Let's start with my trip to Guam. Josie needed to do an interview with the Japaneses embassy and I went with her. Guam is a USterritory and is also where "America's day begins." If you don't know, Guam is the most western part of America. Josie and I spent time at the beach and at few historical sites. It's was interesting place to visit. We all know about Pearl Harbor but these lands were also attack. Japan really did a number to the people who lived here. I'm not going to bash Japan, but let's just say that the people ofGuam were glad when America came back.
Guam also has some of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen. They have a reef that stops most of the wave. This allows the water to become crystal clear. I bought a swimming mask and saw fish swimming inches away from my face. I even had one attack me.
Josie and I wanted to go to point Udall. It is one of two places, named after two brothers, which are the easternmost and westernmost points in the United States. Josie was born in the Virgin Islands and has already been to the easternmost point. The problem was it's on a military part of the Island. We gained the help of a police officer to get onto the base but were faced several time with different road blocks. Basically, there is no way to that point unless you want to face a military trial.
Overall, I loved Guam. I never had been to such a lovely place with such friendly people. Plus, there was several Taco Bells!
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On the way back from Guam, we had over a ten hour layover. After we landed, we headed to Manila. In the city there is a place called Intramuros. It is an old walled city built by the Spanish. The city had many building that used to be churches. It seemed like there wasn't a building that wasn't a church at one time. It was strange for me to take pictures of Cathedral and churches instead of Buddhist and Hindu temples.
Pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.
http://www.facebook.com/album.
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Taryn, a friend from Korea, joined us on a trip to Ko Samet. It’s a small island an hour or two away from Bangkok. The beaches were nice but I think Guam spoiled me. We stayed there for a few days but sadly we had to go back for work.
Later, the three of us went to see Muay Thai. If you don’t know what this is, think of boxing where kicking, kneeing, and elbowing is allowed. Heck, you can’t win if you don’t do it. I was really excited and we ended up getting the most expensive seats (about $50). This of course, allowed us to have front row seats. We were sitting on the red side corner. I was watching the matches but I think Josie and Taryn were more impressed with the coaches. They seem to react more to each punch landed and thrown.
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That weekend, Josie and I hosted a meetup. It’s our way of getting other people to see Thailand with us. We went into Southern Bangkok. We started with a floating market. It’s not “the floating market” but a floating market non-the-less. We then took a ride to the Erawan Museum. This is a huge three headed elephant that is also a shrine. We climbed into the belly of this beast.
After the Elephant, we went to a crocodile farm. We watched three Thai guys play around with the gators but nothing coming close to the alligator wrestling I had imagined. The place also had an elephant show. It was cool to watch but I couldn’t help feeling sorry for the elephants. Somehow, I don’t think God intended them to ride skateboards. The place also had many caged animals. You could buy food to feed them, but I had a feeling they were feed enough by the time we got there. They would just drop the food and look at you bored. It wasn’t a total loss. I got to eat a gator burger before we left.
After the crocodile farm, we stopped at Wat Bang Phli Yai Klang, which has a huge Buddha you could enter. I touched his heart! We also went to Wat Bang Phli Yai Nai. It has a temple that holds some sacred artifact or something, but we were interested in the bathroom. Somehow, this place built a 5 million baht or 150,000 dollars bathroom. We had to check it out.
Josie and I went to Jim Thompson House by ourselves. There is a lot of mystery about Jim Thompson. I think he used to work for the CIA. There were rumors of a forbidden love and such. The only thing for sure was that he mysteriously disappeared.
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Taryn joined us for our trip to Ayutthaya. It’s about an hour or two north of Bangkok. We got to see some old ruined temples. We also stopped of at the Dutch church were the bodies were dug up. It was really creepy.
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The last thing Josie and I did was to go to Samut Songkhram to feed the monkeys. It was another meetup trip Josie and I hosted. However, only John went with us. We started the trip on a train. This train leads to another train which uses the oldest train tracks in Thailand. Unfortunately for us, we came at a bad time and we would have had to wait three hours for the next one. So we took a cab the rest of the way. I bought a bunch of Bananas (around 40) for less than two dollars and we went searching for Monkeys. We found a boat that took us to a little grove, where the monkeys were. They monkey weren’t shy about jumping onto our boat and begging for food. It was a really cool experience. On the way back we took the train we missed earlier. This train passes through a market that built right on the tracks. Every time the train comes by the people on the tracks have to move or face being run over.
Pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.
http://www.facebook.com/album.
http://www.facebook.com/album.
