Smack it up, flip it, rub it down, oh no.

We're almost finished with Asia and will head down under in a few short weeks. We're ready to communicate in English (well, Australian) but will miss affordable pampering. As such, I tip my 40 oz. to the varied and sometimes painful therapeutic services rendered in this hemisphere.

China – The Chinese are really good at foot reflexology and, like everything, they take it way seriously. Any neighborhood salon will offer insanely thorough, highly painful treatment for about $7/hour. The Chinese have these treatments regularly to maintain general balance and well being. Reflexology can hurt, but I enjoy it and find the connection between the bottoms of my feet and the rest of my body fascinating. Often the therapist hit on a pressure point that made my stomach flip, or my arm stiffen, or my face relax. It feels more medical and, thus, beneficial than most massage. The bummer is that each time I had reflexology I felt awful afterward. The toxins that are broken up during the treatment (along with my reserves of MSG) release into the blood stream and then I have to lie down. That said, if I could do 1 thing every week and experience cumulative results, this is what I'd choose.

Korea – Jimjilbangs are the way. Huge complexes with 5-10 floors of baths, saunas, movie theaters, restaurants, mini golf, bars, roof terraces, and treatment rooms. I love the variety of baths; hot, cold, jasmine, salt, jets, wood tubs, stone tubs, outdoors, etc. Its weirdly calming to spend several hours wandering from sauna to pool to sauna, pausing only to be scrubbed by a lady wearing oven mitts made of Brillo pads, and beaten with a palm frond. I'm not sure I felt long term effects, but there are worse ways to spend a Wednesday.

Thailand – Thai massage is a unique practice. Done clothed, its like partner yoga with the masseuse using her weight to leverage yours. I love Thai massage, though its far more active than any other I've had. About $6-10/hr for a high-quality place, a lot of massage joints have only sheets separating the beds or are completely open air. I've seen a few where the beds look out onto ocean/mountains/river in pretty locales. The therapists are often sweet and exceptionally tiny girls. But they're suprisingly, freakishly strong. They work hard to stretch and lift and manipulate our big 'Merican bodies, and they're tired and sweaty at the end just like we are. One girl that I saw a few times on Lanta would crouch behind me at the end of the massage and pull my back over her knees, cracking every vertebrae on the way down. Then she would giggle, and hug me around the shoulders and whisper "feeneesh."  Love.

Vietnam – Massage in Vietnam is a combination of Acupressure, Shiatsu, and a little Thai. Like everything in Vietnam, the therapists do exactly and only what is required so the customer doesn't complain. The massages aren't bad, and one place Gabe took us was actually quite nice. But on our own we had the typical Vietnam experience: 55 minutes instead of an hour, long unexplained breaks, a few cell phone conversations during the treatment. Not the best.

Cambodia – The Khmer have an understandable chip on their shoulder because their kingdom used to be all-powerful and then several surrounding countries invaded and nicked their ideas, traditions and artifacts. Cambodians claim that Khmer massage gave birth to Thai massage, which is a lesser imitation. For my money, Khmer is probably my favorite stylistically and made me most lump-of-clay-monosyllabic. Less like a midevil torture rack than Thai, technically superior to Vietnamese, not as painful as Chinese. Hard and thorough, it was the perfect way to end a day of templing in 100 degree weather.

Funnily, I wrote this before we went out today and we ended up having massages this afternoon at a joint in downtown Pai.  Clearly I'm serious about research and accurate reporting.  Like the Fox News team, but for a blog.  Perhaps a first?

Maps for Blogger

Are any of my technically minded friends out there familiar with a way to add a map that tracks a travel route to a blog?  E & I have each spent quite a few hours trying to do this, and I'm ready to give up. 

I'm putting it to the universe and if no one out there knows, I'm going to assume its impossible.  Like believable hair extensions and good airplane food. 

Also, Happy '11.  I'm in  maybe the most beautiful place in Thailand.  Life does NOT suck.

Cheating while eating

Dear Mister Donut,

I have a confession to make.  I have not been faithful to you and I am so, so sorry.  Before I go on, I just want you to know how much you mean to me and how I treasure our memories.  I only hope that you can see past this one indiscretion and have me back. 

On this last trip through Bangkok, I met someone at the Empire Mall.  He called himself "Daddy Dough" but I don't even know if that's his real name.  We spent one afternoon together, and that was it.  He is nothing compared to you; flashy, too-sweet, downright immature.  It was a one time thing and being with him only made me realize that you are the one for me.  Forever.

I hope we can move past this sad event and look forward to an exciting and fulfilling future together.

Yours,
Misses Donut

Logic

Me (to guesthouse owner):  Excuse me, but there is no toilet paper in the restrooms by the restaurant.  Do you have a roll I can put in there?
Guesthouse Owner:  Earlier someone put paper in toilet instead bin and it clog.  So I take paper away.  Why they do that?
Me:  Well, in a lot of Western countries you can just flush the paper, so maybe they didn't know. 
Guesthouse Owner: If no paper, no clogs.
Me: Or, you could provide toilet paper and just put up a sign saying not to flush it, but to throw in the bin.
Guesthouse Owner laughs.

Cambodian Carnival

Every country has different ideas about how to employ animals to amuse tourists and townsfolk alike.  China trots its giant pandas out like show ponies.  Tokyo has cat cafes a plenty, where anyone can pop in to stroke a kitty and sip a coffee.  Mongolia shelters tiny ponies and gives camel rides.  Thailand has snake shows, tiger temples, and elephant preserves. 

And while Cambodia's contributions in this category are perhaps slightly B-list, they've got a couple of interesting ideas.  In the pro category, Dr. Fish massage is on every corner.  Open tanks where for $2 fish will nibble the dead skin off of your feet for 30 minutes.  It tickled, it worked, and it was mesmerizing.

Less appealing was this restaurant enclosed in netting.  The claim was that thousands of butterflies had been captured for the diners' viewing pleasure and would be flying overhead.  Given the swarming and prevalent insects in malaria-ridden Cambodia, the last thing we were up for was a night swatting away their slightly prettier cousins.   You've got to hand them points for creativity though. 

Things I've mistaken for other things...

Its been quite a while since we were in an English speaking country.  While SE Asia is WAY easier to navigate than, say, China we still stumble through conversations daily.  And when it comes to non-English menus or labels, fuggetit.  The Thai language looks like a continuous Henna tattoo and may as well be for its practical use to us.

Throughout our trip, though, we've happily delved in to the unknown.  Matching up Chinese characters from a phrasebook to a toilet sign so I didn't accidentally use the men's room, pantomiming the flapping wings of a chicken for a Mongolian nomad so as to avoid eating mutton, demonstrating the size and shape and corresponding facial expression of so many things that I like/use/eat/need, to varying effect.  And thus, strictly for laughs, I list for you my most spectacular errors.

We thought that both of last 2 tubes of toothpaste we bought were mint.  Perhaps spear, perhaps winto, we weren't picky.  The one from Japan was grapefruit flavored and the new tube from Cambodia tastes like salt and Lipton tea.

I bought a pastry in Shenyang, China that I thought had a sweet apple filling but was, infact, curried ground beef.

I chose a scoop of ice cream in Korea believing it was green tea flavored - it was actually melon.  And so gross.

There were probably about 15 meat-based dishes we ordered during our month in China thinking they were chicken or pork, based on photos.  They were all stir-fried tongue.  Ed did not go hungry those nights.


Craving potato chips at the beach, I cheaped out and bought a Thai brand that looked like sour cream & onion; actually nori seaweed flavored.  But tasted like dead fish.  With ridges.  Of the flavors that were listed in English and passed over: prawn and chicken stew, barbequed pork bun, and chili crab hotpot (they can get that on a chip!).

We ordered a fish and a pork dish at dinner one night in Mui Ne.  A slab of dry, herb crusted protein arrived and I concluded it was the pork.  It was tough and flavorless so we covered it in fish sauce and buried it in vermicelli.  Only when the bill arrived did we learn that the pork was left off and that the meat was, indeed, our fish entree.

In Seoul, I bought a pack of gum that I thought was spearmint but was green apple flavored.  It tasted like the apple-flouride flavor from childhood dental checkups.

If I had a dollar for every time I've mistaken red bean paste for chocolate, I could buy a truckload of red bean paste.  Which I'd have to throw away just like all the other not-actually-chocolate things I've chosen.  I could extrapolate that I should stop trying to eat chocolate.  But its almost Christmas and that would make Santa sad.

I'd like to say that I've made some special discoveries through my mistakes but mostly I was just startled.  And then confused.  And then, probably, wishing I could spit.  If only I could learn to love sweet red beans....

Don't fear the Reap(er)

After spending a few weeks in Vietnam, we were ready to leave the challenges of the developing world behind.  But, conscientious travelers that we are, we figured we'd flog ourselves later if we skipped a visit to the Angkor temples in Cambodia.  We put off going for as long as we could, imagining a seedier, poorer, harder version of Vietnam.  Geographically, it didn't make sense to fly over Cambodia to get back to Thailand without stopping, so this past week we finally took our medicine.

And that medicine tasted like bubble gum!  Siem Reap was, quite literally, made for tourists.  The city is 100% manufactured for the benefit of Westerners and immediately beyond the town limits on all sides is regular old Cambodian poverty.  But within the high-rollers confines it is one of the easiest, most comfortable places we've been on this trip.  Our tuk tuk driver was Mr. Goodvibes, our hotel was spotless, there were endless respectable coffee shops, and everyone we encountered spoke English.  We ended up being there for about a week and got so relaxed we easily could have stayed longer.  The $6/hr in-room Khmer massages didn't make the exit any easier.

The Cambodian people have it rough but, overall, are a gentle bunch.  The tiny children constantly hocking trinkets around the temples made us sad, but a lot of the kids were incredibly funny and charming and in their distracted moments reverted to being silly, playful tots.  At one point a little girl was giving Ed the hard sell on her basket of crap.  It went like this:

Girl: Sir, how about some bracelets for $2?
Ed: No, thanks
Girl: How about some postcards for $2?
Ed: No, nothing.
Girl: Okay, you can give me $2 for nothing then.

And then, like all 5-year-olds, she completely cracked up at her own joke.  And so did Ed.


Lara Crofting it up in the temples was the best.  The park is at the turning point where the government has figured out that this thing is a legit money maker, but hasn't yet started to restrict access to it.  We climbed on  the thousand year old ruins like kids on a jungle gym.  We got dirty and our quads hurt and Ed took approximately one bazillion photos.  We spent 3 full days exploring temple ruins and probably could have done 3 more.  We also took in an abysmal cello concert, visited a depressing landmine museum, and shopped in the massive local market.  One of the most fascinating and worthwhile weeks we've spent. 

For those who may not find themselves in Cambodia in the near future, we watched an excellent documentary while eating lunch in a roadside shack.  Dirt floors and a DVD player, obvs.  It was called "Mysteries of Asia: Jewel in the Jungle," produced by TLC.  Great footage of several of the temples and way more information about their history than we got anywhere else. 

Cambodia was the first place we've been in a while that bowled us over.  We've returned to the childlike wonder perspective on travel, which we had lost in Vietnam.  Its good to be back, and fitting given its almost Christmas!