The end of Bali

Some things I forgot to mention in my previous Bali blog about why I like it so much:

- Instead of believing that gods are simply good, they have good and evil gods and strive to achieve a level of harmony. They accept that you cannot have joy without sorrow and acknowledge that many things in life aren't black and white but a balance between the two. It seems so optimistic to me to embrace even the negative aspects of your day-to-day life.
- The bike ride I went on was ALL downhill. I literally just sat on a bike for an afternoon and rode downhill. Maybe it doesn't qualify as exercise, but it definitely qualifies as awesome.
- Our cab drivers were consistently super nice and interesting and remarkably well self-educated (except for the guy who asked us if black people's hair grew in dreadlocks).

So, now that I'm back at my grandpa's house in Chiang Mai and reunited with my laptop, I was able to upload the video I took on our trip. Here are some Balinese highlights:

More Travels

Courtney and I went out to Koh Phi Phi from Phuket (where they filmed "The Beach"), in search of semi-deserted beaches. Unfortunately, Phi Phi was completely overrun with filthy backpackers, but it ended up working out in our favor because we were there for Canada Day and spent most of the evening drinking with really excited Canadians. Then, we wandered over to a beach-front bar where we met some boys from South Carolina, played pool with them, and danced on the beach at this really fun bar. One of them was a Cotillian (sp?) dancer and knew how to do all these crazy spins and dips. Lots of fun.

A few days ago, we left Thailand and are now in Bali, which is AMAZING. Arguably my favorite vacation spot ever. The food is amazing and the people are so adorable. Today, we went on a bike ride through the country-side and all these small children ran into the street to say Hello and high-five us as we rode by. It's currently a festival week here ("good-beats-evil day"), and people are making these giant bamboo poles with flowers and leaves all over them and it's beautiful. Two nights ago we went and saw a Kechak dance (featured in "Baraka"), which was unreal. I'm doing a terrible job of describing all things Balinese, so I'm going to stop there. We have tons of photos and videos, which I'll post once we get back to Thailand to my computer. I miss all you Americans and hope you had a wonderful 4th of July.

Some Island Action

Courtney and I spent three days in Bangkok, saw lots of temples (I got yelled at for showing my calves while a bunch of girls in miniskirts pranced by the guards sans problem), ate lots of street food, met some drunk Brits, and then hopped on a plane down to southern Thailand to enjoy beaches.

We spent a night in Koh Samui, then took the ferry to Koh Pha-ngan to make the half moon party: a huge rave scene with lots of people on ecstasy (undoubtedly my least favorite demographic). Watching ravers I feel like the world is DEFINITELY going to end in 2012, I can't believe that music has devolved to just basic repetitive sounds and beats and that members of our generation spend as much money as they do getting to these places to see these mediocre DJs "spin." Anyway, it was interesting to see - not what I would have predicted on a remote island in the gulf of Thailand.

Before the half moon party, we met a couple kiwis at a free pool bar (from Blenheim - small world) which was lots of fun. One of them gave us a ride on his Vespa to the half moon party, which entailed lots of taxi chasing to figure out where this party even was. The Vespa ride was fun, though, and inspired us to rent our own Vespa the following day. The Thai man in charge of "mortorbike" rentals seemed concerned with our driving skills but we figured it out quickly enough (after failing to turn a few times an ending up briefly off-roading through the jungle). We spent the next couple days exploring beaches, snorkling (lots of disgusting sea cucumbers and some really pretty fish), and eating more Thai food.

Yesterday, we took a fishing boat to a more private part of the island (saw lots of honeymooners) to read and nap in hammocks on the beach. It rained for about 30 seconds at one point but we were protected enough by our tree from which our hammocks were hanging to stay completely dry. It's been incredibly relaxing all-around.

Today we're headed back to Koh Samui to meet up with Courtney's parents who are also vacationing in Thailand. Hopefully, updates to come soon, photos to come in a few weeks (no means of uploading at the moment). I'm definitely enjoying vacation and still can't believe that I'm going to be back in the states within the month...