It Started With A Head Injury...

For those of you with a short attention span, here's a brief summary of what I've been up to in the last few weeks: Bangkok-Singapore-Philippines, head wound, creepy town, amazing resort, cave swimming, long bus ride, Philippines-Singapore, aborted take off at airport and a lengthy delay, Singapore-Bangkok, uni, trip to Burmese/Myanmar Embassy, a fish massage, "This Is It".

And here it is in detail.

I flew from Thailand to Singapore to meet up with little Jen and after a brief overnight stopover, we were off to Clark Airport, Philippines! No sooner had we landed, we went to get into a cab to head to Angeles for the night and I smacked my head getting in. Hard. With my sunglasses on my head. Somehow the sunglasses came off unscathed while I was left with a minor gushing head wound. Who knew a head could bleed like that?? I certainly didn't. But I was determined not to let it dampen my mood, (and was 100% sure I didn't want to go to a hospital in the Philippines!) and we headed into Angeles.

For those of you who have never heard of Angeles, there is a reason. Unless you're a middle-age to elderly American man, there is little need to know about the town, much less visit it. But we managed to find a hotel for the night, I washed the blood out of my hair (so gross right?) and were deciding what to do when welding sparks showered into our room from under the door. It was like fireworks. And was so, so funny. We thought our bed was going to catch alight! So after laughing uncontrollably for a good 20 minutes, we checked that the coast was clear and set off to explore. And soon discovered that there wasn't much to see. Except for the old American men with young Filipino girls. Yes, that's right. Girls, not women. It was awful. We walked around for a bit, standing out as the only white chicks around for miles and headed back to the restaurant next to our hotel to have dinner. Where we were again confronted with young Filipino females with older white men. I know that the sex trade is alive and well in Asia (you see it fairly often in some parts of Thailand) but this was something like I've never experienced. There was an American guy that I would've guessed was around 50 years old dining with a Filipino girl who would've been no more than 17 years old. Seriously. It made us feel physically ill. Or maybe that was the orange cheese on the taco salads.

Thinking we'd seen the absolute worst of Asia's prostitution, we headed to bed for an early night. At the same restaurant for breakfast the next morning, things somehow got worse. Not only were Mr 50 year old American and his teen girlfriend there, they were accompanied by another older American man and his heavily pregnant Filipino girlfriend who I would've guessed was 15. 15 years old. With an old man. It was sickening. And there was nothing we could do about. It made me so sad.

Feeling ashamed of being a Westerner like the dirty old men we had just seen, we headed off to the bus terminal for our journey to Bolinao. For those of you who may have been living under a rock recently, or are just plain ignorant, the Philippines has been battered by incredibly strong,deadly typhoons in the last few months. In a country where 45% of the population lives on less than US$2 a day, natural disasters can be catastrophic. Over 1100 people died and countless more were left homeless between September and December this year due to typhoons. Suffice to say, we were unsure of what to expect. I have to say, if you haven't yet been, go to the Philippines. Now. It is one of the most beautiful countries I have ever seen. We were too far north to see much of the damage from the storms and the countryside is lush and green and... amazing. The people we met at the bus station couldn't have been more helpful and friendly. What we did see however, was poverty. And a lot of it. The gap between rich and poor was even more prominent than it is here in Thailand. We arrived at Puerto Del Sol resort in Bolinao (after a trike ride that we were convinced would cut our lives tragically short), an amazing, luxurious resort with a huge pool and a beautiful private beach, while there were whole families living down the road in a tin shed or a bamboo hut. No electricity, no running water, no couch or tv or internet or fridge. Grandparents, parents, children, grandchildren, dogs, pigs, chickens, you name it. All living in a one or two room hut. Suffice to say, I was feeling more than a little guilty.

We spent the next few days living it up in the resort. Relaxing by the pool, hunting in Bolinao and Alaminos for an ATM that would accept an international debit card and eating awesome food. We watched the sunset on the beach almost every night, drank wine and watched the moon rise over the pool. We also took a trip to the Enchanted Caves, where we swam in the tranquil, fresh water cave pools. Incredible. All the while, people around me were living an existence that I couldn't even imagine myself living. But at the same time, they were happy and friendly and helpful. Jen and I couldn't help but wonder if maybe they have it right. Ok, not the extreme poverty, lack of basic sanitation, health care and education stuff but perhaps it's a lack of greed and materialism. The more you have, the more you seem to want. And you don't really need that flat screen tv, or the latest mobile phone or ipod. But once you have one, you always seem to want more. Something for you all to ponder.

Eventually my time at Puerto Del Sol came to an end and I had to head back to Thailand on my own. It may not sound like such a big deal, but I'm proud of myself for surviving 1 day, 3 countries, 2 trike/tuk tuk rides, 2 bus rides, 2 taxi rides, 1train trip and 2 flights all by myself! Especially when the bus ride was meant to have taken 3 hours and been on an airconditioned bus but instead took almost 6 hours, with no airconditioning, just open windows that left me in a thin layer of grease and grime. I was also the only 'westerner' for miles, so I got plenty of stares, points and whispers! I managed to get back to Clark airport in the nick of time, flew to Singapore and had some hard earned Burger King! There were so many Aussies in Singapore airport and I'm not going to lie. I got a little homesick. It could've been so easy to jump on the Jetstar plane that was boarding next to mine and heading to Melbourne! But instead I boarded the plane I was supposed to, AirAsia to Bangkok. As we were heading down the runway, rapidly picking up speed, the pilot slams on the brakes. We all went flying forward, resulting in many jarred limbs and a case of two or whiplash no doubt. But after a brief mumbled message of "technical issues" and an hour and a half delay on the tarmac and a cold, miserable flight spend in pain after the aborted take off, I finally made it back home to Bangkok.

Last weekend was spent with a day in Bangkok, going to the Burmese/Myanmar embassy to get my visa (scary, scary place. Really. Like a prison.), hanging out at Starbucks, going to see "This Is It" again and getting a fish massage. Which creeped me out like I've never been creeped out before. It was hundreds of fish sucking on your feet and eating the dead skin. It was how I imagined leeches to be and I lasted about 35 seconds before flat out refusing to do it again.

So. In summary, the Philippines = beautiful, amazing but sad at the same time, recovered from injuries, even more scared of flying than I was before, fish massage = EW, NEVER AGAIN!

But now, it's back to the reality of uni work and the fun, if slightly stressful, Project TOTO blog!

Miss you all at home to the moon and back!

xoxo