I have a candle. Then groups of students started walking down the street like a parade. They had banners in front of each different group and the student all carried krathongs. A krathong is a floaty thing to float candles down the river. It might be a coconut shell or something made out of banana leaves. They are decorated with flowers or other beautiful natural materials. I saw some made of ice cream cones. Some were plain and some were elaborate, made to look like ducks or swans. There was a giant krathong on a flatbed trailer that came down the street too, but other than that it was just students, thousands of them. I saw no one from Sam Ngao, but I ran into Kru O. She’s the lady I met at the retiree’s ceremony a couple months ago. She introduced me to her husband and daughters. Kru O told me there were close to 5,000 students. More standing around, then we all lit t he candles, then singing, then standing around, more singing. Kru O gave me her krathong to float. I need to put fingernails or hair and 1 baht in the krathong, make a wish and put it in the river. The sight of 7,000 krathongs floating down the river at once was one I looked forward to. It was more like a line of krathongs flying down the bank of the river with maybe one in 50 still lit. It was still impressive to see, but not photo worthy. I didn’t see the giant krathong go. Not sure if did. I think they should set the whole thing on fire. It would be a floating bon fire.
Sunday night I went to the river again to see what might be going on. There was a decent sized market. There were people standing around with candles. There were announcements and singing. There was one group of students in the street. It was like a mini mini version of the night before. In the pavilion there were many giant krathongs on display. Tomorrow night is the actual full moon and main night of the festival. I’m curious what it will be like.
(c)All rights reserved Kimberly Fiore
Horse statue at hotel
Korean BBQKorean BBQ with Noi and Pim
Noi and Pim on phonesForming letters in the streetGiant krathongKru O and her husbandLighting candles
Banana leaf krathong
Last roti sai mai
Have an Awake 2016
This is a waffle with bananas, chocolate chips and caramel More giant krathongs
It was party time again at the Bamboo House. This is the third night in a row I got about 4 hours sleep. I should have changed hotels. I should have known that just because the hotel said the kids would be respectful didn’t mean they would. I no longer can function at this point. A minivan comes to get me to take me to Bangkok. I don’t really want to go by minivan. I have to pay for two seats because of my suitcase. But, still, if I had taken a bus it would have cost about the same amount for a taxi to the bus station and the bus. The minivan does not belong to some company that owns a fleet of minivans. This is definitely a case of “my uncle has a minivan….”. We get into the main part of town and the minivan driver stops, takes my suitcase out and puts it on the side of the road and tells me “out”. In the back of my head I know it’s ok, but I am not equipped with enough sleep to handle anything so I just start crying as he’s talking to some woman across the street standing with more people and suitcases than can fit in the minivan. How is this going to logistically work and why do I have to get out to make room for these people? The lady rushes over and tells me not to cry, it’s ok. Then they put me back on the van and we leave the other people standing there. I have no idea why I’m crying and still after all this time I have no idea how transportation works in this country. I wonder why all this “poor me” stuff is coming up. Once again, I’ve worked on this for so long and here it is again. I feel like I’m doing well trusting that everything in life will unfold just fine and then I feel like I’ve just gone backwards in time. The only thing I can do is just cry and notice that I’m feeling scared and uncomfortable and wait for it to change. It always changes. When we get to Bangkok, the van stops at a gas station and the driver says “Mo Chit”, the name of the bus station I want to go to. So, now my suitcase and I are back out and he takes me to another van. This van is more ghetto than the last. This time I didn’t cry. That van took me to Mo Chit. I was dropped on the side of the road with a few other people. Good thing I didn’t actually want to take a bus because I couldn’t see a bus station anywhere. There were a couple taxis and that’s what I needed so it didn’t matter that Bangkok’s largest bus station had gone missing. I told the taxi driver I wanted to go to Don Mueng airport. He kept asking me. I must have said Don Mueng 4 times. Then he called an English speaking friend so she could talk to me and double check. Yes, still Don Mueng.
Then a lot of time in the airport because I was early. Again, I’m in awe of how strange it is to see everyone in black. There’s no color anywhere. I see on Facebook all the fear Americans are having right now. There is so much fear and hatred, hatred coming from those that are complaining that Trump and Republican are about hatred. I see no posts from Trump supporters. Either they are keeping quiet, Facebook is choosing not to show me those posts, or all my friends are Democrats. It makes me sad to see so much fear and speculation about how horrible it is going to be. The actual truth is we don’t know. I want to stop looking at Facebook because all I see is unnecessary hysteria that helps create the separation that they are scared of. I want to scream at everyone and tell them to calm the fuck down. Oh, is this the real reason I’m crying so much? Is this why I’m feeling scared? I haven’t moved backwards at all. I’m feeling America. Damn it America, stop it, I’m on vacation here.
My airplane to Mae Sot was uneventful. I got to see the smallest snack ever made. The water bottle was so small that it took two sips to drink. But that’s ok because the bun in the snack box was no bigger than an inch in diameter. So, not much water was needed to wash that down. There was literally more packaging than snack. I had a wonderful taxi driver from the Mae Sot airport to my hotel. He talked my ear off the whole way. I stayed at the Hop Inn. It actually has a comfortable soft bed. This is the first soft bed I have experienced in Thailand. I got to eat dinner at my favorite café in Mae Sot – the one I took a cooking class at a long time ago. I love Mae Sot!!!
(c) All rights reserved Kimberly Fiore
This door is why there were so many bugs in my roomBanana Roti with White Chocolate and Ice Cream, WhoaThe River KwaeCool Garden Restaurant in Kanchanaburi
I have heard nothing but amazing things about Kanchanaburi. I say meh.
I took benedryl my first night here to help me sleep through the party next door. I woke up to an ant infestation. I tried to explain to the staff that there were ants in my room. No one spoke English so I had trouble knowing if they understood my concern or not. I tried using google translate, but I never know if it worked or not since google apparently knows only a few more words in Thai than I do.
I did a tour yesterday. First we went to the bridge. I didn’t need to pay a tour guide for that since I just walked there the day before. Oh well. There were 6 other people on the tour. They were not friendly at all. I tried to make conversation, but it was painful. I miss my tour group from China. Everyone on that trip was fun, interesting and friendly. Of course, we spent 2 weeks together so that helped. This is just one day. After the bridge we went to the Erawan Waterfall which is why I booked this tour. It has seven levels. It takes an hour (took me longer) to hike to the top waterfall. It was so humid, my face was sweating. I enjoyed the exercise though. Half way up I was so hot, I wished I had brought my bathing suit. I didn’t because I thought I would just wade in the water and not actually swim. They had told us that we could enjoy the fish massage at the waterfall. Fish spa is where you put your feet in a fish tank and the fish eat the dead skin off your feet. I assumed this is what they meant by fish massage. I finally got to the top waterfall and was so excited to get in the water. I wasn’t even in to my knees before fish started biting my feet. These weren’t the tiny fish I had seen in the fish spas. Some were 6 inches long. Others were over a foot long. I screamed like a little girl. I am now torn between being so hot that I just want to be immersed in water and wanting to be as far away from the water as possible. The fish won. I decided that swimming was not an option and was quite fine not having my bathing suit. I could stand where the water was going over a rock and be fish free. I splashed water on myself to cool down. Overall, the waterfalls were very beautiful and I enjoyed sitting with my feet in fish free zones watching and listening to the water. After the waterfall, we went to ride a train on the death railway. We waited about 50 minutes for the train. While we waited, we could go see the cave near the train station. There’s a Buddha statue in the cave, of course. We rode the train for a half hour. If you are ever in Kanchanaburi, you can skip the train.
Last night I tried to rent a bicycle since my hotel was advertising bicycles for rent. No. No bicycles. But…..I can see them……they are right there. The lady typed into google translate – All broke. Really? 10 broken bicycles? Ok, walking is good exercise too. After dinner it was more party next door. I tried to get help, but no one spoke English. Finally, tired from lack of sleep and just frustrated I slammed my door and cried. I’m sure everyone could hear me crying because Thailand doesn’t believe in insulation or proper building materials. That actually put an end to the party. I should have cried hours ago. I tried to change rooms today, but there are no more rooms. They promised the kids would be quiet tonight. I thought about changing hotels, but I’m too tired and that sounds like a lot of work. Breakfast at this hotel is weird. It’s not a buffet and I don’t get to chose what I want. They just make it when I appear. Yesterday it was fried eggs, hot dogs and fruit. I didn’t eat the hot dogs. This morning it was fried eggs, french fries and fruit. Bless their hearts, they are trying. French fries are better than hot dogs.
I spent most of the day at a coffee shop and a restaurant trying to figure out what I’m doing after the 15th when I have no more plans. People don’t just sit around in coffee shops here so it was uncomfortable after an hour or so when they kept staring at me, but I stayed anyway. It was kind of like the coffee shop in Sam Ngao where the entire menu was different forms of sugar. The restaurant I went to was wonderful. It had a great garden out back. They put a fan on for me and they didn’t seem uncomfortable having me hang out for awhile. They have a free taxi service and offered to take me back to my hotel or pick me up later if I wanted to come back for dinner. I narrowed down the list of possible places to go after the 15th. I was leaning toward Fiji until I looked up flights. It would cost more and take longer to go to Fiji than to go back to America. That was the point where I gave up. I will have to search smarter later as I’m sure it’s possible for way cheaper. I think sites like Expedia assume I’m American and give me American prices. If I search through the airlines that fly to Fiji, I bet I’ll get a better deal.
Trump will be our new president. I really do not understand how this happened. How can over half our nation think he would make a good leader? You only have to listen to him for 5 minutes to see he has no idea what he’s talking about. Yet, half our nation doesn’t see this. What am I missing? So much of the world is living in fear. Fear breeds anger and hatred. Then add ignorance. This feeds the fear and it becomes a never ending circle. I think much of the world is caught in this circle, especially America and they have no idea. It’s the fault of the republicans, the Muslims, the black people, the Christians, the rich people, the Mexicans, – whoever is over there. Everyone is so busy pointing that no one realizes they are on the merry-go-round and they could just hop off. How am I supposed to support people to wake up when I’m standing next to the merry-go-round offering help, but no one hears me? (I know, my new magic tattoo.) How am I supposed to help people wake up when I keep finding myself back on the merry-go-round myself? I don’t know how I got there, but there I am. Last night my issue got resolved by slamming doors and crying – on the merry-go-round. Then I jump off. Oh, crap, how’d I get here again. Jump off. On. Off. In the past some of my best learning experiences came from me getting so worked up, creating drama and destruction everywhere I went, total meltdown or blowout and only then could I see the absurdity in it all. I had to take it to the extreme to see that what I believed wasn’t true, who I thought I was wasn’t true. After that, I can never go back to the old beliefs, but it was a messy uncomfortable process to get to the truth. So, as much as I think Trump was the wrong decision, I wonder, does it have to be like this? Do other people learn this way too? Does it have to be chaos before we will open our eyes and say “what am I doing – this is not true”? Are we doing that as a country? Does it need to be horrible before people will see how ridiculous our thinking has become? Then I also question, will it actually be horrible or will American life go on as it always has? Or, maybe I have no idea what I’m talking about….
I challenge you:
Ask yourself – are you on the merry-go-round? If so, are you having fun? If not, why not jump off?
How many times do you point the finger and blame someone else in a day?
See if you can make it through one week without turning on the news on tv. Then turn it on and see if you can feel how the news propagates fear.
Rraine Drops 