Show me the money!

Ok, Dubai is out of control. You got a crazy idea? It can be your crazy reality. You want to build the most luxurious hotel. The tallest tower. The aquarium with the biggest single bit of glass. You want to serve the most expensive cocktail in the world. You want to create an island shaped like a tree. Heck, here in Dubai there is even talk of cooling the sand on the beach to prevent foot burn. Here in Dubai, you got the money, you got the big dream, you just go for it! I mean I've only been here 48 hours, hardly a pro on all things Emirati, but from what I've seen (the luxury 4WDs and sportscars occupying every residential garage is only the beginning) people have some serious money, and have nothing serious to spend it on.

I'm hanging out with Ash and Kent who are about 4 months localised. From their apartment I got the first glimpse of the most ridiculously jam packed skyline I've ever seen. (Admittedly from A and K's place you can't tell that the majority of the skyline is made up of cranes and the skeletons of yet to be completed big ideas - but still! WOW!) My first impression of Dubai in the daylight probably wasn't true to the Emirate. I mean I caught a fabulous glimpse of nothing but desert as we flew over and into the sandpit but then Ash and Kent quickly taxied me off to a fenced in stepford wives city of neatness. When my hosts popped off to work the next day I explored this city of perfection. Manicured gardens on the sidewalks. Manicured nails on the residents. I cycled Ash's bike taking in each and every one of the luxury vehicles that layed dormant in the sheds. The unused swimming pools. Basketball courts. Tennis courts. This place was a playground for the wealthy - but the folks were clearly wealthy enough that they paid other people to do the playing. I would've got used it...

In the evening we mingled with the locals - briefly. Ash introduced me to her shwarma man. I'll take one of each. Later, I will impress someone with my knowledge of this little street side stall (I will let you know how that goes in due time). Braving the cold (yes, it's cold. Fkn freezing actually) we headed into town. (Jenna - not the cat, the person - was also with us. I hadn't seen Jenna in at least 3 years, possibly 4? It was great to see her and to see that she hadn't changed! Laughter just seems to follow that girl!) So, we are en route to the Burj that is shaped like a sail. The 7 star hotel. The picture of ridiculousness in Dubai. Of course we weren't going into the Burj, but we were in the vicinity. The 360 Bar. The coldest place on the planet. With the fancy wine list. And kick ass price tags. Red wine kinda warmed us up. Kent was on the money with the whiskey straight up. Jenna slightly dissapointed with her 7 potato wedges - what did she expect? Get on the golf buggy, take the man made island compacted sand road back to the mainland. An awesome view of everything. But this little Bangkokian was just freezing her non existent tits off!

With a jacket in hand I might go back there with a bird very soon.

Bizarre border rituals, radical rock gardens and the Dali Lama's Dharamsala

I'm cruising back through my facebook photos to job my memory about what I did next... I've been prompted by Ash to get my ass into gear and update my blog - mostly because she asked me for travel advice about a town I visited about 2 months ago and I can't recall a bloody thing about it.... but I do remember when Ash and Wendy left me to tackle the rest of India solo... well, as solo as one can get in a country of nearly one billion...

Chandigargh... a place on the map that gets me outta Delhi... and only 4hrs by train... I'm on it. Nothing to do in Chandigargh but blow your budget on accomodation, unless of course your fav Indian student hails from the area. Then you get a local shouting you samosa and tea - lovely Kanu, thank you very much :-)
Oh and there was that super bloody weird rock garden - what a kooky place to kill some time! And go on romantic outings with your partners I soon learnt. Every nook and cranny that I came across was already occupied by canoodling 20 somethings.... get a room? Or something?

Open the Lonely Planet and see what comes next... this is hard to do this retrospectively.

I can't remember if I had a plan at this point or not? All I knew was that it was hot, hot hot... and the rumour on the street was that the north was not. Not. Not. Amritsar, your border ceremony awaits me.

I'm bored at the moment... need to do this when I am drunk....

Back dating keeps me looking organised

Ever since I learnt that you can back date your posts with blogger I have become super lazy at posting things as they happen (anyone who ever checks here regularly will know that that is complete bullshit, I've always been lazy with my posts). But, hey, at least I am making an effort to log in and reflect on past experiences? Right? So... I need to go way back to the time when Wendy and Ashley took me to that place with no beer... oh happy days... well actually the happy days begun with the train trip outta there! Ok, drama overload.. .it wasn't that bad... hippy's, yoga enthusiasts, vegetarian food... certainly not limited to only Rishikesh!

Train trip back to Dehli was bearable... although the staring was at an all time high... Ashley on her last stint of patience with the head wobbles, the staring and the moustaches... it was always highly entertaining for me, but I will admit that in the company of the dark haired yet fair eyed Ashley I didn't really receive that much attention... but it left me with more time to work on my Bruce Sprinstein remake of Dancing in the Dark. Which I sang to rapturous applause from the Indian men for which the song was about....

The train trip however was the end of the bearability of all things related to Delhi... our attempts to stay in a cheap guesthouse away from the hoards of tourists failed... dodgy back street after dodgy back street littered with dirty guesthouses ran by scary men had us going back on our goals and following the hoards - back to Parhaganj and the relative safety of the tourist strip....

Sweat, dust and cow shit... Dehli in a nutshell.... add to that some politcal unrest and the closing of all markets that might have been of interest left us with little to do but walk around temples and forts and fend off silk sellers - for three days... I did fall in love with lassis and ate ten too many samosas and photographed one too many unnatractive eunuchs... but that was about it... three days in Delhi... 2.5 days too many....

It's town number two without booze n meat....

Long before the birds woke up and began their daily chores, Wendy, Ashley and I crawled out of our big bed gathered our worldly possessions and went in search of the 4am bus outta here! Imagine the oldest bus in the world, no older than that, and then imagine us riding it for the better part of the next 10 hours.... is the rest of my India adventure going to be littered with such long and painful bus journeys? (For a heads up, yes it will be...)

Rishikesh... hatha yoga centre of the world. Was I bouncing with excitement about the thought of heading to a town without beer. Without meat. And with oodles and oodles of yoga? Well, no, I wasn't... but Ashley is a yoga bunny and I had no other ideas about where I wanted to go!

Ashley tried to convince me to join her in some yoga action, I must apologise for being so stubborn. But it just didn't appeal. Bending. Stretching. Turning yourself into a huge knot of skin. I need the gym. And hotties to check out. And loud music. And stuff. (Sorry ash....)

I think we chilled in little Rishikesh for 3 days or so. Despite me not participating in the mandatory yoga sessions, or silencing my trap for 10 days in a wild Vipassana retreats, I managed to enjoy the peace and quiet and the coffee and the bakeries... and I finished my book....

Vegetarian and booze free?

So the big move after Agra and the Taj was a long and sweaty journey to the mountain town of Nainital (there was a bus trip, a train journey - which involved Indian men and hand holding - and then a private jeep trip to the top... it became clear that we weren't the only folks making the journey, a huge percentage of India's middle class holiday makers were also en route... result? Disaster. No Vacancy. Not Possible. We have nothing. You could sleep in the barn but it will cost you your left leg. Permanent tents are only $40 madaam. What the ?!?!?

Our saviours in Nainital after 5hrs of walking up and down the the lakeside? A handsome group of Sikh men who saw the desperation in our eyes and sorted us out with a sweet room by the lake. It would mean a couple of nights of stationary sleeping as any movement resulted in someone (me) being forced onto the floor - we were three in the bed - but the shower was heavenly and the price was ok and by this stage we really didn't care!

So why did we come to Nainital again? Oh yeah, the walk up the hill (mountain) and the view of the Himalayas...

Early start... up we go... I'm feeling ok, I am pretending to like trekking when really I prefer beer drinking (or even tea drinking)... we take it easy, a leisurely stroll some might say... signs to the viewpoint... I imagine snow capped peaks... keep climbing... mind the monkeys... I see nothing... ok I see clouds... essentially though... I see nothing... ideas? Let's keep climbing up... of course, why didn't I suggest that?

China Peak is the new destination.. only about 9000 ft up... (admittedly at the time I was impressed by that.. then I went to Leh, but I'm getting ahead of myself there....)
You'll never believe what we saw from the viewpoint of China Peak... or will you? Standing by the flag that proudly relays the message "we made it" we look out into the distance and see white... as far as the eye can see... we see white... well it was a nice walk and a nice cup of chai.... let's go down now...

From romance to madness...

The Taj Mahal, nothing short of majestic really. It lives up to all expectations. It's true that at the end of the day it is just a big thing made of marble but the romance, the elegance, the meaning, it's majestic.... but I don't think I need to go about it. I mean we've all heard about it or seen it on the telly or sifted through some old friends boring pics of the architectural monster so I wont say anything more about it. So the girls (Ash and Wendy) had shot off for the day to Fatephur thing-a-ma-jig and I followed the instructions to visit the Agra fort (did I write about this already?)... the fort was gigantuan... and I loved it.. yep, I wrote about this already, I remember now imagining being somebodies concubine....

So speeding up to the next morning when I wake with the birds (the vultures to be more specific) and head to the Taj for opening time... I was surprised to be only one of a few tourists up at this hour to enjoy the peace and quiet at the Taj, pleasently surprised of course. But I was in a slight pickle, cos everyone wants a pic with themselves and the Taj, but I was without friends and without a host of tourists to annoy and ask for help... along comes the moustached saviour for today.. Like a seasoned professional he took full control of my camera and threw countless instructions at me; "sit down", "stand up", "feet up", "smile more", "stop laughing", "move there", "smile more hard" etc etc... The result was a dozen pics of me and the Taj, each one slightly off centre and rotated to the right, but each one screaming with the tears and laughter that the little moustache man had caused for me at 6am on that already stinking hot day in Agra.

Meeting the girls in Agra was a super fun relief. I mean I had only been travelling solo for a little more than 24 hours, and I am generally quite tough, but nobody wants to drink beer alone.. do they? So not only did I move up to the travelling social ladder to "travelling with friends" but I was now able to rest assured that I had a folks to share a beer with... well, so I thought.... Speed up to the evening, with the Taj out in the distance and the sun setting on a blistering hot and stinky day, Ange needs a beer. Ange then needs to twist some arms in order to convince the likes of the Dutch and the Canadian to join her... their homelands would be ashamed... but they gave in and agreed to a couple of bottles... and then they let me drink them... is this how it is going to be? Well you just wait and see what they had in mind for the next couple of destinations.... I've no doubt you will be feeling my pain....

The days start with a cup of hot chai....

Sitting on a hot and smelly train bound for Agra, the home of the world famous Taj Mahal. The tight, sweaty and uncomfortable section of our carriage included a family of six. A travelling group of four men and one (younger) woman. And an elderly chap - pushing 80 by appearance but maybe only 50 - and me. I'd been in India less than 24 hrs. Everything was new. A little scary. Often humorous. Almost always jaw dropping.

Who needs nappies for their young? Pop him on the boob. Feed him up. Burp him. Just like we'd do it at home. Until it's time for motions. Do it on newspaper. Then chuck it out the window. Each time this happened I washed my own face and hands with my little travel pack of baby wipes, gesturing to the sari clad mum that she was more than welcome to have some wipes to clean up her son, or her own hands, but each time my offers were politely turned down. Oh well.. I tried...

The head wobble. What the hell does it mean? Anyone who has been to India will understand the confusion of the head wobble. It's still my day one. Simple questions. Do you mind if I sit here? Is this the station for ? Can I take a photo of you? Would you like some chips? Do I get off here? All are answered with a quick little sideways head wobble. Not quite a yes. Not quite a no. Confusing as hell. But super funny. I found myself just making up questions that I knew the answers to in order to test my head wobble theories. After 4 hours on the train. I still hadn't worked it out. But at least I'd had a good laugh!

Agra. Finally. Time to find Wendy and Ashley. I followed their email directions to their hostel and I found it at the end of a smelly little alleyway lined with open sewers. Nice. Why the hell would they stay here I remember thinking. But I quickly learned that all alleyways in Agra seemed to be lined with open sewers. One of the most magestic buildings in all of the world in the background... open sewers in the foreground... watch your step folks!

I killed some time that afternoon visiting the monstrous Agra Fort. I wandered about imagining life a few hundred years ago as a prisoner or a guard or a concubine! Overlooking the Taj Mahal the fort itself took my breathe away. I am in India. 2km from the Taj Mahal. And 6 weeks away from school and work and responsibility. Time to take a deep breath Ange. And soak it all up.....

As instructed, I returned to the hostel in the early evening to wait for the girls. What a refreshing feeling to see familiar faces and have familiar conversations! And almost as quickly as we'd said hello I pleaded with them to join me for a beer... their first in a week of travel?! Whoops - their healthy, walking, trekking, muesli eating habits might cop a hiding now that I'd joined the troupe! Despite being full of numerous amounts of dangerous chemicals I drank that beer like it was the first I'd had in years... drinking it on the rooftop, with a wonderful view of the Taj... some kind of wonderful.

The only chick in shorts....

I arrived in Kolkata last Sunday afternoon - a slightly delayed departure from Bangkok (will explain later!) meant I had a lot of ground to cover in a short amount of time in order to catch up with my work colleagues and India travel buddies - Wendy and Ashley. In my very first test of backpacker toughness I was faced with the choices of (a) a marathon 24hr train journey or (b) a budget breaking 1hr flight.... hmmm... decisions decisions... how to justify the budget breaking domestic flight? I could not eat for a few days? Or go easy on the beer at some point? Ease up on internet and mobile phone addiction? Spend a day or three in a hammock reading a book? Surely I could claw back the misspent dollars? Regardless... I was alone, in Kolkata, being harassed by every man woman and child in sight. I hadn't even opened up my guidebook, was only vaguely familiar with Kolkata's geographical location, I was blowing the budget on day one and taking a flight to Dehli!!

Arriving in Dehli, 10pm, single, white, female... in shorts.... not a good idea Molony... time to consult the bible (aka The Lonely Planet)... suggestions for solo female travelers: Plan your trip so that you don't arrive after dark. If you arrive after dark, get your hotel to pick you up. Don't take a pre paid taxi.... My arrival went something like: arrived after dark... hotel wouldn't pick me up... i took a pre paid taxi... Hmmm... I was feeling a little nervous.. but lived to experience the ghetto that is budget accommodation in Delhi! Weary from the days adventures I slept like a log in that smelly light starved concrete holding cell and jumped out of bed grabbed my pack and fled to the bustling train station at first light... destination: Agra - The Taj Mahal and Wendy n Ashley...

Finding the want to write...

It's not been easy for me this year... finding the want to write I mean. For a few months there last year I was all about my blog. I was all about telling stories and posting pics and sharing the fun and adventures of my life here in Bangkok. Then I lost the time. Or I lost the energy. Or I lost the motivation. I don't know what it was. And while my best mates Alex, Paddy, Ash and Kent all continued (and started) their blogs, I was distracted, and drunk and unproductive. It's not like I haven't been on any adventures, hell, since February, I've been on a butt load:

1. Liveaboard adventure out to the Similian Islands (read Paddy's blog or Ash's for the scoop)
2. A zip lining crazy adventure in Loas where I spent the best part of three days in a harness screaming along wires at ridiculously unsafe heights.
3. A super quick weekend trip to Melbourne for my best mate's wedding
4. A heap of weekend getaways - Kanchanaburi, Phuket, Pattaya, Kanch again and again
   
5. A week long trip to Vietnam with my Grade 10 students

But finding the energy to blog about it has been difficult... this past year has been difficult... but, I think, I hope, that I am well and truly on the road to happiness now, well, I am certainly off the road to destruction, thank God! Maybe, just maybe, this all means that I have something to blog about now.

So where do I begin? Do I forget the last few months and start from now (that would mean missing out on telling you about some brilliant folks (one in particular) that I have met this year)... but maybe that's all a secret I can keep to myself... at least for now...

So... let's start from right now... I am back in at school (first official day of the summer break)... trying to tidy up my classroom without the hassle of the kids being about, trying to get ready for my 6 week adventure to India... tomorrow, Ashley, Wendy and Myself will fly into Kolkata... totally unprepared for what we might see or do.. but heads up, it's going to be a blast... I hope...

although I will be missing some people... a lot...

No news is good news... right?

Well I am not sure if that is entirely true... maybe it's more that no news is laziness? or extreme lengths of busy? or prolonged periods of drunkenness followed by painful bouts of hangover? maybe it's addiction to social networks? maybe it's just that my everyday life is just that, it's everyday? is anyone really all that interested in how I enjoy kicking my own ass at the gym each week? or how I do the inverse on the weekend and kick my own ass at the pub? I don't know.. maybe I am missing the point of blogging... nah... it's most likely that I am just lazy, and I keep neglected this little page that I was once so enthusiastic about.... let me try to make it up to myself...

The month of January... Paddy's 40th, it needs a mention, and it needs some photos... let me mention that it was a total hoot, that Paddy was in fine form (who'd have guessed he could still pull off the splits?) and that Noi was sensational in his alter ego (not that I will encourage him to do it again!).. check out the pics at Paddy's Page. We rocked on at Ben's place for a while and then had a boogie at Admakers for a good hour or so. We certainly made a scene there! The boys and their afros got the crowds talking - or were they laughing? I couldn't tell....

Ashley and I wangled our way onto a risk assessment trip to Hanoi, far from being hard work let me tell you! A great little city to visit and a totally awesome place to be taking our grade 10 kids in a month or two. I just hope we can handle them! I should have pics of that too... let me finish writing.. I'll get them up soon...

Man, I've loads to talk about, and none of it is rolling off my fingers with the enthusiasm or energy it deserves... it's Friday afternoon.. I need a nap... then i will come back... make you laugh and cry... it'll be worth the wait...

:)

Christmas down under means beer beer beer....

I really had no idea that 3 weeks at home in Melbourne would be so devastating for my liver. Seriously hours after landing I was beer in hand and well on my way to almost 14 days straight of pure torture to my body... I am not sure if it's because the beer is so good, so readily available, so abundant in everyone's fridges or just because it's the most perfect hangover cure? But whatever reason it has played a key role in my trip home to visit the family and friends for Christmas and New Year. When people ask me now if I am ready to go home to Bangkok I say that I am if for no other reason but to give my body a break and to get back to the gym! A year of hard work might very well have been destroyed by the best cold beer in the world!

Early on in my trip I met up with the college girls. A great group gathering, the first in about 6 years that I've been to! The girls cooked up a storm, the beer, wine and champers was flowing, and in no time at all we were once again laughing hysterically at each other and loving every moment. A comfort to know that I have such beautiful friends back in Melbourne who all miss me and want me home - but sorry girls, you'll have to wait a little while!!! :(

Next on the list of awesome and loved friends I needed to catch up with were my high school mates from good old country victoria and what better way to celebrate than to head to a dodgy pub in Hawthorn and bop away to cheesy (yet much loved) tunes from the 90s... who would have thought that 90s nights would be all the rage now?

Liv, Bec, Kath and I danced the night away, drank a mixture of nastiness and ended the night with chocolate, hot pockets and pre christmas ham... Oh what a night!

More to come on adventures in Oz soon....