http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty Mary's Journey to Meet Her Peeps Sun, 18 Feb 2007 03:28:44 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en "Home is a place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in" -The Death of the Hired Man, Robert Frost One week back in Miami, back to my friends and family, back to my job, and back to my old life. It was remarkably easy to sink ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/choose-your-own-adventure-tm.html I got a sweet email from my bank telling me that due to fraud in Vietnam, they have "placed a block on all signature based transactions" here. Thanks, you wankers. More details about my birthday - god I loved those irish folks. Up until then, the people I had been traveling ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/islands-in-the-stream-that-is-what-we-are.html First off, thanks to all of you who sent e-cards and birthday wishes. I have only a moment, but wanted to let you know that I had one of the most beautiful and memorable birthdays ever here in Vang Vieng, Laos. It started last night when Fiona and Caroline knocked on ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/go-mary-its-your-birthday.html In Laos still, in Vang Vieng, a sweet little town that is quickly becoming corrupted by tourism and losing it's soul. But it's absolutely gorgeous, very small, surrounded by karst mountains. It's also the type of town where I would be insanely bored if I was alone, thank god I'm ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/vang-vieng.html Talk about deja vu... But I'll get to that later.The pendulum keeps swinging on Laos - from great to lonely, from perfect to frustrating. Maybe I'm just ready to come home. Yet at the same time I want to keep going and going and going... What I don't like: streets are ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/3-monks-walk-into-a-temple-again.html Stop me if you've heard this one. Yesterday afternoon I went back to Angkor Wat on my own (with my moto driver, Pross) and had a little quiet time sitting on one of the small sub-temples in full view of the front of Angkor Wat. I wrote in my journal, wrote ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/three-monks-walk-into-a-temple.html A quick update... The temples are unbelievable. I'm so glad I'm here. The four of us - me, Salina, and the blokes - spent an entire day there, starting with a sunrise at Angkor Wat, hopping from temple to temple, and going back to explore Angkor Wat again before calling it ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/angkor-wat.html Well I made it to Cambodia. And if there ever was a place with some seriously bad mojo, this is it. After a bumpy and eventful ride, I've arrived in Siem Reap via the capitol city of Phnom Penh. The border crossing from Vietnam was as confusing as one might expect, ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/cambodia-come-for-the-genocide-stay-for-the-temples.html Continuation of last week... Gert and i arrived in Hanoi on Tuesday morning at 4 freakin' 30 am and had to wait for our travel cafe to open up. Then another gross shower in the communal dorm bathroom and off to Halong Bay. Halong Bay is absolutely gorgeous. We spent the ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/me-love-you-halong-time.html Riding the night train to Lao Cai made me think of a Liz Phair song, "Baby Got Going", about a girl who really likes riding the train... Squeeze her knees underneath her book, you know a really good shakin's all it took... The train is fun. Me and Gerrit (who ... http://blogs.bootsnall.com/shescrafty/baby-got-going.html