Green Around the Globe » Thailand

Out from Chinese Censorship

Keith — Wed, 19 May 2010 10:00:40 +0000

The land of the rising sun has provided us with many things over the last two days. Delicious sushi and beer, orderly street crossings and clean air to name just a few. But one of the most exciting things for flashpackers like us has to be the uncensored and incredibly high-speed internet we have at our hostel. We have had our Mainland Southeast Asia highlight video finished for weeks but despite having a VPN we were unable to get it past the Chinese censors and uploaded to Vimeo. Check it out below, and if you have not yet seen the first two episodes you can check them out here.

Also be sure to to check out our guest post on the Art of Backpacking here. The post details our experiences and features some of our best pictures from Expo 2010 in Shanghai. We will soon have a post here highlighting the different sustainability efforts we saw at the Expo, but this post gives our overview and recommendations if you are planning a visit to Shanghai and the Expo. Be sure to leave a comment on Art of Backpacking with your thoughts.

Songkran 2010

Amy — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 10:00:19 +0000

A rainbow of shiny plastic guns erupts, spewing icy-cold water on laughing strangers passing by. Buckets of water warmed by the sun float out above the crowds, tipped just so to drench from head to toe. Hands covered in talc-paste come at your face, your hair, your sunglasses from every direction. Within minutes everyone is a wet, pasty mess, and it is impossible not to smile.

Welcome to Songkran, the celebration of the Thai New Year. Keith and I had been looking forward to our first Songkran since the beginning of our trip planning. We had heard from other travelers that this was one festival not to be missed and planned the Southeast Asian leg of our trip to ensure that we’d be back in Thailand for the celebration. And let me tell you, it did not disappoint.

Keith and I made our way around the Khao San Road area and within minutes were soaked through to the skin and laughing amidst the arcs of water flying all around us. When it’s over 100 degrees, being doused with ice water every few minutes is definitely the most comfortable approach to being outside. We followed the joyful crowds and slowly moved through the center of the celebrations on jam packed Khao San Road. Never before had we experienced such a carefree mass of humanity, everyone grinning from ear to ear and joining in the goodhearted fun.

The Thai people are famously laid back and peaceful, and we were both struck with the thought that such a public celebration in any city in the United States would easily devolve into a dangerous or even tragic situation. Yet here, hot and crowded as it was, we were engulfed by smiles and the spirit of fun.

Then we reached the end of Khao San Road. The crowd thinned out. The laughter was suddenly muted. Instead of plastic toy water guns, the shops were lined with bullet holes. Instead of streams of water and talc, the asphalt was stained with blood. A makeshift memorial arose in the middle of the street with pictures of the dead, flags and twisted metal debris replacing the colorful buckets and beer cans of the party taking place just meters away. Just four days earlier, this was the site of a violent clash between the Red Shirt protesters and government troops that left 24 people dead.

The juxtaposition of such a peaceful celebration and such violence was surreal. How could such sadness have occurred just four days before such joy? It was a gruesome reminder of how quickly a peaceful crowd can turn dangerous and of the three days we spent mostly holed up in our Bangkok hotel watching the news and trying to rearrange our travel plans.

A few days later we were safely out of Bangkok and watching the headlines of increasing tension, police raids and more violent clashes. We will try to remember Songkran for the friendly, easygoing people, the beauty of the throngs of humanity letting loose in the world’s biggest and most entertaining public water fight. But I don’t think we’ll forget the shock of suddenly swallowing our joy and being confronted with the reality of the price that those fighting for a political voice have paid.

In other news, Greenbiz.com recently published an article we wrote about a renewable energy company that we met with in Cambodia. Be sure to check it out here.

Northern Thailand Pictures

Amy — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 05:58:38 +0000

Below are our favorite pictures from our 2 weeks in Northern Thailand, including Chiang Mai and Sukhothai, before heading back to Bangkok and flying out to Bhutan, enjoy!

As always you can find all of our other photos and videos from the trip here.

Dinner in Bangkok

Amy — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 10:00:34 +0000

Because it’s hot in Bangkok. Because we’re adults. Because we can.

Buddha’s Wisdom

Keith — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 10:00:31 +0000

While sitting in the shade near Wat Tra Phang Thong, in Sukhothai, Thailand a sign about 5 feet up in a nearby tree caught my eye. Walking over I found that it was a bit of Buddhist wisdom on a hand-painted sign. The advice struck a cord with me, “Old Age is no cause for regret, regret that one is old, having lived in vain.” As we walked the rest of the grounds surrounding the Wat we saw that there were over 15 of these sayings on nine different signs.

In an effort to share them, as well as pictures of the many beautiful Buddha images and statues in Sukhothai, below is a two minute video slide show of the Buddha’s Wisdom and Images. Enjoy!

Hanging Out (Literally) in Chiang Mai

Amy — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 04:01:57 +0000

The carabineer is clipped to my harness as I stand at the edge of a wooden platform. Our guide triple checks my straps, giving them a solid tug to make sure my harness is secure.

Ready?

Umm, not really, but for some reason I silently nod yes.

Ok. One. Two. Three…

I am flying feet first high above the forest floor, through the lush canopy of leaves and branches that a family of gibbons calls home. Or so I’m told. Honestly, my eyes were pretty much closed on that first zip line. Have I mentioned that I have a serious fear of heights?

After a few more runs across the zip lines, I was getting the hang of it and slowly but surely loosened my death-grip on the harness and began having fun. A lot of fun. I happily zipped along bouncy lines, crossed suspension bridges and abseiled down between platforms. I even dove off a platform head first with nothing but a short bungee cord connected between the back of my harness and the zip line as I flew across the tree canopy like a less than graceful superwoman into a cargo net.

Never in a million years would I have ever imagined not only zip lining through a forest canopy, but also really enjoying it. As we’ve mentioned before, much of the purpose of this trip is to push ourselves beyond our comfort zones and try new things. With Flight of the Gibbon, I was able to face my fear of heights and have a blast in the treetops. Who knows, maybe next I’ll try canyon swinging in New Zealand…

Happy Birthday!

Keith — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 04:01:56 +0000

Today is Amy’s birthday and while we will be celebrating in Sukhothai, midway between Chiang Mai and Bangkok, we took the opportunity while we were in Chiang Mai a couple of days ago to celebrate with three days at the Le Meridien. Using Starwood points we were able to really relax and enjoy three days in luxurious comfort for free. Below is a picture of the great chocolate brownie cake that the manager sent to our room.

Southeast Asia Highlights

Keith — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 15:31:40 +0000

After a 4 hour upload to YouTube (and still less than stellar resolution) our highlight video from our two months in the southern region of Southeast Asia including; Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia is finally up. With this being our second regional highlights video it warrants a new page under the Pictures & Video page, introducing the Regional Travel Video page. As we complete each regional highlight video (one about every two months) we will post it there. Don’t worry though, for the amount of work these take (6-8 hours each), we will also be doing a post about each one as it is completed. So if you are a facebook fan or subscriber to our email updates you will find out as soon as it goes up. And if you are are not, what is stopping you?

Enjoy the video and the snow if you are in on the East Coast in the States.