Thailand. The land of smiles

During this entire time, I have really been wanting to go to Thailand. Why you may ask? Well ask anyone who has been here. It's a beautiful place with wonderful people. Sure you get some scamming schmucks once and a while, but that usually in Bangkok. It's a major metropolitan, of course there are gonna be some, but what major city doesn't have them?

We started our journey there, in Bangkok. After arriving to the airport and catching a taxi from departures (no taxi fee!), we headed to Phaya Thaisky train station. Our driver was kind enough to drop us off right on front of the road we needed, not just the station. We would have been completely lost if he hadn't. So we walked down the road and looking like two lost backpackers (again) some woman laughed when she saw us and told us "go that way, turn left, you will see it." Obviously we weren't the first lost looking backpackers to be seen in these parts.

We found our hostel relatively quickly after and were greeted warmly by a very enthusiastic Thai girl named Geng. She helps run the place. She showed us the place (it's 3 floors. A bottom common room, toilets/showers rooms, and a fridge; middle is the sleeping room (10beds total), third has her room and the volunteers rooms plus a small outdoor patio).

We put our bags down and realized we were starving. A girl named Shannon was there and said she would show us food street and we could find food there. And boy did we find food! Stalls with fried corn balls, vegetarian galore, curries, BBQ meats, green papaya salad and more! Tom and I realized we hit the jackpot, big time.

We found a place that had food spread out, so we could see what she had, for 30 baht (about 1 USD) we had a full portion of rice and green curry. The food was so good that Tom and I came back later at the end of the night to get more food! And if you become a regular or if someone remembers you, expect to be treated well, our plates this tine around was 25 baht.

**Fast forward**

Just a side note, everything in Thailand is reliant on faith. I know people who don't believe in faith, but when you hand someone a ticket, you hope that they will bring you to the right place. You need faith when the taxi looks full and people are standing off the end that you won't die during your ride. Just now, a taxi was "full" so this couple did not want to get on. There would be no more taxis for the next hour but they said they would wait. With some shifting around, they both ending up joining the taxi and they were sitting. Sure the taxi was sinking in the back, almost dragging on the ground but these taxi drivers know why their doing and how many people it can hold. My ride was 2 seconds to the end of the pier since my minibus was there, but, still, you have to have a little faith.

China part 3- Hong Kong and Macau

I was pretty excited to go to Hong Kong, we decided to do a little splurging and stay at a hotel on the beach. It was a big room, a grand view of the water and a comfy bed and out own shower! Oh and did I mention there was also a large swimming pool?

The arrival to the airport was a breeze and when we made it through, a gentleman in a suit greeted us in perfect English and asked which hotel we were staying at. Unsure of how to respond, ( we were used to scams by now in China) the man whipped out an iPad and started looking at all the hotels. We told him ours the gold coast, and he told us that although there is no direct route the easiest is to get to the bus station and pick up our shuttle there. He gave us some maps and sent us to the main express train queue. We bought our tickets using a credit card and realized we needed to exchange money. We asked the guy again and he told us that there was a exchange center through the doors. Ge also told us in case we miss our shuttle which bus to take.

When we went to exchange our money, the woman told us that she didn't take commisson and that she could exchange Czech money! I was so excited! I had a lot left over, so I quickly pulled it out. We then asked about Mongolian dollars and she was confused that theydidnt take RMBs, but they did not. She was also confused that Beijing couldn't exchange them either. We told her we were too.

But we got to our hotel via train and bus, and well it was super nice.

There was a shuttle to the main city from our hotel that left every hour, it was about 35 hkd or about 5usd one way. And it was usually a nice shuttle bus too. Once we had an older one, but compared to the bus we had to get from the train station to the hotel, it was still nicer.

Hong Kong city is a busy place filled with lots of people, hawkers, and fancy shopping areas, like Dolce & Gabbana, Coach, Prada etc on every rd. I bought some clothes at H&M, a cheaper fashion store.

We went to the river one night when they were doing an organized light show on the building to music. It was really remarkable and impressed many people. During our time there, we also took the tram up to Victoria peak, visited the Walk of Stars and relaxed.

We had dinner with one of Tom's old business worker and his friend and did we feast! We had a hot pot with spicy and clear broth and so much freaking food! It was so delicious and we were super full! Afterwards, we found a small store/shop where we had dessert- gelatinous turtle shell. You add a bit of honey on top and it was sweet, earthy, pungent, and a bit bitter. My stomach was overwhelmed but we survived.

Hong Kong was expensive though and we burned holes in our pickets without even knowing it. Dinner would usually end up 100 usd for both of us- including one night when we had 4 beers, fries, onion rings, wings, and a Caesar salad. And with guesthouses being expensive and in noisy locations, we opted for another hotel, closer in the city, to stay at. It was wonderful though, called the Mini Hotel, it was a tall building but with only 3 rooms to a floor. The rooms were large considering where we were. But you could tell we were in a nice area as the Bently car shop was across the street from us.

We also visited the botanical/zoological garden which had monkeys and birds, alligators and herbs all around the park. We also saw the big Buddha which was another tram ride to a different part of the area. It was really cool as you could see on the side of the mountains were grave sites.

There was also a giant freaking spider that was eating a butterfly. When we came back 45 minutes later it was eaten. Gahhhhhhhh! Gross.

We took the ferry to Macau, an hour by speedboat. We waited for our shuttle for about 45 minutes- as we had just missed the previous one- and got to our next hotel. It wasn't the cleanest, but it got the job done. We walked around, ate egg tarts, drank cheap portugese wine, saw a broken down cathedral, watched live international music, got drunk with phillipininos, walked around some more and of course gambled. I lost all my money, but Tom was winning, then losing, then he won again! Needless to say he bought dinner that night.

But that's all I'm gonna write about for these two places. We spent a LOT of money, but enjoyed ourselves. I really liked Hong Kong and wouldn't mind trying to get an expat job there. :)

Next up Thailand, the land of smiles!

China pt 2: Shanghai and cheap eats and jewelry

We took one of the bullet trains from Beijing to Shanghai, in business class as the economy seats were all full from everyone going home from National Day week holiday. But we got a free lunch pack, which included some tasty and interesting things. One was some peanuts, a rice crispy treat but not, and dried spicy fish which were actually pretty good! They had a speedometer which told us our exact speed which was 306km/hr or 307. Either way, we were zooming past everything!

Getting off the train in Shanghai was much easier that in Beijing and people there knew English! It might make me sound like a stupid, ignorant American, but getting help in a language you know is much easier than trying to mime it out to someone who doesn't.

We again got off the subway fine, but we managed to get lost, yet again. Even asking for directions multiple times. We ended up going to a hotel to see if they knew, and the guy at reception told us the info we had wasn't Chinese.... And it was off Tom's tablet from their website. He was kind to us and wrote the adress an name down in Chinese and told us a cab would get us there easily. We walked outside, flagged a cab and showed the driver. Shaking his head, we were lost again as he drove away. Finally, we asked a well dressed Chinese couple and the boyfriend, who knew English, was determined to help us find the spot. After walking another 20 minutes with them, we made it!! We thanked them graciously and he gave his card to Tom.

Rock & Wood hostel is a very new hostel, with outdoor seating, a koi pond, a bar/restaurant and many beds. Our first night we ate there, met a kid named Simon from Cape Town, S. Africa and Raphael from Germany. Tom met some musicians from Costa Rica and I met some young men from China as well.

Tom and Simon went out for some street food that night, and I went to bed early. The street food where they went ended up being our go to food stop, and they gave us some good discounts in the end. It was an open barbecue, and you could choose what you wanted. So they had sticks of raw meats, vegetables, tofu, bread, seafood including squid and whole fishes. It was sooo good! And next to it was a noodle cart where I got lo mein for 5 RMB which is about a buck.

We ate very well, very cheaply there, I don't have photos from it but I'll steal some from Tom.

In Shanghai, we didn't do too much, but we also found the Pearl Market, where they have EVERYTHING YOU NEED CHEAP! Tom and I bought some jewelry, me for my mom, my sister, and myself (2 pair of earrings, one jade, one grey pearls), and Tom bought a really unique pearl pendant for his mom. The woman was SaSa I believe and she was very nice, straight forward, and very pregnant. I will definitely go back to her and if any of you go to Shanghai, buy jewelry from her too, she's the best.

We also walked around their version of Time square and went to the Bund which is a walk along the water. It was really beautiful and they would synchronize the lights on the building with other buildings. Also the wall on the side were covered in flowers. This very English influenced city also had many old European styled building as well, and with the contrast of the modern and the old style Chinese buildings, it was quite unique.

The only day we got up early to explore was when we went to see the World Expo from 2010. And unlike the Olympic area in Beijing from 2008, this place was a ghost town. Seriously creepy. Everything was gated or fenced up, grass and weeds were over running plots of old parking lots and even construction crews were snoozing. It was the only place in Shanghai where you could cross the street without having to look either way. We walked around, found the Polish building and left. We also triend to get into an art museum that was the only thing that looked alive but it was closed that day to the public.

On the other side of the river is the Chinese building which they are making into "the Tate of China" but that won't be til 2014.

I think that my favorite parts of China was actually the ROCs- Hong Kong and Macau.

China Pt 1-Being a real life celebrity in Beijing

Getting off the train was a breeze. Finding a bank to get some RMBs to get onto the metro was almost impossible. We spent a solid hour walking around teh busy station area (which included a bank that was under construction so the ATMs had no money and a few other cash machines out of money) until we found one in the main ticket area that had 2 working ATMs, out of 4. Also it didn't help that very few people know English.

Navigating the metro was easy, due to Beijing 2008 Olympics, but we ended up spending another 40 minutes trying to find our hostel! We finally asked three girls if they could help us and luckily they didn't try to scam us, but they did giggle a lot and had funny work uniforms on. They got us to the hostel (as the directions on the hostel websites are wrong) and we thanked them.

When we got to the hostel, they told us there was a mix up in our booking (even though I emailed them a few days before to confirm and we made reservations WAYYYY in advance), so we couldn't stay there, but they had spaces available for us at a neighbor guest house. So after walking another 15 minutes, we got to the next place (9 Dragon House). There was one other kid in the room when we walked in. His name was Rob and he was touring Asia as well. He was 2 weeks in, and started in Hong Kong and worked his way North and then he was going West and back South. Tom and I decided to go to Ti amen Square that evening to see what the festivites were for National Day.

Holy Shit. It was fracking busy. I would say that there was a bazillion people there and it would only be a half lie, as all the international tourists were ther PLUS the national tourist. Think of Washington D.C on the Fourth of July, or Paris on July 14th or Lewes on Guy Fawkes day. CRAZYYYYYYYYYY!

What was crazier though was that people were looking at us and "secretly" taking photos of us. When we started to look around, we realized that we were some of the few non Chinese people there. Intrigued, we continued "walking," took photos with chairman mao, and then some older woman asked Tom and I if I could have my photo taken with her daughter. Of course I said yes an she and Tom snapped some pictures. Now, unless you're a celebrity, you might not know what it's like, but its weird. Its weird being in a place where you are a complete minority and then people want their picture with you. For some, it might have been their first time seeing a tall, white man with a big beard or an Indian girl. We had our photos taking a few (like 15) more times in total during our time in Beijing.

The same thing happened the next day with our friend Rob when we all went to the summer palace, but we also had some girls from S Korea take photos of us as well. Rob hadn't believed us when we had told him that morning but he laughed and was a bit unnerved as well. I kept telling him that he should pretend he's a famous photographer! As I was pretending I was an actress.

That night we went to the Olympic center and unlike some of the old ones, this one was still booming and looking good. We got some more pictures taken with tourists but we couldn't go inside because of a Chinese opera going on. It wa definitely a high light.

The Great Wall is just an Alright wall, as again, it was super busy! Along with every tourist spot we went too.

The food there was great! Some things a little over priced, but otherwise, rob, Tom and I had some pretty good meals! And we had some cut Peking duck which was salty, fatty, and crispy.

Beijing was more uneventful for me, this isn't to say not to go, but just don't go during the busy times and maybe know some Chinese as well.

Train number 4. Again.

Sorry for the delay on posts. I had a few done on my iPod, but the internet isn't working on it. So I will be re-writing them for your convenience :)

Going back on the train again was a breeze. Tom and I had our ramen noodle soups, some hot chocolate, and knew how to pack our things in our small packs and the rest in the large ones. This time around, we were staying with two guys; one from Germany and one from Croatia, but they both worked in Germany. Having them be the 2nd and 3rd engineers from Germany made it clear to Tom (and myself) that the USA rips off people vacation wise. Germans get around 42 days of vacation a year, the approximate amount if you work 5 days a week, every other week. They were really nice to talk to, (the German slept for most of the trip), but the Croatian had gone through the Yugoslavian war, but it also meant that he spoke Yugoslavian, English, German and Spanish! As he was married to a woman from Spain. Pretty much he made me feel stupid for only knowing French (and not very well at that).

The trip was uneventful. The Mongolian boarder patrol were very nice again, and the Chinese were an in-between of the Russian and Mongolian, not mean but not kind- just strict. The only eventful thing that occured was that I thre up at the Chinese boarder due to my soup - which had too much msg for my body's liking. They closed the toilets at the time, but I was able to grab a bag and make it to the in-between part of the train. The Chinese conductors were very nice and gave me a cup to drink some hot water for my belly. At the boarder, they also gave us free meal tickets for the train the next day, breakfast and lunch.

I was sleep during the free breakfast the next morning, but the boys took advantage of my meal ticket and received an extra egg and something else. tom brought back the bread and jam for me. Lunch was only two hours later, so I didn't mind missing it. By lunch time, I was hungry again.

Lunch consisted of sauteed cabbage with ham, pork meatballs withs auce, and rice. For a free lunch it was pretty decent. We first sat with a guy from Israel, whom we chatted with for a bit, but he was almost done when we sat down and with the full car, he left a bit after he was done. Next two Germans sat with us, and when they recieved their food they were asking in German to themselves if they can get forks and how do they use the chopsticks. Tom being the multi-lingual man he is answered in English that it wasn't too hard and showed them. We chatted with them a bit (they did the full trip from Moscow), but we went back to our car to pack up so we didn't forget anything.

It was when we got to China when things got interesting.

Train tips continued:

Tip 7.
Stomach medicine.
You eat a lot of new and different things while traveling, especially on the road. Thankfully, I brought some Imodium with me, but some Tums would have been nice as well, and they provide calcium which you don't get a lot of during traveling, especially in Russia, when you're getting off and eating the ladies foods, you don't know what in it and you don't want to get stuck at a stop and you need to go number 2.

Tip 8.
Know some polite words in the native language. I had written a few words down while in Russia for China and it was only three I could remember. I will write them here phonetically as i cannot recall how to spell them and also you will know how to say them too. Shea shea-thank you. Knee how- Hello. Gambay- bottom's up (finish your drink). knowing thank you was helpful, especially when the conductors helped me when I was sick.

Tip 9.
Be open to meeting new people.
The train is a great way to socialize and network. I didn't network as well as I could have, but I think from all the itching I had, I was self conscious. It's weird to talk to someone who is always scratching or has bumps all over them. I know I would be cautious: pthey could have fleas, bed bugs, or spreadable poison oak or ivy. It's like when people cough a lot, you want to be friendly to them, but you don't want their germs. I was still friendly though, even when I didn't feel like it. Tom was a life saver, and was socializing with everyone. I could par-take in some of the conversation and then leave if I wanted and I didn't feel bad.

So the train trip is over. When we arrived in Beijing, it was Oct 1st, National Day, which is up next.

Fast Forward a month....

I am soooooooo sorry that I have been so shitty at updating this blog. I am trying my hardest to get posts up, and making more of an effort since learning that some of my international friends are reading as well (I love you Mom, but I feel like you are required to read this :D)

But I wanted to give everyone a quick update of what's going on now, at the present, not from Oct 1st.

Tom and I arrived in Bangkok, Thailand yesterday and we are staying Siam Journey Guesthouse. It has ten beds, a small sitting area, some computes and internet. Last night everyone from the house plus some other travelers came over and we hung out, played card games, and drank some beers. Tom and I found some delicious Thai food with the help of a girl named Shannon, who is now currently going to the Islands (Phuket etc). She studies at St. Lawrence but is studying abroad in Chiang Mai. We had a long conversation with her and Elizabeth last night about Vermont. We also met another kid from South Africa, James, who was in the same class (literally, both in Architecture with 60 students in their class) as another kid we had just met in Shanghai. It truly is a small world.

But I must go, Tom and I are going to Chinatown as there is a Vegetarian Festival. I think it will be nice since we have been eating so much meat and heavy things lately.

Mongolia. Day 3. The last day.

Oh I forgot to mention!

That night, as we were getting ready for bed, the owner came into our yurt and apologized for his behavior. He spoke in very good English how he had told the group not to take off their coats or put them on around the horses as it scares them. He then showed us a scar on his arm from when a horse kicked him and he broke his arm. He got angry because her coat scared my horse and he didn't want (or need) me to get injured, especially this far out. He then asked where we were from and told us how he worked and traveled around Asia and Europe. Then he left. I thought it was really nice that he did that. And in the morning we discovered he apologized to the group too and they got a 1.5 liter bottle of Fanta.

Breakfast in the morning was 2 bags of white bread, apple cinammon jam (very tasty and made me miss VT) and TEA! I woke up third, Tom and Korea were already eating. I'm not sure if it was because they were feeling nice or the liked us, but breakfast was a nice change from what we heard.

After we ate, the wife drove us (in their fancy Toyota land cruiser) to turtle rock, and it does kinda look like a turtle. There were all sorts of tourists and people offering horse rides. There was also a camel hanging out! Korea and I petted it and took photos with it and all three of us took photos with the turtle rock. When we got back, our ride back was there, so Tom, myself and the couples headed back to UB guesthouses. When we got back, Tom and I dropped our stuff, repacked and went out in search of food. We walked over an hour and found a Korean restaurant. They spoke no English (and us no Mongolian) so we randomly picked some stuff, and enjoyed one of the best meals on the trip (this was also before China).

We didn't do much afterwards, just headed back and went to bed early as our train left at 6 the next morning. The guesthouse provided transportation to the train station and with a packed car (Five people, packs and backpacks) we got to the station to begin the last trip on the trans-sierian rail.