A Sad Good-Bye to a Sweet Hello !

Hello everyone!!!

It is Sabrina here - I hope this blog finds you all well in the Western world. Amy, David and I are currently in the Cameron Highlands, Malaysia. It has been awhile since we last wrote, so I will fill you in on our last days in Thailand, and our first in Malaysia.

We flew from Phuket to Chiang Mai on Friday June 28th. If any of you are thinking of travelling to Asia and going to and from different cities and countries, I highly recommend flying with Air Asia. It is affordable, comfortable and the service is friendly. Anyhow, we arrived and checked into the Top North Hotel (not to be mistaken with the Top North GuestHouse). Christy and Courtney were staying in Chiang Mai as well and we thought they were staying at the Top North hotel, but they were in fact staying at the Top North Guest House, which resulted in some confusion. We eventually ran into them at the Night Bazaar, figured out the confusion and spent some time together - again! It is amazing how we keep bumping into them!

Chiang Mai is an amazing city, in the sense that it has a lot to offer in itself, and there are plenty of excursions you can book at your hotel which are located just outside of the city. In just a short drive, you can enjoy the sites and sounds of nature and can return to Chiang Mai at the end of the day.

David and I signed up for a Thai Cooking course at The Master Thai Cooking school. It was a full day of shopping at the fruits and vegetable market learning how to select produce, and then we hit the kitchen. we learned how to make 6 dishes: Tom Yam Soup, Fried Vegetables, Spring Rolls, Pat Thai (that is how they spell it in thailand - when it is not spelled in symbols), Curry (Massaman, Green and Panang) and Mango with Sticky Rice. We ALSO learned how to create a MASSIVE flame while cooking - which was amazing! David and I did it simultaneously and got an unreal video filmed of it. We will load it when we have a chance and link it to the Blog so you can check it out. At the end of the day we got to eat all of the food ( which was amazing - not to boast or anything...), and received a certificate and a cook book. The Master Cooking School was amazing. IT is a family run business and the details of the day unfolded like a well-oiled machine. Each student had their own cooking station, and all of the ingredients were prepared for us, so we could learn many dishes and well...eat while the food was still hot! It was an incredible experience.

If Andrew or Frank are reading this - let us know if and when you would like us to come and teach Michael's and The Wave how to cook Pad Thai in true Thai fashion - we are officially iron chefs.

We also did a Zip Line tour called the Flight of the Gibbons. I had done what I thought would be similar in Barbados in December and was excited for another shot at a zipline adventure through the rainforest. I assumed it would be ziplines that started at one tree, went through a rainforested area, and then landed at the platform of the next tree. I also assumed all of the lines would run horizontally. Piece of cake. For someone who is scared of heights, I figured it would be 'just like Barbados'.



It wasn't.


There were three large drops in the course. Instead of your harness being attached to a cord that was attached to two trees horizontally, the drops went from one platform to another below it, VERTICALLY. Essentially, we were hooked onto a cord that was being belayed (spelling?) by our tour guides, to the platform below. It was like free falling in the rainforest with a cord. I was scared to say the least. The adventure truly tested my tolerance for heights! It was overall an incredible day and we saw an amazing waterfall before heading back to Chiang Mai. It was a worthwhile trip for sure. Our tour guides - Chai and Chai Wai - were absolutely hilarious. While they treated some moments as jokes (when scared people like me did NOT find them funny....), their good humour really added to the experience. They also got a kick out of David every time he ziplined and shook the rope vigorously as he went across - it was very funny!

Amy and I went on an Elephant Trek as well. we rode elephants, watched them play soccer (yes - they are that smart that they can be trained to do that), and went on both a bamboo raft ride, and an oxcart ride. The Oxcart was likely the bumpiest ride I have ever been on! IT was an exerience for sure. We also got proposed to by our hilarious bamboo raft 'paddler'. He was the only person I have seen so far wearing a winter toque - it was hilarious! Why would someone do that in Thailand? We tried to ask him, but the language barrier came across as us wanting his hat, at which point he joked and said we could have it for 100 baht ($3USD)!


David and I also decided to 'lighten our load' in Chiang Mai. I sent home a 10 pound package with some things I had packed ( and truly did not need) and some souvenirs for the people I love. Mom - look out for the package in the next week or two. Finally, Air Asia let me fly without paying a massive fee for my baggage being overweight!

Overall we had an amazing time in Thailand. I will miss the sound of shopkeepers, tour guides, servers and new friends saying 'sawa-dee Ka!' (pronounced so-de-kah)which means 'hello' in thai. The Thai people were extremely friendly and kind. While we met some scheming taxi and tuk tuk drivers, overall Thailand had the warmth of home that is comforting when you are this far away from the people you know and love. I Will also miss Amy in rage when people guess what her ethnicity is and they all guess Japanese or Korean. Once, Singh and I were walking ahead of Amy and all of a sudden we heard her say (with hostility!), 'No - I'm Chinese!'. Amy kept being mistaken for every ethnicity but her own - and David and I got a kick out of encouraging people to ask Amy where she was from, simply because it got a rise out of her. If you know AMy, you would know she is extremely mildly mannered, so to see her get worked up about this was well...pretty amusing!

What I will not miss is being 'mocked'. There was a funny incident at the pier at Koh Phangan involving me, 'stale' pretzels, a street vendor, and her posse. We were waiting for the boat to Koh Tao and I bought a bag of pretzels. After tasting them, I could have sworn they were stale. I had purchased them from a small vendor and I sort of insisted with her that they did not taste 'right'.

Big.

Mistake.

She looked flustered, tried one, showed me the expiry date and glared at me. The pretzels were JUST fine according to her. To make matters worse, she brought the bag over to her friends on the Pier, told them what I had said, had them ALL try one, and full-out mocked me. Then she handed me the pretzels.Without speaking a word of English, she put me in my place.

I learned my lesson. I will never complain to a vendor Ever Ever again. If I dare do so, I will expect to be utterly embarressed in a language I don't even understand among people I do not even know!

We left Thailand on Wednesday July 2nd and headed to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. We checked into the Alpha Genesis hotel in Bukit Bintang ( a popular area in the city. If any of you travel to Kuala Lumpur I highly recommend both this 3 star hotel and the area it is in). Bukit Bintang is filled with everything you need - Indian restaurants, street food, Starbucks, McDonald's, Russian food, Lebanese food, Italian food, shopping centres and of course a 24-hour KFC. People in Malaysia LOVE KFC - I have no idea why. There are LINES there late at night, and during the day. LINES people. Lines. Maybe it tastes different in Malaysia?

We met Alex Paterson and Laura Tribe soon after our arrival. They are friends from Western, working at the Centre for Independent Journalism in Malaysia. They have been there since April and live in an amazing apartment right around the corner from our hotel. They were our companions and tour guides for the three days we spent in KL!

KL appears to be very developed, with some impressively level sidewalks (which still did not curb my tripping and clumsiness that seems to be the trend of the trip), mega-malls with every north-american store you can imagine, and every convenience you would need as both a citizen and a tourist. Everyone in KL speaks English for the most part, which made our travels a bit easier than some moments in Thailand when there was a more significant language barrier to overcome. overall, KL is far less driven by tourism, so it felt more like we were visiting a place that was not expecting us - in a good way. It contrasts Thailand significantly in that way, as the majority of the people we saw even in designated 'tourist' areas, still appeared to be native Malaysians.

After meeting up with Tribe and Alex we ate some serious street food. Malaysia is known for their food, and with good reason. There is SO much variety and the mix of Chinese and Indian food is fantastic. The country is made of people who are mostly MAlay, Indian and Chinese. Food at street vendors is a reflection of this. We headed to an Irish pub afterwards and had a great night catching up.

Over the course of the three days, we visited several malls, bought some inexpensive and good quality bootlegged DVDs, bargained at the night market, went to the top of the KL Tower (the fourth largest in the world -nothing beats the CN tower of course...), and visited alex and Laura at work. Some highlights included Singh bargaining with a vendor for a pair of sunglassess. He offered him 6 ringett ($2USD) and a Lychee. the vendor declined, even though it was the end of the night. He had NO desire in half bartering for a Lychee!

We also indulged in some fine Italian wine at an Italian restaurant, which was a delicious treat. It is rare for a menu in either Thailand of Malaysia to have a wine list. It was great to see our friends and have our own personal KL tourguides! hopefully we will see Laura and Alex again on our way out of Malaysia, before we head to Singapore.

we are in the Cameron Highlands, and leaving this inland place tomorrow morning!! More updates will be to come soon!!

Love and miss you all!


- the southeast asia trio