thehostelwitness

Thrashed

What three days on a bike and four days on a beach will do to you.

The best joke never told, Mui Ne

A) "So in the Ice Hotel, do you sleep on ice?"
B) "yeah, but they give you these suits to wear when you go to sleep"
Me) "...so do they give newlyweds the special Honeymoon Suit?"

You see, the problem with that joke is it makes more punny sense written down versus being said. Suite...Suit...ah, you get it. And you probably think its not very funny, but as 90% of my stupid jokes goes, I don't really care. It must be said. It needed to be said. And yet, as I sat there around a table of strangers here in Mui Ne, Vietnam, I only muttered it. The girl next to me, from Holland, heard me and laughed. Ah, sweet redemption.

I'm in Vietnam. The place where I'm sure at least one of my Uncles was hoping he would never get sent to, I voluntarily went. And I love it. Its such a beautiful country...the mountains of Northern Thailand, the jade green countryside of Laos...all in one place. Saigon, a cacophany of motor horns, the city a gigantic circulatory system with scooters jetting around like tiny red blood cells. To cross the street, you can wait - as the Vietnamese jokes goes, a couple from the countryside came to Saigon to celebrate their honeymoon and were trying to cross the street. Nine months later they crossed with newborn in hand - or you put your faith (and life) into the hands of the locals and just step - slowly - onto the road and walk as slowly and carefully as if you are crossing a tightrope and hope you don't get slammed or run over or thrown about or any other type of calamitous happening. The first few times, it scares the heck out of you. The fifty times after, its like...well, crossing the street.

I stayed in Saigon - Ho Chi Minh City - for only a couple of days, then hopped a flight up to Nha Trang, a beach side resort a couple hours flight northeast of the city. After 3 months of NorthEast Thailand, I was due a little R&R. Did the typical beach side things...laid on the beach, took a nap on the beach, ate fruit on the beach, etc...then on the second day took a boat trip around the bay. Fun, beautiful, nothing really different about it though - except for the passengers. Tourism in Vietnam is different than anywhere else in SE Asia, as citizens are not allowed to leave the country without a passport and very few passports are given out. As a result, they are perhaps the most well travelled tourists within their own country that I have ever seen. Locals from as far away as Hanoi were present. One local told me that in 9 years of driving bike, he'd only given rides to 2 Americans. Its so great to see a country that is thriving - and make no mistake, this country is on the up and up - yet is not catering towards the Western tourist. You got that sense as the boat driver pulled up along a reef and hooked up an electric guitar to lead the group in some sing song Vietnamese songs.

It was all great...but I wanted something a bit different. I remembered that a friend of mine currently travelling through Thailand told me that she took a great trip through Vietnam on an Easy Rider...these are basically motorcycles with a driver who will take you all around the country. So after the beach, Sally and I decided to sign up for a three day motorcycle journey from Nha Trang down to Mui Ne, stopping at a small village by Lak Lake one night, and to the mountain city of Dalat the next night. Its been so much fun and you see so much of this beautiful country, but very hard to find ones' way to an internet terminal in a village where cows are still a common form of transportation.

There were six of us in our little motorcade, cutting up into the jungle-covered hills nearing the eastern border of Vietnam. We came very close to the Ho Chi Minh trail and even got to pass through desolate hills where Agent Orange was sprayed. The "American War" is only 30 years past and while the locals have all been very friendly - one assumes that is the case because they are young and just as easily mistake me for a European vs. an American. There are still those here who bear scars and grudges of course - but really, can you blame them?

Anyway, Mui Ne...its really a string of hotels along a beautiful beach - the kicker of this place is that the climate is arid, so you get sand dunes and cacti right up to the waves. And the winds kick up in the late afternoon, making this THE premier kite-sailing/surfing capital of SE Asia.

I have yet to decide if I'll give it a go. More on that later.

Goodbye Thailand

Has it been three months already? Apparently. Confession: my last couple of weeks in New Zealand, I was weighing in on a decision as to what to do next. The two options I were heavily considering was 1) to go to Mexico and 2) apply for a working holiday visa and stay in NZ for an entire year, working as a bar tender. SE Asia really didn't appeal for me, alone for that pull that I mentioned in previous posts.

But Mexico was shelved for another trip another time and the idea of being a bar tender, while sounding like fun, at 30 years old seemed a like a bit of a reach for me. I would become "that guy" - and one of many occupations that "that guy" excels in, is bar tending. So I came to Asia with a bit of hesitance.

And its been one of the very few times in my nearly perfect life that I was mistaken. Its great out here.

Below is a picture of my thai "family" - Aunt Pi Phoon, Cousin Amy, and Uncle Montri. These guys have been incredible for me, with Pi Phoon cooking me weekly dinners, Amy driving me all around Northeast Thailand, and Montri supplying me with a never ending supply of Singhas. I'm going to miss their laughter, food, and companionship.

So...what's next? Its time to get this thing rolling again. Friend Sally of Italy and London fame is going to be meeting me in Ho Chi Minh City on Saturday and Amy's sister Nong was kind enough to host us for the first few days. I'm sad to be leaving, but fortunately, I'll always have friends waiting for me here.

Sala Kaew Ku, Nong Khai Province

My friend Amy was nice enough to take me up to Nong Khai, just south of the Laos Border, so I can take some pictures of Sala Kaew Ku, a surreal sculpture park combining Buddhist, Hindu, and Mystic elements.

And that was a really long sentence.

Nong Khai photoset

All wrapped up

Not long after wrapping up with work, I was asked by the president of the my company to meet for a few drinks. He's a great guy and played an instrumental role in getting me to come out to NYC. I appreciated the offer tremendously - here I was leaving after only a year and this was his way of saying "no hard feelings".

Drinks went fine. We just chit-chatted about my plans and he nodded along, but it wasn't until I mentioned the possibility of spending some time volunteering at an orphanage later in the year did his eyebrows raise up sharply.

"Wow. I don't know if I could do that."

I guess that was the first instance where I got the hint that this was going to be a different kind of trip. Here was a guy, CEO of a major corporation, one of the most interesting people I've known, and this was something that even he had doubts about doing. I guess because it was still pretty far down the road at that point - I still had 7 months to travel before even entertaining Thailand - I didn't think much of it.

Today was my last day at the orphanage - well, Girls Home to be exact. Not all the girls are orphans. There is so much love there between the girls though that it doesn't really matter. They are all sisters, they are all away from home, they all in the same boat. I've never seen anything like it in my life, that sort of camaraderie between so many kids. And as I stood there today, in front of a group of about 20 of them saying my goodbyes, I felt incredibly privileged that they had included me in their lives.

Ooy, a girl of 14 and one of my closest friends there, motioned me over and whispered, "I hope that you will not forget me."

How could I possibly ever forget?

I don't know exactly why I felt like I needed to be here, only that when the possibility was first mentioned to me all those months ago, it was as if I could hear a door opening inside of me. It was an epiphany - I had to come. I didn't really know why, but I just knew I had to be here. And slowly, after spending day after day here, I came to the realization that those kids were doing so much more for me than I was for them, by a magnitude of thousands.

I had spent the previous 8 years of my life becoming a hardened creature. People were my trade and I began to see the whole world that way. I learned to shed any feelings at having to discipline anyone, lost my temper often, and developed an internal switch where I could become a prick in a matter of seconds. I became a material person. I had difficulties opening up to new friends and it was a simple impossibility to become emotionally involved with anyone at all. It wasn't as if I didn't know these things about myself, I did.I didn't like it. I just had no idea of how to change back to the person I was before all of this.

A little girl, 2 years old, ran up to me and put her arms around my legs, asking to be picked up. She said something in Thai - a girl there translated - and I had to put her down quickly and tickled her to change the subject. She was asking me to be her father. What the hell can I say to that?

You can't come here expecting to save anyone. It will kill you. You can't take them home. You can only open yourself up completely and just absorb as much love and laughter as you can. And then you have to leave, hopefully taking a bit of them with you for the rest of your life. I have no clue what it'll be like for me when I re-enter the workforce. I don't know how much of this will stick with me and how much of the old habits will come back. But that doesn't matter - because when I get home, because of these girls, when I get home I will have a second chance to move forward. A clean slate. And there's no way I could have done this without them. 

Another year down

A year ago, I was well on my way to losing a healthy sum of money in a Las Vegas casino. Oh, the tables were cold that weekend, my friends. Very cold. Even so, it was one of the better weekends of that year - surrounded by friends, drink in hand - it can't get much better than that, can it?

So it was a little bit of a different experience this year; a bit more reigned in, but not any less memorable. I joined my friends Amy and Dat at Dat's restaurant for dinner, was sung happy birthday, and consumed massive amounts of birthday cake. I can't tell you the last time I had a birthday cake. Dat also requested a special birthday song for me from his band and it was with a laugh that I realized the 7 piece band was playing "Hava Nagila". Well...Toda Raba. I was going to tell him that I'm not Jewish when I realized he probably had no idea what the song was about in the first place, only that it sounds kick ass with two guitars, a bass, bongos, a sax, and drums playing it. And it does.

And things here are quickly wrapping up. I have just one last weekend at the Girl's Home. I spent most of yesterday travelling to Khon Kaen to visit the Vietnamese consulate to pick up a travel visa for Vietnam, where I'm heading in less than two weeks. It'll be a short trip there and I'm afraid I won't see nearly as much as I want to, but alas...

Thanks to all the emails wishing me a happy birthday. 30, it turns out, was a great year for me. I can only hope 31 will be just as much fun. And to Lindsay, Palmer, Heather, and Jenn Tesch - happy birthday to you all as well.

Riding with the 5-0, Udon Thani

Such a racket. My seat, just behind the forward bulkhead of the plane and only a few feet away from the turboprop engine that was now booming through my ear drums. It took a few minutes to get into the most comfortable position - that is, one leg splayed out into the aisle and the other leg, knee propped up against the wall only inches in front of my seat, like an involuntary yoga posture. 80 seats on the plane and I get the one designed for Gumby.

Thankfully, the flight was a short one and the drone of the engine actually helped rock me to sleep, albeit a rough sleep and possibly the only one I've had where I could actually feel my headache through my dreams.

A turbulent ride for a turbulent day in Chiang Mai. There was, not so far from my guest house, a nice little restaurant that I had noticed was devoid of patrons. Its there where I made my base, becoming friends with the waitstaff and the mamma-san, a ambigiuous giant of a Thai lady, who for the past few days had become my friends in the city. I'd go out sightseeing for the day and at night, return for a tasty dinner and a few beers. They were thankful for the business and one of the waitresses, an English studies student named Eve, was happy to practice English with me. I was more than happy, as it was one of the few places that featured an absence of working girls and thus, I could enjoy myself in relative peace and not feel like a pervert.

Two nights ago, Eve informed me that she was going to be gone for the remainder of my stay in Chiang Mai. She was going to stay with her older sister, a seamstress, and help her embroider shirts, which were now in high demand with the school season starting up. She had become a friend and thinking nothing of it, we traded phone numbers so we could keep in touch down the road.

And that was that. I sent her an SMS the next day asking her how things were going with the family, not getting any reply. It wasn't until yesterday, back at the restaurant with me, Noot (one of the waitresses), and the mamma-san, that I got a call. Looking at the phone, I saw it was Eve and answered.

"Hello Eve!"

Yes...who is this?"

It would seem that Eve had finally seen my SMS and not knowing who it was from, had called to ask. I was about to explain, when I glanced up and saw mamma-san, eyes open wide, furious, and advancing on me with a spray bottle.

"um, I gotta go." I hung up.

And so the rest of the night went, with me trying to explain to Mamma-san what in the heck one of her girls was doing calling me, a falang. It would seem that in that instance of getting the call, all of her suspicions about me, a westerner cruising around for Thai girls, had been proven correct.

"this is not that kind of place!" she said.

"no, no that's not what this is at all!"

Oi vey. It was just my luck that one of the few times in my life that I haven't been looking for girls, I would all of a sudden be defending myself against just that. And I feared for Eve - I didn't want her in any way to get in trouble for absolutely nothing at all. The irony of it all is that I've been a saint all week - I go out and tour, come to the restaurant and talk with everyone, then around 10pm I excuse myself and head home for the night. In mamma-san's mind, it seemed that I would be leaving at 10 to meet up with Eve for a night of Eastern relations.

It took me the better part of the night and many bottles of beer trying to convince mamma-san - my friend - that I wasn't taking advantage of her girls.

I can certainly sympathize with them - I've seen all of this in Udon. And as the night progressed, she calmed down with a promise of believing me (though not before being misted by the spray bottle). I told her that I would stop by in the morning on my way to the airport - when Eve was due back at work - and we would get all of this sorted out.

Part of me wanted to just leave the mess behind me, but I decided that I was too stubborn to let her think she was right. So, I showed up as promised. Thankfully, Mamma-san was all smiles. It seems that she had confirmed everything with her waitstaff. Eve though, I noticed, was stationed far away from me. No reason to take any chances, I guess.

So, back to Udon on board the plane from hell. I got back into town needing to find a new place to stay for the next three weeks. While at the airport, I stopped up at the cafe, where two of the girls from the orphanage were working and shared a quick cup of coffee with them. Upon leaving the cafe though, I found that the shuttles leaving the airport were all stopped until the next flight in...about 2 hours away. Seeing my predicament, a taxi driver approached and offered me a ride into town for 200 baht.

Now, 200 baht for a 10 minute ride. Lets look at the options here:

1. Wait for 2 hours and pay 60 baht.

2. Walk to the highway and catch a truck for 13 baht.

3. Pay someone 200 baht to take advantage of my predicament.

Yes its $6. Its also a rip off. In Chiang Mai, I could rent a driver for 100 baht an hour. This guy wasn't even going to bargain with me. No way, I told him. I walked out of the airport and started my long hike to the freeway. Stubborn? Sure. But as I learned earlier today, being stubborn can pay off.

"Hey. Where are you going?"

The voice behind me was authoritative and I turned to find myself confronted by three Thai police officers. Oh man, I thought. What am I gonna do now?

"Umm, I'm walking to the highway to get into town."

The policemen conferred with each other. The one who spoke English then said, "for 100 baht, we give you ride on motorcycle."

Having noticed all this, the taxi driver approached to complain but what could he do?

"For 200 baht, I take you easy!"

"Yeah, but for 100 baht...this is a lot more fun!" replied the non-convict falang. The officer motioned me onto his bike, removed his gun belt, handed it to his comrades, and so it was, that for 100 baht I found myself getting a lift into town by a police officer.

Can you imagine standing in the taxi line in the States and having a cop offer you a ride home for a fiver? We got the strangest looks along the way, and even laughter when the cop would ask locals for directions to the guesthouse where I was staying. But we got there and I handed him a 100 baht note. Not bad for 10 minutes work.

So now I'm back in Udon in my new digs, trying to decompress all that's happened; from being accused of corrupting a girl to getting a ride from a corrupt cop in just 24 hours.

Thailand!

It is good to be back in Udon, good to see the girls again. I ended up spending my entire Saturday playing basketball and various forms of catch, tag, hide and go seek, et al. By the end of it all I was just soaked in sweat and in desperate need of a shower. I got back to my apartment (a different one than before), opened the door and there to my un-surprise was a giant roach chilling on the floor. So as anyone that has spent any time in the Northeast does, I killed the sucker, kicked the corpse into the corner for later disposal, and jumped into the shower. Where I forgot about it.

Open scene, following morning. Jacob is in the shower, when he looks down on the bathroom tile and sees many tiny ants wandering about. This being Thailand, he ignores it and continues with his morning routine. Minutes later on the toilet, he notices now that the random wandering has become an organized congo line. Hmm, he ponders. I must have dropped some food? He cleans up and follows the line of ants, right to the now descicated corpse of said roach. With thousands of ants feasting. He throws up in his mouth and begins the task of not only disposing of the roach, but attacking the tiny ants who are now scrambling onto his hands and feet. Jacob abhores - abhores I say - ants.

Lesson: Dispose of the body!