Lalalala Miss Saigon Lalalala Miss Saigon

Oh boy.  Just when I started getting all proud of myself for keeping up with the blog so consistently… So it has been quite a while since I last wrote.  I have since left the wonderful country of Thailand, met up with my Gap group, went through Cambodia, and am now in Saigon (or what the commies like to call Ho Chi Minh City).  Allow me to back up if I may.

The month traveling alone in Thailand taught me a great deal.  I learned about myself and what I am capable (and not capable) of.  I learned more about my fellow travelers- where we come from, why we choose the paths that we do, and what it really is that we are all looking for.  And most importantly, I reaffirmed my love for travel.  I had apprehensions about leaving the solo life to join up with a tour, but the idea of not having to worry about what buses/trains/boats to take, where to stay, and who I would be with did seem quite enticing. I finished up Thailand by taking a cooking class in Chiang Mai and learning how to cook Pad Thai, Chicken with Cashew Nuts, Spring Rolls,  Sweet Sticky Rice with Mango, Green Curry with Chicken, and Coconut Soup (all delicious and more than happy to cook once I come home).  I also got to partake in what is known as “adventure cooking” which consists of dripping your noodles and vegetables in water so that when you put it in the wok a 10 ft flame shoots up at you.  Sometimes the line between “adventure” and “asinine” get a little blurry.

I took the night bus from Chiang Mai back to Bangkok and met up with my group.  We are a small group…only 6 of us which is actually quite nice as it makes border crossings, finding places to eat and drink, and pretty much everything really really simple. I spent my last night in Thailand and got to experience my first (and DEFINITELY last) ping-pong show which for your sake and mine I shall not discuss any further.  The following morning we headed off to Siem Reap, Cambodia- the gateway town to get to Angkor Wat.

Siem Reap itself was surprisingly really nice and I could not believe how cheap it was…even cheaper than Thailand! I got a full plate of ribs, rice, and a beer for $2.50!!! We had a semi-early night since we had to wake up at 430 in the morning to catch the sun rising over the temples of Angkor Wat.  Walking through ancient Cambodian temples in the pitch black was eery to say the least, but the sunrise was definitely worth it (even if it was shared with hundreds of other package tourists). Angkor Wat is truly incredible and we ended up spending about 12 hours there.  The temples are all very well preserved and tourists get free reign to climb up and onto anything.  One of the temples is where they shot Tomb Raider and our guide, Sambeth, told us that he was the one who got to show around Angelina Jolie.  When I told him that Brangelina had broken up he said it was because she had fallen in love with him….silly Sambeth.  He also told us that Angelina had adopted “one baby Cambodian, one baby Vietnam, and one baby….black skin.”  That is pretty much how the Cambodians always speak and it is wonderful.

Next stop on our tour was Phnomn Penh…the capital city of Cambodia.  The biggest draws for a tourist in the city is to go to S-21…the old torture prison of the Pol Pot regime.  For those that were not paying attention during the 15 minutes of coverage that our history teachers granted the genocide I shall fill you in.  Pol Pot was the leader of the Khmer Rouge, a group of absolutely INSANE “communists” that managed to overthrow the government at the time, and procede to “restructure” their society by killing of 1.7 million of their own people.  The story is so hard to wrap your head around simply because it makes no sense…there is no reasoning.  The Khmer Rouge viewed anyone that was educated as a threat and killed them all off.  Even if you wore glasses- that was perceived as intelligence and also warranted an execution.

I could go on about it for a while but it gets even worse and more depressing.  Seeing S-21 and then the Killing Fields which was basically just like a Cambodian Auschwitz makes you realize just how awful the human can become when given power.  On the other hand though, when you look around at the Cambodians who have been through so much even to this day living in utter poverty and still getting blown up by mines, and you see how happy and friendly they all are, it makes you realize just how beautiful the human spirit can be.  A good example of this would be our waiter on the very first night in Phnomn Penh, Sarrah.  He came over to us and kept trying to teach us Khmer, which is SO unbelievably hard.  We talked to him for quite a but while we ate and drank until his shift ended and he invited us out with him.  Of course we accepted and within seconds all of his friends showed up on their motorbikes totally psyched for the idea of taking a bunch of random white strangers on their vehicles to the local club.   They treated us like kings and queens throughout the whole night…giving up their seats when one of us was standing, pouring our drinks for us, and making sure we got the right change from the bartender.  Once again just because we were white everyone treated us in the highest regard.  We danced the night away and showed an entire club how to do the Macarena.

After Phnom Penh we headed to Sihanoukville, a Cambodian beach town located in the Gulf of Thailand.  While the beach was not as nice as any of the beaches in Southern Thailand, it was still a blast (minus all the pesky, relentless Cambodian children trying to sell us bracelets).  It was nice to have a little bit of a break from the buses and be able to party it up till the wee hours of the morning.

From Sihanoukville we made our way into Vietnam!  Now as an American in Vietnam there is obviously that weirdness of being in a place where you know thousands and thousands of your fellow countrymen have died.  But this was all a long time ago and if they are willing to let bygones be bygones then so am I (also America sucked during the Vietnam War anyway so there isn’t much to be said on our part).  Vietnam itself is just insane…the most chaotic of all the places I have been to.  Traffic never stops and it is always packed.  The way we were told to cross a street is to just “step out, keep walking, and never hesitate.”  Easier said then done when you have 6 lanes full of a thousand motorbikes, buses, and cars all bearing down on you.  The Vietnamese people are also hysterical and unbearably honest.  If you are in a store and are trying on something too small they WILL tell you “That shirt no good! You too fat!”  So as a result I, of course, love the Vietnamese.

After another silly night out on the town we woke up today to go to the Cu Chi Tunnels, just outside of Saigon.  The tunnels were used by the Vietcong (the northern Vietnamese who the Americans fought) as a means of survival and also as a way to take on the US forces.  They knew that they could not face the most powerful army in the world face to face so instead they drew the Americans down into the tunnels one by one and set up traps all around.   We got to watch an AWESOME 1967 anti-American propaganda film about the building of the tunnels.  I love seeing it from the other perspective, even if it is outrageously biased…

We actually got to go down into the tunnels, which I was not quite prepared for.  Of course the guide pointed to me first (there were like 30 of us) to go down and I dubiously obliged.  With only a small light coming off of my guides cell phone, I dropped down into the tunnels only to hear from above, “Watch out for bat, now go!” Jesus Christ.  Even with the cell phone light you could hardly see anything at all.  The tunnel was so small and narrow that the ceiling was pushing against my spine and the walls squeezed into my hips.  This would explain the Vietnamese guides at the top telling some of the people on the tour, “You no go! Won fit!”  After about 4 bats and a wrong turn I finally saw the light and got to the top.

Another first on the trip…I got to shoot an AK-47!  The whole set up of an American paying in US Dollars to shoot a gun in Saigon was just too funny I had to laugh.  Shooting a gun is some hard (and LOUD) work.  After every pull of the trigger your body gets jolted back by the force of the bullet.  Admittedly, it was awesome to shoot, even though I missed the target all 10 times (I started aiming out of my left eye instead of my right which is just plain stupid…haha) so I guess I will not be joining the army anytime soon.

After the tunnels we went to the War Remnants museum so I could learn more about how awful the Americans were and how many atrocities were committed on the Vietnamese.  Now I understand that we have done some awful things, especially during that time…the one thing that bothered me though was how little they paid attention to the actual American public, and how many of them protested the war.  One thing I did appreciate about learning at a public American institution was I felt we did get both sides of the story.  Sure, at the end of the day we do always come out as heroes and the ends always justified the means, but it was slightly reassuring to know that we were taught about the My Lai Massacre, when Americans randomly went into a village and killed over 500 people for no reason, that we were informed of even the darkest parts of what we did.

So now I board a night train to Nha Trang…continuing on my journey throughout SE Asia.  I shall try and fight the Vietnamese censorship of Facebook and get some pictures up there and on here ASAP…

Thanks for reading!!

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