packing

My room looks like a bomb went off, which is not a real deviation from standard practice, but gives me anxiety all the same.  I've realized that 3 years of living out of a back pack has given me some strange habits; the one at hand being a deep desire to know that I am all packed up and ready for the next day's adventure.  The problem is that this packing for this departure is a bit more complex than my normal day to day packing and repacking of Poppy (my Osprey waypoint 65L pack).  In the next two weeks I have to brave November in Toronto, the beginnings of the dry season in Costa Rica ( I just checked the weather there: a high of 80 with thunder storms), and then I wrap it all up by moving to Antigua, Guatemala... for a year.
Moving is not my favorite activity, though the prospects of having my own little place where I can grow a basil plant and make coffee and put up photos sounds AMAZING.  Right now I am focusing on those images rather than the overwhelming feeling that thinking about packing brings up. ufff.
Catch you in Guatemala or Chepe or Toronto.

A train of thought:

The loneliness of travel.  a catch-22, which captures me between a home with friends and family whom i love and a life that can't include any of those comforts but is ripe with adventures and discoveries.  To travel is to miss things, we set off and leave our beds, our toilets, our comforts into an unknown.  But by now most of what i encounter isn't an unknown, I have settled into a rhythm, not unlike from that movie, Up in the Air.  I am one of those restless souls, who sometimes looses patience with the need to document every moment digitally, I know the menu, I walk with purpose and direction, rarely with a map.  I hate my arrogance and impatience.  I miss the days of constant new-ness, where getting lost leads to a million new discoveries.  What is left is mostly routine, and yet the loneliness persists.  I am constantly leaving, constantly saying goodbye, creating new friendships with marked shelf lives, 2 days, 3 days, 2 weeks, one month.  I often feel like there is a zen buddhist teacher sitting in a slate kimono repeating an endless koan of, 'let go, let go.'  And it is true, this lifestyle is a lesson, we can't hold on, we are at our essence alone and yet a part of everything.  Beauty can morph quickly into sadness and loneliness, an unshared sunset, a missed joke, a lost story.  And yet beauty, magic, and mystery effuse everything: the discovery of a bright pink wall, grapefruit eaten in a park to the sound of bird song, a taxi driver with a map of where you are going.  I am coming to terms with the gray-ness of everything, in my life there is no longer a good or bad, everything just is. 

dia de las mujeres

Women's day is tomorrow and here in la ciudad de Oaxaca there are sure to be demonstrations in the Zocalo (that's the nick name for Mexico's parque centrals).  I was reminded of this up coming holiday whilst reading a most inspiring post on Rambling Spoon. The post is travel and food writing at its best, illuminating the things that are so easy to overlook and reminding us to give thanks for what we have.
As for Oaxaca, Jesus (not to be confused with THE Jesucristo) my espanish teacher has lots of interesting opinions about the state of women's rights here in Mexico.  I'll be sure to pick his brain and report back on his opnions, the goings on here and my take on all of it.

Happy Oscars.

An interlude in the travel advice...

I'm in Saigon's international airport drinking a $4 (74,000vnd) illy cappuccino while three swallows fly around the curved ceiling of the departures hall, which is paneled with acoustic tiles. Dave says they absorb sound and he is right, as he points out there is no echo in the whole long hall. I figure the $4 accounts for the nice view of the grassy runway which leads planes out of Paris of the East and off to other parts of the world.
We commemorated our last morning in Vietnam with Doner Kebab bahn mi eaten on our way up to have coffee at Highlands coffee (a prevalent coffee chain here). Coffee is a big part of Vietnamese culture, ca phe is drank thick and dark and strong. In fact an ad for instant Vietnamese ca phe showed a guy being punched in the face by his coffee cup, and it can feel just like that. Both Dave and I opt for the slightly less potent ca phe sua, coffee with a 1.5 centimeter or so layer of sweetened condensed milk. Mixed up and over ice it is a nice afternoon kick in the pants.
Most days we've been having a 'nosh.' Come 4 I'm ready for some coffee and Dave, let's be honest is always ready for a beverage. It gives the day a nice rhythm. One afternoon, even after having coffee with my friend from Hue, Mr. Khoa, we still wandered down to the river to have another round.
That's actually been one of the nicest parts of having David here, having the chance to introduce him to some of the people I've worked with over the last 6 months. It was pretty funny to see Khoa (who is just pushing 5 feet) walking on the street next to Dave. Ms. Ha, my tailor-friend in Hoi An also insisted on taking Dave and I to Cao Lau, a famous noodle dish from Hoi An. All the girls from the shop took us over to the market where we squatted on child-sized plastic stools. They all giggled as Dave's knees poked above the table and he housed two servings of the noodles.
Cao Lau is one of my favorite Vietnamese dishes. It consists of square noodles which are a bit soba-like, slices of pork, squares of crackling, and various herbs. You pour both rice vinegar and soy sauce on top and then doctor it with your choice of chile powder, chile paste, pickled chiles and shallots, or lime. It was one of those fantastic moments seeing Dave across the plastic table from me while we sat in the middle of the bustling chaos of a local market.
I have to give David a lot of credit for his stellar traveling skills. I think I had more frustrated moments than he did (especially when we turned around on our way out of Halong Bay to retrieve the forgotten fish). Not many people can hit the ground running in a country like Vietnam; he wasn't phased by much, even when confronted with crossing in front of walls of Vietnamese traffic.

how to give back (and not make things worse) while you travel

To assuage some of that first world guilt we all carry around a lot of people come on my tours and want to 'give back.' I think that this is a great, fantastic, and honorable intention, it just goes wrong so many times. Rather than attacking the tourists for not having a clue and constantly sticking their foot in 'it,' I figure I can write something about how to give back in a good way and maybe one or two of you fair readers will learn something and actually make a difference while you'' are out exploring our fair planet. All of this is based on my experience, and in no way am I claiming to be an 'expert.'
1. Stop giving things to beggars, especially kids.
Hey I know kids are cute, and when they have dirty snotty faces and ask you for food you really really really really want to give them something. It feels really cruel to stand there with your pringles and not give them anything but giving them chips/apples/ a bottle of water is a shitty thing to do. Why? If kids can get food by standing outside a gas station where they know tourist buses stop, they are going to do it. Why sit in school with a growling belly when dumb gringos are going to give you something to eat? One kid turns to three, three to five, and suddenly half the school is out begging and not going to school. If that person isn't a kid, why are they going go get a job if they can survive just fine on handouts? Aid, handouts, gifts, anything that is given with no impetus to improve oneself only hampers, it doesn't encourage development (look at what has happened to all the First Nations in Canada and the US).
2. Don't buy things from kids.
Kids are cute, are you really going to bargain with a 5 year old? Parents are smart, if their kid can make more money than them why are they going to send them to school? Kids who work on the streets are exposed to a lot more dangers as well. Child sex abuses are rampant through many areas of the developing world, when kids are working on the streets they are more exposed to these dangers.
3. Don't volunteer in a place which doesn't require a minimum commitment of time and a background check.
We wouldn't want our kids exposed to just anyone who walked in off the street and wanted to hang out with them, you shouldn't want other people's kids exposed to that either. You should want a place that you volunteer for to care about who has contact with them. Kids are also very sensitive to change, if you can't commit to make a positive difference by volunteering for a longer period of time figure out another way to give back (0ften a monetary donation is the best way to do this). I know that people love the idea of volunteering at orphanages, after-school programs, etc. But the main purpose of volunteering is to improve these kids' lives, not to take cool photos of you with kids, or to make you feel good, right?
4. Buy from fair trade vendors
It costs more because it is fair trade, make sense? If you are on a budget, buy one or two smaller items from a fair trade place. If you have a bit more to spend try and buy the majority of your gifts/souvenirs/etc from fair trade vendors, co-ops, or collectives.
5. Don't buy antique textiles, jewelry, artifacts, shells, coral, bones, etc.
Often times Maya and Hill Tribeswomen will sell their priceless textiles for a pittance to support their families. You take it home and ancient techniques as well as a small chunk of cultural heritage are lost. Unless you are a collector you really won't be that hurt by buying something new. As far as things from the natural world go, unless you really hate the environment you can understand that if everyone goes home with a black coral bracelet from Khao San soon there will be no coral left. Not so different from Ivory, animal skins, etc.
6. Eat somewhere that makes a difference
Asia is full of amazing projects which give back to the local community: Friends, Romdeng, Java (all inPhnom Penh), Starfish Bakery (Sihanoukville), Sala Bai and Chakmar (both inSiem Reap), Makphet (Vientiane), Tamanak Lao (Luang Prabang), Staff of Life (Danang), KOTO and Baguettes y Chocolate (Hanoi), Streets and Blue Dragon (Hoi An).
I'm told there is a similar project in Granada, Nicaragua, I'll have to check it out when I am back.
Full belly, satisfied soul, happy person.
7. Support smaller, locally/family run businesses.
The same reason it makes you feel good to go to your local book shop rather than Barnes and Nobles, staying at a small posada run by a family, or eating at a small cafe will stimulate the local economy and give you a family experience.
8. Give some money
Choose a project that puts a smile on your face, look at their financials and give them some of your hard earned dough. It'll probably a tax write off (not that I even know what that means).
9. Pay a bit more when you go to ride the Elephants
Projects which take better care of their animals usually cost more. Do you know how much it costs to feed an elephant? Plus you don't want to ride a sad elephant. Elephant Conservation Center and Elephant Nature Park (both just outside Chiang Mai) are great projects. Tiger Trails (Luang Prabang) also runs a much more humane operation.

Cool resources: stayanotherday, childsafe, friends international

Happy travels.

sin titulo

Where to begin? I've been trying to work on a blog post the last while but nothing seems to stick. My friend B is traveling through Central America and I read his blog, which just drips with all that fresh travel enthusiasm, add to that his impressive writing skills and I have started to feel like a bit of a farce. On the other hand this blog moved on from being a serious attempt at a travel narrative a long time ago. So what is there to say?
Life has been pretty good lately. I took some time off at the beginning off the month and did a fast at a retreat center in Phuket. It had been quite a while since I had had a vacation from racing around so I was more than pleased to sit in my little villa, read, drink hot water, write in my journal and take about 4 naps a day.
I have also FINALLY found the most kick ass laundry do-ers in Bangkok, just a quick jaunt from the Royal and frenetic Khao San road. It is located on Banana alley, just by the Boots, before you get to Ranee's (mmmmm). Freshie clothes always put a smile on my face. Not only that I have found some lovely places to eat that serve salads which make me feel like I am back in California. SHOCKING! Cafe Corner is my favorite, to get there you follow the boots road over the bridge and take a right on SOI 2, when SOI 2 ends you take a left and it will be right there. Between this place and som tum as well as the juices at Ethos (on the street behind the burger king at the bottom of Khao San) I have been a happy girl. This has put Banglumpu (the general Khao San 'hood) and me on pretty good terms. Which means being in Bangkok feels less and less like a prison scentence and more and more like being in my (like it or not) neighborhood. Is that all it takes to make me happy? Jugo de remolacha (0 betabel para los gueys) and a good lavanderia? I have a feeling some people might be able to relate. My final new discovery was my new THAI salon where I got my haircut (nothing drastic!) which was nice, but the fantastic part was having two Thai ladies blow dry it at the same time. My fancy blow out looked awesome until the monsoon chaos which left most of Rambutri street under about 4 inches of standing water after about 30 minutes of rain and my hair back in its normally wild state. Quite impressive.
What else? I had a delicious snack of these swirly pork (??!!!???) crackers that Meesh and I were a bit obsessed with last September. This was on the way to Kratie where I caught sight of the very endangered Iriwaddy river dolphins. Pretty cool, not unlike seeing whale sharks, but on a sweet long tail boat. Kratie is pretty kick ass, meaning there isn't much to do once you've seen the dolphins, other than playing cards and drinking beer. The place is semi-infested with huge rats, so I find that sitting cross legged in your chair is probably a good practice.
From Kratie I dragged my group north to Laos, which surely deserves its own post. Photos should come as well.

the best place in vietnam

I realized something last night: I have gotten complacent in my travel. Jaded or hardened or whatever you want to call it, but last night snapped me out of it. We were on the SE2 bound for Hanoi, in the plushy Livitrans cart: luxury attached to a howling creaking mess of cars that reek of urine, durian, and sweat all mixed in with stale cigarette smoke. And I have to say something right now, I have gone flash packer because I f---ing hate that part of the train. I hate sleeping on patched dirty mattresses with only a thin sheet between me and god knows what. I hate the cockroaches and the mice and the slimy feeling of everything on the train. I feel like I am caught in some Orwellian nightmare rocking my way through a ghost-like Vietnam cast in misty silhouettes.
Some how one of my passengers convinced me to walk the length of the train to the bar car, through eleven miserable stinking cars just to buy some crap Vietnamese beer. I went because I had this feeling, one that kept coming up: I'm stagnating. I've gotten to used to comfort: air conditioning, tourist food (free brekkie), private transport, I'm getting boring. Vietnamese trains should stink, they should be nasty and freezing cold. I finally said to myself, "I'm not scared of smells, or dirt, I dig this shit. I love the raw wild west chaos that C.A. used to dish out daily and which Vietnam will dish out if I just let it." So off we went, loosing balance, running and shouting, crashing into people's feet, stepping over floor picknicks of ramen, and getting stared at for 11 cars. And we arrived into the most brilliant fuck off bar strapped to the back of this clattering mess of a train. Greasy steel tables crammed between wooden booths, every one filled with 4-6 Vietnamese yelling over tables littered with Heineken cans, balled up pink napkins, cigarette butts, and plates of seafood (side note- train seafood is a terrifying thought). We grabbed the last spot, half a booth with a table covered in bins of silverware and chopsticks and cracked two bia 333 (ba-ba-ba). It was the kind of moment that calls to mind cramming pax on overfull chicken buses (GET ON, WE'RE IN F----ING GUATEMALA!), it is that feeling of being absolutely at home with the clamoring chaos of the world around you.

Train Phở

Across the street from the Ga Nha Trang (Nha Trang train station) is a row of food carts, bánh mi, nước mía, and then 3 phở carts. My favorite is the third, and in my pathetic terrible vietnamese I ask for, "Phở ga." Into a small plastic container go soft rice noodles, young onions sliced longways with most of their tops taken off, little rings of green onions, a squirt of plum sauce, a squirt of sweet chile, a bit of boiled chicken, bean sprouts, and finally, stock. My favorite part of the process is the stock ladeling, the lady swoops the ladel over the top of the steaming pot, scooting the fat, bits of bone and other stock making debris out of the way, then it is one and a half ladels of steaming stock turning the plastic container into a noodle swimming pool. The whole thing is packaged up in a plastic bag with a spoon and wooden chopsticks and back to the train station I run.

I would wager that until you have experienced the incredible-ness of Phở you haven't really experienced vietnam. Though my train phở is always enjoyable it doesn't hold a candle to my favorite the phở from Saigon.

My first night in Saigon I ate phở on a child-sized plastic stool at 2 in the morning. Knees near my ears, two of my passengers by my side, ripping basil off its stem and smothering the whole mess in sweet chile sauce, it is one of those perfect travel memories.
The nice thing about phở for me is that it is a comfort food. I used to go to the Phở lady up the road from my dorms after especially nasty cold rowing practices. My mom introduced me to the place and the lovely Vietnamese lady that ran it. She always gave my brother extra noodles and served us homemade yogurt at the end of the meal. It was where I first got hooked on lemon juice. It was a little slice of Vietnam before I even knew what that meant.

a big happy slow family

I like dysfunction in simple tasks. To be more clear in this statement, I find dysfunction to be a zen koan put into practice. I love and hate dysfunction and in that way my reaction to dysfunction is an indication of where I am at with myself.
For some reason I keep going to the same place in Bangkok to get things printed by the same confused Thai lady. Talking to Eva today I realized why: it is totally Latin. It is that, "si dios quiere..." approach to life, you can't rush god, or cows, or thai photocopiers, or banana shakes, you know? Sometimes I find myself cursing myself for coming to the same damn place. Yet at other times I can't help but stand there and internally chuckle at how brilliant it is that a lady who runs a copy shop has to read directions about how to print a word document.
I mean efficiency is great sometimes. But at other times I am stunned by the coldness of all things efficient. I find myself wondering what happened to all the warmth and friendliness. I mean in the States I can get shit done about 20x as fast as I can here but it is usually without incident, or if there is drama it is yours truly that is causing it. I had a giggle fit calling my bank to find out my login information. Laying on the tile floor of my hotel room in Hoi An laughing while some poor guy in god knows where tries to figure out my damn login name. He must have thought I was crazy, but then again if you cause someone to smile are you really crazy?
The thing that I know is that happiness is a choice, you either make the decision to see the joy, to laugh at the absurdity of my thai photocopying lady or you can get all pissed off and start blaming people.
You choose: comedy or drama.
I'm planning on laughing all the way down the road, wanna come?

sorry, but tubing is not the coolest

The beginning of my previous entry begins with a famous Paul Theroux quote about the difference between 'travelers' and 'tourists.' People who identify themselves as travelers, most often are 'backpackers' on a 'budget.' 'Tourists' are the honkeys running around paying too much for everything with their noses in guide books, yelling loudly in English, right? Usually they are stodgy and old and don't have a clue. They are on packaged tours. They usually have too much money. '

Travelers' on the other hand what are they like? They usually will tell you, with an air of superiority, that they aren't tourists. They've had 'real' experiences, maybe they smoked opium with a hill tribe, or they've eaten street food (though I am still not sure Phad Thai cooked on Khao San really counts), or maybe they've even had amoebic dysentery or if they are really lucky scabies. 'Travelers' are hard core, they stay in $3 a night hostels and can live off of $5 a day. 'Travelers' look down on 'tourists,' who of course have too much money to have had any 'real' experiences.

I guess I am just tired of this perspective. Perhaps it was the half a day I just spent in Van Vieng, a place that for me sums up almost everything bad about tourism. Just about every real 'traveler' who as earned their stripes in SE Asia has passed through this place. And I imagine (just as I do about Cancun) at one point Van Vieng was a pretty cool place to hang out. But most backpackers would have you convinced this is the highlight of the SE Asia circuit. “Why?” you might ask. The answer can be summed up in three bullet points...

1. cheap drugs

2. tubing on the river
   

3. cheap liquour

Now I am not so old that I don't like to party, and I feel like I have done my fair share of it. I also feel like I am a pretty adventurous and fun loving person. But I also think of my self as a culturally aware citizen of planet Earth. And from everything I have read about and experienced in Laos, semi-nudity and drug use aren't high up on the list of how to be a culturally aware, sensitive, sustainable traveler. And though I enjoy a night out with friends I would prefer to experience a different culture while traveling and enjoy a party when it isn't offensive to the local culture.

What bothers me is all these experienced travelers who wax on about how amazing Laos is, how fantastic all the people are, how beautiful the culture is (and I am sure they will go home and talk about all their really amazing interactions and experiences in SE Asia) don't see how tubing/doing drugs/wandering around in the bathing suit all add up to the erosion of the very thing they say they love.

One might defend all these poor youthful backpackers by saying that the Lao people make all these things possible and that if they really found them so offensive they could just stop providing the services. Well that is a pretty un-capatilist perspective as this is is a huge source of income for the Lao that work in the tubing/drug industry in Van Vieng. Imagine, a pancake lady can make 10,000 kip a pancake selling them to all the stoned travelers, maybe she only sells 2, that is more than $2, double the average wage of more than 70% of the country. You think anyone that has the ability to make money off these dumb drunk tourists... ooops I mean travelers isn't going to do it? They would be stupid not to. Just like most people presented with an easy source of income the Lao exploit it even if it is eroding their culture and exposing their kids to Western culture at its ugliest.

I'm sorry if this all sounds harsh, but just imagine if a group of tourists showed up in your hometown, got really drunk, dressed offensively, did a bunch of drugs, all the while your kids were playing in the street. How would that make you feel? And what would you think of the people that were doing it? Now add a couple more things to that image. Backpackers are notoriously stingy (sorry, anyone in the tourist industry will back me up on this one) so now they are nickel and diming you at every turn, stealing hotel soap, extra bread from the included breakfast, never tip, and generally are only looking out for their own benefit. Yet these people who reluctantly part with their money will also exhibit incredible material wealth their $200 backpack. These people are wandering around with a couple $1,000 dollars on their back while fighting you for a $1 a night discount on their room. Can you even imagine what the Lao people must think?

Now contrast that with our original image of the bumbling tourist, does he look so bad?

My point is that as travelers we are representatives of our respective countries and cultures, we have a great duty to our hosts as well, we should be respectful as we visit their homes, walk softly in their countries. No one likes a rude guest, everyone appreciates the person who arrives with a gift, cleans up after themselves, acts graciously, and remembers to say thank you. And now with all these amazing NGOs and social projects we have a chance to maybe leave a place we visit a little bit better than we found it.

I guess maybe not thinking that Van Vieng is cool might make me 'uncool' in the eyes of some really awesome hard core world travelers, but the thing is I don't really care. The more I live in this world I realize that my friend V's grandfather is right, life isn't the number of breaths you take it is the number of moments that take your breath away. You may be able to blow your mind in Van Vieng, but tubing isn't going to take your breath away, nor is partying with a bunch of 18 year olds on their gap year, nor is smoking opium or getting ripped on happy pizza. But watching laughing kids play in the river or people planting rice in the shadows of Karst peaks might just tighten your chest with the intrinsic beauty of simplicity. Too bad all those kids were too busy drinking Lao lao on the river to notice the beautiful world that was passing them by.

Because I think it would be wrong to slag off travelers (who are most of the time just tourists with less money and bigger egos) and not give suggestions, I'll give you my perspective on how I think we could all be better tourists/travelers/guests.

The first thing is not to travel beyond your means. You are working with a ratio of time versus money. What happens to most long term travelers (were talking over a month here) is that you think you have more money than you do and end up just scraping by towards the end. This is NOT the way to do it, you want to go home with money in your bank account. Good advice: take the amount of money you think you need, now double it. When you are scraping for money you end up cheating a lot of people, not to mention yourself because you may not be able to do what you want to do. I am not saying that being on a budget is a bad idea, I have had some very memorable experiences being on a budget, but there is a difference between budgeting and scraping by. Money gives you flexibility, it will get you out of tight situations. Another good rule: if you can afford a beverage other than bottled water you still have enough money to tip.

Yea, so tipping is a BIG F'N DEAL. Round up! If your bill is 17000kip you can afford to leave 20,000. That $0.30 means a hell of a lot less to you than it will to your server. Don't drink your big beer lao and then roll your eyes at me when I suggest a tip. Imagine if your 3,000 kip makes it possible for your waiter's kid to go to school, how would that make you feel?

So how do you save money/budget? Eat on the street (not in the tourist strip you idiot) walk around until you find a bunch of locals, check out their plates and point at what looks good, then gesture the number one and point at your chest. Congratulations, you've just saved yourself $2. Now stop drinking those damn fruit shakes. Stop eating pizza, sandwiches, pancakes, chips. Stay in a room with a fan not a/c. Find a friend to share a room with, or stay in a dorm. Walk everywhere you can, or explore the public transport, how are the locals getting around? Now do it yourself. Interact with some local people, that is why you came all this way isn't it? Or maybe you just came to talk to more people like you?

Personally, when it comes to budgeting what I've figured out is that I like certain things to be nice and other things I am not that fussed about. I spend extra money on a nicer hotel because that is my home, but I don't really care if I have to survive off street food to save some money. So you figure out what is important, pay more for those things. You might have to have money for beer, but you can stay in a total dive and eat pb&j for weeks on end. Just make sure to be friendly and polite to the owners of your dive and maybe offer to make them a sammie. Did you know that if you offer someone food they might want to have a conversation with you and BAM, you've had a unique incredible local interaction.

Learn the language, talk to the locals and they might SMILE at you. A genuine smile from someone is like a ray of light blasting you in the heart. Learn, hello, thank you, how much, and how to count to ten, it maybe the best thing you do on your trip.

Try the local food, not that watered down shit they make for westerners. Eat Thai food that makes your eyes water, eat Som Tham with balls of sticky rice, crouch on a plastic stool in Saigon and slurp pho, eat at the damn taco stands, there will always be time for spaghetti bol at home.

That is the big lesson, if it is the same, if it is comfortable and normal then why travel? Get out of your comfort zone, try something new, that is why you left home in the first place.

Read a book about the place you are visiting, learn the history, try to understand why this place is the way it is. What is growing in the fields? why do people dress that way? What do they believe? What are families like? Start paying attention, what makes this place different from your home? Write your thoughts down, draw pictures, think about it. And don't just take a million photos and think that is sufficient to 'capture' the place. Put your camera down, take a deep breath and think about how each of your senses are stimulated by this different place. What does Oaxaca smell like? What is the exact flavour of pineapple when floating on the Mekong river? What does Bangkok sound like at four in the afternoon? How does your skin feel under the sun while sitting at Angkor wat? Absorb your travel experience, immerse yourself in it. Take a moment to think about how you might put it to words and then do, write yourself a postcard about a simple detail you've noticed, and really mail it to yourself, when it arrives it will be like a little piece of magic, you may treasure it more than anything you purchase.

Find a local supermarket, or street market, stare at everything, try a new fruit, look at what is and isn't available, and wonder how the world works with out readily availalble peanut butter.

Research local projects and NGOs that are trying to make the local people's lives better and participate. Spend a bit more on a fair trade product, even if you buy the cheapest thing in the store you are making an impact. Buy fewer things, but things that you know will leave a positive mark on the country. And buy from women, when money is put in women's hands it goes to kids and food. Men just aren't as reliable.

Learn local customs, learn what is offensive and don't do it, dress like a local, check out a temple/wat/church/mosque and pray, leave an offering, and thank the local gods that you have been so blessed to have the freedom to travel.

See you on the road.

la casa de paños y pensamientos

“Tourists don't know where they've been, travelers don't know where they are going.” Paul Theroux

If Paul Theroux is right then I am totally f'ed. For the most part I am totally lost. My memories have turned into a swirl of faces and places, sometimes I suffer from what feels like mental vertigo. I can't find the line between dreams and memories (then again, maybe there really isn't much of a difference). Recently as I was pulling up to the airport in Phnom Penh I couldn't remember where the hell I was. Somehow Saigon is now north of Hanoi (at least in my mental geography). The whole thing might freak me out, but it have a feeling that this is what a life of constant movement will do to you....

“Life used to be life like/now its more like showbiz/ I wake up in the night and I don't know where the bathroom is/ and I don't know what town I'm in/what sky I am under” -Ani DiFranco

In the same vein I found myself asking Tiago one day: “Where do the towels live?” I can't put a number to how many times I have found myself standing naked and dripping with water wondering where the damn towel is, only to find it folded like a swan my bed. But for me, like Ani, 'the road is my home,' and because of that I shouldn't really complain about loosing towels, that just comes with the territory, especially as people make my bed for me and I don't have to pay an electric bill. But all of that doesn't stop the world from rising up and swirling around, tossing me around like a rip tide. Sometimes I remember dreams about passengers that I had months prior to meeting them. My vocabulary is a mish-mash of spanish (how many times have I said, “Si?” to a Laoatian?), australian, american and pommie english. I miss so many things that the dull ache of absence has become my constant companion. Yet that rawness that lonliness or desire creates makes all the beauty I encounter taste a bit sweeter. As Che says in his Motorcyle Diaries, all meals peppered with hunger taste better (or something to that point) so it is true for my encounters with hidden vistas and unexpected friendship. When you hunger for intimacy, friendship, or comfort, their sudden appearance is all the more welcome.

Dad- don't worry I know this is a bit introspective, maybe it is all the rain and the mist cloaking the karst landscape of Laos, but I've got a big cup of JOMA coffee keeping me warm and a lot of love eminating from Northern California.

On the other side of the glass

I am on the road between Saigon and Phnom Penh. My belly is full of Khmer noodle soup and my head full of thoughts that loop around into questions creating a mess not unlike the rice noodles that I've got swimming in my stomach.

I remember Michael telling me about these very buses which careened in front of her ,Cambodian home, kicking up dust. A blur of white faces protected by glass from the hot dusty existence of rural Cambodia as they raced between HCMC and Phnom Penh. This was back when I was still in C.A. I must have been in Guatemala at the time, because I remember telling her stories of seeing similar buses cramming themselves into the twisty streets of Solola, and it all caused me to think about what it means to have experienced a country and the insulated nature of tourism. My passengers are always talking about “doing” countries or even whole regions after spending a few days in them, “Oh yea, I did Laos, it was fantastic.” Maybe the very act of claiming to 'know' a place we admit to not knowing it at all. Or maybe we only know our very unique personal experience.

I can't claim to know every twist and bump of this highway, and yet I feel attached to this stretch of pavement, for I feel like it might lead me back to Micaheal, someone I miss very much. Or maybe I feel it leads me to a type of authenticity that I feel is so often lacking on the traveler's path. Regardless I find my eyes scanning each hamlet for that familiar ordering of mobile phone shops, market, soy bean juice ladies, and sugar can juice vendors which add up to Svay Chrum. I search to place the memories I have from those days that I spent with Mikee, suffering from the heat, from sleeping on tile floors, from being so far from the comforts of air con, of regular electricity, western food, and western comforts.

I remember our arrival back in Phnom Penh after just 5 days in Svay Chrum, the moment we walked into our $12 a night hotel room with air-con and private bathroom and thinking, money or wealth means you are able to afford comfort. You can insulate yourself from the pains and discomforts of poverty: from rocks in your rice and beans, from mosquitoes, from heat, from cold, from the sun, from physical labor. But the thing those uncomfortable 5 days also taught me was that in all our insulation we have lost contact with some of the things that make humans human. Westerners have a disposable outlook on life, something breaks, you buy a new one, something is lost, you can always replace it. Teeth, marriages, hips, ipods, rain coats. We are so wealthy that we have replaced food which is meant to provide calories with calorie free counterparts, we don't have to move to produce wealth so now we pay exorbitant funds to burn off all our material wealth which lays itself down in the form of a protective layer of adipose tissue, insulating us further and further from our environment. We have shaped parts of our environment so extremely that in places it is unrecognizable. And this is a spreading phenomena, driving into Saigon yesterday I awoke from a cat nap and was lost as to where I was. The suburban sprawl that covers the United States has reached its hand around the globe and has begun to sculpt parts of southern Vietnam. Do we want to live in a world where it is hard to discern between Michigan and Saigon? Is that the goal?

And this all leads me back to my initial thought about these air conditioned bubbles shuffling 'intrepid' travelers who have dared set out to such a wild untamed country.

Svay Chrum slides by as a smear of buildings, how can so many memories be linked to just another collection of same same corrugated tin buildings? Isn't that the strange thing about life? There is beauty, magic, and treasures beyond all belief, the trick is opening your eyes to see them as they are often hidden in strange places: in soy bean juice bought at a muddy market, in the laughing eyes of a vietnamese bus driver, in the unexpected views of the grenadine red sun rising over the gaggle of ducks as your scifo Vietnamese government train rolls past. And I am starting to believe the key to hapiness is being able to see these treasures, to be appreciate all the tiny minutiae that will eventually add up into a joyful existence.

I'm not sure this entry leads anywhere, but maybe that is a good thing, the nectar ,after all, is in the journey.

la amistad

I have been mulling over a concept for the last months, in all honestly it was a thought that came to me back in September. I was sick in bed in Cambodia, and I remember thinking, all it takes is one person." One person can make the freshi lady room home, pumpkin soup into a feast, and long bus rides into adventures. One person can chase out the ghosts of lonliness, doubt, and fear. One person, whether they are only in your life for 2 weeks, 2 hours, or a lifetime can cast the light of a thousand candles.
I spend a lot of time on my own, a lot of time surrounded by strangers, and I am always missing someone, some place, something. I guess that could mean I could spend a lot of time sad, weepy, and down, but that seems like telling the universe that I don't believe it is going to come through for me: That I don't believe in the potential for magic, for new friends, for new adventures with old friends, for coincidence, serendipidity, for joy (even if it has to be bought in 1.5L bottles).
Friendship comes to those who trust, friendship comes to those that give and give and give, for those that find laughter in the dusty cockroach ridden happy house stops. Friendship is what will save us, it is what drives us, and what makes life so damn sweet.
French fries are never as good as when you have someone to steal them from your plate with a plastic pair of chopsticks.
Think that over.

vietnam otra vez

When I go to get a new job (at least one year in the future) and some one asks me what doing this job taught me I am going to say it was an ability to go with the flow and deal with what life dishes out. If you don't have flexibility then you are fucked.
Yesterday I met Jorge, who is L-A-T-I-N-O. Pinche latinos, always f'ing my shit up. I fly 41 hours from Latin America and they still manage to find me and keep me on my toes. Honestly this wasn't really Jorge's fault, I should take the blame, it is all my crazy idea generating mind's fault. The situation goes something like this:
I am sitting in the oasis of JoMa, coffee heaven in Laos: wireless, good coffee, comfy seats. Jorge appears in typical latino fashion: loud, passionate, full of life, and he is freaking out a bit because he is running a trip blind with a tough group. So we do the TL decompression thing: talk about crazy pax, what we have been doing, etc etc. Then we decide to go pay our bills at our local operator. This ends up being more complicated as we get lost, have the wrong address, find a tuk-tuk, get lost again, get found and realize that Jorge doesn't have a Vietnamese visa and he is leaving TOMORROW (which is now today). Of course Jorge is Peruvian and the Vietnamese embassy probably only have a vague idea of where Peru is, and have decided that Jorge is not coming in. I am gringa, si? And though we are a nation of Imperialist puppets we are allowed to go into their proud Vietnamese nation. So now the shit goes down, PINCHE JORGE gets to take my AMAZING group through Laos, and I have to go back to Vietnam. I like Vietnam a lot, but Laos is my place, it is my Guatemala. So man I am pissed.
I guess this is my way of telling you I am going back to Vietnam.
Damn.

This all is compounded by having an absurd experience trying to get out of Vietnam just 2 days prior. We crossed at what the Lonely Planet dubs, 'a remote crossing,' which was pretty obvious as we arrived during lunch hour and the whole place was empty. Well except for the WC attendant who was very clear that the toilets cost 5oooVND to use. I guess it was worth it, they were relatively clean. Anyhow, after the end of lunch call sounded we loaded all the passports through the WINDOW FOR EXIT OF FOREIGNERS FROM VIETNAM and started to wait. Then it turned out that two of the passports hadn't gotten stamped upon entry. So now we are in 'remote' Vietnam with a man telling me, 'no stamp, no Laos." GREEEEAAAAT. After the man makes 5 phone calls, makes photocopies that he doesn't have a place to file, we finally get our stamps and are allowed to leave. Plus there was a thorough investigation of the extra pages that have been stuck in my passport, they didn't seem to impressed by the taping job that the American Embassy in Costa Rica had done. I just can't wait to do that all over again.
The beauty of it is that as soon as you get out of Vietnam it all immediately shifts to Laoatian smiles and good vibes. Vietnam may have Hoi An, but Laos has my heart.

last days

procrastination leads to blog entry.

summation of the last few weeks
thoughts.observations.notes.ideas.wishes

thailand is brief, just enough time for a couple bottles of neon orange orange juice and green curry

the tips of my fingers have started to peel off, what does that mean?

buckets at angkor what? lead to a rough ride to P2 which noodle soup cures, I miss nana

get lost with my group in P2, tuk-tuks save the day and deliver us at Mee Goreng heaven

Ipod induced napping on the bus leads to strange lucid dreams

could Lebo be right about Deli pickels saving the world??? all this poverty in Cambodia is making me hope so

I wish I had brought my black gauchos and not my teal ones

I see a one armed mine victim filling in the potholes along an unpaved portion of cambodia's national road 4 and find myself wondering who is paying him for his work

cambodian children thrive on the beach front town of Sihanoukville selling braclets and when not successful swearing at tourists

Handwashing can be incredibly satisfying.

Crossing the border to Vietnam is striking - how can a bridge lead to such difference? I already miss counting in Khmer.

More ipod, more strange dreams.

I eat frog for the first time.

I get my laundry done in Saigon, everything comes back individually tagged

Night train delivers me to Nha Trang, why is train sleep so satisfying?

confused yet? me too. but life is a beautiful mystery.

sawadee kah

Nothing like going to log in to your blog and finding it in thai script. That by the way is my way of saying that I have arrived here in Thailand.
After being FREEZING cold in california for nearly two weeks the 29 degree (90F for you gringos) heat is AWESOME. And I better get used to it because that is how SE Asia rolls (mikee knows). Cold is a strange concept here, and when it is found it is usually machine generated.
The whole flight/travel/bag retrival/customs/bus here was pretty standard, really the only complication was my constant sneezing freaking out my row mates. Maybe I should get myself a face mask and a shirt that says, "NO HAY GRIPE PORCINA AQUI!" Or maybe that would really freak these people out. Damn that just made me laugh out loud. Sad really. Plus I am guessing that about 1/2% of them can read spanish.
In typical Gemma fashion I got myself all turned around trying to get to Khao San road to check my email yesterday, and then did it again this morning so now my poor feet are a bit sore. I guess the intelligent thing would have been to wear the keens this morning and to look at the map, but I am one stubborn girl and I love a good blister. I only mention this as I was totally convinced when I was back in the states that Chaco flips cannot give you blisters (MOM), but now upon further thought I remember that I got some gnarly blisters back when I first got to Singapore, so now all bets are off.
Most of my time thus far has been me sitting in the green house cafe somewhere on Soi Rambutri Banglampoo ( and yes i did have to look at a map and a menu to get that road name right). And basically what I am half remembering and half discovering ( I guess one might simplifiy that and call it re-discovering) is that street names are a pain in the ass here, not so unlike in Costa Rica (el lado sur de la casa con el techo negro, 100m este de el arbol con los monos azules), but here every thing/place/street has about 3 different names with different spellings. I have yet to make it to the regional office here so I fill my time sitting at the green house cafe laughing at backpacker fashion (which makes the CA travelers look real tame - excluding Argie street artisans and anyone who thinks they are a 'local' in pana-pana-panajachel) and trying to understand the international dateline and how it will now effect my communication with the rest of the world (things look a bit dire).
Really I can't complain, I am trying to take it easy with the thai food, don't want to start hating green curry my first week here, and trying to stop myself from buying music on itunes with the promise to myself that I can go crazy at Laundry in Siem Reap (Mikee understands). So yea, thats all I've got to say for myself other than the fact that I do miss beans. I've never understood all the bean hating that tourists like to do in C.A. Really maybe they never learned the gloriousness of gallo pinto.

Out. (Oh and I'll try to take it easy with the ellipses next time)

adios

While driving from Fortuna to Chepe, past the fields of yucca, framed by hills and the occasional volcano, along a road lined by tree fences I thought about roots. I have put down roots here in Central America, my home is a vast network, sort of a sequoia like mess of friends, cafes, hotels, drivers, other tour leaders, waiters, park benches, and bus seats. How can a bus ride feel like home? How can the staff of a Nicaraguan Mexican restaurant feel like family? Yet both those things are, or maybe now, were true.
I kept and keep thinking, "No puedo, no puedo..." or maybe, "I can't, I can't..." a strange mantra that I felt might protect me from leaving, and yet here I find myself ensconced in California. Re-entry feels bearable because I know I am leaving again and because I have been distracted by an onslaught of great friends and family. But to have left all of that, "gracias a dios," pichazos de aguacate, AMOR, amigovios, Israel, Ometepe, the chicken buses, the smell of high land Chapines, ducual frijoles volteados con platano maduro y queso, flirtations en español, gallo pinto de La Parada, and not being able to say "nos vemos suuuuuuper pronto" to my favorite tico/nica/chapin/catracho/mexicano friends and mean it.
Does the promise of fish sauce and green curry really stand up to that? It better, otherwise this gringa is buying herself a flight straight from Bangkok to some undisclosed central american location.

0

The fool has forever been one of my favorite tarot cards, it is a point of departure and of arrival, a meditation on the ever never endingness of the cycle of life. It sits at 0 in the major arcana, both the first and last card of the spiritual journey towards whatever one might seek: knowledge, peace, enlightenment. And at this exact moment in my life it speaks to where I sit.

Big decisions, big steps, big adventures, it all feels like stepping off that cliff into the unknown. The hard part is to do it with trust, without fear, with love in your heart, with an empty mind. When we give trust to the universe, when we open a space in our hearts for what will come, miraculous things happen.

I had been asking the universe to give me a push in a direction, to give me a next step, and it has come. So now it is time to step off that cliff again, which looks like hopping on a flight to Bangkok to start take a new position leading trips in SE Asia. I am telling myself that the butterfly which is flapping around in the pit of my stomach is not of nervousness or fear, but one of the delights of the unknown. Off I go...

back on the train

images taken at the Copàn Ruinas, Honduras, Central America


I've been off the blog train for a while now, two weeks in fact. Which is LAME. Because even when I am not writing on the blog shit keeps going down. I like to blame the volcano trail for this sort of thing. The Volcano Trail being the fly by the seat of your zip off pants slalom through central america which I frequently end up leading. This last go round was complete with its wildness, quetzal spottings after late nights at bar amigos, a bit of diving on our stop in Utila, and some ruins visiting in Copàn.
I really dug my last group, they were hard work, but kept me on my toes. I`ve gotten kind of geeked out over birds in the last couple months and a couple of them were really into it. On this trip to Copan I spotted a turquoise crested mot-mot from a fair distances, geeky I tell you.

peace out lonely planet

I feel that the guide book might be evolving. At least I really hope it might be. Two recent indicators of this are Urban Lowdown and Sean Bonner's Metblogs. I learned about Metblogs through a feature in Good. These are both new discoveries, and I am not telling you that they are any good, though they might be, I'll have to explore them a bit more before I develop and opnion on either of them. What I like about them, or the idea of them is that maybe, possibly, those damn writers at the Lonely Planet will no longer dominate the world of backpacker style traveling. And man, do those writers make me crazy. More than them, it is the travelers that won't make a decision with out the LP's approval. I mean I get it, you want to have the inside track to a place, but often times a LP writer may only spend 10 minutes asking questions about a place, and never stayed there or eaten there. The implied advantage of these sites is that local people write them, they really know these places, and they don't have to write a whole book about a whole country in 5 days. So that is my spiel on guidebooking, that is until I get my shit together and write my graphical guide to central america. Oh, one last resource for you facebook addicted or avoiding travelers is Matador a social networking site for travelers. Do it up.