It's been a while since my last blog entry, but it is not without reason. I spent the entire month of October traveling. I started my travels in Bangkok, where I spent a week lounging by a friend's pool trying to get that much needed base tan. Then, on October 8th, the real adventure began. We departed BKK for Phnom Penh, Cambodia. We spent about 4 days in Phnom Penh, where we toured the Killing Fields and saw the monuments and palaces that abound in Cambodia's capital. Phnom Penh was interesting and full of good food, but as a traveler you get this gut feeling of being unsafe there (evidenced by my friend's attempted purse snatching while we were walking). We traveled from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap by bus (which I do not recommend. ever.). I absolutely LOVED Siem Reap. It had an completely different overall vibe than Phnom Penh. We stayed at my favorite hostel I've ever been to, The Funky Flashpacker (look it up, go, stay, it's awesome), and made some of the best memories from our trip there. We woke up at 4 am one morning so we could take a tuk tuk out to Angkor Wat in order to watch the sun rise over the temple. It was a dream come true. Angkor Wat had been on my bucket list since I first began reading National Geographic (and it's been a while, thanks for the years on years of subscriptions Mom and Dad). We all went to Angkor Wat together, but I soon separated myself from my friends to walk through the temple by myself. When we first got into the temple there were people everywhere, but I stayed back and took my time looking at everything, just soaking it all in. Everyone was in such a hurry to run through and see the next thing that I was pretty much alone through most of the temple. It was amazing and I am so glad I was able to go and experience that. After Siem Reap we flew to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I really felt comfortable in that big city because so many things about it reminded me of a big city at home. We spent one day there before traveling to Taman Negara rainforest. It is about 5 or 6 hours from Kuala Lumpur and is the oldest rainforest in the world. We stayed there for 3 days and went on a night time walking tour, hiked up a mountain through the jungle, took canopy walking to a new extreme, learned how to shoot a blow dart gun (I was surprising good, and was told I would make a good wife haha), and went rafting through rapids. Taman Negara was our most adrenaline packed part of the trip to say the least, and I loved every minute of it. After that we went back to Kuala Lumpur. It was surprisingly inexpensive there, and you can find such a wide variety of food that it will blow your mind. I tried Indian food (real Indian food) there for the first time and loved it. We got to go to the Petronas Towers which is the main tourist attraction there, and go to their bird zoo (where I discovered my deep, deep fear of birds after an unfortunate peacock incident). A trip to the Batu caves was also made, but it was under construction, so it was not as awe inspiring as we had been told. After Kuala Lumpur we went to our final destinations of Koh Samui and Koh Tao. We did nothing but lay out by the ocean and float while on Koh Samui and it was exactly what I needed. We took a ferry to Koh Tao, where we "balled out" and got a bungalow right on the beach. The view from our porch was beautiful. Actually, every time you looked out at the ocean there was something new and beautiful to see there. We rented a long tail boat just for ourselves and went snorkeling and exploring all around the island. While there I also learned how to paddle board! Koh Tao easily was my favorite stop. All good things have to come to an end, and I have been back in Chaiyaphum for a couple of weeks now. I came into this semester refreshed and ready to be the best teacher I can be. So far second semester is going much better than the first, and I am glad to see that my students did retain some things from our first semester. It is now "cold" season in Thailand (which means it gets down around 70F) and as I sitting outside at lunch the other day I actually shivered. I checked my phone to see what the temperature was, and it was 74F. So, it is safe to say that my body has officially acclimated to Thailand. Now I am worried when I return in March I will need a full parka just to keep warm! My return flight is officially booked and I am counting down the days, though I am coming to realize that I am really going to miss some things about Thailand. But for now I am focused on this semester, and crossing my fingers that I can leave my students better than before I arrived!
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AuthorGeorgia girl teaching English in Thailand Archives
January 2017
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