Rith's Farm, Gem Mining, and 7 Steps Waterfall

Hi sorry I didn't write yesterday but we really didn't do that much.  Yesterday we went and visited the farm that my brother's brother Chan Rith is working at.  It's owned by Mr. Pol who runs Palm Tree Center where Rith used to live.  Rith's farm is huge!  And only six people are working and living there regularly.  But there are often other people living there temporarily who are hired to help.  They grow cassava and rubber trees, in Cambodia they don't eat cassava they dry it and grind it into a powder which they export to Vietnam where it's used to make rice wine and other products.  We took Rith out to the market to buy more clothes and he bought a heavy winter jacket which is really funny because it's so hot here!  But the funniest thing about the market was everything was knockoffs of Gucci, Versace, Dolce & Gabbana and other luxury brands.  But a lot of the clothes were so tacky that I couldn't believe that they would put the labels on them like the other brands made them.  Rith doesn't speak any English so we got a translator from the restaurant Orchid which is part of the Parrot Tours company which organized most of our adventures here.  His name is Dy and his nickname is Barrang, I think that's how you spell it'; but it means foreigner in Khmer.  It's because when he was a baby he was born blonde and he looked Eurasian.  He's half Khmer and half Chinese.  Today he took us along with another guide Sideth to the seven steps waterfall and to the gem mines.  The other guide grew up in one of the minority tribes and he speaks six languages!  He speaks English, Khmer, and four minority languages.  He was really nice and when we went to the falls he showed us where you can jump off the falls which was really fun!  At one part to the side of one of the falls there's a really deep section where it was safe to jump into.  The falls are called the seven steps water fall because it starts at the top and there are seven waterfalls cascading down the hill.  We swam for a long time with Dy and the other guide and the guide jumped in in his jeans and t-shirt but Dy stripped down to just his tighty whities.  LOL  Afterwards we went to the gem mines which were in a nearby town and people were digging really deep pits behind their houses.  They mine for the Princess stones which are relatively common and not particularly valuable but they're really pretty when they're cut and finished, they turn a light blue color.
Jáime beaucoup Ratanakiri!  Cést tres bon!  Je doit aller a ma diner alors au revoir!  Demain nous allons a Kratie et le prochaine jour nous allons a Phnom Penh.
Au Revoir!
Ming :)

Trekking in the Ratanakiri Jungle

So we just got back from our long buggy trek! Ok well it wasn't that long but it felt like forever!  I've never been backpacking before and now and forever have no more plans to go again!  I pretty much hate hiking, just completely not my thing especially on tiny trails in the middle of the jungle with spiders the size of your hand!  The funny thing was that there was a group of adults who were trekking at the same time on basically the same trail only they went the reverse direction that we did.  We beat them to the camp spots and to the finish every time!  And they looked so pissed off it was hilarious, my mom yelled at them when we were swimming in the river by our first camp spot, "What took you so long??!"  and one of the women gave her such a dirty look. It was pretty funny, they didn't look happy at all.  And I thought that I was in a bad mood!  On the trek trail it was about a foot wide at the widest part and had a lot of spiky plants with thorns that ripped into your legs, my legs haven't had a very good time the last two days.  I have long scratches and punctures around my ankles, but the worst one I got on a tree, when I was jumping off a log I looked down and saw a piece just carving a long line through my shin like butter, it was kind of nasty.  We had the same guide from our boat trip, Sok Phaorn and we had a guide from one of the minority tribes and he knew the jungle really well.  He was pretty short though so when he led I walked into a lot of spider webs that he didn't catch when he was walking.  But most of the way he carried a spider stick that he waved in front of him and looked for the huge spiders, there were so many bugs especially ants and spiders.  While we camped my mom got up at night to go to the bathroom and for some reason she didn't put on her shoes and she stepped into a red ant nest and got bitten all over her foot.  We camped by the river and there was a small waterfall that was really nice to swim in.  There was a long vine that my brother and Sok Phaorn both grabbed to swing from to drop into the water Tarzan style.  When we were hiking I cranked up my iPod and then one foot in front of the next, my favorite song was For Your Entertainment by Adam Lambert.  "Didn't know what you were getting into...now I'm gonna turn up the heat"  It was sooooooooooooooo hot!!!!  We knew that it was going to be really hot but it didn't prepare you for the actual heat!  The food was amazing though, we had huge mounds of rice and fried vegetables and beef or pork, in Khmer it's called Cha Creiung.  I'm not really sure how to spell it though.  For dinner on thanksgiving which we had at 2 AM Berkeley time on your Thanksgiving day but our 5:30 PM we had rice, and a lemongrass vegetable that was cooked a traditional way in bamboo and fried vegetables and beef.  We set up camp in a house frame that we covered with a tarp inside and on the roof, then we put up our hammocks.  They were the US Airforce issue and had mosquito nets built in, the house frame was cool, all the supports were leaning out because all the force when we were in our hammocks was inwards and if the supports were straight the frame would have collapsed on top of us.  Then we climbed into our camouflage hammocks and zipped up our mosquito nets and went to sleep, there were relaxing sounds of the waterfall outside and we were so tired we fell asleep quickly.  The next morning I woke up and read a book then got up and looked around, I was second to last getting up.  The last person was our guide Sok Phaorn which is kind of funny because our other guide got up at around 5 but Sok Phaorn's only 22 so I guess he still sleeps in and doesn't work in the fields so he doesn't really have to get up early.  Before breakfast when I was getting dressed I saw a scorpion, it had crawled onto the tarp on the floor and was hiding in the fold on the floor.  The guide from the minority, Khong split a piece of bamboo with his machete and picked it up chopstick style and roasted it in the fire before burning it.  It was cool because you could see the scorpions poison dripping out of its body.  Then for breakfast we had bread and butter and jam and fish Khong had caught in the river.  Then we packed up camp and  continued our hike.  Our hike today was a lot easier than the hikes the other day, I'm not sure why but I think the trails were wider or something.  But we went along faster and after about three hours we stopped along a stream for lunch.  We were on a family's farm and the kids came down and swam with us in the stream,  my mom gave them a beach ball which they played volleyball with.  It's kind of ironic that one the reasons I'm happy to have left  Berkeley at this time is that I'm missing  the rest of the volleyball unit  in PE and here there's a huge volleyball craze, you see kids playing all the time.  But after lunch we walked for about another hour pretty much straight uphill and finally we finished.  As we walked towards the road we were all shouting "YES CIVILIZATION AT LAST!!!"  It was pretty funny, so we went to a nearby shop  and had  cold drinks and  called the man who organized it all Mr. Sita to come pick us up. 
Apres Mr. Sita eu nous, nous allons a chute d'eau mais il a ete seche jusqu'a deja.  Alors nous allons a Crater Lake ou nous allons il ya deux jours.  Il a ete parfait!  L'eau est tres beau et chaude.  Puis nous rentrons a la hotel appelle Tree Top.  Et j'ai pris une douche froid.
 That's all for now!  We possibly might be going to Laos next but we're going to have a lazy day tomorrow!
Ming :)

Boat Trip and Upcoming Trek

Hello all!  It's been really fun here lately, today we went on a boat trip on the Tonle Sam River.  We drove about an hour and a half to get to the river and on the way a truck had fallen off the road because it's axel broke and the driver couldn't steer.  It fell into a swampy pondish body of water and it took a huge truck and two giant tractors to get it back onto the road.  While they pulled it up the bank of the pond it almost tipped over and the driver who was stuck inside the truck looked terrified when it started tipping.  Everyone that was watching when it started tipping all cried out and went whoaaaaa but then it was up on the road and everyone looked relieved.  The roads are really dusty because they don't have paved roads up here, or at least most of the province, we're actually in the town of Banlung in the Ratanakiri province.  Only the main road in Banlung has paved roads but all over there looks like progress towards paving the rest of the roads.  During the rainy season the nonpaved roads are completely impassable.  Once we got to the river we were put onto a long thin wood boat with our guide and boat skipper.  Our guide was really funny, he spoke better English than almost every Khmer person that I know.  He also had a really weird strong Australian accent even though he's never taken an English class and definitely hasn't ever been to Australia but it was easier to understand than the Khmer accent that most people have. When we were on the river the jungle around was beautiful with huge trees and a lot of big leafy greenery.  The river was a murky green color that didn't  make you want to really swim in but a lot of Khmer kids didn't seem to have a problem with it.  I saw one kid with a bunch of his friends and or family who grabbed onto a thick vine and did a Tarzan like swing into the river.  We arrived at a village of a minority tribe of people.  The minorities in Cambodia often speak a different language and have a completely different language and way of life.  Most speak Khmer though, we went into the village after watching girls filter water which they dug from the bank of the river.  The water here isn't safe to drink so we have to drink all bottled water, we can't drink from the tap because of the recycled water.  But these girls were digging water from the bank and filtering it for them to drink.  One girl was pulling up water and pouring it into a gourd then pouring it out again.  As we were leaving the village we saw a little boy who couldn't have been older than 5 carrying on his back a basket full of bottles of water and we tested the weight and it definitely was heavier than our school backpacks which was an accomplishment!   We entered the village after watching the girl get the water but before we could enter the village we had to pay an entrance fee to be able to watch everyone at their daily life and take pictures.  That day it was a holiday for the whole village because that morning a woman had given birth.  We were allowed to enter the room that the baby was residing in with her mother.  We took a few pictures then then because the flash was disturbing the baby we left.  We also got rice wine but my brother and I didn't drink any, the tradition at the village was when a baby was born you got rice wine.  We continued through the village, it seemed like a lot of animals had given birth recently also because there were super cute baby piglets who my brother was obsessed with and puppies that the mother dog had give birth to that morning, their eyes weren't open and they couldn't even stand or walk.  We went to the school a little later and we saw that they were learning a little geometry also but they were also learning much simpler math and Khmer too.  It was kind of funny though.  Everyone in Cambodia is obsessed with volleyball, there are volleyball courts everywhere and you always see kids playing.  But unlike in America only the boys play, it's not a girls sport here.  After looking at the school in the village we went to the cemetery where they have very elaborate tombs.  They were surrounded by fences and had carved representations of men and women around with curved roofs and dragon boats carved on the top.  The guide told us that at every funeral a water buffalo was sacrificed and the bones are left in front of the tomb. After we finished looking at the tombs and receiving a couple more mosquito bites we left on the boats again.  We went back to where we started and had lunch, I had fried noodles with vegetables and beef or chicken I'm not sure what it was.  Then we went to the Crater lake, the lake was formed in the crater of a inactive volcano and at the center it was 70 meters deep.  The water was perfect and the lake was perfectly circular and all together it was wonderful. The water was just like Hawaii, really blue and clear and warm.  Then we returned to the Tree Top hotel where we've been staying; completely worn out.
Il y a beaucoup French personnes ici.  Et tout le monde fumeurs c'est disguste!  Ca odeurs tres mal!  Il y a n'American pas ici!  Je ne voit pas un American depuis nous avons quitte.  Mais le Europeens parlent bien l'anglais.  Il ya  un petite fille qui est Francaise et elle est trilingue et elle est seulement 5 ou 6!  Ca fait tu se sentent mal...
Ecrire plus tard!
Ming :)
Also I won't be writing for the next one or maybe two days because my parents are making me do a two day trek, which means a two day hiking trip in the blazing hot sun.  So not my kind of thing.

We're All Fine and Elephant Rides are Fun...ish!

Hey everyone!  We're all fine we weren't in Phnom Penh during the stampede but if you want to read about it here's a link http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/23/world/asia/23cambodia.html It's terrible that 300 people could die and potentially more because of bad injuries.  Today we went to the jungle to go on an elephant ride and swim in the waterfall.  It was so fun and the waterfall was the best but I kept falling XD...  If you want to see all the pictures they're in the slideshow but it doesn't start at the beginning so you have to click to the beginning.  The jungle was amazing to go through on an elephant so full of birds and plants.   The bugs freaked me out though, I hate bugs!  These huge beatles were flying everywhere and there was one really big spider that we saw.  I rode a male elephant but it might have been young because it wasn't as big as the other male elephant and it didn't have tusks.  It didn't listen to the mahout so he kept prodding it with his stick and it was really cool when the elephant trumpeted.  Then we realized it was angry and got a little worried.
Ma mere achete un arbalete pour ma frere a la chute d'eau.  La chute d'eau a ete tres beau avec un arc en ciel.  Nous tout nage dans la chute d'eau et jouer dans l'eau sous la chute d'eau.  Nous prendrons les motocyclettes a la chute d'eau et il y a les chemins de terre.  C'est tres cahoteux!!! 
That's all we've done today, I'm currently sitting eating my lunch it's about 12 now on Tuesday
Ming :)

Last 3 Days!

Sorry I haven't posted for the last few days!  I was busy and very jet lagged...  On Thursday when we arrived in Phnom Penh the capital of Cambodia we me our friend and translator Pali.  He drove us to our first hotel River 108 where we discussed our plans for the next two days in Phnom Penh.  The traffic here is nuts!  It takes awhile to get used to, there aren't any sides to the roads but people still sort of keep to the right sides and everyone moves in a huge mass moving into the places where there's room.  But everyone is very patient and nobody is in a hurry so I've only ever seen one accident, and it wasn't even in the city.  Today is Monday here and it's the last day of the Water Festival.  On Saturday, Sunday, and Monday all of Cambodia celebrated the Water Festival.  It celebrates the reversal of the direction the Tonle Sap River flows.  Families gather and have parties and in Phnom Penh in the Tonle Sap there are the Dragon Boat Races.  There were about 600 dragon boats and in the biggest boats the crew was made of about 50 men.  There were men's boat and womens boats but there weren't any co-ed boats  because supposedly bad luck.  The boats sit really low in the water and are elaborately painted, usually there's a shrine in the front.  Unlike crew teams in America about half the boat stands to row and the paddles are long and very thin.  The coxswain also doesn't steer too, they just keep everyone together when they're paddling.  They often are dressed up in silly costumes and have dances made up to keep the rowers rhythm.  They often use instruments or a brightly painted paddle to conduct the rhythm.
             On the second day we were in Phnom Penh we went to Palm Tree Center.  It's an orphanage where my brother's family lives.  He has one brother Rith (Rit), and five first cousins Kea, David, Veasna (Vees-na), Thida (Teeda), and Litho (Lito) that live there or are part of the Palm Tree program.  Pronunciations are in parentheses.  He also has three sisters, Hen (Hain), Ma, and Leak (Lee-ak).  His oldest sister Hen has two baby girls Liza (Lizza), and Lizo (Lizzo).  His middle sister Ma also has a baby but we haven't seen  her for a long time, we know she's living in Siem Reap though.  Even though his brother Rith is working in Ratanakiri and his cousins David and Kea are in school in Siem Reap we got to see everyone because they went back to Palm Tree for the Water Festival and to see the dentist.  David and Kea are at a French Hospitality school where they are learning how to become chefs.  They have the best English out of everyone in my brother's family and are learning a little French.  His youngest sister Leak is still living with Tith Horn (Teat-Horn) who used to take care of all of his sisters.  My parents are disappointed that she dropped out of school.  Oh and what's funny is that David and Kea were probably around 8th grade when they went to the French school and they're 18 and 20.  But they didn't start school until they were about 10 or 11 so it's pretty good I guess.  That night we went out to dinner with our friend Petra's brother Jerker (Yurker) and his wife Vathiny (Vat-tinny).  Vathiny is in the book Red Lights, Green Lizards which is about a woman who is working to help educate Khmer (Kuhmy) doctors about preventing and treating STDs.  We went to a restaurant called Serika and the food was great, we had spring rolls, vegetables in a thick sauce, and fish.  For dessert we had ice cream and banana flambe which was cool when they lit it on fire. 
            Yesterday we took everyone as well as Pali's family out to dinner.  There were about 20 people but the bill only came to about $50!  We went to the food court in the Sydney Shopping Center and everyone really wanted fast food so we got food from a place called McKing.  It was a combination of Burger King and McDonald's but probably healthier...  We all started thumb, arm, wrist, finger, pinkie finger, etc. wrestling.  I was really fun and it was funny watching Rith and Veasna, it looked like Veasna wasn't even trying!  David kept poking Veasna's "arm flab"!  Afterwards we went to Palm Tree's Water Festival party.  There was a dance but it was all Khmer music.
           Today we drove to Ratanakiri; we played the cow game where different animals or objects are assigned numeric values and the first team to get 1000 points wins.  Each team is decided by which side of the car you're sitting on and you only look on that side of the road.  But if the other team sees a graveyard on your side then you lose all your points.  The land was beautiful, mostly rice paddies most of the way.  The ride was really bumpy though because most of the roads weren't paved.  The dirt was pretty deep coppery- red.  Most of the houses were shacks on top of high wooden stilts so they didn't get flooded during monsoon season.  They mostly had thatched roofs and were tiny.  What was interesting was that there was cell phone service everywhere even though there weren't even paved roads.  We would be in the middle of no where and there would be a cell phone tower!  They're what holds this country together though because there isn't reliable internet or land lines or roads! 
         Je suis tres excite pour notre (elephant ride)!  Dans cette semaine nous voulons aller (waterfalls), et le Palm Tree Center (farm) aussi!  Ratanakiri est un peu ville mais le terre est tres beau!  Et apres Ratanakiri nous sont rentrer a Phnom Penh pour 3-4 jours.
That's All ofr the update!
Ming :)

DISNEYLAND!!!!! and 14 hour flight....

I had an awesome time today while all you guys were in school today!  Except for the 14 hour flight in a tinychair but at least this time the seats all had TV's.  At Disneyland we went on a ton of rides but my favorite was Space Mountain. 
Bonjour!  Aujourd'hui je suis aller Disneyland!  C'est tres amusant!!!  Le vol internationale (was) tres lentement.  I'm in a store right now because this was the only place I could get on a computer with internet but I'll write more later!
Write later!
Ming O3 <-a mickey mouse head hehe XD

Airport and Cathay Pacific

We're in the airport now, we left Berkeley at 9 expecting to get on the airplane at 1 but our flight has been delayed for an hour and we aren't leaving until about 2....  Then when we get to Hong Kong we have a 9 hour layover but we get to go to Disneyland which is only about 30 mins away!  We got here an hour and a half ago but we haven't even gone through security yet!  At the international terminal everyone here is Asian because most of the flight going out now are to Asia. 
Je suis dans le SFO aeroport et dans le aerogare internationale.  Nous mangons Dim Sum!  C'est tres bon!  Peut-etre c'est parce que j'ai faim.  Mes meres dit le aerogare est calmant parce que des l'architecture.  Parce que notre du vol internationale a ete retarde Cathay Pacific donner nous 40 dollars pour alimentaire dans le aeroport de SF.
Au revoir!
Ming ;)

About To Leave!

Yay!!!! I'm leaving in three hours to fly to Hong Kong!  It's a 14 hour flight nonstop at this second in Hong Kong it's 10:30 am on Thursday Nov, 18!  That means it's 16 hours ahead!  I'm going to Disneyland tomorrow in Hong Kong too!  I'm so excited and I'll keep all you guys updated as often as I can!  There isn't a lot of reliable internet in Cambodia though.
Au revoir tout le monde!
Ming :)