Three monks are surfing the internet right behind me. I sneakily took a picture - wasn't game to ask. Only in Pakse, eh?
This computer is slow. The space bar doesn't work, and I have to press ALT 64 to get an @ sign... So this will be brief.
Went down to Wat Phu today, which is about 45 km south of Pakse. After visiting the temples at Angkor in Cambodia, I was interested to see how they would compare. Despite not being as impressive as Angkor, the absence of the 'you want cold drink!!?!' women was a plus. This Wat was also spread up a mountainside and the view at the top down over the temple and out towards the Mekong River was well worth it. The trip across the Mekong on the wooden ferry was also an experience!
Am enjoying Pakse. The monks are sitting next to me now! How bout that?
Am sick of this keyboard. Will write more in Vientiane - will get there tomorrow.
Sunday, January 06, 2008
Saturday, January 05, 2008
Muk nut in Laos!
Muk nut is Lao for pineapple. Don't quote me on the spelling...
Pakse's first impression wasn't too good. Wasn't particularly bustling, and there were a lot more tourists around the place than in Ubon. But it didn't take me long to warm up - particularly after a wander along the Mekong, and witnessing a local game of petanque - which, unlike for my travel buddy Jen - did not involve any unwanted sexual harrasment.
The trip across the border wasn't too eventful. I was sitting next to a Canadian guy who had been living in Ubon for a few months to learn Thai boxing. He was doing his visa run (crossing the border, just to head back in for another 60 days). It sounded like he'd been having a good time and experiencing some Thai food not seen on the menu - raw meat fermented in blood or intestine soup. He was instructed to buy a live lizard in Laos (where apparently they are purchased quite easily) which he was to take back to Ubon zipped up in his backpack. I think he was relieved when he couldn't find one for sale. Apparently you can buy all sorts of exotic creatures, such as sloths and monkeys, that you can keep as pets until you get sick of them, and which time you can eat them. Perhaps we could let the RSPCA know this a good way to deal with those abandoned Christmas puppies!
I enjoyed a BeerLao watching the sunset over the Mekong, which was very nice. Food has been ho-hum so far, so will need to scope out the options and see if Ubon food can be beat!
Off to Wat Phu tomorrow. One of the 1000 Places to See Before you Die, apparently. Always nice to be reminded of your own mortality whilst travelling. Particularly with the traffic around here...
Pakse's first impression wasn't too good. Wasn't particularly bustling, and there were a lot more tourists around the place than in Ubon. But it didn't take me long to warm up - particularly after a wander along the Mekong, and witnessing a local game of petanque - which, unlike for my travel buddy Jen - did not involve any unwanted sexual harrasment.
The trip across the border wasn't too eventful. I was sitting next to a Canadian guy who had been living in Ubon for a few months to learn Thai boxing. He was doing his visa run (crossing the border, just to head back in for another 60 days). It sounded like he'd been having a good time and experiencing some Thai food not seen on the menu - raw meat fermented in blood or intestine soup. He was instructed to buy a live lizard in Laos (where apparently they are purchased quite easily) which he was to take back to Ubon zipped up in his backpack. I think he was relieved when he couldn't find one for sale. Apparently you can buy all sorts of exotic creatures, such as sloths and monkeys, that you can keep as pets until you get sick of them, and which time you can eat them. Perhaps we could let the RSPCA know this a good way to deal with those abandoned Christmas puppies!
I enjoyed a BeerLao watching the sunset over the Mekong, which was very nice. Food has been ho-hum so far, so will need to scope out the options and see if Ubon food can be beat!
Off to Wat Phu tomorrow. One of the 1000 Places to See Before you Die, apparently. Always nice to be reminded of your own mortality whilst travelling. Particularly with the traffic around here...
Ubon Ratchathani
I'm writing this from Pakse in Laos, after spending most of the morning travelling from Ubon Ratchathani across the border into Laos.
Ubon was a pleasant surprise. The guidebooks don't say all that much about it, and I can see why since there's not much by way of tourist attractions, but it was still an excellent opportunity to experience a bit more of Thailand away from the farang. We crossed the road from our hotel and ventured into the local market. For about $4 we ended up with pad thai, spring rolls and about 20 satay sticks (I only asked for five - lost in translation) plus salads and two cokes. Throwing caution to the wind, I tucked into street food hoping for the best and luckily the food was as good as it tasted as it all went through okay! Definitely a highlight of the trip so far because nobody there spoke any English, and all the signs were in Thai, so it was a good opportunity to mingle with the locals. I think they were pretty excited to have us there enjoying their cuisine.
This trip is certainly reinforcing why I love thai food...
Ubon was a pleasant surprise. The guidebooks don't say all that much about it, and I can see why since there's not much by way of tourist attractions, but it was still an excellent opportunity to experience a bit more of Thailand away from the farang. We crossed the road from our hotel and ventured into the local market. For about $4 we ended up with pad thai, spring rolls and about 20 satay sticks (I only asked for five - lost in translation) plus salads and two cokes. Throwing caution to the wind, I tucked into street food hoping for the best and luckily the food was as good as it tasted as it all went through okay! Definitely a highlight of the trip so far because nobody there spoke any English, and all the signs were in Thai, so it was a good opportunity to mingle with the locals. I think they were pretty excited to have us there enjoying their cuisine.
This trip is certainly reinforcing why I love thai food...
Friday, January 04, 2008
Some photos
I finally got the computer figured out...
The markets in Little India. Be grateful you can't smell over the internet... yet
Messages at the Changi memorial. Sorry it's sideways - will post it right way up when I can!
That's all the photos for now. This computer is slow!!
Farewell to Singapore
Hello from Thailand. It's been a couple of days since my last post - it's too easy to get lazy with the computer when you're out and about enjoying the surroundings. I'm currently sitting in Ubon Ratchathani, which is to the east of Bangkok and close to the border with Laos. Tomorrow (hopefully) we'll make it across the border. The level of English understood by the people here at the hotel is pretty low, so it may take a decent attempt with the phrasebook and sign language to make to the bus station to get to Pakse in Laos.
Since the last blog, I've enjoyed the little things about Singapore. Little India. Little Arabia. Chinatown (unusual since most of Singapore is Chinese). We hit Little India on New Years Day, which I assume is a public holiday in Singapore since the place was packed. It had a lot of atmosphere - particularly in comparison to the Arab quarter, which seemed geared towards tourists. We went into one of the local markets, which stank due to the fish and meat on display. So powerful were the fumes that it gave me a blood nose, so I had to fork out 10 cents to get into the bathroom for some toilet paper. There are two improvements that I think the western world has made in comparison to the Asian world. The first one is adding prongs to chopsticks to make forks. The second one is decided that toilet bowls should be lifted from the ground so that people can sit on them, rather than hovering over the top in a squatting fashion. Fortunately, it was my nose that needed wiping and not my arse, so I didn't have to go through with it...
Before heading out, we visited the Changi Memorial for the prisoners of war from World War Two. It was quite a good exhibit, but perhaps the most moving aspect of it is where the descendents of survivors and victims of Changi and the Burma Railway leave messages for their loved ones. It was also interesting because it also highlighted how bad life was for the people of Singapore, and how they suffered at the hands of the Japanese along with the Allied troops.
No photos today. I can't upload anything on this computer, so will add more later.
Since the last blog, I've enjoyed the little things about Singapore. Little India. Little Arabia. Chinatown (unusual since most of Singapore is Chinese). We hit Little India on New Years Day, which I assume is a public holiday in Singapore since the place was packed. It had a lot of atmosphere - particularly in comparison to the Arab quarter, which seemed geared towards tourists. We went into one of the local markets, which stank due to the fish and meat on display. So powerful were the fumes that it gave me a blood nose, so I had to fork out 10 cents to get into the bathroom for some toilet paper. There are two improvements that I think the western world has made in comparison to the Asian world. The first one is adding prongs to chopsticks to make forks. The second one is decided that toilet bowls should be lifted from the ground so that people can sit on them, rather than hovering over the top in a squatting fashion. Fortunately, it was my nose that needed wiping and not my arse, so I didn't have to go through with it...
Before heading out, we visited the Changi Memorial for the prisoners of war from World War Two. It was quite a good exhibit, but perhaps the most moving aspect of it is where the descendents of survivors and victims of Changi and the Burma Railway leave messages for their loved ones. It was also interesting because it also highlighted how bad life was for the people of Singapore, and how they suffered at the hands of the Japanese along with the Allied troops.
No photos today. I can't upload anything on this computer, so will add more later.
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
New Years' Eve Singapore - No place for the phobic...
Well Happy New Year everybody! I've just experienced NYE Singapore style, along with about two million other people, all of whom seemed to follow me around from the subway through the mall and out onto the esplanade.
It was a night of crowds, and crowds with hands, and crowds with hands touching me everywhere as we fought and jostled for a coveted place on the escalator and out into fresh air. It's no place for the claustrophobic or the agoraphobic. You wouldn't want to be aphenphosmphobic or enochlophobic either, although considering the tight space and sweaty bodies, ablutophobics woudn't feel out of place.
My new friends on the staircase
The night began trying to figure out the Singapore public transport system in order to get into the city, which eventually got us on the subway along with most of Singapore. The City Hall subway station was amazingly busy, but we finally made it to a staircase and up out into the fresh air. Or so we thought. NYE sees the Singapore Auxillary Police out in force, and it's clearly their time to shine and exert their power. We were stopped half way up the stairs because it was too busy out on the park. About 20 minutes later we headed back into the bowels of the Singapore light rail system and to an alternate exit.
Eventually we found position and waited for the fireworks. A lack of watch meant that I had to rely on my camera's clock to figure out the time, but it seems like I was out by seven minutes. Fireworks (fairly spectacular) were followed by a Singaporean youth tradition of shooting shaving foam and sticky string at everyone, which if nothing else meant they had to put their PSP and mobile phones down for a few minutes. In fact, it was more entertaining watching the sea of digital cameras and cameraphones aimed at fireworks in the crowd, than watching the fireworks themselves!
Nice view of a building... with the fireworks behind.
Leaving straight after the fireworks probably wasn't the best course of action, since 90% of the crowd had the same idea. Backtracking the way we came didn't work, since the pseudo-police had blocked off that route, but after another hour or so trapped in crowds, fighting for position, we made it back to the subway. It was late and I was tired and we got lost in Geylang. For those who don't know Singapore, if you're cyriphobic you may want to avoid it. Finally made it home by about 2:00am...
Off to Little India then out to the World War Two memorial at Changi today.
It was a night of crowds, and crowds with hands, and crowds with hands touching me everywhere as we fought and jostled for a coveted place on the escalator and out into fresh air. It's no place for the claustrophobic or the agoraphobic. You wouldn't want to be aphenphosmphobic or enochlophobic either, although considering the tight space and sweaty bodies, ablutophobics woudn't feel out of place.
My new friends on the staircaseThe night began trying to figure out the Singapore public transport system in order to get into the city, which eventually got us on the subway along with most of Singapore. The City Hall subway station was amazingly busy, but we finally made it to a staircase and up out into the fresh air. Or so we thought. NYE sees the Singapore Auxillary Police out in force, and it's clearly their time to shine and exert their power. We were stopped half way up the stairs because it was too busy out on the park. About 20 minutes later we headed back into the bowels of the Singapore light rail system and to an alternate exit.
Eventually we found position and waited for the fireworks. A lack of watch meant that I had to rely on my camera's clock to figure out the time, but it seems like I was out by seven minutes. Fireworks (fairly spectacular) were followed by a Singaporean youth tradition of shooting shaving foam and sticky string at everyone, which if nothing else meant they had to put their PSP and mobile phones down for a few minutes. In fact, it was more entertaining watching the sea of digital cameras and cameraphones aimed at fireworks in the crowd, than watching the fireworks themselves!
Nice view of a building... with the fireworks behind.
Leaving straight after the fireworks probably wasn't the best course of action, since 90% of the crowd had the same idea. Backtracking the way we came didn't work, since the pseudo-police had blocked off that route, but after another hour or so trapped in crowds, fighting for position, we made it back to the subway. It was late and I was tired and we got lost in Geylang. For those who don't know Singapore, if you're cyriphobic you may want to avoid it. Finally made it home by about 2:00am...
Off to Little India then out to the World War Two memorial at Changi today.
Monday, December 31, 2007
Dim sum in Singapore
After a pretty cruisy 4 hour flight I've landed back in Singapore. I've been here a few times but this is probably the first opportunity to have a decent look around. I've tended to look at Singapore as a place to connect from one flight to another, but it's not such a bad place to spend a couple of days.
I've met up with an old friend from Toronto - Jen - who I met in Vinales, Cuba, while travelling with a bunch of exchange teachers in sunny Cuba to escape the Canadian winter. She's a pretty dedicated traveller, and I'm a bit worried about keeping up! This is Jen's first trip to Singapore and she's keen to have a look around, so I'm along for the ride.
Raffles Plaza - Singapore
We headed on the MRT (I wish Adelaide had one of these - not likely...) to Raffles Plaza, before heading into Chinatown for a bit of a look around. Had dim sum for lunch and it was great to be eating good Asian food in the place where it's meant to be eaten.
Chinatown
Will be off to Marina Bay for the fireworks tonight to see in the New Year. I don't think I'll be firing up too much - bugger all sleep last night, considering it was spent in airports and planes.
I've met up with an old friend from Toronto - Jen - who I met in Vinales, Cuba, while travelling with a bunch of exchange teachers in sunny Cuba to escape the Canadian winter. She's a pretty dedicated traveller, and I'm a bit worried about keeping up! This is Jen's first trip to Singapore and she's keen to have a look around, so I'm along for the ride.
Raffles Plaza - Singapore
Chinatown
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