Krup-krup

En route from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap, our van stopped over at Kampong Thom, a province two hours from Siem Reap. A stall on the sidewalk had crickets...

and beetles (or what I hoped were beetles and not roaches):

I don't really care about edible insects, I was more interested in the persimmons and pomegranates in the next stall.

Abet, however, wanted to get the crickets. He sampled some and liked them, so we bought a small plastic bag for 7,000 riel--around P80--for pulutan in our hotel room later that evening. They weren't too bad, actually. Perfect with beer.

Please excuse the girly fingernails--he's a guitarist.

Yum!

On the way back from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh (towards Vietnam), we passed by Kampong Thom again. This time, we bought a tarantula for 500 riel (P6). Neither of us ate it. We'll stick to the crickets next time.

Back from Backpacking

Abet and I are back from an 11-day SouthEast Asian adventure across five cities in three countries: Kuala Lumpur and Malacca in Malaysia, Phnom Penh and Siem Reap in Cambodia, and Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) in Vietnam. We had the time of our lives.

We ate hawker food, went up the Petronas Towers Skybridge, ate at Nando's Peri-Peri Chicken, Carl's Jr. (which we sorely missed), and Baskin-Robbins, found the books we were looking for (Stiff by Mary Roach for me, a book I bought years ago and lost, but want in my library; Hemingway's For Whom the Bells Toll for him), lugged our backpacks all over KL's train stations, visited the Batu Caves, experienced vibrant Jonker Street in Malacca, got lost, visited the Killing Fields, Genocide Museum, and the Russian Market in Phnom Penh, ate crickets, ran out of clean clothes and underwear, toured the temples of Siem Reap, got sunburned, got insect bites, enjoyed a Khmer buffet, watched an Apsara performance, saw the sun rise over the Angkor Wat, saw how fine handicrafts were made, ate ice cream at Swensen's, figured in a bus accident that left several people injured (who had to be carried off in an ambulance), spent 15 hours on a bus, met other backpackers, met fellow Filipinos, became millionaires (P2,700 = VND 1M), ate a ridiculous amount of fruit, ate a ridiculous amount of French bread, drank beer almost nightly, squeezed our ways through one of the Cu Chi Tunnels, visited the War Remnants Museum, survived a sea of motorcycles, enjoyed bowls of pho, haggled at the Ben Thanh market, bought even more books, ate even more ice cream, got items for our future home, bought coffee, nuts and dried fruit for pasalubong, suffered from upset tummies from too much streetfood, and slept at the airport because our flight got majorly delayed due to typhoon Santi (we were still lucky, PAL and Vietnam Air flights were cancelled). We took a bunch of great photos, and thousands of crappy photos. It was a great adventure, and I can't say enough how happy, thankful, and lucky I am that I got to experience this with Abet, just the two of us. Travel is one of our ultimate favorite bonding activities.

My recent trip validated two things:

1) There really is no place like the Philippines. After seeing the different sights in Malaysia, Cambodia, and Vietnam, I realized that the sights, the food, and the people of the Philippines are the best. We have three trips abroad planned for next year, but I'll make sure to squeeze in some local destinations.

2) Abet and I make a great team. Ü I've known this from the very start, but travelling puts our team and our relationship to the test, and I'm glad that for this one, we passed with flying colors. Being alone in a foreign country makes us cling to each other a little tighter than usual and makes us more patient and understanding. We were each other's world for eleven days, taking care of and being responsible for the other. We feel closer than ever, and I learned so much about myself, about him, and about us as a couple. Actually, I'm currently experiencing withdrawal symptoms from my boyfriend--we were attached to the hip the entire duration of our vacation, I think we were apart only during trips to the restroom.

I have lots of stories and pictures that I'll blog about in the next few weeks or days. Hopefully, I'll be able to help out someone planning a similar trip, just like how travel blogs have been helpful to us during our planning. More travel posts coming up!

The long way home

Papa finally got home today after being stranded since Thursday, thank God! It was just supposed to be balikan trip, all he brought with him was leche flan and chocolate muffins for my brother. No thanks to the landslides that blocked Marcos Highway and Kennon Road, he got stuck in Baguio with no change of clothes and no cellphone charger. Still, my dad is a very hard-headed chum and wanted to come home already, especially since Mama just came back from a week in Surigao yesterday. This is the same guy who went up to Baguio in the midst of typhoon Pepeng, after all (while my paranoid office took us home early as a safety precaution--and dropped us off in front of our doorsteps).

And so, my dad is home, safe and warm, but not after three bus rides, one jeepney ride, one van ride, one tricycle ride (12 of them crammed in one tricycle!), and three long, muddy hikes...

the Victory Liner bus from Baguio took them only up to here

damaged road

hiking along the highway

lapuk

boulders along Kennon Road from the landslides

more walking along mud

finally, dry land

this bridge in Pangasinan was impassable...

because it collapsed

Seems like my dad had quite an adventure--and a 12-hour adventure, at that! He's exhausted and is getting a massage as I type. I'm glad that he's as tenacious as he is (he seemed to forget that he's a heart patient, my God!), because if he weren't, he'd still be in Baguio right now, and we'd still be deathly worried.

Anyway, it looks like he enjoyed the way home. Who says baby-boomer dads can't camwhore?