Southeast Asian Adventures

To all who want to read... This January I went on a journey with a small group of friends from my university to Southeast Asia for three weeks. Eighteen thousand miles later, we are home again. It was my sixth trip abroad, and as usual, I have not returned unchanged. This is, in part, our story. Since I could not communicate with any of you while I was there, I have typed a few of my journal entries for your information. Names, specific places, and relevant details have all been altered for security reasons.

December 31st-January 1st 2010
Citizen M Hotel. Schipol. Amesterdam. The Netherlands
Today's highlights....
-Watching a splendid fireworks show from Rotterdam (an Amsterdam suburb) via flat screen HD in a comfy modern hotel room.
-Sleeping in said comfy (albeit tiny) room with a remote controlled 'mood pad' that changes everything from the television to the the room's heat to the lighting.
-Showering under changing rainbow mood lighting. You have to see it to believe it, it's beautiful.
-Making new friends in the lobby of our modern and quirky hotel
-Franz from Frankfurt- slightly wasted, but so polite and kind, and his friend in the purple
Beatles shirt who did not enjoy the margarita with salt on the rim.
-TeeTee from Bangkok, a super sweet little Thai woman who is on the hotel staff
-Favorite person of the day- Mel- a hotel staffer and bartender from the midwest, who kindly gave my mint leaf tea with honey for free and a very disgusting bar of rum raisin flavored fudge.
-Getting Roman candles shot upside down directly at us in a crowded city square
-Riding the train into the city (and losing my ticket when it finally got checked, oops!)
-Pizza, calzones, fries , Coke, and hot chocolate at the Hotel Dorian Restaurant in Dam square
-Word of the day: pulchritudinous (adj.)- beautiful
-To See in the future- The Van Gogh Institute

Travel Days 1-2. January 1, 2010
Citizen M. Schipol. Amsterdam
What a gorgeously woven tapestry of diversity Western Europe is! From what I have gathered in my twelve hour stay, it is both a familiar culture (in that it is Western) and a totally alien one (in that pot scented air lingers everyone amidst the crush of people and sexual immorality runs as rampant and public as it did in ancient Corinth. For instance, I watched an immaculately ressed woman (man) in white go go boots, a tan trench coat and a beautifully groomed blonde wig styled into a 60's era beehive prance down an avenue mere hours ago. We never did see the witching hour really begin because we took an early train back to the hotel after 8 p.m. (because the cold, lack of ways in which to occupy our time, and fireworks being shot upside down in our vicinity became a bit too much for a group of six jet lagged people).

The previous leg of the journey was nearly eventless. I did not, as I had always romantically planned, walk into Memphis International Airport belting my own reinterpreted version of Marc Cohn's 'Walking in Memphis.' My shoes for the entire trip and miles of daily walking- a sensible tan pair or Naturalizers, turned out to pinch my feet so badly that I could not stop myself from exclaiming in pain. Blisters resulted, for I had conveniently forgotten that my feet swell when I travel by air. Thus, a pair of flip flops complimented by a pair of miraculously stretchable white athletic socks were my personal fashion statement of the evening. Though I am aquainted with only a few in this vast metro, I was a little sheepish to look like a silly tourist among the cosmopolitian (albeit cookie cutter) women of Europe. Their blonde, perfect faces slunk by me in designer clothing until they became about as remarkable to look at as the stones on the street. I pray that I will reserve any further stereotypical, L.O.A. type judgements, for as I judge the world, so they'll respond defensively in anger and judge me. Neither am I in any way fit to judge.
May God give my team mates and I the supernatural ability to pour our hearts and souls into every day, every relationship and every task we undertake.

Sawadee!