I finally have a day off!

I'm still in Childers now. I just spent the last 14 days working straight, I FINALLY have a day off today.
I now live ontop of the local Pub in Childers. I also invested in some earplugs. I'm working really hard, and hopefully will be for the next month or so until I continue with my travels. Eventhough I'm workign hard, I'm still having a great time, I still like my job, though it does get tiring and I have great company!
Here are some random pictures to of random things I've done here:

I am a Smut Inspector

Just as my bank account hit 0 and my credit card was maxed out luck has turned around! All four of us got a job as SMUT INSPECTORS. Eventhough it sounds like my job involves me going to the corner store and checking out the top shelf of the magazine rack, it is nothing of the sort! I am actually working for the government of Queensland looking for a disease in sugar cane called; Smut, in order to try to keep this outbreak under control.
The best part is I get paid about quadruple what I have been, lunch is provided, and I get to wear a really cool uniform. I am guarenteed a minimum of 5 days a week, and double time on week-ends. WOOO!!!!
All 4 of us live in a really cute (and very small) cabin.
As always my luck turned around just when I desperatly needed it to, just as it always seems to....

A pointless mission all the way to Emerald

After changing my mind about a million times, I decided to go all the way up to Emerald ( which was a 9 hour drive north and inland) to p[rune some grape vines. On the bus up there I met 3 English girls that were going to the same place. Thank God!!! because the place was a nightmare. The place looked like a concentration camp. We were each placed into seperate white box-like rooms.
Within hours of being there I had my food stolen. To make things even worse our employer tried to scam us by making us do 2 jobs at once but only paying us for one. After a few days we broke free having earned 0$$$. Though it felt a bit like I was escaping from prison.



Wooo! good times in Emerald!
So we took a bus 6 hours BACK south!! to a place called Bundaberg where we were promised at least 5 days a week of work. We lived in a 2 bedroom apartment with 3 other people (that makes 7 of us in atimy little place)....Well a week passed, we watch a LOT of TV and only got one full day of work. Well that got us 35$ richer!!
I wasted more money thean made money there.
So we headed even further south (only a half hour from where I origingally started) to a place called Childers.

Fraser island

So I finally packed my bags and moved from the van. My first stop was to Hervey Bay where I met up with Beverly, my Canadian friend I met while telemarketting in Surfer's Paradise. Together we went on a 3 day self drive Fraser Island trip. This is where they put 10 random people together give us a 4x4 and ship us off to an island made entirely of sand. We sleep in tents the entire time we're there and EVERYTHING gets sandy! We lucked out and had a great team, including bev's friend JP whom I absolutly adore! All in all we had a greattime, it rained a bit but we some great lakes, sandunes, and DINGOS!! Also made some tastytasty BBQ, yum

ABORT MISSION!!

Well a few things have happened again to change all my plans completly. I ended up getting a job with some rich guy painting his massive boat. That was pretty cool until he descided he didn't want me to work for him and wanted me to be his prostitute. HAHAHAHAHAHAHa well that was the last time I spoke to him, now my crazy canadian friend has moved on without me, I'm not working for the perve anymore (obviously) and I'm having a hard time finding a picking job. Well I'm being persistant, and it looks like things should be sorted out within a week. But now unfortunatly I will be on foot/busses. No more vans for me for a bit. Oh well!!!

being my usual random sporadic self

Well I've been in Surfer's Paradise for over a month now...looking for work. Looking so much that I have been to the beach twice since being here, and gone out at night only twice as well. We've done NOTHING but look for work. I did the door to door marketting thing trying to sell 4000$$$$$ vacuums. that obviously wasn't for me. then I did telemarketting for 4 days, which didn't work out so good either.

So I'm sick of surfer's, everybody is rich, snobby and superficial here. They're not hiring anyone for another month, and not that I have anythign against Joan, but after spending the past 4 months together, sleeping, eating, peeing, BREATHING together 24 hours a day, we could defineltly use some time off. (even though it will be the weirdest thing)

I descided to randomly whisk off to Brisbane on my own, meet up with some random Canadian girl I met telemarketting. RENT a van (HAHAH I'll own 2 vans but still can't drive) for about 7 $ a night, meet up with her Gay english friend, and head back off into some farms to earn some good money. We'll do some other things along the way but nothings planned yet.
I leave sunday night, it'll be weird packing my bags and takign a bus. It'll also be the strangest thing being away from Joan. She wants to stay in Surfer's for a little bit longer, and try harder to get some kind of bar work.
I'm also going to spend a week while we're waiting for J.P. (the English guy) standing on street corners begging people to give me money for fundraisers (not my own cause). Oh the things I subject myself to for money!! HAHAHAHH
Well that's me being random again, I wonder how it'll work out, and I wonder when I'm going to see joan and the van again, hmmmmmmm

emotionally crazy week!

Well my week hasn't been the best in Australia. I found myself a telemarketting job which compleltely sucks. The day before I was supposed to start (on mothers day) I found out my Dad had a Heart attack... He's alright now, from what i've heard, but it still such a helpless feeling when you're on the other end of the world and something like that happens.
..Well the job sucked just as bad as i thought. 5 days later I'm jobless again. It was half our descision and half the boss'. The boss pretty much senced our enthusiasm about the whole thing...
So I'm completely broke now and don't know where I'll work, I started going to the gym, but I had to stop that too until I know where I'll be working. We might head inland again to go pick some fruit... I think everything will sort itself out soon enough though.
Well as negative as this blog may sound, things will look up, we also finally met some cool girls to hang out with. They live in a nice apartment with a pool and hot tub. So that should be fun.
They're also having the same luck trying to find a job as us, we actually met them at work, and they lasted even less there than us...
.... So things aren't great now, but i guess they can't always be!!!

I went to a PSYCHIC FEST!

yup I did, and it was pretty interesting. I had my palms read and had some psychic lady tell me about myself and my future. strangely enough what they both said pretty much was the same as eachother.
So now let me give you a bit of insight about my future.
The first thing the psychic lady said is she sees a man with me ( dead man) with dark hair who travels. He's the reason I get along with guys alot more. There was another dead lady with me,who had a lot of love and respect for me. She came from a cottage had a tough life and was surrounded by lots of mountains. She had soft features and light brown hair. (I then told her I don't know any of my relatives so she dropped the whole dead thing and moved on)
I'm goign to keep travelling like this for 2 more years (only TWO more years!!!)
there's going to be some study in my futrue, no university degrees, but more school for sure
I'm having 2 kids, and meeting my soul mate at 29
she spoke of 3 men that are currently around me or in my near futur
man:
1) someone I supposedly met reletively not too long ago. We have a deep connection, he's 6 feet tall (at least) has dark curly hair, likes to party alot. She saw him standing on beach with no shirt on with really baggy shorts (hmmmmm)
I'll end up having a reunion with him and we'll travel together for awhile.
2) A light brown hair boy with blue eyes, I may not even know who he is, but he knows me, and is waiting for me to come home, and stop my travelling way...His family is wealthy ("not that you care" the psychic lady said) his family is involved insome kind of fishing or boat type thing...
3) Black hair, gorgeous guy in the north of Australia. He's 26 years old that I'll fall for, but shouldnt.......
I don't have much of a clue who any of these guys are, but interestig nonetheless...
So it was also mentioned that I am going to come home early, to canada, cuz someone related to me is going to be in an accident or get sick suddenly (she mentioned pneumonia briefly)
It was mentioned that I have a lot of safe energy around me. "If I'm in a bad situation, I'm always in a good situation"
apperantly I will have guns pointed at me at some point, and I'll come out of it ok.
hmm what else what else...
Oh I'm going to have people try to scam me 3 times in money on my way up the east coast (what else is new??).
I'll also end up seperating with Joan for a bit but meeting again.
So I am supposedly a great emotional and spiritual healer. The lady saw me leading young people and helping them in the future.
I'm spiritual (she emphisized not Religious)
The palmist guy said I am not meant to work for anyone. I hate being told what to do, and I'll work for myself or something.
They both told me I should take down my writers block, because eventhough I think I'm creative and have lots of interesting things to write.
I was also reassured I am on the exact path I'm supposed to be. I have to get all the travel out of me to settle down, and also have to gather as much wisdom as I can for my future career.
They said I was lonely, also saw the 2 significant relationships I had and it was mentioned it was really good I ended the last one whne I did, or it would have gotten much more physically aggressive. (the palmist really hit that one right on)
They said a bunch of other things.
So I'm pretty skeptical about this stuff, but I have to admit these guys are pretty good. They didn't ask me many questions, and I barely mentioned anythign about myself and they got pretty close on a lot of things.
Well whether this was bullshit or not, it did make me realize eventhough I'm living my life a bit different than most, I'm still doing what I'm supposed to. It was good to hear that coming out of someone elses mouth, whether they were pulling it out of their ass or not.

So besides goign to psychic fests, I've been keeping myself busy handing out 9847593465349724 resumes. Unfortunatly no one likes to hire travellers because we're all unstable. I'm staying in Surfer's Paradise. which is really nice. It's a pretty big city right by the beach, so its perfect..
Unfortunatly looks like I might end up doing some telemarketting here. Not as bad as montreal telemarketting but still eeeeeeeuuuuuuuu. Oh well, I'm living on my last 40$ so I best not be too picky!
I'll start workign monday, if anythign better comes along I can always quit and do that.
Just incase anyone is wondering, its been 2 weeks since we got the van fixed and he's still purring liek a kitty.
That's about it for the excitment here. As always we met some more people who felt bad for us an invited us to sleep in their beds while they sleep on the couch HAHAH.
But our van is so perfect right now we rather sleep in our own bed.

7 mechanics and 2 weeks later....

Well our van is purrrring like a kitten, It only took 7 mechanics and 2 weeks of patience and about 5 different parts to make it run like that. Luckily and somehow we managed to pull this all off for barely any $$$ at all.
So Now we're pretty happy. We've met a bunch of other random people, and scammed our way into a few other free rooms and beds. People seems to pitty us when they ask "where are you sleeping" and we point to the big white van on the side of the road. Meh works for me. Eventhough the van provides me with everything i need, it's always interesting waking up in a new place with new people. We went to "BLACKBUTT reserve" where we got to see some Walibees and kangeroos, and the cutest animals ever here: KOALAS, man they're so cute and sleepy.
We're finally headed up the coast now. We stopped in a tiny town called Forster, nothing to exciting. Then we drove another 10 hours north and ended up in Byron Bay. Oh man this place is crawling with people. The night life is crazy and oh god, i thought we were original with the campervanning around Australia, but it seems that every second person here is doing the same. What a crazy bunch of hippies.
To make things even crazier here, there's a huge Blues Festival going on all week-end, so people from all over Australia are here. Well sadly its raining today and there's not too much to do,.
We bought some chocolate eggs and we're going to hide them in the van and go for an easter egg hunt later.
HAPPY EASTER!!!

Living in a crazy world with REALLY nice people

Well the past few days have just been weird...and crazy...After finishing up with our farm work we descided to take the 10 hour drive to Newcastle. this wasn't such a bad drive. Everything went pretty smoothly. We parked in the middle of a parking lot as usual right by the beach. But by midnight we realized we were surrounded by a bunch of idiots drinking in the parking lot being loud and showing off their cars. After someone shook our van to see if we were inside we descided we would wait till no one was around, hop out of our van, into the front seat (in our pjamas) and drive to somewhere more quiet. this seemed like it would be simple. so we drove about 50 meters, and our car just stopped HAHAHAHAH. And wouldn't start up again. So this left us in the middle of the road at 2 am, pushing the car in our pjamas. HAHAHAHa. It was pretty funny. At first no one stopped to help us. Even the police drove right past us, even practicly waved, but just kept going. EVENTUALLY two guys stopped, helped push our car into the parking lot left us a number for a mechanic. We hung out with them for a bit, and they've been showing us around the town for the past few days. after those guys left a car full of young drunk guys stopped, offered us some beer. Apperantly one of the guys was in the process of becoming a mechanic. But he didn't help much. they pushed our car even further into the car park, on to a hill so we could push start it in the mornng. So we had a couple of beer with them in the parking lot. It was a bit of a hassle to get rid of those guy, but eventually they left. we went to bed and by the time we got up we were surrounded by cars and couldn't leave even if our car was working. so we were stuck there again. Well the mechanic never showed up the day later. So as we were hanging aroudn the beach trying to figure out what to do, we met a woman in the bathroom, we were making small talk and complaining about our broken car. Well the woman mentioned her girlfriend had been studying mechanics for 2 years. She came and had a look at our van. She more or less figured out what was wrong. She got the van started and invited us to stay at their house, and hooked us up with an HONEST mechanic who would help us tomorrow morning.
So right now we're staying at these REALLY nice lesbians' house, with their daughter and 2 doggies.
So we've been getting home cooked meals, HOT showers (we've been showering in public bathroom's sinks haha) and they're even doing our laundry. I almost feel guilty for all the hospitality they've been showing us. And for the time that they're at work, we're goign to call up the first boys we met and they're going to take us out and show us the city. Our star has definetly been shining. In away I'm glad our car broke down, because had it not we would not have met all these nice people and had our crazy little adventure.
Anyway, Newcastle is great!!1 It's a smaller city, and has gorgeouse beaches and has a huge university, so there's always a party going on. And coincidentally the biggest surfing competition in Australia is happening right now and for the next week or so, So we'll probably stick around here for a bit.

I've got hoes, I've got hoes, in different areeeeaa codes, aaaaarrreeeaaa codes....

Well I found myself the perfect job. I do "Cotton chipping" this job pretty much involves me wandering through cotton fields with a HO (its a tool). The cool thing about this job is, just when u start getting really pissed off at the flies or just frustrated that your wandering around in the heat, you find some huge weeds, and get to chop the hell out of them. It's hilarius to watch, it looks like you're murdering someone from far away. Once you're done, you feel much better and get to continue on with your calm, cool self.
My boss doesn't have a whole lot of work for us and seems to like having us around, so he told us to really take our time and take lots of breaks. I bring my music with me to the fields, stop to bust some moves once in awhile to kill time. They also have ATVs (the 4 wheel bike thing) that i get to drive, god they're so fun. also they give us a car to use. I had my first lesson on manual driving yesterday hahaha, i rather, mess up on that car then our van. The best part about this job is it pays TRIPPLE what the grape picking did plus we get free accomidation. The perfect job. Though I'm SO far in the middle of no where its not even funny. I drove almost an hour to find this TINY little town that has a library for me to use the internet.
Eventhough the farm life has been fun, and the scruffy weird guy who gives us movies and cooks for us once in awhile is really nice, I'm ready to head back into civilization and get some sun and get rid of this UGLY farmers tan.
(Wayne, the really nice guy we lived and worked with while in Griffith)

picking fruit in the country

Well the adventures have now really begun. Living in the van so far has been pretty amazing. We never know where we're going to sleep and we always wake up in the coolest places.
The first night we slept in the van we descided to park in an empty parking lot right by the beach. Oh man this was th funniest night so far. within an hour or so of going to bed we hear a girl yelling to her friend in Spanish "Hey imagine if someone was in there." So this peaked our interest and we descided to have a look outside...hmmm she was waving her ass up in the air at us...she thought our van a good place to take a piss.....interesting...HAHAHAH
so we went back to sleep and woke up at about 5 am to a noise. again we peek outside, there was a man, blocking off the entrances and exits. this was rather troublesome to us. But we ignored it and went back to sleep only to wake up in the morning to be surrounded by dozens of people and lots of white vans and trucks. Turns out they were shooting a commercial around us. So we groggily climb out of bed. We met the director, who appologized for having woken us, and offers us some coffee, and a beer if we wanted,. (it was a commercial for Victoria Beer)
Another night we slept right on the cliff overlooking the beach, and probabaly the most beautiful scene was at the top of a mountain overlooking the city, god it was beautiful, and to make it even nicer it was a full moon and a complete clear night...
So we've been cooking on random BBQs in parks snd using our portable gas stove ( that came with the van) we've also mastered the art of making our own baileys using whatever we can find.
We went up into the mountains for awhile where we did some cool hikes through the jungle.
and for the past few days we've been living in a caravan on a farm. we've been pruning orange trees and doign other random things to help out. Yesterday we went to a Wine grape farm to pick some grapes. We descided that we would make more money collecting cans on the streets. So today we went to pick pumkins. Never again! oh god my back, but good money for a days work. We're probably heading back to the original farm and are going to hang around the orange guy some more.
The most beautiful thing about being out here in the middle of no where is the sky at night. WOW I pitty anyone who has never had the chance to see a clear night while being in the middle of no where. It's beautiful!
Anyway I wish I was a better writer. I can't do ANY of my adventures justice, not at all. But at least you can get a rough idea as to what I'm up to.

In Sydney taking care of our baby

So what have I done since I last wrote? hmmm, not too much, but at the same time so much. I got to Sydney February 13th. We're staying in Panania, which is the suburbs in Sydney with Richard, a friend of ours, which is really convinient since we had a lot of things to do. We opened a bank account, got our tax file number, got a phone number and been cooking up a storm. We've been to a few bars and have exclusively been meeting Irish people, not that I have anything against Irish people but my god why are there so many here, and where are the Australians in AUSTRALIA?!?!?!
I've also been to a beach ONCE since I left montreal, and as always I got too cocky and got a bad burn just like everytime I go to the beach for the first time!
So the most important thing we've done is we bought our baby; a 1977 toyota hiace.
We've been spending most of our time working on him. We got the carborator reconditioned and got most the rust off the body. So it looks pretty good and doesn't sound too bad either for a 30 year old car.
We've also been pimping out the inside. He looks pretty good so far. Now let me tell you a bit about the inside. So far it has a full kitchen, a double bed, a table, a stove, a sink, a fridge, and an OVEN hahahahah so i can bake a cake on the side of the road if I want. Oh and recently we added a fully stocked bar. Yupyup all the comforts of home in a van, I just hope it will last us the year.
Well our van should be ready to take off tomorrow, so we're finishing up everythign and moving in all our stuff. So our real trip will finally begin.
We also plan to go picking some fruit in the very near future. Just not too sure what it is we'll be doing yet. I'll know in a few days

The world is my restaurant

So what have I been doing in Bangkok for the 5th/6th time? Everytime I come here I always discover new things to do and see. This time I learned how to be a complete lazy ass and spoil myself. I figured since everything is so cheap here I would spoil the hell out of myself while I still can, because once i get to australia life won't be so simple and cheap anymore.

The first few days Derek was still here. I hung out with him we didn't do much as always, except run around and get his things together, cuz he was finally, after a year and a half, going back to Ireland/boston whatever. After he left I had a few days to myself. I met a bunch of like minded people hanging out at my guest house. We ate a lot and got a few massages, to finally get those knots out of my back that I got from dragging around those christmas trees in New York. We also spent a lot time just lazing around the front of the guest house and got bitten by lots mosquitos.


Joan arrived here from France a few days ago. We've been doing lots of shopping, got a couple more massages, and I now know how to order food in Thai, thats the extent of knowledge I have in about 10 languages, it's the most important vocabulary of course. We met up with one of Joan's friends, Sugar, who has a tendance of ordering entire bottles of whisky at the bar. Needless to say I've wasted a few days recoving from the nights out. Whiskey is HORRIBLE for hangovers.

Selling Christmas trees in Harlem!

Well after spending my summer painting houses and a few months after working in an institution where they tested drugs on animals, I decided to drop everything, and make my way to Harlem to sell Christmas trees for a month. There's not much I can say about that. I really couldn't put this experience into words. All I can say is that it was probably one of the weirdest things I've done. And even though it was 15 hours of work a day 7 days a week, it was probably also one of the coolest things I've done. It wasn't always easy but definitely good times with good people, I'd do it again.
Some of the highlights,just to name a few, included:
-A Crackhead who claimed to be pregnant peeing on the floor infront of me
-Being woken up at 2 am by Max because of mass green flames across the street and explosions. Then being evacuated from my trailer because of the danger of exploding manholes near by
-Weird diseases from unexplained sources
-Being electrocuted everytime I tried to go into my trailer
-and of course watching my mouse/worm/mold infested trailer being hauled away to the dump
So after spending about 2 weeks de-toxing and recovering from New York, I think I'm almost back to myself. I've booked my ticket to Thailand today where I'll spend a week and a bit catching up with Derek, meeting up with Joan, buying some cheap clothes and eating good, good Thai food mmmmmmmmmmmm. Then I'll be off to Australia with Joan, where I'll start my year long campervan around Australia adventure!
This is where I keep my pictures of my Christmas tree in Harlem experience:
http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=6444&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/my_photos

I couldn't sleep, so I wrote down what my mind was racing about

After having a restless night on the mountain by the temple. I remember sitting in the burgundy chairs that were rescued from down the street. We were sitting infront of the guesthouse/store with the owner, positioned so we could see the road, to see what was going on, to keep an eye out for looters and of course to have perfect access to the road so we can bolt down it again incase there was another scare. We were also still close enough to the ocean so we could here every wave break. I analysed each wave to make sure that things sounded normal. They never did..in my mind...
In the midst of this intense athmosphere I heard the most desperate, horrifying scream from a woman that I had ever heard. She must have just found out about deaths or losses or both in her family. I seemed to be the only one who heard it though. No one said anything, they didn't even raise their heads to the noise. It was odd.
The mosquitos and the flies for some reason were worse than they had ever been. It was so aggrivating. Then out of nowhere I look over my shoulder and see the coolest looking lizard. I had never seen him before. He was about a foot long, his tail taking up 75% of his length with the most beautiful colors.
" He looks thirsty." I thought. so we poured him some of our rationed coke. He came up right next to us to drink it. I thought it was the coolest thing at the time.
As he drank it, I couldn't help but to wonder " How did he survive the tsunami??"
"How come i've never seen a lizard like that before. I've seen millions of lizards, but never that guy. Hmmm maybe he had also lost his entire life, and after doign such a good job from hiding from us for such a long time, he was so desperate, and lonely that he came to chill with us and drink our coke."
HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

does she ever stop?

aperantly not!
So I descided to go a little crazy and post all my pictures up on yahoo just for organizational purposes (is that even a word, hmm). I know most people couldn't care less about pictures, i knwo i usually don't want to see 895724087452 pictures of other peoples trips, but i descided to post them all up just incase someone was bored enough to look.
to make it easier I'll put links here to the different albums:



My home in Nanning china 2003:

http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=1273&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.photos.yahoo.com/ph//my_photos


Vacation from teaching in variouse chinese cities:

http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=2722&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.photos.yahoo.com/ph//my_photos

Laos September 2003:

http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=fdcb&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.photos.yahoo.com/ph//my_photos

Thailand october 2003:

http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=7a1c&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.photos.yahoo.com/ph//my_photos

Japan, december 2003:

http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=9680&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.photos.yahoo.com/ph//my_photos

Mexico, September 2002

http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=c2ef&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.photos.yahoo.com/ph//my_photos



And that's most of the pictures i have of my travels up to date.
So what am I up to now?
Hmm I'll write a summary of the past 10 weeks that I've been back in montreal.
I got home, started lookign for a job immediatly, got sick for 3 weeks, it sucked so everythign was put on hold. then got back to looking for a job, working on my courses online. I made some pretty good progress, until the bastards descided to not get back to me when i sent in my assignments, I'm STIL waiting for a response.

I started working last week. I'm painting again like last year, it's good fun really. i work with two of my good friends so time flies by.
that's the super short version of my time in montreal. though i can't say too much, extremely exciting has happened. Which i'm kind of happy about.

I must admit, even though I was very unhappy coming back home, I now know it was definetly the right descision. I would have gone crazy in thailand, hell i was already half way there. I had to come back home to get my head together, amongst other things.

Eventhough I have the WORST luck when I'm travelling, I'm plannign to travel again. NOT Asia though, i definetely need an Asian break for a little while.
I'm looking in to central/south america. this time I'll go alone, most likely, I mean you meet enough people along the way so it's no big deal and by now i know what i'm doing.
I'm EXTREMELY happy that it's no longer cold and that the snow is gone!!!!
thats that for now!

The pole that saved my life

This is a picture out the front of the place I stayed in, in Mirisa Sri Lanka, a month after the tsunami. I was swept across this street, form inside the house, to where that electric pole is, I held on to that for dear life. hehe, good times

Bus ride from Mirisa to Colombo with 400 other people on the same bus at 5 am

This was the worst 5 hour bus ride of my life. See how packed it is now, it got MUCH worse. It was hot ,and i had to stand the entire way while being pushed up every which way. not cool, not a flattering picture either, but i still like it

Pictures from Sri Lanka and Thailand

Well guys, I've managed to post the rest of my pictures that i have YAY!
I'm still waiting for derek to send me like 100 more, but this is what i got for now.

Sri Lanka (after tsunami)http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=bd98&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/my_photos

Thailand 2005 http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=dfa9&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/my_photos

Finally uploaded some Cuba pictures

There are MANY more, but I'll upload them later, u can check back in a week or so and they might be there,

http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/album?.dir=5d23&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/my_photos

plansplansplans

here's a the site of where i was staying all the way up north in case anyone wants to check it out
www.cavelodge.com. Would have been nice if i hadn't hurt my ankle

Well now I'm back in Bangkok. derek's sister went back home to ireland. And due to many many different reasons i feel the best thing for me to do is go home also. I have lost all motivation here and it just keeps getting worse. I've been dicked around for the past 3 months, and lead on about what is going on, plans were changed on me last minute and now it's just too late to change anything. Plus at this point I'm almost broke. I'm pretty miserable to tell you the truth. I'm not sure if I'll be better off at home in the freezing cold, but at leats I'll have my friends and family around for support and entertainment :D.
So I'm not really saying I regret going to asia. But I pretty much wasted my time here, when really I should have been doing something productive with myself. I guess i can look at this trip as a 4 month vacation.

So I'll be leaving thailand Feb. 27 at 10:55pm, and arriving home feb 28 2 pm. that's a 27 hour trip (there's a 12 hour time difference) , good freaking god!!!!! it won'[t be fun.

first thing i plan to do, is take a nice long hot bath, It's rare for me to have hot water here, let alone a bathtub. And from there who knows.

So if you feel like calling me some time after the 28th, feel free, my numbers still the same it's been in 15 years. I pretty m,uch lost everyones numbers so don't expect me to call ;)

OHHH and i just got my pictures developed today and put on disk, so I'll put those online sometime so you guys can have a look..
see you canadians soon!

it's been a while

Well it's been over a month since I last posted. Why would that be you ask? Pretty much just haven't been motivated to write, and nothing too excitign has happened. but I'm going to rant for a bit to keep u up dated with everythign that's been going on with me within the past month.

I spent a week alone in Kandy which was really good times, everynight i would meet new people and we'd usually go to a pub, (actually my favourite place was "The PUB" hahahah go figure) I was also stalked a lot by the local boys to the point where i had people waiting for me infront of my door when i woke up in the morning. but it was nice to have made other friends to hang out with. The stalkers would pretty much leave me alone when i was with soemone else.

So being the loyal friend that I am, I hopped on a 10 hour bus ride south, up some crazy twisty mountain roads to meet back up with derek. The town was called Haputale. It was really a gorgeouse place. quite cold at night, but so peaceful and almost untouched by tourism. We went on a lot fo walks while we were there through tea plantations, where women would spend all day plucking leaves for mr. lipton (lipton tea, we all drink it). I got addicted to tea while i was there. god it's good.

After a little over a week in haputale I went back to the scene of the tsunami, mirisa. That was interesting to say the least. I'm not too sure what to say. We didn't do much there. The owner of the guest house, derek's good friend was pretty depressed, and we met up with some other friends from the area and heard their stories. It was all pretty sad. I won't go into details of soem of the stories I've heard, I've met people who were part of recovering bodies, people who lost their whole business, house, and family. I mean I remember when the water went back to the ocean thinking "SHIT! I lost all my money and passport again" ( i did that last year while travelling in thailand)
My thoughts were on my most valuable thigns, which was my passports and my money of course and i was pretty horrified.
but imagine havign to think of your baby who was sleeping in the room next door. Or the business you spent most your life trying to build up?
I can't even imagine.
I actually rememebr after people running around franticly searching for family etc. Mean while other people were looting. God everyone was looted afetr the tsunami. I can't imagine what sick people would loot someone who was out looking for their lost family, sicksick people!!!!

So far the government has done nothign for them. Which is odd, because it was over a month since it happened. At this point the sri lankan governement is probably the richest in asia. They have been given billions of dollars. but the victims have seen none of the money. there were a lot of NGOs around like red cross and "goal" who were helping out though.

So after mirisa i headed back to thailand. Once I got to thailand I headed my own way again for awhile. then Derek's sister came to visit from ireland so I met up with them again, and now we're doing a 3 week tour of thailand.
A few days ago we were up north near the "golden triangle" where all the opium comes from. i stayed in a really cool grass hut type place. There is some amazing trecking to do there cuz you're in the middle of a jungle, but because of my great luck i managed to twist my ankle within the first few hours of beign there so i really didn't do much.
2 nights there and now I'm in chiang Mai. derek and his sister went to meet their uncle and cousin about an hour away from here. so I decided for valentine's day I would treat myself to my favourote restaurant here in chiang mai called "El Toro" It's a mexican restaurant that i discoverend here last year. I've been wondering around aimelessly most the day. and tomorrow morning bright and earl;y i'm meeting up with the irish 2 at the bus stop and heading back to bangkok on a 10 hour bus ride, then back down to some beaches.

In thailand, the tsunami affected A LOt more tourists than in sri lanka
cuz well sri lanka just doens't have as much tourism. So it's pretty sad they have hundreds and hundreds of posters up of missing people. Some of the pictures being of an entire family which is missing. Others are photos taken of tatoos from dead bodies trying to get someone to identify them. The people the tsunami killed and how it effected people is much more obviouse here as oposed to sri lanak. the media was pretty quiet about it in sri lanka, and u just didn't see these type of photos. It's really sad to see. there were photos of people of every age every country all missing. so sad.

Anyway at this point, I'm still looking for a job, so I'll either have a pretty good idea where i'm teaching by the time derek's sister goes back to ireland, or I'll be coming home very soon, even though it was strongly suggested i shouldn't. I think i'd be happier being broke and looking for a job in a familiar place whith friends and family as opposed to wondering around the streets broke on my own in thailand, tryign to find a job.
well if you have any words of encouragement or suggestions, or hey a job!
hook me up1
HA
take care, and stay warm, at least i'm doing that much

Alone in Kandy

Well let's see, the past 2 ish weeks haven't been all that exciting, but i guess I'll write abotu them anyway. For new years I climbed 2200 m up that stupid Adam's Peak mountain. It took me about 3 aND a half hours, it was pissing rain, and the wind was insane. I was also leeched a few times. We had a dog follow us all the way up, and the dogs tiny little puppy followed also.

In the morning there was no sunrise cuz it was two windy. And the dog abandonned it's puppy, and the puppy was half frozen to death. so we rapped it up in blankets and dragged the thing all the way down the mountain. Esti!!

Well all that cold got me sick, and I've been trying to get over this cold for the past 10 days. from adams' peak we went to a place about 20 km away, called maskeliya, which had a gorgeouse view of the mountain, and it was by some man made lake, yadda yadda yadda, it was cold, we stayed a few days.
Now due to some "issues" I am back in Kandy for the 3rd time but now I am alone.
Being in Kandy alone is like being in a completely different world. I can't go anywhere without some Sri Lankan boy leeching on. either to try to get me to see his shop, or practis his english, or god knows what. It get's pretty frustrating. Then again, straight of the bus when i got to Kandy i was disoriented, so some guy descided to take my bags and bring me to my guest house. All for the exchange of my home address (which by the way is 123 mainstreet Queerbec, canada,right?)

Anyway my brain is a spinnin' and i really have no clue what I am doing from here on. I'm thinking of options, and meeting lots of people and seeing what they're up too, maybe I'll steel someone elses plan. I dunno.
I'm considering goign home, just cuz I'm so lost right now, but that would probably be the worst thing to do.
I'llprobably go to thailand in a week or so, and try to find a job. BAH! who knwos, but I'll let u know.

Thanks again by the way for all of your concerns

On a brighter note PICTURES

I have some pictures of my time spent in mirissa, before the camera was swept away
enjoy

http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/zigalbum/
I would like to also say THANK YOU TO TOBIAS for putting these pictures up for me
abracao ;)

also here's a good site for some info on what went on while i was down in mirissa, and by the way, the closest city near mirissa is matara, incase u were wondering and couldn't find out.

http://www.cbc.ca/story/world/national/2004/12/27/tsunami041227.html
OH AND HAPPY NEW YEARS!!
I'm heading up to Adams peak tomorrow morning, where i will be climbing a 2200 m mountain, and will watch the sunrise for the new year and hang out with some monks, wish me good luck

Isabel's tsunami story

December 26, 2004 8:40 am. I wake up just like any other morning, take my morning piss, put on my bathing suit and my dark blue sun dress. Brush my teeth with my orange flavoured tooth paste. Derek and I order the typical breakfast of 4 pieces of toast, ginger tea and we were planning to finish off our cheese that we had bought for christmas. Derek asked if i wanted to go for a walk on the beach before breakfast was ready but i decided I would prefer to lie down for a bit.
"Derek!!! you come here, Look look" I hear the owner of the guest house,Siri yelling.
9:15 am (10:15 pm on christmas day for you canadian folk )
"Isabel, shit come here!" says Derek after he takes a look, groggily i crawl my way out of bed, assuming they spotted another working elephant down the road.
As I look out side I see water about a foot deep creeping up the path towards the beach. "hmmm sewage over flowing that must suck" I thought. when I realizecd this water was rising fasting, and caring chairs and tables along with it, soon it entered the building.
"grab what you can and get out of here" derek instructs. Still thinking this will only be a slight inconvinience just getting everything wet not reaching past a few inches. But at the same time getting jittery and panicy. I quickly try to think of what i need dry the most. First I grab my Thesis paper (which i was a few hundred words away from finishing), god forbid my hours of work get wet, and my book i need to read,then on my way out i spot my cd player I grab that too, neglecting my passport and money completely for some reason (thank god you'll see why later).By the time I got to the front door, I was waste deep in water. "SHit this is much more seriouse than i thought" I grabbed a hold of Siri's Tuc-tuc (the three wheeled taxi) and realize that's being swept away with the water aswell. At this point everything got pretty blurry.I realized my thesis and cd player weren't that important when i saw Siri holding on to the shop's pole with his wife panicing and disapearing underwater.

I managed to some how get swept from just outside my guest house out through the gate, across the street, which is at least 10 meters away, I don't really remeber this. Then i tried to grab a hold to a telephone pole.I couldn't get a good grip, but thank god for derek he was holding onto me so I didn't go anywhere. Had i slipped away I would have been washed out into the river and possibly back into the ocean. Then the gushing water just stopped. I have no idea how long all this took, could have been a few seconds or a few minutes i don't know.
So having no idea what had just happened.I make my way back to the guest house everythign was destroyed and a refrigerator had been washed into my room. heading back to the guest house was probably the dumbest thing to do, cuz u never now, these things could have been followed by bigger stronger waves, but we were all in shock and wanted to make sure everyone was ok. We had lost the cook we couldn't find her for a long time, but turns out she was alright.

There was constant tention in the air.No body knew what we were just hit by, and there were constant rumors of more coming, about 15 minutes after the whole ordeal, I heard some one screaming in the distants and a mob of people tryign running downhill. Soenmone thought another one was coming, and i quickly tried to scramble outside the house as i did that i slippped and dislocated my shoulder, but soemwhere while i was running it popped itself back in, and now it's a lil soar, but not too bad. I also have a few cuts on my feet from trying to grip the concrete and a bruise on my leg but besides that I'm fine.

There were about 6 other scares. It was so tense because anytime U here anyone screaming, your afraid that another Tsunami is coming. I must have run dow hill away from the coast and up mountains about half a dozen times thanks to these scares.

Well I gto out of this EXTREMELY lucky, almost too lucky. I feel a bit guilty for all that I have, and nothign I can do
The only things i lost was my cd player, my thesis (figures!!!!) and the books i need to write my other paper. Derek's bag got swept away, but we are both in good health.
The night of the insident, we slept outsode on a mountain where there was a temple, with a few other people, and the night after we took refuge in the house of the pumber of the guest house which was half a km. from the beach. the next morning we caught a bus that was organized to take us to a refugee type of place for the ngiht, where we got a place to sleep and some food to eat.
It was interesting to meet other people and swap our stories, some peopel have soem amazing escape stories.
Some very sad stories. I also got a chance to watch some CNN, up till that moment i had no idea what it was i had just survived, and how extremely lucky i was, and am for that matter. Now I took a bus further up into the mountaims, back to Kandy (where i was first when i came to sri lanka)
I'm safe now, and hopefully disease won't be too big a problem.
Thanks to those of you who send me e-mails of concern, in a time l;iek this it really means a lot to me.
Hey and now i can add a new natural catastrophe to my list

Ice storm, montreal 1998
Hurricane Isidora Yucatan, mexico 2002
SARS Guanxi China 2003
Tsunami Mirisa, sri lanka 2004

hmm i wonder what's next

Just an update

Okokok, I know a lot of you read my last blog and thought "WHAT?! Isabel's reading books?!?!?" Well before you make any comments about it, yes I am. Really there's nothing else to do then lie around and read books, and believe it or not, I'm really enjoying it, who would have thought.

Well today I got my ass on a bus and made my way to Colombo, the capital, to get a Visa extention for another 2 months. I'll probably be staying in sri lanka till somtime in the middle of january or begining of february. Then it turns out I can get a 70$ plane ride to India, why the hell not right?

That's that, sorry if I'm being half assed with my e-mails, just in mirissa, where I'm staying, it's hard to get access to a computer, but I'm trying.Oh and you know how i sent out an e-mail saying i can make this thing update you when Iupdate my blog, well it's not true
sorry, so you'll just ahve to check in every now and then.
well take care and stay warm
(oh and i got my pictures from cuba, if u want to see et me know, I'll snd them to ya)

Sri Lanka

I left Bangkok around Nov 25th. We had a plane to Colombo, Sri lanka at 9:45 pm. It was a 3 and a half hour plane ride. We arrived at the airport at 11pm and didn't have a bus out to Kandy until 5 am. The bus station was extremely hectic, and the fact that I had as many bags as i did didn't help. So I slept through the entire ride pretty much, waking up every now and then by banging my head against the window. Sri lankans are the craziest drivers I've ever seen. I thought China was bad, these peopel are even worse!!! So Kandy is a nice little town in the center of Sri Lanka . People here compared to Asian are much nicer and down to earth. But that might be because most of them speak very good english. I stayed in a nice guest house there called Pinkhouse. Derek's stayed there for the past 5 years so he knows them well. Well the rooms there were shit. Every now and then you's here rats running across the ceiling, chirping of the lizards we had living in our room, and I had a cockroach living in my matress. The place had a really nice athmosphere though. The owner of the place was a really sweet lady and made exellent Dahl and Sambol mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

The food in Sri Lanka is soooo good. Prety spicy and most things are ade with coconut and are curry based. Another great aspect about dining here is you eat everythign with your HANDS!!! I love it!

One of the things I like about the guest house was how everyone came would sit out front in the wicker chairs. It was nice because each person stayig there was from a different part of the world. At one point there wer people frpm Spain,Grece,Israel,Italy,England, Irland,New Zealand, and sri lanka of course. It was cool hearing the different accents al in the same conversation. Also it would be cool how every morning I would wake up to chanting monks, because of the Buddhist temple just down the street.
We didn't do too much in Kandy other than walk down the road past the lake to the bakery to get some "Short Eat" which is pretty much just pastries with some kind of meat or curry spicy type stuff in it.


Aftr 6 days in Kandy we decidedit was time to head south to the beach. It was just a 6 hour bus ride until we got to MIRISSA BEACH (which is where I'm stayig now). Again the guest house we are staying at is owned by someone Derek knows very well.So they gave us a nice room inside their house. Also we get the benefits of helping yurselves to the fridge and sneaking in while the cook is making supper for everyone and pickign at whatever we want to eat. Also we get free tuk-tuk rides if we need.

So my life for the past while consists of pretty much waking up around 8 am everymorning. Stepping out of the door onto the beach for a walk, eat breakfast, Lie on the beach, read a book or work on y thesis paper. Then it's lunch time, which is then followed by nap time. after nap time, it's tiem to bum around a bit, maybe read a bit more or o back to the beach for anoter walk until supper time. After supper time tere's nothing left to do other sit by the beach and have a few beers. And I must add that Sri Lanka makes an excellet STOUT beer.
This is pretty much te storry of my life unti after Christmas.

After Christmas I'm heading to the hills, and doing some walking. and stuff, nothing to excitng
I have some picture, and am in the process of tryign to put them up on a siter.
As i said before it's hard for me to access any good internet here.
Miss you all and hope to hear from you!!! and HAPPy HOLIDAYS!!!!

6 days in Bangkok

So thursday, Nov 18th, mornign at 5:00 I woke up, and was off to the dorval airport AGAIN. Not much to say about that other that the fact that the 30 hours to get from montreal to bangkok were TERRIBLE. Sitting and waiting around when you're exhausted just isn't too much fun.

Well I arrived in Bangkok Friday night at 11:45pm, met up with Derek (the guy I'm travelling with, incase you don't already know) and headed off to my guest house. I'm staying in this really nice cozy guest house called "Suk 11" you can have a look at it here
http://www.suk11.com

hmmm besides that nothign too exciting has happened. This is my 4th time to bangkok, I've already seen all the Wats (temples) and other attractions, so if you're not into hookers, buying suits, jewlery or watching "pingpong shows" (if you don't knwo what that is please don't ask) Bangkok really isn't all that too exciting.

So far I haven't done much other than eat deliciouse Thai food, and bum around. I had the pleasure of visitting a thai hospital here. I have never seen such efficient and good health care before. NOTHING compared to the shitty system we have back home. I got a test done here, that will take 3 days for them to gte me the results, as opposed to when I got them done back home where it took them TWO MONTHS!!!!!!!

I was also taken out to Sirocco http://www.2bangkok.com/2bangkok/buildings/state/state.shtml, what they claim to be, the nicest restaurant in Bangkok, for my a late birthday celebration. MMMMMMMMMMM I had the best food I've ever eaten there, and the view was GORGEOUSE.

I went to a bar, but didn't really like it much because it was crawling with old men with either blue or brown polyester socks pulled up half way to their knee, with sandals and their young hookers. It's really a sad sight.
Due to the lack of anything else to do I went on a day long mission to find my favourite pancake lady and finally found a pancake man standing infront of my guest house, which made my day.

Tonight, I will be flying to Sri Lanka. Originally I was supposed to wait a few more weeks until I leave to go there, but there was no point staying here when I was goign to come back anyway.
I'm pretty excited because the culture in Sri Lanka is completely different (well as far as I know) then what I've experienced so far. Plus apperantly they have some very beautiful beaches.

I won't have access to the internet much in Sri Lanka, apperantly it's pretty hard to find a good connection, but I'll try to keep intouch!
I hope all is well in montreal, and it's not raining toooooo much!

my trip in general

Eventhough my last 2 posts seemed negative I had an AMAZING time in Cuba. I spent most my time, walkign along the beach, drinking all kinds of fancy drinks, swimming in the pool,and coming up with complicated routes to the beach to avoid the stalking Cuban men, well not all of them ;)
While I was there I really met a lot of interesting people,and learned a lot about the country. Before i went I had absolutly no clue about the place, then again I have a habit of doing that.
So it turns out the average person makes about 15 USD a MONTH in Cuba. And for some reason most things u buy in Cuba are in US dollars, not only in the resorts which really confuses me,from what i understood that is.
The money they earn isn't proportional to the cost of living there either. Things are actually rather expensive. Unlike in china,many people were making around 100-150$ a month,which was fine, you can live a decent life with that income there. I really don't know how some people survive there. hmmm theres a lot about cuba i still don't quite understand, it all seems so complicated.
Cuba also has 2 currencies. the Cuban peso which is 28=1 USD
and the Convertible Peso which is 1=1USD
this is what is replacing the american dollar,because as of nov 8 it is no longer allowed to be used.
things apperantly just keep getting more complicated there,i think.
One thing that really stood out about the people there,well besides their sexy accents, was how educated everybody was. In Cuba education is free,all the way upto university, and apperantly most people take advantage of this. I met some people whospokeperfect english, french, and german. Ignorance is something I rarely saw in these people. Generally I was really impressed by the average cuban i met,they seemed like very intelligent,sincere and down to earth people. Then again I was in a touristic area and didn't get to really experience cuba so i'm not really in a good position to judge.
Anyway I'm back home now,I have a great tan, a cigar,and a few litres of rhum and am stressing out because I leave for Thailand on Thursday. Everythig came so fast, it's hard to get everything done so quickly.....

My day as a cow

Today I had the oppertunity to experience what it felt like to be cattle. I was woken up at 7:30 in the morning, graised a little and was hearded onto a bus. I sat on this bus for 3 and a half houres, the destination was Trinidad,an old fashion city in south eastern cuba,or so i was told, i didn't actually really get to see it much. After the bus ride,we were hearded off to graise a bit more on an "international" buffet which consisted of nothing that might resemble authentic cuban food. After eating we headed to a big tall tower which really didn't have any significance or much history as far as i know, so we could take pictures to impress our friends back home with all the real cuban buildings we saw. Of course within this tourist trap we were bombarded by people trying to get money out of the tourists. Tourists hate when they do this, obviously, who wouldn't, but the thing is, it's the tourists fault in the first place that they do this.
I find that many people go to third world countries like cuba, feeling sorry for them due to the fact that they don't have all the luxiouries that we have. Which is true, they have nothign compared to what we have,but in my oponion this doesn't necessarily mean they're living a terribly misfortunate life, just different. They live much simpler,less materialistic lives. Hell if I had the choice to to work in a small hut by the beach and live a stress free life for just a few dollars a day as opposed to a fast pased,stressful life in a dirty,noisy city and be rich,I wouldn't even have to think twice with choising choice # 1. But then again it really depends on the person.
Well I'm straying from my point, Cubans live a very simple life,not very materialistic, because they really don't have the means to obtain many material things. This doesn't mean they are less fortunate than us, generally they're happy with what they have and really don't know any other way. Then along come these tourists who feel sorry for the way they have to live,and hand out all kinds of presents. It's a nice thought in theory,and they're happy to recieve these presents, but now all of a sudden they're introduced to these things that really are convinient or fun, or whatever to have around. So they become accustummed to these things and they feel they need them, and how do they get these things? from tourist! And this is how the whole begging,and scamming and hassling thing in touristic areas started. Which really is a shame.For me it really spoils the experience to be viewed as a way to make some money or some one who should be giving gifts.
I witnessed one thing that really upset me ( you may think i'm crazy for getting upset at this) I saw a couple handing candy to one of the local kid *gasp*
HAHA I mean normally that's a very thoughtful, kind thing. But think about it in this case.
"awww poor kid he's got nothing,let's give him candy"
then what happens? he get's no nutrition, ruins his teeth, get's hyper and throws spazzes when he can't get more. Maybe I'm reading into this too much but i just think that if u feel bad for someone why not give them soemhting that they benefit from.
Well that;'s enough ranting for me. All in all I was disapointed with the trip to trinidad, though i did get to see some of the city, which was beautiful. Oh and I would also like to note,even though you always hear how poor Cubans are and they need help from us, and we should bring all our old clothes when we visit so they have soemthing decent to wear, cuban women were dressed nicer than I ever am. They had soem of the most beautifull clothing I've seen.hmmmmmmmmm

Off to "Cuba"

This morning I woke up grabbed my bags hopped into the van and headed off towards Cuba with my mom and all her friends.

The flight was 3 and a half hours long, nothing compared to what's coming up next week. I arrived around 11pm. My first impression of "Cuba" wasn't a great one. Straight off the plain I was shoved into a bus of complaining cranky french canadians. All the cubans spoke french, and english no spanish was to be found anywhere, which was a bit upsetting seeing how i was excited to try out my spanish.

Now the reason why i said my first impression of "cuba" wasn't good, because really I wasn't in Cuba. It was but it wasn't really. I was on an island off of Cuba called Cayo Coco. This island is strictly reserved for tourist. No Cubans were allowed on this island unless they had special permission. It actrually makes me sad that most people who visit this place honestly believe they visited Cuba.

Well after checking into my large room, checking out HBO on my tv, turning on the airconditioning, and trying out one of the queen size beds in my room, I headed down to the beach. I don't think I have ever seen such a beautiful sky. Actually i have but never while i was standing on powder fine white sand. It was really breath taking. After my not so eventful day I headed back to the comforts of my own home anxiouse to see what the place looked like during the day

I picked up my plane ticket today, now it's 100% official. I leave for Bangkok November 18th, 2004 on flight 725 at 8:25 AM.

A month to go

I'm just pretty much posting this so i can see how it's set up.
Well I have a month to go ubntil i head to Cuba, and a month and 2 weeks till i get to Bangkok.
I'm prettye xcited, though there is still a l;ot fo work to be done til i get there