The Young Man Odyssey

I was wind. I was my eternal soul after death, flying through the great plains of the universe. Atop that motorbike, I was traveling my grandfather’s America. The America Steinbeck and Kerouac traveled; vast and untamed. This feeling of liberation and freedom came on the highways of western Thailand, on a lovely road that parallels the River Kwai for miles upon miles. It was a beautiful stretch, much the same scenery and timeless feel of Highway 1 in between Bolinas and Olema.

I heard rave reviews about a waterfall 40 miles away, and figured motorcycle would be one of the most entertaining ways to get there. And indeed it was! Despite the pebbles thrashing upwards towards mouth and eyes, I spent the day meandering up rickety ladders, wading in pools, and jumping into pools. The water retains a heavenly blue color, as the calcium in limestone has this effect on the water as it runs off the rocks.

It was a glorious day. And swimming, hiking, enjoying things made me very happy to be a human being. However I started thinking of the carpet bombing the US brought to Cambodia, and the dehabilitating chemicals they used during the Vietnam war. It was a dirty way to fight a war, after seeing the aftermath this is my conclusion. The people I’ve seen hobbling on one leg, begging in the streets, could not walk the beautiful paths to the waterfalls. They had the horrible misfortune of finding a landmine the way most landmines are found, by stepping on one. In Laos and Cambodia there are over one million undiscovered mines. They are being cleared, but it’s a really slow process. By a British company.

This was the end of the road. The entire 3 mile hike revolves around one waterfall, that has 7 tiers very widely spaced apart. This was the last one, and I thought it very ceremonious to swim in. I used the weight of the waterfall as my shower, and the temperature was identical to the shower in my hotel room. Cold.

In English, the sign above says ‘end of trail’, but I was told that the script in Thai says, “You have conquered!” I felt this a paltry translation, with no attempt at retaining the spice of the Thai.

And so now I sit, tired, with two nights left. I don’t know how the return to America is going to shake me up. I have grown very accustomed to being able to drink in bars, having street vendors at every corner with 60 cent meals (restaurants much more expensive). $6 hotels, 90 cent taxi rides, 10 cent packs of cigarettes. But I very much look forward to it.

PHOTOS

Excuse this photo, I was told to do a “conquerers” pose.

Temples of Angkor Photos

The most famous of them all, Angkor Wat. Gorgeous, gorgeous, despite the disneyland sized crowds.

One of many temples on the vast property that was the ancient city.

This picture is from Vietnam, a Rikshaw driver enjoying the fruits of his own business.

Angkor Wat Monkey, thoughtful monkey.

The last time I’d been in Bangkok, it was my first night on the road. I was overwhelmed with the city, and left very early the next morning.

My Christmas reunion with the place was different. I was no longer overwhelmed by Bangkok, but felt that the travelers center, Khoa San Road, is a superfluous novelty that I don’t need. It was a different distaste this time, but a distaste nonetheless.

Khoa San Road makes me feel like the world has gone to hell. The closest thing I can compare it to in the states is Las Vegas, but with a different sense of lawlessness that you’ll only find in Bangkok. It is a generic and false representation of the wonderful country that houses it. It makes me want to quit, quit what I don’t know, but that street has an odd effect on me.

I left early this morning, to Kanchanaburi. I have a lovely $5 room only 80 meters from the River Kwai. It is a smaller town, 68000, and retains a relaxed feel that only a large river can bring. There is lots to see and do around here, and I may just spend my remaining three nights here, only to saunter back to Bangkok the afternoon before my flight.

My christmas morning began with a loud series of knocks from my hotel owner, for my bus was leaving in an hour. I had seen Angkor Wat the day before, which was absolutely stunning except for the thousands of people that made it seem like Disneyland.

I have spent all today traveling from Cambodia back to Bangkok. My trip is near completed, Merry Christmas everyone.

I have been in Phnom Penh for 3 days, and I do not want to leave. The architecture is amazing. Gorgeous monuments dot traffic circles and the museums and palaces are extraordinary as well.

The somber side of Cambodia is its brutal history. The Killing Fields is a tourist attraction of a compound where 20,000 people were murdered, complete with hundreds of skulls on display to prove it. After touring the fields, I then went to the Genocide Museum, not the happiest of places.

The markets are lively and entertaining. The Russian Market, has nothing Russian about it. Hundreds of stalls are cramped together in a little building selling anything from watches, and buddha statues to the finest silks and scarves.

It really is a cool city, highly recommeded. I continue on to Siem Reap and Angkor Wat tomorrow.

I am not a synical man, or perhaps I am, but when I imagined such cities so far away I had a pretty rustic view of most of them, Saigon included. However the big ceramic figure that greeted me was not Ho Chi Minh, but in fact Colonel Sanders.

Yes, Vietnam has changed, fused with the cultures of the modern western world. There is a compacted travelers street with any amenitie you could wish, and we all seem to congregate here. The teenage book sellers, after being refused, perform taunting eyebrow acrobatics and quietly offer you drugs. Refused again, they walk away, thinking your crazy, or just boring.

It is the morning now, and I will go to museums that depict the evil Americans of the American War. I have read that there are brutal torture devices on display, perhaps with a tinge of blood still on the machinery.

One more night in Vietnam, and to be honest it will be a relief when I see it recede to the horizon. Hotel prices will literally be cut in half once I get to Cambodia, and it will be nice to read about a horrifying, brutal history that does not include my home country. That sounded odd, eh.

I am good spirits awaiting my arrival to Cambodia. To the museums!

6pm to 6am, dead tired, all the good hotels are full or too expensive. Nice beach town, Nha Trang, I shall get some rest and venture out into the day. Nha Trang is about 10 hours out of Saigon, I’ll be there tomorrow.

from journal:

Once you enter Halong Bay the entire scheme of civilization slips far back to your distant memory. You become one with the past and present, from the first sailors to the rumble of your shiny new tourist ferry. Yes, it seems we all find peace under limestone peaks, but there are a drunk few who care not for local customs or respect.

He had been drinking since noon, and his conversation towards me was too silly in such a beautiful place. I thought he was French.

When the boat docked to refuel, an adventurous bunch of us dove into the water from the third floor deck of our boat. Locals with rowboats full of fruit, beer and candy rowed up next to us, pleading with us to buy something. They were arms-length from the boat.

Our Frenchman, who I later learned was a Scot, jumped off the boat and landed conspicuously close to the ladies and their boats. Her clothes, and some of her food became wet. I have never seen a man scurry up a rickety old ladder faster. He did it on purpose. There were two boats, and the lady closest took a plank from the floor of her boat and threw it at the guy.

The ladies began yelling profanities in Vietnamese, and when I had it translated by my friend he told me they were threatening to stab him. Within a few minutes the ladies relented and paddled away. No sales, wetter but not richer. Nothing happened to the guy, but our whole boat felt embarassed that a foreigner had done something so ridiculous. The guy was embarassed and spent the rest my time in his room.

I’m back in Hanoi now, planning on descending to the south tonight, another night train. Halong bay was very gorgeous, and here are a few pictures:

My friend Hung contemplating the beauty of the bay.

Amazing chess player who owned the restaurant I lunched in Sapa. He beat me three times, very easily.

There is no larger mountain in all Indochina than Fansipan. (Indochina: Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam.) The Three Caballeros(Three Gentleman), was a term that our group used to define itself. The Three Caballeros climbed Fansipan to the top.

From left to right: Myself (the rugged American), Sebastian, the sly Frenchman, and Huong, Vietnamese-American, returning to his birth country after 30 years. He will celebrate his 30th wedding anniversary with his wife on Dec 19, although he will be in Saigon and she in Boston.

The evening before the climb, our guides informed us that we would be eating one of the chickens we had passed on the trail. I had never eaten a wild chicken before, and it took me a while to get used to the idea that something alive in the afternoon would be in my stomach by nightfall. When they cut its throat I was horrified, and I vowed to be a vegetarian. However, once they plucked all its feathers, and started roasting it on an open flame, my disposition turned to thoughts of: ‘That looks good.’

And it was, best chicken I’ve ever had.

The next morning we woke at 6:30, and began hiking at 7. The whole mountain was covered in a thick sheet of fog, and the entire day we did not see a view past 10 feet ahead of us, somewhat disappointing considering it must have been spectacular at 10,000 feet.

It had rained a lot in the morning, and in the open air we were dry. Under the cover of trees, the rain that had been there since morning consistently dripped on us. We made it to the top, freezing, at 11:30, faster than most groups according to our guide. We were so overjoyed to have conquered the mountain, we did not care about the lack of a view, we were all in incredibly high spirits at the summit.

And so it was.

I am now back in town, in Sapa, with a ticket to Hanoi on the night train at 8:30. I feel exhausted and accomplished. I shall be in Halong Bay tomorrow.

Train stations in general, especially in Vietnam at night, have a certain dreamike Polar Express type of feel. I had taken one of the last tickets for the train, a “hard” sleeper bunk than was actually quite comfortable. I was on the 3rd floor bunk of a 6 person room, and the orchestral snoring champions of Vietnam saw too it that my sleep was periodically interrupted. However, even with just periodic sleeping, the night train made the time fly by, and at about 6am the train rolled up to Lao Cai, and promptly I got a minibus to Sapa.

This is the view from my $6 hotel balcony, which is somewhat expensive believe it or not. Somewhere in this picture, perhaps just out of it, is the top of Fansipan, Vietnam’s highest peak, at 3500m, which is somewhere around 10,000 feet. After I saw it, I knew I had to climb it.

So that is where I shall be for a few days, I plan to arrange a trek either today or tomorrow, so do not worry when I don’t respond to emails or post blogs. I don’t need ATM’s where I’m going, unlike my first broke hours in this country. All is well, the mountain air is crisp and somewhat chilly, refreshing from the smog of Hanoi. Exhaust from the cars still flies into your mouth as you walk down the street, but after they pass a breath of the mountain air will cleanse your lungs and fill you with vigor once again.
That mountain shall be mine.

You wake up in Hanoi. Turn on the cable-tv that has provided the facade that you might actually be closer to home than you really are. You switch it off and set out for breakfast.

It seems the entire population of 3 and a half million is scattered around your block. Electric saws carve into hard metal, sparks go flying next to oil covered mechanics and labor workers. Another block, another saw, another ear-drum piercing noise. You continue on to a food stall that looks just comfortable enough to sit in for ten minutes.

Like most meals, it’s noodle soup. You eat around the beef that doesn’t look so much like beef, more like a pig fell into a blender for a few seconds. Delicious, but not enough, you miss the American breakfasts that were advertised all over in Thailand and even Laos.

You return to the hotel, the manager is holding your laundry hostage. 24 hours from the point you dropped it off, and it will be ready. He asks you sternly your plans for the day, motions to the various tours advertised on the walls. They’re cheap yes, but the smiles that lured you into the hotel turned to wide-eyes stares and intensity as he tries, almost demands that you book one of the tours to Halong Bay or Sapa whose advertisements line the walls with colorful pictures of smiling tourists. I’m going to Sapa tonight, but on my own, no hotel managers involved.

And so this is the plan. Book a 10 o’clock night train for Lao Cai, and catch the bus to Sapa when the train rolls in at 8 o’clock the next morning. The berths are little rooms with four bunk beds, and this shall be my accomodation for tonight rolling along at 60 mph.

The fervent pace of Hanoi charmed me for yesterday morning but now is starting to wear on me. I shall play the tourist, visiting sight to sight to occupy my time until 10. I long for the quiet mountain air of Sapa and shall smell it tomorrow. All is well, but I long for the mountains, clean air, and a sparse population.