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I do not think I slept for more than three hours last night. It was too hot and since I did not shower before bed, I was sticky and uncomfortable. The tour guide came to wake us up around 7 am, although I had been up for already an hour. We all sat around the picnic table again to have breakfast which consisted of french toast,regular toast, fruit, and tea. After breakfast, it was time for us to get ready and pack our bags for our next trek through the jungle.
The trek today lasted for 4 hours. The first half of the trek was relatively easy and similar to the terrain as yesterdays hike; however, in the middle of the trek the terrain started to change. We had to hike up a side of the mountain where it became very steep for around 40 minutes. Everyone was exhausted and it was difficult. But thankfully, as soon as we climbed up the steep area it started to flatten out and the trek started to become easier again.
Finally, we made it to the elephant area and we were quickly served soup. Which was made from similar noodles as Mr. Noodles and contained cabbage and carrotts. After we finished eating it was time to go on top of the elephants. The mahouts took our bags and attached them to the back of the seats and then we climbed on top of the elephants. Charlies and Jade sat together, Megan and Adele, then Alex and I. Unfortunately, Alex and I got the oldest elephant there that looked so old that she looked ill and close to death. So we felt sorry for the elephant. This ride was unpleasant, the seat did not have a bar across it and the trail the elephant went on was tiny and there was a cliff on the side that I was sitting on. Furthermore, since we were on the side of a mountain, the terrain was filled with inclines and declines so we were tossed either forward or backwards during the ride.
The elephant that Alex and I were on was the last one in the line and seemed to get annoyed by Megan's and Adele's elephant because it was walking too slow, so ours kept head butting their elephant to get it to move. Thankfully, the elephants seemed to be treated with better respect than I saw in Lao, and the mahouts just walked behind the elephants during the ride, not on top. They never hit the elephants, but they did yell at them to get them to move.
After the elephants, we had a short 15 minute walk until we reached our second home stay location. The tribe looked well off compared to the last tribe we stayed at and seemed to also have a large population than the last. The house we stayed at was nice, and the rooms were on the top level of the house, but the room could only hold 6 people. This time I shared a bed with Charlie, since there were only 3 mosquito nets. There were western style toliets and a watering area for showering. As we were putting our mosquito nets down, once again, Jade saw a gecko on her pillow and freaked out.
We sat around for a while talking until it was time for us to walk around the tribe. At first we stopped by the river and watched a man assemble the bamboo raft that we will be taking tomorrow. It was interesting to see how he put it together and how everything was made from bamboo and wood, even the ties that tied it all together. We assumed that we would be building a raft each ourselves, or at least assisting. But that wasn't the case and we were disappointed that we were unable to help. After watching him build the raft, we continued walking around the village. We stopped by a school and saw some boys playing soccer in the field and then walked by people's houses and back to our house. We sat back down at the picnic table until we saw four girls come into our home with baskets of more things to buy. I ended up purchasing an elephant keychain; while, everyone else bought some jewerly.
For dinner we had banana spring rolls, rice, vegetables, and a chicken curry dish. After dinner, we lite some candles again and sat around talking until it was time for bed. We ended up seeing two giant geckos on the walls of the house. One was probably a foot long.
Although barely anyone had a good nights sleep the night before, no one was ready to go to bed right away so we ended up talking and playing the game of where each person says a sentence in which we build into a story. Our story ended up being about a girl that eats worms for breakfast and receives a knock on the door to her house by a man looking for her mother and needing to use the washroom. The man also has a dragon with him, which she steals and flies away on the dragon. However, they meet a leprechaun at the end of a rainbow that has a present for them but as they get closer the leprechaun throws the present at them and Gail (the girl) gets knocked off the dragon and they fall towards earth. They then get rescued my the man and then Gail and the man get back on the dragon and go up a bean stalk, where they see the leprechaun and a black taxi cab. As soon as they reach the taxi cab they see a giant worm in the driver seat and then bright light flashes before them and they forget where they are and the worm in the taxi is gone. Gail, the man, the dragon, and the leprechaun decide to go to the bar and have a couple of drinks. Then the worm shows up and Gail and the dragon have a plan to surround the worm outside and attack it so she can eat it. As soon as she lunges towards the worm, the worm turns into Gails mother and that is where the story ends. That was the story we made up in a nut shell.
After we finished the story, we attempted to sleep.
- comments
painter From the sounds of that story it seems that most of you were already asleep and hallucinating! Did you join the soccer game?