Diving Heavan: Koh Tao

We were relieved to arrive at our beach dive resort, Buddha View, after our long journey from Bangkok to Koh Tao. That day we simply hung out on the beach and enjoyed the sun and long awaited ocean. The debate was on whether we should snorkel or take up scuba, since Koh Tao is an island famous for having some of the best snorkel and dive sights in the world. It is also one of the cheapest places in the world to get dive certifications. We considered doing our open water dive certifications but after giving it more thought, we decided we just wanted to get some fun experience diving first. The next day we went our in the afternoon for our first dive. We had a short briefing on the boat and practiced our skills in the sand before we went down to the reef. Unfortunately the visibility wasn't the greatest since it had stormed overnight. But, we loved it so much that we booked two more dives the following day, with hopes of having better visibility. The next day was a gorgeous, clear day, perfect for diving! For our second dive, we went out to "Twins" a diving location with tons of busy underwater sea life. It was absolutely amazing to be in the under water world, swimming around weightlessly, not even being noticed by the fish. They just carry on as if you aren't even there. I felt so much like scuba diving was a practice of yoga underwater. Together with the focus on the breathe, the weightlessness, and the peacefulness being under water. For our second dive, we went to a shallower dive site that had stunning coral and rock formations. We were lucky to see a puffer fish and feeding frenzie of big fish on the small. It was amazing to see at right before our eyes. Later that night, Jeremy swam lanes in the pool, while I practiced some yoga, and then we packed our bags to leave for Koh Phangan in the morning.
-ken

We slept on a park bench.

We expected to get dropped off at the pier around 6am and the first boats leaves at 7am to the smallest of the three gulf islands, Koh Tao, our destination. Surprise! surprise!.. at 2:30am we get dropped of at the pier!! 3 and a half hours ahead of schedule! There was nothing at the pier except a cement pad with a few park benches, a few lights and a closed ticket office. We laughed and sat a around fora bit, not really sure what to do. There wasn't anywhere to go. We grabbed a bench and set up camp as we put our long shirts and pants on to help protect us from the swarms of blood thirsty mosquitoes. We tried to get as much sleep as we could but it was so hot, humid and sticky and there were sooo many mosquitoes. I was fortunate to falls asleep for a few hours (thanks to my Bayda genes), Jeremy on the other hand sat up all night and didn't sleep a bit.
The first boat to Koh Tao did leave right on time at 7am. It was three hours on the boat to Koh Tao and when we arrived, we were soo happy to see our resort guy waiting for us at the end of the pier. It felt like the long journey there but the island was stunning and we were soo excited to spend the next three days there.
-Kendal

BANGKoK

We took a night bus to Bangkok, scheduled to arrive at 6:30am.. For the FIRST time ever this trip, the bus arrived early and we were dumped in Bangkok at 4:30 am. We couldn't believe it! We managed to find a room where we stayed for just one night.
That day we strolled Khosan road, the popular tourist Vegas-style strip. We met a lovely local man who informed us that it was the sacred day when they celebrated the death of Buddha. He arranged a tuk-tuk to take us to the temple that was only open on this special day of the year, where there was the lucky Buddha housed inside. When we arrived, a sweet old man showed us how to pray to the Buddha for good luck and told us how lucky we were to make it to this temple on this one special day. He was also shocked that we had even arrived there in the first place, since no tourist ever know about this lucky Buddha! We love finding the non-tourist things to do and were excited that we were able to do this. Later on that night, we ventured out to another very local area and found a massive second hand market. At first we thought it was a night market full of junk but when we actually realized that this was all old, used, one of a kind stuff, we began to really look through it and found hidden treasures! Amazing old watches and jewelry, old time shoes from 20 or 30 years back. It was a blast from the past as we came across our favorite old action figures, original gaming consoles and tamoguchis! We spent all night there looking at so many hilarious things.. We had so much fun! By midnight we decided to head back to our place, but first stopped to have a beer and a foot massage back on the famous Khosan Road. After our amazing foot massage was done we decided to pay a little more for a back rub too! After that, we were out like lights!
The next day we went to the temple where the ginormous gold reclining buddha was. The temple there were beautiful as they were decorated with beautiful tile and glass work. Afterwards we finally indulged in some long-awaited Burger King! Jeremy thought he had died and gone to heaven for a bit!
Bangkok was everything that we expected it to be and we were very happy we only planned one night there. The air was disgustingly thick and heavy from the pollution of the city. The streets were crazy and there were tourists and Thai people everywhere! We enjoyed the craziness while we were there but that evening we caught a bus to the pier, to catch a boat out to the islands in the gulf!! Islands are more our style ;)
-Ken

Chiang Mai: Part 2

After the first few days flew by in Chiang Mai, our next activity was a Thai cooking class. We thought taking this course would be a great idea because we could take a little bit of Thailand back home with the food we will learn to cook! We each chose opposite dishes from each other, and learned to cook 8 different Thai style dishes all together. After our class we darted over to the night bazaar to see the LadyBoy Cabaret show that everyone was ranting about. Upon finding the venue, Kendal was extremely excited but I was extremely hesitant towards this whole idea and experience... she didn't have to worry about the lady boys checking her out! Haha But after the show began they were actually very impressive dancers lip sinking to brittney spears and everything! After the show, I gave it two thumbs up!
The next day we arranged for a tuk tuk to take us up to the longneck and big ear tribes of Thailand, as refugees from Burma, they ended up in Northern Thailand. Seeing this tribe was unbelievable! The rings around their necks and knees were extremely heavy. The girls of the tribe begin to get rings put on when they turn 5 years old. Some of the older ladies had 25 and 26 rings around their neck which weighed up to 20 lbs! After we visited this village we were told to go see a monkey show also, which was also very impressive! The trainers would mix up cards counting 1 through 9 and the monkey could grab whatever card number the crowd shouted for. The monkeys also knew how to play basketball very well, with one guest from the audience shooting 2 out 3 free throws in the monkey sank all 3.
The next day we rented a motorbike and ripped around the city with it. With no idea how traffic works here we braved the worst and set out on our adventure only to find out that this city has too many one way streets! And with no warnings about them at all, keeping in mind that in Thailand they drive on the opposite side of the road! After driving around we found a Chinese doctors office which caught Kendal's eye very quickly, so stopping in quickly to take a peak, Kendal had an appointment within two seconds. Afterwards we decided to drive around the city square and look for cool little shops, getting tired quick and the sun going down all of a sudden millions of moths came out of no where and we found ourselves trying to drive on this motorcycle and hold our breath while getting nailed in the face moth after moth! Returning back safely we packed our bags as for tomorrow Bangkok would be our next stop!
-Jeremy

Chiang Mai: Part 1

After our long adventure through Laos we finally arrived into Chiang Mai, Thailand safe and sound. We found a cozy little place called Tawan Guesthouse where we ended up settling there a little longer than we expected. After checking in we took a walk down the main strip of the city where we found a Burger King, McDonalds and Starbucks. Seeing these joints made us a feel just a little bit more at home and a small sense of relief knowing that Thailand was going to be much more developed than the other countries we travelled from. We surprising passed on the McDonalds and Burger King and instead found a little sushi place where enjoyed fresh made sushi with some amazing spring rolls. Before coming to Chiang Mai there was a zip lining adventure, called "flight of the gibbon" that people and reviews ranted and raved about. The next day we embarked on an adventure of swinging through the tree top canopies of the jungle, attached to zip lines and harnesses. Never doing this before Kendal and I were extremely excited! we woke up at 5am to be the early group so we could avoid the afternoon heat and big crowds of other tourists. Our tour guide "cash" he was extremely enthusiastic and fun to be with for the day! Zipping from one tree to the next, across 33 platforms and 19 ziplines, our day finished to a wonderful lunch waiting for us back at the resturant. Returning to the guesthouse we were really tired and with all intentions of sleeping we ended up skyping home to our families. That night we bought $12 ringside tickets for the Muay Thai boxing fights. We expected to walk into a huge stadium like the one you would see on tv, but we actually ended up being an old, run down boxing arean with worn ropes, no dressing rooms and a terrible announcer who was talking through blown speakers. The fighters were being prepped right behind us in the corner! The ring was surrounded with tons of locals but also bars..the most memorable one to us was the lady boy bar.. Actually called "Lady Boy Bar" where local cross dressing males live the dream and dress like females and prance around the bar... thank god we did not sit there! None the less though there were 8 fights and none seized to disappoint! Flying feet and fists everywhere as fast as lighting. Deciding to order a drink while watching, Kendal thought she read a spot in the menu where it said girls drink 40 baht. ($1.30) Innocently asking about some clarification this ended up being the price that you can pay to order a girl to sit with you and drink for 40 baht! As the fight went on we were entertained with a halftime show, which happened to be blind boxing. Two men boxing with blind folds on and oh yea a midget boxer without a blind fold was thrown into the mix! So instead of 2 blind folded guys boxing we were witnessing 2 and a half men boxing blindfolded, but the midget had the advantage of sight because he had no blindfold!! Only in Thailand! As the fights went on they had to have saved the best for last. Two very good fighters with amazing speed and reaction going at it! With the fight so close little did we know we were about to see Muay Thai fighting at its finest moment this being a quick kick right to the face this would result in a knock out! We looked at each other dumbfounded on what just happened because it was so quick! It was an incredible finish!
Waking up the next morning Kendal was talking the owners of the place about Chinese medicine and naturopathic medicine which she plans to study in the near future. With intentions on getting some information on where to go meet a local doctor, they offered to bring us with them to their doctor. Pulling into a small creepy looking alley loomed a little screen door where a small 76 year old Chinese man was waiting for us. We were introduced right away and before we knew each of us were lying on his working table. Reading palms for only two seconds at most, it was like he had known us for years! He read everything.. personality, characteristics and medical issues, some we knew but others we didn't know about! It was amazing how he knew all this just by looking at our palms, and we didn't say a word. It was incredible and it was very fascinating to meet this man.
-Jeremy

Surprise phone calls home!

When we got to the boarder town, we found the ATM, paid for our boat ride and had an incredible weight lifted off our shoulders! We just missed the last boat across to Thailand at the boarder, so we had to spend one final night in Laos. There wasn't much to do since it was a small town on the boarder, so we sat down to enjoy a no-budget dinner. The excitement was comparable to Christmas, being able to pick whatever we wanted from the menu and we even indulged in ordering a appetizer! That night we found a small run-down Internet cafe and were able to use Skype to make phone calls home. We had skyped home to our families before but it had been 2 and a half months since talking to our parents over the phone and we thought it might be a fun surprise for them to answer the phone to us! I knew my mom would have just been getting up for the day, so I called the house phone and sure enough my mama answered. It was so exciting for me to hear how ecstatic she was to hear my voice when I could hear her tear up in the background. It was really fun to talk to her and wish them a great day! Jeremy tried calling his mom but couldn't get a hold of her and then called his dad while he was at work. His dad too was so thrilled to talk to him. We loved being able to quickly chat with our families. Since our time away and especially after being at the orphanage, family means something more to us.
-Kendal

Pakbeng, with no cheng!

We were very excited to take a boat as our means of transportation rather than another bus. It was awesome as we could enjoy the sun and wind instead of broken air conditioning and a smelly bus.The boat was an old long boat with van vehicle seats as seating! So innovative! (made us think of Joe Bayda) Haha . The 9 hours up the Mekong river was beautiful with amazing landscape and many villagers fishing, washing clothes, sifting rice, and carrying on their daily lives on the riverside.
We arrived in Pakbeng, a tiny one-strip town, just after sunset, and were only there to catch the next boat in the morning to the Laos-Thailand boarder. Pakbeng was unlisted in our Lonely Planet Book and had virtually nothing about it on Trip Advisor so we knew we going somewhere small and literally off the map, but we wanted to try something different from the bus so we thought it would be a good adventure.
After we arrived we got a hotel room at the one of two hotels in town. We were low on money and needed to pull money out from the ATM before we could find some dinner. Asking locals to direct us to an ATM, we got all the same answers, "No ATM, no bank." Wait..What do you mean no ATM or bank? We laughed at first.. we have no money..
We wanted to believe the locals just didn't understand what we were asking but they did, and there was no ATM or bank. The closest one was over two hours away. Initially shocked, then a little panicked and stressed, we scrounged up whatever we could find in our bags and pockets and together came up with $6.
We had $6 to feed the two of us and it wasn't even close enough to buy us our boats tickets out of Pakbeng to the Loas-Thai boarder in the morning. Upon that realization, we were a bit stressed. What the heck were we going to do!? I considered trying to sell my iPod or something haha. A really sweet local man saw us trying to figure out what to do and suggested that we could trade our passports with the boats men and then pay them on the other end when there was an ATM. We crossed our fingers that that it was going to work and then made a plan to budget our $6 for three meals and drinking water between the two of us.
We budgeted dinner down to $1 each for some sandwiches and bought a small bunch of bananas for 30 cents. For the rest of the night we didn't know what to do. It was a really scary feeling of having almost no money. We thought it would be a good idea to make it an early night in because we wanted to conserve our energy since we didn't eat much and knew we wouldn't be for probably the next 24 hours.
It was feeling unlike any other that night. If we were broke at home we could at least hang out around the house or at a friends house. If you're hungry there will be something in the fridge or you can go to someone's house for dinner... But we were in the middle of no where with no money. In the moment we both felt a little homesick, but more incredibly grateful for our friends, family and full fridges at home. We were so lucky that we just had enough to get a room to sleep in, but if we would of had any less, we would have been sleeping outside, homeless for a night. It was incredibly eye opening to imagine how a mother or father must feel when they honestly just do not have money to feed their children. In North America, I don't know if we really have an actual grasp on this concept. Having no money. None. No loans to get by, no friends to borrow from.. Just no money anywhere. My heart broke as I really thought about that. Jeremy and I at least already ate two full meals earlier that day. And we knew we'd see food and money again the next day when we got to the ATM... But to really have absolutely no money, struggling to day to day.. It's so hard to understand that that is reality for people. Heart breaking.
In the morning we shared a really small breakfast and bought some cheap fruit and sandwiches for our lunch on the boat. Our last very 30 cents went towards a bottle of water. We were surprised with ourselves when at breakfast the table next to us left some food behind on their plates and the both of us truthfully considered eating it! We also questioned whether or not to ask the bakery how much it would be to buy some of their day old buns from them! It was very humbling, especially when we had to ask the boats men if we could pay on the other side since we had no money. They agreed upon us giving up our passports. It was such a relief to know we were on the boat and heading to the boarder, and an ATM.
-Kendal