Once we arrived, we got on a low-lying motor boat that didn't feel stable at all! Anita and I kept worriedly shifting our weight whenever we saw the boat leaning or whenever Alim stood up to take a picture of us.
The city where the floating market is, Damnernsaduak, is comprised of interconnected canals and the water looked pretty dirty. We were all shocked when Alim told us that locals bathe, do their laundry in, and drink that water. Despite this, it really is an idyllic village, people everywhere were smiling, the canal banks have wooden sidewalks and platforms that we saw families crossing on single motorcycles. We are talking about sidewalks a couple feet wide and rather rickety with the water mere inches from the edge. Talk about daring! But it is a way of life for them.
While going there, other people on our boat saw two snakes in the water which did not please me but I forced myself to go on the wooden paddle boats once we arrived. My rationale was... What are the odds that a snake would attack ME out of all the people on the water. The odds were in my favor :-D. All kidding aside, I just told myself to get over my fear and get on the boats for it was an once in a lifetime thing to see the floating market.
I felt like we were Huck Finn paddling down the Mississippi river, it was serene and the perfect way to spend a Sunday morning. The boat traffic jam amused me as well. Imagine dozens of boats just bottlenecked at popular canal locations and motor boats powering their way through the jam much to the charaign of everyone else. All of us had to keep our body parts inside lest we lose a finger or elbow! Some of us were poked by boat bows and all boats had grooved/roughed up sides. Testaments to the boat rage that we saw occur!
I bought a cool Thai monk picture that I negotiated down to 700 bahts from 1900. (30 Thai bahts equals about 1 U.S. dollar). While we were on the boat we just kept eating different foods. We tried coconut milk (a nay from KT on that one), grilled chicken on a stick, pineapples, mangoes, baby bananas, spring rolls, and my favorite: the lost apple. The lost apple looks like sort of a shrunken red pepper and it tastes like a cross between an apple and grape. The story goes that they didn't know what to call the fruit when they found it so it earned the moniker of the lost apple. (Who "they" is, I do not know. I would presume that "they" are apple finders of some sort.)
Once we got off the boat, I tried some spicy Vietnamese fish soup on the banks of the canal. This had squid, tofu, pork of some sort, and was super spicy. It wasn't bad but I quickly lost my taste for it/was full after awhile. So I browsed the canal bank markets some while waiting for the others and bought a turtle to add to my collection (they're my lucky charms!), and grabbed some delicious spring rolls before leaving.
Its funny, I'm not fond of egg rolls in America. Nor do I like Indian food much in America - same goes for Thai food. I could take it or leave it really. It is so different when you're abroad because the food tastes much better. Of course, this requires some open mindedness and willingness to try things on your part. Ok, family and friends of mine, you may pick up your jaw off of the floor now -- despite all that I said above, I know I can still be a very picky eater but I have improved!!
Another 2 hour van ride brought us to the Erewan National Park with seven tiers of waterfalls. It was beautful walking under all the teak trees and the trail was challenging. We really didn't have much time to get to the top before it closed at 5pm. I think only 2 or 3 of us made it to the very top only to be turned around (despite the fact they practically ran there!) The rest of us had to stop between the 4-6th level. While I was at the 4th level waiting for everyone, I was people watching as always. The waterfall on this level had two huge boulders that the water was cascading over and you could see two black grooves that had been worn smooth by generations of Thai children sliding down it into the pool below. There was also an overhanging branch/rope from a tree overhead that cantilevered above the water and people kept leaping from rocks in vain attempts to grasp the rope to swing from it.
Once everyone came down, we played at the level 2 waterfall & pool. The pool had huge fishes and I asked a Thai local if the fishes bite and she shook her head in the negative. So I was sitting on a very slippery tree branch and put my feet in the water to cool off, wouldn't you know it, I felt a chomp!
I flailed myself (and my feet!) out of the water quick as a flash, nearly knocking myself backwards off the tree branch in the process. Everyone found this quite funny, including myself. I turned to the same Thai local and said, "I thought you said they don't bite?!" She said, "No bite, it is a kiss." Interesting how they interpret things differently. The others arrived and Alim was finally coaxed into the water to swim with the fishes to the watefall where most of us had gone already. We stood there under the waterfall and let it beat down on our heads/necks/backs and the water was surprisingly not that cold at all.
While Alim was swimming to the waterfall, Anthony said, "ahh! There's a fish right by you Alim!" And I've never seen a man scramble out of the water so fast.
Adrienne, being deliciously evil, signed to Alim from the shore that there was a shark in the water. He was like shit! I'm not swimming back now! We were like it's a baby shark, it's ok! It won't hurt much if it bites you! A freaked out Alim jumped into the water and swam as fast as he could with his little arms and legs and the rest of us under the waterfall and on shore about fell down from laughing so hard. We still heart Alim and we know he hearts us too!
Most of us passed out on the 3 hour van ride back because we were and are all exhausted. We arrived at a restaurant called Cabbages & Condoms. A unique restaurant that donates some of its profits to various women's programs, tsunami relief, HIV/AIDS projects, and so on. The restaurant itself is mostly outdoor in a courtyard with Bali tree curtains drizzling down over the whole courtyard. Soft twinkling lights added to the atmosphere as did the fish in the wall-long fountain and the goblets of lights covered in colorful condoms. I wish we had more unique restaurants like this in America.
The food was delicious, I sat with Anthony, Erin, Rachel, and Shabby which turned out to be a lot of fun. We all apparently love shrimp and kept doing rock, paper, and scissors to fight over each individual piece. Things like that keep things light hearted and fun which we need when we are running low on energy.
Our day wasn't over yet after that as most of us realized with a groan that we had to prepare for the next day's workshops still. We got back around 11 and got to work right away. I was glad to see that nobody was whining about it and set about to do what needed to be done and to help one another. We really have a good group of delegates on this trip! :)
We finally finished around 1:30am after which I hit the showers to wash the waters of Erewan falls off of me and to save time in getting ready the next morning.
Sorry my blogs are so late in coming, it is really a different experience being a team leader, I have a lot less time for one. I'm not complaining though, I enjoy every minute of it and I love watching the delegates grow right alongside with me and make their plans a success as I will elaborate more in my next blog.
Stay tuned!
KT
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1 comment:
awww the kissing fish!!! yes yes yes! they be champ.
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