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Southeast Asia 2000  When my house mate in Toronto announced she was heading to China to study Mandarin, I decided to join her for a stint of travelling around the country first. As we began to get excited, we expanded our two month travel plans to cover Viet Nam as well. Things changed, the plan evolved, and off I flew to Thailand, all by myself, for four months. I never made it to either Viet Nam or China. From Bangkok, I headed north to Chang Mai and got a taste of northern Thailand and its hilly green countryside, coconut rice balls and rich royal history. I met Leana who had been to the same university as me back home, and we travelled together for nearly three weeks; trekking, taking a cooking course, floating for two days down the Mekong river to Luang Prabang and caving in the Laos countryside. I then took a gut-twisting journey into Cambodia, covering horrendous 'ex-roads' in the back of a pickup truck enroute to the stunning 12th century Khmer ruins at Angkor. Heading south back in Thailand, I found scuba diving and beach paradise on Koh Tao, 'Turtle Island'. After two weeks on the beach and underwater, I flew to Nepal for a month, returning to Singapore for a new leg of my Southeast Asian adventure. See Nepal 2000. From the relieving civilization of sticky, sunny Starbucks-ridden Singapore, I headed north into the rolling hills of Malaysia, home to rich tea plantations and muddy trekking opportunities. Next to Penang Island, memorable for its fabulous Indian food, then over by boat to Sumatra, Indonesia's northern most island. A stunning jump back away from notions of the developed world, I enjoyed some of the most enriching experiences of my trip - a visit to the Bohorok Orangutan Rehabilitation center, a climb of an active, sulphur-smoke-spewing volcano and a few days of relaxation on Samosir island in the middle of the caldera that is now Lake Toba. Back on the mainland of Malaysia, I headed for some last days on the beach in the Perhentian Islands, then back into Thailand to beach hop my way back to Bangkok for a departure which I had put off for two weeks. Back home via Seoul where I had a lucky chance to explore the downtown a catch some of the city's greater sights. > See the photos from Southeast Asia. > See the photos from Nepal. Back to top |
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