Easter in Bali

Easter in Bali

Easter morning.  My coffee, a towel and off to find Brad who is already in the water.

A quiet morning with some locals coming in from fishing.

You'd think I'd be happy that no cooking or dishes were required of me this year, but,

I am sad to say that I could not simply embrace the decadence of no expectations and simple rest this Easter.  Unfortunately, a love for being surrounded by family and an event planner at heart along with a joy that comes from celebrating in groups, left me floundering a bit.  And of course, took Anna and Brad along for the ride.

Well, this Easter I couldn't hide behind tradition, church or family, to help me in my celebration.

I was forced to face  some wrong thinking, and I had to apologize for putting my stuff on those traveling with me.

After reflecting, prayer and processing thoughts out loud to Brad I got some takeaways.

I was reminded on a deeper level the ways wrong thinking creeps in and quickly distorts and robs me from celebrating truth.

This Easter is thankfulness on a new level for the truth and gift of and finished work of the cross.

No striving needed. No moments have to be created.

Forgiveness...  Again

Grace beyond measure.

It is finished. Complete. Freedom to express as wanted and okay that's it's where you are at.  Physically, emotionally and spiritually.

Rest.

Celebration daily....

So I am thankful for Easter 2014.

Simple truths.

Deeper reality.

I missed my other two kids and family but celebrated in moments throughout the day.

Celebrated:

The amazing life I live and gift of these travels.

The life He created around me.  Snorkelling three times today and it was outstanding!

The diversity of culture and the people here.  You can see the depth of beauty in both.

And celebrated the gift to sit back and learn.  No hiding, just being and seeing what rises up and the love for Jesus to be willing to deal with it.

An optional place to chill outside our room.

Well manicured gardens leading us to our bungalow, the pool or beach.  Serene and lovely.

I am motivated to add real plants to our home, not just the unkill-able silk kind.

Brad is thrilled!

Rinsed and ready for a new day of celebration!

Happy Easter 2014.

He is risen.

Yay!!!

Transitioning to Tropical Paradise

I can't believe that our time in South East Asia is almost done.

We have attempted to learn new languages, understand different cultures and combine history with reality to get a better glimpse of this massive world we live in.
We only peeked at, scratched the surface, dipped our toes so to say, but it was a start and I don't think it has to take much to open your eyes if you are willing to learn.
We have lost ourselves in the beauty of a sunset, and found ourselves in the smile of a child waving hello as we cycled past.

After thousands of hellos or: sà wàt di ka, sab ai dee, sua s'dei, xin chao we are off to learn our last greeting, selamat pagi along with the typical goodbyes, thank you, that was delicious, and too expensive.... Do you have a special price, I will pay.......

And when no words could be found, the universal sign language and a smile went a long way.

From baht, kip, riel, dong to rupiah.... I have been a millionaire.  But in dong you can afford to be generous, or sound generous anyway.

I have attempted conversations with taxi drivers and fellow passengers on buses with my little Thaidictionary.  I have been corrected on my pronunciation a million times by my husband and daughter and I have had moments when I just didn't care, I just wanted to say it in English, forget the being culturally sensitive,

We have met amazing people and shared stories and moments with people from Israel, Souh Africa, England, Sweden, Bulgaria, Russia, Ireland, Denmark, Belgium, Switzerland, USA, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, France, Germany, Japan and China.  It was even more fun when they would pop up over and over again. City to city. Tour site to tour site.... Yep that was Max from Canada.

Oh, the places we have seen. From cities, to obscure villages. From fishing communities to urban suburbs. From mountain tops to ocean floors. Sunset views from the top of skyscrapers to sunrises from the top of a quiet temple. Aquamarine oceans, turquoise waters, smog filled skies and lush green rice fields.

We have gone diving, swimming, kayakying, floating, biking, snorkelling and hiking,  we have walked busy streets, side streets, back lanes and alleyways.

We have travelled on sailboats, ferries big and small, long boats, arroyos,  cruise boats and boats I can't remember the name of.

We took tours  and explored and discovered and learned on our own. We stayed on the beaten track and left the beaten track.

We have biked through rice fields, farms, busy traffic and quiet back roads along the Mekong River.

We have ridden in taxis, sangtos, Tuk Tuks, cyclos, minivans, buses, bicycles  and scooters. Navigating over bumps, squeezing alongside a bus while on a scooter  when the road is 3 feet wide gives some a rush.  I tend to drive a scooter like I ski.  With caution, a fear of being injured and not a lot of trust for the other drivers out there....

We have learned to cook in Thailand and Vietnam and eaten the local food as much as possible and tried all sorts of their specialities, only indulging in an occasional burger, fries or pizza.

We have had cock roaches and rats scurry through our rooms. Seen dragonflies, snakes, ants, beetles, geckos and gorgeous butterflies galore. We have petted tigers and elephants. Learned to speak
elephant, find the place they liked to be rubbed the most and bath them.

From museum to museum and temple to temple, I have grown richer in history and deeper in appreciation for the amazing love, grace and freedom that comes from knowing Jesus.

I have been inspired by those we have met along the way. Fellow travellers, hard working homestay owners and of course Marg, who serves the children and others with love, joy and passion.

It has been a full and rich trip.  Exhausting exhilarating, enlightening and so so enjoyable.

We are now finishing up our trip in Bali. Relaxing. A holiday from the travels. We are soaking up the sun and beauty of this tropical paradise with thankfulness,  

Thankfulness for this amazing experience we have had the opportunity to do.

Thankful for the safety and health and miraculous prayers  answered when needed.

Thankful for the family and friends who said go for it.

Thankful for Renee and Brad's team at work who carried a huge workload so we could take this adventure and still saying go for it!

Thankful beyond words to have spent so much time with my precious amazing beautiful girl Anna, who is the most easy going, easy to be with person I have encountered to date.

And immensely thankful for my husband, who navigates the logistics of travel with ease, remains confident when I am nervous, pushes me when I need to be pushed, gracious with his two girls and always has my back.

I am sure they would go on and on with thankfulness for my many great virtues, but it's not their blog and it would be wrong to put words in their mouth. Fun, wonderful, outgoing ever positive..... I'm sure that would be on their list though.....

Whatever the words, thankful we are!

Off to Bali.....

Home before  we know it......

Last days in Saigon

The bike tour is done, my sore butt a faint memory.  We head back to our guest house outside Saigon's city center and, with only a couple days left, we hit the ground running to ensure that all gets done on our list.  We can't believe that our time in South East Asia is now nearly done.  There is a melancholy in the air around us.  A slight irritability with each other, coming from each of our random thoughts and emotions surrounding the end of our travels. We are excited to be close to the end as we are a little tired of each other.  We are sad to be done as we wonder if we did all that we had hoped or thought we might do/experience/learn in our months of anticipation and planning.  We anticipate routine, certain foods, missed family and friends but know it might feel like we never left all too soon on our return. We review all that we did. Our highlights. What colours we think each country is best represented by.  We own our emotions so we can finish well (okay so owned them after a bit of irritability and teary emotions).  But finish well we will!

One stop not mentioned yet was a day trip to the Cu Chi Tunnels.  Our tour guide Kim did an amazing job laying out the history of Saigon and the time line of the French Colonial occupation, the struggle between north and south, the role of the various surrounding countries  at different times and in different wars, leading up to the American/Vietnam war.  The tour  was of the amazing tunnels originally constructed by hand in the 1940's during the French occupation and expanded in the 1960's.  Up to 250 km in length it housed up to 18,000 Vietnamese during the war.  It is now a war memorial park with some tunnels reconstructed and widened allowing tourists to navigate and experience what life was like underground.  

This was a moving and disturbing tour for me.  As I hear M16's, AK 47's and light machine guns being fired off in the back ground, and as I see the horrific booby traps meant to sometimes kill or badly wound the enemy, or navigate the dark tunnels hunched over with sweat dripping down my back I am repulsed at war.  There was so much psychological warfare going on and it did not take much imagination to think what it felt like for a Nebraskan farm boy to be dropped into this jungle with never ending heat, rain and humidity and being shot at by the enemy but never being able to see them. Or to imagine being underground and be in awe at how the Cu Chi people survived malaria (2nd killer to wounds), intestinal parasites of significance, slept, ate (a very bland daily diet of a root vegetable that tastes a little like potatoes), planned attacks, healed their sick, taught their young, wed and gave birth all underground.  Imagine the hygiene and bathroom issues  and air supplies  alone...... Wow!

Our tour guide called himself a "good communist" with his father fighting for the north.  Their belief and saying is: "to have peace, you must prepare for war".  Each young person, if not going to university must join the army for 2 years  and if you go to university, you need to do a 2 month training camp and pass a test that includes how to shoot certain firearms.

First stop along the way, crafts made by the victims of Agent Orange.  Again, I refuse to photograph the horrific results of war from no hands, dwarfism, no eyes etc but did enjoy the reminder of the immense work and time it takes to make their handicraft. All by hand. Paid by the government.  You can read yourself the controversy around if the USA should have compensated these victims of war, but they didn't, and I am not going into it.

One of 8 displayed booby traps.

Anna climbing into a quick tunnel access and fortunately it has already been widened.

Air hole disguised as an ant hill.

Displays set up throughout the park.

The Viet Kong made sandals out of tires as they heard they were warrantied for 20,000 km and it also helped when their feet were in so much water.

Anna in the tunnels.

Sample of the daily diet.  Ate twice a day.

Weapons used by the US and information how the Viet Kong recycled the weapons and then used them against their enemy.

Just imagine life down here.  Only torches or oil lamps lighting your way.

Or being a tunnel rat.... Those individuals sent down to find out information about the Viet Kong.

Vietnam Water Markets

Have you seen the professional photos of the floating markets?

Gorgeous, colourful, idyllic scenes that give way to romanticizing what life might be like and makes you want to travel and soak up the image conceived in your mind. 

I've seen those photos. . I've sent my daughter a postcard of one. Part of the reason we did the bike tour was to go and experience it myself.

Reality was a little different.

Reality was better.

Reality was raw and real.

Early one morning we got on a small boat and headed for the water market on the Mekong River.

The river is brown.

Plastic bags, debris and water hyacinths float along beside you.

The homes  along the way are weathered with necessities of life cluttering their small spaces.

The boats haves stood the test of time and miles of travel,
with only a few affording the time and work of adding color.

The skies  are grey with pollution and clouds.

Boats crowd together as each family comes to sell the goods from their farm. You note what they sell by looking at what is hanging from a pole off the front of their boat.

They stay in the harbour, paying a daily fee, until their produce is gone.  Then they go back home to their farms, load up and come do it all over again.

They live in cramped quarters. Washing off the back of the boat, cooking on the boat, dumping all their waste into the water. Making sure their little toddlers don't fall off the edge.

Sometimes there were smiles, sometimes the faces just looked tired.

Rain,wind, heat.....  real life!

Vendors selling drinks, sometimes soup or sandwiches to those on the boat.

I think she's finished her shopping.  

This market is bulk buy for restaurants and those who will go back to their stalls in the market. You don't come here for your daily fruits  and veggies.

An interesting morning and so glad I came!

Mekong Delta Bike Tour

We have decided that it's time to give our feet a rest and put our butt's to the test.

Instead of navigating the maze of the Mekong Delta river ways on our own we decided to do it on bikes via a small tour group.  We picked Sihlo Bike Tours  and were led by An, a sincere gentle soul who was very purposeful in leading us onward. Or perhaps his purposefulness came from trying to help us keep up with a very fun and very fit young couple from Germany? I'm not sure.

Before we could start biking, we needed to get away from the main cities, so onto a boat we went, passing small floating shacks with cat fish farms underneath.

The tour combined stops and information along the way to give us a better sense of how the locals live, and primarily do life on this vital body of water. One such stop was at a family farm where they had a large variety of fruit trees and vegetables which is more lucrative than growing rice.  We toured their home and kitchen and got a better idea of why they layout their homes the way they do, religiously and culturally.  Their homemade banana rice wine was pretty good for home made hooch and we sampled local fruits and homemade sweet rice cakes. One of our nights was spent in a very rustic guest house on the water.  Fairly open air rooms are set up on stilts along the water's edge, and with a need to embrace all God's creatures while there, I tucked myself under the mosquito netting and refused to go to the bathroom until the sun came out.  Good thing, as Anna did see a snake peak out of the open pipes in the outdoor shared bathroom.

Functional if not glamorous.

Home away from home!

Loved the morning light and anticipation of rich Vietnamese coffee soon to come.

Gorgeous sunset as we cruise to our evening stop.

Morning light and with a little Advil, ready to get back on the bike.

Stopped  at a pottery factory for export.

All handmade, and this kiln will run 24/7 for 20 days being stoked and fed constantly with rice husks for fuel. There are 12 of these massive kilns.  The rice husk ashes will then be sold for fertilizer to the farmers. Over and over again I see and am amazed at how they use everything.  Not sure why there is so much garbage in the Mekong River then..... Mmmm?

One of the things I enjoyed most was just knowing that this was the same body of water we were on while traveling from Northern Thailand through Laos to Luang Prabang, and in only another 150km or so, this water would empty into the South China Sea.

Though there were a myriad of idyllic photo stops along the way, it just gets hard to stop and go with a group.  That and it would have taken me even longer to do one of our 60km long days.  Or perhaps the fear that if we stopped, my butt would rebel and refuse to let me get back on my bike. A couple girls duck taped towels to their seat and I know those who have biked with me before would be amazed that I embraced the pain and kept on!

Outdoor toilet. Strategically positioned over a fish hatchery. Just a little extra food and fertilizer for the fish...... Uggghhhhh!

In the outlying farms, family bury their dead on the land And bring regular sacrifice to help them in their next life.

Stopped at a Khmer temple and this new young monk (15 years old) will spend a year here in training.  Temple combines Hindu and Buddhist artifacts. He was very chatty with us and Anna, and amazed at how tall she was, especially compared to him.

Little school girls going home for lunch.

Actually, whining was not high on my list, as I loved the bike trip.  Brad gets a rush weaving in and out of busy traffic, but I so enjoyed biking under a canopy of tropical greens of palm, bamboo, and so many varieties of which I don't know the name of.  Simply gorgeous and when you passed a rice field, you literally felt a cool fresh breeze wash over you as you pass by!

Loved the many bridges and paths  weaving along the river.

What looks similar to our canoes, but called arroyos, we navigated through narrow waterways with spectacular foliage.

Small bamboo bridges to homes across the river.  They are called monkey bridges.

Again so many of the locals and children call out hello and laugh.  Why they laugh, I still don't know. Laugh because we are biking in the heat? Laugh because they just don't see many of us foreigners on the back roads? Laugh, because they are secretly making fun of us?  Not sure, but many hellos were exchanged with only a minor crash as children came out for a high five and when I tried to oblige, more came, along with a bike of two old ladies.  A minor crash with the elderly grandmas resulted in minor injuries, embarrassment (on my part) and one severe tongue lashing to the kids.....  So wish I could have understood it, but I couldn't and just sheepishly biked away to join the others.

It's 3:00 in the afternoon. Temperature 30, feels like 38... Humidity 80%.

Last haul was up a massive bridge.  Never ending steady up.  Brad is cheering me on, I am down to my lowest gear.... I made it without getting off.

Damn proud of myself, though I might have had a minor breakdown after.... Can't remember! Blocked it out so I would choose to go back out again the next day!

Yikes... My carry on isn't carry on any more....

Things have gotten a little pickier here in Vietnam.  My carry on doesn't measure up to their strict standards of carry on here, and I wonder if I will have to change my blog post title to keep myself honest?  My back pack expands and so I have been delegated to carry the trinkets and tapestry and clothes found along the way.....
Siggghhhhhh..... I am now check in girl!
No more bragging rights!
Brad, of course, still proudly states he is carry on, but then slowly became  quiet  as he listed the myriad of items belonging to him that were in my back pack!
But I shouldn't complain because we are flying instead of overnight buses and 20 hour train rides and have safely arrived in Saigon, or Ho Chi Minh city if you are any type of official or politically correct citizen.

Welcome to the city. As this was not even rush hour or the main city roundabouts, we would often jump into a taxi for hops from main sites to our hotel.

Saigon.... What does the name evoke?  This city comes with many more preconceived ideas and thoughts than north Vietnam did for me.  I think also for my history buff husband.  The interest of Vietnam history centres  around the American/Vietnam war which they definitely do not down play here. As well, the author Graham Greene (well read by my husband) and mentioned frequently amongst travellers for his book "The Quiet American" makes for some great stops of interest and the French Colonial occupation is seen in the architecture, the lovely wide side walks, and a larger than expected number of cathedrals.
Saigon is a progressive bustling large city center that carries  with it a different energy and chaos than Hanoi.  One that is more energizing than immobilizing.  Not staying in the tourist center ourselves, we see both realities.  A cosmopolitan center and the more traditional outlying areas where life is carried out on the busy streets.

We decided to pay outrageous prices for drinks to go up a feature skyscraper in the financial district for some amazing views of the city. 

Heli Bar 52 at the Bitexco Financial

There are sleek skyscrapers, commerce, culture, markets, ramshackle buildings  and an endless energy here in Saigon.  It is difficult to keep up and so we don't even try knowing that our tolerance for humidity and heat and endless noise is not that of the locals.  Finding a park, green space is a must and even better when we found one with the ever decadent Häagen Dazs ice cream right beside.  Not a Vietnam copy and so full price required! But oh so worh it!

An easy way to make Anna smile!

Our goal was to do a private walking tour with a university student or the Back Streets of Saigon tour but both were unavailable.  But in the end we found the best guide ever.
Amazing English, great insight, well read on the history, fun facts, perfect pace, all entrance fees and lunch included.  Guide let us stop and browse, shop, go into galleries... Best to date!
Hard to book, but he made an opening just for us.  To book, contact Backroads With Brad.

Stops on tour:
Reunification Palace, built 1966 as the presidential Palace and site where the communist tanks crashed through the gates April 30, 1975 and Saigon surrendered to the north.

Map and strategy room with these phones giving direct access to the White House.

Cathedral Notre Dame, built 1877-1883 and one of many churches to reflect the French Colonial occupation.

Post Office built 1935 and reminded Anna and I a bit of grand central station in New York.

French security building, a prison for Vietnamese nationalists.
Old CIA building where the last of the Americans were evacuated throughout the elevator shaft at the top of the building.

People's Committee Hall for the communist party.  Previously the city hall during French colonial times.

Liked the night time view of this very ornate  and beautiful building with its 19th century Parisian architecture.

Continental Hotel, setting for the novel, "The Quiet American" by Graham Greene.

Opera House
Mosque built 1935 by the South Indian Muslims.
Majestic Hotel where Graham Greene deemed worthy to stay while in Saigon.  It is still stunning with a starting cost of $300.00 a night and drinks a bit too high for our budget.  Especially  when we
are used to $0.25 a beer.

The classy Majestic. Old world charm kept up in style.

Beer may be cheap but fun drinks are not, so only an occasional happy hour stop after sightseeing.

Barbecue Saigon... A fun, happening chain restaurant in Saigon where you grill your own meat and the smells are so so good!

Our final main stop aside from parks, restaurants  and markets was the war reminent museum.  An extremely disturbing museum that highlights with horrific photos the reality of war and the huge affect that the chemical warfare used by the states (called Agent Orange) had on Vietnam.  Again, the museum and history is very one sided without all the facts, but in the end, the reality is that war has no winners and the devastation goes way beyond what gets rationalized among the powers that be.

I refused and just couldn't take photos of the massive display of the after  affects of chemical warfare.

The dedication to the journalists and their photos covered from their different points of view was very moving as well.