Disclaimer: There has been no editing on this post, nor any other posts between November 14 to November 29. If you see a typo or misplaced word, deal with it.

Cambodia. Wow. I wasn’t expecting I’d really like this place. First, the weather has been quite nice–not the sticky humidity I was preparing myself for. Granted, it’s the winter season, but the current weather is definitely increasing my affinity for the place.

For the last two days, Jeff and I have been visiting the various temples in the northwest-ish region of the country. Angkor Wat, the most famous of these temples, is considered one the world’s seven ancient wonders (Can someone actually fact check that, please? Not sure if it is, but sounds good in my post.). It’s a source of large national pride for Cambodians, and although it’s filled with tourists, you still feel like you’re experiencing the real Cambodia.

At each of the temple and ruins sites, you are immediately approached by a battallion of vendors to buy their scarves, bracelets, or meals. These vendors are often little kids who robotically repeat English phrases such as “Want a cold drink? Best price for you” until it feels like a natural sound like a bird in the trees. I express no interest in buying any trickets from them, but they all try their best to sell their products. My favorite has been a little boy who ran up and broke thru the crowd of kids around us jumping and shouting, “Buy something from me! Buy something from me!” and he didn’t even have anything to sell.

But they sure are cute kids, and with Jeff who speaks Cambodian, we can have a little more fun with them.

I would, however, love to buy something from them and send them away with a smile instead of defeat, but I don’t know if that’s the best way to do it.

While driving along a country road, passing little wooden homes with dirt floors and tin roofs, Jeff turned to me and asked, “Is it hard for you to see all this poverty?”

I said yes and no. Yes for obvious reasons–I hate seeing sickness and poor sanitary conditions. That can be hard to see. But for the most part, a lot of these kids seem very happy, and I don’t know if I want them to know a life of video games, SUVs and designer clothes. As long as they have good health, living conditions and education, they can have a meaningful life. Am I totally out of place saying this?

Anyway, I’m still trying to figure out the best way to solve the world’s problems, and the more I think thru this, the more I realize how important schools ate in these developing countries. The next day we were eating breakfast when another cute little girl of about 8 yesrs came up to us with a basket of postcards, wooden flutes, and what looked like the friendship bracelets I made as a kid. I was expecting the same mantras I had heard before, but I was delightfully surprised when she said “I’ll tell you the capital of Madagascar if you buy something from me.” It made us laugh!

The girl then asked where I was from, to which I responded America, and she told me how much she likes our new president. She then asked me what state I lived in, to which I responded Utah, and she told me the capital of Utah is Salt Lake City. Impressed, we then quizzed her on other state capitals, and she answered each one correctly (for the most part) with a big, toothy grin.

I asked her if she had made any of the items in her basket, and she shook her head. Good, I thought, the items were crap, and this girl showed a lot more potential than making cheesy souvenirs. I politely declined her last offer to buy something, and I wished her luck on her way.

But now I kind of regret not buying anything from her. For one, I don’t actually know the capital of Madagascar; and two, I like how she tried to use her education to get ahead. Maybe a purchase would have reinforced the importance of education in her mind, or maybe it would have just reinforced that tourists are just suckers for a puppy-dog face. Either way, she was pretty cute.

After taking one of those color personality tests, I came out red and yellow. If you aren’t familiar with what I’m talking about, let me explain. There are 4 types, or personalities, of people, and each is associated with a color. Red is for the dominant, Type A, “I have to be the best” personalities. Blue is for the social, love eveybody, “I can’t go to the bathroom by myself” types. Yellow represents the adrenaline-seeking, joke-playing, “all I wanna do is have some fun” type. And last of all is White, which represents the nonconfrontational, peace-making, “let’s all just get along” type. I personally really like these personalities. After I took the test, I came out Red and Yellow (you’re allowed 2 colors).

Anyway, understanding yours and other’s personalities is helpful, particularly while traveling. Because you are out of the security and comfort zone of your own bed, familiar food, and people you know, people will often show their “true colors.”

Reds go crazy when things don’t go exactly to plan. Blues freak out if they have to spend a day by themselves. Yellows can’t get bored, and Whites, well, like I said earlier, Whites are great. I don’t know what bad thing happens about them.

I’ve already had to battle my colors, and add some as well.

According to the route I planned, I was suppose to go to Bariloche on these incredible bus/boat ride thru the lakes and mountains. Well, the weather was awful yesterday. It was suppose to get a little better today, and even more so on Friday. This trip thru the lakes is particularly expensive, and I don’t want to pay that money and only see clouds. My Red is screamming because plans are changing. I’d have no problem staying another day, but there really isn’t much to see in Puerto Varas. My Yellow is pouting and drumming its fingers.

But I recognize all of this, and because I know my Red and Yellow aren’t being appeased, I have to squeeze out whatever Blue and White is inside me to improve my situation. In this case, I need more White to make peace with the situation. I can’t control the weather, so why freak out about it. My Red had to make the best decision it could. I decided to wait another day. Maybe the weather will be worst, who knows? If it is, I’ll need more White to relax and go with the flow.

Right now I’m looking out the window and the weather is shining. But the bad weather should be heading over Bariloche, so it could still be raining near there.

And my Yellow will be challenged to find something fun snd memorable to do today. I better get out of bed and get going.

Disclaimer: I am blogging directly from my iPhone. Posts will not be edited and may contain a typos, grammatical hiccups, and uncontrolled streams of thought. Please note these thoughts may be make you bored, depressed, or inspired to do crazy acts of travelling. Read at your own risk.

Day One.

It’s 5:00 pm. I’m lying on a bunk bed in a 4-bed dorm room in a hostel in Puerto Varas. The hostel is called Casa Azul because it is, well, very azul (blue). I’ve been sitting here for the last 30 minutes exhausted. There are two other backpacks in here but no bodies. I opted to go with the roommates to not only save money but also force myself to interact. I feel a little vulnerable out here by myself and that tends to make me shy. You really don’t want to be shy when you are doing something like this.

To get here I took a plane from Santiago to Puerto Montt. I took a bus from the airport to the bus terminal in Puerto Montt. The town looked kind of crazy, and I didn’t feel like exploring it with 40 pounds on my back, so I decided to head straight to Puerto Varas. A woman pointed to a row of buses and said to just jump on one. I stepped into the first because it honked at me. “Vas a Puerto Varas?”
“Si.”
So I sit down. He kept honking at other people but nobody got in. After a few minutes he starts to leave and I’m the only one along for the ride. As he’s backing up I’m realizing that I don’t like the idea that I’m all alone on this small bus with a male driver, and that I should have jumped on another that was full of people. But I didn’t…and the bus was leaving the terminal and driving down the road. I looked at the door directly across from me and I thought I could probably bust through it if I needed to. Man, i thought, i couldnt even make it 24 hours. Just as I was getting my backpack in position to shield me as I jumped through the glass, the doors opened and 3 people stepped on. Phew…it IS a normal bus. I was in Puerto Varas a half hour later.

I need to go find some food. I kind of wish someone was here with me now.