Two Beers and a Pretzel

Yesterday (May 28th) I cruised town to see some of the more famous Buddha statues, then watched a Muay Thai kickboxing match.

The Emerald Buddha is in Wat Phra Kaew, a temple on the grounds of the Grand Palace.

This palace complex is one of the most ornate things I’ve ever seen.  By comparison, this would be neon pink, and the superb art and marble work in the Vatican would be beige.

When you first see it, it’s stunning.  After a few hours you start to get used to the decor.

After the palace, I went to the giant reclining Buddha at Wat Pho…

…then to the Giant Standing Buddha…

This is near the Ratchadamnoen Stadium where I sat ringside for 7 Muay Thai Kickboxing fights.

This is the national sport of Thailand, so the crowd really gets into it – yelling for each landed blow – especially knee hits.  When the ‘better’ fights occur, blood is a pretty common sight.  These fighters were only 110 lbs, but tough as nails and quick as could be.

If you’re a fan of ’80′s pop music, you’ll know from the title that I’m in Bangkok, Thailand.  Oddly, after some wikipedia research, it turns out that the music was written by members of ABBA – I never knew that.

Anyway, after a number of recent nights of revelry, I’ve been taking it easy.  The Woolshed bar in Cairns runs a brilliant promotion where they give you a full dinner including drink and desert for $10AUD ($8US).  Backpackers flood in, and my crew was no exception.  It was not easy meeting up because my SIM card ran out of credit while I was texting Corinna the details of when and where.   Aaron, Roberta, Jenny, Jimmy, Corinna, Henry, Chris, Matt, and a few others met up to see me off.  Then I went back to the hostel and to bed because I had to catch a flight to Sydney the next day.

In Sydney I had a 5 hour layover before the flight to Bangkok… There was a bit of a hassle since I did not have a printed copy of my onward ticket…  In the end, having that page saved in my laptop was enough.  Then 10 hours of the excellent entertainment system on the Emirates Airways Boeing 777.  I watched episodes of Cheers and Slumdog Millionaire – what a movie!

I got my luggage and made it to the street at 2AM.  No one was offering a reasonable fare into town, so I went with a not quite a rip-off hotel near the airport that was offering free transfers and free breakfast for 1500 BHAT ($44… $1.00 = 34 BHAT).  The taxis wanted 1000 BHAT just to get to town, and this hotel took me into town for free the next day.

Once in town, I got a room at Lamphu house in the Bangalamphu neighborhood.  Decent place, and recommended by Lonely Planet.  The best part is that unlike other guesthouses and hotels around here, they do NOT allow unregistered “guests” beyond the lobby.  I’d imagine it reduces complaints and theft.

I’m paying $10 a night for a 2 bed room with a fan (no AC).  Tomorrow I upgrade to the room with AC for an extra $5, although the nights are not as sweltering hot as the days, so sleep is decently comfortable.  Wifi internet is 85 cents an hour – A nice change from $5/hour in Australia and New Zealand.

I bought some new travel pants in Oz, but as always, they’re way too long, so since there are a ton of Tailors around here, I’m having 3 pair of travel pants fitted for cheap.

Bangkok kind of reminds me of an Asian version of Buenos Aires without trash blowing down every street.  It’s actually relatively clean (from a litter standpoint).

Against the better advice of most guidebooks, I hired a Tuk-Tuk to drive me around town.

The reason this is ill advised (other than weaving thru heavy traffic on a 3 wheel moped) is that these guys operate on commission, so they try to push you into every suit shop, restaurant, fake gem store, and tourist trap that pays them.  I told the guy I’ll I go to all of his commission places if he shows me the town for free.  It was fun to start, but after the 4th suit shop offering me “just like Tommy Bahama, but not that pictured pattern”, it started getting annoying.  And the jem shop was a total ripoff.  I did however, get a decent overview of the town, see a few sights, and have an experience far more involving than a simple cab ride.

A guy in this Buddhist temple told me that this is known as the “Lucky” Buddha because when the Japanese bombed Bangkok in WWII, 2 bombs fell just outside, but did not go off.

The same guy recommended that I try the T.A.T. (government travel office). I also had the driver take me to a number of travel agents. All were a ripoff – trying to get me to spend $2000 for 3 weeks in Thailand, and claiming $150 per flight, and $150 per night at fancy hotels.

I left there and ate some great Panang Chicken at a fancy establishment for roughly $10 (not a deal).

Those little round things are a type of eggplant…  interesting texture.

I’ve also had some phenomenal Tom Yum soup and a 7up for $2 at a small dive along the street where I’m staying.  That was really good, and a great deal!

Yesterday I was caught in a monsoon, so I had to buy an umbrella.  Whatever happened to plain black?  The least effeminate choices were between Care Bears, My Little Pony, and a red one with a dog and the word “Happy”.  I snagged it just in time, as the next guy in line got stuck with the Care Bears.

I’m currently planning my side trip to Angkor Wat, Cambodia.  Looking at international airfares on Expedia, I may need to take the bus (6 hours).  However, flying within Thailand is super cheap on Thai Airways…  basically $30 each way.  I’ll check on the discount prices to Siam Reap tomorrow morning thru the travel desk at my guesthouse.  I’m guessing I can get a round trip for under $100.

So the plan is (in no particular order):

Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand for cooking lessons, elephant treks, the Golden Triangle (Thailand, Laos, and Myanmar) and see the long neck women.

Ko Pha-Ngan for the full moon party on the 7th and some beachside relaxing for a few days there and at Krabi / Koh Phi Phi on the Andaman Sea

See Angkor Wat in Cambodia,

Back to Bangkok and on to Bangalore, India on the 16th.

Somewhere in there I need to get my visa to India – they say it takes 6 days, but I just read that if you submit your pasport on the 5th working day of the month between noon and 1, you can pick it up between 3 and 4:30 that same day.  We’ll see…

I finally fit in the skydive.  14,000 ft over Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef.

HOLY COW!!!  WHAT A RUSH!!!  Impossiblt to explain, but it totally kills bungy jumping!!

I had a photographer jump with me, so I have a DVD video and pictures.  Unfortunately, my laptop cannot convert DVD video to an uploadable format, and the picture CD does not come up on my external drive.

Right now I’m at a free internet kiosk in the Sydney Airport waiting to board my flight (Emirates EK 419) to Bangkok in about 15 minutes.  I’ll arrive at 1AM… ouch!!

In the bus from Mission Beach to Cairns (pronounced ‘cans’), I ran into Chris (the Paul Newman look-alike) from the sailing trip.  Being from West London, he says things like:  “Ay geeza, itsa weekend.  We’ll get proppa pissed tonight and land some birds.”  Translation for Americans:  “Hey buddy, it’s Friday.  Let’s go to the pub and try to meet some girls.”

In the hostel, Chris runs up to me and says he’s in a room with a guy who knows me.  He was explaining to the guy that he didn’t know anyone on the bus until “this American bloke from my sailing trip got on.”  The guy listening stopped him and said “You mean Sean?”.  Yep…  with very few American’s on Australia’s East coast right now – I’m almost a D-list celeb.  It turns out that a bunch of the guys and Corinna from Surf Camp were in this same hostel.  Two of them are leaving the next day and want to go out and celebrate.

So Chris and I started the night at 7:30, walking to the bottle shop (liquor store) to get some beers to start the night.  We were going to meet the other guys in town, so by 9:00 we made the 5 minute walk into town and found the Irish Pub.  The other lads weren’t there, but as we walked in a cute girl invited us to a pub crawl that was just starting.  $20, 6 bars, free drinks and pizza, and drinking games with prizes.  BINGO – we have a plan.

A few pubs and games  into the crawl I get a text message from Corinna at a different bar.  The guys are wondering where we are because they’re getting ready to go to bed (it’s only midnight).  So Chris and I get our free shots at Rhinobar and head to the Woolshed to meet the others for a quick drink before rejoining our pub crawl.  After seeing the boys off in style and a few good toasts, we got back to the Rhinobar just in time for a “So you think you can dance” contest.  The girl organizing the pub crawl dragged me into it.  There were 4 from our pub crawl, and 4 from another group.  6 Brits, 1 Frenchman, and me.  The MC chooses a contestant and calls out a dance style.  You introduce yourself and where you are from, then you have to perform that style for 45 seconds on a small stage above the dance floor with appropriately matching music.

The first girl does 45 seconds of lame, white, British girl Hip Hop.  A Brit guy has to do country line dancing.  Another girl does techo rave dancing.  The French guy had to be a male stripper.  Another girl did Irish dancing.  Another guy does a pathetic Michael Jackson imitation.  Then the next to last guy does 50′s sock hop dancing, but has no idea how to do anything like the twist.

I am the last one to dance.  I introduce myself as Sean from the United States, and the crowd (of mostly Brits) boos me…  The MC announces that I am performing BALLET!!!  Holy crap, I was hoping for breakdancing or swingdancing…  I have no idea what the song was, but I did the arms in a halo and spin on your toes.  I ran across the stage doing jumping splits (kind of).  I did back flips and front flips.  Picked up a girl and held her over my head.  More flips and kicks.  At the end, everyone was cheering.  I though it was pretty good to go from boos to cheers in 45 seconds and would have been happy with that.

Then the MC goes thru the dancers and asks the crowd to applaud for the best dancer.  There is standard whooping and applauding for everyone.  I am again last.  When he calls me to the front and announces “The ballet guy from America”, I was almost knocked over by the eruption of sound.  I felt like I just scored the winning touchdown in the Superbowl, or a winning last second half court shot in the NCAA Tourney.  It was nuts.

After being overwhelmed by screams and cheers, I could barely hear the MC over the mic telling everyone that I was the winner of a seven day trip to Fiji!!!! HOLY CRAP!!!  Freaking FIJI!!!!

I can honestly say that a year ago I never expected that I would ever enter a dance contest at backpacker party bar on the great barrier reef, win over the crowd, and win a trip to Fiji.

Now…  well, sometimes it seems like this kind of stuff happens far to often to be random luck…  This night ranks up there with “Spring Break ’95″, “Fraternity Ski Trip”,  “Oktoberfest”, “Duty Free Vodka and Cranberry Juice”, “My first 24 hours in Vegas with Will”, “Casino Winnings at Steve’s Bachelor Party”, “It started at an Irish Pub in Florence, Italy”, and “Searching for Food in Prague at 1AM”.  To that illustrious list I can now add “I won a trip to Fiji at a backpacker bar dance contest in Australia”.

Yes, I am having a lot of fun!!!

I really have no idea how I can ever go back to a suburban desk job – regardless of what it pays.

I just have to figure out when I can go to Fiji since literally 12 hours before dancing I had just booked my tickets to Thailand and India.  I’m thinking Nov or Dec on my way home from the 2nd half of this trip.  I probably won’t have enough money left to do Europe properly, so I may swing back thru SE Asia since I’m really cutting that short, and that’s a place where everyone who’s been there raves about it.

On the 16th Aaron and I took the overnight Greyhound bus from 1770 to Arile Beach so we could catch a sailboat to the Whitsunday Island chain for the 18th – 20th on Apollo – an 80′ Maxi racing yacht.

I actually ran into Lisa, the really cute Swede I met in New Zealand and a couple people from the Surf camp.  Aside from that, Aaron and I already knew 1/2 the people on our boat…  Damien, Belinda, and the 4 Isralies from the Canoe Trip, Marc, Janine and Franzi from Fraser Island, Rachel and Emma (who did the Canoeing with Marc).  The others we met were all cool – including Chris, who looks like a young Paul Newman (after Ant looking like Steve McQueen, I’m now waiting to find a guy who looks like a young Robert Redford or Clint Eastwood).

On the morning of the 18th we walked across town to the marina and met the crew, reviewed the rules and itinerary, and started sailing with some lucky wind (rare for this time of year).  Here’s the crew…  Heidi (skipper), Molly (chef), Ryan (mate), and Jonno (divemaster).

After a great sail, we arrived at Whitehaven beach – where the silica sand is so fine you can clean jewelry.  There was no coral here, but we had to wear “stinger” suits incase we bumped into any jellyfish.  We all just goofed around for a few hours.

We sailed during sunset to a cove in the Cook Strait where we tied up to a mooring buoy.

That night we partied pretty well.  A young Brit, Leo, was celebrating his 21st birthday and the crew rigged a beer bong for our entertainment.  There was a lot of goon, beer, and I had made 7&7′s.

The next day we motored over to Luncheon Bay where there was a very nice reef and reasonably clear water.  Jonno was giving everyone a free resort dive.  I again tried to dive and again started freaking while breathing underwater.  0 for 2 with SCUBA, so I stuck with snorkeling and free diving and loved it.  We were officially in the Great Barrier Reef National Marine Park.  I got the underwater camera and proceeded to break it in 2 minutes.  Luckily, it was just water in the USB socket shorting out the LCD, so after it dried out later that night it worked fine again and I’m being extra careful of sand in the seals.  The result of that problem is a lack of pictures of the best snorkeling day we had.

We all stayed there for a pretty good sunset from the beach with the boat in the picture.  I took another time lapse video (if I can ever upload it).

One more night of partying and we motored to the sandbar at Langford Island where we snorkelled for a few hours.  The Olympus was working again, so I got plenty of pics and videos…

It was a neat reef, with a nice mix of Large Poly Stonies, Small Polyp Stonies, and Soft coral… and a ton of fish.

This cluster of Yellow and Pink leathers was about 1 meter in diameter.

This red acro colony was easily 2 meters in diameter

This blue tipped stag colony was over 1 meter wide at it’s narrowest point.

A Hawk Nosed Sea Turtle

It was really fun seeing fish and corals in the wild that I used to keep in my aquarium.  Especially considering that my corals were considered large at 2 ft across – and some of these corals were larger than my entire 400 gallon aquarium.  Honestly, I don’t want a reef tank again.  It’s cheaper, more beautiful, and less hassle to fly to Australia and go snorkelling.

After lunch, we rigged up for sailing and raced another Maxi yacht back to Airile Harbor.  We killed them.  The wind was pretty light and we were barely making 15 knots, so the crew let me man the wheel for a while…  Cool as anything – I raced an 80′ sailing yacht!!!

This was my view of the boat.

Otherwise we all just tanned on deck and took the obligatory “last day” pics and exchanged facebook ID’s.

Here’s a pic of me with a few Israeli friends who Canoed in Noosa with me and were also on the boat.  Hey dad, the dark guy is named “Yoni” (inside joke).

Later that night a number of us met at a local bar for some final rowdy dancing and drinking.  I had to catch a bus to Mission Beach the next morning, so I left the party around 2 am.