Merry Christmas Vietnam

Vietnam won some Asian soccer cup and HCMC went crazy. The funny thing is, on a world level Vietnam is as close to the bottom as you can get without actually hitting it. Anyways, this event coincided with Christmas Eve so there was tacky tinsel and lights up everywhere as half the city filled the streets chanting VI ET NAM over and over again all while waving giant Vietnamese flags. We took to the streets to watch the mayhem, chant along with the crowd as well as spray and get sprayed by cans of foam everyone was selling on the street. Next thing I know we are eating Pho, a traditional Vietnamese soup, at 4am from some street vendor. A Christmas to remember for sure.

Killing Fields

Mass graves where the bodies were dumped and DDT was poured over them to cut down on the smell of thousands of rotting human bodies.

Over 8000 skulls were recovered and put on display of the hundreds of thousands killed here at the Choeung Ek Killing Fields.

Yesterday was one of those days spent immersed in culture and history instead of white sand and surfboards. The killing fields, where the Khmer Rouge bused hundreds of thousands of Cambodians from all over the nation to be killed in mass graves, are only about 10 clicks outside of the capital of Phnom Penh. As we hop in our tuk tuk and head out everyone is smiling and waving as we pass by through the city, I wonder how such seemingly happy people could smile so much with such a horrendous past. It was a mere thirty years ago that the Khmer Rouge savagely executed close to 2 million Cambodians at a time when Cambodia only numbered about 8 million. These people were imprisoned then executed for reasons that are still unclear to so many. The feeling of seeing mass graves with bits of bones and clothes still in them will stay we me forever and to think the people of Cambodia live each day knowing someone involved, whether executed or executioner. I am not sure what else to say except it makes whatever problems I have in my life seem so trivial compared to such atrocities like this and so many others that have happened and continue to happen.

Phnom Penh

Tuk Tuk drivers taking a little mid day siesta.

Rice terraces growing in the hills of Indonesia.

Indonesia...

It really is a vacation from all our vacations. Beautiful beaches, great diving and greenery everywhere.

Here's Anna with her new best friends. Well at least the two on the right, I think the one on the left called her a whore in Indonesian.

And here I am at one of the most amazing beaches, Gili Trawangan. White sand beaches, amazing sunsets, and mountains all around, can't get much better than that.

Here is the jellyfish that stung my camera and rendered it useless only a few days ago. Those things are more agile than they look...wait, that's not what happened at all. My camera was supposed to be waterproof, but no, what they actually meant by waterproof is don't take it in the water. Now Olympus is going to get a strongly worded email about their products...oh well, i guess it's just money. At least it didn't erase my memory card.

Gili Islands

Who would have thought we would leave India suddenly and land ourselves in a tropical paradise with true white sand beaches and water so many shades of blue you can't help but to be entranced in its splendor? But we did, and everything happens for a reason, right? From here on out it's about experience the natural wonders of the SE Asia, a little different from the cultural wonders of India. We just finished our scuba diving open water course and now we can finally relax on this amazing island. While we were having fun diving everyday at least once, it was tiring watching all those boring videos and actually doing homework when you can see one of the most amazing beaches only a few feet away. Both of us are glad we can call ourselves dive masters now, or at least we can call ourselves certified. Today is going to be a day to relax and recover from three days of the 9 to 5 schedule. I guess even vacation can be grueling.

Scuba

Today is our last day of our open water scuba course. So far we have seen a number of amazing devil rays, tropical fish of all sorts, and one huge manta ray. I have a good feeling about a shark sighting today, but we'll see. Until I get a little more time to blog, this will have to do. Now it's off to class.

Bali

We made it safely from one terror ridden country to another - Bali! No wait that's unfair to say; terror happens all over the world from London to Spain to the US to India to Bali almost everywhere, so we went from one amazing location to another. We met up with some friends out here and plan on renting a car and touring the island a little. It's beautiful here and we have barely scratched the surface. Our plan is to surf, scuba, and enjoy the beaches. So I think I am going to get on that starting now.