Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Sore Throats and Sushi

It’s been 3 weeks now with a sore throat. I made my 3rd trip to the doctor now, so maybe that will be the charm. It’s easing up a bit, last week was the worst when I was trying to eat breakfast, but everything was so swollen I could hardly move my jaw. Well, time to think positive.

It’s been a good couple weeks since I’ve been back I think. My deadline for contract renewal was looming. To take on a 4th year, you need to be exceptionally good to get an offer, so I’m flattered that crossed my desk. It wasn’t too cold the day I got back, but the week that followed was one of the toughest times I’ve had yet.

I started going to bed wearing the clothes I’ll wear the next day, so that it won’t be so painful getting up in the morning. Even though I fashioned a wind-tunnel for breathing under a pile of blankets, for the first time I was waking up because the blanket in front of my face was all wet; apparently it was cold enough for my breath to condensate that fast. How was I going to live through another week of this, let alone another year? I started to wonder why I signed on for a 3rd year…

The weekend came, and one of Japan’s craziest festivals came up. I didn’t go. I went during my first year and this year I was sick, so I can direct you to the last time I went. Richard went and told me about it; it was one hell of an adventure. Apparently it was snowing so hard, that it took forever for the fire to start, and then later the car was covered in over a foot of snow when they went to leave. Then they drove around for hours completely lost until 4 in the morning when they gave up and went somewhere completely different to get some sleep.

I was glad I stayed home after hearing this. I bought a couple games on Steam for really cheap, as its service continues to be amazing. I got 2 full games for $11, and then it downloaded and was ready to play in less than an hour. So convenient. That was mostly my 1st weekend back; huddled by the heater trying to stay warm while playing games.

I haven’t talked to my tutor Kayo yet, so I haven’t had lessons. The mom I tutor is an accountant, and is busy with the New Year’s taxes maybe, so I have over a month off for that too. My Wednesday class doesn’t start until May maybe. It’s been so long since I’ve had a week off to sit at home and play games like I have. Richard’s computer is having problems, so until it’s fixed he’s been hanging out with me using my laptop while I play games on my other computer.

On Wednesday I was really lucky to have a day off for once to finally join a bunch of people at Ike’s place for some home cooking. The man has talent. I had to skip on the homemade milkshakes though, because the cold aggravated my throat, so maybe next time. It was good to catch up with people.

What stood out for me though, was Jessie giving a talk to Stephen, a new Jet, about ways to enjoy his time in Japan. He had such energy, and went on with “you go here and do this, you go here and make friends, you do this” and on and on. I listened closely, thinking “I’ve tried that, I did that, I want to do that but it always fails,” and so on. Suddenly things were really put in perspective.

I remember having that energy, but I’m just tired of hitting my head against a closed door. I’m tired of wanting to play volleyball, but can’t. I’m tired of this damn winter. I’m tired of all the bugs, but the only good thing this winter does is kill them. I’m tired of going to a grocery store, spending an hour looking for something, and then giving up later in defeat.

Of course life is always more complicated than that, but I signed “no” for staying another year.

It was scary at first, but now I feel good about it, and I’m getting excited again for what life may hold after my time here. I’m still too cold and sick (and loving that video game) to really sit down and start piecing a roadmap for my life together yet, but it’s never far from my mind.

Being put into perspective like that helped show me my own warning signs. I still remember that girl that was a pile of negative concerning Japan. It’s good to have role models for the kind of people that you don’t want to be. I learnt something good too from Jessie, how it’s important to pretend you know what they’re saying to you even if you don’t. If you don’t, then people stop talking to you and talk around you. As a teacher I try to weed that out, but never tried it myself.

I don’t believe in living with regrets. When I go over my list of goals for coming to Japan in the first place, either the goals have changed or I’ve seen them through already. I’ve changed a lot since then, it makes sense for my goals to as well. Unless Japan gives me a reason to stay longer, and since you make your own reasons and I doubt it, then I should be home around July/August; so it’s last call for friends or family that want to visit.

So back at the party, Ike urged me to join the sushi-eating contest coming up. I was on the fence, but I wanted to pull through for my team, thinking I could eat my share. On Friday we went up and our block won it all. Normally I eat 12 plates, and that’s a lot of food; but I broke my own record and ate 17. Richard and Michelle pushed me, and I knew I couldn’t let them out-eat me, so we tied at 17.

Ike and Zack had 24 plates each, but Jessie only got to 8 maybe, and tried to make up for it by drinking 7 juice boxes for a higher plate count which ended up not counting. The poor guy tasted only chemicals before long and said he was seeing shapes floating around. The real show-stealer was Chris though. He came in late, and in half the time ate 32 plates of sushi.

The pile was stacked up higher than his head; it was comical if not disgusting. To think my highest record was doubled by someone that wasn’t trying and much smaller than me. Hats off to him :) He won the battle and had his sushi paid for, but our group won the war and earned points for some upcoming cup. I guess I’ll write more about it later when I know.

After we went to Patricia’s birthday party. It was a “posh” party, but I didn’t really care so I just put on a tie over my sweater and wore my nice hat. At a convenience store along the way, they were selling stuffed animals and I bought a skunk on impulse. I liked the black and white, and figure he’ll be a nice mascot for my car.

Most people were sleepy after the contest, but ironically the ones that ate sushi were the ones that didn’t get sick. I tried to mingle for a couple hours, but by midnight my throat was so sore that I bided the time until I could get a quiet place to sleep. Alas it wasn’t to be, as I slipped in and out of consciousness in a ‘quiet’ room for a couple hours, with my throat killing me, wondering why oh why do I go to these JET parties after swearing them off around this time 2 years ago for exactly this reason. It was Patty’s birthday though, and I didn’t want to let down our sushi team.

I felt bad too, a number of people came by and tried to talk to me, but my throat was so sore, and my eyes were rolling around in exhaustion. In the morning I was glad I had some sleep, but Nagano City is still a far ways from home. Along the way we stopped in Matsumoto for lunch, and discovered the annual ice sculpture competition at the castle again. We also got to talk with Neal for a while; he had a good holiday.

The girls wanted to go for coffee, and the re-contracting talk came up. I was the only one of the 4 going home, and the girls, both 1st years, half-joked by saying “since you’re leaving, we don’t have to get to know you” or something. I knew it was a joke, but in a way it’s not. I know perfectly well how busy it is here, and after 6 months already I still hardly know them, only having seen them like 4 times. Even Stephen didn’t know I was JET, let alone on my 3rd year.

I’ve always thought of JET as life in fast-forward. The first years are the children, fresh and full of energy, making mistakes everywhere as they have fun figuring life out. 2nd years and so on are like the parents and elders looking out for the children while still learning themselves; being there to help them along with advice and whatever is needed. When a person leaves, all they’ve done and felt and experienced goes with them; leaving just ripples in a pool that fade out over time.

"The big secret in life is that there is no big secret. Whatever your goal, you can get there if you're willing to work" -Oprah Winfrey

tnoy

Monday, January 25, 2010

Three Weeks of Thailand Part 3: Chiang Mai

Ah Charming Thailand. One sign said: “MARRIAGE registration FOR ALIENS.” I wonder how much business they get; I want to believe. (The X-Files reference). On New Years day we went shopping a bit more and relaxed a lot after such a crazy night. We saw another movie, ate more pizza, and I got a new, proper bag for carrying around my computer. My SaskTel bag had worked very well for me for years, but it was showing its age. I love this new bag, and since I bought it in Thailand, you can bet it was for a good price.

January 2nd was also a nice lazy day, though I don’t remember much more than eating, talking, and later catching an overnight bus that night for Chiang Mai; the biggest city 12 hours to the North. Lily helped us sign up for tours again and it was a steal I thought. For example, a 3-day, 2-night trek through the jungle with food, locals and other perks was a little over $100.

It was a long ways away though, and unfortunately I was a little cramped on the bus with my big legs. A little after midnight when I finally fell asleep, the bus made its only big stop of the night, waking me up. Then at 4 in the morning the bus broke down and we had to change to another. When we arrived, we unfortunately fell into a vulture’s trap; the kind of taxis that sit at a hotel or popular demand spot offering rides for way too much money to new people that don’t know better, much like the airport. Sure the ride was only $7, but it should have been $2 at most; it’s the principle of it.

My warning light went off after he dropped off the first people, and then he asked if we wanted to stay at a hotel that he knew; a sure sign of a scam artist like those 3 wheeled tuk-tuks that offer you a ride for cheap, but don’t take you anywhere except to their friend’s shops where they get commission. Anyways, he ended up driving around in circles to make us think he drove far, but our hotel was down the street as we discovered later.

I normally wouldn’t fall for this sort of trap anymore, but we were exhausted after the all-night trip, and I pretty much relied on Anna to do everything for me with her Thai skills. Now she’s wiser to it, it’s how we learn I guess and since that was the worst thing that happened the whole trip I’m not sour about it. It was early in the morning and we were exhausted, but they wouldn’t let us check in until noon.

We attempted to pass time by seeing the area, but didn’t go too far. I got a new book: “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” as I’m a little ashamed I haven’t read it before. It was pretty good, but really short. They finally let us check in early because we were sleeping on the chairs in the lobby.

Chiang Mai is a beautiful, wonderful place. It’s not hot and busy like Bangkok, so walking around it is no problem. In the center there are ruins of an ancient castle or something and a moat. The moat has since had decorations like fountains installed.

In the afternoon after napping a couple hours, we had a tour to a big temple up on the hill. The tour group we were to go with was over packed and didn’t pick us up, so Lily got angry on the phone with them, and before long a guy came in his car on his day off to take us up on a personal tour as a favor to his sister running the other tour.

He was really nice too, now we have another tour guide friend up North. Apparently it was the 3rd highest mountain in Thailand that we drove up, but it wasn’t too high for a mountain I think. He told us how he used to jog up it every morning, which was still crazy.

Well I wrote quite a bit about temples already, but here we go again. It was beautiful on top the mountain. There were kids giving performances and many markets strung out. Some of the pastel paintings are so beautiful that they’re hard to not buy, but I still have one in my closet at home. I now have lots of decorations that I haven’t hung up yet.

You walk around the large, center pagoda in a clock-wise direction 3 times. Because of an accident years ago, it’s forbidden for pregnant women to do. There was an offering at one side, separated into days of the week, then two for the morning/afternoon, depending on when you were born. At one part after praying, you try to lift a heavy golden elephant with your pinky finger. If you get it off the group, your wish will come true.

Another spot had a strange rock with the 12 Chinese zodiacs on it. Interestingly enough, they got rid of my year, The Boar, so they could put Thailand’s national animal, The Elephant, on it. If you could stick a coin on your animal, it’s good luck. I had no problem, but apparently some people do. Later, there were little leaves of very flat gold you could buy. On the leaf you can write your name and prayers or whatever you like, then hang it on a tree. Later, the leaves are melted down to form a new Buddha statue, immortalizing your words I suppose.

Anna had a really nice bracelet from a temple when I arrived, so I wanted us to get matching ones. In one of the places a monk splashed water on people while reciting prayers or something, and took my hand to give me a bracelet. His English was surprisingly good, and he had a sense of humor for such a humble looking man. He shook my hand vigorously saying, “Good to meet you, welcome to Thailand” and stuff like that. Unfortunately because monks can’t touch women in any way in Thailand, Anna had to get a bracelet from his non-monk assistant for exactly that reason, and as a result our bracelets aren’t exactly the same but close enough.

When we were done at the temple, our tour guy dropped us off near the center of town in the huge market there. There were all kinds of foods, crafts, and whatever including rows of chairs for foot massages. We got a couple bottles of different fruit flavored wine, and then later I bought some silk pillowcases. Not that I needed them in any way, but they were too beautiful to leave at such a low price.

On the way back to the hotel, there was a Mexican Food restaurant. Anna never had it before, so I wanted to share my love of first experiences with her. I bought way too much food of all varieties, and in the end I ate most of it. She liked it a bit, but it was one of those “every now and then” foods, like how I feel with curry and other stuff. I knew she liked spicy, so I got her a side order of Jalapeno peppers.

At first she almost mocked me, with “you say it’s spicy, but I bet it’s not” kind of deal. She took a big spoonful of them, ate them, and looked at me in a “told you so” sort of way. “Ok you win”, I thought, and went back to eating. Not even a minute later, her tough-guy show collapsed into exasperated breaths and a frantic grab for some beer. I laughed liberally at her expense :)

We discovered that Mexican spice in contrast to Thai’s, burns slow and long. In Thailand, it burns hard and fast, but then is gone in a minute. That was interesting, but she still piled food on top of the peppers to finish the rest of her meal. I bought different drinks for her to try too, like a Pina Colada and a Strawberry Margarita, which were mixed really strong, but later she told me to just buy her beer in the future; there’s something to be said about simplicity. So there we had a great Mexican meal with enough food for 3 or 4 people and 4 or 5 alcoholic drinks yet the bill was still only about $35.

Inside there were a couple older fellows sitting at the bar and talking. As soon as they mentioned how expensive healthcare was back home, of course it meant they were American right away. They talked about how cheap it was in Thailand, and how much better the treatment was, with one guy walking out saying “I never had a filling hurt so little” and cost $20.

I remember before leaving Canada, the dentist told me not to visit any Asian ones because they’re no good. What he was really doing was trying to keep his business by trying to keep the superior care a secret; it’s a nice scam the doctors and dentists have going back home.

I was talking a friend here in Japan, and for a simple cleaning they charged him $700 in the States. They told him he had a cavity, and he was like “no thank you!” because they wanted $5000 to have it fixed. You can fly to Thailand, live very comfortably for over a month, have it fixed, and still have money left over at that price; my 3 weeks cost around $1500. But I digress.

In the morning we got picked up and headed into the jungle for the trekking tour. The first day wasn’t too eventful; we stopped off for supplies like cheap flashlights and mosquito repellant. Anna got her first pair of sneakers for the hike that was comically big on her, and then we walked through the jungle for a bit to a small village, passing waterfalls. We stopped at a dam for lunch, and Anna left some of her food out on the ground.

I asked why, and I guess for Karma in the Buddha religion. She said it was for all the spirits of people passed and what not, so they could have something to eat. I wonder if that’s why there is always food and drinks left as offerings at statues. Like I’ve said before, there are all kinds of neat things I learn from watching her, it’s pretty fascinating. You can’t get this kind of cultural experience on just any tour.

We could swim at one of the waterfalls, but I didn’t really have a place to change, and it was really shallow anyways. We saw another temple on top a hill, including a huge Buddha statue maybe 10 meters high. There is such an amazing view from up there; the farmland is something else. I wonder how the statue looks from down below. There was also a huge lying Buddha statue carved into the mountain.

We reached the village with an hour of light left. There we had access to our tour guide’s “7-11”. We were the only two in the group to buy water, while everyone else started drinking beer haha. The one couple went through 12 cans before the sun even went down. The cabins were really interesting, being little more than bamboo suspended above the ground, and using some of the big, thick, strong leaves pierced together by wood splints for a roof.

There was lots of farmland nearby, and what I would call oxen, but apparently they’re buffalo. There sure didn’t look like any Canadian buffalo, but regardless they’re invaluable farm equipment. There was a small stream which double as the water supply and the shower. Anna wanted one, and instructed me to shine a flashlight off to the side and not on her while she cleaned in the cold pond a couple meters away from the campfire where everyone was drinking and talking. I think she was the only one that bathed that night.

And what a cold night it was. It was a nice change from all the hot days we’ve had, but we had to keep close to stay warm that night. I packed my winter coat with me because I knew I would need it when I got back to Japan, but we made good use of it that night. Anna wore the new toque and scarf she made me too.

The huts were big, enough to fit up to 10 people or so, and had mosquito nets suspended above to keep you from getting bitten. I don’t know why or how, but they in Bangkok and Koh Chang had ravaged me earlier and left Anna completely alone. The mosquitoes are much smaller than back home, and after scratching some of the many bumps; sometimes pus came out… which was a first. Maybe that’s why I got sick a little more often than normal.

The second day was really tough; we walked for up to 5 hours, taking breaks in-between of course. Along the way it was really beautiful though, making our way through the mountains and following a waterfall’s path. The path was quite dangerous at times too, being hardly a foot wide on the side of a cliff following the stream. Apparently the rainy season is really popular for this tour, I can only imagine how much more dangerous it would be then.

We swam in the one waterfall for up to an hour. The water was incredibly cold though, so most people hung out around it. I sat in it for a little while, but after 10 minutes or so, it literally felt like there was fire on my skin. It was a strange feeling, perhaps the early onset of hypothermia, or some of my skin cell’s swan song. That’s a phrase I like; in short a “swan song” is the last, and most beautiful thing something does before it dies, like when your ears ring after hearing something loud, saying you’ll never hear that frequency again.

Later on at another waterfall, the tour guide goaded us into sliding down the stream on some rocks. After watching for a bit, I recognized it immediately as canyoning, without the safety suit and all that stuff. I went a number of times, and got even more tired. We continued the hike, walking along fallen trees suspended over the river, and through a small village. In the village a grandma was making cloth by hand using the sort of weaving machines I’d only ever seen in museums before. They have a peaceful life I think, with many animals like pigs and chickens, and people helping each other out; a group was building a house nearby.

Finally with about an hour of light left again, we made it to camp. Here we could sleep in a town house again, or pay an extra $8 and get a private cabin with a mattress and shower. I often have to remind myself how cheap it really is perspective, because at first you hear “250 baht” and you think “Wow! Too expensive.” The shower was totally worth it though, even if there was no hot water.

Also the toilets don’t flush; there is a bit container of water nearby, so when you’re done, you throw a bunch in the bowl to flush. Many times there was no toilet paper either, so you used a spray nozzle nearby to wash off down there; it’s actually kinda smart given how hot it must be normally.

We ate, and drank some of the tour guide’s moonshine. He said it was Thai Rum made from rice, and since it was from rice it tasted like Japanese sake a bit. I was so exhausted though, that I was slurring my words. I really wish I had the energy to sit around the campfire and visit with these cool people, but atleast I saved face a little from going to bed at 8 or 9 by staying up and staring at the stars for an hour maybe. They were absolutely incredible out there in the middle of nowhere.

The 3rd and final day was much less demanding, so much so that I wish they mixed it up more with elements from the 2nd day. After a short walk, we got on the river and paddled little boats. Well, one person got a paddle; the other got a big bamboo pole to push off the ground with. It was fairly shallow, so a couple times we would get hung up on rocks. Anna and I were having lots of trouble, and were spinning around in circles more than anything. A tour guide ended up helping out on our boat, which was great.

The first time I got a paddle, the first thing I did was deliberately soak Anna. It was pretty hilarious; the water wasn’t too warm or clean either. Many of the boats splashed each other, but I we all had a good time for over an hour. There were dogs that followed us too, and Anna picked one up to put in our boat. We saw lots of the countryside and cool foliage.

After the boat ride, we went to another place that put us on bamboo rafts. This time a French dude stood in the back helping the guide steer, while Anna and I hung out relaxing. It’s funny to note, that when we entered the place they had a sign saying how you have to use a lifejacket and such but we couldn’t see any anywhere. The ride was bit bumpier at points too, dropping off on some falls and banging into some rocks. It was still really fun though.

Back on land we waiting for a long time for the truck, so I think they just commissioned a cattle truck because we all stood up in the back of it like we were. It took us to ride elephants. Right away Anna bought a huge bundle to feed the elephant with, and it was hilariously big compared to her; she looked like a little bandit carrying it around; she even ate one.

The elephant we rode was a bit younger and unruly, so much so that we wouldn’t move more than 20 meters before we fed it all the bananas we had. It stuck its snout up at my leg, breathing on it expectantly. It wasn’t happy with just one banana either, Anna was giving him 2 at a time. I was tempted to put one in his big nostril. Later it got water to cool off, and sprayed us good up top. It was still a fun ride and we got some good pictures.

After the ride, we made it back to the city, where we went to a “buffalo wings” restaurant I saw a couple days earlier. This was Anna’s first time having “chicken wings” as we know them back home, and I got them at “atomic” spice level, which she loved. Traditionally, Buffalo wings are hot wings dipped in ranch, so that’s what it was. We had more, but I can’t remember what. I just remember she bought some Durian that wasn’t very good and smelt really bad. We left it outside on the patio to not stink up the hotel.

In the morning we went to the train station, and rode a train for 12 hours back to Bangkok. We did this instead of another overnight thing, because many travel books talk about how it’s one of the most beautiful rides you’ll go on and they’re quite right about that. What we did see was breathtaking when we weren’t surrounded by jungle, until it started raining and we couldn’t see anymore. We really got lucky with the rain again though, it happened maybe 3 times the whole trip, and each time it didn’t really wreck a day or anything.

The train ride was also a good chance to read, nap, talk and play video games. I put in “The New Super Mario Brothers” for her, and I’ve never seen someone have so much fun with anything, she even made her own sound effects. Every 5 minutes or so, she would literally turn the power off, take a deep breath, and try to settle down for a couple minutes before playing again because she was so overwhelmed. If ever there were a time to fall in love with someone, it would be then. It was so cute. She loved to watch me play too when a level was too hard for her.

The last 3 days together in Bangkok are a bit of a blur; we didn’t do anything too special, but we did lots. We saw 2 movies, played Settlers twice, tutored English a bit, ate pizza, met her friend and husband a number of times, went to the night bazaar for drinking, talking and eating. We sang Karaoke with Lily; we went to restaurants, and so on. This was also when I first got sick too, and I’m still sick now 2 weeks later and on medication, I got strept throat again after a hiatus of almost 3 years, I wonder if it’s because of Bangkok’s pollution.

The last day, January 10th was ominous. We held hands tighter and were more quiet than normal. Lucky though Lily called to say goodbye and thanking me for coming, and her friend and husband did the same shortly after. It was a nice little push for me to remember “don’t be sad that it’s over, be happy that it happened.” So many nice people, and so many nice memories. It was an amazing 3 weeks.

"We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give." -Winston Churchill

tnoy

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Three Weeks of Thailand Part 2: Koh Chang

On the 26th we got in a minibus for 4 hours maybe, took a fairy to the island, then went to our hotel along the shore that was 1,200 baht a night ($40). While still cheap, Koh Chang is a bit more expensive than some other places, being an ‘underdeveloped’ area that it is. i.e. it’s not a tourist trap yet like its big brother Phuket. Our hotel was only about a 5 minutes walk to the beach too, where we went as soon as we could around 3:00. The tide was out, so we made camp on a little patch of sand that stuck out.

We were in the “white sands” area, further North from the beach I was at last year (this was where I ate the roast chicken for Christmas with Richard last year). Anyways, the water was more beautiful than I remember, and we played in it for hours. Anna was a bit sad that we couldn’t see fish immediately, but I didn’t mind so much. She still had fun finding the little crab things, and digging them out of the holes in the sand they scuttled into. She brought one to me, but it moved and scared her, so it got away.

We had BBQ supper that night watching the sunset over the water. I got “Cordon Bleu” chicken or whatever, but of course, mom’s tastes better. I still liked it, but I ate way too much. I had gotten used to ordering 2 meals again in Japan because they’re so small; I had some amazing creamy crab soup as well. That was a bad habit I fell on again, causing my recent weight gain.

Like I wrote before, I play a little joke with my students; I say I’m pregnant because of my belly, and they take turns naming my baby. Anna said since my name is “Tony” my stomach/baby should be called “Tonic”. I immediately thought of Gin and Tonic, but it was cute and became the running inside joke of the holiday.

The next day we started off at the beach again. After swimming a couple hours, Anna took a nap while I read “Memoirs of a Geisha” which I finished a couple days later. It’s a good book at first, but with so many of the people being so disgusting and horrible, it was a difficult read. Later the main character comes down with a case of being annoying and stupid that I couldn’t sympathize with her anymore.

After lunch, we rented a motorcycle and scooted around the island for a coupe hours. The bike was only 150cc or something (I know nothing about this stuff) so it worked fine driving along the road, but at a couple steep hills in particular, I had to get off and walk up so the bike could get to the top. Anna has a license so she drove the most, which is fine for me because I like to hang out in the back and take pictures of things we drive by.

Our first stop was the waterfall Rich and I went to last year. It’s still a beautiful place, and the water is still cold, but great to swim in. Again, things just weren’t as busy as they were last year, and we didn’t worry too much about finding room to swim. I can really feel the buoyancy difference from the salty ocean now compared to this fresh water stuff; I need to swim a lot harder to keep afloat.

We made our way to the same beach I was at with Richard, and I’m surprised how much it changed. I think they stopped cleaning it or something, as various things were strung out everywhere; I ended up wearing my sandals to stop from stepping on painful things. I discovered later that it wasn’t such a bad move.

With all the debris, came all forms of life. The crabs were much more numerous, the sand dollars, and even little fish. Anna would corner them along the shoreline, and try to whisk them up on the beach where they were easier to catch and pick up. One dude I saw from Germany had a home made little fishing apparatus, little more that a spool and a hook.

We hoped to make a big circle around the island, and made it half way, but the South-East section of it was closed off, being exclusive to rich grumpy people that didn’t want traffic on their roads or something. We cut our losses and headed back the way we came; I even drove for a little bit on a big long flat stretch. Once back, we swam/relaxed at the Hotel’s pool.

We went looking for restaurants that night, but in the end picked up a variety of different foods from different vendors like Banana Crepe, Roast Chicken, Sausage, Real (and weird) fruit juice, and more. They even had shark on display to be barbequed, but we had enough food.

The next day we went on an all-day snorkeling trip, not unlike what I did with Richard. In the morning it poured and was generally miserable, but by the time we got to our first island it stopped. Colorful fish swarmed the boat, and I was delighted to watch them go crazy over any bread thrown to them. Fins were available for $3, but I didn’t bite. In retrospect I should have just paid the $3 to rent the fins, but out of principle, I didn’t because I’m stubborn, and $3 is a fair amount of money in Thailand.

Anna had a bit of a guided tour around, hanging on a life jacket along with 4 others while a tour guide pulled them along, and showed them things of interest; swimming down and picking stuff up, things like that. I mostly did my own thing, but was still entranced by the colorful fish and coral everywhere. When I was falling behind once, one tour guide gave me a bit of a personal tour, picking up things like starfish for me to touch. All those nature documentaries about those monstrously poisonous and dangerous things underwater make me think twice before I do anything, so that was nice of him.

A couple times it would just be Anna and I lazily floating along the surface holding hands while schools of fish surrounded us. We wore lifejackets because it’s easier to be lazy that way. We reached out to grab fish and pointed out beautiful underwater flowers or whatever. I thought it was magical anyways; the tropics are so pretty. One place was shallow enough for Anna to stand up right on top of the coral. She’s pretty brave with that stuff, like when she goes and catches those weird Geckos and makes friends with them.

We went to 3 different islands, 2 different beaches, and visited the monkey island before going back. At one of the beaches, I got the courage to jump off the ship a couple times. I love to make cannonballs, and because of my size and weight they’re pretty impressive. Anna watched me do one from underwater, then told me not to do it anymore because she thought I’d hit one of the many spiky sea urchins down below. The tour guide picked one of those up for me; they’re crazy little spheres!

We had supper on the porch of the hotel, watching the sunset. The room was so nice, and it had a gecko in it. I didn’t know it, but they make loud chirping noises that woke me up confused and scared in the middle of the night a couple times. I thought it was a bird at first, but you could have sworn it was in the room with you… Sure enough the next day Anna checked behind a wall decoration and found the gecko hiding on the wall.

Well that was my short-lived, but amazing beach adventure. We thought it might be best to celebrate Christmas and New Years in Bangkok, so we came back on the 30th. We relaxed all morning, I read more of my book, and then around 2 or 3 the bus took us back to Bangkok. It was dark by the time we arrived, but we still were able to play “Setters of Catan”, that amazing game I packed up neatly into my suitcase. Anna loves it, Lily did ok, and Peter had to leave early but had fun too.

It was fun teaching them the game, then have them almost playing their own separate game as I didn’t know Thai. There is resource trading involved, so sometimes cards were exchanged without me being able to offer my lot. We had good talks too, my new hair is a hit. Lily went over again how she thought I was lady boy before, and the one guy plainly said he thought I was gay when he met me last year. Later he made a comment about wanting to eat my big pink head like a hot dog with mustard and ketchup, which was odd. He’s and odd guy though, which is probably why it’s fun to talk to him. I was bright pink from the sunburns for a lot of the trip.

Lily also got me, Anna and Richard presents from her own little holiday while we were gone. She got me a shirt of Saturn, and dangling from the rings are various astronauts like they’re at a carnival. I really like it, she’s a sweet lady.

On New Year’s Eve, Anna wanted to go home for a little bit to see her friends, who were calling her now asking if she was still alive. I wanted to go too, and she insisted to wash my clothes, which I didn’t really object to. It was a long drive out into the suburbs or wherever it was. It was funny that as we drove down one road and saw a pile of garbage in the ditch, she pointed it out and said, “That is Thailand.” I have noticed many people usually just throw everything down wherever they are. There’s no shortage of little plastic bags either with all the street vendors handing them out.

When we arrived, most people were feeling the effects of a party the night before. Regardless, it’s a cozy little town house maybe with many roommates, and a nice eye-opener for me. For example, their burner for cooking was a torch/ring burner thing on top of a propane tank.

Soon after arriving, Anna got busy with laundry while I met some of her friends. The one guy was drunk from last night still, and started pouring me whiskey drinks right away. I like to mix with coke or a carbonated beverage of the sort, but they like to use carbonated water in Thailand; a drink I quickly discovered I really don’t like. We talked a little, but not much with the language barrier.

I met many interesting and fun people. One girl had her husband from Sweden visiting in a couple days, and handed me the phone to talk to him in his thick German accent. Another girl was hung over, and hid in the house from me until she showered and had makeup on later. After saying “hello”, one girl right away said: “I want a boyfriend!” Didn’t I just deal with this when I met the fortuneteller? Atleast this time she was young and pretty. This came up later on the trip too: random girls would talk to Anna asking her “how to get a foreign boyfriend.” I don’t know how to answer that other than “Learn English.”

Anna’s English is not too bad, and I notice it getting better all the time. I guess it helped that I corrected her occasionally, and even picked out some good English study books for her at a bookstore; Thailand has a huge and amazing collection! I only wish half of those books were available for me to study Japanese with; especially the readers. Now that I passed my test, I’m not sure if I want to study it anymore.

With Anna talking in Thai to me all the time, suddenly I have more reason to study Thai than I do with Japanese anymore; and that is simply to have someone to talk to. I learnt many words from Anna, and it was fun to drop them into conversations, like calling Anna crazy (peabaa) or saying I’m hungry (youcaow). The funniest was later finding out how to end a sentence like a lady boy.

The language is divided between genders, with boys saying “clap” and girls saying “ka” at the end of the sentence. Ladyboys finish with a feminine “Haaa”, and the first time I said “Hello” like a ladyboy, Anna’s expression was priceless. It’s fun stepping on harmless culture barriers; I like to say silly things to get people responding with emotion. To me it means hardly anything, but she quickly warned me if I said that to her mom or friends, they wouldn’t let Anna talk to me anymore haha. Some words just carry a lot of weight compared to others.

My tutor Kayo talked about her Australian friends going back because they’d have more opportunity speaking Japanese there than in Japan. I understand their sentiments. I remember when Xiao told me for the first time ever she was happy to speak Japanese because with it she could talk to her friend in South Korea; they met in Japanese class. I guess this is why you go on holidays, to escape that which ails you. A lot of bile came up about Japan again, but hopefully I got it out of my system.

Back to the party, her friend didn’t miss a beat after the boyfriend confession, and asked if I knew any guys that wanted to go out with her. I could think of a number of them; people in Japan, Canada and so on, but I don’t know if they want to start something so long-distance. Again, it’s the culture thing, I remember Richard talking about some Canadians he met on the plane to Bangkok, going on their once-a-year visit to see their Thai wives.

So there I was drinking outside meeting new people while Anna did laundry. The wash machine was full (and even overflowed onto the floor at one point, no harm done), so the remainder she washed out in basins outside. I think this was my first time seeing laundry being washed by hand, and it was really interesting. After letting it soak in a soap-filled basin for a while, she would rub pieces of it together and rinse 3 or 4 times over. It was hard to describe, but I could see pieces of the wash cycle on the machine coming together.

I was fairly fascinated, and it worked really well. Here she gave me another scarf and toque that she made as presents, these ones are red and blue this time. She couldn’t make the maple leaf, so the colors would have to do. Here little place was simple but cozy. She loves coffee, so on my last trip I got her a “Hello Kitty” coffee cup and toy that she displays on her dresser.

After laundry Anna got a coconut ready to snack on. She picked up this huge cleaver that was about as big as her torso, and hacked away on this thing for a while. It was really odd to see this little girl with such a big blade. I’m surprised how much coconut is useless too, as she peeled many layers away; it was really cool.

Later on the drunk guy was passed out and we took out the Settlers game to play it again. We played for a couple hours until I was one point from winning, but the drunk guy woke up and simply put a bunch of food out on the table, effectively wrecking the game. Soon after the girls scattered to get food ready. Oh well. They made all sorts of dishes, from BBQ fish to clams to chicken and so on. The table was full of great offerings, but after putting back snacks and pop for hours I couldn’t eat much.

One girl rolled out her computer and the neighbor came by to set up speakers. They played music for hours while videos played in the background. A lot of it was Thai, but the English songs that did come on were of the girl variety; ie “you’re beautiful” and so on. It was still a lot of fun, everyone was dancing and singing along, and this big dude kept topping my drink regularly.

It was getting late and Lily called, saying she was at the world trade place ready for the countdown if we wanted to join her. An hour in the cab later, we were both exhausted and I wasn’t feeling too good for drinking pop for over 12 hours (mostly pop and not enough alcohol maybe), so we just went back to the hotel. I went to the countdown last year, and figured I wouldn’t do it again anyways. We got there around 11:30 and watched it on T.V, which was far superior as I imagined. Half the channels had different events from Phuket to Chiang Mai to Bangkok, and most of them the audience looked bored while being packed like sardines as unknown artists played songs I hadn’t heard of before on stage.

Finally the time neared. You never know the delay from the T.V. to the real time, as last year’s numerous false starts taught me. At 20 seconds left, fireworks were starting to fizzle around the area, then when the time came the sky exploded. From the large hotel windows (it was an amazing room) we had an amazing view of fireworks lighting up the city. Buildings nearby even had them shooting off the various floors. You could see people come out and stand on the rooftops for a better view, and we stood there with the big windows open, enjoying the fireworks for well over 10 minutes. This was so much better, as after you could just get some sleep after instead of fumbling through a mob for hours.

Well that was the end of my decade. I thought back on all that happened in the last 10 years, with milestones like my first girlfriend in 2000, finishing High School in 2001, moving to Regina in 2002, living in China in 2004, graduating again in 2006, coming to Japan in 2007, and the plethora of experiences that followed that opportunity.

I wonder what marvels the next decade holds for me. Happy New Year everyone.

"It is not what we take up, but what we give up, that makes us rich." -
Henry Ward Beeche

tnoy

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Three Weeks of Thailand Part 1: Bangkok

It’s tough being back at work, especially after so long. In retrospect, I think this is the longest vacation I’ve had since coming to Japan, it’s kinda crazy how that worked out. I hear it’s been record cold back home too, so while I’m sad I couldn’t be there for Christmas, I’m not heartbroken (I am however a bit sunburnt)

I don’t know why I keep thinking this will be “hard to write” but maybe not so much so if I just put the disclaimer out there that I spent the trip pretty much exclusively with Anna, and we’re more than just friends. Because of the long distance thing though, I wouldn’t say we’re ‘dating’ as much as we’re really close. I dated Crystal in Canada years ago while I lived in China, and it just isn’t fun. With that being said, maybe I won’t feel like I’m holding out too much information or leave you with strange questions. Also I’m a bit sick today, so I’m not thinking too straight.

I guess my adventure started Dec 19th. For some reason I can’t remember why, the plane was delayed 3 hours and I only got there at night despite waking up at 4 that morning to catch the bus. Japan was covered in snow when I left, so it was extra cold that morning.

Anna came and got me at the airport again, which helps a lot because then I didn’t have to change money at their insulting rates. It was funny catching a cab too, because there was a “working girl” hanging out the back window of a cab asking if we needed a ride. Needless to say, we got a different cab. It was late, and over 3 weeks ago now, so I don’t remember where we went for supper before checking into a hotel near the touristy area.

The hotel was so-so, but the price was pretty good: 800 baht, or $22 CAD. In Japan, I have to pay that today just to rotate my tires (I feel so lazy now, but it's so cold and I don't have the right equipment to do it myself) (When I was there, 30 baht = 1 CAD. 100yen = 35baht) I mostly liked the area, as we took a walk around it in the morning. Thailand has all these delicious foods stands that I love, and one thing that caught my attention right away was some “coconut pudding” little things that were delicious.

We didn’t walk around too much though; I was on something of a mission. I had totally failed to get anything for Christmas really, and I was hoping to shoot off a package before it got too late. Most of the first 2 days were spent in department stores looking at clothing and other things that caught my eye. The prices were great again, and with Anna’s help, I got all my presents together and sent home in a box.

It was great she helped me again, as I got an email from my sister Melissa this morning thanking me for some kinda ‘jumper’ dress. When I first saw it I thought Anna was crazy for picking it out, keeping in mind that I don’t know anything about shopping for clothes, I said we should buy only one. Again I should really, really keep quiet when shopping; I’m glad it turned out alright.

We stuffed it in a box, wrote up a Christmas letter, and sent it hope as fast as we could, which turned out to be almost $100 and took 3 weeks anyways, effectively missing Christmas. Oh well.

I made Anna write a bit in the letter too, because if you haven’t seen the Thai language before, its alphabet is really exotic; the craziest one I’ve seen yet. It’s funny how things translate to our alphabet too, like street signs that say “Mae Wang” or the waitress having a name called “Supaporn”. Last time I wrote about the subway station: “Bang Sue”. While “Anna” is her nickname, her first name is “Punyaporn” which got me wondering if I was reading it wrong.

We watched our first of many movies that night after the first full day, and ate the first of many pizzas as well, as Japan leaves me wanting for that. This time we saw “Avatar” which was pretty cool, although I kinda wish I saw it in 3D to see what the hype is about.

Once the shopping was done, we went to the park to meet up with Lily again. We ate a little, and fed the fish in the pond. When they first came up for some food, I freaked out a little. The disgusting huge things have these “whiskers” or something, which at first made it look like underwater spiders the size of my foot were sucking down the bread. Anna laughed at me and started poking their whiskers. Brave girl.

When we saw Lily I hardly recognized her, she has lost so much weight since I first met her a year ago now. We had a good talk, and she used her great travel agent skills to talk us into moving into the hotel she works at for the same price. The room was twice as big and twice as nice with things like flowers painted on the wall, a fridge, bottle opener, many power outlets and other nice touches. She wanted to treat us to supper too, saying how we’re family now. I was still on a bender from having just left Japan, and suggested Pizza again.

Before we left the park though, Lily’s friend flagged her down, and she happened to be a fortuneteller. I was like “alright”, although a lot of the fortune was strange. For example, the important questions at the start were my about birthday and if they were in the morning or night. I said “March 1st” but that didn’t matter as much as what day: ie Mon, Tues, etc. I didn’t know, and they assumed I forgot. I corrected them saying I didn’t know because it’s not important in any way to me.

This reminded me a lot of when I first came to Japan and people asked me my blood type to use as a basis of getting everything they needed to know about me. For example later when clothe shopping, I asked Anna what colours go good with me, and she asked what day I was born again.

Anyways she gave me my fortune, and I usually seem to hear more or the less when I get these things; ‘you’ll defeat your enemy’, ‘you’ll be well off’ and so on. It was quite the formula she had worked out, and told me what years will be lucky or not, and what age I would die, how many kids I would have among other things. I’m still a bit skeptical about these things, as I know how vague they are. Ie what enemy?

Later she told me about how she is desperately looking for a husband, and she gave me some photocopied papers of her profile so to speak. It said her age, where she can be found, how she doesn’t have kids and things like that. I told her she should try posting that online, but was hard pressed against it, saying how she doesn’t understand, and wanted me to do it for her. Well, it’s a big enough pain the butt doing my own correspondence, let alone someone I just met. I tried a couple approaches to get her to sit in front of a computer and try sometime, but she stubbornly assured me it was impossible.

It’s that attitude I find that really bugs me. Anything is possible, but you have to want to do it. If what you’re doing isn’t working, then try something else. I was really patient and really tried talking to her and helping her as she’s a nice girl, but when I get that attitude in response then I know I’m talking to a brick wall and it’s not worth my time. You have to want change to bring change to your life. Regardless I wish her the best, and if you’re looking for a 38 year old Thai fortunetelling wife, send me an email :P

The next day, the 22nd, I don’t think we did too much, but we went to an Indian temple this time, where Anna prayed and we both got that red paint put in the middle of our foreheads. This was the place I’ve been to before, and thought it was strange they sell offerings like bananas and drinks, just to accept the offer later at the temple, and resell it to the next people back at the front. Anna even tried to keep the drinks for us, but they got angry with her, so she returned them to the offering so they could be resold to someone later. Atleast they can’t resell the incense.

We saw another movie too, this time “Sherlock Holmes” which I loved, and now I want to read the books. Maybe we took it easy this night, because we went on a tour the next day, to the ancient capital “Ayutthaya” which I visited last year. One thing I really noticed this time in Thailand, although there was that huge political unrest last year, last year was a lot busier in many ways compared to this year.

For example this Buddha temple we went to, last year I couldn’t get in the front doors for 10 minutes or so because of the number of people, there were a dozen people maybe, and it was easy to get under the golden robes they threw out to drape over you, then to be swept up to Buddha, taking your prayers with it (to my interpretation anyways, I don’t know what they’re doing) I just know Anna seems really religious, and I still find it fascinating watching her do her thing. It’s so much different and peaceful compared to everything else I’ve seen.

Regardless I don’t mind the fewer people. We fed some fish again instead of going on that boat ride around the island, and saw the decayed old burnt ruins. One neat thing about taking a tour again, you learn more and different stuff. For example, they leave the area scorched as a sort of bad karma thing for Burma for razing the area in the first place. I guess there is a lot of bad blood there even after hundreds of years.

The tour takes you to 4 of the 7 areas too, this time I saw a new one. Here, not all the Buddha heads had been chopped off, and some were placed near the trees so that the roots have started growing over them. It’s a bit ghastly to see. Beautiful places regardless, and later we had Thai ice cream, which was mostly a frozen cube thing with a sharp stick pounded in to hold it. It was really tasty!

Here I learnt more about some weird fruit “Durian.” It has a horrid smell if you eat the fruit, but Anna seems to love it. She got that flavour on her ice cream and after a sample of hers I didn’t want more. Apparently you can die if you eat the stuff while drinking beer, as both heat you up or something. This one guy from India was telling us of his friends that would foam at the mouth because of it. Then Anna said if you eat Mango or something you’ll be ok, as they cancel each other out.

That was another weird treat she liked to munch on, but I quickly fell in love with: green mango with chili and sugar. They like to eat Mango when it’s an under-ripe green colour and really hard, but it’s good with that chili. Because I’m a foreigner, she was always afraid to get me around anything too spicy, but I can hold my own pretty well to her surprise. To her credit though, some of the food she eats makes me sweat just watching her.

For example she’ll get extra chili peppers/oil or whatever and douse her fried rice with it. Just a little is enough for me. Lately I’m more discovering the fine line of eating spicy food for the flavour, and using it to mask the taste of whatever it is you’re eating. For this reason I mostly stopped eating Tabasco (except with my fried eggs of course; so delicious!) The question usually becomes: do you want to eat something with flavour, or do you want to eat a pile of food that tastes only like Tabasco. Usually you only see that with pizza in Japan, probably because the pizza here usually leaves a lot to be desired, and you can hide your tears behind the spice.

Where was I, still on the tour I guess. I wrote about it last year, so you can read about it there too; dilapidated ruins, etc. One funny thing we saw: was a bus in the middle of a park posing as a bank. I thought it was hilarious anyways, to go and put your money in some bus somewhere. And we saw the old living place or whatever it was. It was beautiful again.

When we were back in Bangkok, we went to my favourite little side street where you can get all kinds of food and drinks and whatever. This night we had a whole grilled fish, fried rice, some Pad Thai or whatever Anna had, and 2 big bottles of beer for 100 baht. ($3.50)

When we sat down, to my horror, Anna made a grab for the fish’s eye, scooped it out with her thumb, and ate it right away. Sometimes she will tell me to not use utensils, as it tastes better eating with your hands haha. Anyways, she saw my shock, had a good laugh, and turned the fish over to fed me the other eye, because I made it a goal of mine to try as many things as I can atleast once. It was strange. It was like a sweet jelly, but the pupil itself was like a firm collapsible ball. I thought about it, and the best comparison is that ball the dentist would put in your teeth to measure the gap in your bite.

I had my laugh later though when she was peeling the skin off the fish to get at the soft white goodness inside. Personally I think the skin is one of the best parts, and I grossed her out by eating some, and got her to try some too. I guess the joke was on me though, as the next day my stomach wasn’t doing so well for some reason. Luckily(?) most of the Diarrhea passed that night at the expense of me getting no sleep, as we went on a tour to the River Kawai this time.

Again I went last year, but it was still a different experience. For example, we rode the train a lot longer, and didn’t really have time to walk on the bridge itself. Most of the rest of the tour was stuff you had to pay extra for, so we sat around in the heat, partially ill still, waiting to go back. They had the tiger temple, elephant ride and more. In one last desperate grab to get us to ride, they offered it at 250 baht each, but Anna rode them many times back at home and I rode them last year so I was fine sitting in the shade and listening to the strange birds.

Later another tour group came, and the guys paid 400 baht each. The one dude went on about how he would spend 1000 baht for the chance, and I stayed quiet. I think the bottom line for any of this stuff, to a sane extent, is what is it worth to you? I still remember shopping in China, thinking I got a good deal on something, and some bitter douche bag would say “I would have sold it to you for blah blah” to make you feel stupid after. I hate those people. Bottom line again, is ‘are you happy with it?’ If so, then that’s enough. Leave it be. Life has enough difficult questions to ponder.

Well that was Christmas Eve, we slept in on Christmas after 2 long days of tours and a bit of stomach sickness. They had the Muppet’s Christmas Carol on TV, so we watched it. I don’t think Anna was familiar to the story, so it’s fun teaching about what is famous/popular and things like that back home.

We saw another movie at the mall later, it had no English, but it was still enjoyable: “Storm Warriors 2”. It’s funny how they will have a movie poster explaining it in English, but nothing in the movie. Ah well. I asked Anna how she liked it after, and she said “The first one was better” haha. Later we met Lily and her friend, and went to the Bangkok Night Bazaar; a huge, fun place that’s open everyday with lots of food and drinks and so on.

Lily was quite busy as it was Christmas after all, and “everyone wants to have a good time” as she says; earlier she helped a man order 2 “escorts” to his room. Merry Christmas I suppose; I still find it crazy how prevalent and accepted that is in Thailand though.

Lily invited out a new guy that came in from Russia, and it was a bit scary how much of my old self I saw in him. He was awkward, not really good with people, traveling for the first time and super happy/excited to be out in a new place, fresh from graduating and teaching at a University. Either way, I felt a bit older after meeting him, and told him he’s lucky to know Lily and she’ll take care of him. We couldn’t talk too long though, as we wanted to be up early for the bus to Koh Chang.

"What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us; what we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal." -Albert Pike

tnoy