It doesn’t feel like that long ago that I was driving around New Zealand and Australia. These countries have escaped the worst of coronavirus and have resumed life back to normal. 

Japan escaped the worst of the pandemic during 2020, but it losing its grip on the virus now as vaccinations lag and the Olympics are threatened to be postponed once again.  

Singapore, Hong Kong, and Vietnam were better prepared than many as a result of their experience with the SARS outbreak. Though cases surged in mid-2020, they’ve kept the virus at bay for the most part since, even as variants continue to spread. 

Myanmar is currently facing even larger problems, as violent protests and unrest have broken out as a result of the military staging a coup after the ruling party won by a landslide. 

The past year has been hard for everyone, and in comparison, my problems seem pretty benign. I had planned on finishing this blog months ago, but writing about all the amazing places you went when you are confined to your home proved to be very difficult, so it’s only now, a year into this ‘new world we live in’ as everyone likes to remind me, that I’ve found the ability to revisit my travels.

While covid cut my journey short, I had 4 glorious, uninterrupted months of hiking, backpacking, flying, boating, eating, struggling, and exploring beforehand, and I’m very grateful for that. Had I postponed just a few more months, waited until after Christmas, or gotten cold feet just before the flight out of Ohare, I don’t know that I’d have an opportunity to do such a trip ever again.

The difficult experiences are the most memorable, the most exciting to recall. It seems ironic that one day I was stranded in an airport without any money trying to figure out how to get to my hotel, and the next I was stressed about going to my local grocery store (What if it’s packed? What if I get coronavirus? What if I already have it and I give it to someone and they die?). The grocery store trip, in many ways, felt much more overwhelming than having to sneak across a border because you lost your visa paperwork. 

I’ve unlearned many social skills over the last year, but I’ve gained an appreciation for many things I took for granted – my health, being able to just walk into a restaurant and eat, dance at a bar with my friends, seeing my friends in person. I’ve had the privilege of having the health and means to get a passport, book a flight, and send myself into another world and the ability to figure out how to adapt. 

I’m sure I’ve learned something, and I’m sure I’ve grown, though at the time of writing this, I’m not sure how. Even a year later, I haven’t fully processed everything that happened, and it might be years until I fully understand the full impact of how the last year and a half has changed me. Surely it’s changed us all.

It’s been a year of chaos, but there’s so much hope on the horizon. The vaccine is widely available, at least in America. Countries are slowly reopening borders. Businesses are reopening. 

So here it is. The end of my blog, the end of my travels. Maybe forever, but at least for now. This trip exceeded my expectations in many ways. This blog…not so much. It ended up becoming a laborious project, a thing I dreaded. Nothing I write here is good enough, so why bother? I’m not going to spend days carefully crafting each post, checking every minute detail. And it’s taken over a year for me to be okay with that. 

My trip, my blog, and my life over the past year have been a beautiful, terrifying, glorious, chaotic mess that I’m proud of. At the end of the day, I traveled and kept this digital journey for myself. And for you, if you’re still here reading after all this time. None of it is perfect, but I’m proud of it nonetheless, and I can’t wait to see what the future holds. 

The end.

The post There and Back Again appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

When I returned to Tokyo, I was surprised at how normal everything was. Bars and restaurants were open. A few trains had been canceled due to decreased traffic from COVID-19, but the station was still busy. I noticed a lot of face masks, but that’s nothing new in Japan. It was jarring, hearing everything that was going on in the rest of the world and seeing that Japan seemed, more or less, fine. 

I headed to my hotel where I was scheduled to stay a week before heading to Kyoto. I checked into my hotel and got my temperature checked before dropping off my things and grabbing dinner from a packed, basement ramen shop (probably not the best idea, in retrospect). I was exhausted from hiking and traveling the last few days and fell asleep early that night. 

I woke up on March 19 and decided to treat my time in Tokyo as if I would have to come home any minute. I walked to Shinjuku Gyoen, a park known for being a great cherry blossom viewing spot. The trees were just starting to bloom, so there wasn’t much to see yet, but I’d hoped to come back in a week when they’d be in full bloom. I went to my favorite crepe stand in Harajuku and ate as much sushi and ramen as I could stomach. 

When I woke on March 20, I had several worried messages from friends and family asking if I was coming home due to the news. The Department of State had issued a Global Level 4 travel warning (the highest level) for the entire globe, urging US citizens not to travel for any reason. The US was closing the borders with Canada and Mexico and was talking about closing the borders everywhere else.

On the one hand, if I was going to be stuck somewhere, I didn’t mind being stuck in Japan. In many ways, it seemed I would be safer in Japan than I would be trying to travel home. I thought about traveling to a different country – New Zealand hadn’t yet closed its borders to Japan, and I could seemingly travel there and wait this out, but staying in New Zealand would be expensive, and it could be weeks or months until I could leave. I had no way of knowing. 

I went to get dressed and realized I didn’t have any clean clothes (I’d forgotten to do laundry the night before). After finally figuring out how to use the washing machine, I put in a load of laundry and headed out. I grabbed coffee and lunch to think it over and do some research on flights. I already had an existing flight out with American Airlines, but it wasn’t for a few weeks, and I wasn’t sure I could wait that long. In the end, I decided I should try to come home in the next few days before things escalate any further. 

American Airlines had waved their change fees due to coronavirus, so I called them to move up my flight. I asked what they had over the next few days, the woman paused for a few moments and said the cheapest flight they had for the next two weeks was four thousand dollars. I was stunned. Everyone also panic-buying flights out, and prices had skyrocketed. I asked if she could check if there was anything else, further out, maybe tonight or early tomorrow. The woman said there was a cheaper flight at 6:15 pm tonight. It was 2 pm at the time, and it takes at least 2 hours to get to the airport. It was going to be close, but if I left now, right now, I could make it. I told her to book it, guessing it was the best I’d get. 

Chaos ensued. My clothes were still in the washing machine, which was in Japanese, and I couldn’t figure out how to stop it. I called the front desk and they sent someone up, and we spent the next fifteen minutes trying to end the wash cycle. Eventually, we were successful and I grabbed all my sopping wet clothes and threw them into my backpack. 

Once I made sure I had everything, I went to the front desk to checkout. They politely reminded me I can’t get a refund for checking out a week early, and I said that was fine. I asked if they could call me a cab to the airport, but the time it would take for the cab to get there and then drive me (there was a lot of traffic and would be much more the closer it got to rush hour), so they gave me directions on the best train route. 

So I walked the 1.5 miles with my backpack, now much heavier due to my clothes being wet, to the train, where I then transferred to another train, then another. I made it to the airport around 4 pm. Airport security was very efficient, and I made it to the packed terminal with 30 minutes to spare. 

So, I didn’t get to see the cherry blossoms. I missed out on about a month of the trip I planned, but I made it home, safe, sound, and coronavirus-free.

The post Tokyo, and The End. appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

The Kumano Kodo is a network of trails that weaves throughout the mountains of the Kii Peninsula. The trail is almost one thousand years old and was previously by Emperors and Samurai as a sacred pilgrimage trail. It is one of 2 pilgrimage routes recognized by UNESCO, the other being the Santiago de Compostela in Spain. It is one of Japan’s oldest and most remote trails, with ancient Buddhist temples, shrines, and plaques featuring stories and lore of the area’s history along the way. 

It would take months to hike through the entire network, but the trails are broken into sections to make them easier to navigate. I chose to hike the Nakahechi trek, beginning at Takijiri-Oji and ending at Kumano Hongu Taisha. The trail is significantly different than my New Zealand hike. Even though the trail winds through small rural towns throughout the region, I probably only ran into 10 people on the trail during my 4-day hike. Instead of staying in huts or camping, lodging is provided in the style of traditional Japanese homes or Ryokans (inns with communal bathhouses). Meals are often included with your lodging, providing a substantial dinner, breakfast, and a bento box for lunch along the way. There’s an option to have your luggage delivered to your lodging each day, but since there’s no need to be cooking supplies, utensils, meals, etc, my pack was light. 

Day One

To get to the trail, I took a train from Osaka to Kii-Tanabe where I dropped off my luggage and (thankfully) caught the last bus just in time to get to the beginning of the trail. Takijiri-Oji is a beautiful Shinto shrine tucked away by the Tonda River at the entrance to the trail. A few people paid their respects at the shrine, and they were the only people I’d see on the trail that day. Cherry blossoms weren’t yet in bloom, especially in the mountains, but I did spot a few plum blossoms along the way. 

The walk was only about 4km (2.5mi), but it still took me 3 hours, as the path wound vertically up into the mountains. It was a short but difficult climb. The trail is mostly dirt paths, stone steps, and wooden bridges. There were parts of the trail where the path was washed away or grown over, but overall it was pretty easy to see where I needed to go. Markers along the way written in Japanese and English give the cultural history of the many shrines and temples along the way. 

The trail, and even my lodging, made me feel like I was in my very own Miyazaki movie. The path was gorgeous and the lodgings are exactly what comes to mind when I think of Japanese homes – tatami mats and floor futons, ornamented paper walls and family-style bathhouses. I spent the night in an old farmhouse 15 minutes outside of Takahara. The town felt like a small slice of traditional Japan.

Day Two

It was very chilly outside at the start of my first full day, and I realized that when I packed, I brought my leather jacket by mistake instead of my heavy jacket. As the trail wound up and around the mountain, one side was clear and sunny, the other snowy and windy. The snow was beautiful so I can’t complain too much, and as long as I kept moving I was warm enough. 

Shortly after the snow had passed, I found a small cafe in Chikatsuyu with a few other backpackers and stopped in to eat my lunch and warm-up. The whole walk was 13km (about 8 miles) and took me 7 hours, passing many small, stone shrines and stacked rocks along the way before making reaching my guesthouse in Nonaka for the night.

Day Three

My third day was (supposed to be) my longest, the whole walk about 18km (11 miles) taking 8-9 hours. I ran into some issues along the trail, missing the detour point and ended up having to find a bus into town in the late afternoon.

The weather was much warmer and sunny for most of the day. Along the path, there were several areas I had passed that were closed or rerouted due to damage to the trail from a recent typhoon. 

There was a large area of the trail under construction. At one point on the trail, the road forked. One side of the fork was under construction and closed off. This was the road I would have taken had it not been closed, but I didn’t realize it at the time. I walked for about two miles, uphill, before noticing the river was on the wrong side of me according to the map. The markers along this side were all in Japanese, so I hadn’t noticed I’d left the Kumano Kodo trail for a different path. I had to backtrack 2 miles downhill, and then go back to the fork and get my bearings. I found a teeny, tiny sign that pointed up to the road. I followed the road around for about an hour before I was back on the trail. 

At this point, it was around 3 pm, and I was exhausted. Because of my blunder, I was only halfway to my destination. I hopped on a bus, which was a bit of a bummer to skip that part of the hike, but it gave me more time to visit the town of Hongu, most notable for the Kumano Hongu Taisha, a sacred mountain shrine, and the enormous Oyunohara, a Shinto complex featuring Japan’s largest torii gate representing the division of the spiritual and secular worlds. 

After exploring Hongu, I headed to my traditional ryokan in Yunomine Onsen, a remote hot spring town with two thousand years of history. My final lodging was by far my favorite, complete with an indoor and outdoor bathhouse. Dinner was Shabu Shabu, a hotpot dish of sliced meat and vegetables that you cook in boiling water. It was wonderful end to my day.

Day Four

I spent my last day enjoying one last dip in the hot spring and wandering around the beautiful town of Yunomine Onsen, truly one of my favorite towns I’ve ever visited. I caught the bus back to Tanabe, grabbed the rest of my luggage, and headed towards Tokyo, where I would stay for a full day before abruptly having to return back to Chicago. I’m incredibly thankful I was able to hike this trail before Coronavirus forced me home, and it was a highlight of my journey.

The post Japan’s Ancient <br>Pilgrimage Trail appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

When I arrived at Osaka airport, I was so thankful to be there. I loved my time in Southeast Asia, but after months of exploring the unknown, the foreign, the unfamiliar, I was very happy to be back in Japan. It was my fourth visit to the country, and it was a luxury to not have to relearn how to take the train, basic vocabulary, etiquette, etc. As I walked through the streets of Osaka to my hostel, I felt my stress melt away. 

Myanmar felt very closed off from the rest of the world, so when I arrived in Japan, I expected things to be very different due to COVID-19. The US had just closed its borders to parts of Europe, and I was thankful to have gotten into Japan before they did the same. I figured if I was going to get stuck somewhere in Asia, I’d prefer it be here. 

Other than the temperature checks, things in Japan seemed…normal. I had half expected to arrive at a closed-down city, with people shut inside, but this wasn’t really the case. Restaurants were still open, karaoke bars still blasting J-Pop through the alleys. People were wearing masks, but that’s pretty par for the course here. There were far fewer tourists than I’m used to, especially so close to Cherry Blossom season, but otherwise, everything felt eerily normal. 

For dinner that night, I found a make-your-own-takoyaki (fried octopus balls) bar stand. A local helped show me what I was supposed to do and what toppings to add. Not the most healthy meal but definitely a lot of fun and very tasty. A group of Canadians wandered over and we all spent the night eating fried octopus and drinking Japanese beer. I had to be up early the next day for my overnight temple stay, so I said goodnight too soon. It was nice to know that even with a looming pandemic, Japan was as welcoming as ever. 

The next day, I left the city and headed for rural Japan, a 2.5-hour journey that to my stay at Eko-In temple in Koyasan, Wakayama. The thousand-year-old Buddhist temple offers lodging to locals and foreigners alike looking to learn what a day in the life of a monk was like. The temple features traditional, Ryokan-style rooms, vegan meals, and public baths with water from the local hot spring. 

To get there was a journey. I took a bullet train, then a normal train, where I misread the signs (my Japanese is a bit rusty) and got off a stop early. The train only comes once every few hours so I really didn’t want to wait around. A conductor who also got off the train could tell I was a bit lost. He handed me a paper map of the area which showed I was only a thirty-minute walk from the cable car I needed to take up the mountain. I dropped off most of my luggage at a locker in Osaka and only had my smaller backpack so I didn’t mind the walk. 

One oversight I had on this trek was the oversight of packing for the altitude – the weather was quite cold, and I hadn’t packed my hat or gloves as it had been warm in Osaka. Thankfully, the walk kept me warm, but I was thankful for the lesson for my upcoming hike in a few days. I made it to the cable car, took a bus into town, and finally made it to the temple. 

If it took me three days to get there, it would have been worth it. One of the monks greeted me and showed me to my room – a traditional Japanese-style space complete with beautiful paper walls, a tatami mat, and a Yukata robe to wear to the bathhouse. 

After settling in, I joined a few other foreigners who were staying there to learn about Zazen meditation. It involves sitting with your legs crossed in Burmese position and keeping your eyes half-open – partially present in this world and partially focused inward. I found it much more difficult than meditating with my eyes closed. 

Dinner itself was an event. There was so much food, and it just kept coming. The meals were all vegan, but I honestly couldn’t tell you what it all was other than it was delicious. 

After dinner, a monk guided us through Okunoin Cemetery, one of the largest, oldest, and most haunted cemeteries in Japan, complete with all the superstition and lore you would expect in such a place. The cemetery is about twelve hundred years old, with over two hundred thousand gravestones leading the way to the mausoleum of Kobo Daishi, the founder of the cemetery. It is believed that he is not dead but has spent the last thousand years in mediation. Thousands of lanterns are lit each night around the mausoleum, but photos are not allowed in this area out of respect. I wandered through it briefly during the day, and it was quite beautiful, but it really needs to be seen at night to get the full experience. 

Since I wasn’t dressed for the weather, I was freezing after the cemetery tour. I took a long dip in the tub of the bathhouse outside before bed. When I arrived back at my room, my table had been pushed aside and my (very comfortable) futon had been made on the floor. The room was cold, no doubt a result of the large windows, but the small heater made for the perfect cozy atmosphere for the night. 

Each morning, a Goma Fire Ritual is performed, a ceremony specific to Esoteric Buddhism that is believed to have a powerful spiritual cleansing effect. The fire symbolizes Buddha’s wisdom and the sticks used for kindling symbolize human desires, the root of our suffering. 

After a blissful night at Eko-in, I headed back to Osaka to prepare for my four-day-long hike on the Ancient Pilgrimage along the Kumano Kodo Trail. 

The post The Ancient Eko-In Temple appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

I felt terrible when I arrived. Still recovering from the smoke of Bagan, I discovered that the only way to get to my hotel (I decided to splurge on a hotel room for my last nights in Myanmar) was to take a taxi to the lake and then take a boat. My head was pounding, and I was on the verge of falling asleep, but I didn’t have any other choice. I shuffled into the back of another taxi and headed to the coast. 

Once I got on the water, none of those things mattered. 

Since the trip took me almost an entire day, the sun was just beginning to set as my 40-minute boat ride to the hotel began. Local Intha fishermen were out on the water, balancing on the edge of their boats while maneuvering their large fishing nets. I’ve never seen anything quite like it. 

Inle Lake was the most ‘touristy’ place I visited in Myanmar, but it’s easy to see it’s popular. The lake sits in a valley between 2 mountain range. It is beautiful, and I felt like I was exploring a totally different point in time.

Along the lake are a variety of shops and attractions looking to catch the eye of tourists passing through: silver shops, wineries, cigars, and silk/lotus weaving shops line the lake. The “Jumping Cat Monastery” has cats trained by monks that perform tricks and jump through hoops.

Although the closest Karen tribe, better known as the “long neck women,” live about six hours away, they make the trip to Inle Lake, making a living off of tourists looking for a quick picture. I have mixed feelings about this as it feels exploitive, but it was interesting to learn about the necklaces. They are purely cosmetic and the rings are seen as a sign of beauty and wealth.

The Phaung Daw U Pagoda is a large grand pagoda sitting right on the lake. The temple looks massive and majestic, especially next to the rest of the buildings that sit upon the lake.

For all of Inle Lake’s beauty, my favorite part was not the lake at all, but the Shwe Inn Dein Pagoda which sits at the end of a small estuary. Over sixteen hundred stupas are scattered throughout, some newer and restored, some crumbling remains of the originals built in the fourteenth century. 

Around the temple are older, abandoned remains of smaller stupas and temples that have not stood the test of time. If you wander away from the path, they are easy to find, and they are everywhere.

I was thankful for my time at Inle Lake. It afforded me more leisurely exploring than I’ve allowed myself during my time in Myanmar. My next stop was supposed to be Hong Kong. Even though just a month ago, I had a layover in Hong Kong on my way to Singapore, the country is now completely locked down. Instead, I headed to Japan, which unknown to me at the time, would prove to be the last place on my journey before the pandemic abruptly forced me to return home.

The post The Coastal Towns <br>of Inle Lake appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

Bagan was nothing short of amazing. 

I could have spent weeks here and not touched everything that this city has to offer. There are so many temples, and each temple is vastly different than the last. I couldn’t wait to get started.

Since many of these temples are grouped in one large area, e-bikes are a common way of getting around. I tried walking around on my first day,  but the many packs of stray dogs all around Bagan made this impossible. Stray dogs are common throughout all of Southeast Asia, but I believe the main difference here is that the dogs here are not as accustomed to tourists and were hostile to non-locals. With that in mind, I booked a tuk-tuk to get the lay of the land with plans to rent an e-bike for my following days here. 

Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. 

My first morning, I woke up with a start thinking my hostel was on fire. My room smelled like a bonfire, my head was killing me, and my eyes were burning. 

My hostel was not on fire, but it seemed like the rest of the country was. Trash burning is very common, and during the dry season, so are wildfires. The smoke was so thick the morning that when I woke up, it was hard to see much of anything. There were no fire close by, but the smoke was aggressive.

With my allergies in full blast, I powered through it the first day, but the smoke gave me a horrendous headache that stuck with me for the rest of my time in Bagan, so I didn’t get to see much else. 

I hope someday I have the chance to visit again (though perhaps not during the dry season) as this city has so much more to offer. However, I crammed a lot into that one day, seeing eight amazing temples.

Manuha Phaya
Built in the year 1067, this temple is known for it’s large, reclining Buddha.

Myazedi Pagoda
The temple is most notable for being the namesake for the Myazedi inscription, the oldest surviving Burmese stone inscription at almost one thousand years old.

Gu Byauk Gyi Temple
The paintings on its walls are believed to be the oldest in Bagan. The front of the temple features inscriptions on its four pillars, each in a different language, which were crucial in deciphering the ancient language of Pyu.

Gawdawpalin Temple
This gu-style temple took 24 years to build, has 4 entrances, and was built for the purpose of Buddhist meditation.

Bupaya Pagoda
The original one thousand, eight hundred-year-old structure built overlooking the Irrawaddy River was destroyed along with many other temples in the 1975 Bagan earthquake. It was completely rebuilt in 1978.

Thatbyinnyu Phaya
The tallest of the pagodas in Bagan, this structure clocks in at 21 stories high. Much about the original history and purpose of this temple is still a mystery.

Ananda Temple
One of the most notable buildings in Bagan, this one thousand-year-old temple is one of the most beautiful and well-preserved in Old Bagan.

Shwesandaw Pagoda
The tallest stupa in Bagan features five terraces and can be seen from quite far away. It was built in 1057 AD.

That’s eight of over two thousand, two hundred temples visited in Bagan. Many more are just waiting to be explored.

The post Myanmar’s Temple City appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

The first thing I noticed about Yangon was the smell. Or rather, smells. On leaving my hostel, I walked through a market that was filled with scents of old chewing tobacco, rotting vegetables, and cigarette smoke, all exacerbated by the intense heat. 

I left the market and walked behind a woman and her young daughter holding hands crossing the street. Halfway through, the woman stopped in the middle of the crosswalk, proceeded to vomit everywhere, and then continued walking across the street. 

Myanmar was off to a rough start. 

I’m going to stop here and say that, Myanmar was one of my favorite countries on this trip. Several travelers I encountered in other countries described Myanmar as ‘The Wild West of Asia’. It’s easy to can see why. While highways, cars, and wifi are far more plentiful than they were even ten years ago, much of the country feels untouched by tourism. I saw very few foreigners in my time here and I was getting to see a slice of Southeast Asia before tourism completely took over. 

However, in other ways, this did not work in my favor. The only way to get around was by walking or taxi, Google Translate didn’t work here, the bus system was all but impossible to figure out if you don’t speak the language, and driving was, for lack of a better word, terrifying. Cars here are built with the driver’s seat on the right side, – like in the UK – but cars drive on the right side of the road – like in the US. I spent half of my time in Yangon sitting in traffic because of some sort of accident or another. 

But the morning I begin my walk to the Sule Pagoda, I know none of these things. I know I’m nauseous from the smell and the heat and currently wondering if projectile vomiting is a symptom of coronavirus. I’m not nearly as worried about getting sunburnt as I am about overheating, as the temples here have very strict rules of what can and can’t be worn. Women must have their shoulders covered and a sarong covering their legs, so I’m sweating through layers.

The Sule Pagoda sits in the heart of downtown Yangon and is estimated to be around two thousand, six hundred years old. It is quite stunning to see the building sitting in the middle of the city. 

When I entered the stupa, I was immediately bombarded by two women at the entrance shouting things at me in English, then shoving flowers and incense into my hands before demanding three thousand kyats (about two USD). I just put them on the ground and walked into the temple. They shouted angrily at me as I walked away. Laos had the most laid-back vendors or anywhere I visited. Yangon, on the other hand, had the most aggressive. However, coronavirus may have played a large role in this. While Myanmar doesn’t receive nearly the number of tourists as some of its neighbors, for these types of vendors, it still heavily relies on those making Buddhist pilgrimages. Many had been suffering in the last few months as a result of China and other surrounding countries closing borders. 

I realized I had no idea where to go. There’s little English to be found in Yangon, and it was no different at this temple.

A young man walked up to me and said he was a student and wanted to show me around and practice his English. The first stop we made was a small ‘birthday’ fountain. There are seven – one for each day of the week – and you find the one that correlates with the day of the week you were born. He then directed me to pour a cup of water five times onto Buddha’s head and three times on the tiger’s head. I’ve tried to find out the significance of this. However, I couldn’t find anything about this online, I think there’s a good chance I misunderstood the directions, but here’s a photo of me doing it anyway.

After the fountain, the man shuffled me into a small room where a “monk” was performing blessings. He’d perform a blessing for you and your family using a candle, then give you a small bracelet as a token of protection. Then, he would demand ten thousand kyats (about six USD). To avoid further confrontation, I gave him the money and left.

Feeling miffed at the interaction, I told the ‘student’ I was going to spend the rest of the day on my own. I gave him a tip (which would have been more if the monk hadn’t requested so much) and went on my way. I found out later monks never request money for a service. I encountered fake monks all over Myanmar, an especially gross tourist trap.

I spent most of the day wandering around, trying food, and looking for water and shade. Once the sun began to set, it was time to head to the Shwedagon Pagoda, the crown jewel of Yangon.

Thankfully, there were only real monks in this temple and lots of locals and foreigners alike. This was the first place on my travels where I encountered what appeared to be women who were monks. They are called Thilashin, and they aren’t full-fledged monks, but instead are sort of to Buddhism what nuns are to Catholicism. Instead of the traditional orange robes, their robes are pink. 

The pagoda is also believed to be around two thousand, six hundred years old, and it’s hard to describe how vast this pagoda is, filled with hundreds of temples, stupas, and statues. There is something very distinct about Buddhist temples in Myanmar compared to other countries in Asia. It’s the only place where flashing neon lights seem to be found in every holy place, giving the whole experience an anachronistic, cyberpunk feel.  At night, the lights are given their chance to shine, and over one thousand candles are lit throughout the vast pagoda. 

I had a pretty rough time in Yangon, but visiting this temple made the trip to the city worth it.

I spent my last day in the Yangon several hours outside of the city visiting Kyaiktiyo Pagoda, or the Golden Rock Pagoda. It is most notable for the giant gold rock that sits precariously on the side of a high cliff. According to legend, it is balanced on one of Buddha’s hairs, preventing it from falling. 

When I asked my hostel to book me a bus ride to and from there, I was not aware of how far it was. About 3.5 hours by car, I thought it’d be a good day trip. Little did I know the bus ride would turn that into an 8-hour ride, and that was just to get to the pagoda. 

I arrived at the bus station at six in the morning, before the sun had even begun to rise. No one spoke English, and the ticket from my hostel was in Burmese so I had no idea what it said. I was just sort of hoping I’d end up in the right place. After having my ticket shown to several different drivers each pointing me from one bus to the next, I found the bus I was meant to be on.

Even though it was one hundred degrees outside that day, the bus was absolutely freezing. I had nothing but my thin sarong as I assumed I would be too warm, not too cold. 

I thought being chilly would be the most of my problems until the bus driver turned on the speakers, blasting what I can only imagine was chanting monks, similar to the ones I had heard over the loudspeaker in the Shwedagon Pagoda. I put in my headphones and turned them up all the way, but I might as well have not had them in at all – that’s how loud it was. I thought maybe it was to bless our journey or something, but it went on for hours.

Hours. Literal hours.

About halfway through the bus ride, the chanting monks were turned off and a Burmese soap opera was played on the small TV upfront, volume still at full blast, though it was an improvement. 

We drove primarily through rural areas, and there weren’t any ‘bus stops’ per se. There was a young boy on the bus, around 8 or 9, whose job was to keep a lookout for people wanting to get on. We stopped at least 30 times, which is probably why the 3.5-hour journey took closer to 8 or 9 hours altogether. 

We finally arrived at our destination and – surprise – time for another ride, this time up into the mountains. I left the bus and climbed into what was essentially the back of a pickup truck with benches each a foot apart. Considering I’m a foot taller than everyone else there, I did not fit very well in that seat. They squeezed 30 or 40 people into the back of this truck and then headed up the mountain in what felt like a Universal Studios ride whipping around tight corners as we all smashed into each other. My hands were white from gripping onto the handle and side of the truck so tightly. 

It took about forty minutes to get up the mountain, whipping quickly around corners so everyone in the back is smashing into each other. We stopped once at a vendor and a man stood up and gave a ten-minute speech in Burmese.

I was thankful when we made it to the top. The pagoda was stunning, and the rock truly did look like any minute it could go tumbling down the mountain and into the jungle. The location of the pagoda is even more beautiful, and I wished I wasn’t so burnt out from the ride so I could enjoy it more.

To say I stuck out here would be an understatement. On top of the fact that I’m very tall, I saw only 3 other foreigners in this whole temple, and because it’s so off the beaten path, everyone was staring. Everyone. I felt pretty uncomfortable. On top of that, there is apparently a ‘foreigner tax’ which I paid and then was given a badge to wear around my neck for the rest of the day, which felt more like a dunce cap than a badge as I walked around the temple.

I spent about ninety minutes exploring the temple before I grabbed a snack and headed for the journey back down the mountain. I was so tired and exhausted that instead of being terrified, I actually found the ride incredibly fun. I was tempted to throw my arms up like I was on a roller coaster. Probably for the best I didn’t. I was on a whole new level of slap-happy.

On the way back, the bus stopped at a small restaurant. I tried to order food, pointing to the food sitting out at the buffet, but they shook their heads and responded with something I couldn’t understand. After several minutes of trying to order food, I just left and sat outside to wait for the bus. 

A group of young women watching nearby must have surmised what happened. One of the women spoke a few words of English, and cut her sandwich in half, offering it to me. I thanked her but shook my head. This was consistent with my experience in Myanmar. I couldn’t communicate with anyone but most people went out of their way to be friendly and welcoming.

The ride home was a bit faster and had far fewer stops, clocking in at a more reasonable 6 hours. I was very hungry as I only brought a few sweet rolls with me and didn’t anticipate being gone so long—I left the hostel at five in the morning and didn’t return until midnight. 

After a cold, loud ride home, I laid in my bed on the top floor of my hostel. I am grateful for my time in Yangon, but I hope that Bagan, my next stop, would prove to be less taxing. I closed my eyes and fell asleep almost instantly to the sound of rats scratching and fighting on the roof.

The post The Wild West <br> of the Southeast appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

Laos is a place people go to get lost, leave the grid never to return. The cost of goods lend to this as well – the Lao Kip is essentially a useless currency outside of Laos and it’s nearly impossible to find someone who will exchange it for you outside of the country. $10 USD a day was enough for me to eat, get around, and have a healthy helping of coffee or tea each morning. I found the night markets far relaxing, with no intense sellers or tuk-tuks following me down the street to get my business.

The city of Luang Prabang is by far the cleanest city I’ve visited and perhaps my favorite in Southeast Asia. The city has a heavy French influence, with its beautiful, UNESCO-protected buildings and French cafes lining the city’s tourist areas along the Mekong River. The combined French and Asian influence of this city made it my favorite so far on my travels. 

Mount Phousi (aptly translating to ‘sacred hill’) is a hill in the center of Luang Prabang. A small temple sits on the top of the hill (That Chomsi), with Buddhist statues, altars, and a small cave temple (Wat Tham Phousi) are scattered across the windy trails that lead around the hill. As I climbed, I saw five young monks smiling, running around, and snapping photos of themselves with smartphones as they made their way up the zip-zagging steps. 

The European buildings might make it easy to forget I’m in Asia if it weren’t for all of the Buddhist temples scattered throughout the town and the regular passing of monks in the street. This combined with the slow pace of the city and the background of the Mekong River gives this city a total zen feeling. It’s unlike anywhere I’ve ever visited. 

A short drive outside of the city center live the Kuang Si Waterfalls, and they are absolutely breathtaking. I walked down a short dirt path past a bear sanctuary and into the forest, which provided shade and a cool breeze, a welcome change from the intense heat I’ve been subjected to since arriving in Indonesia and every destination since. A small clearing leads to the first waterfall, breathtaking in its own right. However, walking further up the path leads to even more pools, each one more beautiful than the last. I couldn’t believe the place wasn’t swamped with tourists. The pools are open and available for swimming, so I expected it to be full of tourists escaping the afternoon heat. Instead, I found maybe five people lazily floating around the pools. 

Laos is a country that’s growing in popularity, but the lack of people here made it feel like the best-kept secret in Southeast Asia.

Of all the places I visited, Laos is the one I wish I had spent more time in. More and more countries were beginning to shut down borders as coronavirus cases spread, and I knew I was running out of time. Laos is by far my favorite new country to visit, and I hope someday I have time to go back and explore more of this beautiful country.

The post The Old Town <br>of Luang Prabang appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

UXO, the Government’s National Unexploded Ordnance Program, has a museum in Luang Prabang that explains the work the country and its partners are doing to clear the country of bombs. Clearing the bombs is slow-going. Over the last twenty years, Laos has cleared hundreds of thousands of undetonated bombs, but that is a small number (less than 1%) of the eighty million that they have to clear. The bombs themselves present a strange and dangerous opportunity for locals. While illegal to harvest the bombs, the metal they are encased in is very valuable and can fetch up to two hundred fifty USD. As a result, many of the deaths in the country are as a result of a non-UXO local attempting to disarm a bomb on their own and accidentally triggering a detonation.

Outside of Laos’ main cities, bombs are a part of daily life.  Children across the country are educated on what bombs look like and how to react in an event that they find one, unfortunately not a rare occurrence. The bombs are small and round, and to an unassuming child, look like something fun to play with. Almost half of the casualties each year due to the bombs are children. 

I wish I had something more uplifting to say here, but the reality is at the rate things are going, it will be centuries until the land is cleared of these bombs. People have instead adapted their daily lives, but these undetonated bombs will continue to negatively impact the country’s ability to grow and recover for years to come. 

On a lighter note, I rounded out my day at a different museum, the Traditional Arts and Ethnology Center. The center showcases various types of clothing, instruments, languages, and traditions of the varying ethnic groups throughout Laos. Even though Laos has one of the smallest populations in Southeast Asia, it is home to forty-seven ethnicities and eighty different languages. It is a culturally rich and diverse country, and I’m glad I was able to end my time here on a high note by getting a taste of what the country’s culture is about. 

The post UXO Laos appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

Day 1

The drive down from Pai was not quite as nauseating as the way up but was far from pleasant. After two hours in the van, I was shuffled out of that packed van and into another packed van, where we rode another four hours to Chiang Rai, where we stopped every thirty minutes so the driver could have a smoke break.

Chiang Rai is most notably home to the White Temple, and it did not disappoint. If you took Frozen and Cthtulu lore and smashed them together, you’d get something like this castle. Flaming skulls, monstrous sea creatures, and gothic architecture make up this structure. It was by far my favorite and most unique temple I saw in Southeast Asia.

After 10 hours of shuffling around Thailand, we finally made it to Chiang Khong, the border between Thailand and Laos. At this point, I was given a card that noted my accommodation for that night, and that my meals would be included. I was dropped off at my hostel, a very suspect and dilapidated building. I was the last person to check-in and a private room was the only room available. This would be the only good thing about this place. My Thai sim card thought I had arrived in Laos and stopped working, the bed was harder than the concrete floor, and the bathroom was covered in small black beetles. I was grateful that I would only be there for a night and wasn’t sure what I was expecting when this whole three-day excursion cost me sixtyUSD.

You get what you pay for.

Day 2

After a poor night’s sleep, I was looking forward to an eight-hour—it was a ‘slow boat’ after all. A small group of us headed to the border, which is the most inefficient customs/immigration process I’ve ever been through. There weren’t many people (thanks Coronavirus!) but it took two hours nonetheless. First, an overcrowded Tuk Tuk led to the border, where I waited in line to go through customs. Thankfully, my passport stamp was legit so I didn’t have any problems. I stood in line to buy a bus ticket, which only costs about one USD. The ride feels ridiculous as the bridge is a maximum five-minute walk, but it is illegal to cross on foot. The shady ticket booth also offered to exchange USD for Lao Kip, which I did because at this point the whole thing feels pretty shoddy and I’m not sure that I’ll even be able to find a legitimate currency exchange before I get to Laos (fun fact – there wasn’t one and I was so happy I did this).

I get on the overcrowded bus with no seats left, ignoring all of the ‘buckle up’ signs as I stood in the aisle. We arrive at Laos immigration, and I receive two poorly translated immigration forms for Laos to fill out. I fill out about 60% of it, as much as I could understand, and then stand (surprise!) in another line where they check my papers and take my passport. I must have filled out the important info because they told me to move onto yet ANOTHER line where I wait to get my passport back. Once I receive it, I grab all of my things and head to – you guessed it – another line. This line is where they do a final passport check and you pay the visa fee. My crisp, USD that I took out in Cambodia for some reason ALL had a small, pen mark in the corner, so I had to use my kip to cross (so happy I exchanged it). Then, I go wait for the van to finally take me to the boat.

It’s already been a day.

Thankfully, the pier for the Slow Boat was easy to navigate. Food and drink vendors lined the shore, and I joined a group of ten or so Canadians and Spaniards in filling a cooler with beer, sandwiches, and water. The eight-hour boat ride proved to be an eight-hour-long party. I didn’t get the nap I wanted, but I had a lot of fun. The boat was primarily young backpackers, everyone drinking cheap beer and chatting and playing music. I could see why people opt for this experience vs taking a bus or plane.

We arrived in Pak Bang, our stop for the night, around 4 pm. The boat couldn’t get close to the steps because of the choppy water, so it dropped off on a nearby rock where everyone climbed their way up to the steps with all of their bags which was especially entertaining (dangerous) since most of the boat was very drunk and carrying their lives on their back. I’m happy to report everyone was accounted for and no one fell in.

I discovered my accommodation for the night was not included in the package I bought. I just stopped at the first place I found, about nine USD for the night. It wasn’t luxury, but the bed was comfortable. The bathroom was filled with ants and a resident gecko, but I considered this a vast improvement from last night’s black beetles.

Day 3

I was pretty burnt out from yesterday’s drinking and decided to find a less crowded, less rowdy boat to rest.

Since I had spent the day before chatting and drinking away, I didn’t notice too much of the scenery. Laos is beautiful. So much of the land along the river feels untouched. What settlements do exist are temporary tents, houseboats, and bamboo huts. Another thing I hadn’t noticed – the slightly terrifying whirlpools. The Mekong River is full of these whirlpools that the slow boat captains carefully avoid and feel like something out of a video game. We stopped at several villages along the way to pick up/drop off supplies, and you can see kids waiting along the coast for the boat, waving to all of the tourists as we go by.

We finally landed in Luang Prabang around five pm, climbed our way up the steps, and smashed into a tuk-tuk. Another twenty-minute walk later, I finally made it to my cozy, air-conditioned guesthouse.

Am I glad I did it? Absolutely. Though I can’ say I would do it again.

The post The Three-Day Slow<br> Boat to Laos appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

Such is the case with everyone I met in Pai. I came for a few days, that was 4 months ago, or I was supposed to leave 3 weeks ago. On and on it goes.  

It’s easy to see why Pai is a popular tourist destination. The area is full of vegan restaurants, yoga studios, dive bars, tattoo shops, and foreigners who haven’t showered in days or shaved in months.

Needless to say, I loved it. 

The first thing I noticed about Pai is the sheer number of…injuries. It’s a small town, so there isn’t much in the way of cabs or public transportation. If you want to get around you walk or you motorbike. 

Just about anyone can get a motorbike. I’m sure there are some laws in Thailand about who can ride a bike or get an international license or something, but none of the rental shops seem to pay that any mind. As a result, many people come to Pai and ride a motorbike for the first time, and the result was lots of fallen motorcyclists. Thankfully, motorbikes don’t go very fast, so the extent of the injuries is cuts and bruises. 

I had big plans for Pai. I was going to climb to the Big White Buddha temple or maybe hike Pai Canyon. Tham Lod Cave was pretty high on my list, as was swimming in one of the hot springs, or maybe just attending a yoga class. 

I did none of these things in Pai. 

And I’m not upset about it, not one bit. It’s easy to see why people get stuck here, but a large part of my laziness in Pai was due to the hostel I stayed at. My hostel was fairly small and intimate. There were around ten of us staying there. Some people had been there days, some weeks, and been there for months. 

The owner, Ron, has a lot to do with that. Ron is a Thai man who refers to everyone as ‘honey’. He loves to joke around, and he really built the place from the ground up. He lives with his wife and daughter on the second floor of the hostel, so they’re always around. 

Ron’s wife cooks all the food at the hostel. If you want to order something – green curry, french fries, mango milkshakes, etc – you use the walkie-talkie at the front desk to put in your order, and shortly after, she sends down your food from the second floor in a small, wicker basket. I had a lot of amazing food in Thailand, but nothing came close to a home-cooked meal from this hostel. 

The hostel itself gave you no reason to leave. Two stray dogs – who Ron named Daisy and Hutube – spent most days wandering around the grounds looking for snacks and pets. During the day, residents would sunbathe in the sand or lay around in hammocks drinking, reading, and listening to music. A few would make day treks to nearby attractions, but at night, everyone was together, sitting by the bonfire, drinking whatever beer Ron stocked that day, and playing cards. It felt like adult camp. I rented a private room with my own bathroom, and it cost me around eight dollars a night. Another reason why it’s so easy to get lost here – many can afford to. 

That’s not to say I did nothing while I was there. I didn’t rent a motorbike, but I’d walk the two miles into town to wander around. A favorite activity was watching tourists try to go tubing around the Pai river. It’s a popular activity, grabbing a few drinks and floating down the river. Because of the dry season, there were several spots along the river where it was too shallow to float, and an inevitable backup would form of tubers trying to scoot themselves along the dry patch to continue their leisurely float. 

In the early evening, I would join my hostel mates to wander about the town, eating peanut butter and banana shakes at the night market and snacking at all the food stands. We stopped at a bar or two, such as the popular ‘Sunrise Bar’, but nothing really beats the ambiance we received at the hostel. 

The one ‘attraction’ I did take part in was attending the famed circus show. Pai Circus Hostel is a lodging that also teaches those who are interested in the art of fire dancing. A local Thai fire dancer/fire breather owns it, and many of the people he trained who perform in the show are travelers who got sucked into Pai and stayed to pick up this new trade. The show was quite impressive. 

I only spent a week in Pai, but I could have stayed there for weeks, maybe even months, but it feels like limbo. It’s easy to see how people lose themselves here, and I loved my stay and would love even more to go back. However, I had other countries to visit, so I had Ron book me a ticket to Laos, and I prepared to make the only way one should – by a three-day slow boat.

The post Pai – The Place Where <br>Time Stands Still appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

I spent two hours in the back of a songthaew (it’s like a pick-up truck with the back converted into bench seating, but even more uncomfortable than it sounds) and made a long, hot, nauseating journey to meet my gentle giants.

I spent almost an entire day there, so you’d think I would have learned something in that time, but I was so enamored with the elephants that if I was listening, I didn’t retain anything I learned. So here are some quick facts about elephants I learned from Google: 

• They can live up to eighty years – some even longer
• They eat around 150kg per day
• Elephant poop is mostly odorless and can easily be made into paper (there are LOTS of stands throughout Chiang Mai that will sell you postcards you can send home to your family made out of – you guessed it – elephant poop)
• An estimated twenty percent of Thailand’s elephants are in Chiang Mai
• An elephant’s trunk has over forty thousand muscles – for comparison, the human body has about six hundred fifty

You get the point. Elephants are awesome!

I spent the morning feeding the elephants and the afternoon mud bathing with them. I couldn’t ask for a better day.

I had to say goodbye to the elephants eventually, and I heard great things about Wat Phra That Doi Suthep, the temple on top of the mountain called Doi Suthep. It boasted beautiful temples and even grander views of the city. 

Unfortunately for me, I happened to be here during the dry season, which meant smoke filled the sky—bad for my allergies, but even worse for the views. The climb to the top of the temple wasn’t nearly as taxing as I anticipated, and the temple was beautiful, but the smog distorted what would have been a beautiful view of the city.

I almost forgot about the best part. The reason I’m here. Kim, why did you bother coming to Asia at all? There are so many places to see, some much closer to home. 

Why, the food of course. 

No amount of walking, climbing, or hiking could possibly keep up with the amount of food I ate on this trip, and the food in Thailand was on a whole new level. I signed up for a cooking class in hopes that I could take home a few lessons on the food I adored here.

My class was through Aromdii Cooking School, and I couldn’t have been happier with my experience. We started at the market, purchasing all of the fresh food that we’ll need to make the dishes we chose.

After the market, we headed to the cooking school, a large, open area attached to our host’s garage. Everything I ate was amazing, and the lineup was: 

• Fruit Salad appetizer consisting of dragonfruit, apples, guava, sweet corn, fish sauce, tomato, and dried shrimp for an extra crunch (it sounds weird but it was actually really good)
• Tom Ka Kai, or chicken in coconut milk soup with Galangal (part of the ginger family), lemongrass, and mushrooms. 
• For the main course, I made Khao Soi (also known as Chiang Mai noodles), my new favorite food that I discovered on this trip. It’s a red curry dish with egg noodles, and I craved it every day in Thailand. I hope to someday gain the skills to recreate this recipe on my own. 
• Of course, we didn’t forget about dessert. The final course was Sticky Rice Mango. The rice is boiled with coconut cream and sugar and topped with deep-fried mungbean for an extra crunch. 

It was, by far the best meal I had on my travels to date. I tacked this cooking class on at the last minute, but it ended up being a highlight.

I can’t express how glad I am I extended my time in Chiang Mai. Initially, I had planned on following up Chiang Mai with a visit to one of the islands, or a beach town like Phucket. That is until everyone told me to go somewhere else. Every traveler, every backpacker I came across who had already done Thailand, I asked what their favorite place was. Over and over again, they told me, Pai. 

So with that, I said farewell to Chiang Mai and prepared for yet another long bus ride to the small mountain town of Pai, Thailand.

The post Heaven is Swimming with <br>Elephants and Khao Soi appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

I don’t remember how I heard about Sak Yant tattooing, but when I learned there was an Ajarn (master) in the area who was willing to tattoo foreigners, I thought it would be the perfect way to learn about Thai Buddhist culture while gaining a permanent memento of my travels. 

A Sak Yant tattoo, also known as a Yantra tattooing, uses sacred geometric shapes, animal images, and deity designs to bring luck, good fortune, protection, and other benefits to the owner. The farther down on the body the tattoo is placed, the less sacred is considered, so a first Sak Yant tattoo should be placed above the waist. There are many different types of designs, and Buddhist monks must undergo extensive training in order to be able to give a Sak Yant tattoo. 

Finding someone to perform a Sak Yant tattoo was easier said than done. Practicing monks cannot perform the Sak Yant on women, but former monks who have been trained in the practice can get around this rule. I found several places that used ‘shared ink buckets’, a sanitary nightmare, which is why I chose the place I did – ink is discarded after each use, every needle is sanitized and discarded (or you get to take it home if you like). 

After a short ride outside the city, we arrived at the temple where I would be getting my tattoo. I was accompanied by my guide/translator/driver and another woman who, as fate would have it, was the same height and age as me and also happened to be from Chicago. Ajarn Tu Nametta, who would be doing my tattoo, was busy performing an exorcism (a local woman who was waiting to get her own Sak Yant showed me the video – it was insane) so we had plenty of time to go into town and put together an offering for the Ajarn. 

Everyone in the market stared at the two of us foreigners. We were out of place to be sure, both a full head taller than anyone else. Our guide told us people were staring because they thought we were twins. Even though she is blonde, and I’m brunette, I guess it’s seldom that they see two thin, 5’9” tall white women walking through the market. 

We gathered the necessary supplies for our offering to the Ajarn, which consisted of white flowers, cigarettes, whisky, apples, incense, and candles. We ate lunch and headed back to the temple. The Ajarn was tattooing a young boy, probably around 13 or 14 years old, and the tattoo was a large tiger that took up most of his back. The Sak Yant tattoo is performed by repeatedly tapping a bamboo stick with a thin needle on the end into the skin, and it did not look pleasant. Although, if this young boy could do it, so could I…right?

When it was my turn, I had to wait a bit as there were several monks waiting to chat with the Ajarn. My guide explained that while he is no longer still a monk (which is why he can perform the ceremony for us), he is still revered and respected by the locals.

He came back and motioned for me to sit. He said something in Thai and everyone laughed. The guide told me the Ajarn is very funny, and I’ll have to take his word for it.

When we began, I gave the Ajarn my offering which he blessed along with the needle that he will be using. As he began the tattoo, I noticed it didn’t hurt nearly as much as I expected, but it was still wildly unpleasant since it was on my spine. I asked the guide if he could play some music to distract me, and he began playing a Lady Gaga station on Pandora. The Ajarn started humming along, singing what words he had memorized. 

The guide was right – he was funny. 

My tattoo was called the Prachao Ha Praong. Here is how it was described: “The 5 blessings of Buddha Na-Mo-Put-Ta-Ya. Although less known by the general public, it is considered one of the Yant Kru, or fundamental yant. These sacred utterances (Mantras) are usually pronounced over and over by Buddhist monks, in order to enter a high level of meditation. They can be found in many Buddhist representations. It will bring good luck, happiness, and well-being to the wearer and protect you from the potential surrounding bad spirits.” 

Essentially, there are fundamental Sak Yants which, if this were a video game, would be your base stats. Then, you can level up your character by adding additional Sak Yants that provide you with different blessings and protections. For example, a warrior would want a Sak Yant to protect him in battle.

It didn’t feel great, but thankfully, the Ajarn is experienced and quick so the tattoo only took about 30 minutes. He used olive oil to seal the wound (I googled it and apparently yes, this is a thing) and then began the final blessing for the Sak Yant. I hope it brings me lots of luck and protection for the remainder of my journey.

The Sak Yant was a magical experience. Still, it was early afternoon when I was done, so I decided to show off my new back ink and wander around the Chiang Mai night market. There are several, very beautiful temples scattered around Chiang Mai, and they really come alive at night.

I learned while my Sak Yant may be offering me protection from evil spirits, this protection did not extend to evil tastes. Throughout my time in Southeast Asia, over and over again I encountered Durian, the world’s stinkiest fruit. People have strong feelings about Durian – they either love it or hate it. It seems to be the Asia equivalent of really strong and stinky cheese – it’s either for you or it’s not. I had stayed in many hostels and Airbnbs that outright banned the food from entering the premises. I encountered a vendor who was selling pieces of cut-up Durian and finally got the courage to try it…and, well,  it sort of tasted like popcorn? It’s the only way I can think to describe it. It was more savory than sweet and had a buttery taste to it. The taste itself wasn’t’ bad, but the smell and aftertaste were horrendous. I couldn’t get the taste out of my mouth or the smell off of my fingers for hours. 

And with that, I decided I had tested my luck enough that night. I had a lot more of Chiang Mai to see in the coming days.

The post Sacred Sak Yant Tattoo appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

I woke up early to take the 8.5 bus ride from Siem Reap, Cambodia to Bangkok, Thailand. The bus ride was uneventful until arriving at the border. The bus driver asked everyone to take out their Cambodian visa.

Like most countries I visited, I applied for an E-visa ahead of my stay in Cambodia. When I arrived in Cambodia, I showed the man my e-visa on my phone as I didn’t think to print it out (I didn’t see anywhere that instructed me to do so). He grumbled something I couldn’t understand, printed out a piece of paper, stamped it, and let me through. Apparently, the paper he printed out and stamped was my visa, I needed this paper to leave the country. I didn’t know this, didn’t have it, and was told I needed this paper & stamp in order to leave Cambodia. 

I felt a bit less silly when I found out the Canadian man in the seat in front of me lost his as well. The bus driver gave us both a lecture (as if I frequently bus back and forth between Siem Reap and Bangkok) and said he would see what he could do. Everyone else filed off the bus to go through customs as I sat tensely, hoping I wouldn’t be booted from the bus.

The Canadian and I started chatting. He said he really didn’t know where his visa could have gone. I said if it made him feel better, I never had a hard copy to begin with. He asked if I was Canadian. I said I wasn’t, but I thanked him for the compliment.

The bus driver returned and spent ten minutes explaining in a very roundabout way (and without explicitly saying it) that he could get us across by bribing the border guards with five dollars USD. I thought that was a bargain, and as luck would have it, I had a five-dollar bill on me. We handed over our respective passports.

The bus driver proceeded to close all the curtains on the bus and instructed us to “hide” so we couldn’t be seen in the windows. He then drove to the pickup point on the other side of the border. 

If I wasn’t so tired from the bus ride, I would have been a little more panicked about the fact that I was almost definitely being smuggled into another country.

The driver came back onto the bus and handed back our passports with our stamps inside. If I could, I would pay five dollars every time to not have to wait in another visa line.

We picked up the other passengers and continued on our merry way.

My troubles weren’t over, it would seem. We arrived in Bangkok, although instead of dropping us off at a bus terminal, the bus stopped in a shady lot beneath an underpass and told everyone to get off. Most of the bus patrons were native to either Cambodia or Thailand and seemed to expect this. There was a group of 8 of us who were foreign travelers with no idea of where to go. 

My lesson was clear – in the future, I would fly instead. 

Another American woman and I decided to head towards what looked like a train terminal a few blocks over to see if we could find somewhere to get wifi/phone service or call a cab. We tried to chat with a worker, but he spoke little English, and I knew virtually no Thai. I had taken to learning a few chosen words in each language, but other than ‘excuse me’ and ‘thank you’, the other words I knew – bathroom, water, beer, and train – didn’t do me a lot of good here. 

I was renting a room in an apartment, not a hostel, and figured getting directions to where I was staying would be difficult. I opted to use universal language instead. 

“SIM card?” I asked, pointing to my phone. The man smiled and shook his head apologetically. 

My Cambodian SIM card didn’t work across the border, and I found that while I could use my Verizon SIM card for $10/day, it didn’t work well anywhere outside of the US. 

We continued walking until I found a 7-Eleven that sold SIM cards. I tried to buy one, but they didn’t have the correct one for my phone. They did, however, have terrible Wifi, and I was able to keep connected long enough to book a cab to my lodging. I said goodbye to my new American friend. She was staying at a Mad Monkey hostel, a sister hostel of the one I stayed at in Phnom Penh, and I took that to mean we probably had very different travel plans and wouldn’t be meeting up again. 

The rest of my stay in Bangkok was uneventful. I took advantage of the cheap-priced goods at Khaosan Road and bought a larger, proper backpack. I was only there for 2 nights, and that was plenty for me to decide the city wasn’t my style. Khaosan Road is an overwhelming tourist destination, I visited the ‘gay nightlife’ area but wasn’t admitted into a Cabaret show because I was a woman (which was very unexpected), and I accidentally wandered into the red light district which proved to be disturbing and depressing, with lots of old, white western men fawning over young (in some cases, too young) Thai women. 

I eventually made my way to a dive bar with an older bartender who saved me the trouble of fumbling an order in broken Thai and handed me a beer. I spent the rest of the night there, thankful for a break from the rest of the chaos of Bangkok. I met a couple of American ex-pats, surprised to find a tourist in this dingy little bar. I said farewell and headed back to my room to book my flight to Chiang Mai. I needed a break from buses.

The post It costs $5 to <br>sneak into Thailand appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

I stayed in Onederz hostel during my time there, which I bring up because I had a phenomenal time. I only stayed a few days as coronavirus was becoming a real threat to cutting my trip short, but I could have stayed here for weeks. The lodging was cozy, the food and smoothies were incredible, and I found it a popular stay for young people looking to work remotely in a new and interesting place. It’s very close to Pub Street and the night market, and I met a lot of wonderful people during my time there. I can’t recommend it enough. 

I spent my first full day visiting the crown jewel of Cambodia, Angkor Wat, and the surrounding temples. I arrived bright and early to catch the sun rising behind the grand temple.

Angkor Wat is a Buddhist temple built in the twelfth century and dedicated to Vishnu, ‘The Preserver’ in the Hindu Trinity. It is the largest religious structure in the world, spanning over four hundred acres. It is one of the most important pilgrimage sites for those who practice Buddhism around the world. Its size and beauty speak for themselves, with walls covered in ornate sculptures and carvings, it’s easy to see what makes this an important piece of Cambodian history.

Thankfully the temple was spared much of the war carnage that damaged or destroyed many important monuments throughout the country. Normally, it is overrun by tourists with over three million people visiting each year. Coronavirus has severely impacted these numbers, and there were very few people wandering around the temples during my time there—great for me, not so great for the Cambodian economy.

There are many other temples scattered around the area of Angkor. One of the most iconic and recognizable of these is Bayon Temple, most notable for the large, smiling stone faces that grace the towers of the upper terrace. It is believed to have been built in the late twelfth or early thirteenth century and is surrounded by dense jungle on all sides.

My personal favorite and perhaps the most photographic temple in Angkor is Ta Prohm. The temple has been reclaimed by nature, with large trees growing out of the temple, roots winding wildly throughout the stone bricks. You’ll probably recognize it if you watched the original Tomb Raider movie, and it’s easy to see why. The temple’s wild nature is impossible to forget.

The last temple of the day was Banteay Kdei, or ‘Citadel of Chambers’. The temple is the least preserved of the temples in Angkor, and this is what really makes it worth a visit. Trees and moss overrun this dilapidated temple and old sandstone bricks litter the site where walls used to stand. I really felt like I was wandering through an ancient ruin in a video game.

My final destination in Siem Reap was the Floating Village on Tonle Sap Lake. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize it was the dry season when I added this to the list, so there wasn’t a lot of “floating” in this floating village. During the dry season, the village is mostly walkable. During the wet season, the lake rises to make boats the only form of transportation to school, work, etc. However, the lake holds less and less water as a result of climate change, which is now threatening the economy and ecosystem of this region as the water levels fall each year. National Geographic has a great article talking about the impacts both climate change and now COVID-19 have had on this region.

Still, some of the flooded forest remains, and I was still able to go out on a boat to see what floating structures exist during the dry season. The boat ride and the sunset did not disappoint.

I loved my experience in Siem Reap and I wish I had more time to explore the rest of the country, especially the more isolated areas along the coastline. Alas, it was time to move on and I readied myself for another long bus ride – this time to Bangkok, Thailand.

The post Angkor Wat & <br>the Floating Villages appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

Before coming to Cambodia, I’d never heard of the S-21 prison, or the Khmer Rouge, or the Second Indochina War, or Operation Menu, or the Cambodian Civil War.

I knew none of these things, and after hearing about them, it makes me wonder what other horrifying modern events I missed in History class. 

Cambodia was the place I was most nervous to visit during my travels. I was going into the country completely blind. Malaysia and Singapore were unfamiliar, but they are further industrialized, easy to get around, English-friendly. I wasn’t sure how much of that to expect here. 

These fears proved to be unfounded, as I quickly adapted to life traveling via tuk-tuk. USD is an accepted form of currency, and the cities have exploded with growth in the last ten years. I mean, they even have a Hard Rock Cafe. 

What I was not prepared for, was the dark and recent history of Cambodia. I got a ride in a tuk-tuk from the airport to my hostel, which was blasting so loud that I could hear the music 2 blocks away. Note to self – a hostel called ‘Mad Monkey’ is the place to stay if you want to be wasted at 2 pm and spend your nights sleeping by the pool. It is NOT the place to stay if you are looking for a peaceful night’s sleep after a day of sightseeing. Consider my lesson learned. 

My driver came the following morning to escort me around the city, though I wasn’t prepared for the grim sights that awaited me. 

The Killing Fields are mass graves around Cambodia thought to hold at least 1,386,734 bodies, victims of the state-sponsored genocide from 1975-1979 under the leadership of General Secretary Pol Pot. If you include people who died from disease and starvation, that number rises to closer to 2.5 million. That is out of a total population of 8 million – more than 25% percent of the population died during this conflict over the course of 5 years. My day started at Choeung Ek, the most famous of the Killing Fields.

The Cambodian Civil War of 1970-1975 was complicated and is what eventually allowed the Khmer Rouge to take power. The US bombing of Cambodia contributed to the Khmer Rouge eventually seizing power. 

There seemed to be little distinction of who could be targeted by the Khmer Rouge, with men, women, and children all victims. Some things that qualified you as an enemy of the state were wearing glasses, being considered an ‘intellectual’, speaking two or more languages, living or having lived abroad, Buddhist monks, foreigners—the list goes on and on. The government even sent letters to known ex-pats living overseas and asked them to come home in order to help get their country back on track. Those who did return, thinking themselves patriots, were promptly sent to prison or murdered.

If you’re squeamish, consider this a trigger warning and skip this next paragraph.

Bullets were a commodity, so to carry out these killings, people were murdered in horrendous ways, some poisoned, some stabbed, some bludgeoned. Perhaps the most horrifying is that if an adult was considered an enemy of the state, often their families and children were as well. Small children and infants were killed by having their heads smashed against Chankiri trees. 

The Choeung Ek memorial park is just outside of Phnom Penh. Many of the mass graves here have not yet been excavated and are quite shallow, so it isn’t uncommon to see bits of clothing and bone sticking out of the ground, especially after heavy rain/wind. This location is best known for its large stupa, a Buddhist memorial with glass boxes filled on all sides with the skulls of five thousand victims. When the doors are opened, you can clearly see the skulls, many of which have been shattered or caved in. 

Many of the bodies at Choeung Ek were murdered prisoners of the S-21 Prison, now the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, which made it my next stop. The S-21 Prison was a former secondary school transformed into a prison/torture chamber where prisoners were cruelly interrogated and tortured before being exterminated. 

Prisoners would spend a few months in the prison, many facing interrogation. This included beatings, electrocution, suffocation, ripping out fingernails, waterboarding, sleep deprivation, starvation, general neglect, and rape, although if an interrogator was found out to have sexually abused a prisoner, they too would be executed. The ‘confessions’ were almost always false, with the victims telling the interrogators whatever they wanted to hear. This often included some sort of collusion with the CIA, KGB, or Vietnam. 

Most foreigners had left before the genocide started, but those who remained were executed. I read a story about a New Zealand man and his friend who were out boating when they accidentally drifted into Cambodian waters. They were picked up by a Khmer Rouge patrol boat, sent to S-21 where they were tortured for several months before being executed. There are many other stories similar to this, of people just being in the wrong place at the wrong time. 

Some of the rooms in the memorial have been left just as they were when the Khmer Rouge left. Some contain photos of the many victims who passed through the prison. There are a number of real photos as well as paintings that showcase some of the torture and horrors that occurred in the interrogation rooms. 

This was one of the most mentally exhausting days of my trip. I don’t know what I was expecting from Phnom Penh but…it wasn’t this. I’m glad I went as it was an important experience, but I felt like I was living through a horror film, and the things that happened here were as cruel as they were senseless. 

Perhaps what’s most frustrating for me about all I’d seen was the lack of justice for the victims. When Germany lost World War II, Nazis were arrested and prosecuted, swasticas outlawed, reparations paid, and history books updated to denounce the horrors of the Holocaust. It doesn’t compare to the lives lost, but it’s something. It can offer some sort of closure, or justice, or a path forward. It doesn’t seem that any of this exists here. Pol-Pot was chased out of power by the Vietnamese in 1979, but the Khmer Rouge continued to have the support of China and the United States. Pol-Pot lived until 1998 where, at the age of seventy-two, he died of heart failure. A tribunal wasn’t established by the UN until 2006, and many of those responsible by that point were well into their 80s or dead. As a result, only a handful of Khmer Rouge have been tried and convicted. Just as there seems to be no real meaning to the deaths of over two million people, there is also no closure.

The post The Killing Fields appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

Kuala Lumpur is the cultural and economic hub of Malaysia, and its diversity really makes it stand out. I stayed in Bukit Bintang, the entertainment and shopping district of KL. I found the public transportation a bit frustrating, but the city was fairly walkable so I spent a lot of time close by and in the nearby city center and Chinatown. 

Honestly, I was surprised by how…cool KL was. One area I walked through felt as though every street was an art exhibit, beautifully colored or covered in graffiti. I spent most nights wandering, perusing the street markets with great delight. I can’t say I tried a lot of different food here, as my first night I stopped at a chicken wing restaurant that was recommended to me, and it was easily the best chicken wings I’ve ever eaten. I ate there almost every night, with coconut ice cream for dessert. 

 I found out there was a comedy club in Kuala Lumpur, a rarity in Southeast Asia. I took a cab and—I don’t know what I was expecting—but Crackhouse Comedy Club was a normal, hole-in-the-wall comedy club. There were four acts in total. Malaysia is made up of 3 primary ethnic groups – Malay, Chinese, and Indian. I point this out because it makes KL feel very segregated – each neighborhood feels vastly different than the next depending on what ethnicity/religion is the majority in that area. This exists in other big cities, to be sure, but I’ve never felt it at the level I experienced here.

I bring this up because, obviously the comedy scene in Malaysia is very new, and I believe this is the only comedy dedicated club in the country. As a result, a lot of the jokes felt juvenile, playing off the audience’s shock at vulgar or sexual references. But, I’d also seen firsthand a lot of blatant racism in my time in Asia, and many of the jokes I heard definitely would not be PC in the west. People in the audience were good sports about it, but I found it cringy. Although, the lineup of performers was pretty diverse, which made it more palatable – a Malaysian host, 3 Chinese-Malay comedians, and 1 Singapore-Chinese comedian. I had a great night and it was definitely an interesting experience. 

On one of my last days, I made the trip to the Batu Caves, the main reason I came to Malaysia. The Batu Caves are a series of temples and caves built into the side of a massive limestone hill. The caves themselves are thought to be 400 million years old, while the actual shrines and steps were built in the late 1800s. They are most notable for the 140-foot gold statue that stands outside the entrance to the caves. 

I just happened to visit on the day of the Thaipusam festival. The place was PACKED, the trains were filled with people and music blasted with costumes and rows and rows of street vendors. An estimated 1 million people make the pilgrimage each year, although the coronavirus surely impacted this year’s festivities. I can’t speak to what this place was like on a normal day, but it was bursting with energy on this particular Saturday. 

A large, colorful temple sits at the base of the caves, and that is just the beginning of its beauty. 272 colorful steps lead the way to the entrance of the cave, where many more shrines await. I was disappointed to see how tourists treat the temple – the stairs were completely lined with trash. The issue is exacerbated by monkeys, which tourists like to feed. They are native to the cave, but it was a huge bummer to see a monkey drinking out of a red bull can. 

However, even this couldn’t detract from the breathtaking view of the caves. It almost feels fake – the giant statue, the beautiful shrines, the limestone formations – it’s truly something out of a movie. Once you make it to the top of the steps, you can see how massive the cave is. There is another small temple inside, and then – of course – more steps! These lead to the higher part of the cave, which opens up on top, allowing sunlight to pour in over the towering limestone. It was surreal and one of the best moments of my trip. 

On my last night, I meandered over to the Petronas Twin Towers, once the tallest buildings in the world until they were overtaken in 2004. The towers sit near the KLCC Park, a huge, urban oasis with animated fountains and nightly light shows. I spent the evening wandering around the park, watching the light show in front of the towers, and then headed back to my apartment to prepare for the next leg of my trip. 

The post The Many Colors <br>Of Kuala Lumpur appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

When my flight arrived, the first thing I noticed was Coronavirus was no joke here. As the virus continues to spread across Asia, Singapore took no chances. Body scanners and temperature checks awaited around every corner. I noticed I was the ONLY person in the airport not wearing a surgical face mask and made a mental note to stop at a pharmacy and pick some up for myself (this turned out to be easier said than done as people were panic buying face masks. I eventually did find some available but paid about five times the normal cost. Worth it to not feel like a leper and stick out even further than my five-foot-nine self already did). 

Public transportation in Singapore is only rivaled by that in Japan. Traveling around Indonesia was a nauseating and —easy, clean, affordable, and always on time. 

For the first few days in Singapore, I stayed in a Capsule hotel, a sort of hostel but each bed has its own door and lock. It was very heavily themed – although I couldn’t really tell you what the theme was—Atlantis/Cyberpunk maybe? The free breakfast left something to be desired (essentially toast with a community jar of peanut butter) but overall the capsule was quiet and comfortable. 

Singapore has four main languages – English, Chinese, Malay, and Tamil. I was relieved to discover that just about everyone in Singapore that I encountered spoke English and communicating was far easier than it had been in Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Philippines. 

The first thing I did in Singapore was visit the Tiong Bahru Market and Food Centre. I wandered through rows and rows of food stalls. It was by far the most food I had consumed in months and left me stuffed. I couldn’t tell you what I ate, I just pointed at whatever looked good and handed over my money. The street food was cheap and delicious and a definite highlight of my time here

I would be very interested in what percentage of Singapore’s total square footage is made up of shopping malls. I spent a lot of time wandering around Clarke Quay, a shopping district and nightlife hub on the river. I needed somewhere to walk off all of that food. 

Seeing as I knew nothing about the country or its history, I visited the National Museum of Singapore. Singapore spent one hundred forty-four years under British rule before being handed over to Malaysia in 1963. This only lasted two years, however, due to ideological differences. In 1964, race riots broke out in Singapore between the local Chinese and Malays. As a result, Malaysia expelled Singapore in 1965, giving it independence. This ended up benefiting Singapore in a huge way, as the country underwent rapid industrialization and economic growth, becoming one of the Four Asian Tigers (not my term—it’s used to refer to Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea, four Asian countries that developed into high-income countries by the early twenty-first century). 

My last night in Singapore, I said goodbye to the capsule hotel and hello to the opposite— the Marina Bay Sands. If you’ve seen a photo of the city, you know which building I’m talking about. It cost almost seven billion USD to build and features a hotel, luxury shopping center, casino, museum, convention center, art exhibits, celebrity chef restaurants, and a Skypark that connects all three massive towers, complete with an infinity pool.

The building is as beautiful as it is massive, built in such a way that the building’s features are meant to mimic the waves and water that surround it. A small river runs through the basement of a shopping mall, and the outdoor pavilion is known for its massive nightly light show. 

Also, the hotel rooms are pretty dope. 

Singapore was the most ‘commercial’ place I visited, but its beautiful architecture, fascinating history, and—most importantly—street food made it a worthwhile stop on my journey. 

The post ‘Nobody in Singapore <br>Drinks Singapore Slings’ appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

No noisy trains to sleep on, no terrifying traffic to dodge, no hostel full of drunk hooligans. This week, I’m celebrating my thirtieth birthday in a state of pure bliss, and it was long overdue. It wasn’t until our first yoga class that I realized how much stress I had been holding in my body. I couldn’t even touch my toes – something I’m very certain I could accomplish just a few months ago. 

My seven days at Oneworld Retreats in Bali were incredible. The itinerary could not have been more inviting—each day a combination of morning yoga, delicious meals, spa treatments, relaxation, and meditation. In case I was worried about getting stir crazy in paradise, I was lucky that this week at the retreat was titled ‘Footprints in Bali’, meaning in addition to all the yoga and meditation and zen offered at the resort, hiking around some of Bali’s most beautiful fields and temples.

The first few days were a blur of activity – we visited the Gunung Kawi Hindu forest temple, hiked through rice fields, visited the sacred monkey forest, and most notably, attended a purification ceremony at Tirta Empul, a Hindu water temple. 

During the melukat or purification ceremony, we donned white sarongs, ‘sacrificed’ our offering of flowers and fruit, and jumped into (freezing cold) spring pools, dunking ourselves three times under each fountain before being blessed by a manku (local priest). The water comes from the mountain springs and is as crystal clear as it is freezing cold. The water is believed to have curative powers. Each fountain spout represents something different—some grant protections, others cure physical ailments, others cure mental ailments. I won’t get into all of them, but you can find what each spring represents here.

These photos really don’t do this temple justice—it’s gorgeous.

On my actual birthday, we had a 2:30 am wake-up scheduled to hike to the top of the Gunung Batur volcano. My first decision of my thirties was that sleep was more important than a volcano hike (I was also still a bit nervous after the New Zealand volcano eruption just a few weeks before). Priorities. I slept in, took breakfast in my room, wandered the town for a bit, and then spent the rest of the day reading and journaling outside on the porch while I watched the rain. Honestly, I couldn’t have asked for a better birthday. 

Bali is said to have three seasons – wet season, dry season, and (best of all) Mango season. I happened to be here during the wet season, which meant each afternoon I was gifted a few hours of a thunderstorm. However, I didn’t mind. It was a nice respite from the heat and there’s nothing quite like a rainforest right after a storm.

On my free day, I visited the rice terrace. I had hiked about halfway through the rice fields before a severe thunderstorm came through. I ended up spending the next hour in a small, empty guide hut waiting for the storm to pass.

The trip was worth it as the fields were still gorgeous, I have a weird love for the rain, and best of all, I stopped at Batu Karu Kopi for a coffee tasting. They’re most notably known for their Kopi Luwak, coffee cherries digested and then pooped out by a civet. Happy to report that it tasted like coffee.

Our last full day was a relaxing one. We drove to the beach and spent the day sunbathing, swimming in the ocean, and drinking out of coconuts.

We were given a special treat at night—the resort is also home to Bali’s prince (which is a thing I guess), and before our final feast, we were invited for champagne and hors d’oeuvres in the prince’s stunning home, complete with Balinese artifacts.

On the last night at dinner, we were all given a quick shock back to reality when China completely shut down its borders due to coronavirus. A Swedish woman on our trip was currently living and teaching in China, and was stranded with no idea how she would get back or how to get her things. Although if there was anywhere I’d want to be trapped, it might just be here.

At this point, I need to thank my guides and teachers, Iyan and Desi as well as those who joined me during this week. It was a phenomenal group of people who made it a wonderful experience. The closing ceremony was emotional for everyone and while it was only a week, it provided me with memories and people that I’ll never forget. 

The post Turning Thirty: Peace, <br>Love, and Mango Season appeared first on Kim Is Lost.

After finally getting my luggage, I was harassed by a number of shops trying to sell outrageously overpriced sim cards. The airport had WIFI so I decided to book a Grab Taxi and get a sim card after I checked in. My hotel was only wto miles from the airport, but there weren’t any sidewalks as the highway was the only way out of the airport, so walking didn’t seem like a great option. My Grab (the Uber of Asia) took about forty minutes to get to me and once I got in, we drove 5 minutes before hitting bumper-to-bumper traffic. I was pretty tired after the last few days and took a nap.

I woke up 2 hours later and we were still only halfway there. It would end up taking me almost three hours to get to my hotel, far longer than it would have taken me to walk. As my cab fare was predetermined, but I left my driver a generous tip for his trouble, thankful to be out of a car.

By the time I arrived, most shops were closed, but I found a small hut selling SIM cards. It seemed a little sketchy and the shop owner didn’t speak English so I just pointed to my phone. A SIM card for 2 weeks was about $3 USD, so I decided to take my chances. I popped it in and sure enough, I had internet (I would be grateful I bought the cheap SIM card as I later discovered that SIM cards are regional and only work on the island where you purchase them, meaning I would end up having to buy a new one when I got to my next destination).

The next day, I landed in the airport in Labuan Bajo, a town of about five thousand people. It was a mile and a half to my room, and after my cab troubles from the previous night, I decided to walk. At least twenty people on mopeds stopped me on my thirty-minute walk to ask if I needed a ride. I declined, not wanting to think about balancing all of my luggage on a bike.

I walked past a group of young girls all smiling and waving madly as they chanted their practiced English “Hello”. I smiled and waved back returning the greeting and they all cheered and laughed. I passed a large pile of burning trash, a pile that continued burning for the three days I spent here. After finally arriving at my hotel, I dropped off my things and got dinner just in time to watch the sunset. There are few places with a sunset quite like the ones I witnessed in Indonesia.

The following day, I woke up to complete darkness and headed to the boat where I would be exploring the islands around Flores. After an hour boat ride watching the sunrise, my small group headed to Padar Island to hike to the summit. The hike in total took about an hour and would have been quicker but the summit was crowded. We spotted a baby green tree viper on our way down, which was surprising considering how many people were on this island.

We escaped the crowd and took the boat to the Pink Beach, which was truly unlike anything I’ve ever seen. The beach gets its color from the red coral washing ashore.

The Pink Beach lived up to its reputation.

After sunning on the Pink Beach, we headed to the most anticipated part of the day—Komodo Island. There are an estimated seventeen hundred Komodo dragons living on the island. We were lucky enough to see a few baby dragons as well as several adults.

One thing I wish I had known prior to taking the above photo is that their venom is very poisonous. They bite their prey and wait for the poison to do its job before digging in for a meal. Our guide had a large, pronged stick to push away any dragons that may get too close or try to attack – the stick was not comforting in the least.

On the way to our final stops of Taka Makassar Island and Kanawa Island, we passed a group of dolphins swimming and jumping out of the water. It was a great introduction to the snorkeling we were about to undertake.

We hopped out of the boat and put on our snorkel gear while our guide pointed out the reason we came here – several Giant Manta Rays swam just a few feet below us. These Mantas can get up to thirty feet wide. Ten Giant Manta Rays swam below us, with fish clinging to their backs for a free ride (conjuring memories of watching Finding Nemo).

I was so focused on the Manta Rays that I didn’t even notice we were swimming through small jellyfish. Either they can’t sting or I couldn’t feel it, but the unease I felt when I first spotted them slowly ebbed as I took in all of the sea life swimming around me.

After a perfect end to a great day, we headed back to shore. The following morning, the heat would be unbearable, so I headed to the street with my luggage to wait for someone to drive by and offer me a ride to the airport. After a few minutes, I precariously balanced my luggage on the back of a moped while the driver wound his way up the hills and to the airport.

I’d been going non-stop for the last few weeks and was very excited to be heading to Bali for a much-deserved, week-long yoga retreat.

The post Flores and the Land<br> of Mythical Creatures appeared first on Kim Is Lost.