Pirates, Dolphins, and Islands in the Distance (October 8-12, 2007)

On our voyage from Thailand to India, we had to pass through the Strait of Malacca, which is the most pirated area in the world! There were jokes and comments for a few days about seeing Captain Jack Sparrow and the hopes that the potential pirates would resemble Johnny Depp. The ship was at almost full speed and we had several other ships traveling very close to us for safety. Rumor has it that we also had the water cannons ready. We were not met with adventure and pirates, but we did have fun pretending like we would.

During this time there were also many dolphins around the ship. Watching the dolphins was quite fun and gave us an excuse not to study. We could also see outlines of islands and land for a while, which is different from all of the rest of our time on the open ocean.

I’ll also say here that I get to watch sunsets over the ocean every day. It is so awesome. I live on the east coast, so I never see sunsets on the ocean. I have realized, though, that I really love them. It is awesome that no 2 sunsets are the same. They are each beautiful and painted with unique colors and clouds. I love to sit on the back of the ship, eat dinner and watch the sun set.

Thailand (October 4-8, 2007)

So my first day in Thailand was the most stressful day that I have had on this whole trip. We did not clear the ship until about 2:15 pm. This wouldn’t have been that big of a deal except for the fact that Tyson was going to meet me in Bangkok at 12:30 pm. Unfortunately, the clearing process took much longer than expected. I finally got to Bangkok around 4:30 pm and began searching for Tyson. The funny thing is that SAS chose a drop off point for the shuttle that is literally the largest mall that I have ever seen. I began searching for Tyson, thinking that it would be a quick thing and soon found out that it would take a while. Luckily, my friend Nick was there to stay with me and help me look. If it wasn’t for him I would have been freaking out big time. All in all, it took us until about 9pm to find Tyson. After finding him, we went to the hotel where Nick had reservations and Tyson and I got a room there. After checking in, we went to a market, ate Burger King and returned to the hotel.

The next day, Tyson and I got up early to head for the airport. Some of my friends met us there to fly and travel with us. We took a morning flight from Bangkok to Phuket. Even from the air, Phuket was beautiful. We flew over the northern part on the way down and could see the limestone pillars of Phang Nga. It was beautiful. We arrived at the airport, booked a hotel and caught a cab to Karon Beach, where the hotel was. The hotel was nice and the beach was pretty. We checked in, ate and went for a swim. The water was so clear. Even though it rained for a bit, we still had a blast that afternoon. We searched for sea shells and took a walk on the empty beach. This was not peak tourist time, mostly because it is right in the middle of the rainy season. Unfortunately, we had to deal with this rain most of the time we were there. After swimming, we cleaned up and went to dinner.

The next day, we took a tour to the Phi Phi Islands. It was the most beautiful place. The ferry ride was less than enjoyable because a storm was coming in as we were traveling to the islands. This meant rocky seas and rain, so everyone crowded inside on the ferry. If you ever go to these islands, take the speedboat. It is a little more expensive, but apparently you can go to a lot more places on the island. This is the option we wanted to take, but some of the people we were traveling with did not. The first stop was Monkey Beach, where we could swim to shore or snorkel. We chose to snorkel. It was absolutely amazing. This is the first time that Tyson had ever snorkeled, so it was really fun to swim next to him. I also snorkeled in Hawaii, but this was much better. The reef was colorful and alive and there were tons of fish. The water was so clear, too. I also took my camera with an underwater case, so I hope that I got some good pictures. This was awesome and it made me want to get SCUBA certified.

After snorkeling, we went to another island for lunch. After lunch, we rented kayaks and kayaked to another small beach with monkeys on it. The monkeys were curious and wanted to take things from our bags. In fact, had Tyson not caught one of them, it would have gotten away with my camera. We walked on the beach for a while, which was nice because we were the only ones there. The sand was so white and fine, it was unlike anything I have ever felt. The water, again, was so beautiful, too. It was clear and blue and just like the pictures.

After our adventure on the island, we took the ferry back to Phuket and returned to the hotel. That night, Tyson and I went to dinner and then we decided what to do the next. We decided to go to Phang Nga, which is a naturally beautiful water landscape with limestone caverns and mountains in the ocean.

The travel to Phang Nga was not bad; we took a bus. We got to the dock and rented a longboat for the day. Our guide was this sweet Thai man that told us, with broken English, as much as he could about the sights. We rode the boat in a cave and around many of the islands. We visited the James Bond Island, which is where one of the movies was filmed. Rain came as we were leaving the island, so we waited it out for a while. For lunch, we stopped in a Muslim fishing village and had a great lunch. Then, we returned to the dock. From there, we took a tuk tuk (essentially, a truck with the back made into a covered seating area for passengers) to an elephant village. We rode elephants and took lots of pictures. Finally, we returned to the bus station to head for the airport.

The last day, Tyson and I spent exploring Bangkok together. We went to a market, to a monastery/temple, and walked around the city. It was nice.

I really enjoyed visiting Thailand. The people were very respectful and kind to tourists. One thing that I loved is a greeting that the Thai people have. One holds their hands together in front of their chest and bows slightly. This is accompanied with a greeting, sawatdeekaa (the spelling is probably wrong, but this is how a female would say hello). This greeting is known as a wai and is quite respectful and common. I grew quite fond of greeting people this way and when I said hello in Thai, I was often asked if I actually spoke Thai, which I sadly had to respond with no. In the two days right before port, we have 2 pre-ports, one for culture and one for logistics. These get us prepared for everything we need for the next port. The cultural ones are very helpful because they generally give us instruction on a few greetings in the native language of the area that we are visiting. I have enjoyed picking up greetings in the various languages and have been met with a great deal of appreciation from the locals because I have made an effort to greet them in their language. I think this is important to remember when traveling because too often tourists visit a foreign country and expect standards to be at a Western level and expect people to all speak English. This ethnocentric attitude is rude and disrespectful. The reaction I got from attempting to speak their language was warm and appreciative and I got the impression that few people attempt this.

Finally, I will say that it was so good to see Tyson. It was very nice to have someone fly half way around the world to visit me. It was great to have someone here that I am so close to and comfortable with. So far, I have seen and done so much and I just wanted someone to listen to it all – I needed to emotionally vomit, I guess. That’s not to say that I don’t have good friends here because I do, it was just nice to have him here. It was also great that we got to do all of the things that we did and travel together. There are so many things I have done and seen that I want to share with people from home – my family and friends; I am glad that I got to share some of this.

Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam (September 27-October 1, 2007)

More than anywhere else we have been, Vietnam was real. My visit to Vietnam showed me how so many people in the world actually live. People in Vietnam are very obviously poor. The Vietnamese Dong has an exchange rate of $1 USD = 16,100 Vietnamese Dong. A local told us that Vietnamese people actually use more American cash than Americans do. There is no credit system in Vietnam, so everything is paid for in cash. Small purchases on a daily basis are paid for in Dong. Anything larger than a few hundred thousand dong is paid for in US dollars. Anything larger than a few hundred or thousand dollars is paid for in gold. I thought it was interesting how willing local people were to take foreign currency. I thought about how it would be received if someone tried to use dong in America.

Vietnam has a lot of people that many from a Western point of view would consider to be in poverty. The people don’t seem to think of themselves as being in poverty. Some people begged on the street, but this isn’t what I mean. People that live in nothing more than shacks are still very happy. This is what they are used to. They seem to be content in the conditions that they live. We visited a house of a rather wealthy former photographer and it was still similar to other dwellings. There was a thatched roof and a wood floor. It wasn’t glamorous, but it is all that they need. I was quite impressed by the Vietnamese people’s ingenuity. We visited a village and were shown how many of their products are made. They use everything! Even the shells of nuts and things, they don’t discard them, but use them for fuel for fires. This was incredible and I thought about how different America would be if we just chose to be a bit less wasteful and use things even half as well or as long as the people in this village did.

In my time in Vietnam, I had many adventures. I visited the Cu Chi Tunnels, Mekong Delta, Monkey Island, the War Remnants Museum, an Orphanage and school for deaf children, and the market. From all of my trips around Ho Chi Minh City and beyond, I learned why we say “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”. This is not some super American speech… haha. I just mean that the pursuit really is the most important part. Most people feel like they will reach happiness – as if it is a destination. My adventure in Vietnam showed me that the happiness is really in the journey. I rode busses that my Mom would be mortified to step foot into, I rode on the back of motor bikes with strangers, I was in the middle of nowhere, I stomped through a monsoon and mud in the woods to climb through tunnels – I had a BLAST!!!! (seriously, though – I am not reckless or trying to get into dangerous situations – this is just the way people travel here, it is an entirely different way of life; I did my best to embrace life the way that Vietnamese people live it every day). All of these things were part of the journey, but I probably remember them more than some of the destinations. This is what I mean – the pursuit means that you should be happy in every moment, not just at the destination – the journey should be the exciting part (because really in life we all have the same destination and I’m in no hurry to get the that point yet – I have too much life left to live).

A final thought I must mention from Vietnam is the result of my visit to the War Remnants Museum and the Cu Chi Tunnels. I honestly know very little about the Vietnam War. We just don’t learn about it well in American public schools, which is sad. Considering that those that do not learn from their history are doomed to repeat it, we really should learn from our mistakes. Obviously we haven’t, I mean look at our current situation in the world, but that is a different topic for a different blog. The museum was sad and had very gruesome depictions of the war including graphic photographs, artifacts, and detailed descriptions. The photographs showed US soldiers doing terrible things. It also had preserved deformed fetuses on display, which completely shocked and repulsed me. I say all of this to show that I had no idea what to expect at the museum and that it was incredibly difficult to see. It also left me with more questions than answers. I had no idea what to think because I did not have enough of a basis in my own history to know different from the museum’s description of the war. I do understand, of course, that when a communist regime creates a museum it is going to be biased have propaganda. The sad thing is, though, that I knew so little about the war that I didn’t know what was blatant propaganda and what wasn’t. I also left with questions about my own grandfather’s involvement in the war. Unfortunately, he doesn’t talk about his time in Vietnam because I know that he could answer some of the questions that I have about it all. I just want to understand why America thought it was our responsibility to interfere in internal struggles in a country half way around the world. I don’t understand why we went to Vietnam (except for the ideas about containment and the domino effect that don’t suffice, there was too much at stake for that to have been the only reason). These are the questions I have pondered, asked, and attempted to study since my visit. The exhibits did reveal to me why many Americans protested the war.

I also visited the Cu Chi Tunnels, which was quite an interesting experience. First of all, when we got there, it was pouring rain, like a monsoon and we toured in the downpour, which was kind of awesome. This gave me a feeling of what it really would have been like in the war as there were no other tourists around and it was pouring rain and kind of eerie with just the three of us and guide in the middle of the woods. We watched a video in which the American troops were referred to as “crazy devils”. This anti-American sentiment was evident throughout the whole video and made me quite uncomfortable.

The anti-American feelings in the museum and at the tunnels were in stark contrast to what I experienced from the individual citizens in Vietnam. For the most part, they were very welcoming and accepting of Americans. This conclusion is not just from the tourist areas that we visited, but from the average citizens on the busses and things that we used. We met several people that were quite kind and interested in our experiences in America. This shows the difference between a government and its citizens. I am glad that this distinction can be very obvious because I have noticed many people throughout this journey that do not like the foreign policy of the United States or some other governmental entity, but do not dislike American citizens. This has been fortunate as a traveler that most people can distinguish between my government and me as an individual.

Indescribable

At this point, we are on the way to Thailand and I am so excited about it. It is amazing that two days ago, I left Vietnam and now I am on the way to Thailand. This whole trip can only be described in one word – indescribable. I have tried to use words like amazing, incredible, and awesome, but they just don’t cut it. I truly can’t explain all of the things that I have experienced. It is just, in a word, indescribable. A friend of mine and I had a discussion about this trip the other day and this is the result. I appreciate the fact that there are things about this trip and my life that are beyond words. I appreciate this depth. I am blessed to do things that most people that I know have never imagined were possible. I have visited places that I never though I would. I have met people that I never though I would. I am truly having the experience of a lifetime, just like I hoped I would.

I am having the unique opportunity to have a comparative approach to so many cultures, countries, and ways of life. I love being able to compare one culture or place to one other than the United States. I love having another option for comparison. I love getting out of the ethnocentric bubble that most Americans live in. I love this trip!!

I want to describe everything that I am doing and completely explain everything that I am doing, but the truth is that I just can’t. I am traveling to and seeing things beyond words and the things that I am learning and experiencing are too tough to describe right now, maybe ever. Thanks to everyone who has supported me, encouraged me, and prayed for me. I appreciate all of you at home doing all of this for me. Also, thanks for the letters.

Part of me can’t wait to get home and share all of this with everyone that will listen, but reality is smacking me in the face with the fact that nobody can understand all of this. So few people that I know have been abroad and can understand the feelings and emotions associated with seeing so many things. I hope that I can bring some of this to words so that I can share it because all that I am experiencing is truly amazing and I want for people to understand. I want to share it. I can’t keep it all in! Pray for me during this process. Thanks.

Hong Kong (September 23-24, 2007)

As I stepped off of the plane in Hong Kong, I felt like I was back in the United States. Hong Kong is truly so westernized that it is difficult to believe that it is part of China. For example, there was a Krispy Kreme in the airport. There was also a McDonald’s right off of the dock. I ate at a Hard Rock Café in Hong Kong. There was Pizza Hut and California Pizza. It was crazy how many American companies have infiltrated Hong Kong. This is globalization in practice – Hong Kong is what globalization looks like.

The people in Hong Kong are proud of the characteristics that make them unique from China. We had a guide on the bus from the airport that explained some of the differences between China and Hong Kong. The languages, for example, are different. Cantonese is spoken in Hong Kong and Mandarin is spoken in mainland China. These are just different dialects, but one language is not recognized by a speaker of the other. In Hong Kong, they drive on the opposite side of the road (like in Britain). This shows the influence of Britain in Hong Kong. In mainland China people drive on the right side of the road, instead of the left, like in Hong Kong. Also, more people speak and understand English in Hong Kong. This is another example of the influence of Britain. Hong Kong is much more modernized and westernized than mainland China. Hong Kong is also much cleaner than mainland China. It is difficult to believe that the two places are under the same government because of the distinct differences in the cultures, people, and development.

During my stay in Hong Kong, I visited Lantau Island, which was beautiful. Unfortunately, it was raining, but we had a great time. We saw a huge statue of Buddha that sits on top of a hill. We also visited a monastery. The drive to and from the monastery were the prettiest parts of the visit. Looking over the mountain from the road, you can see the beach and vegetation on the side of the mountain and it is incredible.

Later on, we just walked around Hong Kong, ate Pizza Hut and went back to the ship. I enjoyed Hong Kong a lot, partially because of the familiarity, but also because of the unique way that western culture has been accepted into an eastern place.

Beijing, China (September 20-23, 2007)

We arrived in Beijing a little later than expected because the flight (for whatever reason) was delayed from Qingdao. When we got there the sun was going down, but I noticed that it looked different than sunsets I had seen before. When we walked outside and I got breath of air, I realized why it looked so different. That haze I noticed was smog. I have never experienced smog before, so that aspect of Beijing was quite unpleasant. The landmarks that I was able to see, though, made up for the air. I did a university hosted trip in Beijing, so I got the chance to meet with several students from Tsinghua University. It was very interesting to get the chance to talk with these students. I learned about their perspectives on things, which made me understand Chinese culture more. I will discuss this a bit more later.

My itinerary for the 4 days that I spent in Beijing was something like this (this is for those of you, like my sister, who prefer to see an abridged version of the things that I have done):

Day 1: Arrive in Beijing, Peking Duck dinner with Tsinghua University students, check into hotel, walk around hotel area at night

Day 2: Trip to the Great Wall of China (it was AWESOME!!), Mongolian hot pot for lunch, Giant Panda Zoo, Dinner and visiting with University Students, Bowling after dinner with some of our new friends from the University

Day 3: Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City, Chinese Laundry (dumplings) for lunch, The Temple of Heaven, Silk Street Shopping, Chinese Acrobatics Show

Day 4: View of the “Bird’s Nest” where the 2008 Olympics will be held, The Summer Palace, Lunch at the University, Depart Beijing for Hong Kong

As you can see, we fit a lot into a short time. I felt busy the whole time. It was nice that I went with Semester at Sea on this trip, instead of trying to do it independently. It seems like it would have been very difficult to plan and travel independently in China. I am planning most of my trips in other countries independently, with small groups. The driving situation in downtown Beijing was unlike anything I have ever seen. Lanes really don’t seem to matter. The vehicle with the loudest horn and the courage to pull out is the one that gets to go. It was kind of scary, except for the fact that we were in a huge bus.

My favorite visit in China was to the Great Wall. I was just amazed at the size and length of it. I wondered how people could build such a thing so long ago. The earliest construction of the Great Wall began during the Warring States Period (475-221 BC). I found this incredible considering the huge structure that stood before me. I cannot imagine how much time it must have taken to build the individual sections of the wall that were eventually joined together. The wall itself was quite steep. We were able to climb it. It has stairs to several different levels. We went about as far as we could in the time allotted. The views kept getting better the higher we went. The t-shirts for sale got cheaper the higher we went, which I thought was interesting. I loved staring out at the natural beauty of the area. The mountains are amazing there. I am not from a place with mountains, so just to see this was fun for me. The wall over all of it just added to the beauty because it is such an unreal thing to see. Another thing I really liked about the Great Wall was all of the languages that were spoken there. There were so many visitors from all over the world. It seemed like a modern day Babel with all of the languages and people gathering there together. I also liked that despite or varied backgrounds, everyone was there for the same purpose and everyone was very friendly.

I visited Tiananmen Square in Beijing, which is like their version of the Mall in Washington, D.C. Their Congress building and other important national monuments are there. There is also a building that houses the body of former leader, Mao Zedong. The citizens really seemed excited to visit this site. We arrived in Tiananmen Square at about 9 am and there was already a huge line waiting for entrance to see Mao’s body. I found it kind of odd that they were so excited to see the embalmed body of their former leader, but this just reinforced the idea of cultural differences. We walked around the Square and I got this eerie feeling remembering what had happened there almost 20 years ago. The Tiananmen Square Massacre (as it is referred to by many Americans) is not mentioned in China. The event basically was a bunch of students protesting communism by sitting in Tiananmen Square and participating in a hunger strike. There is a red book that is a compilation of sayings from Mao, which the students burned and desecrated in the Square during this time. The government responded to this uprising by bringing in tanks and military personnel to basically mow down the protest. Thousands of students died. As I stood there, knowing what had happened here, I wondered how many of the Chinese people there knew about this or were ever taught about it. I also wondered if I would have been one of those students had I lived in China twenty years ago. It was a strange feeling. I couldn’t take a picture of me smiling in Tiananmen Square because of the odd mix of emotions I was feeling.

We were given a pamphlet by the university that hosted us that describes the landmarks that we would be visiting. In the section about Tiananmen Square, it only mentions the Massacre in 1989 as the Tiananmen Square event of 1989. It does not say anything about the event and disregards it as unimportant. I found this so interesting. It reinforces the ideas of censorship and governmental control of speech and expression in China. Another interesting thing about speech and expression in China is that I could not access my blog while I was there. I tried to access my blog to update it a little, but when I entered the web address, a page appeared that said “this site does not exist”. I tried to access my blog several different times on 3 different computers to make sure that it wasn’t a computer glitch or a typo. I found it interesting that the Chinese government has strict enough censoring of websites that it would censor my blog. I asked some of my new friends from the University about this and they basically told me that freedom and speech are not important to the Chinese government, “propaganda is number one”. I found it interesting that the students themselves referred to the media as propaganda. I thought this word was something that people use about other governments or an idea that people are unaware is being used, but I was wrong. Wikipedia is also not allowed in China. I thought that this was interesting, as well.

All in all, China was quite an interesting port. I am very glad that I went there. I learned a lot about the Chinese people, culture, and government. Many of my preconceived notions were also challenged, which is something that I needed and am glad to have experienced.

Qingdao, China (September 19-20, 2007)

Qingdao is the port city that we docked in. This was not what I expected at all. The whole experience in Qingdao was literally culture shock after spending a week in Japan.

The ship docked in an industrial yard where huge trucks were moving large pieces of metal and some of us almost got run over. (don’t worry, I’m fine, haha). It was rainy and rather miserable when we got off the ship, which was not the best first impression of China, unfortunately. I walked around the port city the first day with my friend, Robin. We had a fun time and bargained a little at a market. I got some gifts and some things for myself. I bought a cool necklace with a dragon made from jade.

The city itself was incredibly poor. The buildings were in bad condition. The buses and public transportation looked very unsafe. The traffic was interesting because it seemed as if the largest vehicle or the loudest horn ran the traffic. There didn’t seem to be strict traffic laws that restrict the way that people drive. The people were fairly nice, not nearly as much so as in Japan. The locals really seemed to be quite poor. This was in stark contrast to what I expected in China. I have always understood that China is a communist nation. My understanding of communism has always been that equality is a key to the distribution of resources. In communism, people are supposed to have enough; they are supposed to have jobs, and enough to eat. This was not what I experienced. People were living in terrible conditions and literally begging us to buy things from them. There was an incredibly visible disparity between rich and poor. In areas of Qingdao, one could see large high rise apartments that were utilized by government officials when they visited the area. These apartments and leisure homes cost much more than most locals will probably make in their lives. There were also many people riding bicycles or other inexpensive means of transportation, while some people drove expensive cars. These things struck me as out of place in the supposed communistic state. The capitalism that I experienced in markets and such was also unexpected.

It is obvious from my trip to China that it is an area in transition. China joined the World Trade Organization recently and has opened itself up to a lot of western influence. China is also hosting the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, which is bringing renovations to many areas of China to assist with the influx of people during this event. The presence of both capitalism and communism was very interesting. It shows the western influence in the country, as well as the transition going on in China.

After spending a day and a half in Qingdao, I took a trip to China’s capitol, Beijing. This was a very different experience from Qingdao. To be honest, I was glad to leave Qingdao. I am very glad that I got to experience this real part of China. I am also glad that I have a better understanding of how most Chinese people actually live. This has given me a better understanding of the differences between communist theory and practice. Obviously, the theoretical ideas of communism are not being completely practiced in China, as evidenced by the disparity between rich and poor. This has given me a real picture of these differences, rather than just from reading about them. These are the things that I appreciate so much about this voyage.