A Travel Story

This "short" comes from shortly coming home from my trip to India and Thailand. Would my opinion change after going back, (which I hope too!), I don't know.
But I watched an episode of "The Hour", with George Stronpuoiuiukhkohihohiohidsolus.
And Henry Rollins was on. And he said something that to me always rings true. You can write an opinion of a country, but where does that leave you if you have not BEEN THERE? "Knowledge is Mileage" "How do you know, if you don't go?" This is a fact that I will always pride myself on, and will continue to do so. I will not make an opinion that I have not seen. I want to continue on this Nomandic lifestyle I have fashioned, I learn so much, and when I talk politics, I can rival the greatest scholar who has not left Toronto or New York. Look outside the box on your next vacation. And I am not suggesting on your next vacation that you take your kids to the heart of Baghdad, but "Sandals" paradise getaway? Have you researched where in the world you are? Or are you too drunk on your Mai Thai's to give a shit about the bartendar who is paying for his extended family of 14? Trying to get a chance to spend overnight in a cargo ship to a distant land for the same "vacation"?
If I could afford to go an island to have someone wait on me hand and foot, I would rather spend that money backpacking through Africa. I guess thats why I'm broke!

Sent: Thursday, January 20, 2005 2:26 PM
Subject: A Travel Story...


I have written this email to my friend Nathan, who is currently traveling in Asia, just recently Vietnam. He had his own opinion of the culture, and I think as travellers we all gain a new concept on a new land, some loved, some hated. Thats what should keep us all travelling.

** Hey, I never gave you slack about Vietnam...........

I told you I didn't like Thailand, how do like them apples?

Heres my opinion about Thailand: I have never seen a beautiful culture and even more beautiful landscape being taken advantage of by Rich Americans, Canadians, Swedes, Brits.......AND the backpackers that come to "see Asia" think their being all "cultural" and stuff, when more than half of them come to drink Thai whiskey, get laid by "this guy/girl was from like Israel dude!" go to beach raves, and smoke the drugs........I got so sick of seeing fat American men with these Thai women who looked no older than 12 years old. And seeing the beaches littered after another "all night rave".........and the streets just lined with bar after bar, the streets littered with vans driving by with loud speakers announcing the next "beach party", or cab after cab carrying drunk tourists a block. If you've ever been to Ko San road, it's an unforgetable SMELL. If I never hear another Aussie accent, slurring how good the scuba is, I will be thankful. And the "ladyboys" as you term it, the children that come up to you at a bar at 12 midnight to sell you an orchid necklace, the youth are just out there on street selling their bodies, or whatever they can...

I didn't see that in India. It was Different, India didn't wear their poverty like some flashy Vegas strip........

The solice I found in Thailand was on the bus, crashing about......staring out the window, at the lush green trees that seem endless over hills and valleys, passing the sweet famlies on bikes with the dog running behind them. Taking that in while dreading when we pulled up to another busy town where it was another game of stop get out, load up, shout shove, wheeled into another game of find the cheapest accomdation fast. Trusting pimp dealers with the best english not to take you to a hole in the ground. Not too mention being a girl, I HATED GOING TO THE BATHROOM, do you know how hard it is after 3 Singas to pee in that hole and then get that cup thing and swish it down?

I cried seeing elephants tied to palm trees waiting to take tourists up mountians. Thailand to me is all about Toursim, which is especially sad to me now, to see a culture that loses a bit of their religion as is it now represented in the form of a Buddha that sits on the bar with Incense burning....that are so quickly washed out to sea by a Tsunami and the Tourists that have travelled their make the front page. From the screeching ladies on the beach AGAIN I'll repeat it as it still rings through my mind, "you want Thai Massage???" to the men on the streets pulling you into their store to have a suit made???

I went alone one day out, to park which led to a waterfall, which lead to a path, which led to a HUGE white and black Buddha nestled in the rock. Laid out with the prettiest Purple flowers, and it was quite. No honking horns, screeching voices, rumbling of trucks. Quite. So I sat down in front, and just closed my eyes for a bit. I opened them turned around and was startled to see a Monk standing behind me. I was frightend a little b/c I thought I was somewhere I wasn't supposed to be. In his Orange garb he smiled at me, his teeth were all mangled but he had the most sweet face and eyes. He whispered, something I couldn't understand, and then shook his head and I could make out "Canadian?" and I smiled and then he just said the word "happy".

That day I liked Thailand.


Now India, thats another whole story...........