Our Asia Adventure

Elephant Park

2006-05-07T19:17:00.000-07:00

All the volunteers
Do I really need to say how amazing this place was? As soon as they INVENT words to describe how incredible and fantastic this place is, I will use those words.
Our daily routine consisted of, getting up listening to the roosters crow, the dogs bark, the birds sing... and the elephnats trumpeting good morning.

Crawl out of our little bamboo hut and fight our way out of our mosquito net. Breakfast.

Then it's off to do whatever needed to be done that day. We shoveled poo into the compost heap off the walkway, dug post holes for a observation deck they were building, fed the cats, dogs, and cows. Then the day tourists get there with two truckloads of ood to be prepared for the elephants. (that takes some time, trust me.. feeding 26 elephants!)

Then while the elephants were off enjoying a tummy full of fruit we had our lunch. Then it's down to the lake for some cool water and bathing the elephants. (SO MUCH FUN to watch the babies play in the water and the big 'uns roll around on their back kicking up their feet like dogs rolling in dirt) The pics below is Hope and Jungle Boy wrestling in the water.

After their bath was the obligatory scratching session bellies, ankles, you name it they would either rub it against a tree or pick up big sticks and use it to scratch themselves and it's time to let the big guys go back to roaming around the park and eating greens.

This is Bu Pha, they called him my Thai boyfriend. He followed me around like a puppy all week long.

He wouldn't let any of the boys walk near me, he would always push his way in between. (Trust me when a 4000 pund elephant wants to walk in between you, you let him) The workers there said they had never seen him take to someone like that. It was hard to leave him.

It wasn't, however, hard to leave this guy...

the bane of my Elephant park existence. I found one or two of these in my room EVERYDAY! UGH! I even went to put a bucket of water on my head in the shower and luckily I looked because there was one of these floating in the water! I was NOT sorry to leave those behind!

Well, we are resting in Chiang Mai for a couple days, seeing if we want to do a White Water rafting trip or not and then we are off to Laos!

Songkran

2006-04-14T19:48:00.000-07:00

Now, ALL the pics of this are from my balconey I couldn't take a digi cam down into a city full of water guns and buckets. It's eveywhere!! It's like a ritual washing of the city. Care aren't safe, motorcycles aren't safe, they drive by COVERED in water and paste. Here are some in the alley behind our house lying in wait...

And here is a victim!!

SO Andy and I walked to the mall to get water guns of our own. and join in the fun.. getting aquirted (even by my noodle lady!!) all along the way. Trucks even fill up drums of water and drive around looking for victims.

We spent the rest of the day hanging out with the Thais they were so tickled to have a foreigner play with them they would chase us around! They even insisted on feeding us! MMMM good food too!

Songkran Parade

2006-04-14T19:34:00.000-07:00

This is the opening day of Songkran. It's the Thai new years festival. What happens is in the morning they go up and down streets with symbols and drums to scare away evil spirits, they even put ghost money on trees to burn to send over to the other side to appease the spirits. Sorry the pics are tilted but they are mostly taken at odd angles from my balconey. When the guys saw us taking pics they waved and posed for us

Even little old ladies get in the middle of the streets and dance.

Here's what happens when I get bored

2006-04-10T02:57:00.000-07:00

So.. I bought some Henna cones in Singapore's Little India and figured I could use them while I am playing nursemaid to Andy today. Went to the gym, did some laps in the pool, came back,took a shower, and hennaed my feet.
I think not so bad for my first try really.

Who is this man?

2006-04-05T06:11:00.000-07:00

Andy 2 weeks in Thailand

Andy after 4 months of Thailand

Who knew I married a cuban guerilla? Who is this guy?

:) I was just flipping through all our pictures and the difference struck me. Had to share.

OK, Geeks - eat your Heart out

2006-03-31T05:44:00.001-08:00

All this stuff is originals from the movie. How nerdy were we looking at each other saying "It's THE DEATH STAR!!!!" That's THE MILLENIUM FALCON!!!" Big Ol nerds
I refuse to label any of this stuff because I won't insult you. If you don't know what any of this is, you may be on the wrong page.

and yes, we worked out in the Jedi Gym, it was SO FUN! For the rest of the 100 pictures you will have to wait and get Andy to show you when we get back.

Singapore - Singapore zoo

2006-03-28T23:30:00.000-08:00

The Singapore Zoo

So even the big ones do that, huh?

Cotton Headed Tamarind- Am I having a bad hair day?

Ibex- Now THAT"S a stink face!!
Cassowary- Are you talking to me?!?! Are YOU talking to ME!?!?!Howler Monkey - Just hangin'Kangaroo- Having a dip in the middle of the day. He wasnt passing through either, we watched he just sat in this little pool with his hands, feet, and tail in the water and didn't move, just sat. It was so funny it's like the kangaroo wading pool.

Singapore- Animal Encounters

2006-03-28T07:45:00.000-08:00

Or as I like to call it.. Look what I'm touching-

Butterfly

Deermouse (neither deer nor mouse- discuss) it's indigenous to the Singaporean region's tropical rainforestsKangaroos!

Ring-Tailed Lemurs

And, yes, even Pink Dolphins (I was a volunteer in a dolphin show on Sentosa Island)

Singapore Intro

2006-03-28T07:19:00.000-08:00

So Off we go on the sleeper train from Kl to Singapore.....
OK We officially LOVE Singapore.
One of the things that made it really really great was the guest house. We stayed with Ping, Vickie, Ryan, and the crew at The InnCrowd.

It's this great place down in little India in Singapore. The location was fantastic, the staff (I seriously could gush for hours about them), and everyone was really great. This is me with Vickie (next to me in the white) and Ping (in the black). Ping and her husband own the InnCrowd as well as a new venture: Bar Baa Black Chic. They were fantastic! After a week there we felt like veterans and the whole staff acted as if we had been there for years. It was great! I even fixed a big pasta dinner with fresh garlic bread for a few of the backapckers and some of the staff.

This is Orlando, he's this great guy that is from the Phillipines and owned a travel agency. Showed us pics of his beautiful wife and kids.

These guys are from Sweden and Ireland. The guy in the grey and the guy in black are both from Sweden and thought Andy looked like "Yawn" Cusack. The guy in the white is from Ireland and his name is Sean (there's a shocker, a Irish guy named Sean)

Kuala Lumpur

2006-03-28T07:03:00.000-08:00

We took somewhat fewer pics here than we did in other places. We found that KL itself is a real weekend thing. They are advertising their goal: to be the #1 city for tourism in S.E. Asia by 2010. I say good luck. It's fun but after you've seen a couple of sights everything else is malls. We ended up killing time at the guest house before our train left.
Some of the intresting things were really cool though.

This is KL tower. It is the Fourth tallest tower in the world. It was really neat, they give you mp4 players that play certain video/audio mp3's at designated windows so they can tell you neat things about the buildings you're looking at.
These guys played in the courtyard underneath the KL Tower. They were playing indigenous Malay music. It sounds a lot like steel drum bands because of the type of wood they use to make the intstruments.

The Petronas Towers, currently the tallest tower in the world and second largest building. Apparently recently Taipei built one taller. But the odd thing is, they won't let you go to the top, you can only go to the bridges that connect the two buildings.

I CANT ALMOST SEE MY HOUSE FROM HERE!

We are on the bridge of the Petronas Tower. Slightly less impressive after going to top of KL Tower.

Last Day of School

2006-03-03T20:42:00.000-08:00

Well, the last day of school was Friday, my kids did great on exams. We had a big class party. There was SO much food!! I had fun, exams were over by 11, we went to lunch (just a light lunch really). I sat at the kids table for the first time (you’re really not supposed to, they frown on it but I figured they can frown all they want the last day of school, all that frowning isn’t giving ME wrinkles) . I went and sat at the table next to them that was empty and just started eating. One of them looked up and pointed and said “Ohhhh Miss Suzy at little table!!” then started chattering in Thai to everyone and they all looked over and started laughing. I said “What?!?!!?” and they all carried their trays over to sit next to me. It was a really good time. The top pic is me with most of my class.

His nickname is Herman. He's is such a sweet little thing. He was such a ham for the camera! He wasn't feeling well and was fussy, until that camera came out, then he was all smiles. He even tried to walk of with the camera when i showed him his pictures in the digital viewer.

This is Tirani and her sister (can't pronounce the name). She is so adorable. She usually has such a serious look on her face and then all of the sudden she would run around in circles in the room laughing hysterically. She got the other students to carry her around by her arms and her legs and she just laughed and laughed.

I bought all my students little drawing books with cartoon animals on the front. They were so excited. I wrote them all little "yearbook notes" and gave them stickers and stuff. They loved it. They wanted to draw immediately and most of them, the first thing they wrote in their book was "Love Miss Suzy" because that's how I signed their letters. That's what Cash is showing me in this pic.

This is Cash on the left (the one in the pic above) next to her hanging on the other girl is PLoy. The one with the huge smile is Sea. These are my most vivacious girls!! The one to the far left, Cash, is a mini-me. Scary.

Cambodia

2006-02-24T07:37:00.000-08:00

Well we went on our visa run the other day to Cambodia. It's so sad, they will strap infants to the backs of little 3-4 year olds and have them beg the foreigners that come through for baht.
They pull those carts across the border full of rice and stuff for their families and stores. They also rent their services to "rich" foreigners to carry them and their luggage to wherever they need to go. It's bizarre to see, really. You get in a car in a downtown area in Bangkok and when you get out 3 hours later, you are reminded that you are in a third world country.

This is the beginning of the road you have to walk down to walk across the border. On a visa run you generally hop in a "visa van" and go across the border, have lunch, get stamped that you exited the country within the time your visa allows and get another visa on my way back in after lunch. No biggie. Just annoying at times.

On the way back we got pulled over for speeding. If you can't tell, they have two rows pulled over with about 10-12 in each row. They're making what they like to call "tea money" you dont go to the courthouse and pay there, you dont go to driving school, you pay the cop right there. It was funny, we were giving him a hard time on the way home. How can you not, it wa s HILARIOUS!! I think that was his drinking money for later too.

Lick Your face

2006-02-17T23:18:00.000-08:00

I miss you so much I want to lick your face..
So Here, press your face against the screen!

Welcome to the new spot

2006-02-12T22:16:00.000-08:00

OK I had to get a new webspot because I filled up all the photo album space on the other one so I am branching out. I didn't want to keep taking pics off the other site and deleting photo albums.
So, Andy and I went and got our backpacks yesterday at the weekend market. They are Northface trekking packs. The are really neat! Lots of pockets and clips and stuff.
See!!
I thought I would post some pics of my students. We just had a big Academy show and the theme was Harry Potter. They loved it. They had lots of fun having Harry Potter turn them into animals onstage. (Dont ask- it was a first grade foreign language play)

Aren't they adorable!! The far left is Jan and next to her is her twin sister Jen. The giraffe is Tirani, The blue butterfly is Suchera (Earn1) and the girl next to her is Yuphawadee (Earn2) The one behind them acting all goofy is Jenny. The one below is me with Tirani after she got changed back into her clothes. (I know I look like a Lesbian Jimmy Buffett fan in that picture but the shirts were uniforms we had to wear that night and little did I know all the Thai teachers got theirs tailored to fit them) and the students dressed in their costumes for their Thai performance. (Yes even the boys are wearing bright red lipstick)

OK now that I have the new spot set up I will be able to post pics more frequently.