Happy New Year!

I hope everyone has a happy and healthy new year! Have fun tonight but also be safe. Take a taxi or have a reliable designated driver!

Man, I can't believe it's going to be 2009 tomorrow!

Searching For Elephants

Kaeng Krachan National Park is considered the best place in Thailand for bird watchers. Because it was theweekend, dozens of bird watchers were camped at our campsite.

Tom, our tracker/guide, talked with the head of a group in Thai about where to look for elephants. Choke's wife, who was coming along on her first trip, gasped at whatever they were saying. Choke told us the man said where the elephants were.

After breakfast we ventured into the jungle. After walking for less than ten minutes we heard some trees rustling in the distance. No, it wasn't elephants. It was langur monkeys. The monkeys were jumping from tree to tree as we watched. After having our fill of monkeys for the moment -- we would see dozens throughout the weekend -- we continued our trek. We were looking for the largest animal in the forest but kept encountering some of the smallest species:

(PICTURE: A beautiful chiccata that we were told is good luck if found.)

(PICTURE: A pretty freaky looking spider.)

I'd like to take a moment and say how proud I am of my sister. When we were kids you would often hear a blood curdling scream come from Hannah's room, "SPIDER!!!" Hannah was petrified of spiders, especially daddy long legs. Now here we were, in the middle of the jungle and Hannah was searching for spiders! Man, times have changed.

We continued our trek through the jungle following various trails of elephant poo and tracks. Along the way we saw a bunch of cool birds, monkeys, giant squirrels and other things but unfortunately, we couldn't find the elephants.


One quick anecdote: In another case of me trying to be a good big brother, I held a large tree branch back at one point so Hannah could pass and not have to step into a a creek. About ten seconds after she passed I felt a tingling sensation in my hair. I ran my fingers through my hair and saw hundreds of tiny black ants crawling on my hand. Apparently I had held back a tree COVERED in ants and they all conveniently jumped onto my scalp. I got most of the ants out with the help of Choke in a minute or two. Yeah, I said "most of the ants." For the next few hours I was continuing to pull more ants out. For those of you who are counting that's twice I've gotten the bad end of the stick for trying to help my sister!!!

An Often Overlooked City

Lonely Planet called the city of Phetchaburi, "An often overlooked city." Hannah and I didn't want to overlook it so we had the bus to Bangkok drop us off.

Hannah and I were the only people to get off the bus which meant around 50+ people were indeed overlooking the city. I have to admit, it's kind of an easy city to miss if you're not looking for it. When the bus door opened up and Hannah and I jumped off, we quickly realized we had no idea where we were. Hannah, who I have appointed in charge of the guide book, quickly got her bearings and pointed us in the direction to the one guest house mentioned in the book.

After walking through the city for about thirty minutes -- and turning down various taxi drivers -- we arrived at the riverside guest house. Immediately we were greeted by a man with a scar across his face who spoke about ten words of English. Eight of the words he spoke though were, "You go trekking in jungle with me tomorrow?" There are only two things that could make a man with a scar across his face scarier: 1) If he carried around a big machete. 2) If his English translator's name was CHOKE. Hey, Mom and Dad, I'd like to introduce you to our new friend Tom:

(PICTURE: Once again, a smile can be disarming.)

The reason that Phetchaburi attracted Hannah and I is that it is located near Kaeng Krachan, the largest national park in Thailand. Hannah and I really wanted to go for a jungle trek but the prices in the book were a little above our budget. Luckily, Tom had already signed up two Germans for the trek which meant the total cost was cut in half.

The next morning we all piled into the back of a pick-up truck and headed to the park to look for wild elephants, monkeys, leopards and other animals, insects and birds.

(PICTURE: The Germans and Choke, our translator.)





(PICTURE: Hannah and I in the back of the pick-up truck.)

Immediately upon entering the park we saw a crab-eating mongoose run across the road. This is ironic because when we were children I used to call Hannah, "Silly Mongoose." Why? I don't know. Another thing I didn't know -- what a mongoose looked like.

A few minutes later while driving we all spotted a giant pile of dung on the side of the road. Tom immediately stopped the truck and jumped out. His excitement for big piles of shit couldn't be contained. I guess that comes with the territory of being a tracker. The poo belonged to a herd of elephants...and we were going to find them.

(PICTURE: Hannah was pumped to see elephant doody.)

Bathroom Signs

Hannah is on a big kick taking pictures of bathroom signs in different countries. Here's one sign that we saw at a rest stop that I think could work in any country:

Hot And Cold Water

(PICTURE: Hannah trying to flee the fleas...)

On the sixth day of our trip Hannah and I checked into Ban's Diving Resort on the other side of Ko Tao. Ban's was highly recommended to me by my buddy/blog fan Steve who took a dive course with Ban's a couple months ago. Hannah and I were originally going to take a course with Ban's too (Hannah to get her open water and me to get my advanced) but we opted not too. I'm glad we made this decision because frankly, the diving wasn't that good. I'm sure normally the diving on Ko Tao is great but the visibility this month was terrible. Out of all the dives I've ever done, these two were probably the worst.

Hannah was battling a cold and I told her she couldn't dive. Rule 1 in diving is not to dive if you're congested or sick. Hannah didn't put up a fight and decided to snorkel instead. She came out on the dive boat with me and went snorkeling while I was under water. She was also disappointed with the visibility and marine life and after freezing our butts off on the boat after, we decided to hit the mainland the next day.

That said, this blog entry isn't about the cold water in Ko Tao. This blog entry is about the cold water everywhere in Thailand. Besides our first night here, we haven't had hot water once in our hotels/guest houses/bungalows. For those of you who know my sister well, she isn't exactly a fan of showering. It's not so much that she opposes being clean but hates when her hair gets really wet since it takes forever to dry. Up until this night at Ban's, Hannah had only showered once (REMINDER: WE'RE ON A HOT SWEATY TROPICAL ISLAND!).

After going in the salt water, Hannah's hair was already wet so she sucked it up and decided to shower at the hotel. Once we were both ready we went and watched another gorgeous sunset. This one was highlighted by a stray dog trying to catch fish in the water. After the sunset, Hannah and I went for a walk along the beach to find a restaurant. While strolling, I noticed something strange: a thousand bugs were flying above Hannah's head. There were no bugs anywhere else except above Hannah's head. I pointed this out to Hannah and she said it must be the gel in her hair. She tried to shake the bugs by sprinting along the beach. I'd say she lost roughly half of them. The sad news is that this really just gave Hannah a reason NOT TO SHOWER AGAIN. It's been a week since that night...and no shower (although Hannah claims rinsing in a waterfall we went to counts!).

(PICTURE: A pretty picture of a dog trying to catch a fish at sunset. Oddly, this dog had less bugs on it than Hannah.)

Ko Tao

(PICTURE: On our private beach in Ko Tao)

Hannah and I have talked about hiking the Appalachian Trail together for quite some time. We have a grand vision of our journey from Georgia to Maine ending with the publication of a book entitled: "Hiking with Hannah. Backpacking with Ben." Depending on how you hold the book you can read about our trip from my perspective or from Hannah's. You know, a classic "he said/she said" type of book. And yes, only our parents would probably buy it.

Well, those dreams came to a crashing halt on the island of Ko Tao. When Han and I arrived on the island we decided to start off on the east coast which we had read was the remote side of the island. After docking on the island we were immediately confronted by a dozen taxi drivers all asking us where we wanted to go. We told them the name of the beach (Ao Leuk -- it's pronounced Ow-Lock...I think) and they instinctively all laughed. We had no idea why they were laughing and they didn't exactly elaborate. We chose one taxi driver and got in the back of his pick-up truck. (On a side note, most taxis here take some form of pick-up truck form where the passengers sit in the bed). The taxi driver told us he would take us close to the beach but couldn't go all the way there because "the road was bad." After about a seven minute drive we realized two things:

1. We had paid too much for our ride since it was really close and easily walkable (Again, bad job by Lonely Planet).

2. The road was really bad.

Here's a picture of Hannah after she slipped on the road:

As you can see the road is pretty broken up. After this first little fall I took Hannah's bag (big brother points!) so she could go slowly down the incline. While Hannah inched her way along -- and sometimes purposely used her butt sliding technique -- I had an epiphany: this road is no Appalachian Trail! At the rate we were going on this road, we would need at least a year to finish the trail.

Eventually we got to the beach and paid $12 for a bungalow. Besides us, only one other bungalow was occupied (late in the night a couple also came). There were so few people actually staying at the resort that we were actually outnumbered by stray dogs...and one took a shining to us.

Odds and Ends

Here are some other odds and ends from Ko Phanang:

1. I woke up one morning and Hannah was doing pilates on the beach. That was roughly 9 days ago. She's been complaining she was sore up until yesterday.

2. For the most part Lonely Planet has been a pretty poor source of information. Many of the time tables are wrong as well as nearly every quoted price in the book. We've also had much more luck finding tastier food on our own compared to their recommendations. However, they did recommend a kick butt place for sunsets -- Amsterdam Bar. Every night on Ko Phanang Hannah and I would drive up this hill to a bar overlooking the west coast of the island. The place not only had a beautiful view of the sunset but also amazing fruit shakes.

3. Hannah is a slob. Yes, a slob. She has the unbelievable ability to dump out her bag all over a room. This is a picture of a hotel we stayed in just for a night before departing the island. Notice my bag in the foreground versus hers in the background.

4. It seems to me that every place Hannah and I go to Bob Marley's voice is pouring out of the speakers. On Ko Phanang there is even a Bob Marley village near Sallad Beach...and about twenty dudes (Thai and foreign) who look like Bob Marley. This is just a general question: at any given moment, how many beach/island resorts/bars around the world are playing Bob Marley at the same exact time? My guess is at least 10,000. On Ko Phanang alone there are probably 75.

Waterfalls and Crocodiles

Despite my tender ankle, Hannah and I decided to go on a hike to a waterfall. If my injury wasn't enough to turn us back perhaps something more dangerous would. I don't know, maybe something like five guys in Army uniforms carrying M-16 machine guns at the start of the waterfall hike.

Yeah, when Hannah and I arrived at the park and started to hike these five or so guys with freshly polished guns crossed our path. Normally this might be a reason not to go hiking in unfamiliar woods but these guys seemed really friendly as they smiled and waved at us. A smile can really be disarming (although in this case I wish I had the arms).

So, Hannah and I ventured into the jungle. For the record, the voice in my head had spoke out earlier when I told Hannah we wouldn't go on another hike to the highest point on the mountain unless we had a guide. This hike we were told was easy enough to do on our own.

The hike was quite pretty with two different waterfalls and a well marked trail. When we got to the top of the mountain we discovered a sleeping hiker in a hammock and a great view of the island.

As we rested, I asked Hannah what animals were in the jungle. She opened up her Lonely Planet Island edition (thanks for the book, Steve!) and began to read. I forget all of the animals she said except one -- WILD CROCODILES.

Frankly, this scared the crap out of me. I can't remember if I blogged about it earlier this year or not (I'll search in a minute) but I have had FOUR dreams of a crocodile eating either a friend or a family member of mine so far this year (I usually have this dream after eating salty hot pots).
Each time the dream is about me and X (one time even my sister) walking through the woods when a croc jumps out and devours X. I try to fight off the croc in my dreams but soon am chased by it through the woods. When Hannah told me that there were crocodiles in the jungle I had a slight moment of panic. A minute later this appeared from under a rock:

It's hard to tell from this picture but that lizard is at least two feet long. It was a big boy. This lizard didn't scare me so much but it made me start to think, "What if some bigger reptiles are near." Hannah and I soaked in the view for another minute and took off...

Being A Good Big Brother

(PICTURE: this picture was taken at around 7PM on the beach. That's the beach restaurant. To get to this restaurant/our bungalow you need to traverse down a hill which is a heck of a lot darker...)

My ace travel adviser Adam Cooper told me that I had to go to the Ko Phanang night market to sample the "greatest chicken on a stick anywhere in the world."

After watching a beautiful sunset one night, Hannah and I drove to the night market. Unfortunately the chicken stand Adam recommended was out of out of chicken. All they had left were two pork sticks. I tried them and they were delicious. The sauce was really sweet and only peaked my interest on how the chicken would taste. The next night Hannah and I went back again an hour earlier...but the chicken was already sold out. All they had left this time were the chicken innards. I tried them...and they weren't so good.

But that isn't the point of this blog entry. The point is about me trying to be a good big brother. After the night market, Hannah and I rode carefully back to our bungalow. It was dark out but we managed to make it home without a problem...well, almost home. The only problem with the Ocean View Bungalows is that there is no driveway. At night I had to leave my bike parked on the street. From the street down to our bungalow is a treacherous step path with NO LIGHTS. Hannah and I didn't know there were no lights and thus didn't have a flashlight with us (Hannah was given a travel light as a present by a friend and I had my cell phone which handily has a flashlight built into it).

Those that know Hannah know that she's a klutz. A big klutz. She's had many falls in her time including one back in college that had left her with a recently discovered broken bone in her foot (this was discovered AFTER she ran the D.C. marathon). Well, I didn't want any sprains/broken bones on my watch so I told Hannah to wait by the bike (again making her wait alone on the street) so I could go fetch some light. I should tell you now that if you ask my Dad, there are two klutz's in our family. Hannah is one and I'm the other. I made it about four steps down the pitch black path before I twisted my ankle and fell. Whoops. The ankle is broken but it is still sore...a week later.

The Voice In My Head

(PICTURE: Hannah and I were one of only four people I saw who wore helmets.)

When I was a little kid I used to play on a boulder in our neighbor's backyard. That "boulder" I'm sure is no bigger than a Mini Cooper but as a kid it felt huge. Well, my father used to tell me not to play on the rock because I might get hurt. Being the young adventure seeker I was, I didn't listen to him and sure enough eventually fell of and had to get stitches above my left eye.

Probably since that day I've had a voice in my head -- my parents' voice. And well, I always hear the voice ("Be careful", "You can get hurt", "Is that safe", etc. etc.) I don't always listen to it. Traveling with my sister these last couple weeks I've been hearing that voice louder and clearer than ever...and reading it in email form: "Take care of your sister."

Well, the first time I chose to ignore the voice on this trip was when Hannah and I arrived on Ko Phanang. Being an experienced motorbike driver I decided Hannah and I should get a bike to explore the island. I made a compromise with the voice which was yelling at me, "DON'T DO IT!" The compromise was this: I'd get the bike but wouldn't allow Hannah to drive it. Hannah told me she wanted to try when we first got the bike but I said I wouldn't allow her. This is a girl who rented a bike when she lived in Belgium and only rode it one time because, "I can't ride on cobblestone."

Well, Hannah and I got a 125cc Honda Dream and took off for our bungalow. As we pulled out of the bike rental shop I immediately heard a strange noise coming from the motor. I decided to ignore it. A few seconds later I heard another noise -- a screetching from the brakes. I also ignored this too. What I couldn't ignore though were the GIGANTIC hills that we had to climb to get to our side of the moutain. Between Hannah, myself and our two backpacks, our bike had no chance of making it. Within the first ten minutes, Hannah had to get off the bike three times and walk up steep hills. Oh yeah, there was one other thing I couldn't avoid -- Hannah's bear hugs around my stomach. Hannah had never ridden a bike before and was pretty scared. I could tell exactly how scared by how hard she squeezed me...and man, she was squeezing pretty hard. After just a few minutes of fear she told me she didn't want to try and drive the bike anymore.

The problem with going up big hills is that you also have to go down big hills. After starting to go down a huge hill I realized that our brakes were really crappy. I heard that voice in my head and decided to pull over. I dropped Hannah off and rode alone back to the the bike shop we had gotten the Honda at. I complained to the owner and then went with him to the repair shop where two mechanics quickly did a maintenance check on the motorbike. After oiling the gears, tightening the brakes, putting more air in the tires and who knows what else, I took off again and picked Hannah up. I'd liked to say that the bike was good as new, but it really was still kind of crappy.

That said, Hannah LOVED the motorbike. Without the bike we would have been marooned on our isolated beach. With the bike we were able to expolore nearly the whole island (although had to quit a few explorations for lack of decent roads).

Two small funny anecdotes about the bike. In my 7 months of riding a bike in Vietnam I have run out of gas exactly ZERO times. In my three days of riding a bike in Thailand I ran out of gas TWO times...both while going up steep hills. Twice I had to leave Hannah on the side of the rode(by that point I had left her on the side of the road about six times) as I coasted back down to the bottom to get more gasoline.

The other funny story is this: When I first brought back the bike to the owner he told me it was my fault and I didn't know how to ride a motorbike. Well, when I brought the bike back on our last night I paid the owner's assistant money to drive me back to the other side of the island (again having left Hannah so she didn't have to ride the bike with me in the dark). After about two minutes the owner's assistant turned to me and said, "Bike is very bad." Two minutes later he dropped me off on the side of the road because the bike wasn't strong enough to get him and I up the hill.

Ko Samui to Ko Phanang

It turns out that the bathroom at the Ko Samui airport was our favorite part of the island. The rest of the island, although beautiful, felt like a spring break spot. After checking into our hotel Hannah and I went for a walk around the town. The main strip of the town was filled with fast food joints (there were two Burger Kings and two McD's in four blocks), loud bars, and even louder bar girls/hookers/tranies trying to get our attention. This wasn't the island paradise Hannah and I were looking for and quickly decided to head to Ko Phanang the next morning.

We made the most of the night though and ate our first pad thai (one of now dozens), shared our first mango shake (first of dozens) and ate a thai street pancake for dessert (also first of dozens). We ended the night by dipping our feet in the ocean.

The next morning we went to Ko Phanang, an island highly recommended to me by a few people. One of the people who told me about the island is a guy named Adam Cooper who I met in Cambodia back in March. Adam, a California Jew, was traveling with his sister...who also happened to be named Hannah. The Cooper siblings are definitely in the upper echilon of cool people I've met this year and thus I took Adam's words of advice as solid gold. Adam told me to go to Ko Phananag and stay at Ocean View Bungalows on the north side of the island. Hannah, my Hannah, and I rented a motorbike (this will be tomorrow's blog) and drove to the bungalows. Adam Cooper was right -- the place was paradise. The bungalows were on a secluded beach with amazing views and barely a soul in sight. Hannah and I stayed in a bungalow about forty feet from the breaking waves and loved every minute of it. Here's us on a rope swing by our bungalow:

The other reason Cooper told me to stay at the Ocean View Bungalows was because the food at the restaurant was "killer." Well, again he was right. Hannah and I ate nearly all of our meals at the beachside, open air restaurant. The food was simply amazing and still the best food we've eaten on this trip. Equally amazing were the looks we got from the waiters when we ordered enough food for four people.

My Travels With Hannah...

Yes, it is the moment many of you have been impatiently waiting for -- My first blog about Hannah.

On December 6th, Hannah and I met up at Bangkok Airport. This was roughly 48 hours after international flights started to fly back to Thailand after the government protesters took over the airport. However, luck wasn't totally on our side. Right around the time Hannah was leaving our family's house in New Jersey I got this email from Bangkok Air:

Dear MR Benjamin August ,
We would like to apologize for your inconvenience.Please be informed that your flight schedule has been changed for : Your updated itinerary are as below details :Booking Code :PPCXJJ Itinerary PG191 Class : B depart Bangkok (Suvarnabhumi Airport) on 06 Dec 2008 at 20:05 arrive Samui on 06 Dec 2008 at 21:10
(All time are local Thailand/Loas/Cambodia/Vietname= GMT+7,Singapore/China(Xishuangbanna,Xian)=GMT+8) Passenger Adult MR Benjamin AugustAdult MS Hannah August
Total Price :THB 6,140.00 According to the change, please kindly check your connecting time and do nothesitate to contact us if you have short connection. Minimum Connecting Time at Bangkok Airport : International to Domestic 2 hoursDomestic to International 2 hoursInternational to International 1.30 hoursDomestic to Domestic 1.30 hours If you have any query, please do not hesitate to contact us at webhelpdesk@bangkokair.com hopefully to serve you soon.

This was a problem. My flight from HCMC to Bangkok was arriving at 7:15 so I had purposely booked Hannah and I for the 9PM flight. By moving our flight up an hour that would mean I had roughly 45 minutes to connect from the international terminal to the domestic terminal. If you read the bottom of the email the airline suggests two hours to make this connection. Worried that Hannah and I would miss our flight to the island I didn't hesitate to email the helpdesk. They didn't hesitate either in ignoring my email. I sent another email to another person I found on the internet and that person also avoided me. I called the Bangkok costumer help line and they too avoided me. I called the HCMC representitive office and they also ignored my call.

I tried to get in touch with Hannah but she had already left for the airport. I cc'd my mom on the email which was probably a bad idea. This put both my mother and father in a state of panic. I can only assume they thought Hannah would board our flight without me, go to Ko Samui alone and get kidnapped by a rogue Thai group. I believe my mother even tried to have my sister paged at the Newark Airport to tell her about our flight problem (Mom, is that right?).

Anyway, after failing to get in touch with anyone who works for Bangkok Air I made a few decisions:

1. I would arrive at the HCMC airport three hours early and talk to an airline rep there. Having done my homework, I saw that Bangkok Air had a flight going to Bangkok about the same time as my Air Asia flight.

2. I put on running shoes thinking I could sprint at the airport in Bangkok to somehow make my flight.

3. I gave myself confidence by thinking and saying to Hien in HCMC: "I'm not too worried. My sister arrives in Bangkok a few hours before me and I'm sure she'll see the flight has changed and try to get us back on the later flight. She's a really smart girl and will take care of it."

Well, here's how it played out:

I went to the HCMC airport and the Bangkok Airlines rep told me he can only deal with HCMC flights and I would have to fix my problem myself in Bangkok. Yeah, great customer service.

I then got to my boarding gate early for my Air Asia flight so I could get one of the closest seats to the door. Air Asia has open seating (like Southwest Airlines) so I figured I could get off first and run towards customs. I ended up getting the aisle seat on the fifth row. Not bad. When we landed and the doors opened I rushed off the plane while apologizing to other passengers that I had another flight to catch. My quick sprint suddenly stopped when I realized there was a transport vehicle waiting outside to take us from the tarmac to the customs area. I now had to wait for all the other passengers to board the vehicle. While everyone else boarded the vehicle I strategically placed myself by the doors so I could make another quick exit. When the vehicle eventually dropped us off I jumped out and sprinted towards the customs signs. My LHS track skills were evident as I arrived at least 200 yards/1 minute before anyone else.

I was sweating and out of breath as I handed the customs officer my passport -- probably not the first impression you want to make on them. The officer looked me over and after a long, deliberate flip through my passport he gave me a stamp and told me to proceed. I thanked him and took off. I ran past the baggage claim, past the "nothing to declare" signs and into the main part of the Bangkok airport.

Knowing I had a short time to make my flight, earlier in the day I looked at the airport map on the internet and knew exactly where I was going. I ran towards the domestic terminals, past a dozen machine gun carrying army guys who all gave me looks, up two escalators and into the domestic terminal. I immediately ran up to the tv screens with flight information and looked up my flight....which had been CANCELED!!!! Yes, canceled. They canceled my new flight they had just emailed me 24 hours earlier that I was being put on. What the f!!!

I quickly caught my breath and went looking for Hannah. I found her sitting on a chair, calm as could be and hit her on the head with my printed out itinerary and yelled: "Our flight is canceled!" Hannah looked at me and said, "Really? It said our flight was on time." I said, "Did you happen to check your email or look at the flight information?" "No." "Our flight was changed." "Really?" Yeah, so much for my "smart sister" taking care of it!

So Hannah and I went up to the Bangkok Airlines check in and was told by the woman that our flight had been cancelled....but that she'd put us on the 9PM flight. Yeah, the same flight I had booked us for! All that stress for nothing!!!!

Hannah and I checked in, gave each other hugs and eventually got on our plane. The flight was only an hour to the islands and was pretty uneventful...except for that small part when we were coming in for a landing, pretty low to the ground and close to the runway and all of a sudden our plane quickly pulled up back into the sky. Hannah and I looked at each other and started to laugh -- "uh, that isn't normal right?". Everyone on the plane gave each other concerned looks (and looks at us wondering why we were laughing) until the captain got on the PA system and said, "There is an electrical problem at the airport. We will land when it is fixed." Apparently the lights went out on the runway.

A few minutes later we landed and got our first taste of tropical air. We knew we were in for a good trip when we both came back from the airport bathrooms raving about the facilities. The men's bathroom had a fish tank over the urinals. Yeah, can you say paradise!!!

Chi

(PICTURE: Chi not cooperating in posing for a picture.)

When I return to Language Link in January, Chi, one of my favorite people will be gone. Chi, an all around amazing person, left Language Link the same day I did...for another branch of Language Link. We're going to miss you at Cat Linh, Chi!

Zebras

I've been told time and again that Hanoi gets really cold in winter. At first I brushed this off thinking that Vietnamese people were just used to warm weather. However, it has been downright freezing this fall making me think that winter will be ice cold.

I think the main reason that it is so cold is that no buildings have heat. And for that matter, they probably don't have insulation either. So, I came up with a plan -- ADULT ONESIES. Yeah, onesies. I'm talking about an adult version of those adorable little outfits that infants wear. Well, I told the idea to Huyen and she thought it was really funny so we went to a tailor to see if it could be done. I printed up some pictures from online of exactly what I wanted (I'm not reinventing the wheel here since you can actually buy them online). The tailors looked at the pictures and laughed but said it was doable.

The next step was Huyen and I getting fabric. We went to the fabric market and searched high and low until we found the perfect material and pattern. We went with a 75% cotton, 15% wool blend which is both comfortable and warm.

Before I left the onesies weren't finished (they had forgotten to make us our butt-flaps and didn't sew on the shoes) but they let us try them on. Check it out:

Happy Birthday, Ryan!

Happy Birthday, Ryan! Sorry I'm not in Hanoi to help celebrate. Glad you're creeping closer and closer to my age!

Cross Cultural Relationships

(PICTURE: The weirdest thing about dating Huyen is not that she still yanks out my white hairs when I'm not looking.)

I've been asked a few times what the strangest thing is about dating a Vietnamese girl. Well, that answer is really simple: It's waking up in the middle of the night to your girlfriend talking in her sleep...in Vietnamese.

What's even stranger is the next morning when you try to use your rudimentary Vietnamese skills to tell her what she was saying: "Um, you kept saying...'"

Vietnamese Cereal

(PICTURE: My morning cereal on the sidewalk.)

I have never been much of a cereal eater. I've always preferred eggs or pancakes or leftover pizza or Chinese food. Perhaps it is because I'm slightly lactose intolerant or because I always found cereal commercials irritating as a kid (just give the rabbit some damn Trix!).

However, I've recently found a cereal I like in Vietnam. It's called sticky rice. You eat it in a bowl with a spoon just like cereal. It's delicious!
(PICTURE: Huyen and I eating breakfast.)

Tailgate

(PICTURE: My Dad and brother at the tailgate a few years/pounds ago...)

A couple weeks ago while I was eating some strange meat on a sidewalk I had a flash of homesickness:

One of the things I miss most about home is that it is football season. And no, I don't miss watching games. I miss tailgating. My family has had NY Jets season tickets since the Jets played at Shea Stadium. I have always loved going to football games with my dad and brother but it wasn't until about a decade ago that we started to get the full football experience -- we joined the best damn tailgate in the world.

Every once in a while I get a nice reminder from my brother what I'm missing. He sent me this email in October:

forgot to tell you that we had 2 deep fried turkeys at the tailgate this weekend. we also had lamb shish-kabobs and I brought two steaks marinated in a "texas teriyaki" sauce that I found. It was teriyaki with the kick of cayenne peppers.

(PICTURE: The traditional "toilet bowl" dessert. The bowl was painted by my brother a few years ago. It made him a legend at the tailgate.)

Man, I would kill for some tailgate right now.

Weasel Coffee

A couple weeks ago Ryan and I finally tried weasel coffee. From what we had heard, weasel coffee is the best coffee in Vietnam. Sounds great, right? Well, you just have to get over exactly how the coffee got into your cup.

Here's the basic recap on how weasel coffee is made:

Step 1: A weasel approaches a coffee berry.
Step 2: A weasel eats said coffee berry.
Step 3: A weasel regurgitates said berry.
Step 4: The regurgitated coffeee berry is collected.
Step 5: The coffee berry is brewed.

Apparently other Asian countries have similar coffee that is passed through the digestive tracts of their local weasels. According to wikipedia this type of coffee is the most expensive in the world per pound. Vietnamese weasel coffee is a little cheaper since our weasels only puke it up and don't shit it out. Honestly though, you really do need that shit flavor to get that absolutely perfect cup of coffee.

The Dirtiest Bathrom Ever. Period.

(PICTURE: Don't forget to brush your teeth.)

From time to time I've posted some blogs of things that aren't exactly up to my hygiene standards. Well, this one takes the cake. For months I've been meaning to bring a camera with me to this sidewalk restaurant my Vietnamese frisbee friends and I go to after we play on Saturdays.

The food at the bia hoi is great but the bathroom, well, it's pretty disgusting. The thing is, I've been in dirty bathrooms before and you'll never hear me complain. I mean, I lived in a fraternity house for a semester; dirty bathrooms are no big deal as long as I'm wearing shoes or sandals. The thing that gets me about this bathroom though is that above the urinals is a cup holding a toothbrush and toothpaste. That's right, this is the bathroom for the family who owns the bia hoi. You would think that they'd want to remove that cup before an assortment of roughly 40+ drunk men use their toilet every night. But hey, maybe I'm just anal.

To Hannah´s Friends and Family

I have heard some complaints that I have not posted anything about Hannah yet. I urge all of you to be patient. Between bonding with my sister, the skyrocketing costs of internet, lazily relaxing on the beach, etc. etc., I have not had the time to post blogs. It was with this foresight that I had pre written a dozen or so entries.

I promise there will be tons of posts in the near future about my hilarious and clumsy sister. Again, ahoyhanoi urges patience...from you too, mom!

P.S. If some punctuation is wrong in this it is because I´m typing on a Thai keyboard that doesn´t allow me to use dashes or question marks. That is why I purposely didn´t write any questions in this entry.

English Festival Part II

The day after the English Festival, Tuan, one of my Intermediate 2 students came up to me at Language Link and said, "You are a very famous teacher." I laughed, thanked him and then curiously asked why. He looked at me and said, "You were the judge at the English Festival." I asked Tuan if he was there since he is a father of three and perhaps one of his children was in the contest. He said: "No. I saw you on television."

Yeah, apparently it was televised.

English Festival 2008!

I'm not exactly sure how it happened, but two weeks ago I was the "Foreigner Judge" for the 2008 Hanoi English Festival. Basically each school district in Hanoi sent one or two teams to the contest to perform an English themed song/play/dance/etc.

There was a three judge panel: me, a Vietnamese professor from Hanoi University who teaches English and some dude who must have stolen his outfit from a clown (he was wearing a ridiculous plaid jacket with a bright red and white striped button down shirt...but he spoke English really well).

We had to give the performances a score in four different categories: pronunciation, fluency, performance and outfits. I took the judging quite seriously and was shocked to find out in the end that this was just the semi-finals. Out of the 36 performances we had to select 19 for the finals. I was asked to judge the finals but unfortunately/fortunately I'll be traveling with my sister.

Here were some of the highlights:

1. The judge to my left went to the bathroom before a performance and came back as they were finishing. He sat down and without asking my opinion or glancing at my score card wrote his grades for all four categories. He gave them a 70 out of 100. I had scored them as an 88, one of my highest scores.

2. The two salsa dances. Yes, salsa. Your guess is as good as mine why they think salsa is English themed.

3. When the first salsa dance ended I turned to the head of the contest and said, "Um, they didn't speak any English. How do I score that?" The woman said to me, "Give them a score on how they made you feel." They made me feel pretty good. I gave them an 85.

4. Before the contest began the professor told me that Vietnamese people had a different opinion on what made a costume "beautiful." It turns out he was right. I gave high scores for the schools who had put together original outfits. He gave high scores to the schools who didn't wear any outfit except their own school uniform.

5. The contest was four hours long and prior to it I had drunk a bunch of water. I had to pee really badly around the three hour mark and asked the professor where the bathroom was. He told me he'd show me...in the middle of a performance. I said, "Lets wait till the school finishes" but he gave me a look that blatantly said, "Why? What's wrong with you?" So I got up and went to the bathroom with the professor.

6. The English themed dance that was ten boys wearing Yao Ming's Houston Rockets jersey and passing basketballs to each other.

7. After the contest having scores of children and teachers ask to take their picture with me. If only they knew I still don't know when to use, "He and I" or "Me and him."

Masks

I've been asked a few times if I, "wear one of those masks." "Those masks" is a reference to the masks that many Asian people wear on their motorbikes...and sometimes when walking on the street...and sometimes on airplanes...and on buses...and in restaurants...and...

I can recall a few times in America seeing an Asian person wearing a mask and thinking, "They must be sick." Well, that's not why they wear them. They wear them to keep the dust out of their mouths and noses and to protect their skin from the sun.

And the answer to the question is, "Yes." In fact, I've got a ton of masks. See if you can guess which of the masks in the above photos aren't mine.

Mad Libs

I have a fun writing exercise that I do with some of my more advanced classes. It was inspired by both Mad Libs...although is really quite different than Mad Libs. Yes, I want full credit for this genius idea.

Basically I write a sentence on the top of a piece of paper. i.e. "Jeremy met the girl of his dreams..." or "Brett joined the circus...." or "Jennifer had really big feet...".

In my classes I use all Vietnamese names except for my own name. I have enough pieces of paper for everyone in the class and tell the students they have thirty seconds to write the next sentence in the story. After thirty seconds I yell "switch" and everyone rotates their paper. The students then read the first two lines and then write the third. We do this over and over until everyone gets back their original paper. While the students are doing this I'm correcting the grammar (yes, it's still ironic to me, Mom, that I'm correcting grammar) and writing sentences on the board that we fix together as a class.

The students all like this game and then get to practice talking when they tell the class their story. Well, on my last day at school I did this with my Intermediate II class and got a great story. In case you can't read the picture above, here's the translation:

Ben died and went to heaven...
His girlfriend cried a lot.
After that, she had a new boyfriend immediately.
That guy was so handsome.
Especially the new boyfriend of Ben's girlfriend was much healtheir than Ben..
He loved her very much.
So Ben's ex girlfriend felt happier than when she fell in love with Ben.
One day she died and went to heaven too.
She met Ben there.
At first, Ben was so angry and complained her a lot.
Then he said he was healtheir than he was in the past.
After dying, Ben went to the gym everyday.
He had a nice body.
Another beautiful girl felt in love with him.

My Driver's License

(PICTURE: Bam! My new license!)

(Picture: A closer look. Don't I look strange in my photo? Yes, Dad stranger than usual.)

Great news! I can officially drive in Vietnam. Yes, I know what you're saying: "Ben, you've been driving in Vietnam for 9 months." Well, yes, that's true. I've been driving/riding a motorbike since the first week I arrived in Hanoi. However, this license allows me to drive a car! I can now rent a car and drive it to my heart's content. That said, I haven't seen any car rental places in Hanoi.

As far as my motorbike license goes...well, I still don't have that one. When I get back from my vacation I have to take a police physical and then take the road test (which I will drive to without a license).

The Opera House

(PICTURE: Huyen outside the Opera House)

The Hanoi Opera House was the last place in Hanoi I've been wanting to see. Well, check it off the list. I bought Huyen and I tickets for the Opera House to see a highly acclaimed Russian pianist perform with the Hanoi Symphony Orchestra.

After taking a bus, a boat, a van, a bus and a taxi, Huyen and I arrived back in Hanoi with an hour to spare before the show. We quickly showered and jumped on my bike to go to the Opera House.

The Opera House, according to Wikipedia was: erected by French colonists between 1901 and 1911. The Hanoi Opera House is considered to be a typical French colonial architectural monument in Vietnam and is also a small-scale replica of the Palais Garnier, the older of Paris's two opera houses.

The place was beautiful and the acoustics were tremendous. The concert was also magnificent. Besides the music, the highlight was when a baby started to cry...in the second row...in the middle of the piano solo.

Yeah, who brings an infant to a symphony concert? And how did the baby have better seats than me!

Cat Ba Day 2: The Cave

While riding around the island on our rented motorbike, Huyen and I saw this sign along the side of a road:

We decided to take a look and pulled onto a skinny path. Literally three seconds after parking our bike this man pulled up behind us on his own bike:

The man told us he was the tour guide for the cave and told us it would cost 15,000 VND each to see the cave. At first I was skeptical that this guy was just ripping us off but soon realized he was legit. We followed him to the entrance of a cave where there was a padlocked door built into the stone. The man pulled out a key and opened the door.

We followed the tour guide into the darkness where he searched and found two flashlights. He handed Huyen a light and kept one for himself. He then began to walk through the cave which was an intricate three story building built by the Chinese during the American-Vietnamese War.

It turns out the building was a secret hospital to treat wounded Vietnamese soldiers. The only thing to compare the cave system to would be the Cu Chi tunnels in the south (you can search my blog for my entry about those). However, this place was very different since it was a legitimate building built inside a mountain and not underground.


Huyen and I hadn't been expected to see what we saw but that's always the best part of just jumping on/in a bike/car/etc. and exploring a city/island/etc. without an itinerary.