I am almost there

School is out. No more students for eight weeks. I cannot believe it is almost here. I can now say it is less than a week until my departure. It is blowing my mind. I think I have everything I need to go. I am not sure I am ready but I am going and will have the best time. It will be a ton of fun. How else do you put it? I can read all about what is available to see, recommendations of the best parts of S.E.A. travel, and previous travelers’ comments but what I experience will be all me. My experiences will be individual to me no matter what I get the chance to do while I am there. It is a dream come true. I am also going to be getting away from the 100 degree plus temperatures here but am going to a different type of hot, humidity. My last “do to” before I go is figure out how to use my camera. I am not doing very well at this task. Point and click does not mean good pictures.

Realization

My prophetic realization is that I have a lot to do with my house before I go. I haven't really payed attention to it lately. I have been mostly obsessed with all things school. Tomorrow I check out for the summer but I seem to have a lot to do in order to be able to get out, checklists and all that. Then there are all those things you have to do before you leave your house for a prolonged period of time. And lastly, clean up. I need a maid.
P.S. I have my passport back with my Vietnam Visa.

Well...

No Visa, No Passport, No Shuttle, No Money, No Refunds, No Altoids
This is looking worse and worse. Even though I know I will get on the airplane, I may not be allowed in once I get there. This is the ether in between. I really don't know what to think. Last week of school.

New Beginning

I just erased my trip from my calendar. I actually felt bad doing it. There was a lot of work done but now it is just eraser dust. Then I entered a new trip. It is not as concrete but it is a new trip. My new trip has reversed its path. I am now going to Vietnam, Cambodia, then Thailand. Unfortunately Laos it out of the picture. I guess I will just have to admire it from the plane. I better get a window seat. I now leave my house at noon on Saturday the 5th. I now come back in the morning of the 6th (July) instead of the evening. The only problem with that is I get into LAX on the night of the 5th. I have an incredibly long layover for LAX, 8 hours. I could drive home before the plane left LAX. I still have to get a visa and contact a lot of people to get confirmations. Do I have a Super Shuttle reservation yet? I have to go get some Vietnamese money before I go. I also need Arizona quarters and Altoids. Hopefully this Saturday. Here I go.

Building blind

You have a house to construct which is good. You are happy about it. You are given a set amount of time to build it and that amount of time is adequate. You can afford to build it and you have the needed time to get the materials, blueprints and permits. There is no problem. Then one day you realize that only the finishing touches are needed to have the house done. Everything in life is good. You go back the next day and the house has been leveled. Someone even put up a fence around the site so that no one could enter. After much needed mental and even physical grief, you begin again. Although you still have the same due date there is now a greatly reduced construction time. In the previous build the idea of measure twice and cut once was always adhered to but there is no time for such things this time, and no blueprints. The bank has their eye out now too. They always like to see things fail. The construction must be fast, by the seat of your pants, but we all know that is when things go wrong. The house will be built, there is no other choice. The outcome unfortunately will be an unknown.

Things they are a changin'

Something is happening just not sure what. There is a horizon though.

Mad

This is my journal so I will write in it. I am so incredibly upset. No, I am fucking pissed. I just got a call from the travel company telling me that they were going to cancel the trip. No, they said they cancelled the trip. I can get my money back but that is not what I want. I want to go to SEA. This was my one chance to get there. I didn’t think it would ever happen and it did. Now the carpet is being harshly yanked out from under me at the last moment. I am so mad. I have tickets bought and it is past time to get a full refund. I have spent a lot of money on this trip, too much. I rejected two summer jobs for this trip. I sacrificed the ability to buy the new laptop that I wanted. This is something huge to me. This is not a, “Well, I will go next year” type thing. It is a now or never. I am crushed, severely and totally crushed.


I know there are people out there that are probably happy about this but to hell with them, this is mine.

I am to hell mad. I don’t care about the one day we are in Bangkok. We don’t have to go to the demonstrations, it is a big city. The area of all the commotion is not even near any of the places on our itinerary. We don’t even spend that long in Thailand. Damn it all.

I am going to do something to be there. I can’t let this slip out of my hands. I will do what I have to do.
(12:30 PM)

Humorous

I just realized that my Tour Code is "Sext" :)

It is in my hands

Excited? Not even close. Excited is the top of the Sears Tower and I am on Mount Everest. It is all really happening. I got my travel package today in the mail. I almost went crazy trying to get it open. It includes all the in-country travel tickets, reservations, confirmed itinerary, and all other documentation needed for the trip. I have in my hands the trip. It is all there.


I was given some great advise which I think about for all my trips. Don’t look like a tourist. My clothes are all used so that will help. Now I am going to start wearing all the stuff as an outfit I would wear there, including the money/document belt.

Everyone keeps hearing about what is happening in Bangkok and warns me. They tell me how worried they are. People should realize by now that I don’t get worried. We are not going to be near that area, it is a very big city. I do want to go and see the demonstrations though. Experience not tourist. I will see how it goes, I am not stupid.

As it is...

Now there is only three weeks left before I go. Excitement is not a word that is left in my vocabulary. I am way beyond that. Although at the moment I am bogged down with school related tasks. I always hate May. Too many people want something from you and they all want it right now. Grade this paper and this paper, none of which you administered as part of your subject area, then make sure they show that you and the school were successful. All of this is accomplished with a couple of papers. Yeah right. Teach to the test even though you don’t know or have any control over what is on that test. Also you must teach to the individual, duh, yet those tests grade to the general population, not the individual. The end of the year load kills me. I am glad that I get to go on this vacation and wouldn’t mind staying. Yep, it is May.


Well, Super Shuttle is picking me up at 3:30pm on the 4th to begin my trip. Scheduled and ready to go. I don’t have a scheduled return shuttle trip though. Debating whether I need one or not. All the travel is ready and I am willing and able. My only quandaries are about connections. That is the one weak point.

I am going to put it out to people to start thinking about what they want me to look into getting them while I am there. I will not make any promises but I will try. Space will be at a premium as is money. As for me I want from each country a Coca-Cola can, a stone and dirt, a statuette, and a huge Buddha. I am flexible about it though.

I will not let political anything in Bangkok hinder me in any way.

I Continue On

Well I forgot to post my weekly journal entry. I started this journal early so that I would get use to doing it. Then maybe I would have a record that I could look back on later in life. I tried it when I went to Israel but it didn’t work. I hope it does this time. But if wishes were fishes.

I finished my clothes shopping with two pairs of pants and a pair of shorts. They all have large pockets, some with zippers. I already have all the other clothing I need so I am good.
Following a suggestion, I am starting to collect pictures of family and friends for the trip to both to show off (nieces and nephews) and to reference (all the rest).
The disturbing part of my thoughts rest on health. My health now not then. Everyone is getting sick at school. If I get sick before I go and don’t kick it I will be so pissed (and sick). They say you get sick when you are there. I don’t want to go there already sick. This totally sucks.

One Month

At three o'clock one month from today I will be leaving my house and be gone for a month. I think this will be the longest month and the next will be the shortest. Friday will be four weeks so here I go.

Just keeping up

Everything is going well. I picked up the camera and once I have read some of the instruction book I am going to do a "how long will the batteries last" test. At the same time I will do a "how many pictures can I take" test. This will give me an idea of the number of batteries and amount of storage I will need for my trip. Five weeks.