Revisitng Phnom Penh to Hoi An

Well its been quite awhile since our last post yet again, and for such we are sorry. but lets delve right into the details.

After we finished our jaw-dropping 3 day angkor wat experience, we hopped on a bus back to the beautiful city oh phnom penh. Little did we know , when we boarded, that we would actually have to stop about 25 kms outside of the city and from there arrange our own tuk-tuk to take us into the actual town. The reason the bus could not make it into Phnom penh itself was because of the annual water festival that occurs there. This festival is a few days long and cambodians from all over their beautiful country flock there to watch the dragon boat races, the fireworks and the elaboraely lit up boats at night. When we arrived we tried to get a room at the guesthosue we stayed at before, but because of the festival and the fact that it is so close to the river also meant that it was full already. We walked a little ways further and found ourselves a pretty shabby room, which thankfully we has for only one night. That afternoon we both had a nap to regain some energy, and ended up seleping through the fireworks, but we woke up and were able to see the lit up boats ttraveling up and down the river. The streets were blocked off from traffic and there were people everywhere, but it didnt feel like too much of a festival, at least to myself. After walking aroud the streets, watching the boats and hearing abit of a boy band concert in cambodian we returned to our room for the night.

The next morning we got up bright and early and walked to the diamond guesthouse to get a ride to the bus station for our bus from Phnom Penh to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City (HCM) in vietnam) evi edntally we were able to levae the city by bus but not arrive by bus. The trip wasnt too bad at all, until after the border crossing into vietnam. The border went smoothly with no disturbances, However within 10 minutes of our bus departing from the border, the AC died... the next 2 hours of our life were spent inside a sauna. I am not exagerating. There was no air flow at all and the temperature steadily rose inside, making it almost completely unbareable, but its all part of the adventure, and it made us all the more apprecitative of the fan we had in our next guesthouse.

The following morning we went on an organized tour to the cu chi tunnels outside of saigon. This vast underground tunnel system is in total 250 km and is only 80cm wide by 120cm tall. At this site we were also able to go to the shooting range. Also we were able to see all the different booby traps used by the viet cong as well as all the different sorts of rooms in the tunnels and the overall architectural ingenuity of the viet cong guerillas. later that day we also went to the war remnants museum.

We have purchased an "open bus ticket" what this is is a bus ticket to a variety of stops that have no predetermined dates on them. so our trip through vietnam has consisted of and will consist of HMC --> Mui ne --> Da Lat --> Nha Trang --> Hoi an (where we are now) --> Hue --> Hanoi. Tommorrow we will actually be heading to hue at 8 int he morning and then at 5 oclock in the evening of the same day we will board another bus that we will take overnight to hanoi, where we will spend the 24th. We will be flying from hanoi back to bangkok on nov.25.

we sepnt a total of 3 days in mui ne. the first day we found a guesthouse and just enjoyed an easy evening. The following day we took the morning to relax in our room and in the afternoon we each rented a motorbike. one very new one and one more vintage if you will... the official name of the vintage motorbike is "baby blue beauty". We tried to find the local sand dunes, having herd fo the sand sledding there, but we rode right past them and a few km down the road we decided to just park our bike and walk down to the beach. the waves were crashing nicely and the tide was slwoly coming in and the best part was that there was no one else on the beach. It was good to just get to relax on a beautiful beach. After spending some time there we got back on our bikes and set out to return to the guesthouse. on the wway back carson ran out of fuel and luckily it was right at the sand dunes, so we didnt miss tem ont he way back. After getting soem gas, we walked up onto the dunes where the wind was blowing furiously at times and i got to do 2 runs of sand sledding... needless to say afterwards i was covered in sand. not the best of feelings... The next day we spent pretty much only bumming around hte guesthouse. it was our first official day off where we did nothing, and boy did we need it! we both felt re-energized afterwards.

from mui ne we took a bus up to the central higlands town of da lat. that first night when we arrived we went to a cooking class with the owner of our hotel. After our inner, and as we were walking home, we were actually cold for the first time on this trip while beingoutside.... it was very much like going for a walk ona brisk summer night back home. the next day we just walked around town, went t the market and walked to the local flower garden. the following day we left fro nha trang. another beach but this beach was not as nice. the water was murky because it is now rainy season in vietnam i believe and the wind was extremely powerful.coupled with the torrential downpours walking around outside was not the most enjoyable of activities, but watching the large waves break on the shore was a relaxing passtime. We spent 1 night in nha trang and then two nights ago from today we took an over night sleeper bus from nha trang to hoi an. one thign i've found time and time again while traveling out here is that southeast asia is not meant to accomodate someone 6'2'' or so...

We arrived early friday morning and spent the day wondering around town looking in all the shops and just enjoying the old town feel where there were no tourists around. and tonight we will spend one more night at a new hotel , because of some problem at the first one we were at, and tomorrow we head to hue for the day and then at night we will be traveling to hanoi.

-Adam

Waterfalls - Angkor temples.

Sorry it's been so long since our last post here. it's hard to find time to write down all of our stories in the hour time frame that we get every once in awhile, but we thought we should put up some highlights. (sorry in advance for the vagueness in the descriptions).

The day after the tiger temple we went with our newfound british friend (craig) to the erawen waterfalls. these falls were so gorgeous and there are 7 levels. every one was better than the last. To access some of the waterfalls we had to wade through knee deep water and climb over trees and up little waterfalls, but when we got to the top it was completely worth it! one of the most beautiful things i have ever seen in my life! Carson and I were both speechless for awhile.

That night we came back to town and walked on and took pictures of the historic "bridge over the river kwai"and came back later that night because we thought there was a light show and some excitment that was going to happen. we showed up and the only thing happening was soem thailand cheerleading practice... so we took that night off and enjoyed just sitting and talking, then returned to our bungalow and slept.

The next day Carson and myself took a bus into bangkok and then after a very confusing time at the bus terminal we made our way on another bus to lop buri, wehre we spent the next two nights at an OMF missionary guesthouse. the owners were so nice and coomodating and gave us soem good tips on where to go and just overall it was one of hte better guesthouses. The next day we went and saw the monkey temple in town and had monkeys crawl all over us, and one even tried to steal carsons toque. After that we made our way to the train station and took a train to the old capital city of thailand "Ayuthaya". spent the day there doing a tour looking at all the ruins around the town. By the end of the day we were both agreeing that "a pile of bricks is a pile of bricks", but we still managed to enjoy ourselves. we came back on the train and had a little bit of confusion with a motorcycle taxi bringing carson back to the right guesthouse, but it all worked out.

The next day we took a mini bus into bangkok. definitely not wroth the hassle.. it would have been alot easier to take a train. but oh well. we got there got to ride the skytrain and the subway around town till we got to an area of town called lumphini. (A huge thank you to Cynthia for showing us the ropes when we first arrived in this crazy town a month ago!) we got off and made our way to find a guesthouse, and we found one for surprisingly cheap for being in bangkok (only 160 baht) but it was 4 walls, practically a slab of rock for a bed, and a shared bathroom. but oh well we managed there for a night. that night we went out to see a traditional muay-thai (thai-boxing) match. the atmosphere was absolutely electrifying and crazy with the people betting and just the cheers and shouts of the crowd. It was like a mini BC place when the lions have just scored a touchdown. The experience was amazing... The next day we got up soemwhat early and tried to find the candian embassy to get our vietnam visas... after running into soem fellow candians from victoria we found the place and were told we had to go to the vietnam embassy... byt his time we were already pushing it to be at the airport 3 hours before our international flight to cambodia. so we just got a cab and told him to take us to the airport... For those of use who dont know, bangkok has two airports... we didnt know that, and guess what we found out the hard way. so we arrived at the wrong airport after telling our cab driver the right one and we thoguht he understood but i guess not. We had to take a bus from that airpor to the main one and we're already only 2.5 hours before our flight leaves the ground... so an hour later we finally made it to the right airport and got checked in an hour and a little bit before our flight left. grabbed some luncha nd then we were in the air off to phnom penh (the capitol of cambodia)

As soon as we arrived in cambodia there was a difference... the people here were all smiles and just a warm people. carson and i both love the vibe out here... we found a place for the night and then hit the sack. the next day we went to see the killing fields, the genocide museum and the royal palace... the killing fields were horrendous. jsut to think of all the horrors that happened there and just the anguish and pain of the cambodian people... it was heart-breaking for myself. then we went to see the genocide museum at security center 21 (s-21 / tuol sleng high school) a high school that was used to torture and brutally murder innocent cambodian people suspected of treason to the pol pot regime duing the 1970s... Again this epxerience was heart-breaking. Just walking down the street afterwards and having this new understanding of the people and where they are coming from and why you dont really see anyone over the age of50-60 around... after seeing these two places we finshed hte day by seeing the royal palace and the silver pagoda... The highlight of this sectio of the day was getting to sit down with some guys playing music and get to play with them on some form of xylophone type thing, but Carson and I were both too tired to really enjoy it... plus after seeing the royal palace in bangkok, this one didnt compare.

The next day we headed off to Siem reap to sepnd the next few days looking at the ruins of the Angkor wats. They were stunning! the ngiht we arrived we went to see a sunset and it wasnt actually that great but the following 3 days carson and I got to explore the other ruins and we had a blast. I dont htink we needed anymore time becaseu by the end we were getting templed out but just seeing these vast and amazing structures and the murals and sculptures. Amazing! The photos taken dont do it justice at all. And the feeling of being indiana jones... priceless! Also in our time spent in siem reap we discovered the cambodian version of the mennonite favorite "roll kuchen". Though no where near as good as my mothers, it was still a nice treat to have every breakfast.

Today we got on a bus and made our way back to phnom penh. WE had to stop about 25 km outside of the town becasue its so busy here for independance day (nov.9) and the water festival that accompanies it. There are dragon boat races going on right now ads i type. And tonight there is suppsoed to be a firework show that Carson and I are going to try to go to. And then tomorrow mornign we take another 6 hour bus to the city of Saigon (Ho Chi Minh) in southern vietnam, and we'll see what adventures await us out there.

-Adam

Caving and tigers

hope there are still acouple poeple following this! i haven't had time to update the blog in over a week it looks like! lots has happened. soo i'll try and not go into a great deal of detail.

The trip started out with alot of travelling. We started in Phuket at one of the missionaries houses and then headed south towards Bangkok. A 5 hr bus ride followed by 6 hrs of sitting in the train station and then a 10 hr over night train. Long day but we finally made it to a small city just outside of Bangkok. From there we got on a connecting train which was supposed to take us west towards Kanchaniburi. After about 3 hrs on this train (had to stand because it was so crammed) we realized we where heading bak to phuket where we had just came from. haha it was bound to happen. Spent the next 2 nights in Hua hin a popular tourist town. while we were there we spent one of the days hiking and then going through this amazing cave! it was amazing! the size of the cavern was unbelievable! Our transportation there... motorcycle taxi. now try and imagine the Driver, Adam, and myself on one motorcyle. the half an hour ride we thought it was going to be turned into an hour and a half literally... lets just say it'll never happen again.

Today we went to the tiger Temple. They have about 10 adult tigers and 6 young cubs. We got to take pics with the adults and the cub right after we signed the waivers haha. It was amazing and slightly unsettling. I have a picture of this massive tiger with its head in my lap! Definately something Adam and myself will never forget. After that we walked around the rest of the "zoo".. well it was a zoo in there. the animals run free. no cages. water buffalo, hogs, peacocks, cows, dear and more. they said over a 1000 animals just roam free. Something i don't think they would get away with in Canada.

Sorry i do not have my computer with my anymore soo i won't be able to upload pictures. If you would like to see pictures feel free to contact me when i get home and i can get them to you.

Carnival with the kids.

The last week we have been in the province of  phang-nga and haven’t had internet access so we are sorry that the blog has not been updated in about a week.

Last Saturday we had our final wrap-up carnival for all the kids that attended our English camp throughout the week. Back in Canada we were told to expect 20-30 kids for this camp and throughout the week we had over 80 kids! This was both extremely exciting, and a little bit frazzling at times. But praise God we got through it and all went relatively smoothly! At our carnival we had different stations that the kids were able to go to.  I don’t know if ill be able to remember all of them but ill try. Hockey shot, badminton, skipping, water balloon toss, water and sponge relay, crafts and a cookie walk. We split the kids into groups and did a rotation through all of these stations. I was at the water balloon toss and water sponge relay station so I don’t really know how the others went, but from my perspective the kids all had an amazing time! After stations, we sang some songs  (with a lot of help from Amanda & Amber Griffeon (one of the local missionaries)). Then we did a skit called “the sticky chair skit.” Its pretty much a camp skit where there is a guy that walks up to a chair (sin), and checks it out, then gets one hand stuck. Then more and more of their  body gets stuck. Someone else comes along and tries to help them to get free from the chair but they get stuck too, then someone prays and jesus comes and sets the two ppl free form being stuck to sin (the chair) I was the first guy to get stuck then Carson tried to pry me off with a stick and even dumped a big basin of water on me (the kids loved that) then jenaya came along and prayed and john came (john was jesus) and set us free. It was really good. Needless to say though I was extremely wet and dirty after it. Then I believe it was Jacquie that shared her testimony. Some of the kids responded well to it and amber griffeon was able to share more about jesus with them afterwards.  Then it was snack time. We had chips, cookies, juice and of course the drink of the week: water!  The kids were then set free to do whatevr station they wanted. The kids gravitated to crafts or to the water balloon water fight. It was great to see so many smiling kid’s faces! I cant speak for everyone, but I know I was touched by the kids during this camp.

-Adam

 

 

Final day in Phuket

I am typing this email outside of the Griffeons house on the sidewalk. (borrowing their Wi-Fi) The night life here is amazing.. and i don't mean the party scene.  As i've been sitting here i've watched 2 cochroches crawl by my toes acouple geckos scurry by and then i heard some ruffling some dead leaves beneath my feet and a massive milliped crawled out! i almost mistaken it for a snake! it was pushing 10 inches. 

well the final day of the English camp went awesome! we ended things with a party/carnival.  We spent the day prior filling up about 300 water balloons and preparing different stations.  Its amazing how an hour of filling up water balloons can turn into about 10 minutes of enjoyment! i think its fare to say we all had a blast.  John ran the hockey station, Jacquie did games, Sharon ran the badminton, Jenaya did crafts and Adam and Carson ran the Water games. As well Jacquie shared her testimony and then adam and Carson did a skit.  It was a great time to build relationships with these kids and to open up doors for the long term missionaries.

Phuket

This is a photo of our English camp.. the numbers keep growing as the days go by. last i heard it was at 75 kids.

It was great arriving in Phuket. We had a beautiful view of the ocean just before landing. There is more of a tropical look, bigger trees and vines hanging down. The team, along with Cindy met up with Becky Ouelette at the airport and then traveled to their “ muuban “ were we will spend close to a week. Four days of kids camps plus on day of a carnival await us. That first evening we spent with Kevin and Karlene Klassen for our Thai Thanksgiving Dinner. (just a regular meal) haha thai's don't celebrate thanksgiving. I (carson) am now sitting at the Klassens house after just finishing our third day of the english camp! It has been a great time.  Please pray for renewed energy as the heat is wearing most of us out. We have our last day of the camp tomorrow and then the carnival on saturday!  We apologize for not updating the blog as diligently as we had hoped, but a lack of internet connection has stalled things. Feel free to email carsonvogt@shaw.ca with any questions and myself or one of the other team members will get back to you.

Chon Buri

After arriving in the province of Chon Buri, we quickly got settled in and then Dave Sinclaire-Peters picked us up from our hotel.  He took us to the church in Angsila.  Definitely was a spirit filled place where God was doing some amazing things!  Heard a story about a man whose leg was healed and he liternally threw away his cane and walked! This had just occurred about 3 weeks before we came.

That evening we went on a prayer walk through the village.  A Thai lady from the church took us around the town and into people’s homes where we gave them a gift and then prayed for them. It was definitely a memory I will never forget. When we returned it was time for church.  John Esau shared his testimony and we sang Happy Birthday to Adam Braun in Thai. I’d say definitely a birthday he’ll never forget.  Happy belated birthday to Adam!

 The next day we took a sun tao to the Waterbuffalo races. It is a once in a year festival where they ride the waterbuffalo through the streets. You don’t want to be near the finish line because the buffalo are intoxicated with alcohol ( crazed 1000 pound creature hurtling its way down the road ). Unfortunately, due to threat of rain they cancelled the day. Of coarse it never did rain, but we decided to go back the next day. We went back but never did get to see any races. We walked through some exhibits and did a little shopping and had to leave to catch our flight to Phuket.

Grand Palace in Bangkok

In the morning of our second day in the beautiful city of bangkok, Cynthia took us on the popular boat taxi-ish-sorta-thing... we got off at the stop where we got onto the long tail boat tour the day before. instead this time we walked through a market (where we did indeed see chestnuts roasting on an open fire thai-style) Anyways, the point of all this travel was to get to the grand palace. All i can think to say is "WOW!" it was absolutely breath=taking. The whole place what an architectural work of art.  But the sad part about this palace is the that there is a temple made for "the jade buddha" and so many thais come to worship a piece of rock. So as breath-taking as the sights are, there is still this ominous feeling all around.  well im sure that all of the pictures that we collectively took will help to illustrate the scenery.  but after we got back to the hotel, we left of chon buri. when we got here we settled into our hotel and went on a tour with dave sinclair-peters. he even took us to momnkey mountain where we were able to feed and photograph the monkeys. then we went to Angsila church and had dinner and went on a prayer walk. had church (where i was lucky enough to have happy birthday sung to me by the kids in both english and thai) came back and i believe we just crashed. well i know at least for myself i did! but it seems to be time again for me to crash. i need my sleep for the water-buffalo races and then flying to phuket tomorrow. 

 -Adam

Long Tail Boat with Cyndy

when we arrived we got settled into our hotel and then got right into things.  Purchased some amazing fruit from the market and then saw the city by a long tail boat.  It wasn't hard to see the contrast from poor to rich. 

"Those who look to him are radiant; their faces are never covered with shame."

Psalm 34:5

Arrival in Bangkok

Team arrives in Bangkok, welcomed by cyndy.  Though wiped out by almost 24hrs of travelling time, we still managed to put on a smile.

Just before we leave for YVR

Well this would be the group of us. from left to right: Jacquie Dick, Carson Vogt, John Esau,  Sharon Snider, Jenaya Block, Adam Braun. This is hte group of people that we will spending the next 2 weeks with . well we have just been called to board here at the airport. So this is us leaving behind the cold western world, for the hot and so utterly humid east. 

-Adam

p.s. just want to say thank you to all and hoepfully we can post soon.

p.p.s. well im tkaing too long to type so we're the last oens on the plane! 

Thankyou!

Just thought i'd send a big Thank you for all who have contributed to the six of us in anyway.  It's been awesome to see all the support that has come our way!  We are all truly grateful!