Koh Phi Phi

OK this post is on Koh Phi Phi. We're a bit behind here because it was too hard to find Internet access in the North Island of New Zealand (namely because everything closes so fricken early!).

Koh Phi Phi was our favourite place in Thailand. It's made up of two separate islands- Phi Phi Lei and Phi Phi Don. Phi Phi Lei is where some scenes from the movie, The Beach were shot. You can only visit it during the day, except if you camp on the island (very limited number of campsites- like 5). Phi Phi Don is the bigger island and where all the accommodation is. A relatively small (compared to Koh Lanta and Koh Samui) but very picturesque island. It is quite built up since the last I was there, 4 years ago. Lots of little shops, restaurants and bungalows. And nowhere near as commercialized as Koh Samui. They're still doing some re-building from the damage done by the tsunami, but like I said, it's more built up than before.

We only had 2 days in Koh Phi Phi. Spent one day diving, and one day sleeping (we were exhausted from the diving)/ touring Phi Phi Lei. As I mentioned in my last (very short) post, when we were diving we saw a Leopard shark lying on the ocean floor near Koh Bida, which we'll show you a pic of when we get back (can't scan in photos from the underwater camera here). Must have been around 2 metres long. Really cool looking with big spots all over it (hence its name). We also did our deep dive there. A lot of people will start to experience nitrogen narcosis at around 26m depth and start to act all silly. The instructor will get you to do some mildly stimulating brain task to see if you can accomplish it. Happy to say that Sham and I can both spell our last names backwards at a depth of 32m (I'm lucky mine is so short). Neither of us got really silly although both of us mimicking a mermaid's swim was very amusing at the time. We also did a night dive right around Phi Phi Lei. Sham and I both had primary lights plus a backup each. The Divemaster had only one light, but looked like a really good strong, robust light. About 5 mins into the dive, both of Shameiz's lights were out, and my backup somehow got flooded so he couldn't use that either. So we had to hang on to eachother with my crappy light and follow the Divemaster around (more difficult than it sounds when you can barely see what's around you, and to try to control your bouancy together so you don't crash into the rock/ coral below). By the end of the dive, my crappy light was the only one working. Luckily we saw a couple Barracuda, so that made the dive worth it.

OK here are a few pics--
1. Viewpoint on Koh Phi Phi Don (this is not the whole island!)
2. Beach on Koh Phi Phi Don where the ferry docks (accidentally deleted pic- will re-upload later)
3. and 4. Maya Beach on Koh Phi Phi Lei
5. Sunset on the way from Phi Phi Lei to Don
6. Sham drinking

Will post New Zealand soon. So far it has been really nice driving around the North Island- sort of reminds us of B.C. Just got into the South Island last night. Going to search out some seals today on the beach. L8R.

PS. Re Sham's toe. I didn't describe in the last post, that the big ball of crap on his toe is puss. It just sort of exploded out of his toe all of a sudden. Anyways, it's all better now.

Koh Lanta

Here are some pics from Koh Lanta. Sham got his openwater PADI cert (yay!!!! finally!!!! (stupid toe) ). We did a cool night dive together and saw some barracuda (my cheapo crap light was the only one working by the end of the dive), did a deep dive (32m- and proud to say neither of us got nark-ed out), and saw a leopard shark and lots of Nemos (a.k.a. Western Clown fish). Not much else to say since I'm under the influence right now, we're getting kicked out of the Internet place in oh 5 mins, and Sham is ummm busy. We're actually in Koh Phi Phi right now. Looks pretty darn good considering it was wiped out by the tsunami just over a year ago. Off to Phuket tomorrow (cell phone shopping!) and then off to New Zealand! Will post more.. sometime soon...

O, and on the topic of toes, my right big toe's toenail is 3/4 fallen off. Will post pic of toe with no toenail when it gets fully ripped off. Know you're all looking forward to that. Weirdos.








(This is gross but there were too many requests so decided to post)

The Conservatives won???

YUCK...

Well maybe we will stay in Thailand :)

Thailand - Koh Samui and Koh Phangang

Hello Everybody,

We have spent the last 6 days on the islands of Koh Samui and Koh Phangang.

Pictures
1) is a 80m waterfall in Koh Samui at the centre of the island. We took elephants up again since hey I had a bum toe and all, only to discover they only take you up about 50meters..another rip off :)

2)This was one of those we are going to get shot moments that turned out to be not so bad. After the waterfall Mel and I caught a cab (or so we thought, turned out to be one of the elephant riders finishing his shift and being a "cab" driver. Anyway he was trying to tell us something on the ride back that we couldn't comprehend bount sleeping and elephants. About 10mins into the drive he turns off the road telling us we only have to wait a minute and takes a small dirt road to the middle of no where. First thoughts in both our minds were we're going to get mugged, so we went about hiding things (specifically passports and credit cards) in and around us and the car while the driver stepped out. Turns out his final piece of work for the day was to get the elephant beds ready and their food. The elephants were brought to this location to sleep and feed, it was really amazing to watch and be there while they we're "off shift" :)

3-5)Are of our trip to Anghtong National Marine Park. Mel and I decided to take the 500meter hike up to the top to check out the view since I couldn't snorkel or swim...500 meters, right, no big deal...well wow..we can't believe they let tourists actually do this, this was a more technical climb than Kilimanjaro and took us 40mins up and 55mins down..the last pic is of the stretch from the viewing point down, it didn't get much better than this the whole way down..nuts eh? But what a wonderful view, it was worth it.

6-9) Are from our 3 day trip to Koh Phangang where the infamous Full Moon Party is held, surprisingly..every Full Moon. Difficult to take pictures but basically about 5000 people on a beach all night partying to various DJs. Very interesting. These pics are of the Fire Performers, a sign for the Elephant Bar and the last pic is off randowm people jumping through the ring of fire..and I don't mean the post General Tao kind :P..Notice the fire theme!

10-13) Are of our little Hotel Bungalow (My Phangang Resort) while we were in Phangnang. Really quaint place, with a very quiet beach right there and gorgeous sunsets

So we're off to Koh Lanta tomorrow for 4ish days to do ....nadda. My toe is good to go as per the folks at the hospital and I'm going to get my diving cert :) The nurses gave a big woop when they got to look at it, what a fuss...I was actually proud at that moment :)

I hear you Torontonians are experiencing some good mild weather :) Hope it lasts past March!

Thailand - "Ping Pong for you?"

Hello from Pattaya,

The seediest town ever. Yes Yes seedier than Vegas, Niagara Falls, Amsterdam (at least the seedy parts) and a few otehrs combined. Everywhere you look there are older, usually white men with young Thai girls.."Weekend Girlfriends". Anyway, an interesting place. Many Go GO Bars, Ping Pong Shows (and I don't mean the game), Transvestites (Thailand is famous for it's gender bending culture and cheap plastic surgery), markets, tourists, etc.

But we're getting ahead of ourselves. Mel and I are a few cities behind in terms of posting so let's catch up on Thailand. We started off with 4 days in Bangkok. Spent New Years eve at an open air market called Pat Pong which is lined with clubs and go go bars and tons of shopping stalls in the centre. We ended up at an open bar listening to a live duet (think American Idol rejects- William Hung- no wonder he thought he sounded good!). Everything from Fity Cent to Maroon Five. The oddest thing was the choice of song for the midnight countdown..Maroon 5..This love..odd odd, but fun!

Anyway, Bangkok has some great scams, all of them perfected and delivered with a level of politness you can only laugh. We got caught by one though. While walking around on day one a middle aged man asked us waht we were looking for..we were hungry and he seemed to know everything and since it was New Years eve nothing was open...he got a Tuk Tuk driver for us and explained everything to him..well that was a scam, the story goes he was waiting for his wife, but in reality he's a guy that gets business for the Tuk Tuk. The Tuk Tuk then proceeded to take us to all the hsopping places..we were so thankfull, these places were quality and cheap..that was a scam too, basically he gets a gas vouture when he takes us to these places...So whatever, we have watches and diesel clothes we don't need etc.. Also, the tailers here are really cheap. Mel got a suit and a dress and I got 2 suits (Italian Wool) + 2 shirts + 2 ties all custom made and fitted for $500 US..nice stuff.

After our 4 days in Bangkok we went slighlty North and West near the Burma border to a place called Kanchanaburi. The pics below are all from that trip.

1)Erawan Waterfall - This pic is only one of the 7 stages. Basically you hike up to each of the stages. About 2km walk up. Very beautiful, the toe hindered me from seeing the last stage, as I can't get it wet, but basically Mel climbed the rocks to get to the top!!!

2-4)Mel & I petting the Tigers. They're just slighlty bigger Tiku's :P. This picture and the next 2 were taken at a Monk run sanctuary for reclaimed animals. These tigers are taken care of and those that can be released in the wild will be. Very cool place.

5)An elephant Ride through the Jungle. Our elephant was cranky, and it's amazing how much persoanlity they have. Sadly there are only 2000 wild elephants left in Thailand. about 3000 are in captivity, 2000 in tourit traps like this one and others adn 1000 illegaly used in farming and the logging industry. We felt guilty about this one, but they are treated well and fed well...but yeah

6)For those of you that saw the Movie "The Bridge OVer the River Kwai", this is the bridge...well not really. The original bridge was built by POWs captured by the Japanese to create a railway from Thailand into Burma for Supply routes. I believe 17 people died per KM and a total of 17000 soldiers and civillians died in total. A sad place really. This bridge was rebuilt after the war with steel after the original was bombed by the allies near the end of the war.

7) Hellfire Pass along the railway above that killed the most people.

Cheers,
Sham
P.S. Toe is doing well and slowly healing, my diving plans are probably out the window for Thailand, will probably have to do that in the Cooks, but at least I get to keep my toe!!! :)
PPS. Personally I think he should just replace his toe with a steel toe. That would be v. cool. (Mel)

My Toe

Is being a pain.. :P

Had to go back to the Hospital to get it drained again..changed the antibiotics..yadda yadda. Interesting twist to the vacation... :)

Anyway, in Pattaya now and probably for a few more days. We had a good time in Kanchanaburi an will post the pics soon (There is one with Mel sitting down with a Tiger..full grown Tiger..sleeping in her lap). Might head to Koh Samui in 2-3 days and chill out. Anyway, will try to post the Pics soon. Hope all of you are doing well!

Also..Congrats Nick on Making UHURU! Show off :P

Cheers!

India 2

So hello from Bangkok again. Let's rewind back to India for awhile. I'm sitting at an Internet Terminal by the Hotel while Mel gets her 1 hour Thai Massage for 300bhat ~ 8Cdn Loonies. Also, my second toe on the right foot got infected on one of the blisters (scabs) I had from my climb, my guess is it happened in India.. anyway..the story involves extreme pain, a needle between the toes to get a local anesthetic..and some other gross stuff, so I'll spare you the details, I have some pics..but I think I'll spare you that as well.

Anyway, it looks like my toe is not going to fall off and the infection is receding..cause hey I can walk again, and Mel has helped nurse it back to health and is being stringent so it doesn't get infected again...anyway..

Sooo India.

Well first of all, of all our destinations it is the one that we spent the least amount of time in. Mostly because I really wanted to do a full India trip in the future and knew that is a 4-6 week kinda thing. We ended up with 4 days in India mostly because it was a stop over anyway, so we decided to get a bit of a taste. So we chose to stay in the Delhi area, mostly because of it's close proximity to Agra and it's famous Taj Mahal.

Fist of I think we can now crown (although it's still a bit early) the worst Airline we've ever flown....drum roll please.....AIR INDIA!!!!!!!! although American Airlines (or maybe Air Zimbabwe because of the unpredictable fuel shortages) is a close second :). Air India.. the staff are cranky, plane is smelly, bathrooms are not clean (we think since the plane was inaugurated), always delayed, counters never open on time, same food on all 3 flights we took, etc...

So our trip to India started off with delays.. although the plane was on time by Indian Standard Time standards. Basically we had a long travel day from the start. We flew from Kilimajaro Airport to Nairobi, Nairobi to Mumbai and then Mumbai to Delhi. The flight leaving Nairobi was delayed 4 hours (Air India said there were problems leaving Mumbai and so the plane was late), that made us miss the connector from Mumbai to Delhi which almost half the aircraft was on. So we were stuck in Mumbai from 3am to 1:30pm. But just before boarding time, after we were at the gate there were some "Mechanical Troubles"..which delayed us further. So we can shake stuff like that off no problem. But it became quickly apparent that in India your guard has to be way up all the time, everyone we interacted with tried to scam us..fake politley..but scam none the less. I think our guide from the Taj Mahal summed it up perfectly. He said "In india we can and do do everything that the west does, we just don't do anything 100%, everything is about 60%..SOMETIMES WE GET CLOSE TO 80%..BUT NEVER A 100%"..that's about right. We never encountered anything in India that made us say..wow that was amazing...although the Taj was amazing...Agra and the experience of getting to the Taj was a mini adventure.

We hired a car for 3 days to take us from Delhi, to Jaipur and then to Agra and finally back to the Airport. We had a portly quiet driver named Deepak who spoke very little, but a nice man regardless who came alive with conversation near the airport as he realized he should probably start working the tip :)

Some things we observed
-India is the dirtiest place we've ever been to (OK 1.2 billion people can't all be made to use garbages, especially since 700 million or so are utterly poor)
-The povery in India is in your face, and you sadly start blocking it out, it's also amazingly sad, although the poor are fairly adept at the scams here..I guess you have to be
-Monkeys and Cows roam the streets freely(They are considered Holy) and play a central role in the government sponsored garbage cleanup program (by eating/ playing with/ sleeping in the garbage)
-Everyone tries to bud in line..EVERYONE! Lines are the most chaotic things in India. Old ladies are the worst, they act as if nothing is going on and then get mad at you when you point it out. In Jaipur we witnessed a large older lady try to bud in front of the line and got heckled to the back..she moved 1 spot back :) At the Delhi Airport, people were RUNNING to get in front of other people when counters started to open up. It was funny yet at the same time, maddening. If you would like a taste of this in Toronto, visit the Indian Consulate, there where all the tourists take a number a good number of people keep budding and pleading their case for why they should bud. I was even approached by a budder to give up my number since his aunt (who was eating an Ice Cream cone 2 seats up) was very sick..yah..
-Public Urination is very common. The first time I saw this a man in a crowded street in Jaipur started peeing on the city palace..we were in a car 5 feet away from him on a busy street, no one batted an eye. Since that point I started counting, I saw over 25 men from the city to the country peeing within 20 feet of a road. I also (unfortunately) saw 5 instances of people going #2..nuts hunh! Notice Picture below with highlighted rectangle.
-The Taj Mahal is a diamond in the rough..Agra is one of the dirtiest places ever..and then there is the Taj with it's magnificent beauty. I'm surprised with the number of tourists (over 5000-6000 per day) that visit because of the Taj there aren't enough funds to clean up at least the areas around the Taj?!

Anyway, not sure if maybe it was us or India..but we walked away from India thinking we should probably see some other parts of the world first...India has moved down the must-see countries sadly..I dunno, I'll ponder this longer, let you know what I come up with!

OK so the pics
1)Man peeing in Delhi
2)Delhi
3)View from our Delhi hotel room
4)A group of buffalo budding into line at the entrance of the Taj, one Bull actually chased a tourist who ran off screaming..wish I had a pic of that!
5)Us at the Taj in Agra
6)Open Engine farm trucks carrying various grains and produce
7)The floating palace in Jaipur