travel blog

Bon Jour Vietnam

2008-08-28T21:07:00.000-07:00

Okay, so this post is about 9 months overdue..but hey we've been busy.

So where did we leave off? Laos I think. Well we actually finished our trip in Vietnam but we never got around to posting anything about it..so here it goes.

Vietnam was great..one of the easier countries to plan our travels through..we started in Hanoi in the north and headed south.

Vietnam is the quintessential image of french Indochina. This is probably insulting to Vietnamese nationals who have fought several wars in the last century to secure their Independence from among others the French and the Chinese but hey..

Anyway, Hanoi is a cool old colonial city where modernity has intertwined itself with the old world in the form of cellphones, neon lights and narrow cobbled streets overflowing with mopeds.

From Hanoi we migrated south to the cities of Tam Coc, Hoi An, and Hue. Each with its own indelible charm. Tam Coc is like Halong Bay with out the bay, instead a river winds its way through a myriad or karstic outcrops and nook and cranny villages. It's reminiscent of villages and farmers, of dragons and mystics. This was probably the most magically scenic areas we had visited on trip.

In general Vietnam was one of the most photogenic countries we went to.

Colorful market stall in Hoi An.

Man tending field with Buffalo

Boat Lady in Tam Coc. Often, they'll use their feet to oar the boat.

We spent a day with a local family. This was the son. He kept shooting ruubber bands at everything.

Festival near christmas time.

It rained often and the motocyclists would don these coloful rain capes making the whole street seem like it was was filled with supeheroes.

Net Fisherman near Hoi An.

street vendors galor. This one selling flowers.

more street vendors. This one was carving Budha heads.

All good things come to an end

2008-01-02T10:50:00.000-08:00

After eight months on the road without hardly a care in the world, having adapted to living out of a backpack, and being constantly stimulated with new sights, people, and culture, we finally bit the bullet and flew stateside to reunite with our long lost loved ones. It is with mixed feelings being back - yes, traveling was spectacular in too many ways to list and truly an experience of a lifetime, but it's great to be back on home turf. Hurray for home cooked meals and having a home base! We can go on and on about other things we've missed most but we'll save that for another day.

Looking forward to catching up with everyone! :)

Merry Xmas to all~!

2007-12-25T10:34:00.001-08:00

In love with Laos

2007-12-20T22:46:00.000-08:00

After Cambodia we flew north into Laos. Laos is a beautiful country with a bit of a black sheep history. Originally a Khmer vassal state, Laos was know as Lane Xang which translates to 'land of a million elephants'. Some 600 years later, during the 'secret' part of the Vietnam war, Laos could have easily been called 'Land of a million bombs' as the US dumped close to 2 million tons of bombs on Laos to curb the influx of NVA and Chinese supply lines (for purposes of comparison, about the same amount of bombs were dropped on Europe..by all sides..during World War II). To this day, many of these bombs remain unexploded and kill on average at least 1 person and 4 cows a day in Laos). Fast forward another forty years and it seems that with 40% of its population under the age of 14, Laos is now the land of a million children.

Our first stop was the capital city of Vientiane, home to the Laos national symbol Pha That Luang stupa. Vientiane is a relatively sedate town with a humbled (and crumbled) mix of traditional Lao, French colonial and Soviet modernist architecture. We spent a day here taking in the site (ok, maybe it was sites) and had a fresh river fish dinner at sunset on the silty banks of the Mekong.

Next day we flew on a Chinese made prop plane courtesy of Lao Airlines to the UNESCO heritage city of Luang Prabang.

LP is where our love affair with Laos really started. Despite the recent tourism fueled gentrification, this city was possibly the most romantic place we have been to yet in SE Asia. It has that quintessentially colonial Indochina look and feel to it with its narrow streets lined with traditional Laos and 19th century French inspired cedar, teak and bamboo bungalows, interspersed with gardens of lazily swaying palms and lotus ponds and many gilded wats.

We spent a cool five days just relaxing and enjoying the serene scene.
We watched locals making rice cakes and fishing.

We wandered the local markets full of rug, fruit and handicraft vendors.

We watched a local cultural heratige show put on by some of the towns kids.

One little one was so captivated by the show...

..that he eventually joined in.

We cruised longboats up the Mekong to some caves and handicraft villages and got our feet wet at a local waterfall.

The one mole on the face of this beauty was when someone stole my shoes from out front of our bungalow. Who steals shoes!~ Seriously. This is the last thing I would have expected in a country where it is customary (and often compulsory) to remove your shoes before entering most buildings and where the sandal clad natives don't even wear western shoes. Who steals shoes? Especially my shoes with their orthopedic insoles and countless gritty layers of sweat, road dirt and cow crap collected from 4 continents.

Then as if to laugh barefaced at my barefooted misfortune, fate would have it that the very next day while searching for a shoe store we walked past a street vendor selling what else? that's right..used western shoes.

Unfortunately my shoes were not to be found amongst the other lost soles, and alas we found no store selling any shoes remotely close to my apparently sasquatchen foot size of 10.5. So with the sun setting on our trip and with a pair of $5 sandals strapped to my feet for the remaining 2 weeks, we decided to give up the hunt and head up the river to the remote (as in only accessible by river) village of Muong Ngoi for what else..trekking.

On the way to our boat we stumbled across an Hmong new year celebration where the teenage girls and boys line up facing each other and toss balls and pick-up lines back and forth in a colorful courtship ritual.

Once they spotted a toe-headed falang (foreigner) though the Hmong stopped their games and quickly gathered to stare at this blond wonder as he beat a stick of sugar cane against a rock..kinda funny actually.

While in Muong Ngoi, we trekked to some local villages and hill tribes. Crossing streams and hiking across acres of rice paddies we came upon a village wedding and shared some beer and lao lao (rice whiskey) with them.

One of the three most magical things about Laos is the utter lack of modernity that most of the country lives in. Unlike other developed or developing countries we have traveled through, Laos is still pre-industrial in a lot of ways. Bamboo is the material of choice. Young men hunt squirrels and birds for meals rather than for sport. Rice farming is a subsistence activity not a commercial enterprise. Food is cooked in simple pots with simple tools.

Another magical thing about Laos is it's river culture. In Laos, the river is the main street and the life blood of the village, connecting it to the next village and the rest of the world. It is the site of many of their productive, social and cultural activities. Families bathe, launder, travel, play, fish and forage weed from the many rivers sluicing through this karstic terrain. They divert it to flood the rice paddies and they stab it with propellers attached to dynamos to generate electricity from the currents. We found the combination of the river and this 'simpler' life to be soothing in a zen sort of way...something about the cool clear water crawling along its ancient course seemed to set a different pace for life..time slowed from morning to night.

One of the biggest differences between this world and the rest of the world that we have seen is that the trash here is 'clean'.. well, clean like the dirt from a garden would be clean. Unlike the synthetic and toxic refuse from modern industrial cultures, the trash from these villages in Laos mostly consists of scraps of bamboo, dried palm fronds, cuttings from the recent rice harvest, and maybe some broken pottery or dried dung cake which they burn.

Everything else is recycled. Anything remotely mechanical in nature is used to create some much needed piece of equipment. For instance, anything roughly circular is quickly bolted to an axle and strapped to a piece of wood for use as a wheelbarrow. Hinges, nails, pulleys and latches are all collected and reused. Old bicycle tires are cut into strips and used as rubber waterproof lashings for the boats. Broken cups become ash trays, broken ashtrays become plant pots..etc. Aluminum is collected and smelted into propellers for the long boats. Plastic bottles are used to distribute the uber popular fermented rice wine (lao lao) dripped from makeshift stills (themselves usually made from old oil cans and bits of glass and rubber tubing).

I do wonder though that if the scope of production in these 1500 people villages were scaled up proportionately to something the size of Los Angeles, and if the resulting organic trash were burned, what sort of air pollution it would cause..would it make Los Angeles seem clean proportionately?

Despite these morning and evening piles of fire that cloud the valleys in smoke though, Laos still seems fairly ecological friendly and was as close as I have seen to the edenic models of sustainable subsistence economies touted by many luddite environmentalists. The downside to all of this of course is that life in Laos is hard. We had a hard time finding anyone over the age of 50. The Lao live a laborious life rowing and hoeing, they mature fast..getting married by 17 with a handful of kids by 30..then dead by 55. Any decent medical care by western standards means having to travel to neighboring Vietnam or Thailand...which explains the low life expectancy, high infant mortality and low median age.

But every cloud has its silver lining and so the third magical thing about Laos was all these young'uns running around. We saw more kids laughing, playing games, and running naked down the riverbanks to wave 'hello' than in any other country we have been to yet. Here's some fotos of the kids and their games that made Laos such a light hearted delight.

'Let's jump out of the tree' game

'volleyball'

'climb the pole' game

'roll the old bike tire with the stick' game

'knock the cards over with your shoe' game

'let's get naked and say hi to the boatload of tourists' game

'volley ball with our feet' game

'jump over the string' game

the girls

underoos

cool and the gang

umbrella

Helen and friends

what they going to do with all that monk, all that monk..in that tru(n)ck

Khmer Kountry

2007-12-10T05:19:00.000-08:00

After Thailand we flew to Cambodia to continue our tour of South East Asia. Cambodia is a strange country..it seems plagued by really bad luck. Since the fall of the Angkor empire in the 15th century they have been pillaged and plundered by their neighbors the Thais, Chinese and Vietnamese, they have been sweltered and stifled under the unbathed armpit of French colonialism, fought a civil war and war with Vietnam, then endured the genocide of Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge regime. It's as if Cambodia has been wearing a 'kick me' note taped to their back for the last 500 years. Only since 1998 has Cambodia enjoyed a relatively stable and democratic independence.

Needless to say that when we landed in Phnom Penh it was markedly less rosy than it's glossy plasticized neighbor Thailand. Still we decided to give the city/country a chance. We decided to do some homework and visited the killing fields and Tuol Sleng prison. Tuol Sleng was actually a converted high school (how's that for irony), it was where the Khmer Rouge maintained, interrogated and tortured it's political prisoners before sending them to the killing fields for their disposal.

In Tuol Sleng we saw the various torture rooms and photographs of the victims.

In the killing fields, where millions of Cambodians were executed, we walked amongst the many mass graves and circled the 6 story memorial tower filled with exhumed human skulls.

Having satisfied our curious morbidity we opted for a lighter scene and headed towards Boeung Kak, a flood lake of the great Mekong, for some beer, fries and sunset where we were joined by young boys offering 20 minute paddle powered boat rides around the tidal muck for 1 US dollar.

The next day we ventured to the Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda. Why it is named the Silver Pagoda we're not sure as we never actually found a 'silver pagoda' but still it was refreshing to see some of the country's more resplendent past. While riding our tuk tuk back to the hotel we crossed paths with saffron clad reincarnates of the fab four.

We then toured the Russian market, named for its popularity with Russian ex-pats (i.e. KGB operatives and other ideologists) in the 1980's. The market was kinda funny..real dark and grimy..like an old industrial warehouse..but with food stalls and everything from gardening tools, to machine parts, to children's crayons and finger and food stalls for sale. Made for some good fotos.

Unfortunately, PP began to grow on us. The city's children are sent out by their parents to sell various goods (water, books, trinkets, etc) to the tourists..problem is the kids aren't nice..or at least they don't take 'no' well. One of the things Helen and I have gotten good at on this trip is the polite decline, "Oh no thank you." or "No Thank you we already have" and so on. To our dismay these well honed niceties didn't work on the precocious prepubescent peddlers. They had a two fold technique. First, they would lure us in with their highly trained 'how to sell to tourist' educations, which, by the way, far exceeds the standards of American education.. in geography and foreign language skills at least. To start they would say hello and then bonjour..then ask where you're from. When you answered they would name the state/country capital and then say 'hello' in your countries language (from my observations they seemed to know 'hello' in German, Italian, Japanese, Chinese, Korean and Dutch). If this first approach didn't work and we tried one of the aforementioned excuses why not, they would counter with a rebuttal. Here's a real example:

Child "Hello"
Helen "hello"
Child "where are you from?"
Helen "California, but my parents are Korean"
Child "California, capitol is Sacramento, USA. Korea, capital is Seoul, 'Ahn young hah sae yoh' "
Helen "wow, you're very smart!" -- actually impressed
Child "would you like to buy a book"
Helen "no thank you we just bought a book and we haven't read it yet" -- this is true..I had just purchased the book from a previous tadpole and had it sitting on the table in front of me..
Child "well maybe you buy this also" -- holding up a different book..
Helen "no thank you"
Child "why not"
Helen "because we have many books already"
Child "well maybe you buy for your family then"
Helen "No thank you, we have too much too carry already"
Child "I sell to you for 2 dollars"
Helen "no thank you we don't need"
--after another five or so minutes of this..
Child "you're a stingy girl..STINGY GIRL!..." -- then he stomps off about 15 feet and begins pouting and muttering under breath 'stingy girl' for the next 15 minutes..

after several days and several rounds of this our conscious was on the ropes..we needed to escape. So we took a bus north to Siem Reap to visit the famed temples of Angkor Wat.

Halfway into the 6 hour bus ride our bus breaks down and affords us the opportunity to see rural Cambodian life.

After a 20 minutes wait we hitched a ride on another bus going the same way, which was great because the first bus was sooo gauche...and was also still broken down.

A couple of hours later we arrived in the tourist town of Siem Reap and found a bed for the night. Next day we ventured into the ancient city of Angkor.

Angkor was amazing. The scale of this city and its buildings were impressive, putting most of Europe's grand designs to shame with it's intricate temple spires towering over acres of carved rocked and hundred foot high heads..all encircled by concentric rings of columned walls and square moats. But despite being the country's largest national monument it is still a living place with tribal Khmers farming the land and native trees clawing their way down through the ancient edifices; with incense peddlers, Buddhists wats and monks, and Khmer crafts ladies and school children.

Painstakingly it was those pugnacious pipsqueaks that again drove us from the area. This time it was my fault apparently as I 'promised' that "maybe I buy a water later" and then after explaining to me loudly that in Cambodia maybe means 'maybe yes..not maybe no' she said some things in Cambodian to or at me that I'm sure weren't pleasant.

In summary the temples were great..I liken them to the temples of Chitchen Itza in Mexico. PP is an ok town if you're interested in Cambodian history otherwise it is unremarkable and apparently has a gun problem. Siem Reap is good for a couple of days to see the temples but otherwise is very crowded and touristic.

We felt bad for Cambodia actually. They have had such a rough past..and we really wanted to do our little part to help the economy and support their burgeoning tourist industry..but the attitude of the touts, especially the little ones, is unrelenting and eventually unbearable. We stayed 7 days in this country, the shortest time in any country we've visited to date, before flying out to Laos.

on the bright side got some more monk and buddha fotos.

Another night in Thailand

2007-12-01T06:54:00.000-08:00

So yeah Thailand...what a place. Thailand, like most countries as we have been learning, has it's regional differences; the 'cultural' north is ruled by temples and hill tribes, the south is all vacation with it's powdery white beaches and bathtub warm water. Despite these slight cultural differences however the country seems to share a common love for celebration. In our travels Thailand has proven to be one of the most celebratory cultures we've encountered. They celebrate anything it seems. The King's birthday for example..it's in December..but they began celebrating back in October with ribbon-framed, near billboard sized portraits of him 'administering' over every major intersection and traffic circle and with the entire country dressed in pink and yellow shirts in honor of his majesty's favorite colors.

We were lucky enough to stumble across one of the two major yearly celebrations. Loi Krathong, on the 12th full moon of the year, celebrating the life giving force of water and nature with an offering of floating lanterns set adrift in the ocean or lake..sort of a Thai Thanksgiving. Songkran, the other festival around new years in April, is apparently a celebration of rock's magnificent defeat of scissor.

In Chiangmai we spied some monks assembling some rather large lanterns..

It was still about a week before the full moon when we started to see the Loi Krathong celebrations begin. It was our last night in Chiangmai and we ventured to the normally scheduled Sunday night market; but this time the market was gearing up for the 12moonwater festival with markets, music, traditional Thai dancing performances and even a couple of sumo wrestling bouts.

We shopped the market and watched the local bands set up..

We passed many colorful monks and penitent children..

We watched a repertoire of traditionally costumed dancers filter onto stage fluttering fans and twirling umbrellas, bowing in and out of the rhythm of the twangy string and drum music..

..until a troupe of retirees showed up dressed in weird zebra and red leopard print kimonos and began swaying and undulating their way arthritically up onto stage and into these large egg shaped things floating in a glowing pool of water..ok so there wasn't really any egg pods or glowing pools of water but with their staccato'd swaying, porcelain smiles, and eerily unfocused gaze it still reminded me of the rapture scene from Cocoon.

Luckily this ended as soon as the mother ship arrived. And then the sumo started. Though strikingly similar to a Discovery channel show we had watched recently on strange sexual perversions (fuzzy costume fetishes and other weird Freudian infantile regression issues) this was quite fun to watch.

The next day we decided to heed wise words and make our way south.

Our next stop was Sukhothai, seat of the original Thai kings. Here we rode bikes around the ruins of the ancient temple city. Reflecting on the many lakes and temples..

and reclining before many grand buddha.

After Sukothai it was back to Bangkok where we hitched a ride on a bird and flew south for the winter to Krabi, home of some world class scuba diving and rock climbing..neither of which, unfortunately, were we planning or prepared to do. But I don't think you can visit Thailand without the compulsory visit to the beaches of the south.

The south is the perfect place for those tired of Hawaii / Cancun vacations. It really is like the post cards..all limestone cliffs, emerald blue water and sunsets.

The downside to this is that it really is like the post cards and so it is quite crowded and touristic; an unwelcomed change from the more cultural and traditional feel of the north that we had acclimated to.

After a couple of days in Krabi we made our way to the Gulf of Thailand to the island of Ko Phangan. We stayed here for a couple of days and got to see the actual moon-water celebrations, it was neat to see all the families lighting their sparkling lanterns and floating these out into the waveless ocean as a sign of thanks..

After a few days cruising the island on motobike we had to head back to Bangkok to pick up our flight into Cambodia. On the way back we visited a famous floating market..this was quite a neat scene with all the local farmers out on their paddle canoes selling their flora and fauna to the main town stores. Basically this part of Thailand is all water-logged..so the farmers simply divert streams off the near by river and flood their orchards..they then paddle between the trees to collect various fruits and vegetables (bananas, oranges, bamboo, pineapple, etc) and then paddle straight to the river front market to sell direct to trucks, families, and restaurant owners, etc.

After the floating market we made our way to the new Bangkok International airport (which is quite a cool piece of architecture), ate our last Thaifood meal and said our goodbyes to Thailand along with promises to return.

end

Gobble Gobble!

2007-11-21T21:47:00.000-08:00

Happy Turkey day to all our friends and family!

One night in Bangkok...

2007-11-18T08:21:00.000-08:00

When we arrived in Bangkok we hired a cab to take us to Khao San road..the local backpacker ghetto..this place was overpriced and crowded with tourists...guess we could have expected this..when we circle back through BK I don't think we'll stay here again..

The next day we toured around to see some of the sights around town..including many, many statues of Buddha.

then we hired a boat to see the river side of town...sort of an Asian style Venice..

After this we went to the Grand Palace..quite an amazing place actually..the sheer opulence of it all was awe inspiring. The many monks wandering the aisles gave the place a real sense of history and majesty.

But BK is not all temples and Buddhas..there is the food of course..amazing food everywhere...and then there's the shopping as well..

One night we went to Silom road to look for some bars/clubs. We ended up in the 'boy-town' section. This was weird scene, especially since it was located right next to a 'Family Mart' store. After wandering around for a while and hearing all the propositions for "Boy Show" or "Ping-pong Show" and such we did what any self respecting newly-wed couple would do..we went back to our hotel and watched the Hallmark channel. (seriously, it was the only english channel we got).

After Bangkok we decided to get out of the big city and get into a more rural scene. For this we headed north into Chiangmai, city of a thousand temples..well only about 300 but still a cool place. It was a hot day so Helen made sure all the temple dragons were well hydrated.

From Chiangmai we took a hill-trek up to visit some of the local hill-tribes. This was very cool as we got meet these hill-families and stay in the their hill-houses and eat freshly caught hill-food (as in they killed and skinned one of their chickens for us). We found some wild hill-bananas and even got to wear some funny hill-hats. Trekking in the northern hills of Thailand near the Burmese border was definitely a highlight for us. It was amazing to see how these people lived in nature and make almost everything from bamboo. It was incredibly scenic..here are some pics.

After the trek we headed south again to the historic city of Sukothai..where we are now..soon to head to the South circa Krabi and Ko Phangan to catch a full moon..unfortunately the forecast says it'll be all rain and thunderstorms. :( we'll see.

Catching up..

2007-11-12T03:52:00.000-08:00

We are actually in Thailand right now but I figured I'd catch the blog up and finish off our travels in India..

Jai Guru Deva
After spending an enjoyable week in McCleod we moved east to the hippy town of Rishikesh, where the venerable Ganges gathers itself out of the Himalayas and where the Beatles spent several months finding themselves and also apparently the inspiration for their subsequent 'White Album'.

Ashrams on the Ganga in Rishikesh

Unfortunately, Rishikesh was a bit of a bust..overpriced and overcrowded with the baggy pants brigade in full force so we decided to spend just one day walking around the myriad of ashrams and visiting the now abandoned Beatles ashram before heading out. (for more on the shams and ashrams read the Beatles own account of perverted Maharishis and sneaking chicken to vegetarians here)

Downstream from Rishikesh we stumbled upon the much cooler town of Haridwar where we watched the evening Ganga (i.e. Ganges) celebration. Pilgrims from across the country were visiting the Ganga to float candle-topped lotus leaves down the current as an offering to the Pantheon of Hindu gods. If you're not familiar with Hinduism it's worth reading up a bit as it is actually quite colorful and interesting. There are thousands of gods and other incarnations available for petition on everything from financial success to marital happiness although the main gods, Brahma, Shiva, Vishnu dominate most of mythology. Haridwar as it turns out is one of the holiest places to Hindus.

Ganga offerings

Hindu Pantheon

Haridwar was interesting for the couple of hours we spent there whilst waiting for our connecting train to Varanasi further downstream.

Anyway we boarded our train later that night and began our 26 hour train ride to Varanasi..that's right 26 hours. When you consider that the distance between Haridwar and Varanasi is less than 1000km, this makes the average speed about 38km per hour or about 23 miles and hour..pretty damn slow..this has been one of our greatest challenges in India..getting from A to B just takes so dang long..even short distances of 100km or so seem to chew up entire days or two..

Varanasi
Anyway, so we get to Varanasi, which is The City to go to in India..especially if you are dying and want to be released from the cruel wheel of karma. Varanasi is quite a spectacle. Day 1 we did the tourist thing and toured the silk factories. It was interesting to see hand looms in action..especially when we learned how the fabric pattern is translated to a punch card that is then used to drive the weave mechanism of the loom (you can see the 3x5 punch cards hanging in front of the loom)..it was very similar to the old school type of computing..the factory owner even calls this his 'source code'. We saw the dye factories and watched as these guys toted bundles of material from one shop to the next, hammered out punch card patterns or relentlessly threaded the shuttle back and forth through the weave... I think the daily wage for these workers must be something like 100 rupees a day..or about 2.50usd..maybe less.

The next day we took an early morning boat tour of the Ganga. This is what Varanasi is about..well, half about at least. Every morning the Ganga comes alive with flocks of pilgrims streaming down the many ghats to bathe in the holy waters. These pilgrims are met by hundreds of boats full of tourists floating silently past like crocodiles on the prowl.

Ganga Sunrise	Main Ghat
Ganga Bathers	Ganga Scene

In addition to the bathing pilgrims, mystics, and other holy revelers lining the shores..it is quite a scene. I would say it was a bit of a carnival but it really is a holy affair for the pilgrims so I won't. Here is a brief list of the things we saw: An old man, whom we initially thought was dead, lying on the steps of a ghat with his robe hiked up around his waist, hanging out like a Scotsman and covered in buzzing flies. A candy box assortment of mystics lounging under umbrellas offering worldly and spiritual advice to passers by..for a fee. A 10 year old preacher who had an entire ghat captivated by his life lesson. Intoxicated men in complete body paint and costume offering photo ops for 5 rupees. Indian police men stroking their quaffs in front of a riverside barber. Children playing cricket. Shore side massage parlors. Various cafes and eateries. And cows...always cows.

Ganga Mystic

More Mystics

Rupee Photo Op

Ganga Police and riverside barbershop

As I mentioned earlier the Ganga is the place to die if you want to escape the endless cycle of karmic rebirth. Apparently if you die in Varanasi you are granted a 'get out of karmic rebirth free' card and so many come here specifically to die and to be cremated. There is even a cremation ghat that performs several hundred cremations a day. Actually, they do about 200 bodies a day..and not all of the bodies are burned completely before being dumped into the Ganga-kids for example are not cremated since they are deemed to be pure and thus don't require the cleansing fire of cremation. This creates substantial pollution for everyone downstream as there is something like 350 tons of ash dumped into the river every year..and an additional 250 tons of unburnt flesh that is also dumped. When combined with the open sewers and other run off that all flows into the Ganga you can imagine how filthy it must be. Yet surprisingly people still bath here and still use the river to do laundry. Strangely there's even a species of fresh water dolphin that lives in the Ganga..weird.

Crematory Ghat -note the smoke

Varanasi Laundry

As with every morning, every night the banks of the Ganga come alive with crowds to watch the Ganga celebration show, this is the other half of what Varanasi is about. Throngs of men dressed in white tunics and women dressed in their finest silk saris sit in groups to watch the 7 or so young performers offer incense and fire to the Ganga.

Varanasi crowd

Varanasi Celebration

Karma sparks

Darjeeling

After Varanasi we headed north again into foothills of the Himalaya to the hill station Darjeeling. Darjeeling is famous for its tea and for being the launching off point of some of the earliest Everest expeditions. The world's 3rd tallest mountain rises magnificently behind Darjeeling and Everest is a mere 100km or so away..easily viewable from Tiger hill on a clear day.

Population wise Darjeeling was an interesting place. Squeezed between Eastern Nepal and Western Bhutan it is populated mostly by Gurkha, and was much more Asian influenced than we expected. So much so that it hardly seems that it should belong to India. History informs us how it and neighboring Sikkim came to be part of India (read: British Raj era meddling) and also explains the "Free Gurkhaland" rallies we kept seeing around town.

Flower and Vegetable vendor

School kids

Due to this cultural difference, Darjeeling has been granted certain autonomy from India at large. The biggest difference we noticed was the beef butcher shops around town..something that is strictly forbidden in the rest of India. Darjeeling was also cold and rainy, but what else do you expect from the Himalaya in late October.

We spent a couple of days in Darjeeling exploring the town.

We visited the Happy Valley Tea Plantation to watch how tea is made.

Tea Plantation

Tea Sorters

We rode the famous Darjeeling Toy Train

Toy Train

Train hand

And we visited the famous Buddhist stuppa upon Observatory hill where the monkeys run wild.

Helen at Observatory Hill	More Monkey Menace
Monkey Love?

All in all we ad a good time in India. It is an amazing place but after 6 weeks we were ready to leave. And so after Darjeeling we bused it back south to Kolkuta airport and flew to Thailand.

Smokin'

Dalailamaland

2007-10-27T09:36:00.001-07:00

After Amritsar we took a 12 hour bus north again up into the McCleodganj hill station which sits in the foothills of the Himalayas at about 6000ft. The ride up was windy, dusty and bumpy. Our driver was driving this public bus up the windy mountain rode like it was a Porsche..several times I really thought we were going to tip over and tumble down the side of the gorge.

McCleod hill station

Having arrived safely we found the cooler, cleaner mountain air to be a welcome relief from the hot and polluted air of the plains below and well worth the white-knuckled drive up.

Himalaya foothills

We spent a couple of days hiking around the hills and visiting the local lakes and waterfalls.

In addition to the climate change the Tibetan-Buddhist-influenced culture of the area was a welcome change as well.

McCleod it turns out, or more specifically, Dharamsala, about 4km south, is the home of the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan government, and about 400,000 other Tibetans in exile.

Buddhist monks in front of Dalai Lama residence

It was neat to see a new culture. There was a large Buddhist temple in town where many young and old monks and other Buddhist pilgrims would circle and spin the mani prayer wheels (Om Mani Padme Hum) elevating their karma.

Buddhist stuppa

young and old monks

One night a crowd gathered in the streets with candles and flags for a a Free Tibet rally.

Helen and I had seen 'Free Tibet' stickers before..usually stuck to the bumpers of dilapidated old VW's. We had a vague knowledge of the Chinese occupation of Tibet and that the Dalai Lama was living in exile. The day after the rally we read a bit about the history of Tibet and attended a showing of a documentary film about the crisis in Tibet and the plight of the refugees. Until arriving in McCleod though I don't think we had a real sense of magnitude of the situation. Without getting too deep it seems that in 1950 the Chinese Maoist decided to invade and 'liberate' Tibet and have since then engaged in a systematic destruction of the Tibetan culture, a sort of culture-icide if you will, forcing Tibetans to adopt Chinese language and customs and cannibalizing all Tibetan cultural and historical relics. In an attempt to preserve their cultural heritage and historical identity many Tibetan, led by the Dalai Lama, have fled Tibet into India and Nepal to established refugee communities where children can grow up and live free as Tibetans.

This need to preserve a free Tibetan way of life is so strong that many parents send their children over the hill (i.e. the Himalaya's) knowing that they may never see them again. And this is what the documentary film was about. The film followed several young Tibetan children sent away from their homes in Tibet and their perilous journey over the Himalaya's into India. What was particularly moving about the film is that it featured many of the locals from the area, several of whom were sitting in the audience. So when you watch the guide taking these 8 year old kids through shoulder high snow drifts, fighting off frostbite and snow blindness, and running and hiding from the Chinese authorities at the Nepalese border and then you look over and sitting there is the guide with one of the kids (now 15) you couldn't help but feel moved by the reality of the situation. Especially when you learn that not all of the kids make it..some are lost to the elements..others are captured and imprisoned for years (the guide in the movie/audience was only recently released from spending 2 yrs in a Chinese prison)..still others are shot and killed by Chinese authorities, the most recent case of this was a shooting that occurred last month, claiming 9 people. To complicate matters more, Nepal has apparently recently changed its stance on Tibet and is now cooperating with China to capture and return refugees. The future looks bleak for Tibet it seems...

Anyway...

While shopping we came across a necklace for our friend Pierre.. (you know you love it P)

Some other monk pics..

Only in India

2007-10-22T01:14:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since our last blog and we've been to many many places in India so apologies for the long blog and butt load of fotos..

After Jaipur and Pushkar we moved south to the Lake town of Udaipur where they filmed James Bond's Octopusy..I've included a couple pics below but if you really want to get a sense of what Udaipur is like rent and watch Octopusy..the town looks exactly the same!

Udaipur at sunset (City Palace on top of hill)

One night in Udaipur we were trying to sleep and kept hearing this "Beeeoorrraaahh" sound. It was loud and sounded like it was coming from right out front. We weren't terribly concerned as we were on the third floor but we kept trying to figure out what animal it was..was it a donkey? was it a monkey? a camel? an elephant? Who knows..but what is truly great about India is that it could very well have been any of these things.

Elephant ride vendor in Udaipur

After Udaipur we moved east again to a town called Bundi..a small village in the hills that despite being in the Book (i.e. Lonely Planet) is still relatively off the tourist radar. We had a great time in Bundi actually. Rudyard Kipling apparently lived here for several years while writing and it was also where we met our first Indian woman..actually we met two. It sounds funny but as of this point in India we had only interacted with men. Women were always around but were never part of the commercial or social fabric that we interacted with. So this lady that we stayed with, let's call her 'Mama' since that what she called herself, was a Brahman widow who apparently caused some waves in the conservative town of Bundi by opening up her haveli (house) as a guest house with her two daughters. It turns out the women from the Brahman class are not allowed to remarry if their husbands die. Facing a life of destitution (keep in mind that women in India aren't really allowed to work either) Mama decided to break with tradition and open her house to tourists. Her main selling point? Her food. Her food was by far the best food we have had in India. In fact she showed us some articles from the London and LA Times that featured her and her home cooking favorites. Props to her. Later we met another lady who also ran a Haveli with her brother..she was younger and less traditional. She told us that the newer generation is moving away from the restrictive traditions of their parents. She also informed us that we were among 10 tourists in town at that point...apparently all the Haveli owners talk..we became known as the American couple who wanted TV in their room..an apparently absurd request.

Lake house in Bundi (Rudyard Kipling lived here for a short time while writing)

We were rudely awaken one morning at Mama's to the sounds of crashing and banging on the roof above us. Having heard stories of the Monkey menace that plagues the town I grabbed my camera and ran up stairs to the rooftop to try to catch them. On my way up I was joined by another Indian who was staying at the Haveli..he brought a long stick. When we gt to the rf I was surprised to see about 30 monkeys on our rooftop alone..old, young, families. Mothers were hugging their young and the 'teenage' males were banging the chairs and tables around (which was the cause of all the racket). The guy who joined me started swinging the stick at the monkeys to shoo them..which I was grateful for since they didn't seem alarmed by my presence and in fact the older males seemed somewhat confrontational..while the rest of the monkeys fled across the rooftops one of the adult males actually circled behind us in an attempt to flank us or something..we spied him and shoo'd him too. Later the guy told me stories about how the monkeys will steal things from around the house and then hold them for ransom..only returning them if bribed with food. I'm a big fan of evolution and all but these monkeys it seems are getting a bit too smart.

All in all Bundi was a great town with colorful temples and streets.

We spent almost a week here exploring the Palace ruins that loomed over the town like Pankot Palace from Temple of Doom ...and with the swarms of bats that come out at night this place really was from Indiana Jones.

What is fascinating about a lot of Rajastan is that these towns still seem sort of medieval in a way. Swap out the accouterments of modern life (i.e. rickshaws, and tangles of telephone wires stretching across the street) and the scene is probably fairly close to what is was hundred of years ago with the massive city gates and street bazaars.

Bundi vegetable market

Bundi city gate

After Bundi we continued east to Ranthambore National Park to go tiger spotting. Ranthambore was tres cool..real Jungle Book type of stuff..ancient monkey infested temples, crocodiles basking on old Raj hunting bungalows. Lots of wildlife too, mostly monkeys, birds, and deer though. We toured around in an open top van for about 3 hours looking for tigers and just as the tour was ending our luck came around and spotted a mother tiger and her two cubs. They were a bit far away and it was getting dark so I couldn't get a decent picture..but still it was great to see these cats in the wild. Even from a distance you could tell how massive these things are.

Wild deer in Ranthambore National Park

After Ranthambore we said goodbye to magical Rajastan and continued on to Agra, site of the Taj Mahal. The Taj Majal is magnificent, mainly from the outside, but the 20usd ticket price to get in is a bit steep even by western standards. And apart from the Agra Fort and the Taj, Agra is a crappy town so we only stayed a couple of days..long enough for us both to catch colds.

Crossing the Yamuna River behind the Taj

Agra train station crowd

From Agra we took a train north to Delhi. Delhi is a city of about 25 million..almost the population of California. New Delhi is more modern than what we had been used to so far with wider streets and covered sewers. Having fallen ill in Agra we spent almost 4 days in Delhi doing nothing but watching TV and blowing our noses. Feeling slightly better we managed a couple of short ventures out to the bazaars and the Red Fort and even a night out for one of the Hindu holiday festivals.

Festival car..these things were loaded with a 4 man brass band and would cruise the streets blaring music collecting throngs dancing celebrators.

Street crowd dancing in street festival

From Delhi we took an overnight train to Amritsar in Punjab, home of the Sikhs and the holiest of Sikh sites, the Golden Temple.

Crowds of pilgrims stream into this place 24x7 it seems singing songs and reading passages from the Sikh holy book in an effort to pay respect to the religion and gain blessings from the Sikh priests that inhabit the temple. The Golden Temple was great and we came here several times through out the day just to crowd watch and take photos in the different light.

Sikh Guard in front of Golden Temple

The next day we took a day trip to the town of Attari/Wagah on the India-Pakistan border to watch the border closing ceremony. This is a truly bizarre affair. A massive crowd gathers on both sides. Music blares and the crowds dance in the street...

and then as the ceremony gets started.. the soldiers line up and shout some calls in Hindi which translate to something like "Hindustan is great, Hindustan is the best" and take turns marching quickly towards the border swinging their legs in these ridiculously high kicks...

then when they get to the border they face each other in groups and continue to kick the air and stomp the ground while snarling at the other side..all of this happens several times, for about 20 minutes, while the India and Pakistan flags are lowered from the poles. Then they shake hands and the border gates are closed and that's it..everyone goes home.

They'll repeat this to a similarly large crowd the next day..and the next..and the next! Only in India..

On the flipside

2007-10-03T04:25:00.000-07:00

Unlike Columbus, Helen and I actually made it to India. We couldn't help feeling a bit funny as we stepped off the plane and into the sweet jasmine scented air wafting across the tarmac at Jaipur international. Maybe its was just the delirium caused by 24 sleepless hours of travel bouncing from Budapest to Dubai to Jaipur; or maybe it was realizing the historical irony of our situation, that it was because of Columbus' fortunate failure 500+ years ago that we could be here at all, as Americans in India; or maybe it was because we knew that we had crossed a boundary of sorts and that we were now +13 hours ahead of home which, given the inevitability of our round planet, puts us on the return side of our 'half-way-around' mark.

Regardless, arriving in India at 4am after a full day of traveling and after five months in Europe caused a bit of a shock for us. Not the "oh my god" sort of shock but more of a sitting-quietly-while-staring-out-the-windows sort of shock as our taxi raced us through the strange streets of Jaipur. Dawn was breaking and the cows were up..so were the beggars, the cripples, and the homeless families. The hedgerows of garbage, squashed piles of cow dung and open sewers were starting to reek and the gritty fumes of exhaust from dilapidated rickshaws and smoke from numerous roadside cooking fires were already clouding the early morning air.

the frenetic crush of Indian traffic

We checked in to our hotel and slept for almost two straight days. That is to say, we only managed a couple of short ventures into the city for first couple of days..exhausted and dazed we'd quickly returning to the sanctity of the hotel and our English language movie channels. By day three though we had mustered the strength to circle the bazaars and Palaces of the old city.

Palace Guard in Jaipur Palace

Children at play outside the Palace walls in Jaipur old city

Jaipur street vendor in old city bazaar

By day four we managed to hire a rickshaw and tour several of the old Mughal forts capping the hillsides surrounding Jaipur.

parked line of Rickshaws in Jaipur old city

view of greater Jaipur from Tiger fort

And by day five we had relaxed a bit and spent our time visiting some local temples and hand feeding monkeys.

Hand feeding monkeys at Monkey temple outside Jaipur

By day six we had had enough of Jaipur and headed west towards the pilgrim city of Pushkar. Jaipur is a city of 5 million, Pushkar by contrast is a city of only 15 thousand and so is much more manageable by foot. Being a holy hindu site though means no meat, no egg, no alcohol and no public displays of affection. In the Brahma Temple in Pushkar we gave offerings of peace and hapiness to the world in celebration of Gandhi's birthday (Oct2). We wandered the streets bazaars practicing our jedi hand waves and took long walks around the lake stopping to watch the ritual bathers on the ghats and the sunset.

Brahma temple in Pushkar

Street scene in Pushkar

Pushkar Ghats

We've been in India for just over a week now and so far we have nothing but mixed feelings..India can be an incredibly colorful and beautiful place with an equally fascinating history and culture. But it is also a very filthy place as well, with ridiculous levels of poverty. Something about India is very exotic and enticing and yet it is a very tiring place as well. I've tried to capture some various scenes and sentences that I think frame the varied wonder that is India.

We were in Rajastan, one of the poorer states in India.
In Rajastan, women traditionally do not work..some hold jobs of drudgery however as sweepers, street vendors, etc.

lady sweeping at Amber fort

Child labor laws do not apply in India..India in fact is one of the worlds largest offenders of child labor.
On the streets the kids beg in seemingly organized gangs..they ask for food or rupees.. succumbing to one will simply cause the others to rush over and flock around with one hand out and one hand on their bellies demonstrating how hungry they are.
I was accosted by a gaggle of school children wanting me to take their photo in exchange for rupees..they almost pulled me down at one point.

six year old street vendor selling water colors made from crushed rock and vegetables

Colorful ladies in Pushkar during Gandhi day fair selling various fruits and veggies

Cows in India are sacred..Brahma the chief diety takes the form of a cow..and the Brahman Bull was Vishnu's preferred mount.
Seemingly oblivious to most around them the cows lumber slowly through the streets in their endless, unfettered search for food..eating everything in their path..dropped food, vomit, paper and plastic refuse..the nest in droves in the street corner garbage heaps.
Not all cows are benign though..I've been rammed by two so far and Helen was chased down an alley by one who wanted the leftovers in her hand.
The other downside to public cows is the dung..it litters the street so that you have to constantly be on watch for it..I've already missed several times..

street cow in front of street art

Pushkar mystic musician at sunset

Despite the pervasive filth India is one of the most brightly colored places we have been to.
Silken saris and pashmina shops line the walls of the bazaars creating in rippling technicolor waves.
Every hue is imbued with a deeper mystical meaning, painting the world in history and religion.

Pushkar street scene

ibid

ibid

Crowd at Pushkar temple

India it seems has everything..and its all for sale..the bazaar is the medieval heart of the city..it is here that the day occurs. Buying, selling, cooking, packaging, sewing, hammering, resoling, smelting, carving, typing..it is quite amazing actually to just wander and witness all the various tradesmen going about their daily grind..

Pushkar street vendor polishing wares

Pushkar street scene

Pushkar street vendor and cart

Pushkar street scene

Despite the absence of meat, egg and alcohol, Indian cuisine never fails to delight and surprise.

Food Stalls

Driving down the crowded streets in India you have to share the road with a variety of other man, machine and animal. Wizzing past elephants in a rickshaw mere inches from their bone crushing footfalls gives a new perspective on these animals. Despite their colorful adornments elephants though are treated fairly poorly in India.

Elephants at Amber fort

ibid

mystic outside temple

Brahman Bulls in front of Brahman blue wall

tea time

The other camera

2007-09-24T10:21:00.000-07:00

Several people have asked that I (the mrs) write a blog and several people have also wondered whether Ryan was really on this trip as there are hardly any photos of him. So, I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone and post some pics and let them speak for themselves.

Here are some pics from my camera:

Hiking in Cappadoccia valley

Catching up on some reading at a cafe in Krakow

Such a bundle of fun always!

Apparently Asians are not the only ones to sport these photo-squat poses

When in Rome

What are they staring at? (in Agrigento, Sicily)

Thinks he's a war correspondent

Taking in some fresh air in the Austrian Alps

Wondering why there's no one at the Louvre (for future reference, they are closed on Tuesdays!)

Tunnel in underground city of Goreme

Who's shinier?

View from the rooftop of our Florence pension

More Alps

More hiking in Cappadoccia valley

His trying to catch flies face

Ryan being Ryan

It's eatin' time!

Tackled by a wave yet managed to save his beer

Agrigento, Sicily

All in all, we have been having a fabulous time these past several months exploring all the nooks and crannies that Europe has to offer. We of course, will be back to see everything else (and there's a lot) that we haven't seen. And despite the thorns of homesickness, random ailments, and missing seemingly simple comforts of life, we are looking forward to the next big chunk of our trip - Asia... I expect to be inspired, to be tested, and to overdose in the different cultures... as well as the food. Can't wait!

Bye for now

so...

2007-09-22T08:37:00.000-07:00

Normally, this blog is updated a week or two after we've already left a country which means that for you, as readers, you are getting old news..by the time you've read the blog we've already moved onto our next country and our next adventure..(man you read slow~!) this blog, however, hopes to catch everyone, including us, up to speed with where we are and what we've been up to..

So. Where are we now? Hungary. Where have we been recently? Everywhere it seems..well not everywhere per se but we've been moving fast this last week and a half.

As you recall..'Previously on Travel Blog'..(jesus, this blog is starting to sound like a bad Aaron Spelling episode)..anyway, last time we blogged we were heading out of Romania and into Budapest Hungary. Upon getting into Budapest we made our way to Deak Ferenc ter, the center of town, to procure some lodging..which, after a brief stop at McDonald's, The ATM and the Hotel service office, we did without further ado. Shortly after checking in to our private zimmer near the Danube and a polite but broken exchange with our new landlady, Gizi, we made our way to the Indian consulate where we quickly handed in our visa applications and were assured of a hassle free, week long processing time by the India consular rep. Excellent news..as our previous attempts had been thwarted in Romania. Next, into the city, Budapest.

Budapest is actually two towns that have over the slow course of time grown together..Buda and Pest..true to our form we stayed on the eastern side of the Danube in Pest. Budapest is an amazing city..it is a fantastic mix of new and old..with just about everything you could want within a 10 minutes walk or metro ride. We spent several days wandering the old and new towns..sitting in the squares..riding the metro and busing our selves around town. We really liked Budapest and Hungary as a whole it turns out..we found it to be one of the more civilized corners of Europe without the pretension of the more well known capitals such as Paris or Vienna. The Huns, despite their notorious past as barbarians, are actually a very literate and very polite bunch of people. Book shops litter almost every street corner..affable groups gather at cafes and wine shops, in the metro people waiting to get on the trains actually stand patiently to the side of the doors as people exiting the trains get out..amazing. Nowhere else have we seen such a well functioning society of almost 2 million people as in Budapest.

Chain Bridge over Danube and St. Stephens in background

Budapest, Margaret Island and Danube..Buda left..Pest right

Gypsy lady with flowers in front of St Stephens Church

Budapest skyline

Street in Castle Hill area

Looking from Castle Hill towards Parliament bldg..

Having submitted our applications and seen the town we ventured up to Slovakia for a couple of days..into Bratislava, another capital on the Danube. Bratislava is an interesting town with enough history to balance the hangover form its recent post-communist boom. While staying in a hostel in Bratislava we met a couple of Americans..one of whom's, James', mother happened to have owned a sushi bar near my old house in San Jose..Akochochin..this was a bit of an uncanny coincidence since I used to frequent the place about the time that James worked there..odds are, we agreed, that he probably waited on me once or twice during this time..small world I guess.

Bratislava old square at night fall

Anyway, after checking out Bratislava for a day we discovered that Vienna was only an hours train ride away..we obliged the famed city and spent a nice afternoon wandering amidst the old Hapsburg monuments for an afternoon taking occasional breaks to enjoy the surprising mild weather while sipping cafe and wine at the local street fairs. Back to Bratislava then onto the mountain town of Stary Smokovec in the high Tatras of eastern Slovakia the next day.

Four hours east of Bratislava the north western terminus of the Carpathians erupts into the magnificent massif of the High Tatras. We spent a couple of days here hiking around the lower climes of the already snow covered peaks enjoying the fresh air and the views.

High Tatras rising abruptly over the valley town of Poprad..Stary Smokovec can be seen in the foothills in the background left. we hiked to just below the snowy ridge of the peak on the right..

From Stary Smokovec we migrated north into Poland and onto Krakow. Krakow was a very open and inviting city. It has the compulsory medieval center and functional new town. After spending our first night wandering amidst the old churches and medieval squares and feeding the well kept pigeons we retired to a pool bar for some drinks and games. After swiftly defeating Helen in a best two out of three match of pool she quickly returned the favor in a series of crushing defeats at air hockey. Deciding to split the nights victories we retired to a game of Cricket on the dartboard, which, almost as soon as it was getting interesting ended with a well placed dart setting the games alarm systems blaring loudly and causing the entire game to begin resetting itself..weird. Feeling slightly buzzed and embarrassed we then returned to our hostel to watch the only english channel we ever seem to receive anymore.. CNN.

Krakow old square

night fall over Krakow old town

Helen feeding Pigeons in Krakow old square..the square actually has a fenced off section with pigeon coops inside..they are city pets I guess

After a couple enjoyable days in Krakow we decided to head south again to pick up our visas from the consulate in Budapest. So again, a 7 hour train ride back to Braislava, a 1 km hike back to the hostel, a 4 hour sleep before catching the freezing cold early morning train back to Budapest, an 8 dollar bribe to the conductor to let us stay in the slightly warmer first class cabin, and then upon arriving in Budapest and after stowing our bags in the luggage check back on the metro and connecting bus and up the hill to the Indian consulate...phew.. Visas approved and passports handed in we sorted out a bed for the night and waited the final 24 hours of processing. Next day we shower, grab our bags, hit the metro and connecting bus..head back up the hill and pick up our passports..this time however they have glued on the inside of page 17 a shiny new India entry visa! Finally..from idea to execution this process has taken us across 4 countries and at least as many weeks. But it is settled now..we have official authorization to enter India on the 27th of this month..which works out well since we have plane tickets for the same day.

Needing a break from our previous weeks hectic travel-sleep-travel-sleep schedule we decided to head to the eastern foothills of Hungary to enjoy 5 relaxing days in the sun soaked wine town of Eger, their Napa valley, which is where we are now. We'll be heading back to Budapest next Tuesday, the 25th, in order to catch our flight to Jaipur India the next day.

town of Eger

stuck in the middle

2007-09-13T04:01:00.000-07:00

We've been at a crossroads in our travel plans for sometime now..Our original RTW plan was to tour eastern Europe and the baltics then go northeast to St Petersburg and then down through Moscow, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan then into Western China where we'd then overland it down the eastern Chinese seaboard towards Vietnam.. As it turned out...time, visa costs, availability of travel and weather all bullied us into making alternate plans. Finally, after several several weeks of deliberating options we've finally sorted out how we are going to get to Asia..We found a flight from Budapest that connects us in Dubai to flight to Jaipur at the end of the month. This determined our next vector and sent us north from Bulgaria into Romania in search of Indian visas.

Romania is a fascinating country and despite its location deep in the heart of Eastern Europe it is actually more akin to the western romance cultures than any of the Balto-Slavic cultures that surround it. The Romanian language for instance sounds remarkably like French or Italian..sharing many of the same verb and nouns.. which made it very easy to get around.

We started our Romanian adventure in Bucharest. Bucharest is an interesting city due its turbulent history and is a self proclaimed Paris of the east...but, despite their best attempts to live up to these claims, we didn't really see this side. Yes, Bucharest has large Champs D'Elysse style avenues and yes they have their own Arc De Triumph..but they still failed to capture the joi de vive that Paris exudes. For us Bucharest seemed like any other large western industrial city..with prices to match...I think we payed 40usd fore a hostel room.

Bucharest street scene

ibid

The main reason we came to Bucharest was to sort our Indian visas..which proved as big of a pain in the @ss as it was futile...(i.e. 100%). We got up early and trekked all the way across town to the location of the consulate (as per their website) only to find out that they had apparently moved..the phone number no longer worked either..so after asking every policeman, travel agent and bookstore owner we could find we finally tracked them down to the exact other opposite end of town (of course). With only one hour left to submit our Visa applications that day (since they close noon) the clown at the consulate (who wasn't even Indian) tells us that we need several other supporting documents (hotel reservations, flight tickers, bank receipts, etc..) which of course we didn't have (since they weren't listed on the visa applications requirements page of the website)..he then tells us that it'll take 2 weeks minimum if we're lucky..this of course put dangerously close to our departure date..no bueno. we asked him if there was anything he could to help us or to expedite the processing..he simply shrugged..at which point we started shouting very loud and slowly "but we're american..American!!..comprende amigo~!"..ok, so we didn't actually say this..but still, no luck. Ugh..we decided to opt for plan B which was to get to Budapest as soon as possible and use the consulate there..(their website seemed to indicate that they could process the visa in about a week).

Before heading to Budapest though we decided we had to stop and see Transylvania first...which was actually the real reason for us coming to Romania to begin with..

Once we got out of the Bucharest area Romanian really opened up..the country side is beautiful actually..and with autumn approaching all the leaves are starting to turn colors. An hour or two west of Bucharest our train started up into the Carpathian mountains.. Ever since "Ghost Busters 2" did I want to see the Carpathians..if I remember correctly..Vigo, the villain, was from Carpathia.. Later I learned that Dracula and the werewolf were also from the Carpathians....something about this hairy, apocalyptic, blood-sucking disposition of this eastern european range intrigued me from childhood.

Fast forward several years and here Helen and I were on a rickety ex-soviet era train jostling up into the dreaded peaks. After 4 or so hours we arrived at our destination, the hill town of 'Brashov' (best said with a heavy Sean Connery accent). Unlike Bucharest, Brashov and its neighboring towns of Rashnov and Bran (as in Dracula) were very cool and the scenery very beautiful. Transylvania in general seems somewhat untouched by the 20th century, which, when mixed with the darkly wooded mountains, the think unibrows and pointed widows peaks of the locals, and centuries old vampire lore really gives a enthralling 'oldy-worldy' sense to the place. We spent several days here eating in restaurants converted from underground catacombs, drinking bulls blood wine, hiking up hillsides to the ruined citadels and fortresses of ancient Moldavian kings, and roaming the old town squares. We even caught a night of the annual Jazz festival going on in town and snapped our fingers to the hip-happening sounds of "Transylvanian Groove" and others (because nothing goes better than Transylvania and jazz..as in jazz-cula? or is it dracu-jazz).

Brasnov Church

Brasnov Street scene

Helen at Bran Castle

Brasnov main street

Rasnov street scene (note the large Hollywood-esque sign on the hill..all the transylvanian towns had these..strange)

Brasnov Main Square

ibid

Reaper on way home from work..

Ryan turning on his 'vampire charm'

Sad to leave, we shortly had to make our way to Budapest to beseech the Indian consulate there for kindly consideration. Again on the overnight train...but this time there was a bit more excitement as we got into a bit of a fight with some 'I think I'm Eminem' styled Romanian punks wearing LA Lakers jerseys, FUBU jogger pants and gold chains...these guys were jack asses..they burst into our cabin at about 3 am where Helen and another guy and I were dozing, smelling of booze and started making a huge ruckus.. laughing, giggling, talking loudly, jabbering on the phone..we asked politley that they attempt a smidgen of quietude or at least hold their discussions in the hall or in the food car..which they not so politely declined to acquiesce to, so after about another half hour of heated verbal exchange they eventually got off to go home to their mama's..seriously..their mama's...after all their posing and posturing as thug gangsters it turns out that one of the guys was on the phone to his mom the whole time trying to arrange a ride from the station..it sounds bad but I would so have loved to for one of them to raise a fist..argh..I would have loved to have smacked them a few times..

oh and this reminds me...Romanian fashion..hahahahah... one word: 'tracksuits'.. the entire country is dressed in Nike, Adidas, or some other off-brand track suits..the kind the Tony Soprano wears when he's 'off duty'...it's friken funny actually..entire families wearing matching tracksuits out for their evening stroll..walking through the towns was like walking through the set of a surreal 70's bad guy movie.. damn funny.

anyway, needless to say, we survived unscathed..Transylvania warrants a visit again..next time we'll camp I think.

The vulgar Bulgar...

2007-09-11T05:26:00.000-07:00

Note to self: Taking a night bus or train only really makes sense if you are not crossing any borders.

In the case of the the night bus from Istanbul to Plovdiv, Bulgaria we had to cross the Turkey-Bulgaria border... unfortunately this crossing took place about three hours into the bus ride (~1am) and because Turkey feels the need to do three separate passport checks before letting you leave this process took almost three hours to get through.. then there was the random thunderstorm that landed on top of us as soon as we entered Bulgaria..needless to say we did not get any sleep on the bus that night

Anyway, we arrived red-eyed and delirious at about 7am the next morning at the bus stop in Plovdiv (it really just a rusted old shed with some Cyrillic graffiti scribbled on the side). Stumbling out of the bus and into the damp dawn we struggled to sort out which way was up. Eventually we spotted a cabbie whose broken English was infinitely superior to our non-existent Bulgarian and finally managed to communicate that we were looking for a particular street in Old Town. Turns out we were only about 10 blocks from the street and the hostel we were looking for to begin with so the taxi ride was short. We did get to try out the only Bulgarian we knew however "Da, ees OK"...

After milling about out front of the hostel for about half an hour wondering if we were in the right area we finally spotted the lady from the hostel coming up the road..or rather she spotted us...I think our ridiculously large rucksacks gave us away.. We checked in and on our way up to the room to nap we hear that Scorpions song, "Wind of Change", playing on the TV downstairs.. it was somewhat surreal and ironic since that song was written back in 1990 to celebrate the collapse of Soviet hegemony and the re-opening of eastern Europe (places like Bulgaria for instance) to the rest of the world...and here we were..anyway.

Plovdiv was ok..it had a really great Roman amphitheater ruin that was better preserved than anything we had seen to date; and the old town with it cobbled streets and restoration era mansions was cozy. Still we only stayed one day before moving on to Veliko Turnovo near the Romanian border... and this is where out next adventure began.

Getting around Bulgaria was particularly confusing. First of all the alphabet is Cyrillic (e.g. like Russian).. which, forgive my ethnocentrism here, looks like a two year old's first attempt at typing. Trying to find your way to the local автостанция to buy two tickets for a ride to Велико Търново is just confusing.. To complicate matters, the standard yes/no head signals are backwards in Bulgaria..they nod their heads for 'no' and shake them 'yes'. So even after I manage to sort out the above nonsense and get our bus tickets to VT, when I asked the driver of the bus that I thought was ours I get a head shake 'no'..or rather a 'yes'..but then confusion sets in..did he shake his head 'no' and mean 'yes' because he's Bulgarian? or did he know that I wasn't Bulgarian and shake his head 'no' in my language..the only option left was to reconfirm with a "Da?"..which would most would cause them to look at you with the same disdain that one looks at a child with on their twentieth round of "I know you are but what am I?"

Even the simple things like trying to nod 'yes' to the waitress gesturing about whether or not I want milk in my coffee ends up backwards. Over time we tried to adjust and remember the backwardness of it all but 34 years of ingrained social-linguistic training is hard to subvert..mostly our attempts found us making big wobbly circles with our heads..like a life sized bobble head doll..which for all we know means 'see you next Tuesday' in Bulgarian..

History it seems is punctuated by these funny little moments of decisiveness that over time blossom into strange cultures and customs. Take driving on the right side of the road for instance. This American tradition was born out of the teamsters wagon drivers in the late eighteenth century because of the lack of a driver seat on the wagon. The Castillian lisp is purportedly traced back to a fourteenth Spanish king who popularized the speech impediment. Where this flagrant violation of the natural order of head shaking comes from in the Bulgarian culture is any ones guess.

Anyway, we spent a couple of cools days in VT hiking around the hillside town. We met a cool Kiwi couple who was also on a their world trip honeymoon..their travelblog has some funny comments about Bulgaria that's worth reading (http://taneandlauren.blogspot.com/2007/09/good-bad-and-bulgarian.html). We also met a really awkward hotel owner who went on about people from California all being rich, about how he hates lawyers and about why the gypsies are evil.

In general Bulgarians are a funny bunch..they have really bad fashion sense (think a pink stripped jump suit with matching feather boa). The store owners don't seem particularly interested in helping customers..most of the time when you order something they give a strange shrug that is somewhere between bored and 'whatever' that seems to say "well ok..if you want that I guess I could sell it to you..(sigh)". The country is really poor I guess and so maybe I can understand their malaise..what they really need I think is the invigorating tonic of ten thousand greedy capitalists moving in revamping their cities..houses are cheap..30k euro gets you a nice two story four bed town home in the hills above VT.

anyway..after VT we took a bus north on our way to Bucharest Romania.

a puppet player playing his puppets in bulgarian street...

our street in bulgaria (eastern europe apparently hasn't discovered underground cabling yet..almost every street in everytown we've been in is littered with wires and cables hanging across the streets..)

the hill castle sound and light show as seen from our window... (this was neat to see actually as the entire hillside lit up..)

"Stuff me I'm Turkish"

2007-08-31T23:24:00.000-07:00

Several years back while wandering amidst the aisles of some flea market up in San Jose I came across a stall selling, among other things, those goofy little buttons that you see waiters at TGIF's wearıng. And there it was.. right next to the "Kiss me I'm Irish" and "World's Greatest Lover" buttons was one I had never seen before, "Stuff me I'm Turkish" it said. Obviously playing off the well known connection between Thanksgiving, Turkeys and Turkmen. It was bizzare and kinda funny and had I actually known any Turks at the time and had it had been near Thanksgiving I might have bought the button as a holiday gag. As it was I didn't and it wasn't so I moved on and completely forgot about the button....What does this have to do with our travels? Absolutely nothing..except that we are actually in Turkey right now, it's just turned September, and that even though we are surrounded by Turkmen I haven't seen any of these buttons. Life is funny sometimes.

Anyway we glid (glode? glided?) into Turkey a couple of weeks back on a delapidated greek hydrofoil called the Flying Dophin. Imagine the old Flash Gorden rocket ship style..that's what this thing looked like, a big areodynamic tube with stubby wings and skids underneath. After a relatively quick ride from Rhodes we landed in the harbor and after being stuck on the dock (litteraly on a dock..as in a wooden pier about 10 foot wide with water and boats either side of us, strangest customs area yet) for a couple of hours while the immigration guys took off with our passports in a truck, we finally made it into Fethiye. It was a nice beach town and we stayed at a pensione where we ended up meeting a nice Aussie family traveling with their two kids. While in Fethiye we took a day cruise out along the coast for some sun and snorkeling and they joined us. We chatted them up all day and took turns swimming and diving off the boat with the kids. Jason (the dad) and I, feeling somewhat adventurous, took turns swimming under this submerged arch. This was somewhat of a challenge actually as the bottom of the arch was a good 12-15 feet under the surface and because of the high salt content of this part of the Med you had to struggle and kick hard against your own bouyancy to get down and through this thing..once through though you would roll over so that you were facing up and then just float silently up wıth your face inches from this massive underwater rock wall. Fabulous.

After a couple of days in Fethiye we said our goodbyes and headed east towards the old hippie town of Olympos. With about an hour left in the bus ride to Olympos the 8 year girl in the seat in front of us who had been flirting with us for the first half of the ride suddenly spun around and lurched at me (I was in the aisle seat..sitting next to the trashcan). From the green in her face I knew what was up and tried to get out of the way but *blech* she vomitted all over the floor, my seat and on my favorite pants. Immediately her father started to try to wipe my seat and pant leg down while his daughter was falling across other seats continuing to be sick..I had to yell at him that I was fine and to leave me alone and tend to his daughter instead..which he did. The commotion ended after a couple of minutes and they seemed really embareassed. They quickly got off at the next stop. I felt bad.

Olympos is kind of a funny town. Once a hippie paradise known for its quirky tree hut camps it has since become part of the 'back packer route' and has hence become over commercialized and crowded wıth Aussies. Despite this we decided to stay in one of the many tree camps there for a couple of days..although we opted for a bungalo since they were the same price and came with AC and a bug free bed..sort of. To be fair though these 'tree houses' were more like crappy wooden rooms built on 4 foot stilts neatly stacked in rows in a cultivated orange orchard..hardly a Swiss Family Robinson style tree house. Aside from the 'tree huts' and Turks who spoke broken english with Australian accents, Olympos actually had a lot to offer in terms of to-do's. There were 1000 year old ruins which you could 'discover' by hiking back into the woods Indiana Jones style. There was the beach. And then there was the Chimera, a barren hillside where gas naturally leaks out of the rocks in various fissures and vents. Apparently at some undetermined point in the past this thing caught fıre and has been burning ever since..like a natural eternal flame. Ancient greek mariners apparently used this hillside as a natural lighthouse..neat. Spent a couple of days here hiking and swimming and then we noticed it..there are no seashells on the beaches or under the water in Turkey..at least five different days swimming at five different beaches and not a single shell..no one else seemed bothered by this so we didn't worry either..but still..it was a bit weird.

I should digress here and mention that unlike the barren craggy shores of Greece, the coastal terrain of Turkey was strikingly mountainous and wooded. It reminded us of Lake Tahoe or Big Bear Lake a bit...there where these steepish rocky hills loosely covered in grasses, shrubs, pines and oaks that came tumbling abruptly into the aquamarine waters of the eastern Med mixing at the shore in a slurry of gravel and mud. Of all places we've visited so far, Turkey, strangely enough reminded us most of home. So, after a couple of days in Olympos we decided that our 'beachin' days were over and we headed inland towards Capadocia (Kapadokya). On the way we stopped at a town called Konya where the order of the Whirling Dervishes was founded by the Sufi poet Rumi several centuries back (the Dervishes are wandering Sufi monks akin to the Catholic Franciscan order). Konya, which we were going to stay at only to break up the travel between the coast and Kapa turned out to be suprisingly cool. It had some really great mosques from the Seljuk Turks (Seljuk = Alladin, Ali Baba, Sultans, turbans, exotic camel caravans, flying rugs, bejeweled oil lamps, etc.) It also had the Mevlana mosque turned museum that housed the turban topped coffins of many of the great dervish ascetics, including Rumi himself, several ornately gilded korans and other dated texts and a ornamented box purported to contain Muhammed's beard (this is probably true..in fact, I wouldn't be surprised if there were several boxes with his beard since, afterall, beards grow back.) A quick aside about traveling Muslim countries.

If you've ever been to an Islamic country you know that they broadcast the call to prayer on the loud speakers 5 times a day, including one at about 4am. Starting with the line 'Allah u Akbar' (God is great) the call is usually sung in melismatic style and can sometimes take several minutes. Depending on the caller/singer these calls can actually be quite beautiful and evocative. Anyway, Konya is a particularly devout town and is covered with mosques..our hotel was within 4 blocks of no less than 6 mosques and every morning at 4am a cacophany of calls would flood in through our window and wake us..it sounded as a chorus of callers were standing at the foot of our bed singing to us..only later after doing some research did we discover that one of the lines of this particular morning call was 'Prayer is better than sleep'.

After another 6 hours on the bus we finally arrived at Kapadokya. If you haven't been then go. The best way to describe Kapadokya is as a mix of Joshua Tree, the Pinnacles and the rock formations in Arizona's Painted Desert. Very cool place. Kapadokya was apparently formed by a near-by volcano that after dropping several tens of meters of ash then dropped a nice hard layer of basalt. Over time most of the area was eroded but in a few places where the basalt was thicker it formed a protective cap over the ash while everything else eroded around it..the net effect was the creation of these bizzare pillars and columns of rock stretching up out of the valley floor. The locals call these fairy chimneys..which is a weird name because what they really look like is giant penises sticking up out of the ground..I guess calling them penis chimneys wouldn't go over so well with the locals.. As it turns out the ash rock is relatively easy to carve into when wet (but dries to a hard surface) and so 1000 years ago early christians in the area seeking to avoid persecution from the Arabs and Ottomans dug extensive cave houses into these rocks..complete churches even, with frescos and pillars. But they didn't stop here, they dug down too..creating massive underground cities 8 levels deep (think ant farm). It gets better, because of the ash the soil is really fertile and centuries of fruit cultivation has caused the entire area to become covered in fruit and grape trees. Here's a list of what we found: apples, pears, grapes, plums, oranges, watermelons, berries, appricots and a couple of other fruits/nuts that didn't seem ripe. Put it all together and you get an edenic, Dr. Seussian version of the 'Flinstones' meets 'Land of the Lost'. Tres cool. We spent 6 wonderful days here. Our days spent hiking amongst the 1000 year cave houses and eating wild fruit 'till we were full, our evenings spent reading our books and relaxing in our cave room while listening to the mosque calls echo through the valley. Met a couple of cool aussies as well, they were on an overland back to Oz..they were heading down through Syria, Iran and into India..I was jealous.

Then it hit, just in time for us to leave on our 12 hour bus ride to Istanbul. The runs. Helen got it first..then me. A day later one of the Oz girls landed something similar only out the top side..and then the Canadian girl caught it.

Loading ourselves up on meds and skipping dinner we made the 12 hr journey to Istanbul. Man what an uncomfortable ride..Helen managed but I didn't sleep a wink. Another child vomited on this bus ride as well. We arrived in Istanbul at 9am three days ago.

Quick note on buses in Turkey..they come in two flavors..the long distance city buses and inter-city domuses (mini buses). The long distance buses are what Turkey has in lieu of cheap domestic air service. They run the buses like planes too with stewards serving drinks and little chocolate cakes and occasionally coming by to offer some orange smelling hand cleaner. The dolmuses are a lot cooler and is an idea that would probably work well in US cities. Basically its a gutted minvan with several rows of bench seats..the fare is the same regardless of how far you go on the bus and they will pick you and drop you off up where ever on their route (i.e. no bus stops) in fact half the time they leave the sliding side door open as people hop on and off. And because they are privately owned like taxis each dolmus is different. Some are boring. Some play loud turkish music. Some are decked out like pimp mobiles with curtains in the windows, colored party lights, fuzzy dice and leapord print steering wheel covers.

Anyway, back to Istanbul where we currently are. It's a great town but it's expensive and quite westernized. Saw the Hagia Sophia, the Grand Bizzare, the Blue Mosque, the Cisterns and Taksim area..and now we're done. Outside of these attractions Istanbul seems more interesting historically than in life. Our hotel had a channel that was playing last season's episodes of american television: Smallville, My Name is Earl, Battlestar Galactica, Prison Break, Ren and Stimpy, etc. One night of this was enough to trigger something in Helen and I... so the next day we ate lunch at McDonalds, had an afternoon coffee at Starbucks, watched the most recent Harry Potter movie and finished it up with a dinner at El Torrito. No joke...all of this in Istanbul..it was brilliant. We feel refreshed now and are ready to move on. Tonight we board another bus to go to Plovdiv Bulgaria..only 7 hours this time..not so bad.
pics to follow.

Helen gone native

more Fairy Chimneys..note the dwellings

Kapadokya valley

someone

Mevlana Mosques in Konya

Istanbul street scene

chickens in Goreme

Goremestreet scene

Ccave Monestary in Goreme

the Hagia Sophia

cavern of lights in the Hagia Sophia Cistern

belly dancer from Turksih night in Goreme

the blue mosque in Istanbul

the chimera

dervish kids

fairy chimneys

sunny side up

2007-08-13T07:51:00.000-07:00

so the last post was a bit dry perhaps..here are some other various tales, musings, ramblings and other "whatever-isms" that you might enjoy.. or not:

Mustafa, our driver in Morocco has the same first name as a good friend of ours back home..

camels poo as they walk..they poo in little bite sized clumps..and, to the delight of everyone in back, it always seems to be the camel in the front of the camel train that poos the most ..Helen and I took turns in front..we had the pooiest camels..of course..

the stars in the desert are unlike stars you see anywhere else..they are bright, clear and most importantly, they are innumerable..the cosmos is structured, it is bigger than you or I could ever possibly imagine..you can see the lateral wing of our home, the milky way...and it is big and deep..and it is a terrible waste of space if we are in fact alone..god is great..and so are the alien civilizations that rules the unfathomable depths of the abyss..

morocco suffers terribly from pollution and desertification..it's unfortunate..the country it seems, in its attempts to sip from the cup of western wealth, seems to be turning itself into a dried up canker sore..

despite this, and despite bush and despite terrorism...Muslims and the Arab world have a valid claim to culture and insight, they are not savages..it was the Arabs who invented zero..it was the Arabs who, when the catholic church was flexing its stranglehold on Europe, kept the arts and sciences of the ancient alive, only later to be consumed by the crusades and subsequent renaissance masters at Oxford and Florence.. it is unfortunate however that Islam sanctions violence in the name of god..this is a drawback to their case

Politics seems to be alive and well in Europe (they apparently hate NATO and the US)..which is good given the complete and utter lack of a US political interest..although I did see that Rove resigned recently which is good..now we just have to repair the damage...not that anyone really cares..

Greece is a funny place..it is simultaneously western and yet still sort of second-worldy (please forgive the imperialist tone here).. the younger generation of Greeks seem quite westernized..familiarized with all the accouterments of western lifestyle and excess..but the older Greeks are a different story..they seem pushy..almost selfish..but not a selfishness that is born out of greed..but a selfishness that is born out of decades of struggle and survival..they push and they crowd the lines at the bus stations..they push us from behind causing us to stumble with our heavy packs..they push and they crowd at the restaurants as if the restaurant is going to run out of food and they will be sent home (again) hungry..its weird the divide that separates these kids from their grandparents...the parents of course..those of the same generation as my parents seem (as my parents have) to have been able able to capitalize on the position of the country as a tourist trap and have all opened up domatia's or restaurants or other tourist shops..

some however still fish for a living: walking in the streets the waiters and hosts of various restaurants and cafes call and beckon you in for food or drink "hello my friend..please come sit down"...a lot of times this bait seems to work and catch customers... the guy who runs our hostel (Peter) drives down to the harbor every night the ferry comes to catch backpackers as they get of the boat..again, his nets of cheap dorm beds seem to bring in a healthy catch of 15 people a night...they are fisherman.

ironically, real fresh fish are xtremely hard to come by in greece..most seafood is fozen and expensive.

what else?

oh yeah, beaches in Europe are topless and men wear bikini briefs to the beach..this environment is of course a mixed blessing..in ways..also back hair apparently is not seen in any disdainful manner here...as long as you are tanned and fit..

in Greece you are not supposed to flush the used toilet paper down the toilet..instead you are to place it in the foot-peddled trash can conveniently located next to the john..a custom that Helen has readily adopted but that I am still having a hard time adjusting to..

Greek buses are cramped and often there is standing room only..add humidity and 90 degree heat and you have a party in your armpits.. so says I..

like the Moroccan tagine, there is the food at the Greek taverna..your pick of souvlaka, fried fish or pork roast..it all seems rather heavy and fried given the heat..I stick to the cucumber, tomato and feta salads most of the time..Helen sticks to the spaghetti..which despite the fact that it is on the menu is still probably a sore insult to the Greeks, that most tourist will instead prefer Italian food over Greek...

Mopeds...hate these friken things..they are loud, they belch exhaust and they swerve in and out of foot traffic with disdain..Helen has already been hit by one in Morocco..but everyone and their mom uses them here..ugh..they should be banned or all converted to electric at least..

Mediterranean water..beautiful and a blue that seems to make you forget everything else..the waters beckon and call me..the clarity, the warmth, the saltiness..if only I were a fish..I would be home.

the US dollar sucks right now..terrible time to travel..here's how it works..double the cost (European inflation) then add 40% (exchange rate)..ugh..way over budget we are..coming home early I guess..

Or....I had the thought the other day that since I could not beat the falling US dollar that I would instead find a way to profit from it's decline..the answer was simple..stay abroad and work..earn euros or pounds instead and use the devalued exchange rate to pay off our mortgages at a discount rate..only problem is the language barrier..most of Europe uses English as a second language..an Esperanto of sorts..that allows the Danes to communicate with the Greeks..in addition to solid coding skills, most employers on international monster.com are looking for English language skills in addition to the national language as well as other solid technical skills of which I posses none..I feel sorely unprepared to compete in any global market..the cozy blanket of orange county seems a welcome reprieve to this realization..hrm...medium fish in a small pond perhaps..

visual stimuli..its the little things as always..miss television and video games (Civ 4)..been reading a lot lately, Harry Potter, Indiana Jones, Robert Ludlum..its not the same though.. anyway Greece is cool..thinking about opening a Domatia here..

for now, we're camped out in Rhodes for a couple of days as we await the ferry to Fethiye Turkey...killed a cockroach in our room last night..the beds are lumpy and the sheets are threadbare and stained..par for course..

for more pics try Kelly's site at:

http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AcNmbNszcNWHC

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

cheers..............................................................

Ode to Homer (a.k.a. sorry its a long post)

2007-08-10T04:58:00.000-07:00

doh~! getting out of Morocco was a pain in the bum. Apparently Morocco is only really connected to Spain, Paris and Frankfurt by expensive air flights... The initial plan of skipping along the coast of North Africa by ferry was sank due to the recent suspension of several ferry routes in the area..to salt the wound it also seems nearly impossible to get into Egypt without paying for a 400 euro return air ticket from Greece..Greece to Cairo is about Reno to LA..but for 500 usd..darned expensive. Anyway, after some clever searching and route planning Helen and Kelly managed to piece together a relatively cheap string of air flights from Fez to Athens via Casablanca and Barcelona..Unfortunately the travel day ended up being almost 24 hours long..the upside being that we got an 8 hour layover in Barcelona..more than enough time to tour around town and grab more tapas and sangria. Long day short, we arrived in Athens at 4 am local time..and despite this late hour it was still about 100 degrees outside..apparently we had decided to land smack in the middle of a recent heat wave (and subsequent fire storm). We paid 40 euro for a taxi to get from the airport to our hotel in the Plaka area in central Athens which we thought was ridiculously expensive until the sun rose and we were able to scramble up to a rock outcropping near the Parthenon and get a glimpse of the city (some local stray dogs were kind of enough to lead us there in a strange "lassie sort of way").. anyway, wowsers..I thought the LA and Inland Empire sprawls were bad...Athens is ridiculously large and nasty looking with a thick yellow layer of haze blanketing it..apparently it has been suffering from this scale of sprawl, pollution and congestion for several centuries and the airport being a recent addition is of course located about 20 or 30 kms out of town which explains the exorbitant cab fare. Anyway, there we were..sitting on top of a large piece of rock watching the sunrise over the hills behind the Parthenon..kind of a neat scene actually given that for 2 millennia people, all the way back to the original Greeks themselves, have probably been using this perch as a place to watch the sun rise over the Parthenon. In fact the rock itself had become quite smoothed and polished from the 2000+ years of hands and feet scrambling over its surface.. From the rock we mosied down to the entrance to Parthenon to wait to get in..by the time the doors opened several tour groups had already arrived..and within half and hour of us getting inside the other 500 tour groups showed up. Getting out of the Parthenon was actually comedy as we had to fight our way past the throngs of people just to get down the hill. In retrospect it seems that we lucked out with our 4 am arrival time since I think that if we had attempted the Parthenon at any time later in the day that we would have been hard pressed to get close to any of the structures let alone take photos of anything else but other tourists.. So after a couple of extremely hot days in Athens we decided to head towards the milder climes of the Pelopponesian peninsula..to a town called Nafplio by the beach. Nafplio was a welcome relief to the heat and the crowds..well, sort of..yes it was hot but we had the sea to swim in and yes it was crowded but they were all greeks on vacation so it was a much nicer experience than Athens. We ended up staying in a pensione named after Helen that was very quaint. 'Helen' as it turns out is a very popular greek name and I, as it turns out, am somewhat thick since almost every time time I tried to book a place to stay I would begin to spell out Helen's name..which almost universally elicited the response of "yes, I know how to spell Helen, thank you". Only about a week into Greece did I make the connection..Greek = Hellenistic..anyway.. After soaking up the salt and sun in Nafplio for several days we made our way towards Kalamata (where the olives come from) to await our ferry to Crete. On the way we hit a strange summer storm of sporadic heavy rains and (greece) lightening. Taking the ferry to Crete was long and otherwise boring except for the mild bit of choppy waves we hit about half way through. There are these strings-of-beads (kind of like rosary beads but without the religious significance) that only older greek men play with when they get nervous..so as we hit the choppy water the cabin of the ferry became alive with a cricket-like clicking and clacking as hundreds of these beads-strings came out of pockets and began to dance and flail about the wrinkled old hands of just as many older greek men..I told myself that all this noise was surely going to ward off any evil minded water spirit and that we would in fact arrive safely at our destination..which, a few short hours later, we did. Crete is an interesting place politically and geographically.. The mountains behind the town of Hania (chania) are enormous..as big as the French alps we were told..and politically Crete is mostly communist with its own sub-government to greece we were also told. (pls, anyone chime in if this is incorrect as we were skeptical ourselves) Anyway, Crete is neat. Hania, an old Venetian port town, was fun and we were able to take a snorkeling trip out to the local island to see the kri-kri's and a shot down and now sunken german WW2 bomber. From Hania we made our way to the so-overpriced-and-so-not-worth-it town of Heraklio (Iraklio) to await our ferry to Santorini.. I should mention that while in Heraklio we were able to visit the since controversially reconstructed ruins of Knossos..home of the ancient Minoan civilization that was wiped out in a smoldering hot blanket of ash when Santorini (our next destination) exploded 4000 years ago. The ferry to Santorini (thira) was the Flyingcat 4..one of the superfast hydrofoils..this thing was amazing..fast, totally smooth, high tech and a nice bright race car red thanks to Vodafone sponsorship. Santorini is a spectacular place. This once proud and tall island mountain was reduced (in the aforementioned eruption) to a non-contiguous ringlet of steep caldera walls with a still smoking central mound that oozes the occasional lava field and sulphurous stink. We stayed on the outside of the ringlet in a town called Perissa where the beaches are better. After a slight snafu with our lodging reservation thanks to the clowns (i'm being polite here) at Romani travel agency, we settled in for a few days of black volcanic rock beaches and long walks along the crest of the steep caldera walls. It was here that we had to say good bye to our friend Kelly and her funny sunburn (a painfully bright red, almost perfect diamond shape pattern centered across the back of her neck and shoulders). Helen and I wanting to avoid the mayhem of Ios, Naxos and Mykonos made our way back down to Crete this time heading east towards the town of Sitia where we are now awaiting our ferry to the famed island of Rhodes (Rodos) and our next hop into Turkey.

the parthenon being reconstructed..

more acropolis

knossos..the minoan reconstruction

helen and kelly in santorini

temple of the gods..top of the world

the other half

2007-08-01T12:54:00.000-07:00

So after Marrakesh we decided to head south and east...into the desert..as in the Sahara. Most of Morocco is desert as it turns out.

we hired a taxi and a driver..Mustafa..and made our way towards Zagora on the western flank of the Sahara..

So after a 6 hour car ride through mudhut cities and no-mans lands we arrived at a nice oasis resort for a night to prepared for our camping excursion the next day. (as a comment here I'll suggest that these mudhuts despite their seemingly primitive nature are actually quite advanced..no other modern material has yet to come close to matching their heat negating powers as we found out). We hired some camels and a real live desert nomad named Najid to escort us to his camp for the night. Najid and his son Arish were the real deal, they were really nomads living in the wastelands of the Sahara, they were only in town (Zagora) for the tourist season to do exactly this...run tourist out to the desert for the night and bring them back safely. This is the part of the story that I admit that despite my best attempts to feel rough and cool at the notion of camping in the desert that once we actually arrived at our destination and set up camp that I realized how inconsequential and how extremely unfit I was for any sort of 'real' or 'on your own', 'man versus nature' survival I was and that there was no way I could ever live this nomadic desert life. Helen and Kelly in some weird twist of roles found the entire adventure delightful and new.

So after a 3 hour camel ride we found the spot, set up camp and parked the camels of to the side. We then proceeded to watch the sunset and were entertained by Arish as he sang tribal songs and danced. Najid cooked us a traditional nomad dinner of tajine which despite its excellent flavor left me wondering how and where nomads find carrots and potatoes in the desert (although we did pass several watermelon plants along the way out).

so anyway, Arish sang and danced for us as we clapped along..it was weird and wonderful at the same time...escorted by people who had almost no concept of western lifestyle..yet enthusiastically willing to share what little they had..it felt like Laurence of Arabia or the English patient..or at least this is what is it was supposed to feel like..for all I know it could have been some great farce in which we were the main actors..playing our anglophone parts of colonial conquest..

Nonetheless, it was brilliant. I shared my headlamp with Najid and his son as the sun went down and this little piece of technology amazed them both and caused many smiles...Kelly shared her fruit flavored Mike and Ike's with Arish which he treated as a pot of gold. As we talked to them we learned that Najid had in fact been born and spent the early part of his life surviving in the Sahara and that after several years of living a nomadic life in the desert and after starting a family of his own that he decided he was tired of this life and that he decided to move into the city and promote his desert skill to his advantage..aka desert camping trips for tourists..props to him.

Anyway, we slept outside in the desert..watching the sun set and the stars rise..with wind blowing sand in our faces and the smell of camels lingering in the distance. Again, it was brilliant..the stars were amazing, we saw a shooting star together, the camels were great..and the tagine and mint tea served for dinner was excellent..we wont forget this anytime soon I don't think.

Oh, also, in Zagora I got my hair cut (you try going to an Islamic monarchy and let a local hold a straight razor to your American neck..I do admit I was a teensy bit nervous), we went swimming and we spent half an afternoon looking at hundreds of Berber carpets presented by another desert tribe..the blue men. After the desert we and Mustafa our driver (how cool is that) we drove up to Fez were we planned our departure from Morocco.

blue men selling us (trying) carpet

Helen, Kelly and Arish

Camel Shadow..

Arish parking Camels...

Mudhut city on the way to Zagora

helen and elvis camel

Arish and sand dune

Arish (Al Queda) playing the tin pot

our camp

Off the map

2007-07-31T14:16:00.000-07:00

Ok so Morocco is not really off all maps..it was just off our foldup map that we had been relying on for the previous several months..so in a sense we were now flying blind..it felt good.

After arriving in Tangier from Spain via the "2hr" ferry which actually took close to 4 hrs we immediately hopped the overnight train to Marrakesh, capital of the south. Feeling the need to up our standards as those around us fell we splurged 70euro on some first class couchettes..sleeper cars. First class my ass..these things were filthy and dank; the bunks were these old 1" thick mattresses on top of plywood with a few stained sheets littered with an assortment of strange hairs..before the train took off I asked the conductor in my really bad french "c'est premiere class?", "Oui" he replied..but as he did I could hear all the other travellers in the other couchettes scoffing...I could tell they were thinking the same thing..70euro..so not worth it..

We ended up sharing our cabin with a local lady who was carrying a very sick infant with her and after pleading for an hour into a cell phone at the beginning of the trip ended up crying herself to sleep..that was our first night..sticky hot, then freezing cold as the air conditioning apparently went into overdrive..trying to sleep on nasty bunks while the sounds of muffled sobs and a gurgling cough from the kid mixed with the steady chug of the train. And thus began our Moroccan adventure.

We arrived in Marrakesh early the next morning found a place to stay in the heart of the Medina and spent the next several days exploring the Souks and Djemma El Fna square.

Zonkers. That's what we have say about Marrakesh ..it's a complete frikin gong show here..you name it..it has has it. Snake Charmers, Boiled snails, Sheep head soup, fine Berber Carpet, imitation Prada, monkeys in cages, piles upon piles of saffron, teeth for sale, and men and women dressed like Jedi nights everywhere. Morocco comes in just about every color, smell and sound...its a complete assault on the senses. Walking through the souks you are confronted with smells of saffron, then of urine, then of frying fish then Jasmin, sewage and exhaust, then back to roasting lamb. Shoulder to shoulder people, donkey carts and motor bikes scurry about these crowded streets going about their days. There's lots of commotion and shouting and several times a day the many mosques that dot the Medina erupt into the call to prayers across their loud speakers. Despite the otherwise dirty public areas Marrakesh can also be very beautiful in spots. The main mosque in the area had beautiful rose gardens, some of the restaurants and souk shops we incredibly ornate and the Riads were always a welcome sanctuary.

After we picked up Kelly from the airport we ended up staying in a 'Riad' called Riad Catalina that was very nice..an oasis of calm in the midst of the Medina. The Riads are these old buildings built when women we not meant to be seen..so they are quite large structures completely devoid of any windows to the outside..instead they are turned outside-in with their centers opening up into massive courtyards in the middle usually crowded with palm trees, streams, pools, fountains, beautiful fabris and tiles framing eating and lounging areas etc..very soothing havens after a hectic day in the Medina. The food was also good and safe for the most part, although we did get sick of eating tagines and kabobs every day.

Instead of trying to describe the sights and sounds in any more detail I instead offer a brief photo tour of the area...bear in mind as you look at these photos that as we are walking in the souks we are being constantly harangued to come look and buy and that half of these photos we taken in super stealth mode while the other half cost me 1 or 2 dirham (30 cents) to get (Moroccans have zero qualms about charging tourists for any and everything...taking pictures, asking directions or standing in a crowd watching a street show will illicit touts demanding money..after several days it was kind of a pain in the ass actually)..

anyway..on to the pics. enjoy.

inside one of the Palais

tile detail

riad catalina

a moroccan pigeon

a mosque entrance

art display in the art and gastronomy souk

our first riad..

kotubia mosque

standard streeet vendor fare

bab something of other..a gate into the walled city

date, apricots, figs et al for sale
sheep or cow heads
dinner in the square
spices
card game in souks
monkey cages
snake charmers
a souk

in the souks

the square

Sangre y Sangria

2007-07-24T09:14:00.000-07:00

Making our way to Morocco to meet our friend Kelly Belly we decided to swing by Spain for a couple of days, in particular the cities of Barcelona and Seville. Spain wasn't on our original itinerary but something about the the weather mad us want to continue our trajectory along the coast.

Barcelona is home of the Seussian architect Gaudi and is otherwise a fantastic town. We stayed in the Bari Gotic area near the cathedral and old ramparts..we wandered the town, we ate tapas and drank sangria. After a couple of days in B we decided to mosey over to Seville for a couple of days.

Barcelona Skyline

Bari Gotic

Gaudi - Familla Sagrada

Seville was a very cool place to visit. In addition to the fantastic architecture, the town is capital of Andalusia and of flamenco guitar and bull fighting. And, as it turns out our first night there whilst wandering the old town we stumbled across a crowd gathered outside an arena...the bullfights were on.

Sevilla Cathedral

Sevilla

Sevilla Riverside at night

We spent ~7 euro each for tickets, a surprisingly paltry price to watch 6 bulls fall, and sat about 10 rows back from action...and this is where I say that 1) i have never been a huge fan of the idea of bullfighting given the relentless cruelty suffered by these poor brutes..and 2) if you've never seen a live bullfight you should..

Sevilla Bullring

Bullfighting apparently comes in several styles..we were lucky to see the on-foot style (as opposed to the man on horse with spear versus bull style). The bullfight goes like this: 3 young matadors enter the arena. They are all in their teens and are all wearing fancy, brightly colored coats embroidered with gold sequined, they wear tassels knickers, fancy flared hats and matching shoes and of course their deadly red capes.

They strike their pose near these double walled exits that they can duck behind when the bull charges. The brass band sitting in the far side of the arena plays a sketches-of-spain-esque flourish and with a snap of the latch the gate slams open and the bull bursts into the arena. With a short pause in its stride the bull spots one of the matadors across the floor and immediately bolts in his direction.the matador challenges the beast with a few flicks of the cape but as the bull nears the matador ducks behind the blind and bang! the bull rams into the wooden fence..almost immediately the bull spots spots the next matador and charges him..bang into the fence again and then onto the third matador..this cycle repeats several times until the bull starts to slow its pace a bit. Once tired the game changes and the matadors leave the safety of the blinds and enter the ring with their capes en garde..this time one however, one of the matadors is carrying two spears. The matadors take turns taunting the beast. The beast charges, matador pirouettes and slips the bull past his hip..the crowd cheers Ole!..after a couple of turns like this the stage is set for the first strike. The spear matador positions himself just past the cape of the matador fighting the bull, he holds his spears above the head and readies himself in a postures that recapitulates the horned bull himself. At the next turn the bull charges past the other matador's cape and finds himself flanked by the spear man..and with a lunge and a downward thrust the spears find their way into the back of the bulls shoulders..the now defenseless matador sprints back to the blind as the now bleeding bull is again distracted by the other matadors in the ring.. This cycle continues until there are six spears solidly planted into the bulls neck/shoulder area.. At this point the bull has six spears in his neck and has been fighting about three matadors nonstop for about twenty minutes..he is tired and barely fighting back..now the matadors leave and the main matador enters the stage alone. This is the quintessence of the bullfight, man versus beast one on one. This matador, like the ones before him teases the beast into his cape turn after turn. Several times in this dance the matador will turn his back to the vanquished bull and bow to the crowd in a show fearless mastery. After several more turns and Ole's the matador eventually slips his sword out its it holster and readies his blow. Now comes the finally..the matador approaches the bull only feet away from the horns, flips the cape, bull charges, matador drops the cape, sidesteps and drops the sword 2 feet in the base of the bulls neck straight into the heart. Again the brass band plays its flourish as the triumphant matador walks the edge of the arena, bowing to the crowd and receiving his applause. At the same time a several of what looks like janitors enter the ring to begin sweeping the bull's blood and feces..they are followed by a team of horses who are lassoed to the bull to drag it away. Or at least this is how its supposed to happen..and we did actually see one fight that ended with the matador performing this blow..it was completely morbid but beautiful at the same time..the matador must have struck the bull in its heart or aorta or something because almost immediately the bull stopped in its placed and began to lean sideways while blood shot from the bull's next in an arc that nearly reached the first row of seats..this won the matador a standing ovation followed by a full house of white kerchiefs being waved (which apparently means "you're the best"). Not all the fights went this smoothly however..several of the fight had the bull catching one of the matadors with his horns, flipping them onto the ground and the trampling and goring them with his horns..mostly the other fighters would comes to the matadors rescue and help him to his feet but one of these incidents actually ended with the matador being injured enough to be taken of the ring and be replaced. Other times the fights wouldn't end so cleanly. The bull would not be felled buy one blow and would require several and some times several several additional strikes to kill..this was depressing to watch; the mortally wounded would just cower in the corner attempting to get to its feet or turn to run as the matador was handed sword after sword to strike the bull with..the most depressing of these was the bull that required five swords. Basically this was the mark of the bad matador and the crowd would boo these guys. By the time the fights were over we had seen six bulls die..we left feeling strangely charged and yet dismayed at the same time..I think we were both glad that we were able to see the spectacle but I don't think either of us will be back to the fights anytime soon. on a lighter note..we loved Seville and will definitely go back, we also loved sangia and tapas..in fact we plan to have a tapas and sangria party when we get back..you're all of course invited.

A tale of two hostels.

2007-07-13T09:42:00.000-07:00

So after Switzerland we managed to catch a boat to the south of France for some sun. We ended up in Marseilles for a couple of days. Marseilles is a bit different then the rest of France in that is has a strangely north African feel to it. Surrounded by barren, rocky hills it is comprised almost entirely of those blocky white-washed buildings that you always see getting blown up in the latest international footage on CNN. The town itself was alright..comparatively a little drab, but what we ended up liking most about Marseilles was the hostel we stayed in..La Cigale et la Fourmi.. this place was bonkers!!..but in a nice, cozy kinda way. It was run by a french man named Jean who was very friendly and invited us to the hostel he is building in the Philippines. But the real star of the show was this older french/greek man named Patrick (imagine a rambunctious, buzzed and very jovial Keith Richards, leather pants and all) Patrick loved his wine and spent the evenings telling stories of his five daughters with five different women, stories of his time in the isreali army and why he hates arabs (this caused quite a stir with the majority of the guests), how he loves `the asiatic girls` aka Helen, how he just scammed the gaggle of spanish kids staying in the building next door out of some hash, how he speaks seven languages, how he let me beat him at chess, and so on). We spent the bulk of our three days in Marseilles relaxing here, chatting up the others or sleeping the hot afternoons away in our tiny pumpkin coloured room with unabashed views of the neighboring rooftops.

(Notre Dame over Vieux Port in Marseilles)

(street of La Cigale and La Fourmi)

(Marseilles city-scape)

After Marseilles we paddled over to Nice for the weekend. Nice is nice..a sunny and affluent beach city where everyone is pretty and tanned..like a larger Santa Monica perhaps. Here we stayed in what Helen and I started calling "hookup hostel" (Villa St Exubery for those interested in hooking up).. this place was like a college dorm crossed with a Club Med. Helen and I were the oldest people there I think outside from the owners and maybe one of the maintenance guys.. The entire 200 bed place was filled with tall handsome lads and lasses from all over the globe..but mostly comprised of Yanks and Aussies.
Despite this it was actually a pretty cool venue..built out of a converted monastery..20 free computers in the common room, clean rooms, free breakfast and a nightly dinner service with 5 euro dinner specials and 1 euro beer. All in all a good venue. But at night it turned in to Club Hookup..after dinner the common room would be filled to capacity with these young pretties, guy and gals alike, all dressed in heels and hairdos while the music played louder and louder and the pyramids of beer cans stacked on various tables grew taller and taller. The revelry would continue until about 3 or 4 am and could be heard throughout the complex.

Being somewhat short of rest, as you might imagine, Helen and I spent our days trekking to overrated Monaco and the medieval art village of Eze or relaxing on the beach watching the local kids with their little nets catch a flock of jellyfish (in french: medusa) that had just drifted into the wadding shallows.

(nice beachs)

(this brave young medusa-hunter had just caught one; but like myself and so many other brave children of Perseus she too fell victum to the itchy stings less than three minutes after this photo was taken. In a bawl and tear, she fled the hunt and was rescued from the fray by her kind and brave mother.*)

*the medusa stings only really itched a little, no real pain or danger..

(Eze art town)

Having had our fill of sun and fun in the cote d'azur we let ourselves drift west towards Barcelona.

Swiss Family Pluess

2007-07-07T01:02:00.000-07:00

Deciding to test Urs' assertion of the aesthetic supremacy of Swiss cows we made a dash for Lucerne Switzerland for the weekend to meet up with my Aunt Dawn, Uncle Urs and Cousins Karen and Nicole.

17 years!! or something like this is how long its been since I last saw them..that's half a lifetime ago for me. When we last saw each other it was at their ranch outside Brisbane Australia and I had long, 'I wanna be Jim Morrison' hair and was wearing a paisley, 'I wanna be Jim Morrison' vest with mirrored, 'I wanna be Jim Morrison' glasses. In retrospect, it seems that my attempts of capturing Morrison's unique brand of 1970's hippy-cool at the proud young age of 17 failed miserably as all Helen said when she saw the picture was "why are you dressed like Joey Laurence from Blossom?" ugh..sorry Jim, I know you're turning in your grave but she doesn't know..she doesn't mean it.

Anyway back to the family. Had a great time with my aunt and uncle. For many years Urs' job allowed them to travel and live in various parts of the world..and coupled with their native penchant and experience traveling for fun Helen and I spent many hours discussing the in and outs of much of the world. They are retired now and living on top of a hill outside Lucerne in a pyramid house that was apparently designed by an architect who was later abducted by a UFO. We stayed at the house for 3 days soaking up the sun and mouthfuls of refreshing mountain air.As it turns out cousin Karen and her beau Ray were already having a party Saturday night and this provided the perfect opportunity to catch up with them and my other cousin Nicole and her beau Faby. We ate, we talked we laughed..it was good to see the cousins again. :)
(At barn party, from left to right: Aunt Dawn, Cousins Karen and Nicole and Uncle Urs)

The next day we all went to Ballenberg which is an interesting open air museum of rescued historic homes from all over Switzerland. Apparently they rescue these old 200-800 year old cottages and mills etc and move them to this spot where they are preserved. Most interesting is that several of these old places are still working so you can get a chance to see how the 300 year old water powered wood mill works or how the meat smoke house works (i.e. with actual meat being smoked), and so on.

Monday rolled around and the cousins had to get back to their jobs and Helen and I needed to start heading west towards Morocco so we said our goodbyes and promised to not let another 17 slip by before seeing each other again.

J'aime Paris

2007-07-03T13:10:00.000-07:00

What can be said about Paris that hasn't already been said? How about this: crappy architecture and the worst skyline yet. A bit harsh perhaps, but true. Unlike several of the other major cities we've hit and aside from several great structures (i.e. the Eiffel Tour; le Sacre Cour, Pompidou Center, the Orsay, etc.) downtown Paris is actually a nasty amalgam of 1970's block buildings. But this is fine, after all, this is not why you go to Paris..you go for the culture..or so thinks me.

So being the cultural aesthetes that we are, we booked ourselves into the Montemarte district...home of the Moulin Rouge amongst other things.. c'est magnifique!

It was at this point that time decided to hit me with yet another year. Merde. Wasn't so bad actually, spent the night in a bar with my belle and a Beatles / Doors cover band. We sing sung along with a pot pouri mix of garden variety Europeans: large drunk Russian ladies whose voice rattled like a plucked bandsaw, gay french men dressed as Elvis Costello growling away like an operatic Harvey Firestein, and several other stewy types. It was a good night.

Of course we took in the rest of the sights and even caught an Impressionist exhibit (read: Monet, Manet, Cezanne, Picasso et al) at the Orsay. Tres cool.

What else? tired of the relentless tourbook narrative? Here's some other color on the scene. Helen spent almost all of Paris sick with a cold, I got the runs from some bad Vietnamese food. Had a small confrontation with some Nigerian hustlers outside of the Sacre Cour..they convinced Helen to hold onto this piece of string momentarily and within a second they had braided this bracelet around her wrist and were now demanding 10 euro. We argued and insisted they take it back, that we didn't want it, they insisted and when several more joined the fray we tossed them 20 cents and walked away as their eyes burned into our backs. What else..oh yeah, tried absinthe..no big deal..tastes like a nasty watered down Sambuca..

As for our bodies and minds? aside from Helen's recent cold and the occasional spat of the splatters, we've been relatively healthy. Our foreheads and forearms are tanned from spending prolonger hours outside. Our legs are becomming very fit from all the walking/hiking/lugging of packs..I'm actually starting to grow some calf muscles which is a nice change from the chicken legs I'm used to step'n with. Our clothes are beginning to smell persistently despite our best attempts at washing (you try rotating between 3 pairs of socks and underwear for 2 months). We seem to be hitting less and less tourist sites and taking less photos..preferring instead to just relax and enjoy the scene..this at least seems to be working. ('this' being the saturation point that we were looking for, slowly we are shedding our tourist selves and are becoming travelers). Stress too has seemed to wane, I found myself sitting in a cafe the other day thinking of absolutely nothing and feeling more relaxed than I have in a long long time..this seems to be working too. Helen and I have begun to create our own language of hand signs and various head nods to communicate from across crowded trains or when we don't want our euro hosts to know our thoughts (remember all euros speak English..even if they pretend they don't).

Anyway, after several glorious days in ol' Paris we called up the Swiss family Pluess and planned our get away.

Altstadtfest

2007-06-24T07:23:00.000-07:00

Heidelberg..what a cool place..big university town, lots of young international types, good Indian food, and of course great medieval German architecture.

We lucked out. Turns out the day (Sat) we arrived was the AltStadt festival celebrating the the history of the old town in traditional German fashion: Beer, Bratwurst, High school Oompah Bands, men dressed in colored bridge guard outfits drinking from hollowed out yak horns and playing trumpets. We ended sitting and singing with a table of local German dames and some other kids from Mexico city. Once the Germans found out we were from California they all erupted into a sort of hooting and shouting about this is where Paris Hilton was in prison and were we sad; I told them I cried the day she was sentenced. Shortly after, the Mexican kids 'taught' us all the words to la-cucuracha and had the table singing "nah nah nah nah, marijuana que fumar!". H and I of course knew what this meant but the rest of table seemed blissfully oblivious to the translation and kept belting out the lyric. Funny scene.

The high school oompah band left the stage and was replaced by an aging Rolling Stones cover band singing old favs like: "Unter mine Thumb" and "Hey yoo, git off of meine cloud" and so on.. We drank bier and ate sausages until the sun went down despite the rain. Later we wandered into the university campus area and ran across a french ska band that was actually good. Their manager, seeing me and instantly realizing my skill with the camera asked me to take fotos for their fan site. I obliged while Helen danced. The band's site I guess is http://www.roultaboul.com/

we rounded out the night with some good Indian food, several large glass of water and a hike to our subterranean room. Good times.

Sounds like Muzac

2007-06-22T09:00:00.000-07:00

So Salzburg... We arrived last Sunday evening in the old salt city and made our way to the hostel. Actually it was a youth and family hostel which was quite fun. It had several large families staying across from us, a communal TV area where Sound of Music was playing and a bar. Helen watched the movie, I too tried to follow along out out of my one good eye. The next day we did our own sound of music walk, which is actually quite easy since the town is only about 30 min walking time across and all the sites are easily discernible on the stadtplans (city maps CK). We found the ivy covered tunnel that the Von Trapp family airplane danced through, we found Mirabell gardens, the gate, the nunnery and the Hohensalzburg Fortress. We also stumbled across Mozarts birthhaus and other rezidenze, which were both very drab. Later we found a cool little cafe selling a pan global fusion mix of Japanese curry with chicken and vegetables served over couscous..delicious! All in all Salzburg was very nice.

Next we made our way to Fussen in southern Germany. Fussen is the site of the Neudisneylandenstein castle and is apparently a top listed attraction for Chinese tourist. No kidding, we found a gasthaus (guesthouse CK) to stay in for the night and were shocked and awed to discover the next morning at breakfast the the place had slept 27 people that night..about 20 of which were Chinese. We then ventured into town and up to Schloss Neuwaltdisneyenstein to take pictures and waste money on the guided tour. It turns out the castle is apparently the inspiration for Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty´s castle. What´s funny about the castle is that it was built by mad Konig Ludwig in 1869 or so in an apparent attempt to recapture some lost German Medieval romance. In 1870 castles were useless and quite out of place in the modern world, this castle was ridiculously anachronistic (out of time CK). Keep in mind that in 1870, among other things, the world had just entered into the Industrial revolution, The US had just had its civil war, and Darwin and Marx had published their seminal works decades before. The castle is itself a fairytale, it even has its own fairytale cave built inside that looks very much like the fake caves of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland and such. I wonder if Walt Disney didn´t get the whole idea for a fantasy land from touring the site. I also wonder if its this link to Disneyland that attracted so many Chinese to the area.

From Fussen we continued north along the Romantic Road (which itself is a post war contrivance aimed at driving tourism into the heart of Bavaria) to several old romantic Bavarian burgs ending up in Wurzburg.

Wurzburg was apparently leveled in WW2 by allied carpet bombing but was rebuilt again shortly after. All the buildings, forts, palaces, and churches were rebuilt in original baroque magnificence. They are stunning, they are grand, but again, because I know the back story they seem fake again..a romantic fantasy, a simulacra; again, much like Disneyland.

This seems to be a recurrent theme with our adventure so far..Disneyland. I don´t know if its because we´ve been reared on TV and everything seems like simulacra to us, if its because we came with fairytale visions in our minds, or if its because life does truly imitate art but we´ve had a hard time getting lost in western Europe. We can´t seem to go native, everything is too easy, packaged for our consumption, no danger: Mozart chocolates, Italian salumis (no, not salami´s..look it up CK), corner cafes, churches that charge admission, museums, thousands of Europeans who all speak perfect English..Argh!! And now it´s raining and is supposed to rain for the next 10 days. Brilliant. We´ve resigned ourselves to shopping in sports stores for quick drying trekking gear (my newest obsession) and internet cafes (hence this long @ss blog). Tomorrow we´ll try to head to Heidelburg then up into the Koblenz-Koln-Trier areas for some German wine tasting then off to Paris and then backdown through Switzerland to visit family, then finally to north Africa where even the one legged beggars are dangerous.

I should end by saying that it´s not like we´re not enjoying Europe, we are having a blast: Europe is very photogenic, the bathrooms aren´t that bad, and the beer really is cheaper than the water. I´ve even been contemplating buying and running a hostel during the summer months over here..the economics of it seem to work out (i.e. 27 people a night at 20 euro each during the 3 months of tourist season..you do the math.)

anyway...time for a kaffee i think.

that´s what she said...

2007-06-16T11:08:00.000-07:00

so the last couple of posts were Helen´s.. here´s my two cents on the last couple of weeks:

I think what I liked most about Italy were the bidets, they´re very refreshing. I could probably write several stanzas on the joy of bidets but I wont..instead I´ll simply suggest that if you haven´t already and you do get the chance to try one take it!!!

Anyway, in general Italy is fun: There´s the clash of ancient and modern in Rome, the cluttered coziness of the stacked seaside abodes in Amalfi and the romantic rollings hills of the Tuscan wine country. And then there´s the history of it all, tres fascinating: The factions of warring Etruscan townships, the maritime supremacy of the Venetian Doges, the assassination of popes and the building of a better church, the Medici´s and the Mafia, and of course Marco Polo´s and Columbus´ contributions towards pasta.

Aside from being ridiculously expensive, the only other drawback with Italy is that its a bit too Italian. Sounds weird I know but it does seem that Italy is somewhat obsessed with it´s own cliches. Perhaps this is due to us hitting several touristy areas where countless culture mongers package and sell ´la vita Italia´ on every corner, or perhaps it was simply the endless masses of lost and confused tourists who always seemed to be in our way, or maybe it was having to pay €8 for two cappuccinos because we sat down and drank them (versus drinking while standing at the bar). Either way, we ate the food and we drank the wine, fillings ourselves until the taste was burnt into our palates...we came, we saw, we conquered. We´ll come back. We´ll be older, wiser richer...and hopefully the dollar will be stronger. Fin.

We´ve now moved into Innsbruck Austria. Its a nice change of scenery and of weather. Today we hiked in the Austrian Alps. We rode aging Olympic gondolas, we pet long blond haired horses grazing in their alpine meadows, we picnic´d overlooking scenic vistas straight out of the best postcards. It was a good day.

Tschuss!

Gelatos, cappuccinos, and primis

2007-06-13T05:15:00.000-07:00

Mmmm... these are the things I will miss most about Italy. Our time here has been scrumptious so far.

We spent the last few days in Cortona and Assisi and loved every minute of it. Cortona is a small medieval town on top of a hill in the Tuscan countryside (we're also told that "Under the Tuscan Sun" was filmed there... but neither of us has seen it). We spent 3 days hanging out and enjoying the scenes... and if things weren't so expensive, we'd probably camp out there longer. We also did a day visit to Assisi in Umbria, home of Pinnochio and St. Francis.... more amazing views and stunning churches.

After spending a few quiet days in the countryside we decided to make sure we experienced Florence, which is where we are now, and after just a day here we are ready to leave. It is quite a big city and like Rome, wayyyy too many tourists and quite expensive. Lines to get into everything and reservations required for some. A bit too high maintenance for us.

Venice is our next stop, then on to Austria. We'll have to say our goodbyes to Italy... which will be hard, but 'tis a big world to see and we must move on.

Ryan doesn't know this yet, but I am booking a Sound of Music tour once we get into Salzburg. Can you believe he has not seen the movie.... EVER? If we get a room at a hostel we're eyeing in Salzburg, he will have no choice but to watch one of their daily free showings of the movie. He must watch it before we do the tour. I hope the actual scenes are still as pretty as when they filmed the movie!

Oh, and Ryan's bday is coming up soon.... perhaps we will spend it in Amsterdam?

various pics

VENICE

FLORENCE

Italia

2007-06-04T12:13:00.000-07:00

Sicilia
Italy comes in many flavors. This last week we were in Sicily, the farthest south provence of Italy and man..what an..umm.. adventure. It seems that the further south you go in Italy the more impoverished it becomes. They say it's like the Appalachians of Italy. There are certain pockets that are nice though... we got to see Taormina, a very picturesque beachside town, and Syracuse. Also got to see Mt. Etna but we never made it to the very top since it was really cold and windy.
Special thanks to Den & Nano for coordinating everything and helping us adapt to the Italian ways! We had a great time with you guys and we miss you already!

Pompei

After Sicily, we took a train to Pompei. Some of you may wonder... how in the world do you take a train from Sicily to the mainland? They actually board the whole train onto a ferry and boat it across the sea, along with ferrying cars and people. Kind of like going to Balboa island I guess.

Anyway, we got to see the Pompei ruins where you can see how the people lived right up until the volcanoe blew. For such an old civilization, they were very advanced. It was amazing to see their homes... kitchens that had marble countertops! and we even got to walk through the town's whorehouse. You could tell what it was from the paintings on the walls (i.e. all the various positions!!). And the people... still preserved, in the very positions they were in when they died. Dogs too.

Speaking of dogs, Pompei is overrun with stray dogs, hundreds of them, but they are all very well behaved and polite. Yes, polite. Its kinda like Caesar Milan (aka the dog whisperer) meets Pavlov. It seems, having been ignored most of their lives they have tuned themselves into the human psyche and have learned to read our slightest signal and gesture. They have even learned to cross the road by watching and waiting for cars..kinda strange and interesting to see actually.

We also had a chance to visit the Amalfi coast. Very pictuesque... cities on cliff sides... kinda like Laguna Beach, but 10 times prettier! Definitely a nice retreat if you want to get away from the hustle and bustle of big cities. Unfortunately, we only had a day to visit so we only saw Positano and Amalfi which are overrun by tourists.

Roma

From Pompei, we took a train to Rome which is where we are now. We can't wait to get into St. Peter's Basilica and the Vatican museums and the Sistine Chapel! There is something to see everywhere you look.... churches, castles, Roman ruins, statues, etc etc etc! Too bad everyone else in the world is here to see the same stuff. It is very crowded everywhere you go. And lines to get into everything. We expected lots of tourists, but not this many! Strange enough it all seems like Disneyland.

Tomorrow we are planning to get to the Vatican museum by 7am (ayayayy) to wait in line until it opens at 9am. We were told that if we get there anytime after it opens, we could wait in line all day. And it takes several hours just to really take it all in. On top of that, Pres Bush is supposed to be arriving tomorrow or Saturday to visit with the Pope. The city is already preparing for his arrival, as well as the people... the streets are lined with anti-Bush and anti-war posters. They are expecting an anti-American protest right outside the Vatican... which should be interesting since that is where we are staying.

PS. HAPPY BIRTHDAY SHAWN!!!!!

it's the little things

2007-05-31T09:34:00.000-07:00

it's always the little things that stand out most and that you end up missing most. For instance warm water. the sinks in the UK have the hot and cold tabs separate from each other which makes washing your hands or freshening you face with warm water extremely difficult; the water is either scalding hot or freezing cold depending which faucet you use. I guess you could plug the sink (providing it has a stopper which a lot don't) and mix your own pool of warm water..but in a public sink or shared hostel bathroom this never really seems to be an option. Or a cloths dryer. Most Brits have a washing machine but no dryer. They hang their cloths out to dry instead. This would make perfect sense and be a sound ecological alternative to the energy sucking cloths dryers that we use in the US, except of course it rains every other day in England, so about half the time you cloths get rained on when you are trying to dry them. A real PITA. What else? oh, the traffic on the left..not really a problem since we were taking public transport or Steve was driving, but try crossing the road...odds are you'll look the wrong way. I actually had several close calls stepping into the road in front of traffic. The offset of course is that the cars are never really moving that fast due to congestion in the cities. It's the little things. Shops close at 6pm sharp and nothing is open on Sunday. Only 4 channels in TV. The slow dribble of the electric showers, awful instant coffee, etc. I think we're a bit spoiled in SoCal, but this is ok with me.

Cotswolds and Londontown

2007-05-23T02:32:00.000-07:00

So it's been a while since the last update and I figured I'd try to catch the site up.

After York we continued south into the Cotswold's area. Cotswold's are basically a series of quaint little towns lightly sprinkled across the hilly meadows of south west of England. It's a postcard place: Old stone buildings with grass thatched or slate shingled roofs, country gardens full of lavenders, daisy, and other brightly colored wildflowers, long grassed meadows and shaggy trees all woven together by lazy streams and cobbled country roads.

Cotswold's apparently was the center of the English wool trade some yrs back and was quite wealthy back in the day. While the wool industry has since waned the austerity of the area has remained intact, the manor homes and wool monger shops have since given way to restaurant's, pubs, B&B's, boutique candle shops, antique china dealers, specialty hat and mitt shops and all the other things you'd associate with your old English grandmothers place.

Our particular town was called Bourton on the Water. We stayed two days and relaxed and enjoyed the decent weather. We rode bikes in the country side one day and horses the next. The rest of the time was spend wandering the town centers, eating, sleeping and enjoying.

From the Cotswold's we headed east towards Steve's amazingly well organized flat in London. London was alot flatter and wider than I expected. It is more like LA than than Manhattan. None of the building are particularly tall with no particularly recognizable skyline and it's sprawl has several 'centers'. Still it was an amazing city. We toured all the sites: Buckingham Palace, the Mall, Trafalgar square, Greenwich, Piccadilly, Covent Garden, Soho, St. Paul's, the Houses of Parliament, the British Museum, etc.

It was interesting to see how much the founding fathers had pulled from London when designing and building Washington DC. The concept of the Capital Mall with its government bldgs and free museums for instance seems directly pulled from London mall and its government bldgs and free museums; the Capital bldg looks strikingly similar to St. Paul's; the White house seems a scaled back version of Buckingham Palace and so on.

While Soho, Covent Garden and Piccadilly were very cool, Greenwich actually was my favorite place. We went to the Greenwich observatory where time starts and took turns jumping back and forth between the Eastern and Western hemispheres.

All in all it was a great time. On Wed (5-23) we jumped a plain to Bergamo, Italy to meet up with Den and Nano.

Old York

2007-05-18T14:41:00.000-07:00

Went to the original town on York on Tuesday. It's a old walled roman city with lots of old narrow streets in the north England; it is also home to York Minster Abbey. All in all it was a very cool and historical place.

First night in town we got ourselves a B&B and then went out to a pub (it's becoming our thing). After a few pints the bars were closing so we made for home..along the way we passed Cliffords tower. We decided to race up the to top of the grassy mound..which as you can tell from the photo is actually quite steep. And, when you consider the several pints in us and the long, wet grass on the hill it was actually quite hard to make any progress up at all..you had to grab wet clumps of grass in your hands and kick your feet into the side the hill to take one step.

So after struggling at it for several minutes we all made it up. Then the light bulb went off.. "wait a second, this hill is really slippery...maybe we can slide down~!" so we did..it was awesome actually, just jumped at the top and land on you butt and within a second you're rocketing down the hill, sliding on the wet grass, it was like a water slide sans water. Up again and down again. Steve and I must have done 15 runs before we realized the girls had wandered off. So, wet and grass stained we ran after them.

next day we went back into town and visited the Abbey and got to climb the tower. here's some pics:

Outside the abbey.

Inside the Abbey. This place is massive and incredibly ornate.

View from top of the main tower some 260 spiral steps up (makes you dizzy climbing actually since you're always turning the same direction)

in the country

2007-05-16T16:40:00.000-07:00

poked around lake district for a day. very quaint and pleasant.

Lake District is must if your 60+, or if your traveling with strollers. surprisingly the terrain here has naturally formed in a way that turned out to be quite accommodating to a very easy and pleasant outdoor experience (gentle hills, wandering walks, babbling brooks, shady trees, soft grass, etc.)

actually, we didn't really utilize the area to its fullest extent, apparently there are many many miles of hill hikes that you can do, but you need camping equipment since these walks are quite extended and can take several days.

we still had fun though. there was sheep for example...

and a lake that we walked around.

and lots of other photo ops:

Rosslyn & Hadrians Wall

2007-05-16T03:00:00.000-07:00

Like I had said earlier the sun had come out so we stopped at Rosslyn Chapel and explored the area a bit. Recently popularized by Dan Brown's 'Da Vinci Code', Rosslyn was the scene of some Knight's Templar activity back in the day. The medival architecture and cabalistic detail of the interior was neat, unfortunately, it was being reconstructed or preserved or something and the entire outside was covered in scaffolding so I left without a solid pciture (mental or otherwise) of what Roasslyn, the building, actually looks like.

We poked around here for a bit, snapped some photos and decided to hike across the hillside in the direction of the Rosslyn Castle ruins we spied in the distance. Feeling adventurous we decided to take the road less travelled and hike along an animal path (sheep most likely). So after about a half hour of slipping and sliding along the muddy hillside we came upon the ruins. Helen and Ginger were the first to discover the remains as Steve and I were off busily chasing butterflies or digging up ferns.

Only after circumnavigating the remains did we realize the up top was actually a house that was being lived in and a nice gravel paved road leading back towards Rosslyn..given a second chance though I think we'd still have chosen our path.

Anyway, having spent a couple of hours enjoying the sun we got back in the car and get out of this barbarian land, or so the Romans called Scotland. We were making our way south, heading towards Carlisle just north of the Lake District and we realized that along the way we were going to be heading past Hadrians wall, the northernmost border of the Roman empire, so we decided to swing by and a peak.

Hadrian's wall marked the northernmost border of the Roman empire. Emperor Hadrian commissioned the wall to be build in ~122AD to keep the northern barbarian tribes out (a.k.a. the Scots and the Picts). What's impressive about Hadrian's wall is not it's size or its girth (no laughing ladies) although it is about 60 miles long and was some 15 feet high in places with assorted forts and turrets placed along the way. What is impressive is that in ~122 AD when pretty much everyone else in the world is making walls out of wood, mud, or by stacking stones the Romans had mastered concrete..and I'm not talking about some crappy early precursor either, but a real modern, waterproof concrete. Apparently they had figured out a way to use the volcanic ash from Mt. Etna mixed with lye to make everything set nicely. On top of this, what's equally or more impressive is that the Romans had apparently imported I don't know how many tons of this volcanic ash all the way from Italy to Northern England to build this wall. The logistics of it alone are impressive.

ps: if you're still giggling over the 'size and girth' comment from above I guess you could say that what Hadrian's wall lacks in size it makes up for in technique. ;P

English Weather

2007-05-15T17:41:00.000-07:00

After our cold and grey stay in Edinburgh we decided to head south for some hopefully warmer weather. We packed up and got in the car.

10 miles out of town and it had suddenly turned into a beautiful day...or at least the sun had come out. Pardon the digression but I have to comment on British weather here: First off, the UK is actually pretty friken far north..Inverness, in northern Scotland, is actually about the same latitude as Juneau Alaska and London is about the same latitude as Seattle/Vancouver area. Its the gulf stream apparently that circulates warmish water past the Isles and keeps them from freezing. Without the gulf stream much of the British Isles would be covered in glaciers, which is apparently how they formed in the first place.

Anyway, Edinburgh, which is located on a bay type thing called the Firth of Forth, is subject to pretty fickle weather..it can change within minutes..which as you can imagine makes it really hard to plan your outfit..the trick being to remember to pack extra layers and rain coats in your day bag. Basically the weather here is similar to the San Francisco bay area in that in SF it can be cold, windy and overcast and a mere 10 miles away on the other side of the bay it can be 15 degrees warmer and sunny. Such was our day, cold then then warmish.

Feeling revived by the sudden splashes of sunlight on our faces we decided to stop, get out, and explore a bit. As luck would have it we were right near Rosslyn Chapel...but that'll be the next entry...for now, more on the weather.

Coming from SoCal we take the warmth and the sun for granted..in just a weeks time in the UK we had learned that you take advantage of every minute of sunlight and warmth that you can since it could be days again until you see the sun again. And this is a strange phenomena in itself..not seeing the sun. In Scotland it had been so overcast that you really could not make out where the sun was..the sky was a uniformly grey glowing blanket with some darker and lighter splotches mixed in..like a can of grey paint that hadn't been mixed properly. Not being able to see the sun has some strange side effects; particularly, you can't really tell what time of day it is by the height of the sun nor can you tell which way is east or west by the sun's position.

There's actually another story here: When Helen and I first arrive in Dublin several weeks back the weather was similar, and having just arrived at 10am local time after a 14 hour flight we tried our best to explore the city a bit..we didn't last long and ended up falling asleep in our hotel around 3 in the afternoon. We woke around 8:30 to find the sky a similar shade of grey to when we had gone to sleep. We knew it was 8:30 and we felt rested but we couldn't tell if it was 8:30 that same night or 8:30 the next morning..maybe it was the jet lag but I blame not being able to see the sun as well..we actually had to call down to the front desk to get the day. kinda weird and discombobulating.

Anyway, I don't know how the English do it..technically this is their spring time and according to the locals, "it's not bad out".

I think the Beatles put it best: Here comes the Sun, long live the Sun King.

Castles suck!

2007-05-13T10:57:00.000-07:00

Ok, they don't really suck its just that we're on castle overload right about now..seen 3 or so in the last day and a half..they're everywhere. Of note were Edinburgh and Sterling castles. Edinbugh Castle is really dominating on the city skyline (try to post pics later) and Sterling is the site of William Wallace's (a.k.a braveheart) famous victory over the English so these were neat to see. here are some pics:

Edinburgh Castle

Sterling Castle

It's friken cold though..and by cold I mean a damp and windy 50 degrees. Helen and I didn't really prepare for this sort of weather, we did bring a thermal layer and wind breaker but they barely keep the cold out..and then of course is the laundry issue..it's been cold for about 7 days straight now and with only one warm outfit we are starting to stink a bit...well, I am at least, Helen seems to manage not to rot as bad as me..she claims it's all the dairy I eat. anyway.

Ginger and Steve have joined us and we've secured a guest house near old town Edinburgh. Last night we went to a neighborhood pub and had some pints with the locals..it was a bizarre night, here's the scene:

Local scottish pub filled with scrappy middle aged scotsmen dressed in drag mixed with strange older women wearing wigs and Grease outfits (ala Pink Ladies) who looked like the men in drag and selling raffle tickets (apparently all this for a charity fund raising event). As we enter the bar, the locals turned and leared towards like the zombies in a George Romero film.. it was only later that we discovered that unlike Romero's zombies, they were not after our brains.. but our pearly whites.

Finding a cozy corner with our backs to the wall and warm carpet under our feet we decided to stay for some pints. A couple of pints into the evening and someone puts on the Grease soundtrack. After listening to it play through about 3 times back to back they brought out the karaoke machine. This is a sight in itself..drunk Scottish drag queens belting out Sinatra in thick, slurred Scottish accents.

So as the sky grew progressively darker in its shades of grey we slid deeper and deeper into the rabbit hole. Fearing the worst we moved on to shots of slippery nipples, kilt lifters and sambuca, the only 3 shots the barmaid knew how to make (2 technically since you don't actually 'make' a sambuca shot). As the alcohol seeped into our blood and into our brains we slowly began to make out individual words and then slowly complete sentences from the locals. We had learned Scottish! So we decided to engage in some light conversation. It was at this point, face to face with the drunk Scottish drag queens, that we reallized it was our pearly whites that had caught their eye when we first entered. That 'myth' about poor British dental hygine is apparently true. Half of these poor souls had several teeth missing, crooked snaggly teeth, bad dentures, brownish plaque or some combination thereof. All very nice people, but it was all we could do to avoid staring at their gaping maws while we talked over 'Blair's resignation', 'Scotish seperatism', 'how good Mike looks in drag' and 'whether or not Ginger is interested in marrying one of Old Jack's seven sons'.

The raffle comes and we end up winning several bottls of wine (just what we need). We pick at the scraps of food at the buffet and decide we've had enough...it's time for bed.

Anyway, that was last night..I think we're in for a slighly quieter night tonight with falafels, tea and BBC2.

here's the proof:

Steve and 'Honey'

a close up up shot..(sorry)

Ginger with Old Jack

Ryan and 'Penny'

way too happy for winning some cheap wine

Stage left..

2007-05-12T04:02:00.000-07:00

We met Steve about a year ago at our friends Riad's wedding reception. He's been out from London a couple of times since and each time we've hung out with him it's been very cool. So naturally we were excited to hear that he was going to join up with us Friday night in Edinbugh and travel back down to Londontown with us.

Enter Steve. And within minutes of his arriving Steve, who is handsome and charming by trade, quickly works his magic and pulls some of Scotland's finest.

It turns out that Edinburgh is a popular destination for Stag and Hen parties (read: bachelor/bachelorette) and in this case 18th birthday parties as well (equivalent to our 21st birthday due to the drinking age being 18 in the UK).

Apparently the tradition is to dress up in goofy outfits and get drunk. Which when you consider Scotish daily life (kilts, bagpipes, and beer) seems par for course.

Anyway, in addition to the bunnies shown here we saw a Rugby team theme, a 'goofy hats and toy guns' theme, a Star Wars theme, and other assorted goofery.

What's best about this picture is the large girl in the front left with the take away basket of chips.

Church

2007-05-11T08:15:00.000-07:00

went to St Giles Church for a service today..impressive church lots of buttressed ells and stained glass

Edinburgh

2007-05-10T12:47:00.000-07:00

We've arrived in Edinburgh... WOW! What an impressive city.... lots of gothic architecture stacked upon more Gothic architecture. All the stones are black and brooding with age.. very majestic yet ominous. The city seems pretty diverse and edgy, very different from Glasgow and the north... and of course, Helen noticed lots of great shopping. Too bad we're watching our budget!

We're staying at a hostel... kinda shabby, but will do for now.

We're off to check out the bar scene. We've had enough folk music so far so we're eager to see what the kids are listening to here.

Cheers

A Picture Tour

2007-05-10T07:14:00.000-07:00

Irish Police (Guarda) Motorcycles

Irish Bus Station (Bus Eireann) our preferred mode of transport... err, maybe not preferred, but primary mode at least

Irish Country side and old Train station.. Ireland really is this green

Dingle (An Daengian) - great little town on the Dingle peninsula in County Kerry (recommend this)

An Irish parade celebrating our arrival..or maybe they were celebrating Mayday..

A hearty Irish Pub meal (Guinness, Meat and Potatoes!!)

and an Irish rainbow on our last day...

City scenes from around Inverness (great town!!!)

Cawdor Castle

And Helen sporting a Scottish rainbow (remarkably similar to Irish rainbows)

more later..

Highlander

2007-05-10T02:49:00.000-07:00

So we flew into Glasgow on Tuesday and took the train to Inverness same day. We've been poking around the Scottish highlands now for a couple of days and we love it even though the weather is rainy. There are sheep farms and castle relics everywhere...churches too..loads of churches..for instance Inverness must have 15 or so churches..and I don't mean little tiny churches in some random corner of town..I mean large impressive gothic cathedral style churches..sometimes several in a row on the same street.

We also saw the battlefields of Culloden. This is the place where the last battle was fought on British soil.. some say it was fought between the Scots and English, or that it was a civil war between the highlanders and the lowlanders... others say it was a religious war between the roman catholics and episcopalians vs the protestants... I think. Regardless, it was neat to see. There are stones placed on the fields to remember the various clans who died there. There were flowers placed there as well... as the anniversary of the battle was on 4/16..

Today we'll be heading to Loch Ness to try to spot the monster (fingers crossed)..after that we're heading into Edinburgh to meet up with Ginger and Steve for some more fun.

Some observations so far:

Ireland-
- clean and safe
- people are cordial but not as friendly as advertised; they are also very conservative
- seems to desperately be trying to recreate itself culturally as the Gaelic country of Europe and remove itself from the shadow of the UK
- buses are clean and on time
- stay away from Tralee (waste of time!)

Scotland so far-
- friendly people
- already experienced some conflicts between the highlanders vs the lowlanders, or to put it another way, between the pro UK unionists and the nationalists/separatists... they were men in the same bar... snaring at each other because they were each more loyal and patriotic than the other
- gorgeous countryside... some of the prettiest flowers we've seen so far.. it's amazing how such a gray and overcast climate can produce some of the boldest and most brilliantly colored flowers

More to follow...

New Friends

2007-05-07T03:21:00.000-07:00

Ireland apparently is a small country. We met Carmine, from Naples, Italy, in Cork but ran into him 3 separate times since... all in different cities.

Also, here is another friend, Molly. She is the daughter of a family we stayed with in Dingle.

More pics - the Irish countryside!

Blarney Castle

Picnicking in the park

Dublin to Cork

2007-05-04T01:36:00.000-07:00

Liffey River in Dublin

after one day in Dublin we decided that this was not the Ireland that we were looking for. Dublin unfortunately is a large modern city at this point with a high cost of living.. in fact, Dublin is rated the 13th most expensive city to live in. here's an example... pack of cigarettes is 8 euros, which translates to $12 usd. helen and I have had a hard time eating for less than 5 euros ea. as far as the friendly irish, everyone in Dublin seemed way too busy to stop and chat. there are hardly any benches nor any local green areas to sit and lounge. the bulk of the city seemed to be walking somewhere very fast and deliberately. so, for 10.50 euros, we took a 4 hour bus ride south to Cork.. Ireland's second largest city, passing many sheep farms and local villages on the way, all very nice and very quaint. the weather too has been very nice and sunny, strangely warm for this time of year, I'm told.

Dublin Castle Sunbathers

Street in Dublin

Temple Bar in Dublin

anyway, Cork is nice. we are heading to Blarney today before heading up to Tralee and the Dingle peninsula.

View of Cork from our Hostel window

Street in Cork

Greetings from Dublin

2007-05-02T03:16:00.000-07:00

We're here. More later.