The Bug and Bathroom Experience

The Gibbon Experience was many things. Sweeping views of the rain forest that seemed never ending. Lightening storms that turned the whole world purple. Zip lines that stretched for miles 25 feet over the canopy. A hike that was by no means the easy hour that was promised. (Proving that, the world over, from Horst Klemm to the average Laotion villager, hikers are all evil lying scum). Winds so fierce that we twice had to evacuate -- zip lining blind out into the pitch black night and dodging falling tree limbs in a mad dash through the jungle. But as I sit down to recount our story of playing George of the Jungle for 2 days nothing comes alive on the paper save the stories of giant insects and questionable trips to the toilet. So here you will find no gibbons (we didn't find any in the jungle either, though we woke each morning to their ambulance-like singing) for which I am sorry but my muses lead me only towards potty humor (at least I'm not the only one -- see here for one of our treehouse-mates more poetic account of his own adventures in the jungle loo).

I have never been able to sleep through the night. No matter how tired I am, no matter how many drinks I refuse after 9pm, I will invariably wake up in the wee hours having to wee. When my bladder rudely interrupted the dream I was having about a ring that played music, the jungle world was pitch black and noisy. Insects buzzed around and threw themselves in fits against the protective sheet hung like armour around the mats and blankets that made up our bed. Something of considerable heft was wiggling around in the palm leaves of the treehouse roof. I did not want to get up and make the long climb down 2 staircases into the open air bathroom where hornets congregated like the toilet was their office water cooler. I squeezed my eyes back closed, I crossed my legs and thought sleepy thoughts. But my bladder would not quiet: "Time to pee, time to pee, TIME TO PEE!" Left with no choice other than getting up or wetting the sheets (which I would have more seriously considered if I didn't think the urine smell would attract even more beasties bed-side) I crawled out of our cocoon and into the night.

I had to turn on my headlamp lest the boogie man get me, or I kill myself on the stairs but each flash of the light was a beacon alerting every bug in the jungle to attack my head. So I'd turn it on, quickly scan the ground for slippery steps, egg-sized beetles and monster paws, then plunge myself back into complete darkness, shuffle forward a few steps and repeat. I eventually reached the bathroom only to live out childhood nightmare #437.

I scanned the room with my headlamp shining it from the curtain that we called a door to the railing that we pretended was a wall and off the edge into the abyss of the jungle beyond. I entered after the all clear (or the mostly clear -- there were moths and other unidentifiable swarming around my head almost immediately but none seemed bigger than a quarter so I hoped that I could take them.). Before hitting the off button on the light and squatting I quickly illuminated the toilet where some leaf or twig was floating around in the bowl. Two or three thin black strands seemed to be reaching up from the depths to curl over the porcelain lip -- certainly animated only by the lapping of the water. Or, perhaps, more certainly a living creature intent on biting my behind. As I stood there with my light aimed into the pot and an army of insect friends installing a velvet rope in front of the dance club that had just opened on my forehead, the leaves or twigs in the toilet quickly came to life. Flicking up out of the water and trying to cling to the rim were at least 3 antenna or legs belonging to either a mutant lobster lost miles and miles from the ocean or a spider the size of my fist.

A brief aside: For a few years when I was in elementary school my family took off the month of April to go camping on the beach in Baja, Mexico. One year when I was 7 or 8 we rolled home from vacation after dark and as we pulled into our driveway my mom joked that we'd been gone so long that the house would be full of cobwebs and that (most hilarious of all) there might even be cobwebs IN THE TOILET! What the fuck was wrong with this woman I'll never know, but I easily made the leap from cobwebs to spiders to my naked butt and have been a little pee-shy ever since. I always check the pot for 8 legged friends before sitting down. I can't quite tell you what awful thing a spider might do to my butt but I'm certain it won't be inviting me into its home for fly wings and lemonade. My white ass descending on the spider's web would certainly be seen as an invasion and the spider would, almost understandably, retaliate in whatever way a spider can.

Back to the treehouse. Thank god I had the paranoid good sense to check the toilet for arachnids but now that this nightmare had come true I certainly couldn't pee. And, according to my bladder, I certainly couldn't *not* pee. An impasse. But worry not! Your quick thinking intrepid heroine had a bucket and a plan. I stuck the flush bucket under the facet of the sink filling it to brimming while keeping my eye on Daddy Super Long Legs over there and then bravely leaned towards the pot and dumped all of the water, then filled the bucket a second time and doused again. The toilet had a hose that snaked its way 50 feet from the treehouse platform down into the jungle floor and I figured that if I could wash the spider at least to ground level and then pee as quickly as possible he couldn't climb back up the hose fast enough to launch a counter attack. The plan was executed perfectly and my still spider bite free toucas scurried back up the steps and practically dove into bed. Pulling the blankets tightly around my neck I lay my head back down and again listened to the chirp, rattle, peep of the forest -- this time with the assurance that I was safe in my own burrow until morning.

At dawn, after an unsuccessful Gibbon tracking hike through a jungle filled with mist and a breakfast experiment of tomato omelet and sticky rice (marginally successful), I sat perched on the edge of our treehouse with a mug of bitter over-steeped tea. My gazing out over the canopy was interrupted by a tickling on my right foot which I reached down to scratch as I slowly pulled my gaze from the distracting beauty of the forest -- so my eyes and my fingers met their nightmare together. Perched on the arch of my foot just right of center where my white flip flop tan line extends over the top of a juicy green vein a blob of gray snot the size of a lima bean was perched. Oh, but it was worse then it sounds because even more terrifying than the thought that someone had shot a huge booger onto my foot was the reality that a leech was clamped into my bloodline sucking away. My mug of tea crashed onto the floor and of course I screamed as I performed the most violent hokey pokey with my foot, managing to successfully dislodge Nature's Vampire. A river of bright red blood poured from my vein as Geoff and my treemates danced around me looking for the evil leech and eventually forcing his blood fattened body through a seam between two of the floorboards. For the duration of our trip I couldn't walk more than 25 feet without pausing for a thorough leach check.

Night two in the jungle and again I'm awakened by the call of nature (and also, again, surrounded by the many calls of actual nature). This is surprising as we spent day two hiking up hills that no human should ascend and zipping across the jungle at speeds previously known only to gibbons and NASCAR drivers. I admired brown and white butterflies too big for jam jars proving that not all gigantic insects are evil. I should be too tired to pee. As I lie in bed, willing my bladder to shut the fuck up I could only think that last night's midnight jaunt into hell's bathroom was horribly dangerous and ill advised. The number of ways I could have died (not to mention accidentally eaten a bug) were myriad. Never mind the aquatic spider attack -- I could have stepped on a poisonous snake, I could have been attacked by Rodents of Unusual Size, I could have startled by a moth, slipped on a damp board and fell over the side of the treehouse! I cursed my bladder over and over again but as usual mentally willing oneself to an empty bladder was wholly ineffective. I cannot blame PMS or mommy brain or any of the other easy excuses for the following embarrassing situation -- perhaps it was the bit of sleep still clinging to my mind but most likely I'm just a much much bigger baby then I'd like to admit. As I sat up in our bed mulling over my options (1. Use the cup we brought up to brush our teeth as a makeshift upstairs toilet, 2. Get up, make it half way down the stairs, be attacked by some unknown creature and die, 3. Will myself not to pee and eventually lose control and turn our boudoir into a makeshift diaper) I began... to cry. I KNOW. At this Geoff woke up and was thankfully too annoyed to actively mock me. I couldn't will myself to rise and face the haunted treehouse alone and so eventually Geoff was forced to slip onto his white horse and escort his princess to the loo. Oh romance, will you ever die?

So, again, I lived. Despite the obvious threat of death I cannot recommend The Gibbon Experience enough. I have never felt smaller, or more alone that I did huddled in the copula of the treehouse surrounded by creepy crawlies and trees the size of skyscrapers. I have never felt adrenaline pump through my veins or stared in awe as acutely as I did soaring between treehouses on a metal cable high above the jungle. I have never known love as big as a man willing to rise from bed, brave a world of dangerous beasties and escort me to the potty.

(more stunning pictures here)

If You're not Soaking Wet, You're Full of Sin

One of the few specific plans made before leaving the USA was to attend the Thai New Year festival in Chiang Mai. For Songkran people traditionally visit family, visit the Buddha, and ask for blessings; in actuality they spend most of the holiday week pouring buckets of water over the heads of westerners and (despite the many "Alcohol Free Festival!" signs threatening jail time) drinking. I'm not usually a big party in the streets kind of girl but I *AM* a water fight kind of girl. The ritual shower is supposed to remove all bad karma and after 3 days of soaking wet shorts and prune-y palms, my soul must be spotless for the first time since baptism.

The festival is technically only 3 days long but the water seems to start flowing in Chiang Rai and Chiang Mai at least 3 days early, presumably so the natives could warm up their bucket throwing arm for challenging maneuvers like the "hooking water into the back of a passing pickup truck" or the "dousing to the face of a speeding motorbike driver." By the festival's official start on Monday everyone seemed to be in good form.

We arrived in Chiang Mai via a tuktuk that slowed to honk at each gaggle of Thai teens as if to say "Hey guys, Whities in the back! Get out the garden hose!" Our wet ride ended at the main gate into the old city of Chiang Mai leaving us to walk the water gauntlet to our guesthouse with our packs on our backs. Surprisingly, no one splashed us -- we must have oozed too much pathos.

On our first full day in town we decided to walk the around the entire Chiang Mai moat, which is lined on both sides with battalions of armed revelers. Starting near our guesthouse we picked up a couple of mini super soakers (so maybe just soakers?) to defend ourselves. Getting doused only really hurts for the first few bucketfulls -- after that, wet is wet and you can get no wetter. You can, however, get colder. The most ruthless hooligans fill their buckets with ice water so despite the 100 degree heat I believe I have frost bite of the backside. I also did spot one 5 year old ragamuffin perched against a tree, pants down, peeing in his bucket -- a scary prospect that I decided to believe was isolated strictly to this specific little devil.

Throwing buckets of water on girls is clearly the main form of flirting in Thailand. If you like a girl you go down to the river and fill a colorful plastic bucket with murky water and then use all of your upper body strength to propel a 90mph flying puddle in the direction of your crush's ass. My own ass has been blessed so many times that certainly it has no sin left on it and I may be married to 5 or 12 Thai men, it's hard to keep track.

It's difficult to articulate the insanity of this event, and it's hardly captured on film -- we would have better pictures but the streets seemed like a camera deathwish. I walked whole blocks completely blind, taking bucket after bucket to the face. Traffic stands still, the road begins to blend with the river, there's dancing and screaming girls and stand after stand of steamed buns, grilled corn, fried sausages and Chang beer. The lady boys come out in full makeup and heels soaking wet and looking more fabulous then the driest beauty queen. The festival really is embraced by all -- if only because there is no chance of going anywhere in town without your head being introduced to a waterfall. Even the Midwestern Mormon missionaries got involved, standing on the edge of the river in their dress shirt and tie bailing water onto the heads of Buddhists and probably calling it a Baptism. Most. Successful. Mission. EVER! It's loud and chaotic but all in good fun -- I don't think I looked up from a single dousing to see anything other than a grinning face.

There is one ugly side of Songkran: White on white crime. While the Thais are all about soaking with a smile, the trudge through backpacker-ville is a more violent affair. More high propulsion water guns, fewer buckets. More evil cackles, fewer slightly self conscious giggles. It might just be western culture -- Geoff and I joked that should this festival ever cross the globe and resurface in the USA it would take exactly 2 hours before someone (probably my brother) had hooked up a diesel engine to a hose and went all Water Festival X-Games. It might also be that I can hardly blame the locals for relishing in an opportunity for just a little payback against the tourists that seem to own many of their streets for the rest of the year. But what excuse do the whities have for pointing a stream of ice cold right in my eye?

This obviously is not how things have always been. Back in the day the water was sprinkled lightly from a little silver bowl. There were no water guns, no break dancing in the street, no pickup trucks full of kids. I'm sure many a Thai grandma can't stop complaining about how the kids have taken the Buddha out of Songkran. But isn't this the same Buddah who adores alters full of beer and oreos? The same Buddha who ate so many servings of curry that his belly overflows his loin cloth? I can't imagine he'd be completely opposed to the revelry. But I'm an atheist, you can't go by me.

50 Ways to Die in 'Nam

Shortly before we left on our South East Asia Adventure my dad remarked that it was difficult for him to relate to our plans since he "spent most of my 20s trying to avoid an all expense paid trip to South East Asia." Dad was afraid of meeting his maker in Vietnam and that's understandable because even without a war raging this country is a danger zone. I know that I have, perhaps, a lower bar than most for declaring my eminent demise (see: here, here...) but in just 2 days on Cat Ba island I almost died 10-400 times.

(to the tune of 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover)

The problem can't be just inside my head, you must agree

This place is cursed as you will quickly see

You should stop reading now if you are my mom

There must be fifty ways to die in 'Nam

Cat Ba is located in northern Vietnam at the south end of Halong Bay. We visited in the lowest of low season when the bay was misty and the water cold and the hotel rooms with a balcony facing the sea were only $6 (which got you not only a bed and a shower but, inexplicitly, also a huge poster of a naked lady!). Most of our first full day in town was spent cruising around Halong Bay oohing and awwing at the limestone islands, and while I'm sure we could have fallen overboard and drown (esp after the lunch time beers) all felt fairly safe until we arrived at our last stop on Monkey Island.

When we wondered off of the boat and there were 5 primates on the beach surrounded by 10 or so people from another tour. The monkeys were rolling around in the sand and scurrying about which was 100% cute until we discovered that someone had given the smallest monkey some beer, then suddenly it was 90% sad and only about 10% hilarious. It soon became 30% sad, 5% hilarious and 65% life threatening when two monkeys suddenly charged Geoff grabbing him around the ankles and baring their teeth as he tried to kick them off while running towards the surf... Avoid the drunk primate, Kate...Thankfully, the monkeys seemed adverse to swimming in the chilly water (or maybe they just smartly wanted to avoid the beach ball sized jellyfish that patrol the bay... Don't get stung by a jelly, Kelly).

We started out our second day on Cat Ba island with bike rentals -- the national park where they keep the supposedly adorable ginger haired langers was only 12 or 18 kilometers away (depending on your source) which (mostly because I forgot how to convert miles to kilometers) sort of sounding like a distance that I could bike. Barely out of town my bike started making a weird clicking noise which was the perfect excuse to dismount and walk up the first punishing cliff... Could be a heart attack, Jack... The hills did not quit, 6% grade, 9%... and I was reduced over and over again walking the bike. Thank god Geoff and the new friends we had hooked up with were also huge wimps because if I'd had to watch Lance Armstrong breeze up and down the hills urging me to live strong I'd probably be rotting in a Vietnamese prison finding out if communists are pro death penalty (You could get the chair, Blair).

The national park is lush and misty and the steps up the hillside are covered in a slick coating of mud... Try not to slip and fall, Paul...It would be beautiful if I could spare any time from my "oh god the bees are going to eat me" dance. I have never been stung by a bee due primarily to a strict implementation of the brilliant "when you see a be run away" plan. But I can't run up or down or into the forest without risking a slip slide off of the mountain top so instead I stomp my feet and spin around and say things like "Oh god Geoff! They're coming for me!" Our new friends totally thought I was the coolest girl ever. As I gingerly climb hill number 4027 which involves a rusted out ladder precariously balanced over a sea of jagged boulders a pair of Aussie girls are descending. They mention that the top is not far off, that the view is fabulous and that, golly gee, the bees are in no way swarming like everyone said they would be. OH. MY. GOD...Just avoid the bee swarm, Norm...

The top of the mountain is indeed breathtaking and capped with a rickety set of stairs climbing even higher into the atmosphere. The copula at the tippy top is all cracked boards and rusted metal but my god the view was somehow enough to distract me from peeing my pants (but not enough to keep the "I am about to fall through the floor and into the forest" look out of my pictures.). ... Don't fall to your death, Beth....

Down we climb. Back to the bikes and a new route that the park ranger swears is all flat and easy. Liar Liar Liar. The buses squeak by us forcing me to hug my bike up against the edge of each limestone cliff... Don't get run over, Grover... My legs, oh my legs. I start to wonder what will happen if I physically cannot continue to propel my body over the hills. Will I sleep here on the gravel? Will one of these large construction trucks pick me up? Will Geoff be able to carry me and my bike on his back while peddling?

Somehow I make it back to town sore but alive and after much beer drinking and a $3 massage I head to bed hopeful that my aching muscles won't render me paralyzed come morning.

If I'm lucky I won't die in my sleep tonight

And I hope in the morning my legs will work alright

And then I passed out and I thought, as usual I was right

There must be fifty ways to die in 'Nam

Fifty ways to die in 'Nam

Cinderella Goes to Vietnam

Like all women, I sort of believe that if I could just find the right dress the boy would fall in love with me, I'd be crowned queen, and everyone I went to junior high with would be forced to sign an affidavit affirming that, despite what they may have said in 1991, I am actually very very cute. So when I found out that in Vietnam custom tailored clothing was as pleantiful as noodles in my soup, as four year old girls selling ugly soviener fans, as plastic bags floating like sad jellyfish in the Mekong River, I was thrilled for 30 seconds before I became terrified. What no one ever tells Cinderella is that no amount of tulle will make her thighs smaller. And Cindy is never expected to design her own dress -- the birds do all of the hard work!

Of course, I arrived in Hoi An with a plan. While I'd googled my netbook to death looking for advice on tailors and fantasized for weeks about the outfits I'd create what I actually really needed was a new suit. I figured the most practical thing to do was to have something made at a couple of different tailors and pick the one I liked best to help me suit up. Hoi An has (for once I am not exagerating) over 200 tailor shops and they mostly seem like duplicates of each other with the same double breasted jackets, flowy sundresses and business trousers hanging in the entry way. There are a couple of higher end places that are working harder than most to cater to Western tastes with uniformed staff and free bottles of water. This forced me to struggle over the battle of best price vs. possibly better quality. The fancy pants store was charging $45 for a pair of fancy pants and $15-$50 for a dress shirt -- basically JCrew sale prices. The smaller shop with just the owner hanging around in jeans to serve you charged $25 for trousers and $10 for shirts -- not quite yard sale cheap but a reasonable improvement. Ordering pants and shirts was fairly simple -- I started with what they had hanging in the windows and modified to match the vision of the Bannana Republic Martin Fit pants that make my thighs seem less thunderous than usual. Happily, save the very cute custom tag and buttons, the cheapie prototype pants are just as good as the fancies and I place my order for pinstripes at $75 cheaper than expected.

It's after the practical shopping is done that things fall apart. This shopping is fun and I love clothing; so why not get some dresses? Some shirts? Some casual tops? Do I need a sequined formal gown with a mile long train? Cause they have those! ROYAL BALL HERE I COME! I suppose I didn't really need anything other than a suit, but the thing is -- I have not been shopping in over 2 months. This is probably the longest I've gone without a new shirt since high school when the mall was a 4 hour drive. Add to this the fact that I have worn the same shoes everyday since February 8th. Add to that the fact that in Vietnam I am a millionaire and you have the recipe for my new wardrobe.

If only I had even a smidge of Project Runway in my DNA (or magical little birdies in my hotel room) things might have been easier. But instead I stand in front of bolts of beautiful fabric completely perplexed. How can I look at 65 pages of dreams and dollars and diagrams and see a technological wonder but be unable to translate yards of silk into anything more complicated than a table cloth?

Fashion is too much like dancing. One minute you're smiling at the mirror or in the arms of the prince shaking whatever you've decided might be your groove thing; the next you're wondering -- Why are my hands in the air? Why does this neckline have five layers of ruffles? Why has my foot been taken over by epyleptic seizers? Why does this dress have a huge bow over my butt? When you think things through you start to worry that you look ridiculous. And you DO! We all look ridiculous constantly -- the only reasonable outfit is brown sweats and a baggy tshirt but nobody (save the occasional C# programmer) would ever actually wear such a thing.

As I try to design casual seperates the thoughts that fly through my head are suddenly imbicile -- "I LIKE DRESSES!" "RED IS A NICE COLOR!" There are a lot of red dresses in the world and the tailor wants more from me than "can you make me look pretty?" What I would have given for one of the hundreds of JCrew catalouges that are right now overflowing the basket where my neighbor is trying desperately to stuff all of my mail. As I try to mentally construct a dress that is pretty but interesting, unique but likely to look good on my bottom heavy hourglass the tailor hovers over me. "They are very nice here," she says, holding a tape measure around my boobs. She is the third Hoi An tailor to comment on my very western breasts which almost makes up for the free flowing comments about how enormous my thighs. With all the pressure to make myself into Cinderella and no Fairy Godmother in sight I'll take whatever compliments I can get.

Despite the trepidation over fashion design I still get completely out of control.

For roughly $325 I bought:

• 2 pairs of dress pants
• 1 3 piece suit
• 3 button down shirts
• 4 dresses
• 2 pairs of shoes

The speed that the tailors in this town work is a project management dream. An order for a suit placed at 7pm results in a fitting at 3pm the next day. I'm starting to doubt The Mythical Man Month -- if you need a baby in 4 weeks you should at least look into getting 9 Vietnamease tailors to attempt to put one together (but beware, rush order will incure additional fees and at the last minute they may have to substitute a polyester blend for actual fingernails).

The tailors custom fit each piece of clothing at least twice which is great except that they want you to have an educated opinion on things like fit and cut and how to fix them. This is hard for someone whose fashion vocabulary is as limited as my own. The moment of terror arrived when I'm standing in front of a mirror thinking "RED ALERT! The prince will never ask me to dance in this!" but have no ability to explain the problem. The tailor made exactly what was designed by Klemm Concepts, a sort of awkward shirt that despite its bright yellow polkadots manages to scream 54 year old woman who became a grandma much too early in life. How to translate such a problem into something a seamstress can act on seems impossible so I'm left hoping someone at the factory has a wand and a spare can of Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo.

The second dress I pick up is a jersey number that I figure will make a good beach cover up for our last couple of weeks in Thailand and a decent brunch outfit for summer 2010 once we return to mimosas in Park Slope. After two fittings I take it home only to find that when I shake and shimmy my ample bosoms my bra peeks out the top. Geoff thinks this is no problem but you can't go by him -- he's constantly trying to convience me that a bra alone is evening wear and if you'd like a sweeping view of Crackville you can stop by his ass anytime. But the lesson learned is that I need to figure out what I want and how to vocalize it before I take anything else out of the shop. So, despite fears that the tailor will hate me and that I don't actually know what I'm talking about anyway I muster up the courage to have sleeves redone, waistlines moved and jackets lined in electric blue.

And I look good! I can't promise that I'll be queen by July (the clothing has been shipped by sea and will not ride the tide into Brooklyn until sometime in June) but I'm at least hoping to retain the prince that I've got (who had some new shorts designed and for now is crackville free) and return to the real world looking like the prettiest thing in the boardroom and if anyone from Home Street Middle School wants to eat some crow, please, drop me and email. Cinderella never had to design her own ball gowns or find her own glass slipper, or figure out why the website has been down since 3am. Cinderella never wore pinstripes. Maybe I could teach her a thing or two.

Adventures in Boarder Crossing

A terrible thing happened about a week ago in Siem Reap, Cambodia to an anonymous Cambodian motorbike driver who had the incredible misfortune to put head to pavement at an intersection just out of town. A much much less terrible thing happened to me on the same day when I had the misfortune to be in a tuktuk driving by the scene of the accident to see his lifeless body -- his neck squashed down as if his shoulders had tried to cram themselves inside of his head, a stream of urine trickling into the gutter. His girlfriend sobbing at the side of the road, the ambulance finally speeding by us a good 20 minutes later. So it is with this incident in mind that I assure all concerned parties (my mom, Geoff's mom, etc) that my healthy fear of motorbikes has only grown healthier and that truly we are trying to avoid them at all costs but it would be impossible for me to overstate how difficult this is. We always look for taxis, buses and buffalo rides, we always consider walking but all too often we find our behinds precariously perched on the back of a speeding bike. This is exactly how I traveled across the border into Vietnam, my backpack held between the drivers' legs, my head stuffed into a Winnie the Pooh helmet meant for a 7 year old girl, my mind trying to stave off images of the ghost of the dead moto driver with Geoff's face as I watch the sweaty back of his tshirt speed off ahead of me.

Motorbikes were not part of our tenuous plan.

We knew that from Sihanoukville, Cambodia we wanted to move on to Vietnam but we didn't want to go straight to Ho Chi Minh City which posed a problem when it came to bus schedules -- everything goes straight to Ho Chi Minh skipping the entire Mekong Delta. Our only other option seemed to be a $40 taxi to the border. We figured that once across the border there must be services -- taxis, buses, Vietnamese coffee falling like rain -- so off we went.

Cambodia doesn't seem to have traffic laws. Or if they do, they are as follows:

1. Pedestrians yield to bikes, which yield to motorbikes, which yield to tuktuks. which yield to cars, which yield to trucks and buses. Buffalos yield to no man.
2. When in doubt honk your horn A LOT. This applies to passing, driving on the wrong side of the road, saying hi to your buddy and letting everyone know that you are driving somewhere in a very very big hurry.

So I spend the 3 hour taxi ride clinging to the door handle and trying not to scream out that we're about to die. We live. And there it is, the border, I guess. Proceeded by about 50kms of dirt road and seemingly the only building within another 50kms is a cinder block affair locked between two railroad gates, in the distance beyond gate number two is a small guard post and... that's it, not exactly official looking. We are immediately accosted by a couple of motorcycle guys offering to drive us across the border and into the town 15kms away. There may have also been a few cows milling about in the dust but there were no taxis. I don't think Vietnam allows livestock powered border crossing, no matter how backwoods this whole process seemed.

I had dressed that morning prepared for a day of sitting and, anticipating a need for a cool breeze in the nether regions, slipped on a short green cargo skirt. Straddling the back of a moto my first greeting for Vietnam was all class, "Hello! Thank you for having me in your beautiful country, please check out my crotch! How about those under-roos, huh? Just one of the many ways that I plan to honor you during the coming weeks, don't thank me now (thank me next week when I've run out of clean panties and you get a real show)."

The town we end up in is only slightly more impressive than the border. We're deposited outside of an open market with no taxi's, buses or tuktuks in sight. We are not alone. Appearing almost out of the ether is a tall thin man with teeth edged in black rot. He wants to help us. Because this town? It has no buses. It has no taxis. It hardly has guesthouses. And he has family in the USA and he would very much like to take us to the next town to catch the bus to... somewhere else. This is a predicament because we have no real idea where we are and almost no desire to stay but on the other hand this whole schpeel feel like a scam. Because -- if you don't take the bus in 30 minutes? There are no more buses for 3 days. No, he has no idea how much the bus costs, yes he'd love to drive us to an ATM, no he would never lie, yes he runs a travel agency. So after much hemming and hawing and pointing out to a certain boyfriend that in the future we really need to do more than just show up at the border with a smile we decide to take the bus because the other options seem limited and because the Lonely Planet makes the town the bus is going to, Can Tho, sound like a paradise on the Mehkong. There is only one way to get to the bus stop -- can you guess?

My driver is texting while we merge onto the highway. My new helmet (sans the protective visage of Winnie) is way too big and with ever bump it bounces up and back down smacking me on the head as punishment for not just going to Ho Chi Min City with all of the other whiteies. When we get to the bus stop and the bus finally arrives we're quoted a price of $30 each -- sounds OK right? Well it's actually insane. The absolute most we have paid for any bus to anywhere in South East Asia is $12. But.... what are you gonna do, camp out at this road side stand posing as a bus stop? Take a third moto ride back into nowheresville? Accept that you're getting scammed, pay the money and chalk it up to adventure? Here we go.

So, on to the bus -- the very, very expensive bus. Other, cheaper, buses in South East Asia have had A/C, free bottles of water, karaoke, one even gave us each a tiny box of pastries! This bus... has seats with metal rods sticking out of the sides, it has a door that does not close, it has a rickety shelf that threatens to dislodge and topple on my head somewhere about 700 miles from the nearest ER. Can Tho, is 6 hours away. I had a small fruit salad at 8am, it is now 2pm and as if to taunt me fate drives us pass row after row of road side stands screaming "Bahn Mi!" "Bao!" "Other obviously delicious thing that I've never heard of because Bahn Mi and Bau are the only Vietnamese words that I know!" My tummy growls.

The bus is slow and seems to lack any sort of suspension system and it stops every 15 feet for just long enough to be annoying but nowhere near long enough to jump out and grab a sandwich. But it gets us there... or it gets us somewhere. Suddenly, 3 hours into the trip, a woman in the front of the bus hustles Geoff and I out onto the street and into a pedi-bike built for 2, well, 2 Vietnamese with asses much smaller than ours. We managed to squeeze onto the contraption with Geoff perched up on the back edge of the seat for a quick bike ride through traffic. Where were we going? How long would it take? Do they have Bahn Mi there? Because I am starving. We arrive at a seemingly random stretch of road next to a red minibus which is next to a road stand sign where they clearly have sandwiches and might even have Cokes, praise Buddah.

With my first Bahn Mi swimming around in my tummy, at least another 45 minutes of waiting by the side of the road and another bus ride of indeterminate length in my future it was time to answer the painful call of nature. I asked our minibus host to point to the closest lady's room and was directed to a shack just off the road. This was clearly the home of the woman lounging in a hammock in the front room so out of respect I slipped my shoes off before entering and followed her outstretched finger down the one hallway which ended in what, I guess, had to be the bathroom. The light in the room was dim but in one corner I could make out a huge trough full of water with a small bucket floating inside which I recognized as the water for toilet flushing, next to that was a medium bucket half full of water and clothing... there was clearly no toilet. I peeked out around the corner to confirm that the two room shack did not have a white linoleum room with a Glade plug in and a roll of double quilted Charmin hidden just around the corner. Nope. OK, so, no toilet, time to man up and look for the hole that must be somewhere on the floor. I stooped over a bit in the half light scanning the concrete for a darker than average patch with no luck. But... the floor did seem a bit slanted and the walls didn't extend all of the way down, about 8 feet below me I could just glimpse wet leaf litter on the ground. It occurred to me that maybe I was just supposed to pee on the floor. But what if I was wrong? What if I started peeing on the floor and the lady came running in justifiably angry? Also: how do I avoid peeing on my bare feet (which, it now occurs to me, are almost for sure standing in someone else's pee.)? I couldn't muster the courage to go back into the living room and try to pantomime asking the question "Hey? Should I pee on your floor or....?" They say you'll know when you've hit bottom... I pulled back the lingerie-sheer curtain and squatted. I have never peed so quickly. As I walked out of the living room a few minutes later the home owner demanded 5000 dong ($.25) which seemed like a good deal, I'd have charged A LOT more if someone wanted to pee on my floor. And yes, that's me outside of the shack just after doing the deed. Geoff thought we should capture the moment.

Eventually the new bus leaves and we roll through another great swath of lush greenery punctuated by food stands and flying kites as the sun goes down and I think, ok, if we ever get there I think I'll like it here. Rough arrival notwithstanding Vietnam is a huge contrast to Cambodia. The bigger roads have landscaping in the median and all of the cows that we've seen have been on a leash. It seems like a nice place. So when we arrive at the Can Tho bus station I'm not even that troubled when the only transportation option is the third moto ride of the day this time performed with my 14 kilo backpack on my back and my much lighter day pack on my front. If you come to Vietnam forget packing what you can carry, pack only what you can balance on the back of a speeding motorcycle.

Cambodia: Come for the Temples Stay for the Adoption Procedings

To be a good liberal leftie it sometimes seems that you have to love all countries and that you have to especially love all countries that are poor and you have to super especially love all countries where the people had some terrible shit go down (extra super double especially if the US brought that shit down themselves). By this scale Cambodia should be the number one leftie travel destination. The problem is that even bleeding hearts love 500 thread count sheets and electricity and clean sidewalks. Cambodia is pretty rough around the edges. The streets are mostly doubling as garbage dumps, the traffic is chaos, the bugs are huge. When you're traveling, especially when you're traveling for long enough to be called a traveler, you start to feel like you should go see the REAL shit. You know, the stuff mere vacationers never have the time to find, the places that other white people fear to tread. But if you're like me (bourgeois, impatient, really super white) you don't really want to be in the shit. It's always either too depressing or too boring and so you end up on a beach somewhere, looking at the beautiful ocean and wondering if you should have just gone to Florida (You know, if Florida was about 500 times cheaper).

The poverty and the history of the Khmer Rouge make Cambodia a troubling vacation spot. The people are in your face constantly trying to sell you something you don't need for more then it's worth and the history is in your face constantly reminding you that maybe you should buy a plastic change purse for $5. Hell, maybe you should buy 7. The Tuktuk driver who I'm trying to talk down from $3 to $2 for a ride across town is thinking, "Look bitch, your country bombed this place as part of a war with my enemies for 5 years, THEN some asshole from my own country who couldn't even pass college IN FRANCE comes back and just starts killing people because he thinks farming rice should be my greatest joy in life and now I've got drunk white girls all over the place who wanna argue with me over an amount of money that any other day they'd gladly use to buy 1/4 of a cup of coffee." And I can't blame the dude. If I lived through life in Cambodia 25 years ago my ass would STILL be drunk and anytime someone so much as brought up the idea of me and my friends maybe getting jobs and establishing a sanitation department I'd roll my eyes and start with the "When I was your age..." stories. I don't blame him, but I don't have to enjoy paying 3 times the going rate for a ride to the bar.

In Cambodia we have sat on beautiful beaches, seen a tree full to brimming with gigantic fruit bats and eaten a brilliant concoction called bonsong which consists of cold rice noodles, chunks of cucumber, grilled pork, peanuts, a chopped up spring roll and a savory broth. But Cambodia is known for only a few things: Horrible genocide, amazing temple ruins, orphanages and the making of the Tomb Raider movies.

After only 8 days in Cambodia, I can tell you exactly what happened to Angelina Jolie. She shows up decked out in her Lara Croft finery, having just discovered that with enough humidity and enough latex, yes, you can sweat from your boobs. Her hotel doesn't have a full wall between the bedroom and the bathroom, this entire town seems to be sculpted out of wet stinky mud and ain't nobody serving a PB&J, not even if you're making a blockbuster film, not even if you pay $20. She rocks into a local establishment and orders a Cointreau, lime juice and soda because, for some reason, she doesn't know that drowning misery requires much stronger medicine then orange liqueur. (The place names this drink after her and thus dooms all future tourists into paying top dollar for a glass of booze whose alcohol content can't possible be over 3%.) Anyway, she's in a bad mood. But then, out of the 900 degree heat pops a smiling little face, he makes a few jokes, they laugh, he maybe tries to sell her a lanyard, she buys 8. Then, next thing you know, she's back in LA shaving a faux-hawk onto the head of a 3 year old Cambodian boy and talking about raising her own international soccer team.

The kids in Cambodia are adorable. Sure they're always trying to selling you chotskis for inflated prices but they're also smiling and waving and dancing all over the country. The shrieks of "HELLLLOOOOOOO!!!!!" followed by waving so vigorous it could spawn a new aerobics trend, peel from school house windows. The local custom seems to be to dress all boys under the age of 4 in only a tshirt and so I have seen more peen in this country then in 5 years on the NYC dating scene. In one restaurant, the owner's son got his naked butt up on a table and dropped it like it was scorching hot all over the flatware. The next day, on a second visit (how could we say no to a free dinner show?), he emerged from his bath holding a gigantic toy ray gun and stalked his way across the dining room like the naked Cambodia James Bond before being scooped up for fatherly butt swatting.

Our greatest Cambodian child cuteness show took place in Angelina's own stomping grounds just outside of the temples at Angkor Wat. A few nights into our stay (visiting the sights of all of Lara Croft's greatest ass kickings, naturally) we had dinner at the local night market. The owner/waitress had brought us a bunson burner, a makeshift grill, a plate of raw shrimp and squid and her 5 year old child to keep us company. He started off his comedy stylings with a costume composed of toothpicks stuck anywhere they'd stick -- his nose, his hair, his mouth, all were festooned with wooden barbs -- perfect for scaring the white people. I met his growl with a "Grrrr!" of my own and a friendship was born. Next he showed us his muscles, and examined ours, feigning awe. Then he ran out into the street and flagged down a tuktuk driver, he climbed into his carriage and waved and waved as his chauffeur drove him slowly around the block. Then he was back to show us his belly, and demanding to see our bellies, then his chest -- my refusal to respond by flashing by bra received much frowning and pointing but I held my ground and managed to avoid a Cambodian indecent exposure arrest. Next, he demanded to use my Carmex but he obviously wasn't expecting lipgloss with such a kick because as soon as it hit his lips he was spitting on the ground and wailing to his mom about how disgusting this American woman was. By now we were done with dinner and forced to be on our way bidding our new friend adieu with vigorous waves of our own and a 2000 Reil ($.50) tip for his troubles.

So let's say you don't want to adopt a Cambodia kid -- should you still plan a visit? Well, the nice hotel rooms are $25 and so far the beaches are free of full moon parties. The temples put the ruins in Rome to shame and occasionally you can find street vendors selling doughy steamed buns stuffed with everything from minced chicken to cabbage and boiled egg. So, of course, like any Obama-loving secret socialist I'm going to do the good thing and say, "Yes, Come to Cambodia." Be shocked and sad and a little grossed out. Be amused and giggly and awed. And when you're sitting on a street corner in the dustiest town ever next to a river of mud unable to find a cafe clean enough that your lily white butt won't cringe while drinking her coke breath in, apologize to your boyfriend for being a huge baby and figure that this too is part of the experience. And then get yourself on the next bus to the beach.

And really, you can't be sure that you don't want a Cambodian child of your very own until you see them in action. Our little friend from the market wasn't even in an orphanage, in fact his mother was standing 5 feet away so I had to consider more drastic action like telling him I had some candy in a van just down the road. Unfortunately he was more of a Jolly Ranchers fan and I went with Snickers, foiled again.

Cambodia: If You Don't Buy From Me, I Cry

I love kids. I love them so much that if you're under 10 years old and I meet you on the subway in NYC or waiting for the bus in Bangkok I will smile and make funny faces and wave and blow kisses. So kids, if you're wondering who that crazy lady was -- it was me.

I am also not above buying your love. This is why I do not even consider visiting my niece and nephew without presents in hands. I find that children under the age of 5 are very easily bought off so for the price of a latte I can purchase at least 3 kisses and an I love you. Deal. Similarly, I have a long standing rule that I'm buying whatever the kids are selling -- from lemonade to Girl Scout cookies to raffles tickets for a cord of wood -- here's my dollar. In fact, in the case of Girl Scout cookies, here's my wallet.

Cambodia has shot my approach to children straight to hell. The kids are everywhere, waving back at me, saying crazy precocious things in better English than I speak, selling me postcards. And there's the rub. A girl can only buy so many postcards before her $70/day budget is completely blown.

I make the perfect target but despite my nature I've been breaking little hearts all over the country. In Phnom Phen the kids are all selling books. Copies of The Killing Fields pour from laundry baskets carried by 8 year olds at the Khmer restaurants and outside of the national palace and I was personally offered every single copy. Ultimately though, Geoff was the real target. Sitting at dinner on our last night in Phenon Phen he was hit up first by a 14 year old Obama fan (how awesome is it to be proud of our president while abroad? SUPER awesome) who he managed to fend off. Then came an 8 year old dressed in a smart button down shirt, red jams and a pair of pink crocs. He had all of the tactics down. "You, buy a book." "Buy this book, everyone loves it." "I have not read it but all of the tourists think it is great." "Why not? You don't like to read?" "Ok, you eating dinner, I let you eat and then I come back." And to me, "If he does not buy a book you buy a book." Impressive move sir.

And as soon as the last of our Angkor beer, amok and loc lac was deposited in our tummies he was back. "Hello, ok, you done. You buy book now." This finally devolved into a Rock, Paper, Scissors challenge and Geoff cannot resist any opportunity to gamble. So we now own a copy of The Killing Fields ($6) with a very nice cover and inside pages that appear to be photocopied on a machine from 1988. I also bought a set of 12 postcards for $2 because I am a sucker and also because one has a picture of kids and a buffalo and the back says "Children with Buffles" -- No one can resist Buffles, not even a cold hearted snake like myself.

The kid salesman mob at the front of the Angkor Wat temples means business. They swarm you as soon as you exit your tuktuk with cries of "Laaaaadeeeee! You want cold drink?" "You want bracelet?" "Five for 1 dollar!!" The first English phrase learned by all Cambodia children is "No, Thank You." The salesmanship is also bordering on stalking. "I remember you, you come back you buy from me." "You come back you want cold drink, you only buy from me, or else." "You not buy from me I cry." No pressure. Thankfully, these are all idle threats, but as soon as some kid comes through with the tears I will probably lose my resolve, give her all of my money, and catch the next flight back to the job that pays for my food/ragamuffin support fund.

Billy Mays is alive and well in the hearts of Cambodia. "You want wooden flute?" "It has carving!" "But wait there's more! Carving of bird!" "And an all bamboo woven case!" "BUT WAIT!" "All this for ONLY $1!!!!" "You buy flute now!"

Sadly (or for my budget, luckily) the children selling things outside of the temples here have failed miserably in understanding the needs of their customers.

Things Being Sold By Children Outside of Angkor Wat

• A million "silk" scarfs
• Gold painted Buddha figurines
• Pieces of bamboo folded into the shape of a grasshopper
• Photocopies of the Lonely Planet
• Water

Things I Wanted to Buy Outside of Angkor Wat

• A shower
• A battery powered fan
• A huge chunk of ice
• Gatoraid
• A parasol
• Moister wicking underwear
• Water

Those water salesman made a killing.

If I weren't committed to 2 more months of carrying all of my belongs on my back this would be a shoppers paradise. Tshirts for $5, scarves for $1, piles of silk pillow cases for $2. (Aside: Thailand is just as good and in our last few days there in May the spending spree is ON. Place your orders for knock off Calvin Klein panties and generic Viagra ($9/15 pills!!!)). Besides the pack of postcards and a tuktuk full of bottled water I'm purchase free. Good for the budget, but obviously I'll be back in Brooklyn come June lying in Prospect park wishing some toddler would waddle by with bottles of water and a $5 t-shirt covered in engrish.