Fighting crime, hedging bets

My own Sweet D is a camera genius! Today, she taught me how to use the color pick and color switch functions on my camera, and the two of us had a grand old time in Dalat, creating photo art and drinking WAY too much iced coffee with condensed milk. One habit fed the other, and, well, you can see the results.



'Cado mountain



Vietnamese cafe. Can you tell from this picture how strong this coffee is? Or FROM MY TYPING! Seriously, I could climb three mountains and translate the Bible into Klingon right now, I'm so wired. But shush, I'm busy blogging.



Au Lac - a Buddhist restaurant with only vegetarian food. I'm not even going to try to joke about this one. This food was serious.



Small children and a bulldozer. Apparently, in Vietnam, safety has taken a holiday. Paul, does your Mom know about this?

So Wrong, Yet So Right

Something about this doesn't feel right...

Mary: "Dude, I'm really disappointed in us," Dana said today, as we walked down the street.


Immediately, as is my nature, I assumed that I'd done something wrong, and was trying to decide whether to be apologetic or defensive, when Dana interrupted my thoughts.

"I can't believe we haven't gotten more massages, she said, shaking her head and grabbing my hand to cross the street, weaving through several dozen motorbikes.

Oh, well that was alright then. We'd each only had one, both from a man named Mr. Wong, who bent and stretched us with aerobic Thai massages that were somehow amazingly relaxing and painful. Such is the magic of Mr. Wong.

But we now wanted a Vietnamese massage. So, we went to the Saigon massage school for the blind.

It was an incredibly awkward, surreal experience. I paid 40,000 dong (2
dollars), and was told to go behind a curtain in a room, where I stood
for a few minutes listening to people talk in Vietnamese outside and
wondering if I shoutld take my clothes off. Finally, I yelled, "should
I take off my clothes?" and someone said "yes, clothes off!"

Then my masseuse came in, her eyes white and fumbling to feel where I
was. It felt sort of wrong, somehow, to get massaged by her, but I
guess everyone needs and deserves a profession. I tipped her after,
and got a picture with her, but it's an incredibly awkward picture, so
not going up on the blog :) The massage was weird - it was a mix of
fluttery, feathery, wrist-flicks and judo chops.

Dana: Yeah, I'd have to agree...the massage experience was like nothing I've even done before. Lonely Planet suggested that we go to the Vietnamese Traditional School of Massage to get a hassle-free cheap massage...so we did. I had a hysterical time trying to communicate with Hung (the girl who massaged me), but we were both laughing...I kept encouraging her by saying "very good" with much enthusiasm and even ended up giving her a hand massage in the end to show her my appreciation...she squealed with delight. I really needed a massage after my many failed attempts to fall asleep on bus rides, stiff beds, rock-hard pillows and a bed in a closet with springs bulging from the mattress and water dripping on my forehead from the a/c. Tonight we board a bus for 7-hours and head to Dalat (it's a sitting up bus, guess they don't offer a sleeper for the route we're going, damn). My body will be craving a Jess, Trisha or Mama Goose massage tomorrow for sure! Send love to you ladies and your amazing hands!

Speaking of sending love...I must say I left my heart in Koh Phangan. I truly miss the fantastic experience I had over the past month. I didn't think I'd say it, but I miss doing 4 hours of yoga a day and even miss the brown rice (ha-only kinda). I definitely miss swimming in the tropical blue waters, motor-bike cruzin, jumping off the water tour, music meditations, sun salutations, heart hugs, giggling during class (Carl you always got me going), and I miss my island family. I better be seeing you guys sometime in the near future!!


Phun--our trusty friend at Madam Cuc's--this girl works hard and is always smiling!


Pagoda in Saigon


Dragons in the park


Gettin Pho'd Up!


Pho Yum!


The beautiful and talented Amanda


Beautiful on the inside and out




Typical Mary and Walter

What to do when there's nothing to do...and no power.

Last night we stayed in a big, old family house on a longanberry and pommelo orchard, right on a canal that leads out into the Mekong Delta. It was a bit of a walk even to the closest neighbor, and no store or anything nearby, but it was very beautiful. Our room was open to the outdoors, with mosquito nets around the bed, and a canal thick with waterlilies ran right up next to the window.

We learned to make spring rolls and fry sweet potatoes (during a power outage) from Chin, the woman who owns the place, and then ate a big feast with a couple of great Brits (Laura and Graham, looking fly and very special in some palm hats they purchased) who stayed there as well. We asked what people do at night in the tiny non-village, and Chin said:

"We go to bed early."

Hmmm... so we sat around on the hammocks for a bit, and she told us more about Vietnamese culture. Slightly more comfortable with us, and back on the subject of what there is to do at night in the Mekong, she elaborated.

"It's a good thing people have TV's now, because before there was really nothing to do at night, and everyone had 10 children. I am the youngest of 10."

Woah. On that note, we returned back to Saigon, and then on tomorrow to Central 'Nam. Not trying to do any baby-making on this trip...


Also...
Shanti shanti to the Agama people reading this. We love and miss you, and are so glad we met you all! When describing the experience to other travelers, it sounds suspiciously like we joined a cult that worships brown rice and running salt water through various orifices. They don't know the half of it :) We've been faithful with morning yoga practice so far, and hope you all are doing it as well. "Focus to perceive..." us thinking of you!

Flying in Coach never felt so glamorous

Flying in Coach never felt so glamorous
Yesterday was the best airport day I've ever had. The Koh Samui airport is beautiful, indoor/outdoor with furnished bungalow-type things acting as gates, free snacks and internet. There were streams with water-lilies growing in them, running right past our gate. Ridiculous. Then we spent what felt like days in the Bangkok airport, where no one but each other got our jokes and we roamed the floors for free samples of everything from perfume to sesame crackers.

To ease your worried minds (because obviously you were concerned), we are safe and sound at Madame Cuc's guesthouse in Saigon - out of the beauty of the islands and the dangers of Bangkok, we are now surrounded by the energy of these streets. Part New York (traffic, horns honking, everyone very busy), part Paris (cafes, baguettes!, a culture of blatant people watching, everyone in the city socializing in the park on a Sunday night), and all Asia (thousands of motorbikes, driving on the sidewalk as well as the street, food vendors everywhere selling pho and fruit and fish and quail egg in rice paper and everything else weird and unimaginable).

After our first baguettes of the day, we are off to see the city. Cafes, temples, trying not to get hit by a motorbike (we've been holding hands like little kids), more strange and awesome food (had my first pennywort juice and loved it), and maybe even a water puppet show. We love you all so much, and we're so glad you are sharing this experience with us from wherever you are.

xoxo Mary & Dana

What A Magical Place...

Dana: Sorry it has been so long since I last posted on here. I'm more of the photographer type than the writer anyway =)

We have two days left in the yoga program and I'm getting sad to think about leaving this "life" we've created for ourselves. It has been a month since we arrived to Koh Phangan, Thailand. We've rented motor bikes, a house, explored the island, cooked meals in our own kitchen, gone swimming as much as possible, snorkeled, boated, ate delicious food, drank smoothies, read, did yoga for hours, slept, laughed, danced, learned, listened, sweated, taken days of silence, vamana dhauti (don't ask unless you really want to know), sanka praksalana (the cheapest colonic you can self administer), swam underneath the stars at night, ate only brown rice for days (macrobiotic diet), explored new fruits, got lost, sweated, danced at a bollywood party, got pulled over by cops (can't tell you why, but we got away), found the post office, tipped over on motorbike, ate more, drank more smoothies, jumped off a lookout tower in the ocean, hugged every morning, swallowed salt water, got salt water up the bum, took a sun bath, fell asleep in savasana, held yoga poses for 8 mins, found limes, dined at the open-air night market, picked up sea cucumbers, deeted, ran in the rain, massaged each others hands in class, sweated more, meditated, laughed, read in bed, read poems to each other in bed, listened to the rain pouring down from the heavens, scraped our tongues together in the morning, danced naked in the bedroom, danced at the fullmoon party, sipped on mushroom shakes at Mellow Mountain, got inspired, yelled at our dog Max for barking in the middle of the night, thought about killing the roosters that crow at all hours of the day, sweated more, scared our neighbors into thinking we were practicing witchcraft because of the baby powder trail surrounding our kitchen door to keep ants out, meditated on ping-pong balls out on the porch (which probably convinced the neighbors even more), spent hours in internet cafes, cooked with coconut milk in EVERYTHING, watched heat lightening strike over the ocean at night, played with phosphorescence in the ocean, skyped with our mommies and dear friends, explored new beaches, drank tea at the Art Cafe, played cards, ate more food, laughed more and best of all met some of the most amazing people and started some friendships that will last a life time.

The people you meet when you attend a program like this are such incredible human beings and I am honored to have shared the intimacy of practicing yoga next to them for the past month. It will be sad parting ways, but this is not goodbye...it's "until we meet again..."and we will, I promise!

5 more weeks...

Vietnam here we come!!!