http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Amanda-and-Griffin-Schutt/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Amanda and Griffin Schutt en-us Sat, 28 Nov 2009 06:04:25 +0000 Sat, 28 Nov 2009 06:04:25 +0000 Around the time I was born American troops pulled out of Vietnam. After loosing a war that was never officially a war our military came home heavyhearted with images in their mind's eye that are too treacherous for many of them to talk about even today. The Vietnamese were left to fix their broken hearts broken families and broken country. They're gonna hate us was our thought as we prep http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Vietnam/Mekong-River-Delta/blog-106834.html After over nine months of being on the road two fatherly arms wrapped around me in a familiar embrace. We had spent two days in Bangkok hopped on a bus and then a ferry to finally get us to the island of Koh Samui off the east coast of Thailand where my dad and his girlfriend Rebecca were waiting to welcome us to their adopted country. The two live half of their lives wallowing in the wonders http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Thailand/blog-103283.html Well folks for reasons you will read below we have no photos to go with this piece but thanks to some of our fellow bloggers who are much more talented with the camera anyhow you can still see this amazing city for yourselves. Click here for great Varanasi photos and then... Click here for more great shots After leaving Kaza and realizing that the experience had changed our lives forever http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Rajasthan/Jodhpur/blog-96587.html I thought we were going to a staff meeting. Griff and I had been volunteering at a school in Manali a town in northern India laying at the foothills of the Himalayan Mountains. When the Assistant Principal asked Griff and I to join her for a meeting that Tuesday night we accepted and expected to see the innerworkings of an Indian school staff meeting. We met in a small apartment near the school http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Himachal-Pradesh/blog-91900.html Super Deluxe. This is the label that they have slapped onto our hotel room in Manali India. Call it being spoiled call it being American but the term Super Deluxe conjured up in my mind something wonderful something spacious something unforgettable. Okay one out of three aint bad this place is at least unforgettable. A black pinlegged spider ran across my arm last night right before http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/Himachal-Pradesh/blog-82128.html It is the one place we'd be traveling that I had been to before. I was twenty years old fresh out of teenhood and ready to see the land of spice and color that I knew so little about. Everything in the country was new and exotic and different to me. The green of the rice fields was the lushest I had ever seen. The monsoons that swept across the fields and villages was thrilling. The clothing an http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/India/National-Capital-Territory/New-Delhi/blog-82124.html Istanbul the capitol of Turkey. A city unique in that it straddles two continents Asia and Europe. We arrived in Istanbul on a bus that entered a bus station big enough to be a city on its own. Our bus went through tunnels garages wound around corners and then lurched to a halt. How were we going to find our way out of the bus station much less to our apartment We immediately started ask http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Turkey/Marmara/Istanbul/blog-84491.html What We Know About MuslimsWhat would you say if I had told you that we would be traveling to a country with a 95 Muslim population The borders of this country are shared by Iran Iraq Syria Georgia and Azerbyjon. Would you have been nervous Scared Afraid that we would be victims of terrorism Would you have advised us against going The truth of the matter is that before coming into Tur http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Turkey/blog-79929.html Mandy and I first came into Peru on a colorfully panited and smelling bus from Bolivia. Puno was the first city we were stopping at and the place we were going to use as a base to explore a few islands in Lake Titikaka. This place immediately began to form our imppression of Peru. There was amazing things to see here but we needed to be much more careful as travelers. With little http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/blog-79926.html I am at a beach in Karpathos Greece. Sitting on my rented beach chair with my calloused feet hanging over the side. The tiny gold pebbles chip away at the poor paint job on my toes an attempt to cover up six months of travel dust. Overhead hangs a blue sky exactly the type you would imagine present in Greece and in front of me the Aegean waves rejoice that they have met their destiny a http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Greece/Thessaly/Meteora/blog-76488.html Well here they are the answers to the questions that you might have about our travels I actually wrote out the answers but Griff and I went over each one together so they are from the mouth and heart of both of us. And now the answers to your questionshellipHi Mandy and Griff My question is Are your travels causing you to be more thankful for the comforts and conveniences of American life http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/blog-77964.html This entry is a continuation of More Than S'mores and Kumbaya a journal that I kept during our week at a camp for Romanian orphans. Before reading this entry please make sure to read what preceds.WEDNESDAY For some reason the day seemed really long which 305s odd because I managed to keep myself busy for most of 305t. I have gotten to know the Amer305can Team a l305ttle better and http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Romania/blog-79052.html I was go305ng to wr305te about our week at a k305d's camp in Romania a la Hello Mudda Hello Fadda. The entry was already started 305n my m305nd 305t was go305ng to be a sort of letter home full of the funny th305ngs k305ds do and say. It was go305ng to capitalize on the campy aspects of our experience th305ngs l305ke bunk beds and funny food... but then http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Romania/blog-76518.html Hello to those who are actually READING th305s stuff I love that though we have been away for a half of a year people st305ll care about what has been heppen305ng 305n our l305ves. I am sorta beh305nd on post305ng the blogs 305 have them wr305tten just not entered 305nto the computer yet. It has been more d305ff305cult than expected to f305nd cheap 30 http://www.travelblog.org/Middle-East/Turkey/Marmara/Istanbul/blog-77818.html Today I have a date with a man whose kiss is so tender that he has made himself known all over the world. His kiss is so passionate that none can come close to its beauty though many have tried. I have donned my only skirt and smoothed my lips with gloss. I am ready for his kiss. I am ready to see the art of Gustav Klimt. It was Griff's suggestion who would have thought We had not planned t http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Czech-Republic/blog-71109.html Our last moments in Spain were spent waiting out our time between the bus dropoff in Madrid and our plane to Prague. We sat at a park across from the Prado Museum and watched a middle aged man with redrimmed glasses eating a broken coconut like a chipmunk. After every few mouthfulls he would let out a chuckle that made his shoulders shake. We watched him from a park bench in a small http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Spain/blog-65868.html Please note that the photos in this entry are extremely poor. Our camera was being repaired and we used a disposable which obviously had problems as well. I think they will do the job though and it will give you a better idea of the poor lighting conditions that the doctors were working under....read on... During my preteenyears I was what some would call...well...homely. My par http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Lima/blog-66797.html We woke for the sunrise but it wasn't the sun that we wanted to see it was what the sun was illuminating. With our backs to the heat we watched the city awaken. The cold dark stones slowly warmed into a living city. The slabs of rocks evolved into living rooms bedrooms an empire. Silence was broken only by the waking birds and the grazing llamas eating their breakfast of grass grown in a http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Cusco/Machu-Picchu/blog-62461.html The other night while sharing a Cusquea with Mandy over dinner in Cusco I began to go on and on about the political affairs of Bolivia. Then it may have been the elevation but Mandy convinced me that I should give some kind of a political update on the countries that we visit. I donrsquot know how well this will work for every country but after spending six weeks in Bolivia I ha http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Bolivia/blog-60039.html Her name was Lola. She was a showgirl... Ahhhh How I love Barry Manilow writer of the songs that make the young girls sing My sister and I used to sing this tune often especially when we both were serving our time as waitresses in a Seattle based Bolivian restaurant called none other than Copacabana. After delivering thousands of plates filled with Pollo Saltado and clarifying countles http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Bolivia/La-Paz-Department/Copacabana/blog-59394.html