...part 2

here is the continuation of my description of our trip. Unfortunately, I am sick in bed with a fever and chills, so my apologies if this entry is a little less upbeat than my last one.

So as I said, we found a beautiful hotel room even closer to the pier with a view of the ocean and right next to the pool. We stayed there for two nights. After settling our stuff in and taking a brief swim in the pool, we decided to go on a little hike to explore the island. We had asked several people about hiking trails (people in the dive shops, etc) and they all claimed that none existed. Mike's guidebook said they did, but we soon realized that his book was pre-tsunami. The tsunami really devestated Koh Phi Phi, but now, a little over 2 years later, you can hardly tell that there was any damage except for the huge amounts of construction around the pier. But, we decided to go for it, trails or not, and I'm so glad we did. We walked along the beach for a while, maneuvering through huge boulders. Eventually we decided to go inland, and did some nice walking through the woods, stumbling upon many tiny bungalow places with private beaches. That was more the sort of thing I was expecting when we came to Koh Phi Phi, but unless you really know how to find those places, it would be sort of impossible. Also...our one huge rolling suitcase wouldn't have been well suited to that hike.

Anyway, we got to one part of the path that we were on that was surrounded by trees. We both mentioned that we were on the lookout for monkeys in the trees, but hadn't seen any up to that point. However, it was our lucky day. Not long after saying 'i want to see a monkey,' we looked up and saw a whole family of monkeys in a tree not far from where we were standing on the path. I took a few pictures from afar, but Mike was more brave than I and climbed up the side of the hill off the path to get a closer look. One of the monkeys threw a piece of fruit at him, and at one point a big one was crouching not far from Mike and growling at him. I kept having visions in my head of those tv shows "when animals attack." Thankfully, nothing like that happened and we continued happily on our way, overjoyed at seeing monkeys in their natural habitat. After stopping for a refreshment at one of the bungalow places, we decided to head back to the beach to watch the sunset, which was beautiful (aww). After that, we took a long boat back to our part of the island, wandered around through the shops and restaurants, and I ended up talking Mike into going to one of the million massage places. He opted for a foot massage, while I opted for the traditional Thai massage. I liked some of the stuff the lady did that stretched out my leg muscles, but overall I wasn't really that into the Thai massage. Mike was even less impressed with the foot massage when the guy proceeded to spend half an hour scraping and filing off his caluses. So much for walking barefoot.

Our last day on Koh Phi Phi was even better. We got up and went for another hike, this time choosing to go to the viewpoint on the island. It was quite the hike, but well worth the 9 billion steps we had to climb. When we got to the top (we actually went to 3 view points, all of which offered a slightly different view), we had incredible views of the narrow part of the island that was the most severely damaged during the tsunami. At one of the view points, the guy who ran the little souvenir and refreshment shop had a book all about the tsunami, where we were able to see how much the island has changed since then. It was really fascinating. I really loved the hikes we took because it's not something I get to do that often, living in Shanghai. The closest thing to is is the Taiping hashes that I go on with my friends, but I've only been to 2 (and i'm going to my 3rd this saturday, provided that i'm healthy). The change of scenery from a filthy, smoggy city to tropical paradise was just what i needed.

After our hike and lunch on the beach, we decided that it was time to explore one thing that had really interested us about Koh Phi Phi-- monkey beach. I had read a little bit about it, but still didn't really know what to expect. Would there actually be monkeys there? Would it be a big disappointment? Needless to say, we were excited about the idea of feeding monkeys and decided to hire a long tail boat just for the two of us. Our driver was nice, and the boat ride over (which took about 25 minutes) was spectacular. The cliffs of Koh Phi Phi are really breathtaking, and the whole time we were there I felt like it was all a dream. When we arrived on Monkey beach, we were a little disappointed that there were so many other tourists, but pleasantly surprised that there were, in fact, monkeys. the beach itself was beautiful, with really soft, white sand. We decided to buy some bananas, which the monkeys gladly grabbed out of our hands and peeled themselves. Other tourists gave them coconuts, bags of watermelon seeds (which they opened themselves, and then cracked the seeds to eat what was inside), and other various types of fruit and candy that needed to be unwrapped. Unsurprisingly, these monkeys are obese. It's really actually pretty sad, because they just eat and eat all day long. But...that doesn't mean we fed them any fewer bananas.

Our taxi boat driver had told us that there were actually 2 monkey beaches, and that the other one was far less crowded. We bought some more bananas and asked him if he would take us there. He told us that it was low tide, and that he wouldn't be able to get the boat onto the beach, but that if we wanted to swim in to the beach from the boat, he would do that. So, when we got close enough, Mike was the first one to jump in the water. Our driver told us that we had to be very careful because there was so much coral (most of which was VERY sharp) and to wear our flip flops while we were swimming so that we could walk on the rocks when we got close enough. Sadly, Mike couldn't see what he was jumping into when he got into the water, and ended up cutting his foot up pretty badly on some coral. However, he was determined to get to the beach, and with a bunch of bananas in his mouth, he swam ashore. I followed suit, managing to steer clear of the sharp coral. When we got to the beach, we were greeted by a lot more monkeys than at the last beach, and these ones were a normal weight. Apparently not as many people come to this beach to feed the monkeys, and they were acting like they were starved. Mike and I fed them more bananas, but these ones were also a little more aggressive, as one actually jumped up on Mike's leg to grab a banana out of his hand. I couldn't believe it. Two other monkeys seemed a little upset with me that i didn't have any more food for them, and ran around my legs, scaring the hell out of me. Once out bananas were gone, we made the slow walking/swimming journey back to the boat, feeling like we had finally accomplished everything that we had wanted to on our vacation.

The rest of the night was pretty uneventful, and we left on the 9am ferry to go back to Phuket the next morning. Our last day of vacation didn't really feel much like vacation at all...we had like 6 hours in Phuket until we had to go to the airport, so we pretty much just ate lunch and went and hung out in an air-conditioned coffee shop for a while. We had timed it so that our flight from Phuket to Bangkok would only leave us with a few hours at the Bangkok airport before our flight back to Shanghai, and it worked out really nicely. Our flight left Bangkok at 1:30am, and it turned out that our flight was only half full, so we ended up with several seats to ourselves. Arriving back in Shanghai was uneventful, and the last few days of Mike's visit involved mostly sleeping and relaxing and a little bit of eating and drinking. The most touristy thing we did was go to the bar on the 87th floor of the Jin Mao tower for drinks and appetizers, which was really romantic and really fun.

Needless to say, it was hard to say goodbye. I can't believe i've already been in China for 6 months, and sometimes another 4 months seems like nothing...but saying goodbye at the airport always makes even hours or days seem like forever, let alone another 4 months. The semester has gotten off to a decent start so far, minus the fact that I'm sick in bed right now...I just hope i can strike a good balance of enjoying my time here while being excited about coming home and starting law school and my 'real' life.

february is a wonderful month...part 1

Yes, it's been a whole month since my last update, but to be fair, i've had visitors for the past 3 weeks. i've been busy living my life, not writing about it.

the semester ended really well. the parent meetings went well, and i found out that i had the highest 'satisfaction ratio' in the primary school. during every semester, the students take a survey about their teachers on the computer, saying how satisfied they are with the teacher's performance. apparently my students all like me a lot and think i'm doing a good job. that made me really, really happy.

Roel was here for about 6 days, right when the semester ended. It was nice that i didn't have to work, so we were able to do a lot of siteseeing and stuff together while he was visiting. It was great to see him, and we had a lot of fun getting massages, eating good food, doing some touristy stuff i hadn't had a chance to do yet, etc. I won't go into great detail...if you're curious you can check out his blog of his travels at roelsreis.blogspot.com.

After Roel left, i had a few days of down time before Mike arrived, during which I hung out with Shannon and Dania and their friends who were visiting, and relaxed. Mike arrived on Sunday the 11, and monday the 12 we left for Bangkok.

Let me preface this explanation of our trip by saying that it was by far the most incredible vacation i've ever taken, and that Mike's visit was undoubtedly the best 2 weeks i can ever remember. I'll try not to be too mushy when describing our trip.

I knew it was going to be a great trip when we walked onto the plane to Bangkok and we found out that we had exit-row seats. Seeing as Mike is 6'4'', the exit row definitely can make a huge difference in the comfort of traveling on a plane. Things got even better when we got to our 5 star hotel that we had booked and the receptionist told us that the type of room we had booked were all full, and that they'd have to upgrade us. Our hotel room had a kitchen, a living room, a giant bed, and the most amazing bathtub/shower combination i'd ever seen. It was the nicest hotel room i've ever stayed in for sure.

But onto the more interesting stuff. Bangkok seemed a little bit more foreign to me than Shanghai does, but I can't tell if that's just because I'm used to being here or not. The Thai people are sooooooo sweet and kind, which was a very pleasant change from China. Our first night there, we went for a walk in the vicinity of the hotel, which was a mixture of seedy bars and restaurants and malls, and on our way to find a place for a late dinner, we saw a baby elephant walking down the sidewalk, being led by its owner. I got so excited, but for some reason that I can't really figure out, we didn't stop and feed it. I still can't believe we saw a baby elephant. God it was cute.

So the next day, our only full day in Bangkok, we decided to take a taxi to Khao San Road, an area where all the backpackers like to hang out, very touristy. We got there and found it to be a street just full of little souvenir shops, which meant, of course, that I was in heaven. We had lunch at a restaurant there, and went to a travel agent through whom we bought our plane tickets to Phuket for the next day. Our round-trip tickets to Phuket were only about $100 a person, which was pretty awesome. So we spent the better part of the afternoon browsing the shops, buying stuff, and then got in a tuk-tuk (sort of like the thai version of a rickshaw...a little open-air car thing that i think runs on a motorcycle motor? i don't know, check out my pictures for more info) to go to a big temple recommended by Mike's guidebook. Unfortunately, it was closed when we got there, so instead we managed to get an hour-long cruise on the river in our own long-boat. We were out on the river while the sun was setting, got to feed some fish, and stopped at another beautiful temple. That was definitely the highlight of Bangkok for me.

Our flight for Phuket left not long after we checked out from the (wonderful) hotel, so we weren't really able to see any more of the city. Bangkok is definitely a city that we want to go back to, because 1 full day really isn't enough to be able to see hardly anything there. It's always nice to go somewhere and leave it wanting more. When we got to Phuket, we went to Karon beach (as my friends had recommended) and checked into the hotel that our travel agent in Bangkok had booked for us. It was a really nice place, but a little farther from the beach than we had hoped. It was Valentine's day, but since the entire vacation was ridiculously romantic, neither of us felt a need to make valentine's day a big deal...but we went out for a really nice meal at this steak restaurant and walked around for a while before calling it a night.

The next day we spent mostly on the beach, relaxing and just enjoying the sun and warm water. We also found a new hotel to stay in for that night and the following night for 600 baht/night which ends up being about $16. Of course, you get what you pay for-- two twin beds, no tv, and the shower WAS the bathroom...a drain under the sink and a little hand-held shower thing that was on the wall next to the toilet. I guess it was sort of convenient though, we could store our shampoo and stuff on the back of the toilet, and you could (theoretically) get clean while doing your business. But all in all the place was decent and right across the street from the beach, so we couldn't really complain.

The next day (feb 16) we went on a boat tour that we had booked to check out James Bond Island. I don't know what the real name of the island is, but now they call it James Bond Island, ever since the movie 'the man with the golden gun' was shot there (starring Roger Moore as James Bond). I don't know if i've seen that movie, and if i did it was definitely a long time ago, but i was excited about it nonetheless. So after a miserable, full, motion-sickness ridden van ride to the pier, we got on a big boat with maybe 30 other people and started the tour. It was a full-day thing, which included going to 2 islands besides James Bond Island, where we got to ride in canoes (paddled by Thai guys that worked for the tour group) and go in these caves that were so low to the water that we actually had to lay down on our backs in the canoes. Then we'd come out of the caves into an open area in the middle of the island, surrounded on all sides by these tall cliffs. The whole experience was really breathtaking-- the water was so blue and warm. It felt totally surreal being surrounded by such beautiful landscape. We got to get off the boat when we got to James Bond Island and walk around there for a while, and got to go swimming off of another island after that. The whole day was really incredible.

The next day, we had booked a ferry to take us to Koh Phi Phi, an island about 2 hours from the island of Phuket. Apparently we had made a big mistake by booking the afternoon ferry, because it was by far the most horrible experience we had on the trip and definitely my worst boat experience ever. The ferry was packed, but luckily we had gotten there early enough (after another sickening van ride) to get seats down below, out of the sun. Or, we thought we were lucky. Turns out, the windows didn't open and the exhaust blew the diesel fumes right into the cabin of the boat, so we had to sit in the sweaty, stuffy, exhaust-y boat for the 2+ hours it took to get to koh phi phi. sitting outside was a little better but it couldn't be done for long unless we really wanted to fry. But, mike took good care of me when i feltl ike i was going to possibly be ill and we arrived at Koh Phi Phi healthy and with no further problems.

Since we didn't have a place to stay, we had to talk to one of the million people that approached us as we got off the boat in order to find a hotel for the night. We ended up getting an overpriced air-conditioned bungalow not too far from the beach for the night, and even though it was the most uncomfortable bed i've slept on in a long time and had another 'shower' bathroom, it was pretty cute from the outside and our little porch came complete with a stay cat. There are TONS of stray cats in Thailand, and even more on Koh Phi Phi. And i guess with so many tourists around, the cats have become pretty domesticated and are SO friendly. The one that was living on our porch would even lay down to have us scratch his belly. We went to a restaurant on phi phi that had a whole cat family living directly at the front of the restaurant...a female with her 5 new kittens. Mike and I chose the table closest to the cats and spent our meals there pretty much just oohing and ahhing over how cute they were.

So the interesting thing about Koh Phi Phi is that it caters to pretty much whatever you might want to do there. The crowd on Phi Phi was very young-- it seemed like pretty much everyone there was our age, whereas in Phuket there were a lot of older people and families. Near the pier, there were about a million tourist shops, restaurants, bars, internet cafes, dive shops, and massage places. The whole area was very loud, crowded, and touristy, but I really liked it. We went out to a really crowded bar on the beach the first night we were there, 'enjoying' the bucket full of thai whiskey, coke, and a can of red bull (random trivia....red bull originated in thailand, it's an energy drink whose name in thai means 'red bull' and then i guess someone decided to market it worldwide). I sort of felt like i was on the tropical spring break i'd never gotten a chance to take.

We switched hotels the next morning, finding a beautiful room at a hotel even closer to the pier. We ended up spening more money than we had expected to on the hotels, but it's sort of difficult to really find a bargain if you don't know your way around the island, don't have anything to reference (i knew i should have bought a lonely planet guide) and have a giant suitcase to cart around. The place we stayed was really nice-- our room was right next to the pool and had a view of the ocean as well.

ok i've been writing for pretty much forever...only a few more days to write about but it's gonna have to wait. more tomorrow, or sometime soon.