Bangkok

Bangkok River Ferry










Homes in Bangkok










Gina Gets an After School Treat!













Wat you waiting for?

BANGKOK - KO TAO

Notable items!

BANGKOK

1. Plane to HK: Infant collicky triplets with parents whose idea of calming was to 'serenade' ( - compete in terms of volume - ) with screaming Asian lullabies and nonsense rhymes...I blocked it out with lots of Celine Dion (an idea inspired by the one and only Andrea Henkels).
2. Bangkok = hot and smelly. Our room = balcony door that didn't close. More hot. More smells.
3. We ate a lot of food from markets and street stalls. Fried insects with peanuts and chilis - not so bad...
4. Bangkok is full of swindlers; masterminds of taking tourist money in incredibly convuluted ways. After a death-defying tuk-tuk ride (a small go-cart taxi rig), a haphazard stop to get fitted for suits, a conman posed as a university student to convince us that the travel agency was legit we STILL managed to get caught in a scam. All to the glory of Gina's quick thinking, I was able to cancel the credit card before identity theft could occur or charges could be made. A definite close call.
5. Despite the scams and the bugs and the sweat: I AM LOVING the backpacker life, but learning to trust no one. Luckily, Gina and I have each other. We met a woman from Scotland who was traveling alone - she was supposed to take this trip with her boyfriend, but he broke up with her 1 month before - she is my hero for going anyways.
6. Spent a morning learning Viphrassa meditation from a monk in Wat Matarahat in Bangkok. The monk told me I have a mind like a monkey. I think this list attests to the truth in that fact.
7. Last week the King of Thailand's sister died, Gina and I watched procession and the entire city dress in black to mourn and flock to grand palace to pay respects.
8. Mastered the river ferry (populated quite like the MTA subways in the city).
9. Singha vs. Chang - an ongoing beer debate.
10. Overnight bus to Chumphon, then early morning catamaran to Ko Tao, a small island off the southeastern coast of penisular Thailand.

KO TAO IS THE ADULT VERSION OF SUMMER CAMP.
(with bigger toys and slightly altered kinds of candy at the Canteen.)

Like any American summer camp, this island is much the same way in terms of societal structuring. Because of limited perameters, people are forced to define themselves to groups (for example, native islander vs. tourist - scuba divers vs. beachbums - British girls vs. American girls) and we are finding that this setting encourages fonder, faster friendships (unless your socially structured group is at odds in their quest to define themselves, as Gina and I have found it impossible to befriend the Lilly Allens of the island).

Characters:
Csiakorn (manages the Sairee View, the resort we are staying at) is a Rastafarian, dreadlocked Thai. Very sweetly and awkwardly in Love with Gina (twice as tall as he is).
The Germans 7 Bavarians (whom we refer to as German #1-#7) who let us use our ipods in their "Ghettoblaster" because we are the women of the resort, and they have graciously conceeded that we are to have our way. The Germans are also quite funny and have good travel stories.
Thys Our Dutch SCUBA friend, not afraid of mountain biking the treacherous .75 mile steep hill to our bungalow to talk philosophy and religion.
Gina After surving a motorbike accident that ended in the emergency room with a large 2 x 2 infected wound on her left leg and a souvenier xray of her right hand, she is still in remarkably good spirits albeit not able to swim, kayak or hike very far.
JoAnne Content to look after Gina's war wounds, find used book stores, try all kinds of tropical fruit, and lounge about the island - on the gorgeous beach or the hilltop patio bar of our resort.

We will continue relaxing until Gina's leg shows better results from the antibiotics, then we are off to Ko Phangnan for the Full Moon Party. After that, possibly Ko Samui or Ko Chang - then to Bangkok again and a possible flight to Siem Riep in Cambodia. We have decided to ix-nay the Malaysia and Singapore iteneraries in terms of saving some money and for other reasons far too mundane to explain here.

Until next time - Saideekai (JoAnne's phoenetic spelling for 'Cheers!' in Thai)

2 DAYS

Gina's going to buy a monkey.

I am infatuated with my life.

That is to say, my life rivals Jessica Alba’s sex life, Disney Sing-along Songs, Barack’s staffers on this celebratory day of caucus winning, free beer when you don’t expect it (or a snow day, for all my under-aged readers), Bono’s shades, and all of those people that got cars from Oprah.

My life is Patrick Dempsey on Zoloft and I can’t stop smiling.

Gina and I spent the morning at the NY Consulate Chinese Visa and Passport center which is almost in the Hudson River – on the very corner of 12^th in midtown. As we stood in the freezing cold, we giggled, in that organic, stream-of-consciousness way that we do when we’re together.

Yes, we’ve had to discuss out a lot of uninteresting details (when, where to take Malaria pills, the arduous visa acquisition process, how much do you think we’ll really need an emergency supply of floss?) but we also get gloriously convoluted in these Steve Mollick obsessive rants of hilarity (for those of you who do not know Steve Mollick, I apologize not only for the missed reference, but for the pure misfortune of not having met a most unique individual).

In lieu of the entertainment value that our tangents hold, I present the following conversation, which I have lovingly titled “Boomerangs”.

Gina: You know, I’ve heard women say that wearing a wedding ring has really aided their travel experience and prevented unwanted advances.

JoAnne: Cool. Should we go to Chinatown today and get some bling?

Gina: No, I have some wedding rings. (JoAnne smiles and wants to say something smart-ass but doesn’t because…) But! Speaking of Chinatown, I got a small keychain that says NYC for Eva when we stay with her in Singapore and I was thinking of other small things to take with us to give to people that are hospitable new friends that we make.

JoAnne: Yeah! So I read this book, and…wait, I have to remember how exactly this happened. Ok, it was called “Love and Death in Kathmandu”…and….ok! Yeah! The book was about humans being used as portals for Hindi deities. The royal family worships this one goddess in the form of a 6-12 year old girl, and there are all these specifications – like, she has to have the eyes of a seagull and the feet of a dove and smell like the inner petals of the lotus bud or something like that – and, like, mothers across Nepal really want their little girls to be the next carrier of the goddess – can you imagine all these Nepalese pageant mommies pushing around their Jon Bennett-Ramsey kids to walk more like doves and spraying them with lotus blossoms? Anyways, no one was allowed to see this small girl-child who gets worshipped as a virgin goddess, but these Australian writers managed to bribe the guards by giving them a cheap wooden BOOMERANG!

Gina: But we don’t have Boomerangs.

JoAnne: Yeah, no.

(Brief depressed silence.)

Gina: So what’s the New York City equivalent of Boomerangs?

JoAnne: Stickers?

Gina: Stamps?

JoAnne: Cigarettes? Wait, what we need is something free that has New York City written on it.

Gina (as we are on 42^nd and 8^th): Let’s stop at Port Authority and ask!

JoAnne: Who?

Gina: Police?

JoAnne and Gina laugh as they both arrive at the same conclusion: Condoms!

Gina: I was just thinking that! The ones that the aids activist group gives out that say NYC on the wrapper!

JoAnne: We’re going to ask the Port Authority Police for condoms?

Gina: Uuuuhhhhh…

JoAnne: Stop…wait…I’d like to paint a mental picture of our trip. Me, clad in my pumas that I bought like a dummy without researching the fact that they could’ve been manufactured by one of our potential new Indian friends’ little six year old brother who has diphtheria and a cleft palate, and YOU with a MONKEY (Gina’s latest obsession is traveling with an exotic mammal friend) and we’re handing out condoms while wearing wedding rings and being attacked by mosquitoes (because fate WOULD pair two kids together as travel buddies who can’t feel being bitten by mosquitoes) in the middle of poverty-stricken Calcutta.

Gina: AND! Condoms aren’t always effective in tropical climates. Matchboxes!

JoAnne: We’re going to get shot at. More than once.

Oreos for Barack

My parents sat in Joe Biden's section at Saturday's Jefferson/Jackson Dinner in Des Moines.
They got Raspberry Cheesecaked by a staffer. I visited Kirsten in Knoxville, we watched CSPAN's coverage on YouTube and electronically sat in Barack's section. We got Oreoed by ourselves.

I told them that our Jefferson/Jackson dessert effort was completely grassroots (and therefore morally superior) because nobody's campaign donation was directed at our excessive consumption of sugar. My mother said the equivalent of "Big deal, snobby offspring! You may be your own neo-hippie, but we were there taking part in history and you weren't." Then she swooned over John Edwards, mentioned seeing Tom Harkin buy beer, and reported that she mailed some confetti she swiped from the floor of Veterans Memorial Auditorium to my sister.

My parents have a relationship to the caucus reminescent of the way I felt about Justin Timberlake in '99. Sure, JT lived on, and we're all thankful, but I'm still partial to the days of N*SYNC.

I warned her about that. All 6 leading candidates can't have big parties in DM forever. She's got to live each of these moments like a crazed teenager. She must listen to "(God Must Have Spent) A Little More Time on You" on repeat. She must eat every last bite of her cheesecake and enjoy the autumn-themed floral arrangement the Biden team sent to the house. She sighed wistfully, as good as any Disney Princess. "Don't I know, Jo. Don't I know."

Just want you in my Caddy

Last weekend, there was a shooting at “The Icehouse” (the B-team version of “The Mill”, the establishment at which I work). An estranged boyfriend of an Icehouse waitress entered the bar area and opened fire, killing an IU student home for fall break, and critically injuring his friend. This is the same place where, 3 weeks ago to the day, my best friend Kirsten, visiting on her fall break, sat with me. We cheerily enjoyed our huge mugs of beer and watched the man with the mullet set up his karaokee machine for “Icehouse Trivia Nite”.

Today my run was perfect. The weather was cool, and I was making good, efficient strides - - until I wasn’t. Hoping to find a better rhythm, I skipped a few steps, shuffled sideways a bit and then realized that what would really break my icky stride would be to bust out dancing to “HEY YA!”, which was playing on my ipod.

Embarrased to perform near the hospital (fairly populated at 9 am), I wished for a running partner who would do this with me. In my dillusional state of aerobic activity, I crossed my fingers for a combination running buddy / soulmate. My dream man would make “dance breaks” a regular happening in all joint-jogging expeditions. The pragmatics of this were slow to come – we can’t both dance to “HEY YA!” at the same time, unless we had a splitter. And all of those cords would be limiting and obnoxious while running. Maybe we could sing “HEY YA!” outloud while he rocked the Andre 3000 keyboard-playing dance. How about programming the ipods to the same playlist and then pushing play at the exact same time?

Then I realized that more than having a “Mandatory Dance Break Enforcer” I wanted someone to give me a hug and kiss my forehead and tell me that tragedies happen, kids mistakenly die at bars as they merely reunite with a friend. In that moment this morning, I deeply, sorely, didn’t want to be in this place anymore, lonely and scared. I wanted someone to pull my hair, make fun of my dorky mom-gifted frog socks that I haven’t changed for days (eww, gross, I know…), someone to punch in jest (Papa doesn’t respond well to that), a reason to shave my legs, someone to tell me that I shouldn’t be afraid to put ipod earphones in – that it’s broad daylight, and I’m running responsibly in populated areas. Someone who would reassure me that certainly, I would hear an insane man with a riffle approaching and could out run him, and dammit, if I couldn’t, then my running buddy would be there to take the bullet. Unless, of course, we were too busy jamming to “HEY YA!”.

There’d be worse ways to go than during a dance break with someone who loved you and your neon green frog socks.

Halloween 2007

Gina and Andrea hit up the LES parade as pirates.

Jilianne went par for the course in the Concordia Choir contest as a tree.

My Aunt Barbara dressed as a witch. (A good one, naturally, with lots of glitter.)



I thought about the two easiest costumes at my disposal. The option I didn't take: A frozen hiker. Cool as that could've been, I knew I would look disgusting as a dead Jon Krakauer character. That had the potential to disable appetites at the restaurant. I wouldn't want eat anything served by someone with simulated frost and blood painted across her face.



So I visited the closet in the next room for inspiration -
I went as Grannie Annie.