First impressions

This is what I first saw that morning in late march when I stuck my head outside.

Nong Khai was flat, Xalapa was among other things not.

Quiztime!

Q: I don't feel so good. Why?

a) Because I missed Shakira live in Mexico City.

b) Because I have a habit of eating streetfood from places with questionable hygenical standards.



Winner gets a Taco. A clean one.

¿Dónde estoy?

The first couple of days I felt like I was in some kind of twilight zone. No, tuk-tuks, no rice, no buddhist temples and no Singhas. Instead, taxis, tortillas and Coronas. Crazy traffic was however one thing that didn't change just because the continents did. When planning this little escape from Suecia-07 trip, I'd first decided to go to Tijuana. After having discussed it with the T2T staff in Mexico and a former volunteer, I changed my mind as late as a couple of weeks before leaving Thailand and decided on Xalapa instead. This meant a lot less time to mentally prepare for the new place (don't know if that mattered though) and I was pretty confused in the beginning. The lack of sleep and fast paste of my last few weeks in Nong Khai surely contributed to that feeling, and I started my time in Mexico sleeping up to 15 hours a day and having problems constructing more advanced thoughts than "I'm hungry", "Where am I?" "What day is it?". Nonetheless, I had been given a schedule for my teaching and other activities and just as in Thailand it started right away with some three hours of "teaching training" and preparations for my projects that took place not even 12 hours after I'd arrived in Xalapa.

Poor traveling me

I was pretty much sick and tired of traveling as soon as I got off the tuk-tuk 15 min after I got on it. Unfortunately it didn't bring me all the way to Mexico, instead I had a considerable amount of time in planes, airports and buses ahead of me.

First stop, Udon Thani Airport, where I was informed that my bags were very much overweight (which they weren't), and therefore a pretty large sum of baht were requested of me if I wanted my bags (or myself) on that plane. I didn't make sense at all for a number of reasons, but I had no intent trying to bargain or argue with them. So I complied with their demands, and payed while giving them the evil eye which I'm sure terrified them and helped matters a great deal.

I had another pleasant surprise and another battle with the airport staff waiting for me in Bangkok, but this time they actually had good reasons for giving me a hard time. It seems that nowadays in the war on terror age we live in, more than ever are great measures taken in order to keep track of people traveling by plane. No surprise there, but the fact that showing up with a bunch of one-way tickets instead of a carefully plotted travel-itinerary could, and would, bring me so much problems I had no idea of. They weren't really satisfied with me not being able to show a valid return ticket from Mexico to Sweden, and they certainly didn't seem to like the fact that I had planned a visit to the United States prior to my return back home. My only weapon in this fight were my sad puppy-eyes and constant reassurance that I had no shady intentions whatsoever. After having "consulted" with some people unknown to me, and made some "phonecalls" they finally decided that I could get on the plane.

Next stop, Seoul, South Korea, where I spent the first 5 of my 10 hours there asleep on a very comfortable bench I found in the transit hall.
After that it was time to find a computer and a printer, since I had to print out my own bording pass for the flight from Los Angeles to Guadalajara and then to Mexico City. Failing to do so would result in me not being granted permission to enter the United States for my transfer to Mexico I had been told in Bangkok. No printers worked anywhere in Nong Khai, therefore I hadn't been able to get this done before I left. My first plan was to take care of it in Bangkok, but since explaining my travel route took up most of my time there, I had no choice but to do it in Seoul. A super modern airport with everything one could ever expect, an abundance of luxury and hi-tech gadgets everywhere, but no f*****g printers! I now know Seoul International Airport better then the architect who designed it, because of all the running around I had to do. I finally hit jackpot and found a printer, without ink. The girl in charge of the computer was asleep next to it, but there were no time for politeness so I abruptly woke her up and explained that she simply HAD to get that thing working, which she did.

No more unpleasant adventures but of course the plane was a little bit late, so I think I set a new LAX record in covering a lot of distance in a very short amount of time. The security controls were endless, and took forever, which I had expected. Actually worse than a couple of months after 9/11 at JFK in New York. With no shoes on, half of my stuff in my hands instead of in my bag I reached the gate approximately four minutes before it closed and took off heading for Mexico.

Changed planes in Guadalajara, bought a coke, and then got on the flight to Mexico City. Upon arrival I took a taxi to the busstation and after that I had a 4-5 hour busride before I arrived in Xalapa around three in the morning, somewhat confused and jetlagged.

Naranja

It's more fun to play with colors than to actually write here.

Thailand Days Re-Revisited

So...the last two weeks were fun, although exhausting. Schools were closed for summer holidays or something, so the week before the Chiang Mai trip I'd been assigned to teach the teachers at my school together with 3 other volunteers. Kind of a different feeling all of a sudden having 20-something teachers and other faculty members in front of you in the classroom. At first I was under the impression that we were only supposed to teach the english teachers and perhaps a few more, but the whole thing seemed to have been pretty popular with the staff, hence the big attendance. If the students were shy, quiet and unwilling to speak their minds, the opposite can be said about the teachers. Especially the assistant director, also known as "crazy coconut lady" due to the fact that you would always end up with more "burned coconuts" than you could carry whenever she would drive you anywhere. She had a way of "taking over the class" when given the opportunity, so you had to make sure there wasn't any questions about who's boss! Well, what's thirty years of teaching compared to 6 weeks of volunteer work anyway, huh? Luckily, Lacy had just the right kind of booming teacher voice needed to get the job done, giving the rest of us the chance to sit back and enjoy the coffee and cookies we were always served during class, best cookies ever...mmm. On my last day they arranged a day trip for all of us, and some students too, including a forest temple, an archaeological site and...a winery. Not what you expect on a fieldtrip with a bunch of teachers and students, but lots of fun. Especially since they all bought a few bottles for the songthaew ride back home which were passed around while the teachers entertained us with something that was apparently "bad songs". I couldn't have gotten a better ending to my teaching experience in Thailand and I really enjoyed the school and all the people there.


As for the rest of the time, new volunteers kept coming, old ones leaving, and after a while one had gotten sort of numb to all the new faces, names and people to get to know. Goodbye parties were mixed with the introduction to the intricacy of Nong Khais nightlife, both held at Surreal and Bar-Nana and with the newly established coffee-ritual in class every morning, there was always one or two more beers at night. New friends were made, both thai and farang, and old ones were said goodbye to. There was always something going on at night. During my last two weeks the downtown area was occupied by the annual Nong Khai Fair, with everything found at the regular markets multiplied by 100, as well as rides, games, exhibitions and live music.
Trying to make the most of my final weeks in Thailand, I slept on average 3-5 hours a night between teaching, running back and forth from the Fair, and the rest of the time trying to spend as much time as possible with the people I probably won't be seeing again anytime soon. Don't know how it worked out, but I guess when you're having fun anything works even though some days are a bit sketchy. I've got the days a little bit mixed up, but I clearly (well...) remember a BBQ some days before I left.
On my very last night Mark had arranged a buffet and some special cocktails at Surreal and as always, a great time and then off to Bar-Nana. The night ended not so early in the morning in the hammocks at Meechai Dorm. Probably my best night in Nong Khai and the perfect ending of my time there.
Of course I hadn't packed at all and and the next morning, with a brain not working on full speed I surrendered to the task of locating all my stuff and trying to squeeze them down into my bags about two hours before I had to leave for the airport. Don't know how I managed not to forget half of my stuff and especially not how I got to the airport on time. With my bags packed, I eventually succeeded in hauling what must have been the slowest tuk-tuk in Thailand, and after some quick goodbyes I left my friends at Meechai Dorm in a cloud of dust traveling at the speed of a lawnmower.




Bye bye Thailand, thanks for everything.

Regreso a Xalapa

It turned out to be more like 22-23 hours on the bus, most of which were endured listening to the deafening snoring of one of my fellow passengers. The beaches however, were nice...

Vamos a la playa

No updates for a while, I'm off to Playa del Carmen tomorrow. Around 18 hours on the bus, but still definitely worth it. Back in about a week.

Back on track

OK, so about two weeks prior to my departure we took a weekend and a few days off to explore Chiang Mai. Being the second biggest city in the country it has a lot to offer, but still nothing in size compared to Bangkok. It's usually said that Chiang Mai has all the good stuff that one can find in Bangkok, but none of the bad. Traffic is a lot better, it's obviously less crowded which makes it easier to get around, but the best part was the cooler and more pleasant climate. Nice and warm, but without the humidity found elsewhere in Thailand.

The only thing we had planned was a jungle tour that started the next day, so upon arrival after a freezing 12 hour busride from Nong Khai we were happy just walking around in the sun checking out what the city had to offer. We ended up at the Chiang Mai Zoo, which was pretty cool. They had pretty much all you could expect from a Zoo and my personal favorite were the tigers. Not just normal ones but the black and white (forgot the name...zebra-style?) tigers. I kept running back and forth between the tigers and the leopards like an excited five-year old trying to get some decent pictures while my fellow travelers became increasingly annoyed and wanted to check out the elephants. All the girls seemed to like elephants better for some reason. We compromised and decided to pay a visit to the Pandas. Not too exciting, they just sit there and eat, but not too bad either.

At night we wanted to check out Chiang Mai's nightlife, but all we could find around where we lived were the kind of shabby bars with young thaigirls and old western men you really don't want to go to. After a while we stumbled upon a club that looked really cool, only one problem though, no foreigners allowed. Luckily, it seems to be an universal rule that rules in bars seldom apply when applied on girls. Bouncers can always be persuaded and it helps to have a thaiguy magnet in the shape of a dutch girl with you. Five minutes later we slipped passed the line and spent the rest of the night partying with the locals. It saved the night and we had lots of fun.

The next day it was time for the jungle tour, which started out with some elephant riding. I thought they would just carry us around on a plain field for a while, but instead we went on some really steep paths which made you wonder exactly how much trouble you'd be in if the elephant slipped, sprained a leg or whatever. Being really nice guys, Hampus and I also made Yvette sit on the elephants head with those big ears as the only thing to hold on to, brave girl. She did fine though, and after we were done with that, we started some five hours of trekking along the side of a mountain that would eventually take us to the place we would spend the night at.

My camera ran out of batteries just as the trekking begun, so I unfortunately just have one picture of the jungle, and none of the hilltribe village we spent the night in, or the things we did the next day. The village was very nice, and we had a great time with good food, some local performances and whatever they call the moonshine they served us in small hand-carved mugs. Feeling a bit too brave, we also agreed to try some local cuisine made up of...raw meat drenched in the spiciest sauce I've ever tasted. I won't try it again.

More trekking followed the next day, and on the way to the white-water and bamboo rafting we met a crazy danish couple who accompanied us for the rest of the day. We stopped and swam in a really beautiful waterfall, much nicer than the one on the road to Chiang Khan. Again, too bad I don't have any pictures of that. The white-water rafting was fun, but could have been better if it hadn't been so dry. High season for any kind of activities on the river is the rainy season of course, and since we were there in the warm season there wasn't much water in the river. At lunch in a little hut next to the jungle, the danish guy all of a sudden requested to sing karaoke(?!), much to the locals delight. Just a little hut, looked like a toolshed, no running water, some basic stuff for cooking....and a super-modern karaoke machine. Anyway, the rest of us sat there confused out in the middle of nowhere while this guy had us endure his interpretations of various songs until our guide declared that if we wanted to make it back in time, we (he) had to get going. Some nice, peaceful bamboo-rafting later we headed back to Chiang Mai and got ready for another night out.

The girls had decided to get tattoos. It's a bit of a cliché to get tattoos in Thailand, I know, and so did they, but nevertheless they were determined to get it done that night. We found a place that seemed professional enough and while the girls got more and more anxious, I got more and more relaxed drinking beer, looking through the various photos of the tattoo-artists work, contemplating whether I'd looked good or not with a giant "Thailand 4-ever" tattoo on my back...

After the girls were done we celebrated by playing a few games of pool where we all got our butts kicked by some local guy, had some cocktails and later moved on to this huge club we'd heard about the other day by some of the people we had met at the "no foreigners place". Entrance was not cash, but a bottle of SangSom whiskey in true thai style, and the place was indeed huge, but of course...no real dancefloor. There the people would not only dance by their table, but also on them or wherever there was an empty spot. Crazy but fun.
We did some temple sightseeing on our last day and of course checked out the markets of Chiang Mai. The temple we went to was Wat Doi Suthep, definitely worth a visit and the climb up the stairs leading up to the temple. Not much more to say, another 12 hour busride took us back to Nong Khai, but this time the A/C wasn't on full power all the way which made it a lot nicer than on the way there.

Köttfärslimpa & linguistic patriotism

Once upon a time, in Spain, I watched Meatloaf being interviewed on TV. His name was translated into Cache Carne. Wonderful.

Having said that, does anyone know what Smashing Pumpkins are called here in Mexico?

-Puré de calabaza . I'm serious.

Chiang Mai

Trying to remember...

Jaha.

Eftersom att Nils har outat mig kanner jag att jag plotsligt maste borja ta detta lite mer seriost. Eller ocksa inte...