Sabaidee! The last couple of days in Luang Prabang have been full of amazing activities. Yamil and I decided to take a half day elephant tour. We took a minibus out to the "elephant village" about 30 minutes away from town. All of the elephants are former working elephants, mostly from the logging industry. They now live a much more comfortable life, giving people rides through the jungle and allowing people to feed and bathe them. Sure beats the dangerous hauling of logs from the jungle...Since the elephants cannot be feasibly re-introduced back into the wild after they have been trained, I fully support the efforts of the "village". At first we headed into the jungle on a bench perched on a saddle on our elephants back. You are up so high that you can see ... read more

Well things have remained interesting in the last couple of days. After writing my last blog I did indeed get my Laos herbal massage. It was a mix of stretching, aromatherapy, chiropractor, massaging, and placing bags of hot herbs over my body. Obviously enjoyable. Then I had one of the most romantic dinners of my life....by myself. Picture a little french bistro overlooking a fountain in central Vientiane with light French music in the background. One of the better oven-baked thin crust pizzas I've ever had too. The next morning I took the bus up to Vang Vieng about 4 hours away. Vang Vieng is a tourist stop for multiple reasons. The first night I got in a sweatily (I was carrying all of my things) found the first guesthouse that had one bed. When I'm ... read more

Our next day was an unexpected surprise. Kyle had met what he described to be a very friendly Cambodian the day before in an internet cafe. He said he was between jobs and would love to show us around if we wanted. He didn't want any payment, just our company. When Kyle told me I was skeptical at first. You're never sure with certain scams etc. in SE Asia. Kyle had gotten his phone number so that morning we gave him a call. The girls wanted to have a shopping day around Siem Reap so we split up. Our Cambodian friend met us fairly quickly and I instantly knew how harmless and nice he was. His name was Sambath (pronounced samebaht) and he had a huge smile on his face from the moment we met him. ... read more

Mount Kinabalu So last I left off I was heading, pantless, towards Mount Kinabalu. The mountain dominates the landscape and, at just over 4,000 m tall, is the tallest mountain in SE Asia. I, along with my travel mates, had certainly never climbed a mountain that high, but we thought we would give it a try. The hike consists of two parts, a 6km trek to Laban Rata where the guest houses are and a 2.7 km jaunt up to the peak that is usually done the next morning in the dark to reach the top for sunrise. I have certainly hiked more than 8.7 km before but never with such an elevation change. The base is at roughly 2,000 metres, so that doubles in a very short period of time. Mount Kinabalu is known for ... read more

Hello again! I last left off having just returned to Penang from Pulau Redang and getting nice and cozy again in our Hotel Vistana. Unfortunately, the work had just begun (we are in school after all). The first thing to finish was the paper and corresponding powerpoint presentation. My topic was the Malayan tapir (Tapirus indicus), a peculiar rhinoceros/horse relative that lives in the jungles of Malaysia. I won't get into it now but needless to say an interesting topic for me. The biggest issue with writing the paper was internet and computer access. The USM campus was a short ways away but was not all that convenient, so we stayed around the hotel. My computer decided that it will only charge when it is off and will only hold about 1 hour of time when ... read more