A Dubai-ous Day of Commerce

Dubai doesn't quite fit the profile of the cities we've visited thus far - it has a very modern infrastructure (read: drinkable tap water), its oldest standing structure was erected after 1800, it's very safe, and the main attractions are modern architecture and commerce rather than ancient culture and prehistory.

After disembarking, we traversed the "old town," an 1800's-1900's quadrant of Dubai that still clings to its Arabic culture. Old town is known woldwide for its inexpensive gold, silk Persian rugs, and hookah pipes. We quickly resolved to shop for all three.

We decided to use Thursday as our "see every product available in Dubai" day, Friday as our "lets think about what we want to purchase at the beach" day (most shops are closed for holy Firdays), and Saturday as our "hemmorhage money (UAE Dirhams) to the Arabs" day.

We spent the majority of Thursday refining our taste and expertise in Persian carpets. Here's an abridged lesson for you - actually, imagine we're explaining it to you in the middle of a crowded arabic parketplace with bright textiles and chickens on spit-roasts...

----

Us: So, you have to consider the carpet material - silk or silk substitute such as acryllic, wool, or some blend thereof. Silk is more expensive, but the color is sharper and it lends an interesting shine, making the colors shift subtly from different angles.

You: Ooh, let's go with silk.

(A man interrupts: "My friend, you want copy watch? Copy Rolex? Copy Omega?")

Us: Excuse us - thanks. Next, you have to consider whether you want your silk carpet hand-made or machine-made. Hand-made can be ten times more expensive, but wow - some of the richness and color gradients really can't be produced by a machine. The hand-made pieces really exemplifiy the Iranian attention to detail.

You: Well, I'd rather not expel somebody from my home for dirtying my floor covering, and I like to maintain a healthy blood pressure - so let's look at the machine-made pieces.

(Another man approaches and leans in: "Copy handbags? My friend, you want copy handbags?")

Us: Ahem. Very well, so now you just have to consider thread length and silk origin, which determines the texture. Then just consider size and design - and happy shopping!

----

Oh yeah, we forgot to mention - there's lots of people selling knock-off products.

Shopping for gold in the Gold Souq (gold market) was equally exhausting. There's a great deal of modestly-priced, generic-looking gold jewelry (and watches) available in the dozens (maybe hundreds) of accredited, camera-survaillanced shops; however, the more traditional Persian pieces were much more distinctive and interesting. Many were so ornate that they look like fake stage jewelry, so it's a cautious endeavor.

We wrapped up the day with an hour-long search for a restaurant - gold and thread everywhere, but not a crumb to eat! - and we settled for some delicious burgers and a relaxing hour at a hookah bar.

Today, at the Arabian Sea beach in Dubai, we're discussing what we saw and learned and asking ourselves the incessant consumerism question:

Do-buy or not do-buy?

Oh, man - that's too funny. Let's just leave it at that.

The Doc's First Patient

Pssst - Sara wouldn't want me to tell you this because she thinks it's "dorky," but I think it's pretty cool, and I think you'll agree.

Allow me to set the scene...

March 28, 2007. Emirates Airlines flight EK0722, departing from Nairobi to Dubai. The craft has boarded and is about to commence liftoff. It's 23:46, so everybody's drifting off to sleep - including the Doc, in her sky-blue Target eyemask. I'm uncomfortable, because I can never figure out how to relax my neck while in an upright seated position.

...But as destiny would have it, danger brewed five rows ahead. A fellow passenger was ailing and was unfit to take to the skies this fateful night.

A flight attendant bellowed: "Is there a doctor or medical professional on board with their license handy?"

Nobody raised a solitary hand. A long pause. The Doc removed her sleepwear and misplaced it somewhere in that long moment.

She bellowed again: "Is there any doctor aboard with any identification at all?"

Still, no hands raised.

The Doc then calmly raised her hand, and the flight attendant approached. "Are you a registered nurse?" The attendant cocked her head.

I shot her a "you sexist!" glare, but the Doc politely corrected her, offered her passport as identification, and more fully qualified her medical expertise. The Doc rose to see the ailing passenger, and the craft hushed. Several tumbleweeds blew across the aisle (well, not really - but it'd have been fitting).

I sat patiently as she assessed the situation several rows ahead. Three visibly panicked flight attendants flanked her as she spoke to the ill passenger, nodding politely and docilely.

I covertly filmed the majority of this exchange with our digital camera, as I awaited the prognosis with the rest of the captive audience.

Due to HIPAA policy, I'm unable to disclose specific patient information, but the Doc suggested that the passenger leave the flight. Now, I applaud the Doc for her swift and righteous justice, but removing the passenger and respective luggage added another hour to our flight. The Doc returned to sleep quickly, but not before accepting a free Emirates Airlines pair of socks and a replacement sleeping mask.

Perhaps I'll write a limerick to honor the event - or maybe an epic poem - or maybe a rag-tag guitar tale in the style of Jim Croce or Arlo Guthrie. In any case, I can't sleep since I'm so excited!

Hooray for our not-yet-employed Doc!

Turfin' Safari

We left Nairobi for a three-night camping safari through Kenya - it's a great lineup of trekking and watching large predators from a somewhat-armored, open-roofed, safari cruiser.

We're traveling with four other tourists - an Argentinian couple, a Brazilian airline pilot, and a friendly Australian girl - an adventurous and enthusiastic bunch.

The guide and staff are another animal altogether - our "guide" for the four-day excursion is "Winston." You know that feeling you get with some people - the "this guy is trying to screw me over big-time" feeling? Well, you'd get that feeling talking to Winston.

Some contextual information:
Most Eastern African excursions operate based on two payments - the advance, corporate payment, and the sizable cash-only local payment. The later is used for entry fees, foodstuffs, and other such on-the-spot expenses included in the itinerary.

Well, Winston is trying to skirt all said on-the-spot payments or discourage us from participating in several included activities. We [our band of tourists] are persistent in demanding our share. Cough it up, Winston! And so, our trip:


Hell's Gate National Park

Our first day is Hell's Gate - named for its steaming hot springs and tortuous gorges.

The terrain above the gorge is a boxed red-rock canyon with herds of zebras, warthogs, and gazelles running along the dirt roads. We spent the majority of the ride with our torsos through the sunroofs, just as everybody dreams of doing in their prom limousines.

The Hell's Gate gorge took an hour to traverse - canyoning down rocky streams, shuffling through obsidian gravel, and using the sandstone ravine walls as fingerholds for climbing. We wore flip-flops (Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!) but we made it down to the boiling springs without injury or snakebite (black mambas are indigenous to the area).

Winston apologized for some of the confusion over our dinner campfire. We're still skeptical.


Masai Mara - Northern Serengeti

We drove several hours of plains to the Masai Mara - the ride there was scattered with gazelles, zebras, and gnus, so by the time we arrived we were already a bit jaded. We were ready to see some big game and some carnivores.

The reserve is so expansive - thousands of acres, and that doesn't even include the Tanzanian side. Here's a recap of some of the more interesting sightings:

• A family of giraffes running across the plains



• A herd of twenty elephants walking single-file through a valley



• A male and female lion sleeping (in the "spooning" position)



• Several hippos (actually the deadliest animal in Africa, by the numbers) bathing and singing in a pond



• A leopard high in a tree with the remains of a most unfortunate gazelle



• A massive eagle dive-bombing and making quick prey of a smaller bird

All-in-all, a very productive day of observation. We'd rather see it all on our feet (rather than on wheels), but we'd quickly become prey ourselves and it's hard to cover enough ground - after the next full day of safari, we'd be ready to get back on our legs.


Masai Village

We left camp early and headed to a Masai tribe village for a quick glance at their ceremonial dancing, traditional architecture, and cultural traditions.

We witnessed two dances - male and female - both of which entailed call-and-answer singing, and both of which are performed at circumcisions (yes, both male and female circumcision). The most impressive feat was the standing vertical jumps the males used in their dance.

The village huts are constructed from sticks, straw, and cow manure - they're expected to stand for about five years until the next tribal migration. We'll probably build a similar establishment in the middle of Lincoln Park in Chicago to inhabit during the residency/Ph. D. years.

Trevor, can we rel on your civil engineering signature to certify its structural soundness? (You'll have to check the books for the cow manure load-bearing coefficients.)


Lake Nakuru National Park

We spent the afternoon game-watching at Lake Nakuru, a famous living and breeding grounds for the white rhinoceros. We saw our fill of rhinos, but even more impressive were the pink flamingos on the lake itself. On the horizon, between the dark lake and the green hills is a thick band of solid pink - more pink than even Lisa Baldwin can comprehend.

We also saw our fill of baboons - so many that they're considered menaces at the lakefront. So, as far as baboons go, we're done for now. If you have some baboons waiting for us in the states, sell 'em back. We're through with the 'boons for now, but we deeply appreciate the gesture.


Safari Afterthoughts

We're happy that we went on safari and we're delighted with the multitude and density of wildlife we saw. However, we now know that safaris are passive activities - sunroof gazing, picture-taking, and (if you're lucky enough to get an enthusiastic, informed guide) listening to a wildlife lesson or two. There's another brand of safari out there - the trekking safari - where it's just you and a rifle-bearing guide stomping through the wild. It's more expensive, but it may have suited us better.

As the saying goes, "a satisfied customer tells one person, a dissatisfied customer tells four" - so readers (at least four of you) take note:

Do not use Nomad Tours (the company based in South Africa) for East African excursions. The itineraries are unrealistic, the guides are dishonest and unprofessional, and they do a poor job of allocating our payment fees. Other firms, such as Gap Adventures, provide better service for a similar fee. Hope this appears in search results so other people can be happier on their excursions.

So, having climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro and seen the predators of the Northern Serengeti, we believe (as per Steve's question) that we now understand Toto's 80's-riffic single entitled "Africa". We'd love to share our understanding, but you really have to come here and see it for yourself.

Until then, (to make an acute cinema allusion) you can listen to Toto, but you can't hear Toto. Let's leave it at that, Steve.

Also, happy belated birthdays to Kristin and Jenny!

We leave for Dubai tonight - we'll catch up with you all then, and we hope to have more frequent computer access.

Kilimanjaro

(Don't skip to the end - to keep the suspense and stuff!)


Nairobi, Kenya

Nairobi is the largest city in Kenya, if not the largest city in Eastern Africa. All tourist literature we've read suggest that it's not a premier tourist destination; and the USA government websites we've visited give it a 5/5 for crime... and 5 is bad. he only other 5 we could find is Baghdad. In the words of "Airplane": it's worse than Detroit.

Our hotel suggests not leaving the premises with jewelry or valuables, and strongly recommends to "take special care" between 18:00 an 06:00.

So why are we here? Good question. Our Kilimanjaro trek an safari both depart from this city, from the very hotel we're patronizing. So... room service and card games it is!


Moshi, Tanzania

After several hours on buses (listening to some friends' mixes, TV on the Radio, and Steven Wright stand-up) we crossed the Tanzanian border and arrived in the town of Moshi, via Arusha. The trip would have been faster, but our bus stopped several times for cattle stampedes crossing the dirt road, and for border patrol passport checks.

We spent the night at a hotel near the base of Kilimanjaro, where we met our guide, received our briefing, and rented additional equipment (sleeping bags, hiking poles).

At the loge, we made two friends: Czar, an RN from Southern California, and Charlie, an accountant from Canada. Czar signed up for a different Kilimanjaro route (his afforded him an extra day) and Charlie will climb with us an share our guide.

Our guide is "Johnnie" - a young man from a Mozambique tribe with a calm countenance and a winning smile. We'll set off in the morning; our group consists of three tourists and several attendants (guide, cook, and porters to carry the food and some of our spare clothing).


Ascent Day 1: to Mandara (2750m alt.)

Today we hiked about five hours uphill, mostly through rainforest terrain on a clay path - the weather permitted us to wear shorts and t-shirts.

The porters and cook set off ahead of us, carrying most of the supplies in tarps balanced on their heads.

We paused or jaunt only for carb-heavy snack breaks and to learn about indigenous flowers.

Oh yes. We also paused to gaze at the ants. Big ants. Big ants crawling into our socks, leaving itching welts on our ankles. Each of us sustained tens of bites on both feet; however, walking subtly scratched our bites, which yielded a satisfying motivation to climb faster.

Also present on the hike was the Tanzanian flag bandanna we purchased at the mountain base. the wearer is granted the wisdom of Tanzania's greatest national park. Plus, it makes you look like Rambo - or perhaps, "Tanzaniambo."


Ascent Day 2: to Horombo (3750m alt.)

Godliza, our cook, boiled seven liters of water for the two of us to carry on our backs for the day's hike - Johnnie suggests that we drink the entire quantity within the day to prevent dehydration.

Today we wore rain pants and fleeces; the weather looked ominous initially, then the clouds broke an we were left with a chilly-yet-sunny day... and third-degree sunburn.

By 10:00 we left rainforest terrain an entered "Moorland" altitude - short, coarse, bushes with "hot poker" flowers and weedy grass. No more monkeys, unfortunately - just lizards and huge birds that threatened to snatch our lunch. Nobody messes with lunch.

We hiked 200m altitude past our sleeping point before returning for dinner - overshooting your altitude is just what the doctor ordered for healthy acclimation. Climb high, sleep low, yo.


Ascent Day 3: to Kibo (4703m alt)

We slept well - better than we could have asked. Yet, that didn't make the day any less tasking.

We donned our fleece pants, long underwear tops, winter hats, ski mittens, and balaclavas (the facial windguard, not the tasty Mediterranean dessert). We didn't want to add windburn to our growing list of ailments.

By nine this morning, the Moorlands disappeared and we trekked across an expansive alpine desert. For the most part, no foliage can survive here, and the fauna disappeared as well. The wind tears across the dusty ground - and it's not warm.

The itinerary for the rest of our climb is daunting, at best. Here's what's on the platter:

• 4:30PM: Dinner
• 5:00PM: Sleep for the "night"
• 11:30PM: Wake up, eat "breakfast," and begin the hike to the summit, so we get there and back before the sun melts the frozen gravel an the path gets slippery.
• 3:00PM (next day): Arrive at our encampment downhill for the night.

That's right - 15 consecutive hours of altitude-defying, joint-burning, lung-gurgling, hiking.

Stretch out on a couch for us.

Day 4: Catching the Night Train to Uhuru (5895m alt.)

"Ridin' the night train - never coming doooooown!"

- Guns 'N Roses, Appetite for Destruction - "Night Train"

...So that's similar to our nighttime summit - except that "going down" is on the itinerary. Also dissimilar, GNR uses a train as a metaphor for their hard-living, "loaded" lifestyle - and we're climbing an African mountain.

Anyway, note that yesterday we expected to sleep from 5-11:3PM. Nay. One million times nay. Not a wink of sleep - mainly due to other tourists in our miniature barracks speaking inconsiderate German, Swahili, and French (the anxiety probably had something to do with it as well).

O' pity us, fair reader! Fifteen hours of subzero summit-hiking on no sleep!

Okay, enough with the excuses - here's now it went down:

• 11:40 PM: Begin tedious zig-zag "switchback" hike up Kibo volcano with headlamps, three layers of pants, three layers of jackets, hats, balaclavas, ski mittens, an two layers of heavy-duty socks.
• 11:50 PM: "Hey, this isn't so bad"
• 1:00 AM: "Why am I traversing the loose gravel of this desolate lunar landscape in the dark, foot after numb foot? I paid for this? I'm a moron."
• 4:40 AM: Arrive at "Gillman's Point" (5861m alt.), where many people end their climb. It's situated on the rim of the volcano, so it's a great place to do a high-five an start your trek back down. However, if you're more daring (or perhaps, more "dangling") you can continue to Uhuru Peak, the topmost point on Kilimanjaro and all of Africa - "Africa's Ceiling."
• 5:00 AM: Depart westward for Uhuru, treading through the snow on the rim of the volcano's crater - this is all before sunrise, so only the snow is visible.
• 6:00 AM: Altitude sickness (cerebral edema) further closes its icy grasp. Begin frequent anti-nausea breathing breaks.
• 6:20 AM: The three of us made it! We pose by the official Uhuru Peak sign for a quick snapshot. Excited by the fulfillment of our longtime goal, we sigh relief and start back Eastward.
• 6:30 AM: Sunrise. We're able to discern our surroundings, and are imbued with newfound energy. We run through the icy slopes of the volcanic rim and are captured by the expansiveness of the glaciers on the rim and crater of the volcano, and by the landscape of clouds below. We repeatedly risk frostbiting our fingers by snapping photos of the scenery. Our guide suggests climbing down before the sun melts the icy rim into a hazardous terrain.
• 7:00 AM: Look down at the newly-lit, steep, zig-zag path we traversed in darkness for five hours up the volcano. Cue ominous music.
• 7:10 AM: Learn "shortcut" technique of surfing down the gravel in our boots. Much more fun, and much faster.
• 8:00 AM: Arrive back at Kibo encampment. Brief meal and relaxation.
  
• 10:00 AM-4:00 PM: Trek down to our final encampment. Soak our feet, hallucinate from exhaustion and sleep deprivation. Good times.
  

Hopefully, a good night's sleep will cure nausea, headache, delirium, third-degree sunburn, and fire-ant welts. Well, we can hope.

Kilimanjaro Afterthoughts

Time well-spent. And not just the mountainside experience - the training, too (thanks for letting us use your skyrise, Jen).

It was great to have Charlie with us on our trek. He resolved early-on to avoid decisions and just concentrate on "putting one foot in front of the other" and enjoying the scenery. "Resolute indecisiveness" would be the most fitting oxymoron. He also maintained the most reasonable and constant pace, which abides by the Swahili saying "pole pole" (pronounced "polay-polay"), for "slow-slow". Charlie, if you're reading this, it was great having you mountainside.

We're currently at our Moshi, Tanzania hotel - at the pool sampling some local lagers. Our feet have nowhere else to take us right now, which is nice - because we can ask of them no more favors.

Interlude

We're currently stealing high-speed Internet in a first-class lounge (and we're flying economy - sticking it to the man).

Just wanted to say "Thanks" to everybody who's reading and leaving comments - it's fun and motivating to see that people are tuning in.

Gotta go - they have free food here, too!

Match.

Match! Match, match, match.

For those of you who aren't acquainted with the medical residency match process (and how could you be, if you've hung out with us for any length of time?), all medical students learn where they'll be living for the next 3-4 years on March 15 at a midday envelope-opening ceremony.

We and the Axners tried to recreate a similarly formal atmosphere by wearing clean(er) clothes and underwear. AS we were twelve hours ahead, this meant recreating the event around midnight.

Our official match evening commenced with a late dinner, a trip to the Haagen-Dazs cafe, and hopping three Thai pubs.

On our way to the third pub (around 11 PM) we received the call from Minnesota - one whole hour before we expected it!

[Drum roll...]
Northwestern University in Chicago, Illinois!
[Drum hit]

Throw the confetti - the future has been spoken, and it is good! We spent the next two hours celebrating and, well, breathing.

If you're looking for us this Summer, we'll be in Chicago (Sara: medical residency program at Northwestern / Scott: computer science PhD and research at Northwestern). Anybody on the North Side want two clean houseguests for the next four years?

After completing our international "Midnight Match," we believe our system to be superior than that put on by American medical schools. Our system may be more perfect - informal, colorful, celebratory, and with the optional assistance of dirt-cheap alcohol. (Of course, we have no basis for comparison.)

We have some gentle planning and sighs of relief ahead of us - we'll have plenty of time for the former (probably not the latter) on our next endeavor... A six-day climb to the peak of Mount Kilimanjaro! (dum, dum, dum!)

We leave for Nairobi today - we'll try to be in touch before we start our ascent.

To all of our Minnesota med-friends: congratulations on your excellent matches. We wish we could be there with you, as long as we could return here without any time elapsing. Due to the physical implausibility of this, we send you an electronic high-five.

[Smack]

Hot damn.

The Northern Thai Trek

We'd have been fools not to partake in Northern Thailand's top visitor attraction: trekking. We signed up for a private four-person, three-day two-night trek with the Axners and a designated guide.

Pan, our gentle, all-knowing Shirpa (playable by a young Pete Postlethwaite) picked us up from our hotel and drove us to the elephant training grounds (read: elephant school). They begin education at age six, reach their peak education at age eighteen, and retire to the tropical woodlands at age sixty-five - much like us humans. They have an abundance of free roaming space and live richer lives than many humans (so don't feel bad when you see the video we captured of the elephants doing their little dance). We rode on elephant-back for an hour through varying terrain, then we began our trek.

The first day was a three-hour uphill trek to a small village where we stayed the night in a "farang" (white foreigner) cabin. Pan cooked us a feast of soup, chili paste, and stir-fry, and we crashed after several hands of rummy.

• 1:00 AM: Cock-a-doodle-doooooo! Cock-a-doo! ...a chorus of roosters perform a medley of varying lyrics, intonations, and gusto. Interesting to witness.
• 1:05 AM: We lose interest.
• 1:30 AM: Ahh, silence. Sleep at last.
• 1:50 AM: Chorus begins next verse. Repeat every twenty minutes until 7:00 AM.
• 7:30 AM: Breakfast, discuss beheading the village roosters.
  

The next day held a seven-hour trek, mostly uphill, through varying terrain - woodlands (reminiscent of Northern Minnesota), rainforest with parasitic strangle-vines and orchids, meadows of green tea bushes, and a sprawling bamboo forest. Wild banana trees were scattered throughout - if you opt to peel and eat one of their fruits, mind the seeds). Pan mentioned the possibility of sampling some authentic Thai moonshine (fermented from corn) at the destination village.

By 4 PM we arrived at our next accommodation, Baan Pha Daeng - a tiny Lahu village. We slept and ate in a charming bamboo and thatch hut on stilts with a private porch, adjacent to similar cabins. If you view it from the front, you can see a half-obstructed view of the landscape behind it; though the bamboo paneling represents privacy, frosted bathroom glass would suppress more sights and sounds.

We ate another of Pan's tasty Thai candlelight suppers, and he made good on the moonshine - it was warming, reminiscent of sake, and could probably fuel a small go-cart.

We turned in for bed two hours after sunset and lied on our backs on the floor of the bamboo hut, under our mosquito nets. At the risk of sounding pedantic and overly-sentimental, this is our account:

We could hear through the bamboo panels to the adjacent huts, and we could share in their evening episodes with our eyes closed: a teenage mother frustrated because her crying infant wouldn't feed, a nylon-stringed classical guitar strumming basic, open chords, a woman pouring used dishwater from her stilted porch onto a family of chicks, Pan speaking quiet Thai with a Lahu village elder.

The village finally fell silent for the night, the stray and wild dogs of Northern Thailand held a brief forum of howls, and then all that remained was the ring of the cicadas, phasing in and out of unison.

Hours later, the dogs and roosters reminded us that they, in fact, owned the morning, and we were merely members of their captive audience.

In recounting our other Southeast Asia experiences and sharing in Baan Pha Daeng's humanity, we had acquired a colorful, albeit rudimentary, understanding of life and culture in this corner of the world.

Though we suffered a nigh-sleepless night with a morning hike ahead of us, we were already comforted by the memories we'd created on this leg of our trip, and we regretted nothing.

We ended our trek yawning under the sun on a bamboo raft.

Eat some snow for us.

Chiang Mai, Thai

Chiang Mai is in Northern Thailand, close to the Burmese border. It attracts tourists for two reasons: authentic cuisine and rustic excursions. We've partaken in both.

We attended a culinary class at the Chiang Mai Thai Cookery School, the first Thai cooking school established in Chiang Mai. Historically, we cooked "Thai" stir-fry a few times a week in our household, mostly from macro-ingredients. Having attended the class, we're now armed with an arsenal of curry-paste cunning and culinary techniques. Perhaps you, fair reader, shall someday witness the fruits of our classwork.

Because the class spanned eight hours and seven dishes, we were stuffed to the brim with our own concoctions. We were almost too full to eat the last dish, but it was sticky rice pudding with cane sugar and coconut milk - so clearly, we made room and went back for seconds.

The Night Bazaar (open nightly) and Sunday Night Market with stretches through the old city, offered some good souvenir opportunities and great street food (still diarrhea free, by the way). There we encountered the "Rock N Roll Power Bracelet" (at left) which we had to purchase. It shall serve us well for the remainder of our travels.

Laos: Deux

We drifted the Mekong with the Axners and ducked into several caves that were packed solid with Buddha figurines - gifts from worshipers. Most of the figures were "prayer for rain" (Buddha gesturing downward) and "stop arguing" (Buddha standing with hands out, in a double "talk-to-the-hand" gesture) poses, indicative of drought and war/genocide at the time of past worship.

While the Axners visited the waterfall (Kuangsi Falls [at left] - we visited them on our hillside trek) that afternoon, we walked a few miles of Mekong shoreline. We brought the iPod (along with our quintessential headphone splitter, so we could share the same aural experience). We listened to some experimental rock - a selection from Tortoise's TNT, some Four Tet, and a little Boards of Canada.

The instrumental, experimental tracks melded well with the colorful markets and expansive Mekong riverbed; as much as we wanted to hear Tom Waits' new box-set "Orphans...," his raspy narratives about hard living just don't cut it on this continent.

We'll catch up with you when we're back across the pond, Tom.

We ended the night with card games on the balcony over several 640ML bottles of Beer Lao, so as not to break the national curfew. We've been in bed at 10PM every night - it probably has something to do with the heat, the walking, and the rich dinner curries.

And now, without further ado - Unexpected Transportation Headache #1:

Our Thai Airways tickets from Laos to Chiang Mai, Thailand indicated a 11AM departure, so imagine our displeasure when we arrived at the LPQ airport at 10AM to find that the departure had been changed to 6:10PM. Instead of shaking our fists at the system (or at ourselves for not checking the departure schedule the night before), the four of us got a free ride back to town and treated ourselves to a classy lunch and traditional Khmu massages -60 minutes for $3.00!

You could certainly make the case that our massage frequency is getting out-of-hand, but we consider participating in massage as an authentic cultural experience, or something like that... but most importantly, the Axners had more massages than us in Laos!

The food here, aside from being dirt cheap, is delicious, and should be eaten with your bare hands with the aid of highland sticky rice (like Indian "naan"). The local beer (Beer Lao) has surpassed the other local lagers we've drank across Southeast Asia - most other Asian lagers have been under-hopped and poorly bottle-conditioned.

Luang Prabang

We found it. The town that most accurately and most peacefully speaks "Southeast Asia" to us is Luang Prabang, Laos. The town is at the juncture of the Mekong and Nam Chan rivers, and is considered the best-preserved town in the four-country region.

Its unfortunate 20th-century history affords it some intrigue as well; from '64-'73, the USA dropped over 2 million tons of bombs on the country, since the Ho Chi Minh trail (Northern Vietnam supply route) ran through Laos - making it the most heavily-bombed country per capita in the history of warfare.

Historically, the USA has had a negative or skewed impression of Laos - amidst the war in Vietnam, Secretary of State Dean Rusk stated that the country is merely "the wart on the hog of Vietnam." Today, it's not often considered as a tourist destination, and it's rarely worthy of mention in the news or in classrooms.

Well, we love it here. We've hiked to neighboring Khmu and Hmong hilltribes and waterfalls, we've roamed the markets, and we've visited a handful of temples, two of which were in caves.

We expected to hike through woods or forests on our excursion, but we found ourselves in the middle of a rainformest - tortuous vines, giant figs, banana trees, and bugs - lots of bugs. We didn't notice them until we sat down at a stream for lunch. Sara sustained some small bites on her sternum, but we're not medically concerned.

The hilltribe villagers were very polite - their children kept stalking us with caution, then when we smiled and waved, they'd laugh and disperse behind wells and baskets only to stalk again when we turned our backs. We were pleased with our guide's policy with the tribal visits: pay a small "tribute" to the official preservation fund for the tribes, but do not give or accept anything while in the village - this could encourage begging in the children (see: Cambodia).

The sky and sunsets here area bit hazy - we're told it's because of the dry season; farmers in the hilltribes burn their rice fields and there's no rain to bring the hazy particles back to the ground. However, it yields a campfire smell along the small villages - kinda nostalgic.

Hanoi Proper, Vietnam

...and still diarrhea-free!

This city has a lot of rules, and a lot of signs. Big, red, Vietnamese signs. In most cases, the signs instruct you not to proceed forward. Chances are, if you're close enough to read the signs, you're already dong something wrong.

The multitude of guardsmen with automatic rifles and banana clips serve as a friendly reminder that there are repercussions for legal infractions.

The best-guarded national treasure is the mausoleum of Ho Chi Minh, or as the children of Hanoi address him, "Uncle Ho". His body is embalmed and openly displayed in glass within his mausoleum. He looked peaceful - as we walked along the velvet ropes surrounding his glass casket, he seemed to move his hand!

Well, actually, this was only due to accidental flaws in the thickness of the glass, changing the index of refraction. Guess you had to be there. No pictures allowed; x-ray scanners, metal detectors, and armed guardsmen yelling at you to keep your hands in plain sight made it nigh impossible to get a candid snapshot of Uncle Ho.

We also attended a traditional Vietnamese water-puppet-show. Yeah, we paid to watch an aquatic puppetry performance - you got a problem with that? What a gas. The live music to which the puppets danced was well-composed and performed, and the puppets were maneuvered in whimsical, munchkin-like gestures (they even included some simple pyrotechnics) that had us laughing the majority of the performance. The rest of the audience chuckled too, so we weren't blatantly mocking their traditional culture.

On our last Vietnamese morning, we dined at a joint that served Pho (Vietnamese noodle soup, a popular winter dish in our household), which completed our Vietnamese cuisine experience, in our opinion.

Now we jet off to Laos with the Axners in a propeller jet - no napping here.

'Nam

Our guide, Mr. Tinh ("Ting") met us at the Hanoi airport to expedite our visa service. The fifteen minutes we spent separated from our passports seemed an eternity, but we really appreciated having a native to help us through the immigration bureaucracy, for a change.

We ran into two bums in our hotel that looked and smelled a lot like the Axners from Minneapolis, so we agreed to travel with them for the next twelve nights. We walked through the "Old Quarter," a district full of native markets, motor scooters, and colorful refuse in the gutters.

The next morning, we drove three hours with Tinh through rice fields to Ha Long Bay, stopping at an embroidery factory to see the craft in action. Of course, we walked out with some lovely examples of the artwork, too.

Ha Long Ba looks like some "Lost World," with densely-forested peaks jutting out of the saltwater into the foggy, cool, air.

We're spending three days on a "junk boat" - it can house twelve passengers, but for three days, it's just the four of us and five attendants (three cooks, a navigator, and an English-speaking guide).

Each meal is several courses of rich, fried, seafood, artfully-presented cucumbers, and some of the freshest rice we've ever had. Thus far, we've kayaked to a floating school and to a quiet bay, and we've crawled through two seaside caves. In these mountainous islands, they predict that there are over 140 undiscovered caverns.

The coffee is not to be missed - rich and almost chocolaty, with dollops of condensed milk lumped at the bottom of the mug. Stir vigorously and enjoy the tastiest eye-opener in Southeast Asia.

The weather for the entirety of our cruise has been a bit overcast, but it only adds to the mystical ambiance of the Ha Long region.

Wrapping up in Cambodia

We'll miss Siem Reap.

We spent our last day sampling Cambodian massage and beer - both are a bit rougher around the edges than their Thai counterparts.

The Cambodian (Khmer) traditional massages were only $6/hour, but ended with a "full-nelson" hold, and getting pulled back with our spines against an authentic Cambodian knee. Yee-ouch.

Angkor

We left Siem Reap early in the morning; we hired a private driver for the whole day (only $25) to tow us northward to Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom, and the surrounding temples of Preah Khan, Ta Prohm, and Phnom Bakheng.

Wow. We'd do the sites little justince with a wordy, qualitative description. So take a look at a few of the photos we've included.

The majority of the stone is sandstone, which allows for intricate detail in the bas reliefs that adorn the temple walls. The region started as Hindu temples, but the Buddhists came to own it and built atop the existing walls with new imagery. We really struggled to see everything in a day - even now, it's the largest collection of religious structures in the world (it's also nominated as a New Wonder of the World).

The entire Angkor region (including the temples we traversed) was rigged with landmines in the last few decades. When you ask a Cambodian if the temple grounds are mine-free, they nod and smile with gritted teeth - "Yes, is safe."

Nevertheless, as you stand at one temple and gaze at another, you start to walk towards it, and you find yourself about to cut through a grassy, rocky, terrain - off the dirt path. As convincing as the toothy smiles and Cambodian assurance may be, think twice. Stay on the path.

We stayed in Northern Angkor until sunset (we watched it from atop Phnom Bakheng).

If you find yourself here in Southeast Asia (and hopefully you didn't wind up here by mistake or against your will), you need to visit Angkor. We'll even pay for your admission ticket.

We're due for a night of good sleep.

P.S. - Pay for your own admission ticket, cheapskate.

Siem Reap

Welcome to Cambodia. Please adhere to the same rules as Thailand, but we have another rule:

No public displays of affection; not even hand-holding.

Showing affection is condiered vulgar in public, and should only be exercised privately. We weren't aware how natural it is for us to hold hands while walking, and we spent the day with one person reaching for the hand, and the other swatting it away. Nobody gave us any dirty looks.

Siem Reap is fantastic. We've not encountered any of the duplicity we found in the Bangkok urbanites, the weather is outstanding (85 F) and the town is situated on either side of the quite, muddy, Siem Reap river (it's more of a stream). Our hotel is right on the shore.

Some other interesting episodes here on the first day:

• A man driving a motorbike with four (four!) pigs tethered belly-up to the back of the bike. The pigs were still scurrying.
• A shopowner in the market tells her un-diabered toddler son to to pee. He stands at the threshold, facing out of the shop door, and urinates onto the dusty public sidewalk. A man walks by, watching, and treads directly through the resulting puddle.
• Adolescents bathe in public, in the stagnant, muddy, brown, Siem Reap river.
• We helped the boy at the reception desk with his resume cover letter; he was applying for a reception position at another Siem Reap hotel.

We ended the night with a dinner performance and a few local Angkor (American Standard Lager-style) beers. $.50 apiece. Jackpot!

Sunburnt in Bangkok

Welcome to our home country of Thailand. We have a few simple rules we'd like you to follow during your stay:

• Don't speak poorly of the president or the ruling party. Don't mock the imagery of him that we've hung on every lamppost - if it helps, just avoid looking at the lampposts altogether.
• Don't point the soles of your feet at people, or at images of the Buddha.
• Bow out of respect with your hands in prayer at your neck. Bow win entering and leaving. On second thought, just keep bowing - especially when you're not sure whether or not to bow.

We followed these rules in an effort to appear respectful, and we think it worked quite well for us.

Bangkok is a zoo. To expand this metaphor: zoos are smelly, crowded, somewhat flashy, and of course, packed with more sights than you can see in a single day. Zoos also have cheap unnecessarily expensive food, and zoos have people leaning against lampposts lying to you that an exhibit "doesn't open until 2 PM" and offering to drive you somehwere else in a three-wheeled open-air taxi and charge you a handful of dough for his services. Well, zoos don't really have that last part, but Bangkok sure does. Even if we hadn't read about that scam beforehand, we'd have known better.

The grand palace and "wats" (temples) we visitedin Bangkok were gold-tiled and quite garish. Inside the Wat Phra Kaeo (the holiest Thai temple) sits the Emerald Buddha. Well, it's technically Jade, but the monk who unearthed it mistook it for a more precious stone - thus, the moniker. They change the Buddha's clothes thrice a year to comply with the seasons. It was still dressed for the wet season, so the statue wore a golden gown. I think it was inconsiderate of them not to throw in a wee little golden umbrella. I suppose it's hard to pray to a dude holding an umbrella, though. O' the plight of the Buddha!

The hilight of our morning was our authentic Thai herbal massages - an hour of pressure-point full-body massage with some scattered rub-downs with hot, menthol-soaked rags. Ours for only $16 apiece!

We had some beers with an Australian chiropractor and another American traveler. Chiang Mai and its neighboring village "Pie" (sp?) in Northern Thailand came very highly reocommended. We may have to alter our itinerary accordingly once we return to Thailand in two weeks.

We spent an hour at an off-the-map temple/graveyard, where a man sold us a plate of banana segments and two long sticks ($.10 total) and we fed dozens of turtles in the temple's ponds! We did this until our bananas ran out; it was more fun than we'd like to admit.

After walking the markets and climbing the Golden Mount to get a high-altitude view of the sprawling city. We didn't appreciate the city any further, but it did satisfy our innate urge to climb things. We actually discovered that we had these innate urges as we made the climb. The delights of self-discovery! Ahem.

We hit the hay early that night after a Bangkok canal ride and a dirt-cheap five-course Thai dinner. Let's go to Cambodia.

So-Long, Japan

We spent the last morning in Japan visiting the Ueno Zoo (oldest existing Japanese zoo) and hitting the Tokyo districts we loved best - the sushi market and Asakusa. We decided to do it all by foot - a morning cross-town jaunt across Tokyo.

Our flight to Bangkok featured "My Super Ex-Girlfriend" - a splendid movie date over our boxed curried chicken and complementary Bailey's Irish Creme. Way-to-go, United!