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The last few days have been a whirlwind. After spending all night on the overnight bus, I arrived in Vientiane. Apparently, Laotians don't like Canadians, because visas for canadians are $42, as opposed to everyone else, who only pay $30-35. Add to that fact that I needed pictures and didn't have them, so they charged me an extra $2, plus I paid in thai baht (they murdered me on the exchange) so altogether it ended up costing me around 50 bucks. Wonderful.

Anyways, I arrived in Vientiane...not exactly paradise. I spent a few hours at the thai embassy getting my next tourist visa sorted, went for lunch, walked around and decided that I was leaving that afternoon to Vang Vieng.

The bus took a long time (welcome to Laos) but I finally arrived in Vang Vieng at around 6 pm. Went for some beers with an Irish guy I met on the bus, only to find out that the bars all close at 12 pm and if you're out past 12:30, the Laos police can arrest you.

Yesterday, I walked around Vang Vieng, and it's absolutely gorgeous. Not the town itself of course, but there are massive hills, jungle, it's amazing. I went tubing down the Namsong river all afternoon - got absolutely wasted and met a ton of people. It was soooo much fun.

Then, after that, last night was an interesting experience that I don't want to write about on a public blog, so I'll leave that until later...

Well, my time here in Bangkok has been grand...at least what I remember of it...It mostly involved drinking plenty of buckets on Khao San Road, hanging out with Andrew, Tiff and Peter, and lounging by the pool during the day. Yes, it was a very cultural week.

Tonight I'll be taking the overnight bus to Laos and arriving in Vientiane sometime tomorrow morning.

Hope everyone is well!

Damn buckets...when am I going to learn that you have to build up a tolerance and not try to drink 3 of them on my first night. My first night in Bangkok was pretty mad...at least what I remember of it. I started off by drinking at a street bar on Khao San Road and met a bunch of Aussies, then some black dudes from Zimbabwe, then some guys from Montreal. We ended up at Gulliver's (anybody who has been to Bangkok knows where it is)...but after that...no recollection. I woke up in my own room with all of my money and body parts intact though, so I couldn't have gotten that out of hand.

Yesterday I was pretty hungover, so after taking care of some errands (putting my pack into storage, checking out transportation costs, ie...) I just chilled out. Last night I just had a few beers and watched the football on the backstreet parallel to Khao San.

Anyways, today I have to go blow a lot of money on my CELTA course, and maybe I'll go see a Muay Thai match.

Hope everyone is doing well!

China eastern airlines....worst...airline...ever.... (cue the fat comic book guy from the Simpsons). Two cancelled flights, two delayed flights, and worst of all....no beer on the international flight. Finally arrived in Bangkok after a 3 hour flight delay at 4:30 in the morning, so as expected, no rooms were available. Had to wait until 9 am with all of my bags to check into a room, then crashed out until now. Now I'm all settled though...time to go drink a Singha...

I was supposed to have 2 days in Shanghai, but unfortunately my airline likes to change their flights around. First, my flight on Saturday was cancelled so I have to fly out tonight instead, then they cancelled my flight yesterday and put me on a later flight. Then, my later flight was delayed 45 minutes.

Great airline.

So anyways, after showing up in Shanghai and finally finding my way to the hostel (which was also lots of fun), I arrived here at around 12:30. I met with my friend Pedro and we had some Tsingtaos, but by the time we tried to go out, most of the clubs we went to were closing, so we ended up getting drunk at the hostel and catching up - which was actually pretty fun.

Today, after having brunch (massive meal for 1$ - and Shanghai is supposed to be the most expensive city in China) I checked out the Bund and the view I have to say is one of the best in Asia. Unfortunately it was foggy/smoggy so I didn't take any pictures, but it was still amazing. Old-style French colonial buildings on the left, the Huangpu river on the right (with boats with 50 foot wide TVs on them blasting Yao Ming commercials) and a futuristic Jetson's style area across the river. It's gorgeous.

After that, I checked out Nanjing Road, People's Square and the Yu Yuan Temple Markets - all pretty interesting. After being in Korea, it's wierd having the feeling of space again...

Tonight, I fly out to Bangkok.