The Upside to Insomnia

The upside is to insomnia is that at least you are not sleeping through life. Of course, there are many downsides which I could list for hours and hours...





This is not a bad view to have from a window and a balcony, eh? Maybe it was an omen of good fortune because I then had lunch with the hot yogi after class today. Unfortunately, it's his last time teaching at Yoga Elements, should he find a teaching assistant job at the University of Washington. He got accepted for PhD candidacy in Comparative Literature, but you know, the money thing.

My Father is Vulgar

And that is precisely why I love him.

Since I can remember, anything I did something goofy, cheeky, or lightly naughty, he'd laugh and yell, "Aye, hoi!" Hoi means clam. Used this way though, it's slang, sort of like..."bearded clam."

MY FATHER HAS BEEN CALLING ME A POONTANG SINCE BIRTH!!!!

Khao Lak, Ko Lanta, and Wii

I went to Khao Lak and Koh Lanta for five days. When I returned, I spent a day at Mr. Lee's house - Mr. Lee is my friend from my eight-day tour in China's Yunnan province. These first pictures are from my plane's descent to Phuket International Airport - the nearest to Phang-Nga.







Khao Lak is in Phang-Nga province, north of Phuket and was hit particularly hard by the tsunami. Many Thais are still afraid to go, for fear of ghosts (attributed to the high death toll), and so business has not recovered as quickly as it has in Phuket. As I was staying in a five-star resort and spa (La Flora) that charged $85 dollars for a massage and facial combo, I felt I did my part to help out the local business. It's a shame because that area is beautiful.



From Khao Lak, I arranged for the Pimalai Resort & Spa on Ko Lanta to pick me up. Three and a half hours later, I was in Krabi province, at Pimalai's private dock. Pimalai also has a private floating jetty on the island that looks gorgeous in pictures, but as the rainy season is approaching and the water levels are high lately, the boat had to land at the main pier on Ko Lanta. A shame.



After five days of rest - perhaps too much rest, I somehow returned to Bangkok exhausted. Maybe I kayaked, slept, read, and was massaged too much.

Yesterday was May Day, Thailand's "Labor Day." Oh this holiday, I spent the entire day at Mr. Lee's house. This house makes my aunt and uncle's house here in Bangkok look like a shack. Picture this: 30-foot ceilings, a home theater with real movie screen and rows upon rows of leather recliners, a kitchen that every celebrity chef would die for, a home gym with dance room (mirrored walls and barre), pool table room with it's own bar (one of about four bars in the house), a pool, and outdoor kitchen, a boat, Lexusii and BMWs up the wazoo, gigantic flat-panel TVs everywhere, a sauna...and that's only what I saw and remembered. But most importantly, Mr. Lee has Wii.After hours of Wii boxing, I was sweating like a pig. Strangely enough, I'm a Wii idiot savant, while Mr. Lee has enough enthusiasm and style to make up for any lack of skill. Ha, I want Wii.

China Recap

Nobody wants to read a play-by-play of my week in China and quite frankly, I don't want to write one either. But basically, my aunt and uncle took me to China with them. Before this trip, our conversations were limited and sparse. Since the trip, I have been able to have full conversations with my aunt in Thai and learn more about her life (and my father's) when they were growing up as orphans. I guess that's what treating your now-27-year-old niece to a $1,300 trip to China can do. Additionally I started out as a near-deaf-mute because everything was in Thai and Chinese (and not my kind of Chinese) so I didn't really have a clue what was going on nor did I know what to say to people, but by the end...well, let's say I have a lot of new friends now. My aunt was impressed. Ha ha.



Anyway, the tour was great but I don't know if I am such a fan of tours in general - the itinerary was so packed, there was hardly any private time. Evenings could have been private time, but being on the road and on one's feet after a 5AM wakeup call nearly every day (on sleep-in days, we woke up at 6AM), by the time you finished dinner, sleep is all you can think of, especially since you started the tour the morning after a "red-eye" (three-hour) flight. And going in a large group means you cannot explore the small little cafes where food is much more delicious and authentic than large banquet halls or hotel restaurants - the only places that can accomodate crowds like this. Still, no complaints. This trip was free and I was given a spending allowance.

Anyway, the Yunnan province is beautiful, with what guide books call the most varied climate in all of China. We did not venture to the south (had I known, I wouldn't have packed tank tops, but I couldn't read the intinerary), instead starting in the provincial capital of Kunming on a dreary, dreary Thursday morning and working our way northwest to Tibet. I now know why Chinese calligraphy artists painted the way they do - much like Constable was enamored with clouds in England, I was enamored with the clouds in China. They are just so different and so much more expressive than anything I've seen in North America. The closest comparison I can draw is the Smoky Mountains if they were merged with the Rockies and I've only ever flown over and gawked at the Rockies.

The toilets were dismal and the stench and conditions turned almost into a joke. Nature is best, and proving this point were the outdoor toilets, basically earning their "W.C." status because someone had bothered to erect some sort of wall shielding the female squatting over some sort of hole from the public. Of course, this did not necessarily mean there were walls should there have been two, three, or four holes together, and so I can so I feel a certain sense of cameraderie with my fellow female tour-goers. The Exxon on that dirt road in the U.S. ain't nothing till you've had to squat less than six inches over a pile of shit in a commode that has grip marks for your feet and lack of any flushing system.

The highlights of my trip were taking a lift and then walking a kilometer to a meadow for a drop-dead gorgeous view of the Jade Dragon Snow Mountains and visiting the monastery in the Tibetan town of Benzilan. It was at that monastery that a Tibetan monk blessed me after I donated some money and felt a sense of spiritual peace. I got two bracelets made of wooden beads out of it. Oh, another highlight was that I made my first midget friend, Mr. Lee. He is from Taiwan but has lived in Bangkok for over 20 years. He is so great and hilarious, the height thing doesn't even occur to you. His wife, her sister, and her sister's husband were also great. Mr. Lee tried out his Cantonese on me, and the first thing he said to me was, "You are a fat pig." Of course that is the perfect way to get on my good side.







But visit my Flickr page and you'll see China as I saw it. I'm still not exactly sure how to describe my first pilgrimage to the motherland, although my family is from the south, not the southwest (we speak Cantonese and Teochew primarily - Mandarin is the "national language" and so we must speak it too). And another first - I have mentioned this story to some people, but here it is again. On the second or third day in China, my aunt's 80-something year old friend grabbed me in the bathroom of a hotel where we were having dinner. As more women entered the ladies' room, she pulled down her pants and underwear, shoved a bottle of green eucalyptus oil into one hand, and forcefully placed my other hand on her ass, directing me to massage oil into her ass. "MORE! HARDER! MORE OIL!" she kept yelling. In Asia, one always defers to her elders, and so I obliged, though not quite willingly. Whatever, it is amusing, so I'm not exactly upset. Her butt was a lot softer than I would have expected.

Tomorrow I am off to my five-star resorts. The chauffeur is taking me to the airport at 7:45AM. I chickened out on asking the yogi to come with me, even though I had the perfect opening. I wasn't getting the strong vibes I needed to go through with the invitation - I think he is a shy "good boy." He is looking to go to the University of Washington for a PhD in Comparative Religion next year and when I mentioned that Seattle was a great city except that everything shut down by midnight, he sheepishly said he hadn't stayed up until midnight in quite some time.

This means no boozed-up making out which means not entirely compatible, I think. But we did have a 20 minute conversation, which is a baby step. Ha ha.

The Past is Amusing

My crazy ex-pro jetskier friend for some odd reason decided to send me a scan of my senior year high school portrait. I think this is hilarious. He is totally crazy but in a fun and amusing way and well, he's a family friend as well. This is a guy who can get away with what every other guy would get punched in the face for doing. For example, he can obviously ogle women's breasts and make an equally obvious U-turn just to talk to aforementioned breasts' owners and the women LOVE HIM FOR IT. I have seen this happen. Anyway, this is me at age 16 (yes yes, I did not turn 17 until the very end of my senior year). Ha ha, babyfat! Makeup! Innocence! AAAHAHAHAHHAHA!


Then, my cousin and her fiance found a photo album my father must have left here in Thailand. Half of the pictures are from my parents' honeymoon, the other half from my dad's bachelor days, I assume.


(My effing camera won't focus properly, sorry, but you can see they are very hip and all 70s. Also my parents are slim and manage to look normal height - you would never guess they are short as shit. Ha ha.)


I believe this picture to be the sort I would take. You make someone pose for you so you can really sneak a picture of the background. I suspect the photographer was a male. My father is very dapper, isn't he?

My cousin also told me a story about how, back in the day when my father lived with them, her mom was opening up the house in the early morning and there was a woman waiting on the doorstep for my father. My aunt told her to shoo the woman away, so she said "You have to leave! He is not home! GO!" Hahahahahaha. I am going to ask my dad about it in person, with my mom there so I can see their faces. My parents were already together by that time.

Recap of China to come. I'm so sick of China though and I'm headed off to some islands on Wednesday - Khao Lak and Koh Lanta. Five-star resorts, baby. I have on day (Tuesday) to try to convince my yogi to come with me so we can you know, um, do synchronized yoga all weekend.

Wavering...

Sometimes I think I am okay with what happened on Friday night...and then sometimes I am really not okay. Maybe I am trying to put up a front and joke about it because then it is like I am objectifying the incident. As I've said, I cannot deny the sick comic value it has, but at the same time, part of it is a defense mechanism, not only for me, but for my family.

I don't want to worry my parents, not when I am planning to do much more solo traveling, nor do I want to worry my family here in anyway - they are not really my guardians, but I am sure they feel some responsibility for me, so I'd like to avoid sending them on a guilt trip.

Right now I'm riding a wave of "I'm not okay," especially since it's not exactly the first time I've had something traumatic happen.

Even getting extra attention from James the Yogi today during our meditation/relaxation part of class(nobody else got mano y mano stretching or a neckrub) only helped for about 15 minutes. Too bad I think my feet may have smelled from my sandals, and I'm sure my headband did because we don't really use a dryer, so sometimes it takes a while to dry after I wash it.

What Is Planned vs. What Really Is

Things I had planned to do in Singapore (knowing fully well that it wasn't the most exciting country on Earth):
-go to the Singapore Art Museum
-hang around Clark Quay
-visit the Botanical Gardens (I like pretty plants)
-go to the Night Safari
-have a Singapore Sling @ The Raffles Hotel
-eat Taiwanese, Singaporean, Indian, Chinese, and Arab food
-buy new iPod earbuds (they cost twice as much in Thailand)

What really happened:
-went to the Singapore Art Museum

-walked around the Esplanade after passing Raffles for some art, intending to get a drink on my way back to the hostel
-told an old geezer that the subway was straight ahead, only to have him keep trying to talk to me, follow me, and then attempt to sexually assault me - all he got was a boob because I was caught off guard, and then I threw a right hook (note to self: I am glad I work out)
-called the police and had to take a cab myself down to the station to file an official report, only the lone investigating officer was at the hospital taking statements for some other incident that would only happen when I was in the country, so I had to wait for him until 5AM
-had to hail a taxi MYSELF back to the hostel at 6AM, only there are no cabs, they refused to even call me a cab, much less give me a ride home
-woke up around 12:30, moped while swinging between extreme moods (freaking out vs. wanting to laugh at how ludicrous it was that a 70-some-year old Chinese man with age spots and of a smaller build than me would even try such a thing)
-walked around Orchard Road and became further incensed by the commercialism, malls, and lack of street food, but when it's rainy outside, malls are a good idea
-met Eli (pronounced Ellie) in the elevator at The Hangout hostel
-went out to dinner with Eli's jazz band, his manager, and the jazz club owner - $75+ USD free meal with wine at La Petit Salut in Holland Village, which Eddie Chan (club owner) called "Yuppie Village"

-went to Eddie's South Bridge Jazz Club and didn't have to pay the $30 cover and listened to great music until 2:30AM

-ate a decent breakfast at the hostel and then schlepped to Little India for the morning and breakfast #2


At least it was eventful, I guess, but I am probably five years closer to death now.