sidewalk

beckie and i went to see the girl who played with fire at the screening room. and oh man it was SOOOO GOOD!!! i CAN'T WAIT to read the book! i haven't had the chance to read it yet, it's the sequel to the girl who played with fire. i would have to say, that it was the best sequel i've ever seen. it's not this outlandish plot that is a bit of a stretch to happen to the same group of characters. it was just a really beautiful continuation of the story. it's wonderfully weaved together.

lisbeth salander is probably the most amazing literary character i've ever read. she's just so interesting. it blows my mind. wow.

so yes, i think i'll pick up that novel before heading up to silver lake tomorrow.

it's a great feeling to have just seen a really great movie. i don't know when i saw such a great film last.

i think i'll go eat some cucumber slices. i miss tv :( it would be nice to eat cucumbers and watch mindless television as a means of unwinding.

there's something in you that brings so much out of me.

flush

i like that sometimes things just suddenly click. that's what we've been waiting for, needing. last night, after my latest blog entry, brendan and i had the best evening together since we returned from cambodia. funny that after i decided to document the bumpy transition on the internet we finally turned a corner and are back into our regular groove. i really really enjoyed my time with him and it makes me feel so happy! we did our banking and made bread together in our new bread maker. when we sat down for dinner the doorbell rang unexpectedly, so brendan's best friend robb joined us around the table.

for many years i would lie awake in bed thinking about my osap loan. dreaming about paying it off. i lied in bed while brendan watched john mayer clips on the internet. i rambled to him about if we save this much, and that much, and combine it with whatever, we'll have such and such saved within 2 years for a downpayment on a house! heehee. i think it's funny that i've got a new financial goal to work towards. it's super important to me that we save a lot because i want to have low monthly payments. not unbelievably low, but it would be nice if our mortgage was around how much we currently pay for rent.

all us girls from book club gathered at rach g's place last night. we drank some kind of blueberry alcohol out of a pop bottle and shared some laughs and stories. i love those girls. i'm so glad that we get together so often. it's true that we don't get a lot of reading done, but it's the gathering together part that's so great. i like the rhythm of it and their good natures and positive energy.

it's amazing how much easier it is to keep a house tidy when it's tidy. i feel so much more motivated. this morning i peaked out on the balcony is see a trashbag full of dirt that has been sitting there since i planted my garden in may. i suddenly felt super motivated to gather it up and toss it to the curb before the garbage truck came by. i rushed around in my nighty, dragging this heavy filthy bag around - it slowly rubbing it's dirt on my leg as i walked. as i came down my back stairs i hear the truck drawing nearer so i rushed and dashed down the path to the curb. feeling a great deal satisfied with myself i dumped it beside the recycling and brushed my hands clean.

i also did laundry! what a good start to the day :)

 

well i have known all these things
and the joys that they can bring
and i'll share them all for a cup of coffee
and to wear your ring.

polite

now that we've been back in k-town for about 10 days, life feels like it's resuming to it's regularly scheduled programming. b and i are beginning to find the adjustment to living together difficult. it's funny because all the things we were expecting to be hard have turned out to be easy! and all the things we expected to be easy have been hard. this realization has not come without it's share of discouragment. in some ways i'm really excited to see that we prepared ourselves for some things so well that they've been very smooth. yay team lorimer! but it makes me feel like we gave so much attention to this or that, that other things didn't reach our radar and are therefore much more challenging than their contemporaries.

i guess we're finding ourselves on that proverbal learning curve. are we ready for this? 'all passengers please keep your arms inside the ride...' i do like a good challenge, i'm the kind of person who likes to set my attention on one thing at a time, accomplish the task at hand, and then check it off my list:
dishes - check
vacuuming - check
bathroom - check
be a good wife - tbd...

i like that we're making stories. first it was the b+l hook up story, the b+l dating story, the b+l proposal, the b+l engagement story, the b+l wedding story, the b+l honeymoon story. now it's b+l learn and live and grow and be in the maxi pad story.

yes, it's called the maxi pad. we decided that i would take his name, and he would that my apartment's name.

so how is this story going to unfold i wonder. i suspect with fun and fights. spooning and snoring. teamwork and thoughtlessness. music and malady. and as usual, i'll celebrate the awesome stuff, i'll manage and learn thru the hard stuff, and at the end of each day be excited about everything that makes up my life with b.

of all these friends and lovers
there is no one compares with you.

misnomer

the first summer i lived in toronto was 10 years ago, in the year 2 thousand.

i had an office job for the first time where i worked with my future housemates bonnie and leslie. i drove thru toronto traffic each morning and evening making my way to the industrial park in markham. our office was near a spice factory. the air was thick with the smell of spices and soon, due to the summer's heat, the seats in my car began to absorb the scent. for the rest of that summer when it rained i'd leave the windows down in my VW jetta (named asher) in hopes of the rain washing away the odor. it never really worked. so for the next 2 years my car continued to smell like spices when the temperature got just so.

thunder only happens when it's raining.

bodacious

so brendan and i decided yesterday that we'd go camping overnight on the long weekend. we picked two possible provincial parks, but when i went to make a reservation they were fully booked and had no vacancy. and so did the next 5 places i tried. i ended up finding a semi ok site at a place called silver lake. i have no idea what it's like because i've never heard of it before. however, it's slightly north of sharbot lake which is where beckie's cottage is and that's a nice area so i feel ok about it. we did leave it a little late so we can't be too picky. i kind of think it will make for a funny story if it goes badly. i've never done regular camping before, only group camping. i think this will be fun. we can take all our new camping goods with us and have a grand ole time. there were a number of sites available at this campground, and the site descriptions involved words like "poor" and "severe". i managed to get one that says "average" in a few places and "slight". it has a fire pit in the back, oh man... i hope that brendan brings his guitar and we sit around the fire roasting marshmallows while he plays. i wonder if that would be uncool for the neighbours. it's live music, who doesn't like GOOD live music?? it's not like it's a radio blaring or some obnoxious garage band. i have to admit... it was more expensive than i had expected. are the rates better for week-long camping? it doesn't feel much cheaper than a hotel. frig! we could get 2 hotel rooms in cambodia for that price :p

oh speaking of rooms in cambodia. i found the website of our hotel in siem reap - EI8HT ROOMS. remember how i told you that i was pretty sure it was a gay hotel?? well check out their site and tell me what you think. i think it was owned by gay people, it wasn't specifically a place for gay travelers, but they're welcome. it was a really great place, we loved it and the staff were super attentive and helpful. two thumbs up from the lorimers!

i had a super lovely time with melissa and mark last night. i went to their (her) place around 6:15 and didn't get home til 9:15! it was really nice getting caught up and sitting in her backyard.

pretty eyed, pirate smile, you'll marry a music man.

i love melissa.
she's a super and special lady!

water lily

it's odd how hair can change from one week to another, or even one day to another. today i feel like at the rate my hair is growing, and in the manner in which it's growing... it will some day be quite the mane! i a little bit like that!

it was a full weekend. saturday was taken up by domesticity. i worked on the bedroom, brendan worked on the backroom. then we went out to sears to purchase items off our registry and we came home with a vacuum and a coffee table! b is quite enamored with the vacuum. i've never seen him so blissful over a bissel! then on sunday we went up to little long lake to spend the afternoon with david and sue. we went swimming and canoing, had a lovely dinner. it was very nice. the perfect day for the cottage. their country road is quite hilly and curvy. at one point we were driving up a steep hill and it became clear that i was in too high of a gear. at nearly the top i had to stop. i took a deep breath and said to brendan "get ready to see my mad skills of starting on a hill". i released the clutch and pushed the gas and after a bit of spinning tires on the gravel we got up and over the top. to be honest, i'd been a little afraid. but brendan was so impressed that he said he'd never been more attracted to me in his whole life. hahaha :D

i was feeling a bit whiny on saturday night. i was feeling sorry for myself that i no longer have cable, and that i'm cutting back on sugar and salt :( i'm enjoying tea less than usual. however, after last evening when i sat reading in the new listening station corner of the living room (b has a vast vinyl collection and record player, so we got that all set up on saturday), i felt very content. i'm encouraged, maybe i'll end up really enjoy having no tv after all.

i love corn on the cob. it tastes like summer goodness.

today was my mid-year performance evaluation. once again, i passed with flying colours, which is encouraging. it's very nice to know that i'm good at my job. the change of boss is just great, and emma was very impressed that i continued to be highly productive at work while still managing to plan a wedding. this has been one very full year - this time last july i was in peru with jill! there's part of me that thinks there'll never be another year as full as this one. it's been a special one that's for sure.

lovers, keep on the road you're on.

tonle sap

an article about the khmer rouge caught my eye on google news this morning: genocide in cambodian

the first of the 5 cadre has been convicted of genocide and crimes against humanity. while we were at the genocide museum in phnom penh i read that this particular person became at christian after the regime was over. situations like that can be difficult for me to wrap my brain around - justice and grace. grace and justice. without spending some serious time thinking about this dilemia, and without knowing this man's personal faith or whether he is repentant of his heinous acts, i've concluded that in cases like this grace is justice. does that make sense? forgiveness does not necessarily mean exemption from punishment. there are concequences for actions. i believe anyone who is truly repentant would willingly accept their penalty.

that being said... i hope that this conviction, and the ones to follow will not only bring long awaited justice, but will bring healing to that nation. they are a very broken people, and i truly hope for restoration for them.

imagine all the people living life in peace.

dark

i'm excited that it's almost the weekend. we have lots to do around the house tomorrow, and i'm kind of excited that it's someone else's mess too!

i'm really liking having brendan as my housemate. although, his tolerance level for tidiness is much lower than mine. this morning i did the dishes while he was sleeping, i was really happy about it and was hoping that he'd be delighted to find a clean kitchen without having to ask me! he always mentions the mess before i have the chance to clean it. so i was pleased do chores without being promped. so far my favourite part of having brendan as a resident of 330 york street is getting to see him before work. i tend to pester him in the mornings by getting back into bed for 10 -15 intervals in between things like breakfast and shower. i unwittingly poke and prod at him as he sleeps, and he responds with moans and whines. this makes me giggle and it delights me to no end. i'm reminded of how i acquired the nickname "pest". i also really like it when he picks up groceries. one thing i've missed about having housemates is the lack of other people's food in the house. i swear nothing tastes better than other people's food. i remember taking a bite of my friend's sub at lunch in college, and they always tasted better than the subs i ordered for myself. packing my lunch for work is an adventure, i like finding leftovers in the fridge or bringing spare fruit into the office. shared food is great.

in other news... since taking out my dreads i've discovered that my hair is now wavy. this is extremely strange after having silky smooth hair for all those years. when i mentioned it to my hairdresser she said that people's hair changes during their lifetime. she thought it was good or else we'd get tired of the same old thing. i suppose that's kind of true, but i liked my smooth straight hair, i knew what to expect from it. i don't know what to think of my wavy locks. i can't wait for a year from now when my hair will be semi-long. and i really can't wait for a year and a half when it's really long! as much as i miss my straight hair, i also miss the fullness of my dreads. i think what it comes down to is this middle of the road haircut, it bores me. i dyed my hair the other day because i needed my hair to be just a little more edge.

whatever colours you have in your mind.

stegosaurus

the folks at storytellers last night were asking us our highlights and lowlights of cambodia. it was a good way to summarize our trip, so i thought i'd include them on pspd.

HIGHs:
1) ta prohm temple
my favourite by far. it's engulfed by the jungle, the trees grow all over the old stone structures. the strength of their roots lift and move parts of the temple and look like muscles strangling the old ruins. it was much bigger than i thought it would be and we spent a long time waundering around there amazed at what we saw.

2) the bus ride
i sat for 6 hours looking out the window at the unusual and amazing country of cambodia. i saw cows bathing, tiny children riding big bikes, flat plains covered with scattered palm trees.

3) the fish massage
in siem reap they have these fish tanks out on the street. you sit at the edge and countless tiny fish come up and kiss your feet. it feels like tiny bubbles and it tickled so much!!! it made me laugh and laugh. it was 3 dollars for 20 minutes!! brendan took a video, we'll be posting it on facebook soon.

LOWs:
1) our fight at angkor wat
a disagreement in the sun. frustration and defensiveness. sweating in the heat, waundering around looking for a place to finish our conversation, while trying to stay on the path because of the potential for landmines. it was crappy, and the timing sucked. i get over stuff fast, while brendan takes some time to process. we eventually sat on the ledge in the shade in the temple. b stared into space while i drank water and bided my time until he was ready to carry on. we weren't in a rush, so i waited for him to shake it off.

2) getting driven into by a bicycle while we were homeless in siem reap in the dark (after arriving later into town than we expected)
the hotel we'd been looking forward to staying at did not have our reservation. we got a tip from another traveller about 2 other good hotels so we headed off into the night to find a place to lay out heads. a guy on a bicycle drove up behind me and hit me with his bike. the front tire seriously went thru my legs. i have no idea how he didn't see me, i had a huge backpack on.

3) brendan being sick
i've never had a fever before, and i was rather freaked out that his was not going away. one night i became very discouraged and felt very overwhelmed because we were so far away from home, and he was solely my responsbility, so i had a little cry. i was afraid that something would happen to him and it would be my fault. plus, with him being sick we missed out on activities that i'd been looking forward to.

i'll draw three figures on your heart.

meant

my cable is being disconnected today :(

when i called to cancel the service, the lady was skeptical. i told her that my husband doesn't want a tv. she said "at all?", "yes" i told her. she went on to say that i've had it all this time and yada yada yada. so i had to explain to her that i'd only just got married and he'd only just moved in. "oh" she said. brendan is rather proud of the fact that he's the reason for our service termination. when i was growing up cable was my only luxury item. we were fairly poor, but my parents splurged on cable because it allowed us to receive the christian radio station (i'm not sure how, but i gather it was not a free station or something). we had a black and white tv, it was years before i discoverd that penny (on inspector gadget) had blond hair.

i've only just discovered that sherlock holmes' first name is sherlock. hahahaha. i always thought that sherlock was a title like 'doctor' watson.

every year around this time my garden starts to whilt. this morning as i ate a banana out on the balcony i noticed the dead plants were isolated to the pots that have no drainage. i put pebbles in the pots, but that doesn't seem to be doing the trick. so next year i'll have to invest in 4 new plant pots. truth be told, most of my pots are crock pots that i bought at value village :S i was trying to be stingy. i have a year to keep my eye out for some more practical plant holders, so i should be able to find something suitable.

the soul travels on foot.

traffic, paper, strawberry

on saturday b and i spent the afternoon in hong kong. when we were there the first time we walked around in the stifling heat (hk is unbelievably hot and humid, we were unprepared for that). near the end of our time there we came across a hop-on/hop-off bus tour. we didn't have the time, and wanted to limit how much money we spent before reaching our destination, so we decided against it. but on our return trip we knew where the tour company was, we knew how much it cost, and we had plenty of time, so after arriving in the city via the train we beelined it to the big bus tour office and hopped aboard. it was really great because we got to see all of the island, while at the same time learning about what we were looking at. it was very cool. hong kong is an impressive place.

when we got back to the airport we had a fist full of money left over, and when we browsed the bookstore we both found magazines that interested us. brendan is a big fan of the new yorker, and i like glamour magazine. however, they were $81 and $53 respectfully (hong kong dollars - which is 1/6 american). so we counted up our dollars and had just enough for both. as we sat in the lounge reading i came across an article about sugar. i discovered that (as a society) our intake of sugar has gone up 34% in the last 30 years, and that sugar is added to everything, even bread! this is a problem because sugar is the greatest cause of weight gain. so, being a person who wants to lose some of my extra weight, this was valuable news to me. this morning i googled how much sugar we should have each day, it said that aside from naturally occuring sugars (in fruit, milk, etc) we should only have 40 grams (8 teaspoons) a day. up until 2004 i had 4 teaspoons of sugar in each cup of tea. i wanted to cut down my sugar intake so i cut it back to one, but gradually worked myself back up to 2. on average i have 4 cups of tea a day, so that's my 8 teaspoons right there! so i'm going to retrain my pallate. i'm scaling it down to half a teaspoon, i may increase my milk content to compensate. i'm glad i came across that article.

the thing about weight loss is that it involves a certain amount of obsession to make headway. a person has to be very dedicated and diligent if they're going to change their eating or exercise habits. when i've really given it a lot of attention in the past i made a lot of progress. a friend of mine from college lost 60 pounds in one summer because he was so obsessed with losing weight, he didn't keep it off in the long run because he went back to school and well.. simply... life happened. certain stages of life lend themselves to things like weight loss or reading or sports or cooking classes. i'm hoping to find a balanced life-style, i don't want to neglect working out, but i don't want it to be my first priority either. i'm happy that limiting sugar intake is something i can do fairly easily, it'll work with my life-style pretty well.

we are collapsed in the act of just being here.

return

after a 15 hour flight thru 11 time zones and one mini day, we arrived in toronto. at customs the man asked us if we had a good trip, and in a travel-daze brendan informed him "ya, we just got back". we collected our luggage, then came thru the doors and down the ramp to the smiling faces of andrew and shannon. they got up at 2 am to drive to toronto to pick us up. it was so nice of them, and it was a great warm welcome home. we listened to 90s music on the satellite radio as we drove the 401 in our massive dodge ram truck. when we stopped at a service station for breakfast b and i told them all about the genocide museum we visited, hearing about it seriously made shannon cry. i'll tell you about it later.

we did our laundry and watched some of the office season 6 (we bought it at the russian market in phnom penh for 6 dollars - the complete 4-disc season), and fell asleep by 4:30. we slept 12 hours, i got up at 4, did some things around the house, then headed to work for 7. it was kind of nice, but it means the day is going INCREDIBLY SLOW, because i've done so much already and it's only 9:45 am.

b and i both felt good to be home. being in the maxi pad, getting re-aquainted with our space is nice. we feel pretty rejuvinated, and i feel like our trip was very energizing.

videos and photos to follow on facebook soon.

time will hold its promise.

lady

we rode on the bus back to phnom penh today. it was another grueling 6 hours or so, but it was ok. i sat looking out the window listening to my ipod the whole time. i have to say... that trip has a mighty fine sound track. we passed rice fields, and rural cambodian houses, palm trees and ponds full of cows. it was a beautiful sight, and one that made the long trip pass in no time.

i spent much of that time thinking about my life. life in general, but specifically my life. this new adventure of marriage to brendan puts things on a different road than i was on before. i feel excited, and eager to know how things will unfold. i'm surprised at my desire to rush to every milestone asap. i want to know what our house will be like, what we'll decide to name our kids, what kind of parents we'll be, how we'll interact with our friends and families as the years pass. inspite of my eagerness to hit the fast-forward button i have to remind myself that there's no rewind. plus, i don't actually want all those things at once, or even right now. it's best to tackle one thing at once, and my excitement is just that... excitement. i feel like my life is a good novel. it's a page-turner that i want to rush thru in order to know what's going to happen next. what a huge mystery it all is :) but i'll pace myself. i want to experience all phases in their own time.

we're on the final leg of our time here in cambodia. unlike in past trips, i'm not sad to head home. i was telling b the other day how my life was often made up of having one thing to look forward to, and then another. usually when a trip is ending i have nothing else to look forward to until my next trip. but things are different now. i'm looking forward to getting into a routine with b, figuring what our life is going to look like together. we've been sharing funds for the last 2 weeks and already find that that makes life WAY easier. i suppose that's the first change of many, and i'm sure they won't all be that easy.

beneath the stars came fallin' on our heads.

painted

tomorrow we head back to phnom penh. we've been in siem reap for over a week. we've spent the last 3 days with brendan feeling sick, feeling better then feeling sick again. brendan having a fever and brendan's fever subsiding, then returning. brendan barfing, and me not feeling great. but today we ventured out for one last trip to the temples. on our way in the tuk-tuk b said to me "'i'm going to miss this ride"', me too. it's unfortunate that between bouts of sickness we missed opportunities that we'd been looking forward to. activities we'd been greatly anticipating ended up not working out and we can't just do them tomorrow because our time here is done. i was bummed out for a portion of the afternoon. i've decided to not mention them by name so that i don't hold tight my disappointment. but instead i'll take hold of the wonders of our trip, the time spent with b, our nice hotel, our relaxing stay. the chance for us to further connect and come together as a unit, to share in an experience we've never shared with anyone else. it's lovely really. the things we missed out on can be done at another time, in another place. but this first trip together, our honeymoon in the south pacific can never be duplicated, it's special on it's own, even without the bonus experiences.

part me of feels like writing is the best kind of art form.
i'm reading yet another don miller book, and am thankful he exists.

bikcycle

brendan is feeling worse than before. we had a plain breakfast then decided to take a short visit to the temples. while we were there i was keeping tabs on his health and he said he was feeling a 5 (out of 10). but since returning i think he's feeling more like a 3 or 4. i got the shower working, but he doesn't feel well enough to stand so i'm trying to keep him cool with a wet cloth. we're not concerned, we're quite certain it's heat exhaustion. i keep insisting that he drink lots of water. he said he got a fever in dominican and that he just slept it off and was ok again. i've never had a fever before so i'm just going to trust him on that.

it's an odd feeling taking care of someone else. i've never done this before. no one else has ever been my responsibility before. it's interesting, i hope i do a good job at it. i think i'm doing ok. this is a new beginning - being someone's somebody. it's nice to know that as i am here for him, he'll be there for me too. that's one of the many wonders of partnership.

when i'm confident that he's feeling a little bit better i think i'll go to the market and do some looking around. there's a few things i'd like to pick up and it would be nice to be able to take my time - since b does not like to shop. we've already bought a number of nice things, such as a summer bedspread, a photo album, i bought a new purse.

i'm growing suspicious that our hotel is run by a group of gay cambodians. brendan thinks this must be a drink come true for me, since i like gay men so much. but i'm finding it a little odd, if not surprising. why are they all congregating at the same place of work i wonder?? our room comes with a dvd player and we can borrow from the selection of movies in the lobby. we really like that set up, and think it's a great asset. the first thing that tipped me off was that half of the movies are gay films. one or two is not surprising, but half i tell you! i'm not quite sure what to think! well, i don't suppose i need to think or conclude anything, it just is.

well i'm going to go check on b.

******************************
ADDENDUM:
when i got back upstairs, i helped brendan into the bathroom for a shower, but when we got there he said "'you should leave, i'm going to throw up"' but i stayed, because he's my 'band and he needed my help. so he barfed and barfed, and is feeling much better now. he was really surprised that i watched him barf, but that's what i'm here for - you know... the whole sickness and health thing. he was really quite touched, and i feel like we've crossed yet another bridge of intimacy :p in a way it seems fitting that he'd throw-up on our honeymoon, since he threw-up the night of our first date. he laughed and said he'll throw-up to mark every special occasion :p again, we're doing alright, no need to worry.

alice

we're both feeling a little unwell. my stomach is bothering me, and i'm having a tooth problem. brendan feels on the verge of a fever (just as our shower decides to stop working). we're doing well, but spent most of yesterday sleeping in our air-con room. hopefully we'll feel better today. i think we're dehydrated, so the plan is to drink lots of (bottled) water in hopes of our physical selves feeling better. plus, we have next to no appetite due to the heat. no need to worry, we're just changing gears a little.

on a brighter note, we saw some apsara dancers last night, which was really neat! we're planning on going back to the temples today, and hoping to take an elephant ride!!! so exciting! elephants are my favourite animals :)

hope all is well where you are!

democapitalist

the funny thing about brendan is that he's rubbing off on me. we're both excited to get up at 1 am tonight (we've been falling asleep before 8 every night) to watch the soccer game. i would never have imagined that. and we've been getting pints of beer for 70 cents (he's also rubbed off on me with the whole drinking beer thing).

today was another super sweaty day where we rode around on a tuk-tuk (it's a motorbike with a carriage attached to the back for passengers) and saw three great historical temples. after that we went to a mexican restaurant for $1 tacos (cambodia is full of every kind of food imaginable, and they do a great job at it too!), followed by relaxing in a place called "peace cafe" where i had a mango lassie and ice cream. at restaurants they give everyone a cold wash cloth to wipe your face. at peace cafe i sat with the face cloth on my head for an hour or more. it was nice. while we hung out there i read about pol pot and the khmer rouge. man, that's a complex history that is too much to explain in one blog entry. basically... after the vietnam war the khmer rouge imprisoned its own country, forced them to be slaves and killed people by the thousands. it was basically genocide and a holocaust in one. totally horrific. it's a complete understatement, but the khmer rouge were just jerks. they filled the countryside with landmines to kill their own people, that to this day people are still stepping on and losing their limbs. we see a half dozen landmine a day at least, many of them are young adults. the khmer rouge fell from power in the 80s, and they've been rebuilding ever since. one thing we've found about cambodia is that it's quite a progressive nation. i'm sure a lot of their principles fall short in practice, but they have signs everywhere about responsible tourism (ie anti-child sex trade), and anti-drugs, they have laws about equality for women, and are open to same-sex relationships. i would imagine they have a long way to go, but we are glad to see they are so progressive in their outlooks.

we've been a little disappointed that the other gringos (white people) are not very friendly. jill and i chatted with lots of other travellers, but the people here are not very friendly. they don't even smile at us on the street. we''ve noticed that besides white people there are lots of westerners in general. it's quite easy to spot people who are of asian descent but who live in north america (or other wealthy nations). so we''ve stopped referring to tourists as white people, but rather as westerners. most of the gringos we've been able to overhear are aussies or kiwis, not many canucks this part of the world it seems.

hope you're doing well! we are doing fab :) it's hard to believe we've only been here 6 days!

pretty lazy

we've overcome the hurdles of yesterday. our hotel is really very lovely. it's called EI8GT Rooms (but it how has 16). they're super accomodating, which is refreshing after the jerks from yesterday. the funny thing about our hotel is that the shower is in the middle of the bathroom. there's no curtain and everything is tile. basically the bathroom is the shower stall and the sink and toilet are in it. hilarious! the two single beds pushed together worked out last night, brendan snuck over onto my side, which was nice because he finds it difficult sleeping with a buddy. so that goes to show he's starting to really take to it :)

thanks to everyone who commented! i wondered if no one was reading because i was away on my honeymoon and they thought i wouldn't be blogging. i've discovered a lot of people have funny concepts of honeymoons - one being regular emails are abnormal. but i like to write and i like to process my experiences thru writing. we have free internet at our hotel, which is GREAT! oh, and jordin... i won't be able to upload any photos until we get home. but try this..... to give you an idea of what we're doing and seeing. we took a tuk-tuk to our first bunch of temples today. it was a long ride, but the temples were amazing. we're having the funnest time. the sites we went to today were not very busy, in fact, the second one was empty except for us which was great.

the food has been amazing. we had indian last night, and it was oh so tasty. we''re going for dinner soon and are hoping to try some more local cuisine.

everyone speaks english very well and all the dealings is in american, so that makes transactions very easy. we've been drinking lots of bottled water and coca cola. the caffiene isn't negatively affecting me at all! i think that's because i'm really relaxed.

golden

today we took the bus from phnom penh to siem reap. it was supposed to take 3 hours, and it took 6.

then when we got here the hotel we were super looking forward to staying at didn't have our reservation and was booked up. so we waundered the streets in the dark looking for another place. we found one, but didn't like it. it was crappy. so we left that room and waundered again. we found one, it's more expensive, but we like it. unfortunately, it only has two twin beds, so they pushed them together into one double. we might stay here for the next 10 days if we can get a different room.

all in all it's been a bit of a rough day. and a waste of day. we're going to go scavenge some dinner now. we haven't eaten a meal in 12 hours.

:S

tuk-tuk

is anyone reading this thing? it seems no one comments anymore, so i don't know if anyone is tuning in. that's ok, it's nice to keep a record for myself.

things are going great here in phnom penh. it's stinking hot and i can't make it thru the whole day without stopping for a shower midway thru the afternoon. we're learning to navigator ourselves pretty well. we accidentally scored with the location of our hotel. it's in a prime spot close to everything. traffic is CRAZY. we've seriously never seen anything like it in our lives. motos (motorcycles) just drive right at each other thru intersections and yet they don't crash. it took us some time to learn how to cross the street.

i'm nearly out of time, so i'll right tomorrow! we're going to bed soon, but have a nice day!

ting-ting

we're in hong kong at the moment. we went into the city this morning (10 hour layover) and walked around for several hours. it was super hot and humid, and unfortunately our summer clothes are in our checked baggage. we were dripping with perspiration when we caught the train back to the airport.

 

before we left kingston i wisely told brendan "pack a toothbrush in your carry-on" then proceeded to forget to take my own advise :S i'm dying to brush my teeth, and brendan won't share. i reminded him that we're married, but he said that kissing and sharing a toothbrush are two totally different things.

 

we're having a really great time. we're totally amazed and regularly say to one another "we're in china!" i don't think it really sunk in for either of us that we would be spending time in hong kong. it's pretty awesome. the mountains are amazing and the ocean. oh man. when we were on the train going into the city i turned to b and said "THIS is why i work in my cubicle. it's for moments like this" it's good to be remindedof that.

 

we got some sleep on the plane last night, and so far we're managing pretty well. it's 1 am at home right now, and we seem to be doing well believing ourselves to be in the early afternoon instead of night. we're hoping to stay a wake until a reasonable time this evening before going to bed. we'll probably walk around PP for a bit after getting settled in. we're having fun :)

 

tonight's gonna be a good night.