Looking Back

Bangkok, 8/9/11

As I make my way towards Bangkok airport, here is a quick update on my halfway point checklist.

Lost/Stolen:
-ATM card (replaced)
-SD card reader
-Camera charger (replaced with a terrible $3 knockoff Laos fluorescent version that glows while it charges and makes it difficult to sleep Broke)
-Cargo pants (likely swapped in a hostel washing session)
-Watch
-Money in Hanoi (see below)


Survived:
-Violent motorbike taxi mugging in Hanoi, Vietnam
-Zip-lining in Laos' Bokeo Forest 300 ft. in in the air with no helmet or properly checked harnesses
-Tubing on the Vang Vieng's Nam Song river, laden with death (12 tourist deaths in June - a new record!), disease, injury, rabid pink eye, broken bones, lost friends, drowning, leeches, miserable house music, drugs, and alcohol
-An afternoon at a shooting range in Phnom Penh, Cambodia with military-grade tanks, rocket launchers, grenades and AK-47s
-Consumption of copious amounts of street food, including utterly rancid fried fish
-Terrible sun burns
-Amateur motorbike riding at 60MPH  Motorbiking in the pouring rain, alone, in Vang Vieng, Laos, through rocky dirt and mud paths despite crashing five times and cutting my arms and legs
-Trying to keep up with my guide on my motorbike as he went 65MPH over moon surface-like roads in the pitch dark at 4am in Mui Ne, Vietnam
-Amateur sandsurfing in Mui Ne, Vietnam
-Vaginal dart gun attacks in the Red Light District in Bangkok, Thailand
-Saddle-less elephant riding with a stubborn, disobedient pachyderm in Chiang Mai, Thailand
-Getting wrapped in a python in Chiang Mai, Thailand
-Rolling on the floor with 200 pound adult tigers in Chiang Mai, Thailand
-Feral monkeys climbing all over me in Lop Buri, Thailand
-Scuba diving at 30meters/100ft depths with lethal 5ft long barracudas in Koh Tao, Thailand
-A 15,000 person island rave in Koh Pha Ngan, Thailand
-Nearly being hit in the head with an underwater longboat motor in Koh Phi Phi, Thailand
-Multiple Pompeii-like bouts of traveler's diarrhea

All the ways I have consumed bananas to date:

-Raw, with almost a candy-like sweetness
-Crepes (plain banana, banana/nutella, banana/peanut butter, banana/egg/chocolate)
-Pancakes
-Grilled whole
-Smashed, grilled, and served with a deuce de leche sauce
-Chips with salt and sugar
-Chips sans salt and sugar
-Jam on toast
-Fruit shakes (alone, with pineapple, mango, and/or passionfruit)
-Dried into fruit leathers that look like bacon
-Donut on a stick
-Fried with ice cream
-Fried into fritters with honey dipping sauce
-Wrapped with sticky rice in banana leaves
-Carmelized with mango and served alongside black sticky rice, cooked in coconut milk, and topped with sesame seeds
-Shared with monkeys
-Shared with elephants


All the ways I have consumed local Southeast Asian fish:
-Simply grilled and eaten during sundown on the beaches of Koh Tao, Thailand, while fire twirlers danced in front of me
-Fried and served with roasted vegetables and a light ginger dressing in Koh Phi Phi, Thailand
-Steamed in sour lime juice and chilies in Ayutthaya, Thailand
-Served in spicy river fish soup in Ayutthaya, Thailand
-Steamed with soy and scallions and served alongside jasmine rice shaped like a teddy bear in Kanchanaburi, Thailand
-Fried catfish salad, almost like panzanella, made by students during our cooking class in Chiang Mai, Thailand
-Seemingly delicious fried fish with garlic, herbs, and chilies which turned out to be revoltingly rancid and blood-stained, tasting like decaying human flesh in Chiang Rai, Thailand
-Salt-crusted, lemongrass-stuffed and grilled, served in the Night Market in Chiang Rai, Thailand
-Caught the morning of, brushed with soy, salt, pepper, stuffed with lemongrass and garlic and grilled over charcoal in Luang Prabang, Laos. Eaten this way four nights in a row.
-Made into lettuce wrapped "fish tacos" with pork skin-infused rice pilaf and fresh herbs in Vientiane, Laos
-Marinated in turmeric and grilled in front of me, forming an oily, herbaceous, spicy fish stew with noodles in Hanoi, Vietnam
-Turmeric covered and grilled and presented alongside noodles, peanuts, chilies, pickled vegetables and rice paper in a do-it-yourself spring roll dish at the pro-bono restaurant Koto in Hanoi, Vietnam
-Baked whole with soy and scallions and served family style on a junk boat in Halong Bay, Vietnam
-Marinated and grilled over charcoal during a massive barbeque on our own private island in Halong Bay, Vietnam
-Smoked with chilies and noodles inside banana leaf in Hoi An, Vietnam
-Bone-in steaks covered in chilis and lime juice eaten at a restaurant in the sand in Mui Ne, Vietnam
-Intensely bright, spicy Fish Amok in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap, Cambodia
-Grilled ourselves on large Cambodian barbeques ("Phnom Phleurng's") in Phnom Penh, Vietnam
-Lime-dressed, almost like ceviche, as an appetizer in the degustation in Phnom Penh

Modes of Transportation:
-Airplane
-Tuk-tuk
-Songathaew
-Minivan
-Local bus
-VIP bus
-"Super VIP" sleeper bus
-Local train
-2nd class sleeper train
-Longboat water taxi
-Low-speed ferry
-High-speed industrial ferry
-Mekong slow boat
-Vietnamese junk boat
-Scuba boat
-Motorbike (e.g., super high-powered scooter)
-Motorcycle taxi
-Taxi
-River-wading 4WD pickup truck
-Bicycle
-Zip-line
-Elephant, with saddle
-Elephant, bare-backed
-Ostrich