Sawasdee Ka!!! Hello from BEAUTIFUL thailand! I know that this is my Palau blog, but this trip happened because I was so close to Thailand in Palau, so it's going to count as something bloggable. I'm having, quite possibly, the best two weeks of my life here. The first day I was in Manila, I wasn't so sure, but after purchasing my new hot pink travel watch, things started to brighten. My first stop was Bangkok, to see the Grand Palace and the lovely Jolie. Bangkok was great, and the grand palace was grand, but once I tripped into Chiang Mai, I fell head over heels (pun intended, and admittedly bad). Chiang mai is an amazing city in the north of thailand, surrounded by hills and jungle, as well as waterfalls and many, many elephants. Tara, my travel partner extraordinaire, and I were off as soon as we landed. we shopped, and then shopped some more, and bought as many $3 shirts and $1 wooden elephants as we could stuff in our bags. WHen we couldn't stomach buying anymore souvenirs (for a day or so), we signed up to go ziplining through the jungle. This was incredible. I nearly vomited many times, but in the end I think I conquered a fear or three! Tuesday we took a thai cooking class. I made springs rolls (see below), chicken with cashew nut, green curry paste, red curry chicken, and a chicken coconut soup. #1 rule in thai cooking: NO OLIVE OIL. a distinct digression from the cooking I have known all my years.


Tuesday night we went to see Muay Thai boxing. This was also incredible. the women were my favorite. Tara and I tried our hand at it, but I think both of us are too smiley for boxing. Then wednesday we set out for a two day trek in the mountains. we jumped on the "van" which is a big glorified (not so much) taxi, where you sit sideways, and in our case, with 13 people on about 5 feet of wood. Thank goodness for motion sickness pills! We stopped at a karen longneck village, which was sadly set up for tourists to buy their local artifacts. I knew this, but I bought some anyway, because apparently the government has put the karen there and based on one translation, they may or may not be permitted to leave.

We also stopped a local market, where, yes mom, I ate this grasshopper (see below). It wasn't so bad. not so great either. I won the respect of all these spanish guys though (there were 5 on the trip, and they paid a good amount of attention to tara and I while we struggled up the mountain). The rest of the trip went like this: we hiked for 3 hours up a VERY steep hill. I lost about 5 pounds that day. we stayed on top of a mountain, listened to a thai guy sing a romanian song taught to him by an australian, ate amazing homemade food, got massages by the locals (amazing), woke up, hiked down the mountain for 3 hours, whitewater rafted down the river, sat on a bamboo raft for a while, ate more homemade pad thai, then pilled back into the van for our long and sleepy ride back to chiang mai.

Back in Chiang mai, tara went off to an elephant sanctuary, while I pampered myself with a massage from teh women at the chiang mai women's prison ($5.50 of the best money I've ever spent). Saturday we were VERY sad to leave, but tara had amoebic dysentary by then and I was anxious for some beach relaxation time. I'm now in ko samui, after riding on teh smallest plane of my life, and loving the sun and the absolute power to sleep as long as I want!

Helicopter pics

Blue Corner from above
No doors!

The beautiful and protected Seventy Islands 

I'm an idiot

Uighurs is not spelled with a Q. I'm a moron. To be fair, they don't teach us how to spell in law school.

In other news: I got to go on Helicopter ride last weekend!!!! It was, hands down, the coolest thing I've ever done. I have the most incredible pictures but I can't upload them the moment... stay tuned.

Summer in Palau

Happy Fourth of July!

We have had a very nice summer here in Palau.  The weather is exactly how it has been every other day this year, but somehow summer just always has a nice ring to it.  We had a big ex-pat party on the 4th, where I wore my sparkly headband and proud Barack Obama '08 pin.  I had a lot more to be proud about this year as an American and actually felt excited for our wonderful nation.  I also felt wonderful about the open bar, and the beach frisbee that happened!

These are some pics of our third trip up to Kayangel. We did Special K olympics for the second time, where Rick and Christy dominated spouse-style.  I did not do so well this time, as I had some trouble keeping my butt off the ground during the marathon crab walk.  There's always next time I suppose!  When we arrived on friday, the owner of the island showed up proudly displaying his catch of the day: 3 lobster, a very big grouper, a clam muscle for sashimi, and an octopus!  Not wanting to scoff at this hospitable gesture, I womaned up and tried the freshly boiled octopus.  To my astonished delight, it was AMAZING! I tasted like really chewy lobster, but rich enough to eat without salt, butter or lemon.  I am officially a new woman: eating things with tentacles and raw fish right out of the water.  

Oh! also, this is a picture of a blowfish that Curtis accidentally speared.  All of their spikes are poisonous, but if you really, really know what you're doing, you can eat them.  Our fearless ranger Lazarus promptly took the blowfish into the boat and told us that they are find to hold, so long as you stick your fingers through their eyes.  He proceeded to do so, and I nearly lost my lunch.  

Other things that have happened in june and july here in Palau: 1) new crop of navy boys arrived.  much better than the air force so far.  a little on the young side, but a chivalrous group, which is hard to dislike; 2) I've decided to go to thailand next month for two weeks; 3) we're getting some quighers, and I hope I spelled that right; 4) R.I.P Michael Jackson. we did a very long tribute night at the karaoke bar, where I discovered that it does not sound good when I do "I want you back" in falsetto; 5) It rained a lot and I discovered that "The L Word" is a really good show.  

A little over two months left here in Palau, and I'm still enjoying every second of this place! 

Jesse comes to Palau!

The pillbox
Jesse, Me, Rubak

It’s been a while, I know.   I scared my parents with the last entry, which resulted in a stern lecture about sailing outside the reef, and something about “knowing better than that.”  I agree, and I promise mom and dad, I will be staying far inside the reef from now on, although mostly because I’m “risk-adverse” and not because  you said so.  

My very dear friend Jesse came to visit Palau the first week of May and arrived just in time for the sun! It rained a lot before then and it's rained an awful lot since then, but Jesse got sun almost every day she was here, and we had a blast.  While we accomplished a lot in the two weeks she was here, the most memorable were our three day trip to the deserted beach of Ngerbalas, getting to see some very well-trained dolphins, and taking a kayak tour of the islands with a personal palauan tour guide.  

I had been to Ngerbalas before, but only very briefly.  The waters surrounding palau's northernmost island, Kayangel, are absolutely breathtaking and consist of more hues of blue than you can imagine.  we camped, and ate, and for the most part made the difficult decisions about which hammock in which to nap.  On the third day, I made everyone play beach olympics.  Events included hit and spin paddle ball, the machete toss, coconut bocce ball, and a driftwood obstacle race.  Mihnea came in first place overall, and sang the Romanian national anthem for us.  It was a glorious end to a glorious weekend. 

During the following week, Jesse and I got a free trip to dolphin's pacific.  A trainer here rescued seven dolphins from japan, where they are hunted for food.  He has since trained them and raised them next to several rock islands here.  Dolphins have never really been my thing, but i was really impressed by how smart they were, and how well they could be trained.  Considering that I can't get my cat to stop biting my achilles tendon when she's hungry, I was amazed that a small hand movement could yield a very large backflip from the dolphins.  Here's something interesting I learned: dolphins can't digest leaves, and they eat them all the time.  the trainers have to catch them about once a week, hold them down and stick their hands down their throats and into the dolphin's stomachs to take the leaves out.  gross, but fascinating. 

THe next day, Jess and I took a day-long kayak tour of the islands.  We had our own power boat driver, and our own tour guide.  we were plunked down in some of the most gorgeous little lagoons between islands and learned so much about palauan history, biology and chemistry.  ONe stop we made was to an island that had on it a "Japanese Pillbox."  These were little, roughly 8 x 5' cement structures that Japanese soldiers made for the war.  They have one tiny hole in them for their guns, and one smaller hole for a flashlight.  We stopped at this one box where we were told that a chinese soldier was held captive for leaking information to the U.S.  He wrote a note home to his family in three languages (korean, mandarin and japanese), but unfortunately died inside.  I was amazed at how well preserved the pillbox was, and that the writing (which appeared to be in charcoal) remained untouched.  People can walk right inside, but unlike in other parts of the world, the structure could remain tamper-free.  

Palau continues to amaze me.  I am amazed that I never even knew this country existed before last year, and amazed at how few people have come to soak up all that it has to offer.  

Skiffing!

Hello!

I've been sailing this amazing boat with an couple here in Palau, Richard and Rita.  They are incredibly inspiring people who have taken the American dream, injected it with saline and sailed it around the globe.  They live here in Palau on a beautiful sailboat and awake every morning to the serene alcoves of the Rock Islands.  Richard is a lawyer here, so to all those legal naysayers, the answer is yes, you can be a lawyer and be totally rad too.  

Richard and Rita started sailing an Australian 18-foot death wish about twenty years ago.  It's flat bottom, super high mast and short hull make it a very unsteady, very fast machine.  Four people sail at any one time, and two people are attached to harnesses, and balance the boat out on racks that extend from the boat.  Because the wind is so variable here, and comes in short bursts, some filled with rain squalls, balancing this boat is often precarious and often results in capsizing.  Of course, those several seconds all the way out on the rack with only your feet touching the boat are worth all the fear and bruises. 

Last sunday the boat capsized in high seas, a couple miles off shore.  The waves and the wind were such that getting the boat back up was nearly impossible, and proved to be too time consuming with the setting sun.  Luckily we had enough extra crew members that day to have had a dinghy out with us with a motor, so we went back to get some help from the good palauan rangers.  At about 9:30, with a very tired, cold, head-wounded (for Vivi) crew, we made it back to land.  

All in a good day of sailing!  Here is a picture of the skiff on a sunny, calm day.  It doesn't look nearly as scary as it is in real life!

I forgot

My Frisbee boys! and ariel and nick

oh also,
14. Nick and I tried chewing betelnut. it was incredibly gross. Nick's cheek was swollen for over a week.
15. Karaoke. Yes. To all who doubt it, I watched my brother sing a country western song at a karaoke bar. I have it on video. it's amazing. He even admitted that he had a ton of fun doing so. I also made ariel sing Edelweiss with me, as an homage to our sixth grade play "the sound of music," and we got high score of the night! (these scores, as far as I can tell, are arbitrary, but we will take this praise nevertheless).