ADDICTED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I think we found ourselves a new hobby. Diving. I never really thought about it before coming to Thailand and I would have never done it just by myself – but Loes got me into it. We arrived in the south of Thailand on these little islands and they’re just packed with diving schools. Loes started talking about it, saying she really wanted to do a course. I wasn’t so sure but I went with her to get some information and then thought to myself, let’s give it a try. Apparently this is the cheapest place in the world to get your certification, so why not? It was a four day course. We spent the first day in a classroom with 4 other students and I felt like going back to school – but it was nice. On the second day we practiced some skills in shallow water and we did our first dive on the third day. Going down that deep was a little scary at the beginning but I think we were addicted as soon as we were down to 12 meters. It’s a completely different world – sounds are strange, colours are weird, there’s fish and coral all around you, and it’s just amazing. We made another dive in Mango Bay and also passed our exams that third day. Today was supposed to be the last day. We got up early in the morning and went to White rocks for the first dive. More fish – and the water was so clear! Then to Twin peaks for the last dive in the Open water course – we found Nemo! After about 40 minutes we got out of the water. Loes and me looked at each other and without words we told each other: we don’t want this to be over yet!
The boat went back to the diving resort. A guy from our course told us he’s doing the advanced course. Again we looked at each other. Maybe we should..? Yes. We found an ATM and paid for the course – starting tomorrow. Five more dives before we leave this island!

One week in Bangkok

One week in Bangkok was way too much. We stayed in the most touristy street ever – Khao San Road and decided to call it ‘Salou of southeast Asia’. It’s all about partying and it seems like people are drunk 24 hours a day. Mainly English tourists, a lot of Dutch of course – because everywhere you go you’ll meet Dutch people and sometimes I wonder if there’s really only 16 million people in our country. You’ll also see a lot of prostitutes who try to pick up western guys. It works - we’ve seen it with our own eyes.
Out of Khao San Road we went to see the Royal Palace, saw a big Buddha and some temples – and we’re already sick of Buddhas and temples. We probably saw too many of them on our previous trip. Everytime the Lonely Planet named one we followed our travel bible. This time we consider our bible not that holy anymore and stick to our own plan. We also took rides on a tuctuc and got sick of the drivers who try to take you to souvenir shops – they get commission for that. We ate street food – which is delicious – and tried scorpions, caterpillars, dragonflies and cockroaches (I’m trying to picture the look on your faces now).
Now it’s time for some tanning and island hopping. Right now we’re at Koh Pha Ngan, a small island 500 kilometres south of Bangkok. We have our own little wooden bungalow near the beach. Besides beautiful nature the island offers some great partying; we went celebrating Black moon party a few days ago and Half moon party lies ahead of us. We're planning to do a diving course as well and we've already rented a scooter for a few days to discover the island. As you can see we're not planning on coming home anytime soon!

Goodbye Nepal

Kishor, one of our Nepali friends, called our hotel early in the morning. We were checking out and ready to leave for the airport. Our Nepal adventure had - unfortunately - come to an end. But Kishor told us there was a strike and all the roads were blocked. I rushed outside to see if I could find a taxi but I didn't see any. We asked the hotel manager to call one and he came up with the same story: no taxis because of the strike. 'How do we get to the airport?' we asked him. He said there was a special tourist bus provided by the government for occassions like this and took us to the place where the bus was supposed to pick us up. But there was no bus and the manager started talking to the police. 'It's a bad day', he said. In the meanwhile rickshaw drivers surrounded us, eager to take us to the airport. That one ride would mean a day's salary at least. We didn't see any other options and stuffed ourselves and our bags into the rickshaw. The poor driver had to carry on of the backpacks on his back. The ride had just started as we saw a bus passing by. 'Tourist bus', it said. We told our driver to stop. Loes got out, ran towards the bus, came back and said the bus would go to the airport. We gave the rickshaw guy a small fee and got onto the bus. Policemen were on board to guide the tourists. On the way to the airport we saw loads of people in the streets, blocking the roads. Finally we got there and we were lucky to be in time still. Kishor was waiting for us and waved us goodbye. As the plane took off we thought of Nepal and what a great adventure it was. We met so many nice people, went to great bars with live music every night, hung out with the locals and started to feel like locals ourselves. We've seen the most beautiful nature and up in the air was another surprise: we could see Mount Everest. Now a new adventure awaits us in Thailand. Nepal, we'll miss you but we'll be back!

Pashupatinath

One of the most important places for Hindu people is the Pashupati temple in Kathmandu. It’s a pilgrim place – like Mecca for muslim people – and all Hindus should go there at least once in their lives. The temple is built near the river Bagmati, where cremation ceremonies take place 24 hours a day. Hindus believe in reincarnation and therefore their bodies must be cremated when they die. There are a few exceptions, for example babies and pregnant women. That’s because babies are too young too know what’s good or bad (karma).
Sadhu (or Baba) people are another exception: they are considered holy and can’t be cremated. It’s their own choice to become a Sadhu and by becoming one you reach Samsara, which means you leave the circle of life and death and won’t reincarnate. We saw a few Sadhu’s today. They smoke marihuana and travel around, and they’re not allowed to have sex.
When a Hindu dies the body needs to be cremated within 24 hours. The family is supposed to wear white clothes and takes care of the ceremony. First the body is carried into the water to wash the feet and face; this purifies the body. Then it’s carried to a sort of platform. Formerly they used platforms with different heights for the different castes, but not anymore. Some rituals are performed and the family takes off the clothes of the deceased: you are born naked and so you have to die naked. The platforms on which the bodies are burnt are out in the open and placed near the river because of the elements of life: fire, water, air and earth – and they’re necessary for reincarnation. We watched a few ceremonies today. It’s quite amazing – watch the pictures and see for yourself.

I’m writing blogs for another website as well: http://www.rnw.nl/nl/node/5809

Bhaktapur

We went to Bhaktapur yesterday, an ancient city 16 kilometres from Kathmandu. We decided to take a local bus instead of a taxi to save some money. Of course the driver ripped us off. On the way to Bhaktapur we had to pay 50 rupees each (which is still nothing) and on the way back it was only 16 rupees. Anyway, here are some pics of a political demonstration and of Bhaktapur, where people live the old fashioned life. When we sat down for lunch we watched an old woman hanging up laundry on the rooftop of her house.

Living the tourist life

Loes woke me around 10 o’clock. It was time to get up. Brian was leaving today, we were moving to another hostel and we had to extend our visas. I had to go to a photographer to take new photos for the visa and Loes wanted to buy Brian a little Buddha. We walked down the street into the photographers’ shop. A lady took a digital camera and placed me on a seat. It was not the kind of camera you would expect – her camera was definately much older than mine – and took one picture. ‘Good!’ she said. Five minutes later I walked out with four photos. Loes bought a Buddha after some bargaining and we walked back to the hostel to play one last game of chess before Brian left. Then all of a sudden Narayan showed up – our guide during the Annapurna trekking. We were surprised to see him. He asked when Brian would leave and said his boss, Devy, would take us to the airport. We wondered why, but agreed to walk to the office with Narayan. Devy came and called another guy, who would take us. Loes and me took our passports with us so we could extend our visas at the airport, as they would expire today. It didn’t take long to get to the airport. We realized we couldn’t go inside with Brian and had to say goodbye sooner than we expected. Our taxi driver told us we had to go the immigration office inside the airport to extend the visas. We tried, and one cop sent us to another but they wouldn’t let us in. ‘I’ll take you to the immigration office downtown’, the taxi guy said. We filled out the paper work and asked how much it would cost. We then realized we didn’t have enough money with us. To extend the visa for 7 days was more expensive than obtaining a 15-day visa. We got out of the office to find an ATM. The immigration officer told us we needed to hurry because the office was closing and we would have to pay a penalty if we didn’t fix the visas today. Of course there was no ATM to be seen anywhere near. We went to the taxi guy. ‘How much do you need?’ he asked, and gave us the money. The immigration officer told us to wait another while. Would we like some tea? ‘Sure.’ He took us to a little tea shop across the street and ordered milk tea. He told us about his family and assured us he spoke not only English but also Japanese and Italian. ‘Buongiorno!’ Then he started talking about his sister who had a really nice house, and we should definitely come there with him. Loes and me decided to agree with everything he said until we had our passports back. We drunk our tea and the immigration guy said: ‘I pay or you pay?’. So we paid and left. Finally we got our passports back. ‘You come with me now?’ We ran out of the building, back into the taxi and our driver safely took us to our hostel.

For more stories and pics, see http://loestwistedfairytale.blogspot.com

Enjoying Nepal

It feels like we've been in Kathmandu for ages, but it's such a nice city - although the pollution is pretty bad. After the trekking we've been taking it easy; reading, writing, walking around the city, taking pictures, going for drinks in one of the numerous bars they have here. Of course we celebrated Loes' birthday. That night the police decided to close down all the bars at 11 p.m. but somehow we ended up in a bar that was still open, entering through the back door. We met people that climbed Everest - it's cool to hear their stories.
We've seen some temples, a Tibetan monastery and today we visited an ancient town near Kathmandu. Brian is leaving in a few days. Loes and me decided to stay a little longer since we like it here. Tibet is not going to happen. Last week, when we were on the way from Pokhara to Kathmandu after the trekking we ran into this Australian guy that we met in Shanghai. What are the odds? Anyway, he's been to Tibet and told us it's really expensive to go there and you can't do anything by yourself so you have to take a guide with you everywhere. Daniel, the Australian guy, said their group also had a spy following them everywhere.
So we changed our plan. Thailand will be the next destination. Our flight is on the 15th. Until then we'll enjoy ourselves in Nepal!