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So an archaeologist, a English teacher, and a land mine bomb technician walked into a bar…

A good title (also true) I had to put to pen, but Lindsay is hungry so I’ll have to fill this with content a bit later… sorry for the lack of posts all!!

miss u all,
kev

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Vi sitter här i venten och spelar lite DotA.

I just had to share quickly, last night was awesome as Lindsay and I went to an internet cafe to do some Cambodia research, and what should I find but a few fellow DotA players! DotA, being a somewhat obscure video game I play (not enough? too much? I’m not sure..) back at home. Anyway, it was great to see such a familiar, “important” thing to me in such a distant place, being played by guys who couldn’t even speak english. It was pretty awesome.

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rant.

This is how my morning began.

I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible no-good very bad day.

Once one’s head hits the pillow for their midnight Bangkokian slumber, it becomes extremely apparent within the first 30 seconds that their rickety old ceiling fan (circa 1800) on “high,” from their $4.50/night room just ain’t gonna cut it. Within the first minute, the frugal tenant comes to terms with their cheapness and prays for a morning where their face doesn’t look like they smeared it with Vaseline per their nightly bedtime anti-wrinkle regiment. They also pray they won’t slip-n-slide their greasy way out of bed in the middle of the night and break an arm. When prayers aren’t enough, they buy soap. Plenty of sudsy shower soap.

I have never hailed myself a clean freak. On the other hand, nor have I bragged about how few of showers I had taken in any given week (*cough KEVIN*cough*). That said, soap is what gets me through the hot sweaty nights. Soap is what makes me feel a little less like the skuzzy traveler I know I am, and bit more like the skuzzy CLEAN SMELLING traveler I know I can be (albeit for the first 20 minutes, anyway). When I dropped my soap this morning, my ONLY hope of smelling (and feeling) even remotely clean all day, down the squatty potty….a squatty potty which looks like it hasn’t been cleaned in well over a month (see that lovely ring?), in (once again) a $4.50/night room, with cockroaches…within the first 10 minutes of my day, I knew it was going to bed one of THOSE days. A day when just looking at me the wrong way may constitute a punch in the face.

A no-good, very bad, straight-up rotten, kind of day.


Now, I recognize it might seem a bit drastic to deem a day “rotten” within the first 10 minutes simply because I won’t be able to degreasify my body. This may, I understand, to those unknowingly basquing in the ordinary comforts of an air conditioned home, seem drastic. But let me assure you. It’s not. Do you ever just have one of those days when you wake up grumpy? Maybe you slept funny, or couldn’t find your blanket for 1/2 the night, or MAYBE you went to bed grumpy, and therefore, woke up that way? Unfortunately, that’s what happened to me. Last night, around 2am I decided having a clean, non mildew smelling pair of shorts to workout in would make my new step-aerobic friends more likely to want to stand by me (did I mention I’ve been doing step aerobics in the park with the gay men, and little old ladies? Well I have. And it’s awesome. But that’s for a happier, less “woe is me” kind post. Stay tuned:)). So, I got out my trusty little bar of soap, and went to work. Once all my workout clothes had jumped up a few notches on the clean scale, I had a second wind, and thought, “Hell! While I’m here, I might as well do everything!” I should mention that a few days ago I bought some new (read: used) clothes off the street for 50 baht that I LOVE. 2 cute shirts, and a pair of green cutoff shorts. I’ve been wearing them everywhere. So, I scrubbed and scrubbed, and close to an hour later, thrilled about saving the money by washing everything myself, but exhausted from all the hard work (thank god for modern day advances), I started to hang up everything to dry outside my 5th story balcony window.

I felt very domestic.

So just as I’m hanging my last sock, I swear to god, the only gust of wind Bangkok has felt in 2 months comes swirling by, and knocks my favorite new CLEAN pair of shorts off the line, down 5 stories, into a muddy gutter way above anywhere I could reasonably reach without a 40 ft extension ladder.

So I may have misspoke when I blamed my day going wrong when I dropped the soap in the toilet at 9am this morning. Come to think of it, I had a hankering my day would be a little less than perfect around 3:30 am staring over my balcony at my shorts. My favorite new CLEAN shorts (man, there seems to be a clean-theme here I didn’t recognize before this!!).

I’m sorry that you all might be getting a little bored with my little sob-story. I don’t care. It’s not done yet. It’s days like this where I feel totally justified complaining about everything and anything…but wait a second! There’s nothing new with that, now is there!!! 🙂

Okay. So lunch. I was starving. Must have been all those step aerobic workout moves, but I’m pretty sure my stomach would have eaten all of my other organs if it could have. For some unknown reason, I have this uncontrollable craving for “Seafood in Sticky Gravy Sauce,” a dish I tried one of the first few weeks here, and really loved. So, Kev, being the trooper he is, ignores my mood, and brings me to find what I’ve been craving. I order it. It looks great. Exactly as I remember. It looks like this:


Yes. Noodles covered in sticky, mucus-like gravy….uh oh. Sick. Just as I’m about to take a huge delicious bite of the one meal I have been craving…the meal we have spent over a hour looking for, I am reminded of an episode of “Dirtiest Jobs” that we watched with our dear friend Nick in a hotel room in Seattle one night on our way out west. Sick, slimy, disgusting mucus-expelling sea slugs. A Japanese delicacy. The sea slug mucus is exactly what is covering my noodles, and I can’t take my mind off it. Why then? Who knows. I’ve eaten this meal before. Fate was against me. I try singing a tune. I try playing “Expando” on Kev’s iPod. I can’t shake the sea slugs.

Lunch: ruined. I stomach a few more bites not to totally annoy Kev too, and leave, vowing to never again to watch “Dirtiest Jobs.”

Skip forward to much later in the day (I’m sure lots of reeealy annoying things happened in between there, but it’s getting late, and my tiredness is overriding my need to vent about the previous 24 hours:)). In an effort to get me in a better mood, Kev takes me to see Mamma Mia! which I have been ecstatic about seeing since we saw the preview during Death Racer. Lame, yes. I was thrilled just the same. Thrilled until I noticed the lead was the same chick from Mean Girls. Thrilled until Pierce Brosnan started singing. For the record, Pierce Brosnan should never sing. I don’t know where his agent was on this one, but if I was her, I would tell him to look for 2 things: movies where he can just sit, flash his pearly whites and look pretty, or movies where he can choke on half-chewed pieces of shrimp in fancy restaurants. Too bad I’m not getting paid the big bucks–I would have just saved that man’s career. All in all, the movie was terrible. Just kidding. Kind of. I can’t be too hard on it. It was terrible, but at the same time, any movie where you can watch Meryl Streep shake what her momma gave her in gogo boots can’t be all bad. Also entertaining? Looking down your row at all of the men singing, “Dancing Queen.” Tonight being the opening night, and ours being the first showing, I expected to see a lot if girls with their mom’s or girlfriends. Nope. Quite the opposite, actually.

Score for tonight’s events:

Movie:5.2
Entertainment:9.5

So we left the movie. Walking quickly enough to make the last run of the Skytrain. It’s 12:09am. One step from under the Skytrain’s aunning… lightening. CRACK! Thunder. Torrential downpour. Look at each other. Laugh. Taxi? Bah. Can’t stop a bad day set in motion. Just gotta let it run it’s course.

Total expenses trying to get me in a better mood (food, entertainment): 735 baht
Total travel costs to get me in a better mood: 180 baht
Walking for an hour through crazy downpour, getting the best shower (with or without soap) Bangkok can offer: PRICELESS.

Rant: I still don’t have my shorts.
Rant: I hate the traffic here. After 2 months I still don’t have a clue which direction it’s going to come from.
Rant: I hate the bugs who bite your legs and leave SCARS! I have 22 unknown bites on my legs, and look like I might morph into a leopard from the thigh down. Kev’s feet are worse. Terrible picture, but you get the idea.

2:52am. Almost 24 hours exactly to when my “terrible, horrible, no-good very bad day” began.

Here’s dreaming of a happier day tomorrow….and soap.
xxxlgt

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Omg

OMG I was just literally 3 feet away from all of the Thai Olympians
with their medals!!!

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Idea

Learn how to make sesame things
Banana roti
and
cow neeow sune kaya.

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sharing.

ayuthhaya. once capitol, now ruins of thailand.

unbelievably, the humid thai air has enabled kevin to grow facial hair.
he talks about how manly he is at least 5 times a day.
(i’m not lying).
he has also been experimenting with different looks.
pictured above: gotee
pic for proof.

epic.
(and i don’t even like that word.)

head/armless statues.
decapitated and amputated by the burmese playing mind games in 1767

buddha resides in all.


beautiful wat (temple) in chiang mai.

takkke me to the riiiverrr! drop me in the waaaterr!
dinner on the riverboat in chiang mai.

kevin attacking my face.
waterfall somewhere far away(15+km) from chaing mai.
we don’t know where… just happily exploring.

leaving ayutthaya for bangkok, for the 3rd time in 2 months.

BKK bound.
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A few new photos

Well, we’re in Ayutthaya at the moment, but tomorrow we’re heading off to Bangkok. It’s 11:30 PM here.

Tonight, as sad as it sounds, was almost ruined by two terrible meals. First was at a place called the Moon Cafe. I ordered “chips and cheese with salsa” for 100 baht, which I figured would be a cool thing to eat, considering I haven’t eaten any sort of chips in the last month and a half. But, I ended up getting Dorritos (sans cheese) on a plate with a bit of salsa (which actually wasn’t bad to be honest) for 3 bucks. The second bit of food was the same sort of thing.

The night was made better by a trip to seven eleven down the street where I found a bottle of goats milk, which I bought and drank and was very very happy with.

I really love food.

Also, just FYI I posted a few photos on Flickr. I’d post them here as well for those of you who don’t feel like clicking on a link, but I have 1 minute left before the ocmputer shuts off.

much love to you all, miss you!!!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/shoelessone/

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A detailed budget of sorts

500-ferry-kohphangan-koh tao
Taxi-200
400-big blue lodging
Internet-50
Indian food-400
Sandwhich-50
—-1600—–
————–
100-Thai lunch-res
30-mango shake
200-lodging
320-dinner
30-banana pancake
50-beer
20-soap-711
3600-diving-big-blue
—-4350——
————
120-breakfast-2egg-sandwhiches
270-dinner-coconutsoup-gingerchicken-rice-frenchfries-icecoffee
1356-tickets-koh-Tao-champhon-kirikah-boatbustrain
400-rooms
60-smoothies
50-cake
30-lemon shake-street
—-2286—-
————-
120-breakfast sandwhiches-res really good double decker
10-ice 711
40-soup for lindz-street
40-soup for kev-street
120-dinner-friednoodle-padthai-iced coffee-tip20b-res
35-cholate nuts and soymilk-shop-trainststion
500-hotel in kiri khan
—-865—-
————
500-hotel
90-breakfast at hotel 4 eggstoast
90-umbrella
100-rice for kids
35-ice cream and cake
20-crazy drinks
60-soup at stand
15-coconut
10-monkey food
100- foot cream
110- laundry
490-dinner ouch-lindz=300
70-food market @10icecream
—–1690—-
————
90- breakfast
30-711 ice coffee
45- coffee and desert
80- monkey feeding
500- rooms
40-pad Thai street
40- chicken soup street
5- dumplings street
15- egg and meat stick
40- ice cream
20- kow neo- sticky rice with custard
24- toilet paper and H2O
—–929—-
——–
100- nice lady breakfast
10- rice and sugar in bamboo
10- noodles on train
12- ice cream
28- pruat kiri Kahn – hua hin
88- hua hin to Bangkok
470- rooms at not such a nice place w cold AC and no adjustments
10- water
70- taxi from train station
80- Internet
110- Internet
50- pad Thai
32- batteries
—–1070—-
——–week1—–
470- rooms
120- may kaidee
13- yogurt at 711
20- fresh guava from street
5- water
12- needless giving
6- 3 statue guys
30- Internet
50- pad Thai
10- water
30- sky train
109- gormet shopping orange juice and milk
15- chocolate puff
240- movie
80- taxi
70- mango and 1.5 hours Internet
—-1280—–
————
8-3-08
70- taxi to siam from khoason
12- bread for Lindsay
11.75- yogurt at fancy store
470- rooms
70- cipro
12.75- yogurt from fancy store
6- water from gormet store
20- curry naan from mall
12- Japanese custard pancake
70- taxi to khoason road
100- stuff
50- dinner
22- 711 stuff
20- pop
—–1196.5—
—————-
15- Internet
90- taxi from khosan to suk11
800- nice rooms at suk11
453- crepes+50 baht tip
40- internet
50- BTS
60- 50 iced coffee
40- BTS
—–1548—-
—————
160-Internet
85- lunch
1222- 2x train from bkk to chiang mai
70- taxi from nana to train
100- dinner at train station
60- beer and water
80- train junk food – bun, dognut, etc
—–1777—-
—————-
6-8-8
550- rooms- hollanda montri
100- tuk-tuk to rooms from train
650- sushi
–1300———-
——————
550- rooms
90- food at street stalls
1200- visa run
1000- border crossing to Burma
280- mikes burgers
400- deposit for cooking class
40- internet
60- shake and leomanaide at border
—3620———
——————
1400- cooking class
130- 711 shampoo, razor, batteries
550- rooms
25- giving
–2105———
—————–
550- rooms
60- lunch
144- dinner
75- Internet @ 20b/hr
—–829——-
—————-
180- rooms darets
20- giving
40- drinks
29- gas station
25- sushi
20- dumplings
10- fish desert
30- sushi
300- scarves
30- sushi
40- games
69- coffee + custard
80- Internet
60- wallet
10- earings
50- postcards
5- water
20- kow lahm
110- purse
200- shirt
20- games again shooting targets
—-1348——–
—————–
180- rooms at darets
300- bike for 2 days
70- breakfast
90- gas
60- wat entry
150- prison backrub
40- prison coffee
20- kow neow
70- lunch
150- umbrella
300- dinner at da stafano
45- mango shake and lassi
—–1375—–
—————-
180- rooms
74- breakfast
80- fuel
225- dinner
40- street food
100- ice cream at mall
20- video game
5- pen
20- coconut shake
135- Internet
15- guava shake
49- tea at grocery
——-943——-
——————
180- rooms
400- bike x2 days
90- breakfast
492- dinner
80- gas
—–1240—-
—————-
180- rooms
60- Internet
240- dinner
38- desert at street market
110- paper market
199- helmet
70- fuel
90- breakfast
15- soap
18- almond thing
—-1120—-
————–
180- rooms
75- breakfast
400- bike
600- haircuts
40- desert
20- video game
10- massage chair
250- shoes
565- dinner on the boat – riverside
12- water
—————
676- ticket to ayuttaya
180- rooms
80- drinks
77- breakfast
70- gas
100- bike
150- dinner
128- buds ice cream
80- Internet
15- ducttape asprin
————–

+++27793+++
16 day average:
///1737B///
54.20 USD

————————
asia.shoelessone.com
(from iPod Touch)

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Just a trim.

Well, I guess It’s been a while since I’ve written much of anything, and after a lot of harassment from Kev, I realized I do actually have a few things to report. As it turns out, 1 1/2 months later, I need to make another addition to “the list…but I’ll get to that in a second.

As of 6 tonight, I “bit the bullet…” “went all out…” [add other ridiculous little phrase here] and got cute shoes AND bangs!!! Okay fine, my shoes aren’t really all that cute. In fact they’re knock off, $4.50 Birkenstocks, and my bangs, well…without a blow dryer, curling iron, or straightener, you could say they’re looking a bit funky, air drying with all this crazy humidity…but I will not be discouraged!! Kev actually was first to get his hair cut earlier this afternoon, and after watching him get a (seriously, no lie) 10 minute head massage and shampoo, I decided it would be a crime if I didn’t get one too (right?!). So, I found a cute little picture of a hair cut I liked, and showed the guy what I wanted. Obviously there is a BIT of a language barrier in this joint, but when he saw the picture I liked he said…”Oh! You want Asian girl hair! I give you straight Asian girl hair!” (this is what I THINK he said, by the way.) l smile and nod my head, and adjust myself in the really sticky pleather chair. Now there are two things I should mention at this point. One. While, yes, I picked out a picture of an Asian woman to copy my hair after, there were absolutely NO magazines of any white girl haircuts to choose from (not that I initially minded). Two. As I mentioned earlier, my hair’s been runnin’ with this whole humidity thing, and has left me with quite the crrrazy do’s these days. My hair is thick. I am white. Unfortunately, no amount of hair product will leave my hair as straight, slick or shiny as any of the girls’ here. I figured the man would recognize this. But decked out in his pink Lacoste hat, matching polo sweater vest, tight leather pants, and enormous diamond encrusted cross necklace and earrings– it was obvious, this man was on a mission. Almost 2 hours later, my “trim with bangs” was completed. Looking down at the floor, I laughed at the 1/2 of head of hair laying on the ground. This poor man truly could not handle the wave in my hair. Every time he cut and released the hair he was holding, my hair would lay with a slight wave. I watched as his face tensed up, and he grabbed the thinning shears, trying to thin my hair down to a point of no wave. When he could thin-no-more, he resorted to the hair wax, and methodically attempted to tame my hair into the “Asian hair” style he promised. You could almost read the profane words of frustration coursing thru his brain, mixed with the lack of understanding on “why it won’t lay flat!!!” In the end, afraid of losing any more hair, I finally stopped him, and just told him I liked it just like it was. He smiled, and whipped his hand across his forehead with a sigh of relief, and then proceeds to say, “You the first white girl hair I ever cut! Not like Thais, it hard!” Ha. My poor hair has been through so much over the years. It’s a wonder it doesn’t fall out just to spite me. I walked out looking like a drowned rat, while yelling at Kev for laughing at my “special new hair cut.” It was quite the trip…but now I’m one step closer to “fitting in”…right?! 🙂

Okay, so back to the list. Number 3… (Dun, dun, duuuuuun!) Being able to drive a scooter like a bat out of Hell. Let me just say for the record: Kev has mastered that skill. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn he has Thai blood coursing thru his veins. Today alone he ran 3 stop lights (common practice), utilized his horn multiple times (common practice) and mastered the delicate art of car/tuk-tuk/pedestrian/songatheaws/scooter/stray dog weaving. Needless to say, I’m veerry impressed (and scared to death most of the time:)). Speaking of stray dogs, the other day Kev picked up some dog treats at this night bazaar and has been carrying them around searching for hungry stray dogs for close to a week now. A giant bag. Full. Of smelly dog treats. It’s pretty cute, I will say.

Tonight we ate dinner on this boat while putzing along the river. It was an amazing way to see the city from a different angle. After, we went to another night market (where I bought my shoes!) and drove around looking for stray dogs to feed for an hour. It was really fun. Although pretty scraggly, they are pretty cute…and make me miss Clee the Beeo.

On a totally different, not so happy note, the other day I went to the Women’s Prison to get a massage. I heard that they had just implemented a program where 100% of the money the women made would go directly to help them get back on their feet when they were released, or to their families, assuming they weren’t getting out for a while. The woman I was with was named Soi, who seemed to have an incredibly sweet, but unmistakable sadness to her. I was just making small talk with her when she said, out of the blue, “so I bet you want to know why I’m in here.” After trying to assure her that, no, it really wasn’t any of my business, she said she needed to talk, and wanted to tell me. So I sat back and listened to how she had just seen her 4 year old daughter a few hours earlier and had been doing a lot of “thinks” all day about how she got there. She told me about how she found out her husband was molesting her daughter, and when she found out, she bashed his head in with a mortar and pestal. A bit graphic, sorry. She said he was in “really bad shape,” and that even though she was just protecting her daughter, she had a long time to serve. I haven’t looked into this, but she told me that in Thailand children are considered almost like adults by the time they’re 3. Which means, even though this little girl had no way of truly protecting herself from her dad, she still is responsible for her safety as far as the court is concerned. It was really difficult to take in. She also talked about the child-sex industry and made mention to why it’s so big here. She told me that even though it is now illegal to sell your child into the sex industry, parents (in especially rural villages) often have no way of protecting their daughters from it. And, of course, there’s no protection for the parents trying to protect their children. It’s a sick, frustrating cycle. I asked her if I could do anything, give more money, etc, but she told me no, she was just giving a service, and couldn’t take a cent more from me. When I left, she gave me a giant hug and thanked me for listening to her “thinkings.” I smiled, asked again if there was anything I could do and left feeling unbelievably drained, helpless and sick to my stomach. So much for a relaxing Thai massage! I guess this is the kind of stuff you find out once you’ve been somewhere for more than a week…you trim off the fat, and get to the meat of the issues effecting the people you’ve been surrounding yourself with.

I’m planning on going back to see her tomorrow.

Anyway, enough of this depressing post. It’s been a long day–and I think I’m hittin’ the hay. Miss and love you all.

Trim what you don’t need.
Xxx lgt

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I bought a bike helmet

I just bought a bike helmet. It was 199 baht, a bit less then 6 bucks. I bought it because it has a visor, and I’m tired of my current loaner helmet which doesn’t have a visor (makes driving in the constant rain difficult), plus my current helmet smells terrible.

plus, i’m going to buy a scooter when I get home. Mom/Dad, we’re gonna need a bit more room in our garage!

terrible pic: