Waves in the Streets of Seoul

The past few days have been a torrential downpour. As of today, 49 people have been killed, many of them students and hundreds of people have been left with out a home. I thought I would post this video in case people were unaware of this sad situation happening in Seoul. Keep them in your thoughts. Stay tuned...

Peace & Love,
Elissa Rae

Thailand Redemption

Unable to erase the horrors of the last 48 hours, we settled on staying in Bangkok for a day or 2. There was no way any of us were getting on another bus or train. Luckily for us, things finally started to turn in the right direction.

We started off well rested, since we we're finally allowed to sleep, and wandered around the city without a plan. The idea of playing with a tiger still lingered in our minds. So we attempted to find Tiger Temple, only to find that it wasn't near where were staying. Sadly, no tigers in Thailand for us.  The Tiger Temple was too far and we missed the zoo in Phuket by minutes. With that idea down the drain, we plotted our next plan of action. What would you expect to do in while on vacation in Bangkok? If you said "go see Harry Potter", then you would be correct. We went to the theater and bought our Imax theater tickets for around 9 dollars for the evening showing.

In the meantime, we decided on seeing a few temples- because that actually made sense. We took a boat taxi down the river and our first stop was at Wat Pho- the Temple of the Reclining Buddha. It's a massive Buddha on it's side. It was amazing to see, but not much time was necessary. We shopped around for souvenirs and came across a cute mom and pop shop. After Becky bought half of the store, they gave us good luck charms to carry on with us. Then back on the boat it was. Our next stop was Wat Arun - the Temple of the Dawn. It was unlike other temples I had seen before. It was a nice change of pace from the usual. We walked around taking in the sights, taking silly photos, and occasionally stalking monks. It was getting late, so back to the theater we went. 

We ended our evening with a good movie and too much popcorn. Couldn't have asked for a better, more relaxing day to put Thailand back in my good graces. Now on to Cambodia, hopefully we'll make it past the border this time! Stay tuned...

Peace & Love,
Elissa Rae

Bad Luck Gabe

It all started on Wednesday night. 

We were anxiously awaiting for the arrival of our friend, Gabe Kim. We had no way of knowing the bad luck she would bring. The signs were all there; Within 30 minutes of her arrival, we discovered the bus driver gave her the wrong bag, Becky was suffering from dehydration, and I had a bad case of sun poisoning. But that was only the beginning.

Without any sleep, we headed towards the Laos border. We purchased tickets for Vientiane, only to discover around 8 p.m. that we were lied to. Our tickets only got us to Udon Thani and there were no more buses until morning, leaving us stranded in the middle of nowhere. Exhausted and hungry, we found our way to the nearest restaurant, Fuzzy Ken’s. We ordered 3 bowls of beef stew, which took 15 minutes to microwave EACH - there was only 1. As for the “cheeseburger”, there was no burger, no cheese, and stale bread. I’ve had sliced ham thicker than this burger. Old Ken couldn’t even remember 3 bowls of stew- the easiest order ever. He came back to ask us what we ordered at least 5 times. 

After walking home through a parade of cockroaches, we got ready to wake up at 4 a.m. to catch the first bus to the border. The 4 o’clock bus arrived at... wait for it....7:30. Once we got to the border, we went to the VISA office to find out that Canadian VISAs take hours to process (thanks Gabe). Once across the border, it would take a few more hours to reach our water tubing destination in Vang Vieng. To top it off, it would be raining for the next several days, making tubing impossible anyway. We decided to cut our loses and head back to Bangkok. It couldn’t get much worst. Right?

After he refused to pay the inflated price her tuk tuk driver was demanding, he threatened to call the police. Thankfully, our driver came to the rescue and revealed the true price.  Eager to get back to Bangkok, we discovered the only bus had holes in the seats, screeching chairs, and falling cushions. It also came with an evil bus witch. Every time we tried to sleep, she came back and yelled at us. Apparently sleeping, unless completely upright, is not permitted. At the first stop, we tried to transfer to a luxury bus. After unloading our bags and sprinting to catch the bus, we came realize we had been deceived: it was no better. We made our way back on the our original bus. 

We were stuck on a bus for 48 hours going nowhere with bad food that Becky wouldn’t even eat, her toe possibly broken, and to top it off, and alcohol free Thailand for the next two days thanks to Buddha’s Day... NOW how will we erase the memory of these horrors???

 We'll see what happens next. Stay tuned...

Peace & Love,
Elissa Rae