LAtrain
Lauren Allain Joined: January 6th 2009
Logged in: February 15th 2012
Logged in: February 15th 2012
Travel Blog Posts
Christmas and New Years at MBK, one of Bangkok
Yep! Merry Christmas on January 30! Since we arrive on January 9 most of the Christmas and New Year decorations have remained up. Bob has photographed almost every decoration we've noticed so we can share here although they're so numerous sometimes I forget that it would be strange to see those decorations still up in America and we pass by without thinking twice about it. This is actually one of the things I was looking forward to most with arriving in January. I'm a huge sucker for anything related to Christmas – decorations, lights, trees, Christmas songs, candy, snow and on and on. Most malls here in Bangkok get decked out for any holiday, which is where we've seen most of the decorations. Along with that, some are still playing Christmas songs. White Christmas was playing ... read more
The world according to Legos
Sixlets. I forgot to pack the Sixlets I got in my Christmas stocking. Seventeen hours in the air en route to Bangkok gave me a lot of time to think of what I forgot to pack for this next adventure. Seventeen hours also proved to be enough time for me to come up with the theory that long-haul flights should have a “traveling with children” section of the plane. The perhaps three-year-old boy behind me was either not feeling good or very, very tired but not sleeping for what felt like an eternity. Not that I blame him – it's a long time to sit. However, it severely disrupted my enjoyment of the flight. To recap for those who don't know Bob and I have arrive in Bangkok to attend graduate school. After a 15-month program ... read more
Wat Pho
Seven months ago we said our goodbyes and set off for our second Asian adventure. Two weeks prior to departure I packed up my life and wondered if leaving was the right decision. I was nervous and scared. Despite knowing I'd be back, it was tough to uproot everything about my life. Now I find myself in Bangkok doing the same thing. We fly home in two weeks, and I'm anxious and excited as well as terrified and nervous. Just like leaving home, leaving my life in Bangkok is tough and it's even tougher to say goodbye to my friends here, in the same way that it's tough to say goodbye to friends back home. We're heading back to Seattle for an unknown amount of time with an unknown plan for the future. We may settle ... read more
Borneo
My grandpa died on Wednesday. He died peacefully in his home in a suburb of Boston. I wasn't there. I was in my apartment in Bangkok; some 8000 miles away from him. Months ago I got word he was sick again. We had no real guesses of how much longer he had. I weighed my options. Should I fly to Boston to see him once more? Should I continue traveling? Should I head to Boston when things seem to be declining? Or do I just continue on and not leave Asia at all? I decided on the last option; to continue on traveling. I wasn't there when he died, and I won't be at the funeral. I wish I had been there for both. It's upsetting to be so far away from family right now. We're ... read more
Life in Bangkok - not bad
I never realized how tough it is to run with a 30-pound backpack on until we found ourselves in the LCCT in Kuala Lumpur desperate to get out of Malaysia and back to the comforts of Bangkok. We were running because I had booked us a flight from Miri to Kuala Lumpur and then KL to Bangkok with a layover time of 60 minutes. When I booked the tiny layover time, I hadn't been to the LCCT before. After experiencing the LCCT for 12 hours and having the immigration officer take a nap on me, I realized I had made a fatal mistake. Getting off of one plane, through immigration, checking in for the second leg, then back through security and immigration and onto another plane in 60 minutes seemed impossible. So we ran. I used ... read more
Gunung Mulu National Park entrance
Mulu was like a bad summer camp; the one where you count down the days until your parents come pick you up but hope they telepathically know you're hating it and come pick you up early. Maybe that was just my experience with summer camp but Mulu was an insane test of endurance, which I defeated without grace and and many streams of mean, unrepeatable words. Gunung Mulu is possibly Borneo's most well-recognized national park so I was excited to go. Watch the “caves” episode of Planet Earth and you'll see a lot of shots from Mulu including the black ribbon of bats leaving the world's largest cave cavern for the night in search for food. Sadly what we found at Mulu was a expensive tourist trap in a resort town. We saw some cool caves ... read more
Beach stroll
We gave the bus driver two ringets (Malaysian currency). He said the price had changed to three ringets. This is the way traveling in Malaysia works; read one thing, plan according to what you read, come to find out what you read is outdated or untrue. The difference between two and three ringets is about 30 cents so it wasn't a big deal but when stuff like that happens over and over and over on a bigger scale (like buses no longer operate at all or on a different schedule than they did yesterday) it gets to be a bit (or a lot) trying and frustrating. We paid three ringets and boarded the city bus for a half hour ride to Bako National Park which naturally ended up being an hour-long bus ride. The next step ... read more
Rainforest World Music Festival
We stood in mud that smelled like elephant dung for hours on end the other night. Our clothes are speckled with dried, red mud. Our feet are just now fading from the red mud dying them a jaundice color. It was all worth it though to experience the Rainforest World Music Festival. Held annually in Kuching, the festival was incredible, despite the standing area in front of the stage being a mud pit that stunk like so much elephant poop. The mud actually ended up being pretty fun to stomp around in. The festival takes place over three days with workshops during the day followed by six main-stage performers in the evening. It's held at the Sarawak Cultural Village where they have replicas of longhouses that the local tribes live in. We arrived early to check ... read more
Must have known all the cameras were out!
On Monday morning, we boarded the run down public bus headed for the Semenggoh Nature Reserve. The park opened over 20 years ago and serves as a rehabilitation center for young ornag utans who have been orpahned or rescued from captivity. The program aims to teach these orang utans how to survive in the wild. Semenggoh keeps the orang utans in semi-captivity, meaning that they are free to roam the surrounding forests but have the option to come back to headquarters for a free and easy meal twice a day. Because of this, visitors are advised to visit during feeding times but are not guaranteed to see any animals. When the surrounding trees are fruiting the odds of seeing an orang utan come to the feeding platform drop significantly. In all reality, we should be happy ... read more
Jungle across the river from Kuching
Kuala Lumpur was a bit like a bar of Hershey's chocolate. Stuff it between a two graham crackers and a toasted marshmallow and it'll do the job, but it's not great chocolate by any standards. Kuching, on the other hand is like the most delicious hand-crafted truffle. I love it here. It has small-town charm and the mystique that surrounds the jungle being just a few kilometers away. As we took the one and a half hour flight here from Kuala Lumpur I couldn't help but think that we were going on an Indiana Jones type adventure. We usually fly by the seat of our pants and don't book reservations beforehand. It's worked every time up until Kuching. Unknowingly, we arrived here along with 6,000 Hash House Harriers from all over the world. We managed to ... read more
