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Reflections on Thailand
My optimism about “layers of culture” in Ko Tao quickly disintegrated as soon as I started trying to access those layers. Overall, Thailand didn’t win my heart. The places I visited–the places that most people visit–were not, in many ways, very different from any other beach destination or tourist spot in the world. Thailand is…
Ko Samui, where the livin’s easy
A cockroach the size of an oreo just crawled across my white bedsheet, which smells either like laundry detergent or embalming fluid, I can’t decide. I am writing this post with one hand; the other is holding fast to my shoe to launch a defensive strike against the next cookie sized roach that comes my way. This…
Once upon a time, on the streets of Bangkok…
…four silly Couchsurfers went out in search of food. The travelers, each from a distant land far far away, all agreed on one thing: they were hungry. They were really quite hungry, and decided to venture downtown to a night market. It was closed. So they searched and searched, and finally found some squid-on-a-stick, which was…
I’m in love with a MANdalay!
What a day. I thought when I got back to my hotel that I was definately going to collapse. After eating street food all day, forgetting to drink water, and sitting on the back of a motorbike all day, my body had pretty much had it. I knew I was gonna get the runs eventually,…
My very first earthquake
It’s gettin’ real. We were eating breakfast on the roof of my seven story hotel in Mandalay, my friends from Holland and I, when my tea cup started rattling on its saucer. The tea was spilling over the rim of the cup, and I wasn’t touching it. I looked at it curiously, at first, but…
The Train. The Zoo.
It’s hard to come up with words to describe such a day, so I am relying on the video clips I have. Please excuse Pavlo’s language in a couple…
The train was packed. There were people shouting, dancing, singing, sleeping, selling, and moving their household furniture.
It was nothing I could have imagined it would be. We were on the train for five hours. I felt like passing out from the heat. I should have brought more water. I looked at the water from the vendors on the trains longingly, wishing I could drink just a couple of sips. It wasn’t bottled. I might get sick. I ate watermelon, sucking the rind for all the water I could get. We got off between two stops, two hours from central Yangon. We walked down the tracks and saw a family. The kids were flying kites. A man beckoned us over.
Sweltering in Yangon.
I am safe and sound in Myanmar. I don’t have much time to write, as I am heading to the zoo with two new friends I met at my hostel, from Australia and Greece, but I wanted to check in for my mom’s sake.
A Letter to my Gut.
A letter to my gastrointestinal tract:
The havoc that is about to befall you, is one that I would not wish upon my greatest enemy…
Beijing, for 13 hours.
After arriving in Beijing, I quickly began to feel like I had lost my marbles. What the hell were you thinking, Anoush, everything was going to be in English? Everything was definitely not in English. I was the only non-Asian on my flight, and anywhere I looked for that matter. What were you THINKING it would be like? I began feeling a little overwhelmed. I was exhausted from an 18-hour flight and two failed attempts at knocking myself out with ambien, and I wasn’t imagining it would be like this upon arrival.
The Honey Badger made me miss my flight
It’s true. I think. I was sitting at gate C31, in Chicago O’hare, my least favorite airport in the world, just wasting time. I had 2 hours before my flight, so I got comfortable. Bought a $13 salad, and was feeling good about being almost home. My flight was to depart at 6:20. I sat…
Airports, waitings, headaches
Alarm clock wake-up at 4 a.m. Foggy, solemn ride to Boston. After a early morning, teary-eyed goodbye, I boarded my 6:40 a.m. flight to Chicago. Arriving at 8:15 in Chicago, I was set to depart by 9:30 to Bozeman. The gate was packed with people, and the standby list was long. “If anyone would be…