I'm Not Good with Goodbyes

I know 3 months is a short time to call a place home but Paris was that; more so than anywhere else we'd been in our crazy adventure. Of course we had copious amounts of the foods we've come to love. Ah, chiboust I will miss you so. And what will our friendly waiter at O'Jilou think when he notices the Americans aren't coming by to butcher his native language anymore? How will I ever get by without my gelato fix at Amorino? It seems cruel to separate me from Fauchon so soon. Sure the departure was largely self imposed but it was time to move on and bring the travel to a close. At least we were leaving on our terms. Next time we go to Paris it would be to live there. But for now, au revoir.

NEW BLOG SITE!

http://www.prefectlife.net/

I may not get around to writing blogs very often, but I have found a bit of time to play around with the website. I've pulled the blog into the prefectlife.net website, so you only have to remember the same old website name. How nice is that? I'll leave this site here for a while, but all the old posts and your comments are safe and sane on the new site.

yet another vacation vacation

We're off on another adventure. Tonight we fly to Valencia, Spain to meet Mary's mom and brother for a 10 day tour. We'll spend a few days in southern Spain, seeing the Alhambra and a bit of the frontier before crossing the Straits of Gibralter and moving through Morocco. That means back to sleeping under the stars in the desert for us. I'm pretty accustomed now to hot showers and a clean sheet, so this is going to be rough.

We'll be following some of the same trail that we did almost exactly two years ago in Morocco. We pick up our car in Tangier and will drive to Fes the night. After wandering the ancient medina of Fes, we'll head out to the big dunes near Merzouga. We'll spend as much time on camels as our butts will allow and then head south, hopefully finding the Tondra Gorge and some nice kasbahs on our way to Oarzazate. The trip will finish up in Marrakech with our flight home on June 4th.

Until then, au revoir.

ps. we'll leave the key to our place under the doormat if you're passing through Paris while we're gone. Just do the dishes before you leave, please.

Starbucks will never make it in Europe...

We headed into the Latin Quarter tonight for the beginning of a two week jazz festival. There's a few shows most nights in different venues and a bunch of the small ones are free. Very cool and cultural and Parisian, right?
There were 4 concerts tonight and 3 of them were in a Starbucks. The Latin Quarter isn't all that big, but there are at least 4 of Seattle's best affront to the Old World in place.
Welcome to the Americanification of Europe. Buy Starbucks stock.

Singing The Baguette Blues

We both love the bread in Europe. A warm baguette with lots of super crunchy crust and moist fluffy innards makes any day better.
Most mornings, I run across the street to get a fresh baguette and then fry up some bacon and eggs to complete a perfect brunch. Yes 'brunch'. It's light out until nearly 10pm here, so we're night owls these days.
So the whole daily fresh baguette thing is great and all, but we've discovered that the grass is not always greener. Several times now, we've bitten into (and been bitten back by) squishy, dense or otherwise boring bread. It's horrible. We're not in Milpitas; this is Paris. We have expectations to be met. The bread should -always- be crisp and yummy.
We've boiled down a few theories to these rules:
4) Don't buy on a Monday morning or after a holiday. The oven just doesn't have its heart into the job yet.
3) Skip it on a humid or wet day. It's just not worth the risk.
2) Think twice if the counter girl says "blahblah pas bien blahblah"
1) NEVER EVER buy at the Naturalia grocery. Even if they are the only boulangerie open on Sunday. UGGGG. Healthy bread in any language sucks.

Mary says: the baguettes from the Nature store are like Cold War bread 'da! you veel eat rock!' but today we found a boulangerie that sells the lustiest bread we've had. it's simply glorious.

Paris!

After 2 years, 2 weeks, 2 days and 38 countries, we have finally reached the end of our envisioned trip. We realized long ago that too quick a move back to civilization would likely cause headaches and internal bleeding, so we decided that Paris would be our method to slowly and safely try out 'normal' life again.

We have a cute little apartment in the Marais district just a 10 minute walk from the Louvre and Notre Dame. What's 'little'? How about 350 square feet. That's smaller than our bedroom at the Los Gatos house. And we're very happy to have so much space in this part of town. There are flats half this size for rent.

We've already installed geraniums and fun lights we picked up in Bangkok. For the first time in 2 years, we have a closet, and it's already full. My allocated space has a suit, 3 t shirts and 2 wetsuits...

What now? Well, we've been wandering around town so far. Saw a ballet last night in French :) We're going on a side trip to Spain and Morocco with Mary's mom and brother in a few weeks. And...and... well we'll just have to see. We're STILL on vacation, after all.

Boredom, Hunger and the Lazy Diver

So, yeah. The Maldives are pretty cool for diving with the big fish. But there really isn't much else to do if the big boys don't come out to play. The coral and macro life isn't so great and we spent several dives looking for other forms of entertainment... and sometimes a little snack...

Marcel does always swim with a fork, and I'm never underwater without travel chopsticks. mmmmm....anago...







The currents were sometimes roller coaster fun and we got to watch the lazier divers hang onto coral for their dear lives. My favorite move was by a German couple who could magically use both hands to grab on to the reef while kicking the coral behind them AND somehow poke at a scorpionfish to take a blurry picture of him.

There was another technique that we'd never seen before. It starts with that Batman utility belt you got last Christmas. Secure the grappling hook to the reef below and then lay back and take a snooze while the world blows by. Now this actually does make sense in some situations and can be better for the reef than using your hands - if you're careful. But the sight of ten divers strapped into the reef in a very mild current just waiting for their suffering to end is a little funny. In all seriousness, I've never seen so much general disregard for nature amongst a group of divers. We all accidentally kick, touch and break things now and then while diving, but I take it for granted that everyone is trying not to. This trip taught me that there are a lot of divers who just don't care and that's really sad.

Sad, but it reminds of the other German girl who stopped at nothing to get a blurry photo of everything. One dive, she crawled into a hole on top of an exposed rock and didn't realize she had chased her target octopus out a small hole in the bottom. So the octopus is now sitting near me and we're both watching her butt hang out as she's draped over this rock still looking inside for my new friend. Oh, if only I had a camera for that!

Mary says: but what about the lady that massaged an anemone with her hand?!

One Fish, Two Fish, Big Fish...BIGGER FISH

The Maldives sit near deep water and provide a nutrient-rich environment that attract a good cross section of the marine food chain. Popular members of nature for divers are the 8-15ft manta rays and 15-60ft whale sharks. With a little luck, there are even hammerhead shark schools lurking here and there. But the big fish don't always come out to play. The cruise before us apparently had terrible weather and saw basically nothing.

But that's ok, we had good weather and great luck with the fishies. Our third day out, we were in the water by sunrise to look for hammerheads in the deep open water where there nothing to be seen but dark blue peppered with shimmering plankton. Eventually, a pair of fat hammerhead sharks glided silently by to check us out. Soon after the outlines of a dozen more around us appeared and drew closer. We've seen so much diving the last couple years that little excites me anymore, but all I could do was shout WOW! again and again...and again when we surfaced.
The next big dive was a manta ray cleaning station. We waited anxiously on a sandy bottom 78ft under as our air and nitrogen time quickly ticked away. After a bit everyone started to drift slowly shallower along a nearby reef. Well, everyone except Mary. She was on manta watch and stayed in the sand staring into the blankness ever so patiently. As the group was moving out of our sight, I went to prod her on a bit. Just as I got to her, I see the first manta coming right at us. I was too fixated for charades so I just grabbed her and aimed her at our visitors. Around eight 8ft to 15ft mantas played around in our bubbles for almost half an hour. We both were buzzed within inches of the big boys as they came by to see what we were all about time and again. As great as the mantas were, the most amazing show was watching one of the dive guides physically restrain a German woman trying to escape his grasp and mount a manta.

Next stop: whale sharks. The game here is to cruise a stretch of deeper water on the outside of an atoll and watch for their shadows. One minute we're napping after the morning dive then the bell rings and we're jumping off the boat to snorkel with a 30ft whale shark. Through our captain's persistence and luck, we found and swam with 7 whale sharks from 25 to 35 feet long in a four hour period. It seemed like no sooner had we dried off than he found another. The first 6 encounters were ok but shared with many divers. We stuck with the 7th shark longer than the others and when I finally looked up I saw that our boats were a couple hundred yards away. It
took me about 5 minutes of on and off signalling to finally get noticed. For almost half an hour we were alone with a 30ft whaleshark who continually swam within petting (we didn't) reach and even let me dive down beneath him a bit. These animals are beautiful to watch swim at any distance but it is truly amazing to be so close and -feel- their presence. A 30ft fish an arm's distance away is just...huge. Thanks for the photo, Marcel.

As if those encounters weren't enough, we also saw innumerable whitetip, blacktip and grey sharks including a school of a dozen babies. Single mantas joined us for a few more dives, a couple of dolphins cruised by on one dive and I caught a really rare glimpse of a sailfish (maybe marlin?) passing by on another. After one dive, a half dozen dolphins came by and we jumped right back in the water to snorkel with them. They weren't particularly friendly, but it was fun to watch them watch us.

Bad Steve!

I'll get this over with quickly. The bell rang at some ridiculous time like 5am. I assembled the underwater camera quickly and we jumped in the water in morning darkness to search for hammerheads. At about 20ft under, I noticed the camera case was slowly flooding. I ran(?) back to the surface and got the camera out of the case as quickly as possible and got the boat's attention to come back and pick it up from me. So first bummer of the trip: no hammerhead
photos. After the dive, we found the camera functional, but with water spots clouding the lens. Oh, the horror! How sore my arm is from Mary punching me.Here we entered the frantic and desperate times that have made us so well acquainted with the inside of our camera that we could easily get jobs with Canon.
Cleaning the lens by flooding it with freshwater didn't work, so our next desperate move was to swap the lens assembly with the jammed up one that we had replaced in Bangkok. Yeah, I'm a geek. I kept the busted lens assembly because it looked cool. This worked unreliably for a few dives, but the original busted gear problem eventually beat us. For our second trick, Mary disassembled the delicate lens assembly with hopes to clean the individual lenses inside.
Wow, what a job, but she did it. Unfortunately, we couldn't quite get this evil jigsaw puzzle back together. So - we've got no photos of any of the good stuff we saw. Oh well, at least we got to see it all and you don't have to suffer through 200 manta and whaleshark photos.

Right...?

Back on the Boat

Our stop in Sri Lanka was denied by a delayed Air Asia flight and our only alternative was to fly directly to the Maldives. Unfortunately, we could only get a night flight an so missed the view of the atolls from the air. After moving through the tiny airport, we met our greeter and jumped onto a small ferry to our hotel on the main island of Male. That's right, the airport gets it's own island and the island is no bigger than the runway and terminal. Male itself is like a Playschool Manhattan. I went for a walk to get water and saw about a third of town in less than an hour.

The next morning, our rastafarian dive guide showed up to take us to our home for the next two weeks, the MV Stingray. We joined up with some of our 16 European (German, Austrian, Dutch) boatmates on a 30' dhoni (small boat) for pickup. When the it's not running errands, the dhoni carries all the dive gear and follows the big boat around. It's a really nice setup since the air compressors are also on the dhoni so we didn't have to listen to them between dives. Our two week cruise moved us through five atolls and three dozen dives.

A typical day started with a wakeup knock at 5:45am, a confusing dive briefing at 6:30 and then normally a short dhoni ride to the dive site. Currents play a big role in atoll diving and are not predictable by the tides here, so one of the guides always jumped in the water to watch the direction the fish were swimming to determine which way the current was blowing and where the boat should drop us so we'd land near our intended dive spot. Invariably, no matter what the spotter saw, he would sing the same deadpan Bob Marley song "Medium to strong current. Medium to strong current. Go down quickly. Go down quickly." We'd all jump in the water and usually not see the guide again until we were back on the boat. We'd be home for breakfast by 7:30 and napping by 9. Most days had dives at around 11 and 3 with only a couple night dives. That left a lot of time for napping.

Interrupting naptime, we had opportunities to visit a few islands. The ones we saw were all pretty similar: sandy streets lined with brightly colored walls hiding family compounds. A main street right in front of the jetty with a few tourist shops. Maybe a boat or two under repair on a beach. A few fully covered women playing badminton in front of a mosque. Pretty much just like Hawaii.One night we had dinner on a tiny uninhabited island. We showed up after dark to find the crew had layed out a candle runway for us leading straight to the whale shark-shaped table they dug into the sand. That was cool enough, but then they got drunk, played with fire and tried to sing for us. ouch...

Mommy, what's an atoll?

Charles Darwin theorized that atolls are formed by coral reefs growing at the edge of sinking volcanoes. Give a few million years and all you have left is a ring of reef with little or no actual land left in the middle. Anything above water left in the middle becomes an island with the fringing reef protecting it from the open ocean. Given more time the island too will disappear. The Maldivian islands' maximum height of 7.8ft above sea level doesn't bode well for the 350,000 people in this Islamic country.

That's where we are, somewhere in the 600 mile stretch of coral and sand in the Indian Ocean known as the Republic of Maldives. Amidst the atolls there are a debatable 2000ish spits of sand, 1192 of which have something green rising above the sand on them, and only about 200 of those that people call home. More than half of those are private or resort islands.

Where else in the world would you expect to find islands named "Paradise", "Holiday", "Picnic", "Fun", and the constantly burning "Trash Island" mixed in with Dhoonidhoo, Nakatchafushi and Hulhumale? Sadly, we haven't found Fantasy or Pleasure Islands.

Finding your island of choice on the map isn't easy. Maldivian maps belong on golf course scorecards. Instead of fairways and traps, you get submerged reefs (green) and land (yellow). The 100 square miles of Maldivian dry land hide on 1,800 square miles of reef spread over more than 45,000 square miles of ocean.

Regardless, over half a million mostly European tourists visit these specks every year. Most sit in little resorts on those tiny islands. The more claustrophobic tourists like us come to the Maldives to board a dive boat and scoot through the atolls in search of manta rays, hammerheads, and whale sharks.

Life as a Tourist - Two Thumbs Up!

You get to eat pizza everyday and have ice cream whenever you want. That was our experience while mixing with the sunburnt foreigners on the beautiful beaches of Koh Phi Phi in southern Thailand. The islands in this area are gorgeous. It was so good that we decided to skip the other islands we had on our list and spend the entire time here. You just have to accept that you're one of the thousands that flock and bake here. Don't fight it, just pass the coconut please!

We hiked, snorkeled, took boat trips, but mostly we just worked on our tan lines while watching the parade of bikini bottoms stroll by. Yeah, bikini tops aren't really the in thing here. They're so 7th grade dance.

We also spent some time exploring Krabi, Ao Nang, and Railei before saying farewell to Thailand, for now. Little did we know that a technical problem with our plane would cause us to miss our connecting flight to Sri Lanka thus forcing us to spend a couple of unplanned days in Bangkok before we could secure new flight to the Maldives directly, thereby missing Sri Lanka altogether. A big AIYA!

Fake Smiles in the Similans

Most people go to the Similans because it's supposed to be one of the top places in the world to dive but for us it's a convenient place to try out our dive gear.

We booked ourselves onto a 4 day liveaboard with 21 other tourist divers, 8 divemasters and 7 crew; the MV Dolphin Queen embarking from Khao Lak in south Thailand. Before we pushed off from the dock the crew lit a 10ft string of firecrackers hanging off the bow of the ship to bless the boat for its voyage. We were told not to worry because the pressurized bottles of oxygen and generators were in the back of the boat. The vessel wasn't big but somehow there was always space and plenty of lively conversation. We were even surprised by how little toe stepping there was given there was only 3 bathrooms on the entire boat that everyone shared. It's funny, when we were on land sitting in the dive office watching their dive video we kept whispering to each other 'where's the fish'. There was a very noticeable absence in the usual underwater reef scene. And we had heard from people that have history in these waters that in the last two years between the mass tourism and warmer waters (el nino gets blamed for everything) the quality and abundance of the fish life has dropped dramatically. So we were set up for a pretty tame time and wow, there really was nothing to see. Sure there were highlights now and then but in general the visibility was low, the water cold, and creatures few. We still made the most of it and kept on jumping in four times a day. On the boat we were having a good time and there was enough underwater to keep us interested. Even more importantly our gear was working nicely.

-- steve says: The Similans don't top my dive list, but they were better than I had expected. No big fish, but we did get seahorses, ghost pipefish and a stonefish!

Another Day Another Temple ... or Baganarama

After so many temples in so many Southeast Asian countries, it's hard to get excited about seeing ANOTHER temple and yet we found ourselves on a slow boat from Mandalay down the Irawaddy to visit the temple-strewn plains of Bagan.

The temples started sprouting up here like weeds a thousand years ago. There are now around 2000 temples remaining - with a few brand new ones to offset the thousands that have been destroyed over the years. That sounds pretty incredible, and it sort of is. It is hard to find a spot where there is not a temple of some sort in site. Some of the temples can be climbed and offer unreal panoramas of a galaxy of stupas rising above the trees. The temples are fairly spread out over 16 or so square miles of farmland, so we rented bicycles for a few days to explore. That turned out to be a bit of work on some of the sandy paths, but at least there weren't any real hills. I woke up at 5:30am one day to capture the temples rising through the misty jungle sunrise. Instead, I got a 5 mile bikeride in the darkness and rain and a few gloomy photos. Yay!Like the rest of Myanmar, Bagan was largely devoid of tourists. On our biking adventures, we came across hundreds of temples, but only a handful of foreigners. Only sunset at one of the big temples near a posh hotel drew them from their air conditioned lives. OK...we had A/C, too. But we managed to go outside and see stuff during the day.

We also found the moral equivalent of the Thai "No Whammies" Prayer Machine. Here, you throw money at target wishes a spinning wedding cake. I'm shooting for "May you win in lottery".

No, please not another water village!

Next stop: Inle Lake, probably the #2 tourist destination in Myanmar. Inle is surrounded by villages that start on the lake itself and gradually move up and onto dry land. There are even water bungalow resorts on the lake. I can't think of any reason you'd come here and isolate yourself from Myanmar by staying in a beachless resort, but people do. We stayed in Nyuangshwe, a short canoe ride up a canal from the lake itself where we were surrounded by a great local scene and a few businesses close to our hearts.

Our neighbor had an authentic homemade wood fired pizza oven that he knew how to use and just an appetite-whetting walk away was Pancake Kingdom serving up chocolate covered strawberry and banana love for breakfast, lunch or dinner. For us, it seemed like we stayed in a very local town, but Nyuangshwe is normally well touristed. More than once we found ourselves sitting alone in a cafe hearing from the owner that there were now only 10-20% the number of tourists as the same time last year.

Back on the lake, we wandered through a handful of villages on foot and also by boat through the many canals. As many fishermen as we saw on the lake we couldn't figure out what they are really doing because we never saw a single fish in a net or boat. There was very little fish in town, either. No wonder one person we met said the fishermen were the poorest people in the area. The lake edge does house large "floating gardens", though. Tomatoes and sugar cane are grown in great enough quantity to export from the area. We got really lucky and passed a shack where the sugar cane is pressed and boiled down into bars of pure goodness for easy transport to the sugar refineries. Oh, it's so yummy. They should just wrap it up with the label "instant cavity" and ship to America.

Aside from the general beauty, friendly people and interesting villages, the
highlight of the lake is the temple complex at Indein. After braving a half mile of
souvenir stall-laden covered walkway up to the temple, we continued on to a hill
behind that overlooks the temple and lake. What a view.

My vote for best religious sellout in Southeast Asia also sits on the lake: Jumping Cat Monastery. It has a real name, too, but that hasn't been relevant since the monks first taught cats to jump through hoops for their kibble.

Fashion is Function

Skirts for men - IN. Except they're called longji. This traditional wear is worn prominently throughout Myanmar though pants are nowadays widely seen on the streets.

Rouge on cheeks - OUT. Women, children and pansy men wear sandalwood powder on their cheeks as make-up that doubles for sunscreen. Most people wear it smeared neatly in squares prominently on their faces. Other variations include messier shapeless blobs, rebellious mickey mouse outlines and the all over spread.

Teeth whitening - OUT. Chewing arecanut wrapped in betel leaves is not only addictive, suppresses the appetite but it also turns everything in your mouth a rotting shade of red. Small carts are found on all the corners selling this popular pastime and is the source of all the red stains on the streets.

Kid sized furniture - IN. Food options and sanitation is heavily lacking in Rangon so many food stalls expand their space by setting up play tables and chairs on the street. So while squatting with your knees up to your chest you can join the locals in enjoying pickled tea leaves and pickled tofu with raw garlic and chili peppers for condiments. Just don't drink the tea, the cups are not washed between uses.

The Temple's so Bright I Gotta Wear Shades

High atop Rangon is a big golden temple bejeweled with diamonds and rubies. It is seriously too bright to look at with the naked eye. If you try your eyes start watering and you're forced to squint or turn away. It sits in the center of the massive shining complex of Shwegadon. Surrounding this holiest of holy temples is a smorgasbord of lesser temples each dedicated to topic and day specific buddhas. Families come packed with a day's worth of food and spend all day in the shade their religion offers. They take naps, women braid hair, rugrats run amok, and everyone takes time to make offerings to their buddha of choice. The look of the buddhas area quite different. Most are the typical golden sitting statues with coils of hair and a soft smug countenance.

But there are also the old men likenesses of revered monks and even a green troll demon. This latter one was being proffered fast food and lit cigarettes in addition to the usual incense and monetary offerings.

It took us several hours to take it all in, including a rest with the locals on a tiled floor of an open air temple under the watchful eyes of the ever present buddhas. Interestingly the entrance and exit for foreigners is distinctly separated from those of the locals. Our shoe racks were separated as well as bathrooms and even the elevators. Obviously we had to pay an entrance fee but we were also required to sign in to a log book that we found out later freelance guides peruse to pick out their next targets. Our guy had walked around for over an hour and couldn't find us until we were on our way out.

Into Yangon

It's no longer Rangoon, Burma but goes by Yangon, Myanmar now. There are limited entry points into Myanmar and you can only enter the military led country by flying into Yangon. Actually only certain parts of the country are open to tourists at all. This includes the official new capital located more centrally within the country where the government buildings are built like bunkers, locals were restricted access, and foreigners are absolute forbidden to go near. Years ago during their last election the military leadership lost but refused to give up the seat of power so their regime of oppression remains. Outside of Myanmar there is a debate over whether or not tourists should visit the country because a portion of their spending money goes directly to support the military via government taxes and visa fees. However when you ask the Burmese the same question they can only express how much taking tourist dollars away hurts them directly. And it's not just the income they need from foreigners but they want visitors to take take their stories out of the borders to be shared with the world. Those that are against the regime risk harm for themselves and their family. We heard stories of people divorcing their wives, moving to far off regions, cutting off all communication to their family, and even remarrying just to keep their families safe. Some have even tried to fake their own deaths in fear of retaliation of their political beliefs. All these things are not on the surface or evident on the streets. In fact walking around the various towns it looks like people are just busy trying to eke out a living, which they are. Much of the oppression is hidden from the west. The internet is heavily monitored within the country. Email sites like Yahoo, Hotmail, Gmail are all blocked out as are blogs and many international websites. The violence that resulted from the monk protests six months ago in the Rangon made headlines in the international media and has kept many people away. That was evident in walking around bustling Rangon where we saw less than ten tourists in total over several days.
We talked to monks and local people that cautiously told us that they could not openly speak out against the government. A monk briefly recalled the demonstration months ago where monks were beaten and killed to stifle the anti-government protests. Most of the people in this largely Buddhist country are impoverished and the few that have money do their shopping overseas. The shelves in markets are lacking and hold the same basic provisions. People live in the streets and those that have nothing beg from the poor. So it's probably not surprising that as much a tenth of the population submit to the temple and don the sacred robes where they are provided with a roof, education, and food. But like I mentioned this suffering is quiet, beneath the surface of a population that has found no safe outlet for their grief so they tiptoe within the boundaries, trying not to step on the wrong toes.

Going Green

It's hard to resist cooking classes when you're surrounded by such good local food so we signed up for a 3day/3night cooking course up in the hilly farm lands outside of Chiang Mai. It wasn't until we looked at the poster a second time that we found out it was an organic vegetarian farm. We were worried we'd be surrounded by granolas but the people there were really friendly and fun. Okay, so we were the only two people that didn't practice yoga, meditation and mantras daily.

There was yoga class at dawn, fresh baked bread for breakfast from the sustainable farm next door, then we would cook 3 dishes for lunch and another 3 for dinner. We even made tofu from scratch. Everything was fresh and made from raw ingredients. The kitchen was completely outdoor and had a great vista of the village and farmland below. While we were there we stayed in a hand molded mud hut right out of the flintstone's. There is a wealth of knowledge there and a seemingly endless list of active projects. One day a group of 25 monks came by for a tour of the place and to learn how to make natural soap and shampoo. The day that we left they were mixing up organic paint. Who knew! It was easy to see how most people there were repeat and extended stay visitors.

The people that we met were part of the highlight we spent the nights laughing at everyone's stories and screaming at rowdy card games. The Thai couple that owned and ran the cooking class were incredibly funny and awesome cooks. We made so much food that we couldn't eat it all.

All in all it was a great time and we now we know how to make really good pad thai, tom yum soup, curry pastes, and an awesome peanut sauce among other tasty thai dishes, with or without meat.

We are Short Necks

When we got to the village we were told the first souvenir booths were of the short neck people so we should walk without stopping until we get to the long neck tribe. Yes, we were part of the short necks. The road was muddy and slippery and completely lined with souvenir stalls on both sides so that you didn't see the villages right behind them. The women were sitting at their shops making scarves. Many of the people on display were young girls. They were quiet and seemed not to mind the attention of the cameras and people that would crowd around them. They would pause and smile for the photos then get right back to their threading like seasoned veterans. Many of the faces were painted in addition to make-up. No one seems to know why they started doing this practice of lengthening the girls' necks but the three prominent stories are
1. because tigers bite necks (but then why don't the men do it?)
2. to make them ugly because the ruler could pluck any girl he chose
3. as a beautification that makes them look more like a swan.
Yes, the last two contradict but so goes theories. I asked Ren if the girls thought it was pretty and his answer after a hesitation was that he thinks they do it for the business. Otherwise no one would come up here. And inside their straw huts were portable DVD players so it shows it definitely pays off. One old woman had the solid brass rings off her neck which I was surprised by because I had thought that they couldn't survive long after taken the rings off because of a lack of support. But it seems they can live with their extruded necks bare. The girls start the process at 5yrs old and put on progressively taller rings until their late teens. Thus taking advantage of the growing years. They definitely moved about with a stiff neck, like someone wearing a brace.

Prayer Machines, No Whammies!

This is our 3rd time in Thailand and it won't be the last. We're spending a week in the northernmost province of Chiang Mai. We visited an orchid farm and went into a cave in the highest limestone mountain in Thailand that was a temporary shelter for the Burmese army during the war. All that was only mildly interesting compared to the small temple sitting outside the cave that had prayer machines. That's right, prayer machines! With their flashing red lights you could see them from the parking lot. There were eight Vegas style slot machines and a weekday Buddha in each. Wednesday gets two for some reason; one for the day and another for the evening. Each of the 8 boxes had slots for the offerings. Sadly there were no levers to pull but wow, this was 'Lord of Light' put to action. I knew the book's idea of prayer machines would catch on sooner or later. It was too good to pass up for any entrepreneurial religion.

Laos in a Betel Nutshell

Laos was a quiet and less populated country than its neighbors, by far. The capital Vientiane feels more like a resort town with its laid back atmosphere lack of traffic. There are plenty of expats living and thriving here to provide the comforts of western life amongst the stupas. The US embassy rep gave us a funny look for needing extra pages added to our already double wide passport.

Vang Vieng is best described as spring break for wannabe backpackers. The main street is lined with open air restaurants blaring episodes of Friends and The Simpsons. The river right outside the otherwise dusty road town is one bamboo bar after another. The locals meanwhile take advantage of the dry season and drive their tractors to the middle of the river for gravel while others stoop over to collect river weed. The river weed is dried and compressed to look like thick seaweed then roasted and sprinkled with sesame seeds. It made me hurl for 24hrs.

Luang Prabang was all about temples. Everywhere you walked there were monks going about their daily activities in their saffron robes and often matching umbrella to keep off the sun. The monk schools were packed with boys of all ages. Here more than anywhere else it seemed monkhood was a way to get an education.

To get from the northern Laos town of Luang Prabang to the Thai border we would have to endure a two day journey by slow boat up the Mekong. Each day's cruise started at 9am and ended just after 6pm. There were no stops along the way except to drop locals at their villages so we had to bring all snacks and beverages along, as well as entertainment. At least we were going against the grain of the travelers so we had space to spread out on the wooden boat. The boats going in the opposite direction were notorious for packing in 100 passengers on a 40 capacity boat so people had to fight for room and some slept on the piles of cargo and backpacks. We had less than 20. The first night we slept in a border style town with nothing but guesthouses and snack shops. The next day was full of rain and we had to put the tarps down to stay dry. At the end of the second day we arrived after the border closed so we had to wait until the next morning to make our third entry into Thailand.

Mahouting Around

In Laos and Thailand elephants are still being used in the logging industry despite animal rights activists. Some projects have popped up to try to save the ailing beasts of burden. One idea is to buy the sick and injured elephants away from the loggers and try to restore their health. To offset the costs of maintaining such large animals the ellies are then trained for their new job in tourism. We wanted to see for ourselves so we spent two days at a mahout camp. The herd was made of 8 adult girls and one baby boy. Physically they looked to be in good health and well fed. These Asian ones are much smaller than their African cousins, almost 3ft shorter. The shape of their heads, back and mouths are distinct as well. We rode on the necks and felt their bristly hair poking up at us. It's not easy to stay balanced on a moving elephant. You can feel their shoulders alternating with their stride rocking you to and fro. And it feels like you're sitting on a rotating turret swinging from side to side as the elephant takes in its surroundings. There's nothing to hold onto except your will to not fall 8 feet to the ground and get trampled under foot. We walked them up the mountain where they spend the nights eating and sleeping. In the morning we met up and they gave us a lift down to the river to give them a bath. The mahouts gave us scrub brushes and though the elephants got cleaner we got dirtier. The adults went back up to camp to get ready for the next tourist rides while the baby was in a tyrate for being left behind. The mahouts found the girls wouldn't work if the baby was around. The ellies and mahouts work for 14 days then get a day off. The elephants get their 200-400lbs of food a day and have medical supervision so most will live to the natural ripe old age of 65. Whereas ones stuck in logging only survive half that lifespan. Given that freedom is not an option the tourism gig seems a better life than logging.
Surprisingly there are sparse wild elephants in the mountains but their days of freedom are numbered as people encroach on their territory

In the Belly of the Beast

Laos is cluttered with limestone mountains which is prime for caves. What better way to explore them than by innertube. In addition to the big rubber donut we were given headlamps, though Steve's was as bright as Mars as seen with the naked eye standing in downtown San Jose. The battery pack was what killed me. They looked just like car batteries, except a quarter of the size and weight. They were attached to the lights by exposed wires and were made to hang from your neck. Supposedly they watertight and I was going to test that out as mine kept slipping into the water. There was a rope that we could pull ourselves into the cave with. The jagged entrance was no more than two feet high so you had to flatten yourself and exhale to pass through unscathed. The sunlight didn't penetrate very far into the cavernous tunnel. The rope led us farther into the pitch with only our headlamps and echos to break the darkness. It was a good thing there were so many of us. Advancing along the rope while dodging the many head gashing traps in the meek light was trying enough then add keeping the camera out of the water to take video and I was at my multi-tasking limit. Next we hit a shallow flat with about six inches of water so we walked our tubes across. The cave was so low we had to stay bent. On the other side we hopped back onto our tubes but this time we linked up to form straight lines with the guide at the lead. I had to give up my light so he could navigate us as we went deeper in back first. With our shoes on our hands we all paddled slowly through the water like a caterpillar walking on water. The light from the other tubers' lit up the cavern walls. They were twenty feet across, curved and smooth on the sides and came together in a jagged crevice ten feet overhead. That gave the illusion of a rib cage a spine. As Steve put it, we felt like Jonah inside the whale. It would've been nice to have a light but it was also a good idea not to look at the water or the cave too closely. Watching all those points of light dance on the curved tunnels lighting us various features and colors was mesmerizing. The guides sang soothing Laotian songs that echoed through the chambers as we paddled to the end then turned back. That was good, dark, wet bum fun.