Erin Marie Boyer

I am in hell. After coming from the paradise of Cambodia and I must have used all my good traveling luck. I hope I get some back. Let me start over. Yesterday morning Dy took me to the National Cambodia Museum, which was incredibly interesting and I learned a lot about the Buddhist and Hindu religions in Cambodia. We then went to a restaurant made of of several rows of bamboo and straw huts with hammocks. You lay around and order food ($4 for two meals and a soda) and we did just that for about an hour an a half. He took me to one more temple, then back to the hostel to take a shower (they let me use an open room so I could shower for no charge) then off to the airport. ... read more

I love traveling. No. I LOVE traveling. From the moment a trip idea materializes in my brain until the moment I step off the return flight home. I love the planning, debating, talking, and reading about it. I even love paying for airline tickets, hotel rooms and new backpacks. There’s nothing like throwing the bare essentials into a bag, getting on an airplane and knowing you are about to have the experience of a lifetime; good OR bad. Nov. 13 Well, I’m in Siem Reap, Cambodia, and so far it’s all good. The moment I stepped off the plane and onto the tarmac I was overwhelmed with humidity, a bug up my nose and the majestic quality of the airport. It was all of one building, lit up like a tiki bar. Once inside you pay ... read more

There are so many people in China that retirement for men is mandatory at 55 and at 50 for women. So what do the Chinese do? Go to an old folks home, become reclusive and moan that no one visits? Nope. Instead, they become fully sociable, joining clubs, taking up hobbies, singing and playing games. And the place to do it all is the Temple of Heaven. Here they dance, play hackey-sack, sing in large choruses or solo, twirl ribbons, create music on Chinese stringed instruments alone or wind instruments in bands, play badminton and cards. Throughout the sprawling and well kept Temple of Heaven grounds (no one walks on the grass so its always perfect) groups gather according to what they want to do. The air is filled with music from radios, choruses and bands. ... read more

Well, we decided to give it one more shot and visit China. For those of you who are avid "Erin and Daniel" blog readers you are probably thinking, "But Erin! You were deported last time you were in that god-foresaken country! Why on Earth would you want to return?" I might say, "I wanted to bring a little bit of American democracy to those freedom deprived peoples during our Independence weekend." But really, one of my goals is to visit all the World Wonders and the Great Wall happens to be one of them. So we booked a (cheap!!) four-day tour through MWR and off we went. (For $600 p/person the entire trip was covered- air, hotel, transportation, visas, food, entrance to sites, theater.) After dropping the puppies off with my friend, Shawna, we drove to ... read more

For those of you who don't know, I made the very difficult decision to quit the teaching job I love and accept a position as a career counselor, a contracting job with the Army. The U.S. economy is having a worldwide affect, and Korea's economy took a sharp downturn about 5 months ago. The Korean dollar is worth about 30% less than when I arrived. Therefore, I needed to earn U.S. dollars. Sounds easy enough but visa laws are pretty strict. I've been jumping through hoops for a week, and one of the thing I needed to do was leave the country. Dan and I went to Tokyo last May and I vowed I would see more of Japan. So here I am. March 15 I arrived at Kansai International Airport after a 90 minute flight. ... read more