Allright, it's obviously been a while since I've done this!! Going from top left....a LARGE crocodile on the Kingabatagan river in Sabah, Borneo, Malaysia....although I was told by an Indonesian that it's not actually that big! Photo taken from a river boat. Next, old Dayak women in the Kelabit Highlands, Sarawak, Borneo, Malaysia. Typical longhouse "kitchen" Kelabit Highlands. Women working in rice fields, once again, Kelabit Highlands. And finally, blowpipe warrior...this was actually taken from a performance at the Sarawak Cultural Village just outside Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia.

FINALLY....new photos!!! They're extremely out of order as far as my time here lately......

Me (obviously) with SHORT HAIR....reading to some local boys by MY private waterfall/swimming hole. I found this spot accidentally on my bicycle, it's about 4 miles out of town, an easy ride. Usually during the week for a good part of the day I have the place to myself.
Nunu & me at the oldest Wat (temple) in Luang Prabang for a ceremony ordaining some novices into monk-hood.
Nunu, Diana, and Izzy in a tuk tuk on our excursion to a local village.
It's enough that I'm even able to post photos and put together this blog....you can't expect them to all be upright...oops!! Anyway, this woman was spinning cotton into thread in one of the villages we visited.
A peculiar spider web I see all over the place, I'm curious & fascinated by them. I'll do some research and report back, but they're not typical webs, they're fuzzy & form a hole that leads into the ground.
Siblings (?) in a tuk tuk along a dirt road leading to a different waterfall I discovered while riding my bike.
Local villiage women along the same dirt road as the children above.

Dong Det....where I spent Christmas. The sunsets were amazing, nightly. This photo was taken from the deck at the Sunset Cafe....a fitting name!
The Mekong River, the beach that I spent many days getting relief from the heat, as well as bathing & getting relief from myself!
My friend Lucy, the Christmas pasta chef.
On each full moon, the novices shave their heads, eyebrows, all body hair.
Shadows of Nunu, Izzy, and myself in cotton that's being laid out to dry, taken in one of the villiages we visited across the Mekong.

Kong Lor cave, 7 km long, the place I visited before heading to Dong Det. Not the best photo quality, however this is on long shutter setting, taken essentially in pitch dark!
Food vendors on the local bus that come on to sell their goods at each stop. Chicken!!
Dong Det is SOOOO laid back....as the sign implies! No, I didn't actually get my room for free!
A boy & his pet piggie.
Another sunset taken from the Sunset Cafe, Dong Det.

My bicycle along the dirt road leading to my private waterfall (as mentioned above).
A riverside garden in the villiage I stayed near Kong Lor cave.
Another peculiar spider web.
Riverside photo taken from my guesthouse near Kong Lor cave. This is not the Mekong, however the name of this river escapes me.
A villiage elder (woman) taken in one of the local villiages along the Mekong.
A darling little girl from the same villiage.
Buddhist statue taken from one of the Wats across from our house.

Luang Prabang & the Nam Khan river taken atop Phousi Mountain.
Elephant eye, up close & personal!
Riverside life....not the Mekong.
Sunset along the Mekong.
A floating "gas station" for boats traveling the Mekong to refuel.

Instead of Thailand for Christmas, I went to southern Laos & had an incredibly good time! The family made their plans rather late & ended up not having a hotel room for me, and possibly not for themselves either, so they said I could join them & take the risk or stay here....free time, 10 days off, yes!!! So I left the night of the 16th by overnight bus for a 12 hour ride to the capital, to take another bus about 6 hours to a small town in the mountains. I arrived at a nice guesthouse along a river (not the Mekong), I was the only person staying there, so needless to say, it was very quiet and peaceful! The next day I went for a hike & walked through some villiages, tourists do come to this part of the country, but not so often, people did seem a bit surprised to see me and many of the tourists I'd spoken to in other places weren't familiar w/where I was, so that may give you an idea of its remoteness.

The next day I booked a trip along the river through the 7km long cave, the main draw to this area....we go by a small, motorized canoe, I would have preferred to kayak, but those tours are quite expensive. so it was an interesting, DARK trip. I had a flashlight & the driver of the boat had a much stronger one. We stopped on & off to see cave formations, stalagmites, stalagtites, etc... it kinda reminded me of a cave we boated in when we were younger, back east somewhere. Otherwise it was much like sailing through darkness, like it'd be on the moon or some distant planet. The next day I left for my next LONG journey to the 4000 islands in the very south of Laos, near the border of Cambodia.

Now, there are buses, then there are these small trucks w/bench seats that drive throught the villiages on the dirt roads. I had to start in one of those for about 3 hours, imagine the dust, then another for about 3 more hours. Incidentally, this is also how I first arrived at the villiage near the cave....this is the local transportation....picture bags of rice & pigs (live) tied to the roof, as well as baskets of chickens, vegetables, etc...anyway, I finally get on a real bus, prepared for another ride through the night. I prefer travel at night so I don't waste daytime where I could be doing something other than sleep...plus sleeping on a bus saves money on a night in a guesthouse or hotel.

The journey started off fine, I have my book, my Ipod, it's a bit crowded, but I'm ok....off we go.....a while into the trip something happened, not even sure now how I realized something happened. but people look concerned, unsure....we pull over, we're stopped for a while, it's dark out, so hard to see what's happening. I exit the bus, no one speaks English, so no one can explain what's happened. I start using body language, I eventually begin barking & a woman nods, then I run my hand perpendicularly across my throat, the same woman nods.....supposedly we hit & killed a dog. we were stopped a good 40 minutes, and to be honest, I'm surprised it was taken so seriously, there's dogs, goats, pigs, cats, chickens, cows & water buffalo wondering all the streets!

So we proceed, the public buses stop at many towns to drop off & pick up people, we arrived at a town, people get off & I finally have an empty seat next to me, "yes, I can lay down!!!" and then a man comes to sit next to me....there are other empty seats, "why me, why is it always me?!" So he sits & says he wants to practice English, I tell him I want to sleep, he says when I'm ready to sleep, he'll move...by then there are no more empty seats. So I overcome my frustration, we chat & talk, he's studying English in college, his accent was terrible & he really didn't understand me too well. So after some chatting, I start to sleep, it's quite chilly at night & some of the windows are open, so he gives me his leather jacket to use as a blanket, sweet man. And he kept making sure it stayed in position, wasn't falling off. Then as I'm asleep, I feel the bus slamming on it's breaks and feel the man next to me throw his arms over me, holding onto me for protection, and then we stop! Again, not sure what happened, it smelled to me like there was a tire blow out, but when I went outside to look, the tires looked fine, but the driver was doing some work under the bus....maybe a broken belt? My protector couldn't tell me in English, I'd say he has a lot more studying to do! So on we went.

We're finally approaching our final destination at about 2:30 a.m., apparently 8 km out of town, the bus stops, parks on the road, along w/other buses....apparently the police won't allow buses to enter the town until 6 a.m.....why? Don't know, again, no one can tell me & my protector can't tell me in English either. So I'm thinking "why doesn't the bus leave at 8:30 p.m. instead of 5 p.m. to avoid parking on the road for 3.5 hours...seems logical to me?!" There are many mysteries when traveling like this!! So I slept, we finally arrived, my protector went his way, I thank him & tell him he'll make someone a lucky lady someday. He was 21 & shocked at my 36...."why are you beautiful?" to them 36 year olds are already married w/3,4,5 kids!!!

So an eventful journey brings me to the islands....in the rainy season the Mekong rises so that all these islands form, there are 2 main ones, the one I was on has no cars or roads, instead dirt paths, and electricity on generators that stops at about 9 p.m...my bungalow was along the river & I immediately met my neighbors, 2 girls from Germany & their friend from Italy. So I had instant friends. The German girls left the next day & for the next 5 days it was me & Lucy (Italian) & some of the same other people we'd see around the tiny island. Lucy was lots of fun, we rode bikes & went to the beach & took walks, she's 38, nice to have someone my same age range, many travelers are young, in their 20s.

So for Christmas Eve there's a bakery/restaurant run by an Australian man & we had pizza there, then on Christmas Day, we made pasta!! I'm talking homemade pasta....Lucy taught me how, it's quite easy! We bought some flour from the baker man & one of the guys we'd met had a camp stove, we borrowed pots from the guesthouse family, and bought tomatoes, onions, oil, etc... for the sauce & had an honest-to-goodness Italian pasta dinner! carvatiella is the type of pasta we made. So I'd say my Christmas was about as unique & different as it's gonna get.

I know you all worry about me & some of the details of this journey may make you think I'm crazy, but some food for thought....most people in this region of the world are Buddhist. I know you don't know much about Buddhism, neither do I, it's quite elaborate. But what I do know is that Buddhists are quite peaceful, honest, caring people. They meditate & strive for inner peace & balance, they do not function by harming, cheating, or destroying others; violence is not part of their way....so when you find yourself worrying or wondering, maybe this will help ease your mind.

photos to follow...............

A hill tribe girl (homeless?) just outside of Sapa, Vietnam.
Me...at the river after a 4 km trek through the hill tribe villiages outside of Sapa, Vietnam.
Red Thai tribe woman & child.
Children at a local school in one of the villiages we visited.
More Red Thai women....Thai doesn't mean they're from Thailand....
Another assortment of "food" at the market in Sapa, Vietnam....heart and kidneys!!
"The Amazing Cave" Som Sot Cave (in Vietnamese)....in Halong Bay. MASSIVE CAVE!!!!
More "foods" available...notice the legs, feet, beaks, heads, waddles, etc....
Also at the market....you can make up your own story here!!
Need I describe? In the "Amazing Cave".....I think our guide said this was a finger....for some reason I was the only one who would outright say "no it's not, it's a penis...." of course it's mentioned in the guidebook as one of the "must-see" features of the cave!! This cave is so large & full of geologic features that one woman I met from Europe said "it looks fake, it's like being at Disney World or in a Star Wars film".

A woman outside a market in Hanoi, Vietnam
A fruit vendor in Hoi An, Vietnam
My bedroom at the house in Saigon!
A funeral procession in Hoi An.
An assortment of "foods" available on the streets in Hanoi.
Even though we left the house almost a month ago, I still feel the need to show where I was lucky enough to live during October 2006. This is the hallway, stairs leading to the second floor...I'm modeling the dress that I had tailor made by the ladies on staff!
This is the billiard room, also where we had our pedicures done!
The formal dining room where we ate our nightly dinners.
The living room, the wooden doors behind the red chair lead to the back yard/swimming pool.
The massive kitchen, notice the granite floors & countertops.