Treat Yo'self Day(s) in Hanoi and Halong Bay

After a brief respite in Phong Nha and Dong Hoi (the city with the airport closest to Phong Nha), I suddenly found myself back in the hubub of a Southeast Asian city and determined to find a proper escape from the nonstop honking and near-death experiences each time I crossed the street. And so, my arrival in Hanoi morphed into Treat Yo'self Day: I got a leg wax, a Vietnamese coffee scrub, and my first-ever pedicure (in Barbie pink, of course!) at a spa.

Touring Hoan Kiem Lake as the sun set over my Treat Yo'self Day

I paid (for the first and last time this month) to have someone else do my laundry. I picked up my big souvenirs for the month's travels: two gorgeous handmade lacquer ceramic vases. A local art, all sorts of unusual vases are sold all over Vietnam, but I have to say, these two were my favorites.

Vases from VietCraft which went on to fill up the bulk of my carry-on backpack for the rest of my travels across SE Asia.

And finally, I signed up for a luxury one-night cruise on the Halong Bay.

Halong Bay: so promising before the thunderstorms rolled in

Sadly, like all good things, Treat Yo'self Day had to come to an end, and did so distinctly before the cruise began. While the vases remain an intact remnant of that lovely day, the rest of the day's luxuries rapidly disintegrated, first of which was certainly the "luxury" cruise. Despite the positive reviews on tripadvisor, I entered my room to see a stream of water flowing down one wall. With not-so-distant memories of another Vietnamese room flood coming to mind, I preemptively stacked my luggage on my bed and was very grateful for the forethought when I returned later that night to find the same sort of musical performance pattering against my floorboards as had visited my bunkbed just a few days prior, back in Ho Chi Minh City. The key difference, however, was that this time I had paid 20 times more for the same deal! After a night spent spooning my suitcases, I was reimbursed a total of approximately $6, or 1/30 of the cost of the cruise. Coupled with the cloud cover and evening thunder storms, Halong Bay was an all around disappointment. Beyond an enjoyable hour-long kayak trip, I pretty much wasted my money on this one. I am not confident that these countries have mastered the concept of customer service as it pertains to luxury tourist experiences.

Halong Bay cruise, complete with visit to a pearl farm, kayaking, spring roll cook/prep lessons, and one very leaky room.

An unexpected challenge in Vietnam was the quest for some decent food. While ingredients often tasted fresh, Vietnam fell short of Thai standards when it came to rich, intense flavors and vegetarian options. And beware of their meats: unlike the Thai, Vietnamese openly acknowledge eating dogs, and the reality shows in the countries' respective populations of stray dogs. That said, I did manage to stumble across a few real finds. The most memorable was The Lantern Lounge (2nd floor, 80 Ma May, Hoan Kiem, Hanoi), where we sat on pillows, the dim room lit by the soft hues of a hundred different brightly colored lanterns. (You can see a photo in the bottom left corner of the collage.) Here, my pineapple curry fried rice was actually served to me in a fresh pineapple. The relaxed atmosphere felt miles away from the street one floor below. And on my last day, I discovered the Lucky Day Restaurant (62 Hang Bo St., Hoan Kiem, Hanoi), where the service was shockingly slow but the end product worth the wait: The fried noodles and seafood were the most fresh and flavorful dish I had across Vietnam. 

Dining in Hanoi

Generally, to give Hanoi some credit, it has more charm than Ho Chi Minh City. The Old Quarter can be a lot of fun for meandering. The narrow winding streets give this part of town an intimate feel. And the city stays up late and wakes early, so no matter your schedule, you'll be entertained.

Wandering through Hanoi, mostly the Old Quarter

I spent my final day in Hanoi visiting the Ho Chi Minh Museum and Mausoleum. I was surprised by how artistically the museum had been curated. The displays were all beautifully presented. There were many families visiting with children, and the young visitors enthusiastically posing in salute next to images of Ho Chi Minh seemed somehow very sweet.

Me at the Ho Chi Minh Museum

Exhibits from the Ho Chi Minh Museum artistically illustrate the Vietnam War, and Ho Chi Minh's struggles, strategies, and victories.

The Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum

I was surprised by how much I'd enjoyed the museum, as it was a last minute thought to throw it into my itinerary. Ending the city and country on a high point was a great way to wrap things up. After a brisk walk back to my hostel, I hopped a taxi, Thai iced tea in hand, vases carefully wrapped up in my backpack, and bags carefully loaded. Next destination: Luang Prabang, Laos.

Recommendations: 

If you do Halong Bay, try to book according to the weather forecast, and above all, avoid Majestic Cruises!

Worth checking out: The Lantern Lounge, the Ho Chi Minh Museum 

Jungle trekking, cave swimming, and hammock camping

From the moment I arrived in my Lake House Resort in Phong Nha on the night before my scheduled two-day caving trek, I knew I'd come to the right place. This place was a 45 minute drive from an airport so small that it actually shuts down in between scheduled flights. There was more traffic from cows than cars on the road to Phong Nha.

Not in Saigon anymore: More traffic from cows than motor vehicles in and around Phong Nha

There was a soft silence and calm for which I'd begun to ache. And the beauty of the nature was nearly heartbreaking for someone coming from the smoggy cities not so far away.

The Phong Nha Lake House Resort where I stayed the night before my caving trek.

The Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park is on the UNESCO World Heritage list. Its karst formations have evolved since the Paleozoic era (~400 million years old), making it the oldest karst formations in Asia. The park covers 104 km (~65 miles) of underground caves and rivers, including Sơn Đoòng Cave, discovered in 2009, the world's largest cave, so big it can fit a Boeing 747 in its largest cavern. (That's just one reason I have to return to this region!)

Our trek began near the misty karst mountains by base camp.

The hiking crew setting off for our two-day trek

For my time in Phong Nha, I opted to explore the Tu Lan caves. 

On our second morning, we swam into Tu Lan Cave, shown here, one of the four caves on our trek.

The Tu Lan cave circuit included four caves: Hang Ken, Hang Kim, Hung Ton, and Tu Lan caves. And the overnight trek also included a barbecue (with vegetarian options!) and camping in hammocks in the jungle. But the biggest selling feature of this trek was the fact that these four caves are filled with water, and exploring them involves swimming through them with headlamps and waterproof backpacks.

Venturing in for our first cave swim!

Group photo deep within Ken Cave.

Floating and swimming through in the dark cavernous caves was just one extended awestruck moment filled with the realization that I was living one of the cooler experiences that I will ever have in life.

Chilling before dinner outside the Ken Cave.

My fellow hikers also did a lot of to round out the experience with their interesting life stories. And a pair of them were even doing this trek as part of their honeymoon. How cool is that?

Kicking off Day 2 of the trek

I also can't go without mentioning my caving team. I went with Oxalis Adventure Tours, which I would highly recommend. The guides were professional, very good at English, attentive and yet not overly protective. Porters hiked ahead of us with the camping equipment, but the trek wasn't for the weak of heart. There were very minimal railings and no trail markers along the way, but it also wasn't too vicious: when one of the hikers started showing signs of fatigue early on, the guides phoned back to base for an extra porter so that our fellow hiker could keep pace. And in the evening, the tour guides cooked us dinner and chatted with us about their lives. Overall Oxalis does a great job of giving a non-touristy jungle trek to small groups interested in diving deep into nature for a few days.

Our Tu Lan trekking guides

Phong Nha was the best part of my travels through Vietnam. I sincerely hope to return one day. And with over 100 km of caves in the area, there's definitely much more to see!

Two-day one-night Oxalis Tu Lan Cave Encounter

Recommendations:
Check out Oxalis's caving company!

Pack Teva hiking sandals for the swimming instead of using proper hiking boots

Saigon, Cu Chi, and the Mekong Delta

Country #3 on the grand tour: Vietnam. Finally, here, I'd scheduled several stops as traveling north through the country. I began down south in Ho Chi Minh City, formerly known as Saigon (a name whose usage still appears pretty frequently throughout the city). The heat was a mere 35 or so Celsius against Cambodia's 40+ Celsius (triple digits Fahrenheit), but when coupled with the humidity and the smog, the midday heat was still hardly bearable. As soon as I planted my bags in the dorm and ventured down the street, I wondered just how welcome I would be as an American: parades of blended civilian and military-dress people were marching down the streets and saluting. Children played around papier mache tanks, and posters advertized month-long celebrations marking the fortieth anniversary of the capture of Saigon, that same victory which spelled defeat for my own countrymen. Continue with caution, I figured.

My fears quickly allayed, it seemed that every local I encountered was pleased by my presence, especially those who could convince me to loosen my purse strings. And given the prices here, that didn't take much persuasion. I quickly settled in at an outdoor cafe with some fresh fruit juices to watch a 40th anniversary celebratory concert which, after some frighteningly angry Communist chanting to kick things off, was generally pretty entertaining.

The beginnings of April 2015's month-long celebrations of the 40th anniversary of the taking of Ho Chi Minh City. Westerners welcome.

I had an early start to the following day in order to catch a tour through the Mekong Delta. Honestly, if I were to do this again, I'd skip it entirely. Unless you have a half-week to a week to go through on your own for an authentic feel for the place, it's not so worth the travel time. Our tour took us through four different islands where locals briefly showed us a craft, livelihood, or tradition and promptly tried to shove associated products down our faces. Yes, the beehives were cool, as were the traditional dances and song. It was interesting to watch the regionally ubiquitous coconut candies in production (even though they were nearly impossible to dislodge from my teeth) and watching crocodiles pant like dogs in the heat was thoroughly entertaining. That said, I could have done without the tour and, most especially, the sexual advances from my tour guide. The only plus was that he so thoroughly targeted every female on the tour that the Japanese, Chinese, and Western tourists were all banding together and doing our best to make jokes across our diverse cultures to protect each other and ease the tension.

The Mekong Delta- worth more than a day trip if you want to really experience it

The Cu Chi tunnels, on the other hand, were absolutely worth the visit. The trip was powerful, inspirational, and a little depressing. Our guide showed us just how narrow this tunnel system was, and I felt amazed by the lengths to which the people were willing to go to protect their homeland. Then the guide showed us a series of tiger traps built from scrap metal from US bombs in order to bring unsuspecting US soldiers to grisly ends. And in case the demonstrations of the actions of the various traps with a bamboo stick wasn't enough, their were paintings of US soldiers with characture-esquely white facial features falling into pits screaming with blood shooting out. I looked at them and imagined all the poor young men drafted against their will, andd it made me so sad. Our guide didn't make light of the traps, but obviously approached the issue from another perspective. Our guide showed us many little tricks the people developed to help support life over extended periods in the underground tunnel network. Smoke from underground kitchens was directed through narrow tunnels and out into gaps between tree roots, where fallen leaves could hide the ventilation and were replaced daily to prevent US soldiers from becoming suspicious over charred leaves. The locals also built shoes with wider heels than toes so that any footprints they left behind indicated they'd been walking in the opposite direction. I was so impressed by the locals' ingenuity, and left with no question as to why they'd won the war. Wrapping up our tour, the guide, who was my age, served us boiled tapioca which we dipped in ground peanuts, and explained to us that this and rice were the extent of his diet, three meals per day, every day of the week, as a kid in the late '80s and early '90s. Thinking back to the hot pot I'd had the night before and the street foods I'd enjoyed alongside locals, I was astounded to taste such a stark symbol of how this country's wealth has evolved over the course of my lifetime. It's amazing to observe the resilience and resourcefulness of these people.

The Cu Chi Tunnels

Back in the city, the joys of hoteling reared their ugly head once again. The first installment of hostel fun had arrived on night 1 in Bangkok, where a minute's abandonment of my towel in my shower stall in order to run back and lock up my wallet which I'd accidentally left on my bed resulted in an hour sitting outside the stall listening to the musical aftermath of someone else's night out drinking, followed by another hour of airing out my towel before I was brave enough to attempt using it on my freshly bathed body. Here, I returned home to make two rather unpleasant discoveries: 1. the floor in my dorm was slightly tilted toward my corner of the room, and 2. this tilt was made evident by the leaky air conditioning unit that had exclusively flooded the space under my bed where I had had the misfortune of leaving all my luggage. But in case that wasn't enough fun, the aforementioned leaky air conditioner sooner began an irregular pattern of rain onto my pillow. Not exactly the recipe for a good night's sleep (or two). Finally I even had to move for my last night to the hostel across the street, a move I regretted as I had so enjoyed the company of (some of) the fellow hostelers back where I'd begun.

Among interesting encounters, one toward the top of the list throughout the month was an American historian/trial lawyer/Vietnam vet who was staying in this first (flooded) hostel. He had the kindness and patience of an archetypal grandpa coupled with some fascinating life stories which he shared over a dinner one evening. He's made a historical investigation into his personal life project, and it has led him to many interesting and unexpected destinations on the quest for the truth. I'm looking forward to seeing his work published soon.

Good food, good company: Shared Vietnamese hot pots with an American Vietnam vet who shared his compelling life story

It was towards the end of my time in this city that I began to notice something strange: it is now significantly easier for me to understand the French than heavily-accented Australians or New Zealanders. Given that the latter share my native language, I was rather taken aback.

Over drinks at this bar with some fellow hostelers, I came to realize just how much easier it's become for me to understand Parisian French than Australian English. Not something I'd expected to discover on my travels.

My last morning, I discovered a surprisingly trendy cafe with Nordic decor, where I enjoyed the most relaxing moment I'd had in the past half-week. The Vietnamese are quite fond of coffee and have their own particularly strong way of preparing it, though any of their many coffee cafes will serve you in a dozen or more different styles to your heart's desire. In retrospect, these cafes merited more of my time in Saigon. They likely would have served as the Vietnamese equivalent of Bangkok's temples for me: little oases in the middle of the insanity of a Southeast Asian city. 

The noisy, smoggy, fast-paced lifestyle of Ho Chi Minh City

Recommendations:

Make sure to take the time to relax and escape the fast-paced city in one of the many coffeehouses like Alo Trà (address: 212 Lê Lai Bến Thành Quận 1 Bến Thành Quận 1 Hồ Chí Minh, Vietnam)

Take a half-day to check out the Cu Chi tunnels

Angkor, the mother of all temple complexes

Next stop on the grand tour of Southeast Asia: Siem Reap, Cambodia, home of Angkor Wat, many other temple complexes, several capitals of the Khmer Empire dating from the 9th to 15th centuries, and the remains of the world's largest pre-industrial city. (Thank you, wikiTravel.)

From the get-go, this place was a surprise. The hotel-provided taxi service arrived in the form of a tuk-tuk, a vehicle I'd carefully avoided in Bangkok. Soon I found myself loaded up in an open-air cart-type structure hooked up to the back of a motorbike. (As I said in my last entry, people in Southeast Asia will strap about anything on a motorbike!) The ride was bumpy, but not entirely unpleasant. As long as I kept a firm grip on my sunhat, the wind rushing through my hair was quite welcome, even if it came with quite a lost of dust.

My first tuk-tuk ride

My second surprise came just a few minutes later when, short on cash to pay the hotel, my tuk-tuk drove me around the corner to withdraw. Here, I found that the ATM was spitting out US dollars! Only later did I discover that they do also have their own currency, which they use as a substitute for US coins. Basically, instead of getting 50 cents in change, you'll find yourself being handed a couple of Cambodian bills.

On that first night in Cambodia, I met an elderly American man with his Cambodian escort, and we ended up sharing conversation over dinner at our hotel. He had a life story, one that was sad, even tragic, at times, and at other moments left him very much the one at fault. Getting to hear one person's life path that would bring him to a retirement spent half-time in Southeast Asia (and in the company of much younger women) rather amazed me, perhaps because it is so easy to imagine such a character as a monster, which he wasn't. It was rather fascinating to see the embodiment of a stereotype in flesh and blood, to see a human being at once very flawed yet still very human.

I planned two full days around Angor Wat to explore the temples, and I'm pleased to say that I found this to be enough. Things kicked off with sunrise at Angor Wat on Day 1. This called for a wake-up call around 4am, which meant we were already roughing it, especially in my book.

Sunrise over Angor Wat

Angkor Wat

After a few hours at Angkor Wat, my tuk-tuk driver and I began doing the rounds of the temples. I quickly learned that there were two main architectural styles: Hindu (12th-13th centuries), marked by three large, central towers in a row; and Buddhist (13th-14th centuries), marked by entryways topped with four faces of the Buddha, one looking out in each cardinal direction. This region transitioned from predominantly Hindu to Buddhist during the height of the temple building era.

Angkor Archeological Park, Day 1

I distinctly recall an overwhelming frustration that I had been so oblivious to this clearly extraordinary culture and civilization which had flourished in what my history books referred to as the "Dark Ages," which were clearly a period that was anything but dark in this part of the world. That said, these parts had their own darkness in much more recent memory, the remnants of which still walk, or hobble, through the streets today. At the end of our first day touring the temples, my tuk-tuk driver took me to some killing fields right near Siem Reap. Here, a memorial stood to the nameless victims, their skeletons dug out of the mass graves and put on display behind glass walls. Donors who had "generously" helped fund the memorial with as little as $5 US were listed by name, such was the value of money here. It made me feel sick.

A Khmer Rouge killing fields memorial.
I've superimposed a close-up of what peers back at visitors from behind the glass panels at the top of the memorial's stairs to capture its relative emotional size, in hopes of conveying the bewildering experience of seeing this firsthand.

The emotional exhaustion was compounded by the positively overwhelming heat, which was like nothing I have ever known. Determined to see as many temples I could manage, I pushed on and plowed through water bottle after water bottle, practically swimming in my perspiration as temperatures soared through the hundreds Fahrenheit and humidity climbed steadily higher. I was rather horrified to discover that no matter how humid it felt, my handwashed clothing still dried in just an hour or two at such temperatures. I wanted to scream, how could this air possibly hold any more moisture?! At night I slept in undergarments without even a sheet and still felt cozy. Cambodia's weather showed no mercy.

On Day 2, we ventured far out from most of the temple complexes to visit Banteay Srei, the Lady Temple. With all its finely carved and well-preserved detail, this was probably the coolest temple after Angor Wat itself, and was well-worth the extra fee to venture far off the beaten path. Banteay Srei is a Hindu temple completed in 967 AD, but significantly renovated in the 11th and 12th centuries. Over the years it was forgotten, only to be rediscovered by explorers in the early 20th century.

Angkor Archeological Park, Day 2

Another highlight was the macaques we spotted along the side of the road in between temples. Apparently they're a friendly species and children often grow up playing with them, though my driver told me that they'd frightened him as a child.

Macaques like to play on the side of the roads near the Angkor temples. They will reach up and try to grab things straight out of your hands. And the weirdest thing is to realize how eerily human those hands feel.

Besides the temples, one of the coolest things I saw in and around Siem Reap was the leather carving, and honestly I regret not having splurged to pick up a piece along the way. The decorative carved leather figures were used for Sbek Thom, a shadow puppetry performance recognized by UNESCO as an Intangible Heritage of Humanity. These shadow puppets were used only several times a year for performances on important holidays. Under the Khmer Rouge regime in the late 1970s, the art was nearly destroyed, but work has been done to preserve the art over the past few decades.

Traditional Khmer leather carvings on display

To be honest, I didn't make the purchase as I'd found myself so much on the defensive trying to evade locals attempting to sell me anything and everything. I found the people really straining, especially the children. They seemed to have an uncanny ability to memorize every word you said as you entered a temple and to be able to throw it back at you on your way out in an effort to convince you to purchase from them, reminding you that they didn't have the money for school and just wanted to study. It was heartbreaking. Many of the temples had little bandstands set up where land mine victims performed traditional music with their worn-out prosthetics propped against the side of the stage. It ripped my heart out, but I couldn't afford to pay every one of these groups. And I had to bear this with the knowledge that the proceeds from my ticket sales for the visit of these temples wouldn't even reach the locals: the king of Cambodia sold the rights for Angkor Wat, Cambodia's top tourist destination, to the Vietnamese government, a neighbor and fierce rival of the Cambodians, for a period of 99 years. What a maddening world in which these people find themselves trapped. 

A land mine victim band plays traditional Cambodian music outside a temple.

Yet even when I tried to escape the sadness at the end of the day in my go-to place, a massage parlor, I was shocked to discover that the masseuse who had worked on my back for the last hour was actually a blind land mine victim! Apparently many blinded land mine victims are employed as massage therapists due to their heightened sense of touch. It's great to see that they can find work, but it made me all the more aware that in this country, there is no escaping their bloody past. On that note, I can recommend one fantastic piece of literature which helps capture the story of a family under the Khmer Rouge, First The Killed My Father by Loung Ung. If there was one souvenir I am very glad to have picked up from this country, that book is it. And reading it as I traveled through the region made the story all the more powerful.

By the time my tuk-tuk drove me to the airport on my third morning in Siem Reap, Cambodia, I was more than ready to move on to my next destination.

Recommendations: read Loung Ung's First They Killed My Father and The Lucky Child

The Big Mango

Let's get one thing clear from the get-go: this post's time stamp is a lie. It marks the date I wrapped up my time in Bangkok, but it's hardly the moment when I found a chance to sit and write. Turns out that powering across Southeast Asia in just a month doesn't leave a lot of time for blogging, hardly even for selecting the photos for a daily facebook post. And returning home to jetlag, mutliple rounds of friends visiting, and a few trips scattered through Europe in between preparing to move out of Paris and attempting to catch up once more with each of my friends in the city of lights, well, it doesn't leave much time to document an amazing series of adventures from the other side of the world. So here I am, sitting on a bus heading back to Aarhus (I'll fess up: it's already late May), and I am trying to find a way to summarize an eye-opening, bewildering, and exhausting month of exploration while on the brink of beginning a new life as a postdoc in a small(ish) Danish city.

A random smattering of Bangkok

I began my grand tour of Southeast Asia in Bangkok, aka The Big Mango. Here, I discovered the true meaning of the phrase "the city that never sleeps." The steady flow of heavy traffic at all hours of the day and night sets the tone for this hectic city. Even on our night bike tour with our hostel owner, we found ourselves battling to dodge traffic.

Night biking through the Big Mango with out hostel owner

I also learned that people here will put just about anything (and any quantity of it, challenging the limits of physical possibility) on the back of a motorbike. You have to admire their industriousness.

Defying gravity: the Thai will put anything and everything (and as much of it as possible) on a motorbike

Juxtapositions between modernity and poverty were striking: on day one, I found that the metro system was modern, comfortable, even fully air-conditioned, but try to transfer onto a bus and you'll find yourself in a rickety vehicle with seats resembling school desk chairs nailed to the wooden floors, and a woman with a change tin walking around the bus in between stops to collect fares. 

In every direction, the cacophony of novel and exotic sounds, smells, and colors could easily become overwhelming, especially when blanketed in a tropical heat. And so the temples were a welcome respite from the energy of the city outside their walls. I made a point to visit Wat Pho and Wat Arun, two temples boasting very different styles.

Wat Pho

Wat Pho was built between 1656 and 1783, though it later underwent some major renovations. Not only was it a holy site, but it is also Thailand's first public university. Here, King Rama III had scholars collect the wisdom of the age on topics such as poetry, history, religion, medicine, political science, literature, and linguistics, and had this information carved into over 2000 tablets which were posted around the temple grounds. Wat Pho is famous as the home of the reclining Buddha, a 46-meter-long, 15-meter-high, lacquered and gilded Buddha statue which you can see in the middle of my Wat Pho collage.

Wat Arun

Wat Arun, or Temple of the Dawn, was built around the same time period as Wat Pho, but it has a very different feel. This temple is located right along the Chao Phraya River, so I navigated my way past the Royal Palace and Wat Pho, through some markets, and into a ferry to make my visit. Much of Wat Arun was under construction, and so we couldn't climb the central, Khmer-style tower for which this palace is known. Wat Arun was smaller and felt less regal than Wat Pho, but it held a different sort of charm, especially with all the mother-child animal sculptures scattered around the base of the central tower. And who can complain about warrior sculptures guarding real-life napping cats?

With some new friends, I spent part of my last day relaxing on the Golden Mount (Wat Saket), which offers some fantastic panoramic views across the city. Here, a friend taught me about some tidbits of Buddhism. The half-empty bottles we saw lying around the statues here weren't trash but rather food offerings to the gods represented in the statues. I learned that the bells and gongs can be used to make beautiful sounds which are also considered to be offerings to the Buddha. When watching my friend cringe as a tourist rang a gong four times, he explained that only certain numbers are considered auspicious (like 1, 3, and 5) and should be used in offerings.

The Golden Mount

No description of a visit to Bangkok is complete without some mention of the royal family propaganda. Photos, billboards, and posters of the members of the royal family are plastered all over this city. For the most part, it seems harmless enough: the people here are rather fond of their king, who they feel makes a particular point to travel around the country to get to know his people, for whom he has real concern. Still, things can easily become a slippery slope. Remember, this same king supported the military coup. (Locals will tell you that he did this to stop the warring factions from killing so many people, but then again, the locals who sing another tune don't face such great outlooks these days.) At least what I can tell you from a tourist's perspective is that the coup increased military presence in the city and thus improved security for foreigners. Whether I should feel guilty about this or not, the military coup certainly wasn't bothering me.

Thai Royal Family propaganda is all over this city

My mouth has never been so happy as it was in Bangkok (and, believe it or not, my stomach too!). The freshly squeezed pomegranate, passion fruit, starfruit, and orange juices awaited me on every corner, readily poised to satisfy me as soon as the craving might strike. And the coconut ice cream was served in coconuts cracked open and shaved upon order. I had never realized that fresh coconut shavings could be so slimy, almost mango-like in texture!

Coconut ice cream eaten out of a fresh coconut with its own shavings is even better when shared with friends

I soon learned that there's nothing like a refreshing, mildly sweet papaya salad for an afternoon snack on a sizzling summer day (maybe minus the tomato slices.) I even found a vegetarian restaurant, May Kaidee, which offered a ridiculously delicious and accessible cooking class full of lessons on curries, spicy soups, salads, and a mango sticky rice dessert. By chance, I was the only sign-up my day, so I even got a private half-day cooking lesson!

May Kaidee vegetarian Thai cooking class: highly recommended

A quick swing by the Flower Market a couple of days later enabled me to stock up on all the exotic spices I'd need to hone my Thai cooking skills back home. (Now to just find the time to put those new skills to good use!) 

The Flower Market

My muscles also didn't have much about which to protest as, at $5/hour, I was a very regular client at the Thai massage parlor just across from my hostel.

The massage parlor had little towels folded up like elephants and topped with orchids on every chair.

It's a hectic place but I absolutely loved it and hope to return. Bangkok ranks high up on my list of cities to visit.

Recommendations:

-Enjoy the curry and the fresh fruit dishes.

-Make a stop at May Kaidee's restaurant

-Get as many massages as you can squeeze in. If the full-body thing isn't for you, at least sit back in an arm chair and let your feet be pampered after a long day of walking across the city.

-If hosteling, check out Born Free Hostels. Run by a Swiss-Thai couple with a perfectly blended local and international flavor, they get give you advice as locals and insight into the culture in the context of a broader Western perspective. The hostels cultivate a social environment ideal for meeting fellow travelers, especially important for solo travelers.

Entry/lounge area of the traditional Thai home converted into the Born Free hostel where I spent my first five nights in Asia. Recommended, especially for solo travelers. Great atmosphere and layout for meeting new people.

Bangkok via Moscow

Luckily, the flight over was fairly uneventful. In fact, on the overnight leg, the plane was half empty so I even go to stretch across three seats for an 8 1/2 hour flight, an unusual luxury. That said, there are still a couple of highlights to share.

Number 1: Welcome to Russia! Undress yourselves!

Moscow airport may not pay top ruble for their translators.

BON VOYAGE!!

Number 2: You know you're in Moscow when you see these vending machines.

I especially liked the one of Putin chillaxing in Crimea. Too soon? Not in Mother Russia!

Number 3: Watching the morning sun dance across the clouds over Bangkok during our descent.

Sadly, my SD card broke last night and all the photos from my first day in Asia are lost. You can imagine what's on the top of today's to-do list. I'll be snapping and posting more shots soon.

Ready to go!

Travel outfit a.k.a. hiking gear laid out for the morning.
Suitcase packed.
Vaccines, travel visas, extra passport pages: check, check, check.
And after this painful evening trapped in my former PhD lab, loose ends on my pending scientific publication: all tied up.

At last, I'm ready to go!

Ready to test out four weeks of life as a backpacker.

My flight departs for Bangkok in less than 12 hours. I'm off for four weeks backpacking across Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Laos. Southeast Asia, here I come!