Kuta, Bali, Indonesia: I have sand everywhere and I’m surnburnt. But I’m in friggin’ Bali!
Getting to Bali is a nightmare. We are travelling from Siem Reap to Kuala Lumpur, and then to Bali. When we finally arrive, after two delays, we can’t find our luggage, and when we finally do, it’s just mine, since Air Asia has lost Pete’s. That doesn’t put us in a particularly good mood, but that’s what it is. We get a prepaid taxi around 1:00 AM and on a Friday night, the traffic is kinda hectic. We finally arrive at Kayun Hostel Downtown though, and I have to pay the driver an additional amount of money – why I don’t know, but I don’t care at this point. Our check in takes even longer, since the receptionist forgets to heck the both of us in, so we just get to our room when we are called back to pay some more. Grumpy and tired, we both pass out.
The following day, Pete is really keen on going surfing or snorkelling. Problem is, that other than the fact that I am reluctant to, it’s super windy. We go to the beach and check it out: there’s garbage everywhere, and since the sun’s not out, there’s no point hanging out here. We have awesome lunch at The Balcony and then chill out at the hostel, watching movies until dinnertime. We go to a bar and I have a hookah with white wine instead of water and I get super smashed. Time to pull the tactical chunder.
We then go for dinner/partying at Skygarden, which is super awkward at first. It’s just Pete and I, being kinda sober and doing our weird dances. Eventually, some of our hostel mates show up, and the party instantly brightens up. After the rest head to another bar, I go watch the end of Horrible Bosses 2 at the hostel and then get some sleep.
The day after, we go to The Balcony for breakfast and then head to the beach. The sun is out today, and locals are cleaning up trash on the beach, so everything’s looking much nicer today. While Pete encourages me to get surfing lessons, I am content just watching for now. It’s amusing to watch all these people be that shitty at it. Pete rents a board for himself and I decide to just tan a bit to even out my weird tanlines from the outfit I was wearing yesterday.
About an hour later, we’re done beaching for the day (mostly because I’m turning incredibly red) and go back to the hostel and look into getting to Ubud tomorrow. Then we go get sushi at a Japanese restaurant, and we eat a lot. So much, we pass out for 3 hours afterwards. Then, we go out to buy some sounverirs; Pete buys an Indian headdress, and I just take pictures of dreamcatchers.
Back at the hostel, we fool around with the Indian headdress and hang out with some of the guys, while watching an Indiana Jones movie.
Stole this picture from Lauren, oops!
Afterwards, we go to Fat Chow and have some awesome food and then get back to the hostel to drink some beers. Then I end up at my computer doing practical stuff instead of going out. Which is why I’m writing this right now.
Siem Reap, Cambodia: the second time I go and basically do nothing.
We are staying at The Luxury Concept Hostel, which has the perfect distance to pub street, night markets and whatnot. Unfortunately, we don’t have a WiFi signal for most of our stay, which is only an inconvenience because of some practical things that has to be taken care of. We receive a YouTube link to a video of our shooting in Phnom Penh, and it’s awesome! Here’s the video for those who are interested:
It’s actually a super long and embarrassing video
When we arrive on a Tuesday evening, we are a bit too tired to go out. We eat some food, go check out the Mad Monkey rooftop bar, but end up looking like those boring couples who are just observing the fun people, so we just relax for the rest of the night. The following day, we get up to see Angkor Wat, Bayon and Ta Prohm. I’ve already seen these wonders last time I was in Siem Reap (read about it here), but I can’t pass up the opportunity to go back, especially if that means I get to force Pete to do something slightly cultural!
We pay Clem 15 dollars for a ride in his pink tuk tuk around the temples. We unconsciously go the opposite way of everyone else in the temples and therefore get a unique (and really short) experience, but it’s fine by me. I am sweating like an eskimo in Africa, and let out exhausted sighs every few minutes. Pete takes a gulp from his massive water bottle and spits it at my neck, making the ice cold water drip down my back. Right there in front of Angkor Wat. The man has no shame.
We get something to drink before moving on to the Bayon temple and then walking the whole way around it to find Chum. We barely spend 10 minutes at Ta Prohm, which is not nearly enough time for me to pretend I’m Lara Croft minus the everything. At this point, we’re ready to go get some lunch and then AC.
Come nighttime we need food again. Pete has been eating snacks at the rooftop café of our hostel, and I drag him to Little Italy, which was a favorite place of mine last summer. I get a carafe of wine and a whole pizza, while Pete is picking at his pasta. I get drunk and loud and order dessert, and we spot Linda and Anna from The Mad Monkey in Phnom Penh at the same restaurant. Along with two of their new friends, we walk back to their hostel which is – surprise, surprise! – The Mad Monkey. We also run into our MM roommate Pascal (you know, the one who called me a fake Viking). We are drinking and having a good time, bonding over our double chins and writing country songs. Linda and I started a band back in Phnom Penh called Two Ladies, One Cowboy Hat, or The Diarrhea Dames, I don’t even know at this point. Back in Phnom Penh we wrote a song called The Ballad of The Man With Two Penises, which was inspired by yes, the man with two penises. There were front porches, whiskey bottles, pickup trucks and of course, a man with two penises that finds love when he meets Carly, who has two vaginas. Linda wanted us to split up for a while, but tonight we’ve decided to do a comeback tour.
We all head to Pub Street when I get a serious craving for chicken on a stick. I make an Irish exit to find some street food, but it seems to be an impossible task. I end up with a bag of chips and go to bed, while Pete apparently finds Pho without me. Jerkface.
On our final day in Siem Reap it is Chinese New Year, and we decide to go shopping. All day, we go to a market, come back to the hostel, eat food, go to a new market and so on. We do manage to squeeze in an awesome foot and leg massage at Pura Vida, but other than that, our day is pretty much in a loop. We are on a hunt for flag patches for our backpacks, and we have found some cool mini ones at one of the shops by the bazar, but they’re $1.50 each and we’re sure we’ll be able to find them much cheaper everywhere else. Turns out only two shops in all of the ones we’ve been to have them, and at a ridiculous price. So begins an entire day of finding flags, and in the end, we manage to find most of them, some slightly larger than others, though. While Pete goes for flags that represent the nationalities of his former conquests, I am only looking for flags for all the countries I’ve been backpacking in, which is mostly South East Asia and a little bit of Europe.
Apparently I am a bit too keen to shop today, so I buy some India pants (I know, I know, they’re actually called Ali Baba pants) and a long skirt. I was having a bit of a clothing crisis when we went to Angkor Wat, since most of my clothes was too “slutty” for temples, so I figured buying some comfortable cover-up clothing would be a good idea.
We head back to the hostel, probably for the 8th time today, and I put on my India pants and step back outside. We discover the night market that is right behind our hostel, and immediately we see a horde of American girls all wearing similar pants. Of course this is normal, just not to see 20 of them wearing the same as you at once. They run towards the fish spa and scream loudly everytime the fish pinch their toes.
The amount of people on pub street tonight is overwhelming. We find a pop-up bar and order a drink, originally meant to be to-go, called Welcome to Cambodia. It’s basically a Long Island Ice Tea with orange and lemon juice. We sit at a table while we wait and start talking to an old Scottish guy, Kenneth, who’s kind of funny, but kind of weird, and completely impossible to understand. After I finish my drink, since I’m being a bit slow, we escape Kenneth and after walking around aimlessly for a while, we go to bed.
Now it’s time to go to Bali, which I am really excited for. These past days, I’ve woken up with countless mosquito bites and bruises and I am still so white I could hide by standing by a white wall, completely naked. To be honest, the mosquito bites and my bleeding bruise with black and blue around it on my butt would give me away. Seriously, how do I get these injuries? Also, my nose is getting really red again. Yeah Bali, you better get me a tan, I think that would solve most of my problems right now.
Phnom Penh, Cambodia: Here is a story about semi-drunk people handling weapons and the content of their stomachs.
So it’s Valentines Day and I arrive in Phnom Penh. Even though it’s early morning when I leave the airport, traffic is a bitch, and my ride to Mad Monkey Hostel is taking well over an hour. When I get there, there are still two hours until check-in. When I finally get in my bed, the sweet 14-year old cleaning lady Sopan is being very chatty. She finally leaves me alone so I can get a few hours of sleep.
When I wake up, the sun has set and I run into Pete, a Pink Palace friend. It’s totally not weird being a boy and a girl travelling together on Valentine’s Day. We eat ramen for dinner and then check out the bar on the top of our hostel. It’s 8 o’clock and we start out with a shot of absinth. Then we do bazookas, grenades, beers, mimosas and basically anything that’s in a glass. Since it’s Valentine’s Day, there’s red and white paint to use on our faces. I paint Pete’s face white and put a red hand print in the middle of his face, naming him Wilson after the volleyball in Castaway.
We end up in a corner with a group of new friends, singing Wonderwall and Save Tonight with Linda on a guitar that’s just lying around. We (and by that, I mean I) go hunting for burgers and find new friends… I think. After Mad Monkey’s bar closes, we go to a bar and do balloons. Pete and I get lost on the way home.
What I’m trying to say is that we had an epic night, but we don’t really remember it. People we’ve never seen before come up and talk about how much fun we had together last night. In the morning, we’re a bit drunk, but not feeling too hung over until we get picked up by a car to go to a shooting range. I am sitting in the back, trying to take deep breaths, while Pete talks about things that make me want to throw up, like food. Since the drive is around 2 hours, I eventually give in and I end up throwing up in a trash can until there’s nothing left to throw up but bile. This is painful and I hate my life, but I continue to giggle over the burping noises I make while spewing. I am being as quiet as possible, and Pete hands me baby wipes and a disposable toothbrush, so I think I’ve gotten away with this without being noticed by the drivers.
Suddenly, we are parked in the middle of nowhere, and a few guys on scooters arrive with some big duffel bags full of weapons. Pete notes that the weapons look old, like the Vietnam War Era old. We are handed a set of earplugs, and within the first five minutes, Pete has an RPG in his hand and is shooting at a mountain.
After that, they put an M16 in my hand and have me shooting water bottles and coconuts. I am not cut out to be a sniper, I tell ya that. Eventually I hit a water bottle, which sends it flying, and then they hand me a Makarov that is even harder to aim with. It’s just so much fun though! Pete plays around with an AK47, and then he gets a bright idea: I should throw a hand grenade!
They make me do a few test throws into a pit and then suddenly, kinda without warning, the guy pulls the pin. I just hurry up and throw it away and forget all about throwing myself on the ground, until the guy pulls me down and I hear the explosion. That is fucking awesome!
Posing with the RPG just ’cause
We get in the car and prepare for another 2 hours on the road, when Pete gets the bright idea to throw out the clear plastic bag full of my vomit. I want to do it myself when we get back to the hostel, but he just grabs the bag and shows everyone what I’ve eaten this morning. I’m getting a bit embarrassed, because it is really fucking disgusting. And of course, I get angry at him when I suddenly want to vomit again, and the bag is gone.
Back at the hostel, we sit at a table at the restaurant area and hang out with some friends. Eventually, several hours and ciders later, we end up at the upstairs bar. It’s Sunday, so no one is going too crazy. At least not yet. We play songs on the guitar and some foos ball, forcing drinks down our throats and slowly getting more incoherent. The bar closes at midnight and Pete and I feel like going to bed, but we end up partying with all of our roommates but two Californian girls. We get some drinks, a deck of cards and play drinking games for several hours. Pascal from Germany tells me only Norwegians are Vikings, and I get so upset with him that I beat him up with a rose – yes, a rose. Staff keeps coming over to get us to be quiet, but we can’t help it. We decide to go back to our room, but we keep talking and eventually one of the girls tell us to shut up. Oops.
A teapot of booze
We wake up pretty late the following day, not feeling too good. We look into a few things to do, but everything seems so expensive, so Pete goes for a massage and I go to take a nap when Sopan comes in. We talk until Pete gets back, which means I don’t even have the nap I so desperately wanted.
At night we end up drinking pretty heavily at the bar. We play cards and flip cup and beer pong and then a small group of us decide to head to Club 88, a karaoke place in a fancy hotel. Here, we get an expensive private room ($70!) and sing everything from the theme of Titanic to Bon Jovi for several hours.
Without a word, Pete and an Aussie girl leave the room and we don’t see them again, until we walk in on them in our dorm room. Awkward, since I had loudly planned to grab one of Pete’s water bottles by his bed. Grandpa, our roommate who did karaoke with us, tags along to the nearby In N Out Mart for some water and to give the couple some privacy. As soon as we’ve decided their 5 minutes have passed, we walk back to the room to find them gone, but one of our other roommates loudly snoring and swearing in his sleep.
Another morning, another hangover. I throw up and then eat some yoghurt before we get on a bus to Siem Reap, which takes us a total of 10 hours. At one of our restaurant stops we are almost left behind by the driver. I can’t deal with that kind of stress when I’m hungover, to be honest, but we arrive in one piece, and finally find our hostel, and it’s really nice. Now it’s time to tuck in early, maybe we should actually do something with our lives tomorrow.
I also hope everyone back home is hanging in there. #weprayforcopenhagen
What’s the worst that can happen when you’re about to embark on a 24 hour long journey? You miss your flight.
Despite numerous checkings, me and my family still managed to think “depature 6 AM” meant “departure 8 AM”. OK, it was mostly just me.
We (my family and I) arrive at the airport at 6.30 to check in, when I notice my 8 AM flight isn’t on the board. I panicked, go to look at another one and then pull out my ticket to realise the sad truth.
I go to a counter and try to get some help. They tell me there’s nothing they can do. All my flights are lost and there’s no way I’m getting a refund. They look into other possible flights, but they are between 10.000 and 40.000 kr (yes, business class is offered) and 42 hours of travelling. I decide to just laughit off and end up finding a reasonable priced flight the next day on Skyscanner. That is until I find a cheaper, shorter trip a few hours later from Copenhagen’s airport.
I try to book the flight from my phone without any luck. I get out my laptop in the car on the way to the train station, but the page comes to a stop right after I’ve entered my credit card details. I reinstall Java and try again. When that doesn’t work, I restart the browser and this time it works, as we’ve been parked outside of the station for a few minutes. Stressful.
We buy a train ticket to Copenhagen leaving in 40 minutes, but when I get to the platform, I realise there’s another train arriving in 8 minutes. I run back to the ticket counter and get the ticket changed and when I get back to the platform (out of breath from running), the train has just arrived. My dad, who’s been guarding my luggage while I was at the counter, practically throws my backpack on the train, and it’s the quickest, least heartfelt goodbye ever before the train doors close and I’m off. Everything that’s happened today ans the fact that I didn’t feel like I got to say a proper goodbye makes my eyes water while I wait behind a group of teenage guys that are taking an incredibly long time to put away their suitcases and sit down. I, a very non-confrontational person, feel like bursting into flames and cry and yell and do everything to show my annoyance with them and with this day. But I wait patiently for them to get out of my way, then I kick a guy out of my seat and sit down and hold back the tears.
2.5 hours later, I am at the airport. Everything is going well, although I have to deal with a super sassy staff lady when I have problems scanning my ticket. By the time I’ve gotten through security, it’s 12 o’clock
And I haven’t had anything to eat or drink all day. I decide to just get something at Joe and the Juice. It’s a super-hipster-green-juice place where they play loud clubbing music, and all the guys working there (there are no girls here) have manbuns and extremely bad attitudes. After a guy yells out my name while handing me the juice, obviously annoyed that he’s living in a world where basic people order juice, I head to the gate.
Hipster photo of my hipster juice
After a super long flight, I’m in Bangkok and from there, I fly to Phnom Penh. I MADE ITTTT!
The time has come for another adventure, after almost 6 months of being a poor couch potato. Is it weird to have mixed feelings about it? I have serious Traveller’s Guilt. I don’t want to leave my friends behind, now that I’ve finally gotten them back from their exchange programs. I don’t want to miss out on yet another Danish summer and the big events happening in my loved ones lives. I don’t want to spend all my money. But I am going, and it’s exciting to me in a whole new way. For one, I am moving to a country I have never even been to. I don’t know when I will see my family again. I am going to do some travelling by myself for the first time ever. I am even going to travel for a month with a person I have never met. So while I sit in a pile of clothes on the floor, teary-eyed and nauseous from nerves, I am also certain that this experience will not only be amazing – it will be life changing.
Even though I am heading to what are arguably more stunning surroundings, I am really going to miss my home, the town of Horsens. This is where I grew up, and I still think of it as the small prison town it once was, despite it now being the 8th largest city in Denmark and one of the cultural capitals. I wanted a post just for myself, so I have something to look at when I am missing home, so here are some pictures of my home, a place I am truly going to miss.
Coat of arms
The European Medieval Festival 2014
Pictures from Lunden (“The Grove“):Friluftsscenen (“Open Air Stage”)
Menneskemuren (“The Human Wall”) by Horsens Art Museum
Nordre Cemetery
Klosterkirken (“Abbey Church”)
Horsens State Prison, now mostly a concert venue
Triton Water Fountain by the train station
Blue Diamond Water Tower
Purhøj
From the top of Purhøj:
I’ll end this post with one of my favorite songs, sung by Pretty Maids,our local pride.
Coat of arms
