Greetings from Koh Phangan Thailand,

I have made it out of Indonesia and Malaysia and am now in what is supposed to be the crown jewel of any Southeast Asian Adventure -- Thailand. It is the land of elephants and lady boys, deserted beaches and the filming location for the Hangover 2. Our time here is off to a great start, but first let me fill you in on what has happened since I last wrote.

After Bali, we traveled to a small island called Gili Trawangan; it is just off the coast of one of Indonesia's other major islands, Lombok. Getting there was a bit of a trek. About 4 hours in bus rides and another 4 on a massive rusty bathtub that they called a ferry, but it was well worth it. Gili proved to be one of the most beautiful islands I've ever been too and it has a nightlife to match. As you can imagine, Courtney and I fit right in. The locals here were also as friendly as anywhere I've ever been and there were a few nights where I played guitar with them while the locals backed me up on vocals. It's funny how no matter where you go in the world, everyone knows "Hotel California," even if they may change up the lyrics a little bit to compensate for their limited English.

There wasn't much to report on in Gili, except for a fair amount of partying that is more of a "you had to be there situation" than a good story to tell. Plus I need to keep anecdotes like that to a minimum lest they come back to haunt me in my 2036 presidential bid. Let's just leave it at, we had a really good time. 

On a party boat

After Gili, we spent a couple of days in Kuta Beach back on Bali which is kind of like Indonesia's attempt to combine a Vegas night club and Papas and Beer in Mexico. Something that is fun to see, but two nights there was plenty.

Sorry for the vulgarity mom, but it pretty much sums up Kuta perfectly.

From Bali, we flew into Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. We didn't have high hopes for Malaysia, partly because most other travelers said they weren't a huge fan of it and partly because we knew about as much about Malaysia as Barack Obama knows about being president. Luckily, it ended up being one of my favorite places we've been so far.

The Patronas Towers
They used to hold the record for the tallest buildings in the world

Kuala Lumpur was a very modern city with all of the conveniences that come with it. The subway was immaculate and efficient, their markets were well stocked, and their 7-Elevens had slurpees. I can't overstate the importance of that last fact. When you have spent the last month in 90 degree heat and 90% humidity, no drink on earth sounds better than a Slurpee. Every country I had been to had 7-Elevens on every corner, but not one of them carried the nectar of the gods and the relief that is a slurpee on a hot equatorial day. This fact alone made the trip to KL worth it. 

No kid in America would be this excited to eat a "Dried Meat Burger"

Beyond slurpees, KL was also a very diverse city. In China and Indonesia, the population looks very much the same and though there are different ethnicities, they are a very small part of the population. Malaysia is another story. You have huge populations of Chinese, Indians, and Malaysians. The interesting thing is you might see a Chinese lady yelling at her husband standing next to Malaysian woman in a full Burka looking about as happy as you can be when you're dressed in all black from head to toe and it's 85 degrees out. The burka is something that we could not get over. No matter how many women we saw wearing them, it was still shocking to see.

There was a ladies only car on the train. We tried to get a picture of it, but it left before we could.

Hookers and layboys have seemed to become a bit of theme since we left Indonesia.

One of the highlights of KL was the largest outdoor aviary in the world. There were all different species of birds flying around and it was quite a site to see, but the highlight was definitely this kid.

There were more birds than just peacocks; the were just much harder to get pictures with.

After about 5 days exploring KL, we headed out to Taman Negara -- the oldest rainforest in the world. As with most great trips, getting there is half the fun and Taman Negara did not disappoint. We had a 4 hour bus ride through some beautiful country, but the highlight was the 3 hour wooden boat ride up the river into the jungle. The pictures will do it more justice than I can. 

Once we arrived and dropped off our luggage in our hostel, we prepared for our night walk through the jungle. They showed us a video of the animals that we might see and then Courtney made a comment that was something to the effect of, "there's no chance we see anything as cool as what was in that video." She couldn't have been more wrong. It started off when a Tapir wandered onto the property. For those of you who don't know what a Tapir looks like, imagine if a panda bear and anteater had a baby.

The tapirs are actually extremely calm and we were both able to pet it so long as there were some carrots around for it to eat. I don't care if this seemed like a jungle petting zoo, you can criticize me once you've pet a tapir. It was sweet. 

I would have been happy with the Tapir, but instead I got something so much better. As we were walking through the property on our way into the jungle, our guide spoke to one of the staff and found out that a wild bull elephant had walked onto the property. We were able to see it from about 40 or 50 yards away and it was pretty exciting, but not nearly as exciting as what was to come. After we got back from our night walk, Courtney and I were talking about how cool it would be if the elephant was still there. That was when someone told us that the elephant had wandered onto a different part of the property and that we should head over and see it. We came across the elephant standing outside someone's bungalow/jungle cabin pulling out palm trees and pretty much ripping up any other plants he felt like. We were able to watch him from only about 20 or 25 yards away. It got real exciting when someone got a little too close and we all had to sprint away because we thought he was going to charge. After probably 45 minutes the elephant got bored and walked back into the jungle. Here's an idea of the destruction I was talking about:

So as exciting as that was, it was nothing compared to the next night when our elephant friend came back for round two. This time the locals weren't as thrilled to have the elephant come around because of all the damage he did the night before. (Side note: the lack of supervision by the staff with this thing was laughable. They pretty much let you get as close as wanted and just told you not to use your flashlight or make a lot of noise, but that was about it.) When we showed up to try and get another glimpse of the elephant he was hiding behind one of the buildings and there was a local lighting a fire to try and scare him off. This did not go as planned. All of the sudden, the guy lighting the fire dropped his stick and barreled towards us in a dead sprint screaming, "Run! Run!" I sat there looking long enough to see the elephant round the corner with his face lit up by the red light of the fire. Then I turned and sprinted for my life with the rest of the group. We ran for probably 50 yards and hid behind some of the bungalows. When we dared to peak out, the elephant had retreated back into the jungle again and there were probably 7 locals lighting fires behind him to make sure that he didn't come back. I have done a lot of camping and seen a fair amount of bears and even had to set off some flashlight alarms to scare them away, but nothing compares to running away from a wild bull elephant.

We didn't just swimming in this picture. It's just sweat.

We also went to an Orang Asli village. The Orang Asli are Malaysia's version of Aborigines. 

  

Sorry I wasn't able to get a good photo of the elephant. The whole if you use your flash, he'll charge you thing made it difficult.

You can kind of see him right in the middle

I have some more stories about lady boys in Thailand, but I feel like this post is already too long so I will save those for another day. As always, I hope that everything is going well at home and I miss you all!

-Ben

Hong Kong and Bali

Hello my Fellow Americans,

I hope all is well back in the US of A or wherever you might be. Last time I left you I was on my way into Hong Kong for a little East meets West action. Hong Kong did not disappoint. As much as I enjoyed my time in China; Hong Kong had two major advantages. One, the weather didn't feel like I was on an Antarctic expedition. Two, I was guaranteed a toilet that I could sit on when I walked into a bathroom, instead of the "will it be a hole in the ground or a toilet" gamble I took every time I walked into a bathroom in China. Toilets are a big plus for any city.

Probably the coolest thing about Hong Kong though was it's skyline. It was incredible. Hong Kong is an island so the city itself sits right on the water. When you combine that with its modern skyline, mountainous background, and tropical foliage it makes for a view that is pretty unforgettable.

What also makes a city super cool is when your aunt and her boyfriend fly out there to meet you and put you up in a really nice hotel with them. Thanks Ishue and Tim. A word of advice to any one out there who is thinking about doing some traveling any time soon; find someone who is probably older than you, most likely related to you, and definitely richer than you. It makes the whole experience so much better (and cheaper).

With your travel partners/financial backers:

Without them:

I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

Also there was a rugby tournament happening. I guess it was like rugby olympics or something. I don't really know. If you're reading this I'm guessing you know how much I would care about an event like that. But, I'm glad it was happening because I learned that the rest of the world likes to get just as, if not more, drunk as we do. This was evidenced by the 40 and 50 year old Australians, English, and New Zealanders who were literally falling on the ground because they were so drunk at 8:30pm. On a Wednesday. It made me feel a lot better about my own life decisions over the past 5 or 6 years. Also Tom and I weren't making asses of ourselves on the stage at Chinese night clubs until well after midnight; much more acceptable than 8:30.

Also, Big Buddha. Not a lot to say. Huge Buddha statue. Really big. Really cool.

After Hong Kong, Courtney and I flew out to Bali. A few main highlights: the monkeys, the temples, and the landscape.

We spent a few days on the beach when we got to Bali and they were great. It was really pretty, but not my favorite part.

In the middle of Bali there is a town called Ubud, which is supposed to be the heart of Balinese culture. There was definitely a lot of culture there, but more excitingly and importantly there was a monkey forest. This is supposed to be a monkey preserve to protect the native Balinese monkeys. I can honestly say that after experiencing the monkey forest, these monkeys need no protection. Not only are these monkeys vicious, but they are also mean spirited and most of them are rabid (and I'm using rabid in the most literal sense. The monkeys actually have rabies). Before you go in to the "forest" you have the option to buy bananas to feed the monkeys. I of course purchased a bag, but Courtney and her mom declined because they knew about the whole monkey rabies thing. We walk into the "forest" and I have a bag of bananas in my hand and decide to feed one of the first monkeys I see. I hand him a banana, he grabs it from me, eats it, and then immediately comes back for more. And by come back for more, I mean he literally climbed up my leg and tried to pull the bag of bananas away from me. I fought him for a second, then he showed me his teeth, and then he tried to bite me. I let go of the bag and then the monkeys went crazy trying to gather up as many bananas as they could. The fatter monkeys were successful, the baby monkeys literally got grabbed by their tails and tossed out of the way. I'm glad I that I dropped the bag because we met a guy on our way out who didn't drop the bag last time he was at the monkey forest and got bit. He had to go to the hospital to be treated for rabies.

Another thing Bali is famous for is its temples. It literally has thousands of temples because every family has at least one temple in their house and every village has their own temple and then there are also public temples. It's kind of out of control. All the temples are for different gods with the main gods being Shiva, Vishnu, and Brahma. The Balinese hindus believe that the gods should be treated like people so they cover the statues in cloth for clothes, make offerings of food to them on a daily basis (multiple times a day actually), and even put umbrellas over some of them to shield them from the sun.

The craziest thing though is the offerings. They are EVERYWHERE. In the front of every car, in front of every store and restaurant, in hotels, on the sidewalk. You honestly can't walk more then 10 feet on any street in Bali without almost stepping on an offering. The women make the offerings every day and have to make a basket out of palm leaves and then fill it with flowers and rice and other goodies. It wasn't uncommon to see a women with 7 or 8 offerings in her hands as she made the rounds and deposited them at all of the appropriate places in her house or place of work. I may not be the best Catholic, but I can tell you for sure that I will not becoming a Balinese Hindu any time soon. If for no other reason, than solely because it is an insane amount of work. Offerings and prayers morning, noon, and night. For anyone who has ever complained about having to go to church on Sunday, come to Bali and I promise you'll never complain again.

After Bali, we spent a week on Gili Trawangan Island in Indonesia and then flew into Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia yesterday. We should be here about two weeks and plan on doing a little bit of jungle trekking. I won't take a month to update next time, but Gili's internet was almost nonexistent. Anyway, I miss you all and hope to talk to you soon!

-Ben

P. S. if anyone wants to skype, my skype name is benjamin.t.conway