Finally, some wildlife!

Today at lunch my boss mentioned that he had seen a lot of monkeys and some elephants here in Phnom Penh. I was very disappointed, because I hadn't see any! Then he started talking about baby monkeys, or baboons, we're not sure what they are, and I was even more jealous.

Well, it's a good thing I went out for a walk after work this afternoon, because I struck gold! There's a temple right across the street from our hotel, and even though I had been there before, the animals weren't out then. Today they were though. And you'll have to excuse this picture, it had just rained a little before I went out, and when I took my camera out the lens got all steamy. I thought it was just the screen, but once I got back home I realized the lens must have been all fogged up too. I was able to clear some of them up, but the colors are still a little off.

If I wanted, I could have ridden on this guy, or fed him some peanuts I think. I opted to take pictures, from a short distance away. I don't think he showed up very often, because even the locals were hanging around and checking him out.

I nearly missed these guys! I was heading back to my hotel when I noticed them. There were a bunch just hanging around and getting food from people. I'm not sure why I didn't notice them when I was here the other day, but they must have been up in the trees or something.

They were definitely not afraid of people! I was able to get pretty close to some of them, and they hardly noticed me.

Isn't this guy a cutie? He was the littlest one there.

Finally, I just wanted to thank everyone for their comments. I haven't really gotten a chance to respond, but I am reading them, and the emails! Some people have said they had a problem leaving a comment, but I'm not sure why. I've got everything opened up to anonymous users, and I turned off the word verification, so maybe that will help.

Cambodian Fruits

I've got a couple posts planned, but I thought I'd interrupt myself and tell you all about some Cambodian fruits that showed up at my door this evening.

There was a little incident earlier, when I went to make myself a cup of tea, and noticed that house keeping had...overlooked some things when cleaning my room before I got here. I called room service to get some tea, instead of using what was provided in the room, and when it arrived, I gave the waiter a piece of my mind. He called house keeping, and eventually a manager showed up, and I gave him a piece of my mind - I'm getting quite good at that by now. But seriously, I was a little disgusted by the dirty napkin and erm, body hair on the dishes. Well a little while later, this fruit basket showed up at my door - just in time, since I was getting hungry! So, I thought I'd take a look at some of the local produce, and try it out for your entertainment, human guinea pig style.

Okay, the orange colored, round thing...just an orange. I didn't bother with pictures of that. If you're curious, walk yourself down to your local grocery store and pick one out yourself. Then come back, there's more to come here.

First, we have this fruit, kind of looks like an apple, kind of looks like a pear.

Once inside, yup, still can't decide - apple or pear? I took a bite...still couldn't really tell. Well, really, it's an Asian pear, but tasted pretty bland. It definitely needed another day or two to ripen.

Next, oh boy, we've got something strange looking here. The spiky looking bits are funny, and kind of soft. Hmmm. I cut it open to see what it's like on the inside. My first thought - damn, these would make good eyeballs for a Halloween haunted house - like grapes, but bigger, and even more slimy. I scooped one half out, and gave it a little nibble. Tasty. Sweet, and a little on the tough side to bite off at first.

I wasn't so sure about eating that seed though, so I turned to my good friend, Mr. Google, for help on this one. This is a rambutan. And you're actually supposed to just squeeze them to get the fruit out, and don't eat the seed now, because that can be toxic. Okay, should have googled a bit sooner!

Don't worry, I didn't eat the seed. You're just supposed to nibble this and leave the seed, and the skin around it. It was kind of hard to get the flesh off without eating the skin from the seed, so I gave up after a bit. Still, tasty, and enjoyable.

On to the next funny looking fruit. I turn to Google right away, since I'm not too sure how to approach this one. According to a Cambodian cooking school website, and all the other sites I checked, this is a dragon fruit. I can kind of see where that name came from. And all you have to do is cut this right in half.

It cut very easily, and opened up to a white inside, with lots of little black seeds. I took a spoon, and scooped out the flesh, just like you would an avocado. The seeds are edible, luckily, and the fruit itself is kind of like a kiwi, but without the tartness. In fact, without really much taste. It's a watery fruit, and didn't really jump out at me. Okay, but not my new favorite fruit.

Lastly - you didn't think I was going to eat the bananas, did you? I'll tell you, I actually ate one in Bangkok (since there was always a bowl of fresh fruit in my room there), and it tastes like a banana. Plain old, boring, mushy banana. Never been a fan.

Actually, I finished up with this. I stopped for lunch at this place called The Shop, and they had a good selection of pastries there. The mousse is chocolate hazelnut, and it looked much more attractive before I bought it and took it home with me in a tuk-tuk. And the brownie...just a brownie (and upside down too, I think). I'm actually saving that for tomorrow - I hope it's worth it!

Not much to report so far...

It's been pretty quiet here in Phnom Penh. We arrive on Tuesday, and since then I've been pretty much lying low. I'm ok with that though - I found that in Bangkok, I just focused on my work during the week, and on the weekend had enough time to see everything I wanted to see. I do have a few things planned for this weekend and I am looking forward to them.

I also managed to do something to my knee on Tuesday after I got here. Once I got settled in to the hotel (which sadly, is nothing like the hotel in Bangkok - it's more like 70's era Holiday Inn furniture and bathroom), I decided to go for a little walk, and see what was in the near vicinity. Well, there isn't much, aside from the tuk-tuk and motorcycle taxi drivers every 10 feet, each of whom as if I want a ride. I came back and had lunch at the hotel, and when I got up, noticed something not right about my knee - it had all of a sudden swollen up and I could barely walk. I hobbled back to my room, barely, to assess the situation. Ice was order from room service, and I spent the rest of the day with my leg up in bed. It's still a little swollen, but today I was able to walk fairly normally. I'm hoping that by Saturday it will be doing even better, and I'll feel like I can go out and see some stuff. I have to admit, even in Bangkok when it wasn't swollen, I was disappointed that I couldn't do as much walking as I might have been able to a year ago. Just something I still have to keep working on!

Chatuchak

After visiting all those temples on Saturday, I decided to spend Sunday shopping - clearly I've got my weekend days of worship a bit mixed up.

It wasn't quite as early a morning as Saturday, but I was up at a decent hour and headed down the street to the local Skytrain station. The train, or BTS as it is really called, is nice and clean, and easy to figure out - they only have 2 lines. I headed up north to the end of the line and got off at Mo Chit, for Chatuchak, the Weekend Market.

The Weekend Market is the biggest in Bangkok, I believe. Some estimate that 200,000 to 300,000 people come on a single day. There are 2 main 'buildings' with maybe 6 or 8 aisles in each one. While I did have a map, and there seemed to be general areas for specific things, it wasn't uncommon to find a stand selling jewelry right next to the pets, or food stands in amongst the silk stands.

Like the Night Bazaar, you can buy all sorts of things at Chatuchak - and then some. Clothes, new and used, jewelry, purses, shoes, silk products, ceramics, silver, paper products, furniture, pets, toys, old army stuff, random junk, etc. I didn't spend too much (what a surprise!), but did pick up some souvenirs for gifts. I also bought myself a strand of tourmaline gems, and the only thing I regret is that I didn't get more. I'm such a conservative shopper!

I ended up spending a couple hours at the Market, mostly just wandering up and down the aisles. It was definitely a nice way to wrap up my weekend, and my trip to Thailand. Next stop - Cambodia!

Grand Palace and Wat Po

Finally, the weekend arrived, and I had two things in my pocket: time and energy. I also had great plans and plenty to see! While work has been going well, I wasn't really getting out much last week, and wasn't really enjoying Bangkok as I should have. But I definitely did this weekend! Just in time to leave on Tuesday, too.

I started out nice and early on Saturday. I wanted to see the Grand Palace and some temples, and luckily they were all in the same direction. I flagged down a taxi outside my hotel and told the guy to take me to the Grand Palace. You'd think that would be easy, right? I mean, I'd assume every Thai knows where that is, unless I'm overestimating it's importance.

Luckily, I got there in one piece, though for a second I did think the guy was going to take me to one of the temples on the other side of the river, though when he pointed to it on my map, I vehemently said no, and kept pointing to the big picture of the Grand Palace. A little detour through Chinatown, and we were there in about 30 minutes, and all for about 3 bucks.

I'll admit, I did get a little brochure about the Grand Palace, but I didn't read it. All I know is that it's a huge place, with lots of temples and most importantly, I believe, the Emerald Buddha. Sadly, no pictures of him, as he is inside one of the temples and it's a holy place, so no shoes, no hats, no cameras. There were a lot of people sitting down, praying, making offerings, so I just quietly walked though. While I did see the Buddha, I didn't actually realize it was the Emerald Buddha until afterward.

There seemed to be a few different styles of design among the temples. We've got the one big shiny gold temple, we've got glass mosaic ones, and we've got ceramic mosaic ones. For the ceramic ones, they actually took new bowls and broke them to use the pieces in the designs. I think the ceramic ones were my favorite design.

Some of the shiny stuff you'd think would be kind of gaudy, but it's not really. Like I said, I didn't read the brochure, so I'm not sure how old some of the temples are. They were actually working on some of them, fixing or re-tiling, throughout the day at both places. Amongst all the shiny stuff, there were also a lot of gargoyles-type statues. I think they're supposed to be demons.

After I finished seeing everything at the Grand Palace (and had an ice cream!), I headed over to Wat Po, which was pretty much next door. I had an interesting encounter with some guy on the way, who tried to tell me that Wat Po was closed until 1:00 to foreigners because it was a holy day. He told me I should go see some other temples, and for 20 baht, his buddy with his tuktuk would take me.

Now, I'd read about these guys, so I knew he was full of it. And there was certainly no way I was getting in a tuktuk, which is a little three wheel motorized contraption. I'm sure no matter where I'd ask him to take me, it would involve some sort of scam at some point. So I walked up the block, crossed the street and came back down on the other side, and what do you know, Wat Po was open! I felt like going back to the guy afterward and asking him if lying was bad karma.

Wat Po is another temple (or wat), and a lot of it was very similar to the temples at the Grand Palace. What makes Wat Po famous though, is the Reclining Buddha. The Reclining Buddha is huge, and has a pretty big temple all to itself.

After I finished up at Wat Po, it wasn't even 1:00! I was also very hot and sweaty - it was in the 90s, at least, and I had on pants since I was going to be going in to the temples (if I had worn shorts, I would have been required to buy a nice long skirt before going in). I grabbed a cab and headed to a mall on the way back to my hotel for lunch. Then it was home, and time for a shower!

The good thing about Saturday though, was learning that my new camera takes pretty good pictures! It was incredibly sunny all day, and sometimes I was shooting right in to the light. Most of these came out gorgeous, if I don't say so myself! You can see more at my flickr page.

Suan Lum Night Bazaar

The other night I mustered up some energy and walked down to the Suan Lum Night Bazaar. One of the things that Bangkok is known for is the markets, where you can buy all kinds of things. The Night Bazaar is apparently one of the nicer ones.

There were 3, maybe 4 buildings, with long hallways filled with small stalls, maybe 8 or 10 feet square for the most part. When I got there it was just opening, so some people were still setting up and there weren't too many customers there. There were also a lot of empty stalls - apparently the land the bazaar is on is locked in some sort of court battle between developers, and it could be closed down at any time.

As for what you can buy...pretty much anything. I actually didn't get anything myself though, as I'm not really sure what I want to get. Here's a list of things I saw there: graphic tees, pashminas and silk table runners, silk ties, knock-off purses, shoes, flip flops, garland lights, knock-off (possibly real) Tiffany's, silk pillows, DVDs and CDs, lighters, luggage, hemp and leather jewelry, lingerie, other clothes, strange foods, etc. I could go on. One of the things I noticed as I walked along one hallway was the smell - it reminded me of a couple stores in Oak Bluffs, where one could buy incense, Jimi Hendrix tees, leather strap bracelets, maybe a hemp purse with a big green leaf embroidered on it...you know what I mean. Then I walked by the case with the hand blown glass pipes...it was about that time I was done with the Night Bazaar, and ready to head back to my hotel.

I'm going to try to go to another market this Weekend, which is much busier, and much crazier from what I've heard. I'll try to remember my camera next time!

Surprisingly, not too many mosquitos here!

But there is this adorable little elephant on my bed!

Has it really been 4 days since I've posted? Well, unfortunately, there's not much to report. Half of the nights so far, after work, I've just gone back to my hotel and relaxed. Or gone to bed before 8:00. I have gotten out a bit though, and I'll try to write a bit about it soon.

Bangkok, from my hotel room.

Bangkok is not really what I expected, to be honest. It's more like New York, or any big city. Loud, lots of traffic, dirty, various different smells, lots of skyscrapers. I guess I was expecting some place more exotic, more tropical. Weather-wise, it's very tropical - hot and muggy, all day, usually some showers in the evening. Despite the amount of moisture in the air, I haven't felt too sticky. It's almost a dry heat, except that it isn't really.

One of the first things I noticed when I got here was the smell. It's not a bad smell, just different. I first noticed when we were driving to the hotel, on the highway, and the driver rolled down his window to go through a toll. It's a heady, spicy fragrance that just permeates the air. I don't notice it as much now, unless I'm walking by the food stands that seem to be everywhere. Those are interesting! There's a couple that we walk by on the way to work, it's like a cornucopia of smells, changing as we pass the different vendors. Some of the smells are definitely not appetizing!

Another thing about Bangkok is that there are a lot of stray cats and dogs hanging around, though you'd never know they're actually strays. Being that this is Asia, and there are a lot of Buddhists, people believe that feeding the animals is good for their karma. There are actually a large number of cats who pretty much live at the American Embassy, and are vaccinated and whatnot, but are still strays. Aside from one or two lap dogs, all the animals I've seen haven't had collars on or been on leashes, yet they look very well groomed and well fed.

The view from my bathroom...yes, there is a
curtain that pulls across the glass wall.

I'll leave you all with a nice shot of my bathroom, as it looks out to the rest of the room. Luxurious, is it not?

One Night in Bangkok...so far

When we last met our heroine, she was sitting in an aiport lounge, enjoying a nice morning drink...

Given the mileage to my destination, I made much better time than on my last trip. It was still a long day though - a little over 13 hours on my first flight, Washington to Tokyo, then about 3 hours at Tokyo Narita airport, followed up by another 5 hours on a plane, give or take. The time-space continuum has left me feeling a bit warped, as I woke up in DC on Friday morning and when I went to bed that night, it was Saturday in Bangkok. That's two whole days of very little productivity! You know how much work I could have gotten done?

The flights themselves were pretty uneventful, aside from the fact that in both cases I had way more foot room than I knew what to do with and the flight attendants were practically throwing alcohol at me the whole time. Yes, traveling is business class is all it is cracked up to be. They really do hand out champagne before you've even had a chance to buckle your seat belt and stow your baggage for the take-off. And I'm never one to pass up a free glass of bubbly, plus it would be kind of rude, don't you think?

The comfortable seats - including those on the second flight, which were those pod ones that laid out completely flat - were a big factor in me getting a few hours of sleep on each flight. First flight I turned the tv on for a few minutes, but otherwise spent my waking time reading and knitting a bit. I finished off the book I was reading, plus read a whole Sookie Stackhouse book - my latest guilty pleasure. On the second flight, the seats had bigger tv screens, and a selection of movies you could start at anytime. I saw X-Men Origins: Wolverine (lots of delicious men in that...) and Star Trek. They were both, as my boss pointed out, the appropriate geeky choices. Not much else to say about the flights - oh, except that Jessica Simpson was on the second one.

Now I'm settled in to my hotel, a Hilton. I took it easy today, slept in a bit before going to get a late breakfast in the executive lounge. That was followed by a nap, and some relaxing in my room. I took a little walk outside, but with the muggy-ness and my unfamiliarity with the area, I only made it around the block. I then went back to the lounge for a cup, no, a pot of tea, and some snacks, and followed that up with a massage at the spa. It was very nice and indulgent, and I'll probably be back there before I leave here. Dinner was at one of the hotel restaurants, a buffet style that served Thai and International cuisine - tonight it appeared it was Indian, and as most of the other stuff had fish, that was what I had. Plus desert of course - they did have a good assortment of ice cream.

So, now you are all caught up on my time so far in Bangkok! It's very exciting, isn't it?

Ready for take-off!

Here I am, at the airport! In true Deirdre fashion, I got here a little after 9...for a flight at 12:50. It was quiet too - I feel like IAD can either be mayhem or absolutely dead. Today it was empty. I went right up to the desk for check in, and literally had 3 agents helping me. Then I strolled through security - it's so nice not to have anyone behind you, pushing you along the line. Hopped on the moving lounge, and got to my gate only about 20 minutes after arriving at the airport. I've had some breakfast, exchanged some money, and now I'm hanging out in the business lounge, having a free drink and enjoying the free wifi. So far, my trip is off to a good start!

Packing!

Don't you just love my matching luggage set?

Ok, so in the photo above my bags are empty...the suitcase is mostly packed now. My carry on and my messenger bag will be packed tonight. I've got almost 10,000 miles and over 20 hours before I get to Thailand, so I need to make sure I've got anything I might want with me.

Enough clothes, toiletries and shoes for 3 weeks?

I hope I've made the right choices in what I've packed. Linen pants, light-weight cotton shirts, some basic work clothes. I'm only taking things that give me multiple options - all the shirts can be worn with more than one pair of pants, etc. I haven't counted how many outfits I'll have, but I think I'll be all set.

Previously on...

My travel adventures actually started a few weeks ago, when someone mentioned to me in passing that I was going down to Charleston, SC. And what an adventure it was! I only took a few pictures while I was there, as my camera was broken and all I had was my phone.

Charleston Battery, down by the waterfront

I left DC around 4:00 on a Sunday afternoon, to fly to Atlanta and get on my connecting flight to Charleston, which was unfortunately not until 10:00. Now everyone knows I have had my fair share of flying adventures, most of which involve late afternoon or evening flights in the summer. You'd think I'd know better by now than to book these kind of flights, but apparently I'm not as smart as I might seem at times.

Houses down by the waterfront

Well my flight from DC landed in Atlanta on time, but that's about the only thing that went well. I went and found someplace to sit down and eat, some cheap Nascar burger place. As I took my first bite in a not-so-well cooked burger I would later come to regret, I looked up and happened to see a Moe's Southwestern Grill just a few yards further down the terminal. Oh well, I thought, and finished up my burger and went back to my gate to sit around for about 4 more hours until my flight to Charleston. The typical, and expected, summer thunderstorms came through, the runways closed for a bit, and flights got later and later. Eventually the weather cleared, they found another plane for my flight, since the original one was still somewhere up in New York. It actually look like things where going to work out. By about 10:30, my 10:00 flight was there, and we were almost ready to board. By this time, the flight that had been fully booked was about a quarter full, if that. We got on, we sat, we waited - the airport was still very busy. And by 11:15, we were off the plane...apparently Charleston airport closes at 12am, and we weren't going to be able to leave in time to get there. So I spent the night in Atlanta, at the airport Hilton. By mid-afternoon the next day, I was finally in Charleston. Next time, I'll drive.

Charleston's historic Rainbow Row...
and an unintentional picture of a Jag

Once I was actually in Charleston, the trip was fairly uneventful. The people we were working with were all really nice and friendly, and not too much went wrong with the work we came to do. We also had a lot of stuff we learned which will come in handy for our other trips.

More of Rainbow Row...

When I wasn't at work, I did get to see a bit of Charleston. One night my co-workers and I went out to Sullivan Island and drove around a bit, checking out the place. We had dinner at a local bbq place, and headed back to our hotel. It was hot and muggy the whole time. Charleston was a nice, older place, but it felt empty at times. Maybe it was just the heat, but I was really surprised when I walked down the main shopping street around 6pm on a Monday evening and found I was one of the only ones out. All the stores were closed too, at least, those that were in business. I felt like there were a lot of empty store fronts. When I walked through the historic residential district down towards the water front, which is full of beautiful older homes, there seemed to be a lot of for sale signs.

...And some more

One night, despite the heat, I made it all the way down to the water, and saw some of the really old homes. I also saw a sign on something for the Daughters of the Confederacy, which was kind of interesting (Toto, we're not in Kansas anymore...). The homes were nice, and the summery, vacation-home feel kind of reminded me of the Vineyard, albeit a very different style of architecture and surrounding flora. Rainbow Row, which I think used to be merchant's homes and stores, was kind of like the Campgrounds, but not nearly as impressive.

Charleston Custom House

All in all, it was a nice trip. I didn't do much touristy stuff, but I don't really feel I missed out on much. While I wouldn't mind going back for work, I don't see myself talking any vacations down there and seeing a bit more.

The good news though, is that my flight home was uneventful, and delay-free!