This email is so good a few years ago Michelle posted an edited version it to our other site Killawatts. You can read that version here. But as a special treat, below is the original unedited email.

Subject: Jungle Mania in Malaysia

Date: February 12, 2001

Welcome to the jungle/We take it day by day If you want it you’re gonna bleed/But it’s the price you pay — Axl Rose, Welcome to the Jungle, 1987

Apologies but I had to quote the guy (even though there’s a good chance he didn’t write the song. But then again, if I knew that I would know entirely too much about Mr. Rose) because I’m quite certain that no one else would, now that he’s a certified has-been, all washed up in his Malibu (or Miami, whichever) mansion trying to make a comeback with only his hairy belly to accompany him. Slash is gone, Izzy disappeared, the racy-looking girls have vanished, the 90’s are practically retro and I’m now 30. I remember thinking that guy was so hot/cool/beautiful, I’m positive I cried during the Sweet Child O’ Mine video many times.

So, we just spent 4 days in the jungle and I’ve probably unintentionally taught the Malaysian jungle birds to whistle the tune above due to the number of times I hummed it while sitting there waiting for monkeys to swing by.

The prevalent rumor about Taman Negara National Park in central Malaysia is that although elephants, tigers, bears and wild pigs live in the park, you won’t see any of them because the park is too big and the animals are too bashful. CK and I found this to be completely false. We sat diligently in a hide, which is basically an elevated tree-house, overlooking a salt lick for hours at a time, the only sound being the creak of our out-of-shape necks to comfort us. We saw mouse-deer (head of a mouse, body of a tiny deer, legs of a mouse-cousin of the mid-western jack-a-lope), silver-leaf monkeys, macaques, flying squirrels, horn bills and a fire-crested pheasant. It was truly magical.

Some of the more unsavory creatures we witnessed were giant red aunts (the size of my thumb), rabbit-sized mosquitoes and leeches. I was having a really great time traipsing through the jungle, listening to the sounds and smelling the scents and then a leech crawled on my sock and suddenly the world seemed a hateful place. I honestly think I need leech-desensitization therapy because of the twist of my demeanor pre-to-post-leech incident. Before the leech incident, I was a happy child of the jungle, swinging on the vines and soaking up the rain, whistling to the birds and taking in all the sounds of beetles, birds, monkeys and unseen mammals crawling through the forest floor. After the leech incident, I became jumpy and alert, given to wild fits of ripping off my socks and shoes, searching for the blood sucking villains, not knowing what I would do besides faint if I found any. CK, serving as my makeshift therapist, had to endure endless questioning sessions about what would happen if there were hundreds of leeches all over our legs. Where would we start? How would we kill them all? What would he do with my lifeless body, etc?

I know leeches are not dangerous, and if I’m going to fret about anything in the jungle it should be the numerous life-threatening snakes that dwell there. But for some reason the idea of leeches, and the prevalence of them, the obscene way they crawl, the way they suck your blood and then get all fat and happy and start looking for other leeches to hump, makes my skin crawl.

Anyway, I don’t want to leave you with the idea that the jungle is only about mud-dwelling, blood-sucking, mate-humping leeches, so I will leave you with the highlight of our jungle visit, which was witnessing an entire family of wild pigs. We heard them squealing long before we saw them, then they finally emerged from the dense underbrush, looking stark in the man-made clearing, and seeming a lot smaller than they sounded. They completely avoided the salt-lick but we got to watch them for about 30 minutes as they grunted their way around the underbrush, looking for dead leaves or truffles or whatever it is that wild pigs eat.

One more thing about the jungle, for all you snake-haters: it’s pretty well-publicized that the jungle is abundantly stocked with deadly snakes. What they don’t tell you is that the roots of the trees crawling all over the pathways look exactly like our slithery enemies, so that at first, every step you take you must decide, is that a snake or is it a root? After a few minutes you get used to it. I’m not even a true snake hater, but it was touch and go at first.

But despite snake-looking roots and leeches, the jungle is an awe-inspiring place. I highly recommend going to one, whenever you can just to listen to the sounds of birds, monkeys, pigs, beetles and other wild creatures. And of course, as we are all well aware, the world’s jungles are disappearing at an alarming rate. We could practically hear the jungle shrinking, almost as fast as poor Axl’s career.

Now we are back in Bangkok, our home away from home, getting ready to go to India and Nepal. We fly out March 3. Hope all of you are doing well. Feel free to write me!

Michelle

Back in Bangkok. I love that city. Big, exhausty, loud, hot. It’s one of my favorite places. Again, Michelle emails a hilarious story about the Jim Thompson House. The House is on the tourist circuit. We went just like every western visitor who has set foot in Thailand before us. It’s a little strange going to gawk at the estate of a rich westerner. Look how successful we are. Rich and powerful, even in foreign countries. We made this country prosper. But in the end Jim Thompson disappeared walking in the beautiful Cameron Highlands. All that is left is a legacy and a few notable antiques.

Subject: Feel the Fear…and Laugh at Pee-Pee Anyway

Date: January 22, 2001

Hi there-

We’re back in Bangkok and went to the Jim Thompson House, as suggested, and took the tour from a woman who sounded like a Sleastack. While she was showing us the guest room, which contained an antique porcelain cat that held the urine of the “little boy, so he could carry it around”, the guide re-emphasized “you know Pee-Pee? Pott-ee? Ureene? (she pronounced it like that) She was clearly trying to get some kind of response from the glassy eyed tourists, who probably weren’t even listening. But I heard, loud and clear, and was of course stifling laughter at 1) the accent on the word “Ureene” 2) the emphasis on the pee-vessel and her need for someone to acknowledge the humor of the situation. So finally, I let out a teensy guffaw, half out of nervousness, and half out of pity for the poor woman and half to break the ice. Yes, that’s 3 halves. No one else laughs. The woman turns to me and says, in exactly the same voice, “you like?”

Then I’m thoroughly embarrassed. I’m sure I turned all red when everyone turned to look at the idiot who was laughing at the urine holder. Yes, people, I like urine. Ok, I think it’s funny. Pee and poo. It’s alllll fucking hilarious and the only reason why you don’t think so is because you are all a bunch of humorless morons who are afraid to laugh.

Of course, I did not say this, but only imagined saying it, as I was trying to stifle a laugh for the rest of the tour.

In other news, we are currently in Singapore and although it’s basically a big, clean, western city in Asia, I’m loving it. It reminds me of what a NYC theme park, brought to you by Disney, would be like. The food is amazing, and I bought a new shirt and a skirt, and went to Borders! Just getting prepared before we head off to Delhi…

Love Michelle

Sitting on a white sand beach, watching the sun set into the calm blue ocean, palm trees overhead, is a wonderful way to spend any day, even x-mas. I did miss my family but Michelle was there and Jen, and some friends we had meet along the way. It was difficult to find presents on the little island. There was beer, of course. But I was hoping to buy something a little more personal and permanent for Michelle. I had to wander off for the afternoon in search for presents. I came across a tiny flea market. Two families had setup some goods on a blue tarp. There I found nail polish. I then bought an anklet for a Thai women hawking jewelry on the beach. I also wondered into the one air conditioned store and found, to my delight, boxes of firecrackers. I ended up buying a brick, not for Michelle but for me to shoot off on New Years.

Subject: Christmas Day

Date: December 25, 2000

Hey mom (and everyone else)-

Glad everyone likes their prezzies. I will be sending more as the year goes on, in probably the same way (heaps of prezzies sent to one address, and y’all can sort them out as time progresses). It’s very expensive to send stuff so that’s why. Today is the day after x-mas. We had a nice x-mas, Charlie and I exchanged gifts from this tiny island we are living on (I got red sparkly nail polish and an anklet, he got some goggles and some flip-flops!!) We put them under our paper-cut-out tree. Then we sat on the beach, watched an amazing sunset and had dinner at our favorite restaurant with some kiwi friends we met, one is originally Thai, so we got to ask her all sorts of stupid questions about Thai culture and she also taught us to count, and, of course, how to say all the Thai dirty words. It was really fun.

The sunsets here are amazing, so much so that I am starting to take them for granted! We are staying right on the beach front, so the ocean and sunset can be seen from our porch, it’s beautiful. We got a deal on the front bungalow because we are staying for so long (2 weeks) and it only costs $12 per night! We’ve been swimming in the ocean and snorkeling, and beach-sitting for the last week or so, and we plan on continuing this rigorous schedule of relaxation for another week.

A few days ago, we rented a scooter and drove around the entire island. I practiced a few times by myself and then had Charlie hop on the back! It was great until this huge mud puddle. Charlie said “just go right through, don’t worry” and of course I went right through and then we promptly and unceremoniously fell over. It was very surreal, neither one of us screamed or said anything, the bike just tipped and we tipped with it. I have a nice bruise on my shin and some lacerations on my elbow, but other than that, I was fine. But as we were driving back, I was smart enough to walk the bike through that mud puddle, but came upon another one soon after, and got freaked out (”mud puddle equals pain, mud puddle bad, don’t like mud puddle” my mind said) so I basically freaked out and began GASSING the bike (because the accelerator is on the handlebar, but I forgot and just kept GRIPPING!!!) Charlie’s in the back saying calmly “just let go of the accelerator, take your hand off the accelerator, NOW”, but of course I mistake that for “grip the handlebars with all your might, don’t let go for anything in the world. not even chocolate or baby puppies” So I was able to avoid the puddle, but we wound up on the side of the road between the hard dirt and some bushes. My hand is still on the accelerator, gripping, the wheels are spinning, but the bike has long since stopped moving. I ended up getting my ass burned on the pipe, and I felt a bit shaky after dump #2, but once again, we emerged from the wreckage just fine. As for the bike, we asked a nice Thai man along the way of we could use his hose, we washed it off and turned it back in with nary a scratch! So that’s enough excitement for a few days.

We are going to Bangkok in about one week to meet Christa and then will be off to Malaysia and Singapore. Having good times, miss y’all and hope all is well!

Love Michelle

Still in Vietnam. Reading through what Michelle wrote, it seems like we had an okay time. But for some reason Vietnam was my least favorite country. Probably the rain and the tours. The one thing I really enjoyed was the monkeys. Even if they were caged or chained. I could usually persuade the owner to let me play with the monkey. This usually involved having the monkey pick nits out of my hair, while I did the same for the monkey. The monkeys where starved for physical attention. Sad.

Subject: Ahhh…I love the smell of fish sauce in the morning

Date: December 11, 2000

Greetings from Vietnam, where women wear matching top n’ bottom pajamas all day long, where ear cleaning is an entirely public affair (using this long copper wand thing), where crossing the street is an extreme sport, where nodding the head and smiling actually means “No Way”, and where caged animals (bears, birds, monkeys, snakes) are de rigueur. Oh yeah and where fish sauce is made. Most of Southern Vietnam smells of fish sauce, which is evidently made from toe jam, belly button scum and bat guano, with some fish parts thrown in.

Today is our last day in Vietnam, and Charlie and I have mixed feelings. We’ve been here for 3 weeks now, and we haven’t really gone far from Saigon. I suppose we sort of lost our momentum because of crappy weather and being sick. First we spent about 5 days in Saigon, getting our visas extended, then we went on a 3 days tour of the Mekong Delta, then we came back to Saigon, then I got sick and I stayed in the hotel for a few days in Saigon trying to recover, then we went to the fishing village of Mui Ne to see some huge sand dunes, then it pissed rain for 4 days straight while we twiddled our thumbs at the beach resort, where the main attraction was a 4 month old monkey named “Tony Blair” tied up to a chair. Needless to say, we were all on suicide watch, including Tony. After that, we separated ways with Jen, and Charlie and I went to Dalat, which is a town in the central highlands of Vietnam, popular among Vietnamese tourists. The air was nice and the weather was lovely, and cool. We walked around the lake and noticed that even though it’s like 75 degrees there, people were literally wearing snow outfits, complete with full head wraps and ski boots. I guess it’s the coldest place in Vietnam, but it felt like Oakland on a warm day to us. We decided, after Dalat, to go back to Thailand so we could spend my birthday and Christmas on a beach, instead of in central Vietnam, where the weather is crap due to a typhoon off the coast of the Philippines.

I’m a little disappointed that we aren’t going to northern Vietnam, but not disappointed enough to actually go.

Some cultural differences worth noting about Vietnam are that people have no social taboos against touching other people—especially hairy westerners like ourselves. I have been amicably grabbed, slapped, pinched, pushed, prodded and poked. Charlie gets a lot of arm hair pulling (cuz people aren’t so hairy here, they can’t believe it’s real), and I shaved my head so everyone wants to feel my scalp. Also, people seem to work so hard here, hustling their butts off to drum up some business. Selling shit is not the calm affair that it is in the States. Walking down the street is like walking a capitalism gauntlet, with business people trying to get you to ride in their cyclo, eat in their restaurant, or buy their handicrafts. Also, as soon as westerners enter a cafe, the proprietors tend to crank up the loud 80’s tunes, for our benefit. Thanks! Because of this I always have bad 80’s tunes in my head, usually of the “easy listening” genre. Lionel Ritchie’s “Hello”, Christopher Cross’s “Ride Like the Wind”, Air Supply’s entire oeuvre. I must say I really miss music, and it was quite a mistake to not bring any listening device along on the trip, because we are subjected to cafe tunes which are typically the aforementioned hits, or Vietnamese pop, which is basically the same as the aforementioned hits, only in Vietnamese. We were lucky enough to witness two non-fatal traffic accidents, one that we were actually involved in. Talk about fascinating! Basically, whoever is bloodiest or whose vehicle suffers the most damage gets paid money. Everyone stands around in the street arguing (amicably) until someone gets paid off. No one calls the police because then the payer must pay them off too. Payment can be paid in local currency (Vietnamese dong), US dollars or whatever goods happen to be involved in the accident (in one case that we saw, a bag of rice was the preferred payment). No one cares whose fault it was, or what really happened, they just look around at the damages and come to an agreement about which party is worse off. Our accident was deemed our fault because we were not bloody, and we had to pay about $4 to fix the damage to the taxi we were in.

Most of the people we met were warm and friendly and loved practicing their English with us and were more than willing to help us with our Vietnamese. The sentiment we heard most was Vietnamese people’s forgiveness about what happened during the war, that they are hopeful for future relations with the US, and they do not dwell on the losses they suffered. Many people in the south also want to go to the US to visit family members, but can’t get a visa, or don’t have the money. I know sentiment in the north would be different and from talking to people I learned that Vietnam is still quite divided, despite the united image it conveys to the rest of the world.

This place comes in second, after Uzbekistan, in terms of being vastly different, culturally speaking. First off, there’s the whole communist thing going on. But after talking with some locals, I found that it’s actually a socialist republic. People still have to pay for health care, education, etc. The economy seems pretty capitalistic in big cities like Ho Chi Minh and Bill Clinton just visited a few weeks ago, so things are loosening up politically and economically. There are literally TWO Americans traveling here—me and Charlie. All other tourists are from England and Australia. I like the place ok.

That’s it for now. Hope you are all well!
Michelle

Vietnam was my least favorite country during our trip. I’m not sure why, probably the endless rain, the guided tours, the rat infested zoo and the chained-up baby monkey dressed in a smock named Tony Blair. But there were a couple of fun experiences for Michelle, Jen and I. Sliding down the waterslides with thousands of Vietnamese school children staring, crawling through the Cuchi Tunnels drenched in sweat, throwing trash into the delta like the locals, and the fender-bender that Michelle writes about below.

Subject: Mekong Was Fun, Now We are Moving On…

Date: December 4, 2000

Hi everyone-
We just got back from our 3 day trip in the Mekong Delta, it was pretty fun, but will probably not go on another “guided tour” (more about that later…). Anyway, we are fine (despite my nasty cold) and we will be moving out of Saigon and on to the sand dunes of Mui Ne, which is up the coast a bit. Not sure how long we will be there, but will probably stay a while to recover from the pollution of Ho Chi Mihn City (or “the Ho” as we like to call it).

We got in a little fender-bender in a taxi today, but we are all just fine and dandy, but are so ready to get away from all the hubbub of Saigon. Of course, we had to pay someone off because the police are corrupt here, and the entire process was actually worth the $4 it cost to fix the door of the taxi. Basically, if someone gets in a car accident here, the two parties argue on the street until one party tires of arguing and decides to pay. Calling the police is completely out of the question. Luckily, the woman who runs our guesthouse is wonderful and we called her and she came to the accident right away and got our fine reduced from $8 to $4 (I know, I know, it’s nothing but when you are trying to live on 15 dollars a day, and have no income, it really adds up!), and she was able to translate for us. We bought her flowers as a thank you gift. The best part about it was that they could care less about “our side of the story”. It’s not like in the states, where all parties involved get to testify. Our friend Tan simply rode her scooter to the site, said hello to us and began talking to the taxi driver and trying to lower our fines. Ok, so I gotta go. We will probably not have access to email for a few weeks.

Hope all is well,
Michelle & Charlie

Phnom Penh smelled of guns. A distinctly US odor. Growing up with quasi-hippie parents, you’d think I wouldn’t have access to guns but I shot BB guns, pellet guns and the occasional twenty-two. Most experiences with guns weren’t good. From my uncle shooting a helpless robin traumatizing me when I was 7, to my friend Mike Larsen shooting a herring down at the creek next to the high-school tennis courts making me fell guilty for years, to my friend Jimmy Guerrero bringing a handgun to my college dorm when he visited for a week making me paranoid of getting expelled.

Guns pervade the US psyche and environment. You can smell it everywhere here. And that’s the odor that hit my nose when we stepped off the plane in Phnom Penh. Within in the day of arrival, I was offered to shoot an AK-47. I could ride out with some guys to an empty field and shoot away. It was rumored for a few hundred dollars you could shoot a grenade launcher at cow, something I was tempted to do. Besides war, when else can you shoot a grenade launcher at a cow?

Michelle also tuned into the gun vibe that permeates Phnom Penh and didn’t like it.

Subject: Thanksgiving Greetings from the Developing World

Date: November 22, 2000

Hi Everyone-
It’s me again. I just realized that it was practically Thanksgiving! So I thought I should send something to wish you all a good time. Eat some traditional TG fare for me (losta gravy and cranberry sauce on that turkey, please). I like Phnom Penh a lot more than I did 2 days ago. Today we went to the Tuol Seng Holocaust Museum, which is basically a high school turned death-camp used by the Khmer Rouge from 1975-1979. We topped it off with a visit to the Killing Fields, where all of the people held and tortured in Tuol Seng were sent to die. Needless to say, I am feeling very sad and depressed about human suffering. It’s so hard to believe that during this genocide in Cambodia, I was spending my days in a safe little elementary school in Nor. Cal., talking Holly Hobby and Sesame Street. Anyway, looking into the faces of the people here, it’s hard to imagine the horror of what happened or that it could even happen at all. At least 1 million people were killed, but estimates are that it was more like 3 million. So, very sad today, and we are leaving to Saigon tomorrow.

I will be glad to leave Phnom Penh, but like I mentioned before, it’s not as bad as I had originally thought. We moved to a new guesthouse in a better part of town and we all feel much better now. The developing world is so interesting, especially here because PP is a city of 1 million, yet there are very few paved roads, and no high-rises, or other city markers. No freeways, either. People either live in their businesses or they live in small, open front shacks where they do everything outside (wash, pick lice out of kids hair, pee n’poo, eat, sleep in hammocks, wash vegetables, cook, chop meat, etc.) I discovered a fascinating outdoor beauty parlor yesterday while walking around. Men and women literally set up small beauty shops in a field (men barbers, women manicurists). They bring their own equipment (mirrors, nail stuff, chairs, water) and just get down to business.

The markets here are pretty grisly. Chickens, tied down but still alive, pig heads (decorated with their own tail in their mouths), fish slopping out of their shallow water pan (half dead, of course), slabs of bloody beef (smells really bloody), blood just about everywhere. I always vow that I won’t eat meat when I leave, but once I smell bacon or fried chicken I am back on the meat wagon. Again, there is a seediness that pervades this place. In Thailand, you could wander off the tourist circuit and have a great time. Here, there are either places where tourists and ex-pats go, and there are places where they don’t go and the difference is pretty obvious. So we’ve been spending a lot of money at the ex-pat restaurants and bars. I gather from what I have read and my own observations that this place is a lawless city, where the cops moonlight as bandits, pedophilia runs rampant, and guns are welcomed. They call it “the Wild East” so I can see why a lot of creepy guys who like guns and kiddie-porn wind up here.

Anyway, hope this does not bring you down. On a lighter note, I got a massage today from a blind woman. There is a place here called Seeing Hands Massage and it’s an organization that trains blind people in massage and the profits go to the blind and disabled. On a heavier note, there are thousands of people in Cambodia who have lost limbs due to land mines. I’m assuming that the blind people may have been land mine victims as well, but not sure. Anyway, I miss all yall and I hope you have a great Thanksgiving. Remember to savor the flavor of American food. I’ll be thinking of you!

Love, Michelle

One of my four favorite places on our trip was Angkor Wat. The 160 square kilometers of intricately carved temples kept me mesmerized for the four days we explored the ruins. One of the days we rode out to Bantay Srei. Read and laugh below.

Subject: Cambodo-Cross 2000

Date: November 20, 2000

Hey Everyone-
Having a great time in Cambodia. We were at Angkor for 4 days and now we’ve descended in on the gun-heavy city of Phnom Penh, and as far as I can tell, I hate it. Siem Reap was wonderful, warm, open people, breathtaking temples, good food, with a small town feel. This place seems to be hell on earth. Crowded, muddy (it just rained), lots of creepy guys trying to get you to take a ride from them (I am sure they are just trying to make a living, but en masse, they are somewhat threatening), in essence, this place is a skanky hell-hole. The only redeeming quality I am aware of is this internet cafe, which I plan on living in until we can get the hell outta here.

Air-conditioned, free water, an oasis smack dab in Hades. (Just to clarify, Angkor did not have any of these amenities, but because it was more village-like and remote, it was so much friendlier.) We had a little guesthouse snafu today because the place where we intended staying had construction (rocks busting other rocks) going on at all hours and our rooms were right above it. After 4 days of temple and ruin viewing, we wanted to rest in Phnom Penh, and then move on to Saigon in a few days. We were obviously wearing Bad Idea Jeans when we made that decision because this place is anything but restful. This place is about guns and hookers, all traffic and seediness.

By the time we got out of the taxi we had 7 new friends who wanted to take us to the Killing Fields monument, to the Royal Temple, anywhere we wanted to go. Rumor has it that for a price, tourists can shoot up wildlife with AK-47s here. Yikes. Anyway, the following is part of an email that I sent to Eleanor earlier today, but I thought I would excerpt it and send it to everyone.

For our last night at Angkor (in Siem Reap) we decided to hire moto-taxis to go see Bantay Srei, allegedly one of the most beautiful temples in all of Angkor. It was supposed to be a 16 km ride (40 minutes) out of town, and we tried to hire a taxi to take the 3 of us, plus one friend we met along the way, Susan. We talked to one guy who said that a car could not make the trip because the roads were too bad, and another said a moto-taxi (basically, you ride on the back of some guy’s small motorcycle) could not make the trip for the same reason, so we decided to go the cheaper route and take the moto-taxi. The ride would be 5 dollars each so we agreed, got on our bikes and set off for Bantay Srei. Once we were out of the main tourist area, we came upon a village. Riding by on the bikes I saw a small child riding a huge bike with a tiny monkey riding on it’s head, oxen, water-buffalo basking in mud, pigs, a Cambodian-dwarf child, chickens, tiny shack-like homes (some with tvs), a young guy playing with a BOOMINH sound system, loads of children (who would run up to the road to say “hello” to tourists on the way to the temple and “goodbye” when they leave) villagers carrying bushels of wood on the back of their bikes and various ages of workers (no child labor laws, I suppose), all transporting rocks of varying sizes to different locations on the new road.

There were also several political party encampments out there (FUNCINPEC and Cambodia People’s Party) and of course I imagined that we were somehow being taking up on this mountain not for sightseeing, but to be shot, possibly tortured and killed. Cambodia is seeing more and more tourists, but it’s still a somewhat dangerous place to visit, remnants of Kmer Rouge brutality. I’ve been told that police often change out of their uniforms and moonlight as bandits. Anyway, the drivers kept driving on what seemed to be a 3 phased road: paved, moto-cross track and endless red dirt. Over the previous 3 days in Cambodia, I became addicted to riding on the back of a motorcycle, where you can see what is going on and feel like you are a part of the hectic environment, rather than simply observing it from an air-conditioned box. But this ride was possibly the worst mode of transport I’ve ever experienced. And it was 3 hours total. The driver, who had obviously never been on this road, hit each deep pothole with glee and when I would ask him to slow down he did the Cambodian equivalent of “yeah, sure honey…shadduuupp”!”, complete with a placating hand wave. We sped along like this for a whopping hour and a half. Each time we hit another pothole, I would curse a new person; the driver, Charlie, the other drivers, the other people we were traveling with, God, my parents, George W. Bush, Celine Dion, etc. At one point I just started hanging on like I was riding a buckin’ bronco, one arm attached to the back of the seat and one waving up in the air. I almost fell off the bike approximately 40 times. I’m sure I squealed like true western princess each time we hit another pothole, but pretense and bravado had fallen off the motorcycle miles ago, so I really didn’t care. By the time we got to the glorious temple, we all had a thin layer of red dirt covering our entire bodies, with only a clean strip where our eyeglasses rested. I could give a shit about the divine temple, as I was trying to figure out how to feign an illness so life-threatening, that a comfy helicopter would have to come and rescue me and all my friends. I was also trying to figure out how to deal with a brain-damaging head injury, in case one of us was thrown from our death-mobiles on the way back down. Tourniquet to keep the brains in, fashioned out of Cambodian scarves? Duct tape?

Anyway, after 1/2 hour speed tour of the temples, (oh, yeah, there’s Shiva, ooh, look at that serpent, nice garuda, etc) we mounted our death-mobiles and sped off down the hill. The descent was easier because it was getting dark so the drivers slowed down a bit. Plus, I had gotten used to “riding bronc”, so it was little more peaceful. And I knew that the drivers were not going to torture us and/or kill us, they just wanted the 5 dollars each for the trip. We saw an amazing sunset on the way down, as well as some interesting cloud formations. About 1/2 hour into the journey back, the interesting cloud formations turned to heavy rain. I couldn’t see the road (which was key in anticipating the potholes) because my glasses were wet and dirty, so I just shut my eyes and hung on, occasionally looking back to make sure we were still all together.

We were drenched within seconds. The drivers kept on toward our destination at the bottom of the mountain and we surprisingly made it there in tact, despite the caked on dirt and bruises on our asses. It was one of those experiences that I only enjoy once I am safely writing about it from a known location, at a later date. I’m glad I went, even though if left to my own devices I would’ve opted for a 4 wheel drive multi-purpose vehicle with dual airbags, but I probably would not have been able to witness a monkey riding on a child’s head.

Bye for now…

This is the first long email Michelle sent while we were travelling. We’d already connected with our friend Jen Rose in Uzbekistan by this time. Jen was the catalyst for us starting the trip in 2000. She had spent the previous two years in the Peace Corps in Uzbekistan and for the whole time she was there, I kept swearing that we’d visit her. Well in 2000, Jen’s Peace Corps stint was coming to an end. Michelle and I had to get there before she left. And luckily we did. Uzbekistan is one of the few places we’ve been that very few people have visited and it really is fascinating. I don’t think we’ll ever get the opportunity to go there again. Thanks Jen. After our Uzbekistan visit, Jen traveled with us to Southeast Asia. You’ll see her mentioned in Michelle’s emails.

Subject: Letter from Bangkok

Date: November 15, 2000

Hey Family/Friends-
Just wanted to drop a line to say hi and let you know where we are in our trip. Right now we are in Bangkok, and we are about to depart for Cambodia tomorrow.

We’ve been through Bangkok several times now as sort of a stop-off point between visits to nearby islands.

The heat is sweltering here, but I love it! We’ve been to 2 islands already, Ko Chang and Ko Samet. Ko Chang was by far the best. It was pretty isolated and the people were very friendly. While on Ko Samet, there are mostly European and American tourists looking for PGFE’s (paid girlfriend experience) with Thai women. It’s pretty amazing how blatant sex-tourism is here, even though it’s allegedly illegal. Anyway, Charlie, Jen and I have been enjoying beach life so much that we’ve pretty much decided to continue hanging out on beaches as much as we can. The pace is slower, people are friendlier and it’s much more relaxing, not to mention beautiful.

The next stop on our itinerary is Cambodia. We leave tomorrow, flying into Siem Reap, which is where Angkor Wat is, spend a few days exploring and taking photos, then we fly to Phnom Penh, spend a few days there visiting the killing fields, and a few days later fly to Saigon, where we will hang out for a bit and then hopefully make it to a beach in southern Vietnam. We were originally going to travel overland to Angkor Wat, but after hearing about the 12 hour journey in the back of a truck through land-mine territory (no roads), we decided against it. We plan on spending a month in Vietnam, traveling by train from Saigon to Hanoi, and then to Laos and back to Cambodia. I will probably be able to check email in Phnom Penh in about one week, so feel free to write!

Overall, we are having a blast, meeting some great people (everyone seems great for a few hours, right?) but agree that we miss everyone from home. Bangkok is a crazy city, hard to describe. We had an amazing time a few nights ago during Loi Krathong, which is a festival to celebrate the end of the rainy season, and the full moon. Our guesthouse rented a few boats for the evening. The girls who live/work there had been spending all day making flotillas made out of flowers, vegetables and candles. The tradition is to put money in the flotilla, light the candles/incense and send them out on the river for good luck for the whole year. It was so cool because there were hundreds of boats on the river that night, and seeing all of the lighted candles floating all over the river was spectacular.

Another spectacular sight was seeing a 4 year old boy, buck naked in the water, flotation device and all, taking apart the lovely flotillas to get the coins! Then the cops chased him away. The boat ride became even more fun when all of the girls started singing Thai pop songs into the microphones on the boat and making everyone dance and sing along. Good times…

Feel free to write me and tell me any news from home.

I’ll write again soon. Love and hugs, Michelle

In 2000 and 2001, Michelle and I took a 10 month trip. We visited many countries including Uzbekistan, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore, India, Nepal, Kenya, Netherlands, Germany, Croatia, France, Italy, and England. Over the course of the trip, Michelle penned many heartwarming and hilarious emails to our friends and family. I still enjoy reading these emails and want to share them with everyone again. So over the next few months, I’ll be adding several of the emails to this site, I’ll also try to add related photos. Wish me luck.

In 2000 and 2001, Michelle and I took a trip around the world. Being a total geek, I took my handheld GPS and took coordinates at every place we slept. I thought, "I'll overlay the coordinates on a map when we return. It will be the coolest map in the world..." But back then creating a digital map was a little too time consuming.

But today I was reading through Chad Dickerson's Berkeley-area doctors map mashup and I said to myself "Charlie, you have the data. Make the map." And I did...

First, I took a look at the Yahoo! Maps API but so far on the USA is supported. Then I checked the Google Maps API and bingo. I was up and running in about 30 minutes. The only problem I had was with IE aborting the page. But executing the map's JavaScript at window.onload solved the issue. View the source to see the solution.

The small version of the map is below or the full page version is here.

Zoom in on Nepal. That's the Annapurna basecamp trek we took.