I head out to Ministry of Sound and yes I did already mention that but I will track back a bit. After having a long night out with Rohan and listening and dancing to some great tunes, I get back home at roughly 8:30am. We both had to wait for the early train at 7am and that is an experience for yourself. Kind of like walking home from kings cross to the station after a big night out on stuff and seeing people walking their dogs and going for morning runs. That kind of bad. Hence breaking my number one rule to be back in bed before the sun comes up.
I finally jump into bed and think to myself OMFG!!!!! soo good to be in bed when I hear keys at the front door. A minute later Iax is shouting out "Hey, wake up stop sleeping in you lazy ****". I get up and straight away I say " sleeping in??? what no, I just went to bed. I was out at Ministry of Sound all night" he cracks up laughing calling me a crazy bastard and all that. This was the start of a lot of drunken party nights soon to come.
But without divulging into the partying side of my London lifestyle there is a more dominant side at the moment which is the domestication side. We (both Iax and myself) are quite domesticated, cooking really nice dinners during the week from Roast turkey and pork, spaghetti and chicken katsu-don curry. Hmm :D so I thought I would add this vid to show you all the softer kinder most awesomeness cooking side of us both. Cheers
I ended up back in Sultanamhet while I waited 1 day for my flight. I thought id have a quiet night in and then while editing my blog for your viewing pleasure in walks Drew!! "Hey your back, come join us were having beers outside" big smile wipes across my grin. "well certainly sir, I have to finish up this bit of editing im doing for all my gracious fans out there first though"…(see how I so easily put the love and devotion of my fans out there before random strangers and beer, but of course). And so I finished up my editing and relocated to the table of lots of beer.
I wake up early, because my flight at lunch time is a international flight, and it takes 2 hours to get to the airport (the asian side one) and lo and behold I experience my first day of rain since leaving Australia (first rain since those 3 days straight at Kakadu). I meet on the way some cool british people who also enjoy travelling.
Getting through Luton was a breeze with some assistance from some new friends and then I finally make the trek to Iax's place over in Hanger Lane.
I cant really get into too much details because not much really happened. I caught up on a lot of rest, watched some TV and some movies. Participated in the post move ritual I call whaling, which involves me sitting at home resting and putting on weight. I did lose light 15 kg since travelling and am roughly around 71kg atm so I wanna get a little bit more weight put on and be close to that magical 75kg mark.
I began the whole process of looking for work :(boo): and trying to figure out where the hell I wanna live. Still trying to do both FYI, and overall get a feel of the place and see if I want to stay here for a extended period of time.
A few highlights were going out to have lunch with Rohan and Phil and heading out to Ministry of Sound. I know that sounds like a perfect blog video moment, and yes it probably was. Not that I could have said much about it because the noise was so loud and I was in no shape to do a blog, but also because I idiotically forgot to bring my camera. *Cheshmonkey now proceeds to forehead slaps himself.
But as I get into the groove of the whole place I think I am starting to like it. It certainly has become more lively now that Iax is here and we mix the week up between partying and cooking dinners. :)
After Gallipoli it was a long sleepy bus ride back to Sultanamhet. We got back in and after a quick unpack decided on a late beer then a good nights rest. We all deserved it. Actually the best part was the warm shower. Sooo good after that cold night out on the beach. I met up with Rosco and Ritchie and a few of the boys and last I saw Rosco he was ready for a night out in Taksim and a Yager Bomb. When I woke up in the morning my good friend at the hostel started telling me how my friend who I was drinking with last night had broken both of his arms. It could only be Rosco I though.
What had happened was they had a few Yager bombs and a few drinks. and he climbed up some ruined building, grabbed a bit of wood sticking out which then broke and he fell 3 floors and used his hands to stop him from hitting the ground. Hence two broken arms. He and Ritchie had to head back to Australia to get operated on.etc
I spent that day walking around and sleeping, catching up on some much needed rest. I eventually made my way over to Red Apple where Tom was staying and found him upstairs playing cards. "Asshole" was the game, very much the same as Big2 or 13 but with a interesting 7 forcing you to play a lower card. Good Game.
We drank there with Kimmy and Teddy ??? and Zara and her girls. Her friend Bronwyn I found was from canberra and friends with my cousin Amy. Wtf. small world. We played asshole al night while drinking a lot of Efes while smoking shish-a. We had such a great night. Jimmy came eventually and joined in the fun. The bar staff who they had nicknamed as beer god, told us he'd take us out to Taksim so as it was nearing midnight we all got into cars and cabs and made our way down to the party central of Istanbul.
From here on out it gets a little messy and all that I can say is that we ended up in 3 or maybe 4 different clubs, one of which I almost lost everyone because it had like 10 levels all of which were empty. Like Groundhog day. We ended up at this one club and a cute little brunette girl kept coming up and dancing with me. I though Awesome, and danced back, then from out of no where her friend would just in between us with her arms out wailing STOP!!! Just as if you were trying to stop a car on the road from running someone over, and then her male friend (who was just staring at us while dancing like studying) would pul the cute girl away. HAHAHAHA awesome.
I partied in Sultanamhet then ventured down south on a Boat Cruise. The people I travelled down with, Xavier, Chris and Meaghan were also doing something similar to me and Kimmy from the previous night was to but she was on a different bus. The plan was to go to Olympus and head to the Treehouse Village for the night before going and partying on the boats. On the way down I found out there was apparently a singles cruise and a couples cruise. The tree houses were cool but not really tree houses more just wooden cabins stacked on each other, and when I got on a different minivan to the other 3 I soon realised I was on the couples boat. :(
It was ok actually in the end. Being on the couples boat meant that I literally didn't have to worry about trying to pick up or get really drunk and it ended up being a good time to relax and enjoy travelling the south coast of Turkey. The one thing that I am proud about was that I wasn't sea sick the whole time. Well I had moments of dizziness but I wasn't sick. The 2nd night I went to bed early because I ate too much food. soo good. Then when I woke up 3 people had been sick because of the rocking of the boat. Lucky me I thought as 1 couple (who were really nice) had to get off because it was too bad.
I had a lot of fun just diving off the boat into 20m water but it was just a little cold. I managed to swim with Matty to the beach one day which was about 300 meters. I thought back to my scuba diving initiative and how I struggled soo much with swimming the 200 meters in the pool. This was the ocean though and I was freezing, the water was so crystal clear and the buoyancy was unbelievable. But the 300m to the beach and back again was easily the furthest I have ever swum. But it felt really good to do.
The most notable thing is that I learnt how to play backgammon on this boat cruise. great game.
I woke up the next day feeling pretty relaxed and really just wanted to chill out a bit. My body was still climatising to the weather as it was easily 15 degrees cooler here then in Thailand. So I awoke around 11am and looked around and saw that my entire dorm. all 36 beds were empty. All the guys I hung out with last night all were leaving at midday and I was all of a sudden hit with a realisation that maybe, just maybe I had read the email wrong on my tour booking. I knew that the time said 12:00 but I wasn't sure if it was midday or midnight.
I got my lappie out, went up to reception and checked my booking email. Yep I had misread it completely. It clearly stated picked up 12:00, then followed by 14:00 stop in for quick meal break.!!!!! doh FML. it was now 11:25 and I had less then an hour to pack all my stuff back into my bag and get my self ready for Gallipoli. I went back to my room and OMFG all my stuff was everywhere. To this day that is the quickest I have ever packed my bag.
After a quick rush and dropping my bigger bag off in the storage at the Orient and another reorganising of things that I need I ran across the road to New Backpackers where I had to wait for my pickup. Here I ran into Maxine and Paul again from last night and while we waited Tom showed up. Another Aussie that would continue partying with me for the next couple of days. Tom had just finished a Top Deck tour of europe. Once on the bus we met Drew, another Aussie who had literally just came over from a few months in South America. (Mental Note: do South America trip :D)
We kept each other company over the 5 hour trip to Gallipoli and ended up at Eceabat for a few hours and waited at The Crowded House hotel who were the company who we booked the tour with. There was a time in which they let all the buses in so we cruised around Eceabat and got some local food and stocked up on supplies. At this point in time, because I hadn't prepared myself for a night out on the hill, and I was expecting to rock up at some stupid hour like 4 see the service and leave, I didnt really bring adequate clothing of materials to keep me warm. Neither did drew since he came from SA and so I didnt feel that bad but no I had to invest into something that will save my life.
After eating and seeing the miniature model of the beach and war sites we invested in some local blankets. Some of the girls from our bus also bought some and we haggled in a deal a 4 for 60 TL, 15TL each. ooh yeah. Note that this blanket surely was the best buy of the night as meat pies were 10TL. I thought I had enough as I couldnt see sleeping bags anywhere and later wish I didnt get the blanket and got a sleeping bag for 20TL, but we eventually got back on the bus and made our way to our resting place for the night. On the bus came the final member of our possie, Jimmy. A army chef who unlike the rest of us stayed in Taksim the night before rather then Sultanamhat.
Once I got to Anzac cove I was surprised over a few thing. 1. The massive stadium seating and entertainment screens/podium.lighting rigs.etc etc. It really felt like I had just come to a big day out. There were the obvious police checks for drugs and weapons and in the back of my head a memory about alcohol being banned from the celebration. fair enough too because Aussies would take it waay to far but it really was very very tame.
2. No Alcohol
3. The Fanatics / Top deck people. To say anything about Aussie pride would be sacrilegious on ANZAC day but the fanatics IMHO were all wankers.
4. How fricken cold it was
Once we were in the core of the hub of people between the two big screens and surrounded by a mass of people we soon realised that all the good spots (on the ground) were all taken. We had been let in too late and now we had to take a seat in the stands. We based ourselves to the back left of the middle sections and allocated ourselves sufficient seating for ourselves and our gear. We would have arrived around 8pm and got comfortable, then checked out the food options and toilets as you do. As the night went on the presenter would play some clips and movies all ANZAC related of course and go through some of the major events that happened during the 8 months they were camped there. Around 11pm it was time to get some rest and the cold was becoming relentless.
The blanket I had bought, along with the 2 singlets (lol) shirt, hoodie and rain coat, (only had jeans and sockets doh!) were no where near sufficient to keep me warm. The blanket was inferior to a sleeping bag because no matter how you had it wrapped around you there was always a little gap that the wind could sneak in and your body would then drop in temperature quickly. Around 11:15pm I got some sleep, laying down on the wooden boards below where our seats were. Jimmy and Tom had found some isolated place up the back to rest as me and Drew stayed and looked after the gear.
Then at 11:30pm some crazy woman start yelling from directly above my head, yelling at the whole course of people because everyone was trying to sleep and that we were taking up all the room. There was actually sufficient room she just wanted to sit in our section. It wasn't even a nice complaint, or asking anyone if they could make some room, she just started yelling in a sarcastic bitchy tone about "well if all the people here weren't taking up and the room, sleeping on the ground then maybe we can get a seat somewhere". I know that it sounds a little selfish and that sure we could have made some room for her, but at the same time she was such a bitch about it, and I was woken up by this (we all know how pissed you get when someone wakes you up, especially when its 0 degrees) but the reality is that we had to face that same problem a few hours ago. It;s not a ticketed system its a first in best dressed system. We missed out on the premium grass seats and she now misses out on the premium stadium seats. She could easily have gone and sat on the many seats to the left or right.
After that Jimmy and Thom came back and me and drew sat up. A guy behind us started arguing with her and I was relieved because I would have told her to fk'off which wouldn't have done any good other then start her arguing. Then she cam back with one of the festival guys and he had to ask us to all sit up. lol. Someone yelled out "Theres actually alot of seats at the back" and so she went up about 8 rows and well whadda know. there were alot of seats up the back. soo annoying. We ended up freezing our asses off for till around 4am when I finally just kind of collapsed on the floor and passes out for a bit. Then after half and hour the speaker told everyone to wake up for the ceremony.
Even though I was cold and freezing and ill prepared. I think that its probably the greatest respect that you can give to your fallen ancestors. They had to come out here at the same time of year with equipment that was even more inferior to our Gortex jackets and sleeping bags, under the rain of fire from Turkish machine guns nested high in the hills surrounding the beach and for them to still fight on through 8 months of hardship is amazing. One night for me to spend out there wasn't going to kill me and it would be my honor to do it again. Next time I think I will take my kids when they are like 15 or 16 and with a super duper warm sleeping bag. :D
It brought a tear to my eye being able to sing there with the many other Aussies and Kiwis the National Anthem and take pride in being Aussie. Mental note. need to learn the second half of the Anthem. oops
Song: Not original music of my creation. "Lest We Forget" please purchase if you enjoy it. cheers
Koh Phangan > Surat Thani > Bangkok > Kuala Lumpur > Istanbul = 30 Hours
Getting through customs in Turkey I would have to say is the easiest so far. Literally give passport and pay 15 Euros, stamp and your through. The line was massive but I ended up chatting to some Aussie girls which made the time pass and ended up sharing a driver into Sultanamhet saving me a good 50 euro.
I arrived in Sultanamhet literally with no place to stay. Silly me should have realised that it was ANZAC day and that the place would be booked out with Aussies and kiwis, I had checked a few days ago and there were still places so I thought I would be fine. I get in at 8am and start with a few of the places I read in the lonely planet I borrowed from the girls at the airport. Bahaus and Big Red Apple were all solidly booked out, then I moved on to Sultans and New Backpackers but still nothing. Next I headed into The Orient. No the said but they did offer me a bed on the floor if I didnt manage to find accomodation anywhere else. I thought that this had been the best offer I had so far so I chilled out there for an hour or 2 chatting away to paul and getting info on the blue cruise down south.
After 2 hours the manager offered me either a bed in the 30 dorm room or a mattress on the floor of the 24 bed dorm. I cashed in my 30 dorm bed and within a few hours I had been upgraded from homeless to having a rood above my head. nb. I highly recommend the hot apple teas you get around this area. soo good.
I decided to get breakfast and started chatting to 2 Aussie guys, Ritchie and Rosco. Both you guys on a 1 year travel trip around europe. They had also just come from Bangkok but had a extra day on me in Istanbul. The boys I planned on meeting later and after a few hours of sleep I found they had teamed up with paul who I had met earlier, damo his friend and Max the chick Paul was waiting for coming from England.
We had all set our sites on checking out the local Football match playing that night Galatasaray vs Kayserispor. Galatasaray being the local team but also the team with Aussie players Kewell and Neill playing for them. We ventured out into the night and embarked on a journey through the Istanbul tram and train system that eventually after 4 trains led us to the Telekom Stadium. You could hear the crowd so very loud outside the stadium while we walked towards the game.
We eventually got in the game and found our seats, and despite the fact that Galatasaray was coming 14th in the league, they were the local team and the fans were out. After the trains and a delay at one station we actually ended up being 25 mins late and missing the first 2 goals. Guess what the final score was 1:1. Yeah missed em.
By the time we got back to Sultanamhet it was time for one last beer and then bed. Everyone was up early the next day to go to Gallipoli.
Song: Not original music of my creation. Some FIFA song "Ole ole ole ole" please purchase if you enjoy it. cheers
Dont Det > Bangkok well where to start. Travelling from 4000 islands on Lao new year to Thailand for the Full Moon Party is just insane and intense. Nina and Sissel were staying and heading up to Vang Vieng for tubing because Nina hadn't dont it yet. So it was Richard, Cally, Alex and myself all heading to Ubon in Thailand and only Richard not heading to Bangkok.
I had prebooked my flight from Bangkok to Surat Thani and it was leaving @ 9:50am on the morning of the 17th so I needed to be there by then. When I had booked my ticket to Dont Det I asked if there wouldbe any issues going to Bangkok on this day and the guy assured me it would be fine. Dont listen prebook. The bus from Don Det was 2 hours late and so instead of arriving in Pakse at around 1:30pm we arrive there @ 3:15pm and the bus from Pakse to Bangkok was leaving @ 3:30pm. We had no money because there are no atms on the island and so we had to Tuk Tuk it to an ATM. The guy literally didnt understand what we are in a fucking hurry means and drove us miles away from an atm and dropped other people off too. We got back in time to see the full bus leave and us miss out on a ticket.
After some arguing we asked if we can hire a mini van and so the four of us and some locals all took the mini van to the border. Actually the mini van was quite nice and I was thinking at this point in time this is a good way to travel if you dont wanna be one of the masses and that I actually got to Bangkok to catch my flight. We got to the border and the Lao Kip we had taken out to pay for travel wasnt what he want and so we had to pay in Baht. :( no I had 300,000 (30AUD) worth of useless money. The Visa stamp was easy, 15 free days travel for Australians when you enter via land crossing and 30 via airports.
Then we Minivan'd it again to Ubon and minivan to ourselves this time. After we got to the Bus station we soon learnt how dismal our chances were of getting any kind of bus to Bangkok. As richard looked after our packs we found that every single bus was booked out. All the Thai people were heading back to the city after Songkram and Lao new year. Thing were not looking up. I thought hey maybe we will do the minivan thing again. There was a really nice thai girl that helped translate for us and soon we heard those magical words. "Special Seats" hmmmmm…… I thought wondered what they could be.
Special seats as they turned out were seats in the aisle. We all sat in between the other seats but they had nice fluro coloured plastic chairs for us to sit on. Other then the high premium that we were paying and the fact that we had to sit like this for 10+ hours I was quite relieved that we were on the bus and that I was going to make my flight. We left richard and Cally, Alex and myself headed on to Bangkok, laying down in the aile and going to sleep. Me and Cally decide to go halves in some Lao Valium and 8 hours later woke up in Bangkok. ooh yeah. travelling in style.
Bangkok airport > Koh Phangan I finally made it to the airport in Bangkok and found I was 3 hours early. The first thing I did was kick back into westerner mode and found myself buying a burger from Burger King. Silly mistake. It ended up being the biggest fattiest burger ive ever eaten and in the end I had about a 1/4 of the whole thing and at 6am in the morning after 2 months of Pad Thai and noodle soups it made me feel a little ill. It was also more expensive then m last 10 meals combined. Afterwards I slept in the airport across 4 chairs while I waited for my flight, waking up finding people surrounding me and my flight ready to board.
The flight was easy enough, then a bus to the ferry dock which took an hr but was ridiculously hot, lucky I brought my fan :D and then the 2 hour boat ride across to the island. This is where I met Vadim, An american russian guy who ended up teaming up with me as we ventured into the great unknown of Koh Phangan.
Total travel time (Approximately 32 hours)
Koh Phangan 17th, After finding the Dancing elephant and going through the Initiation by david the french owner, me and Vadim headed out to meet up with his friend Kim who owned a bar called seaview sunrise and her friend Kelsie who were semi working the bar there. a few drinks later and a massive discussion on what was the best film to come out since the matrix and me and Vadim decided to head off to the pool party at coral bungalows. Good times, buckets, a girl named jenny which neither me nor Vadim will go into details about but the pool ended up being quite hilarious a night, Also ran into the british guys I met in Nha trang and Vang Vieng. its a small world in the south east asia backpackers world. After the pool party we ended up at the beach and then on to the mushroom mountain where joints were 250 Baht :P way too much and alot of people getting stoned. I hung out with 2 aussie girls and stayed up to watch the sunrise. quite beautiful in reality and quite sad that that beach was being so abused by so many tourists each month.
18th. Full Moon Party Hmm well what to say. we started back down at the Seaview Sunrise and had a few drinks with the girls. I suppose we were going to hang out with them all night but Kelsie passed out around 10 and so we bailed and moved on to the bulk of the festivities. Im sure I snuck a bucket in here, and at some point I sat down and with some girls on the beach and got all painted up with gow in the dark paint. This I think went for an hour. Then Vadim convinced me to go on the fire rope at which I found really easy for the first 20 swings then thought id up the anti and start spinning ??? and ended up getting burnt on my leg. sucks balls. Then we partied for quite a while and it felt like it was getting late. Around 2-ish I think. I then thought I was really tired and left Vadim and went home, on the way home at which we called the Chicken Corner due to the chicken shop there I ran into my friends Lily, Ben and Emma from Vang Vieng. Omg finally I thought but was the worst time as I was all ready to pass out and sleep. I ended up heading back out and downing another bucket, probably the one I would regret later. Ended up shooting my blog around this time and after watching the video I realise how drunk I was. At the time I didnt think I was drunk at all and just though I was tired. hmmm, its amazing what the video camera truly reveals.
Sleep….well so I thought. the next thing I know after laying down peacefully in my dorm was me standing in the dark and spewing while holding myself up against the wall. At some point someone turned the light on and I saw the devastation I had caused. My bed was strategically located at the front of the dorm at the top of the stairs. I had somehow managed to cover the entire floor of the entrance, the top of the safety boxes (2), a small part of my bed, the bed below and some of the stairs. The worst thing is that I was still drunk and that I now had to clean up this monstrous mess. 2 hours later and with a little help from one of the girls in my dorm ??? (sorry I cant remember you very much but you were a great help) the mess was cleaned and I was ready to pass out. thanks FMP, great night, crappy morning.
19th. The surviving people managed to chill out all day watching mainly movies and catching up on the internet and FB. At night we all ventured back to mushroom mountain for a chill out session involving some pricey 500 baht mushroom shakes. I had half and pretty much just got a little happy and a little tired. me Shaunie and tom??? I think who reminded me alot of phil, headed back for food and ended up crashing out early after watching about 5 minutes of harry potter.
20th. As everyone started to some what recover we soon realised that most people were heading to Koh Tao for some kind of after party/diving and that myself and Shaunie had pre paid for 5 days at dancing elephant, a little scam to make money after the FMP, and that they're were no more boats available any how. In the end it was Shaunie and myself and about 3 other people that stayed on with a quiet eerie feeling coming through the dorm as it got quieter and quieter.
Mission: Shakes, Sunrise. very very cool start to day. Results: failed. lol. I had a great time but I think we definitely shouldnt have had that second whiskey bucket before the shakes.
22nd. Chill out day and rest, was a great day. Kinda like the calm before the storm. Little did I know that I was in for another 30hr epic travel adventure.
After deciding to leave I found that I was increasingly difficult to get tickets due to Lao new year :( I had finished work for the day and all the VIP buses were booked out to Pakse. I called Souly and she found me a palce that was going there but I couldnt book over the phone and had to drive out there, it being 10km outside the city. I managed to have a lengthy discussion with the manager of the benacams apartment and then convinced one of their workers who spoke english to drive me out there on my motorbike.
ok, so tickets booked. spent the entire next day wrapping up the final clips for SEDA and sorting out my backpack. FYI it sucks trying to repack your bag after youve had it open for 3 weeks. Then once all my stuff was done and packed I heading out to the bus stop leaving for good my fancy Vientiane apartment.
The bus ride to Pakse was quite simple. It was a VIP sleeper bus and I had to share the double bed with this old Lao guy. He was very kind and helpful when it actually came to stopping and getting off at the right stop. The bed was ok and I literally after editing for 4 days was so tired I fell asleep and woke up about 45 mins before I had to get out. The trip took 10 hours to Pakse and once I was there I booked straight away to Don Det. that took 2.5 hours and then a small river crossing to get to Don Det.
I really wasnt sure when I was travelling on the small river boat how in hell I was going to meet the girls. This was quickly solve when as the boat approached my smile lit up and I could see them waiting for me on the beach. Probably one of the most joyous occasions on my trip so far. So relieved to be reunited with friends, to be away from Vientiane and to be ready to chill out and party. The girls had already been there for a day and had found bungalows on the sunset side. We check and there was a spare and so we ended up with 3 bungalows in a row right along where the river goes by. Quite nice.
There I also me Cally who I had met previously in Nha Trang with sarah but sarah had headed home already and Alex. To my surprise richard was Richard was still with Nina but they had split apart and then reunited earlier in Siam Riep. I only had 2 nights here and so I was quite happy to chill out and hang out with the girls and enjoy the quiteness of the islands.
FYI go bycling to the waterfalls bring a Ipod and control the music at reggae bar tubing and drinking in the water. very nice here nothing like vang vieng chill out in hammocks on bungalos bring money as there is no atm on the islands. you have to travel to Pakse just to get money out.
After a bit more then a week and hearing that the girls Nina and Sissel were going to be in 4000 islands I decided that it was time and that I was a little bit over Vinetiane. I managed to buy my self a copy of "Journey to the west" which is about the monkey king and the voyage of a Buddhist monk to retrieve the original Buddhist scriptures from India and to return them to China.
Anyhow I decided to go out on friday night and wasn't looking for a real big night but while I was eating my fish and chips with beerlao @ sticky fingers I was invited to join a group of westerns that had already begun a big night of drinking. I soon found out that those westerners were all volunteer people. OMFG I had found them, the long lost volunteers of Vientiane. Most of them I found all worked in the same place a renewable energy company and were doing internships for their university degrees! unbelievable. renewable energy. It sounded like they were doing the job I wanted to do. Oh well.
My dilemma was that I had already decided to meet the girls down south and had booked tickets and started wrapping things up with work and accommodation and the like. Unbelievable, that the same day I decide to leave I finally find the other volunteers.
I had a good time with those guys that night heading to a new bar just around the corner from my house that was not only full of locals and westerners but also stayed open much later then the standard 11:30. They also had a fooseball table :) but there was one guy who just keep smashing me. apparently he played there every night. Then we headed out to Don Chan Palace again. :(
Finally getting into the bulk of the work here deciding to do a doco on the Rice Farmers with a broken water pump, + interview, mushroom farmers, + interview and the weavers of the 790 Camp, + interview.
I found that my time in Vientiane was pretty good. Its a completely different take on the travel thing that most people end up doing. ie tubing and partying a lot. Going into the whole thing I did expect to be associated with more volunteers and in the end it was jus a real close relationship with myself and Souly.
Going out and filming the farmer I thought was alot of fun, not only because I was out and about getting to meet the people and experiencing Lao culture but also because Souly is hilarious when she get on camera. I would say that she can get infront of the camera for about 5 minutes before she starts blocking up and starts losing track of what she was saying. It did make for a longer shoot but definitely a lot of more fun.
