Ok – stop hassling me! I know I haven’t been writing in here regularly. I am sorry. I will try and do better from now on!

Life has been very busy! I feel like I’ve entered into a permanent state of temporary. I’m still doing a bit of flute teaching and the very occasional bit of performance, but honestly – nowhere near enough to earn a living. So I’ve been trying to use my newly acquired Masters in Journalism to gain work of some description. In another area. Anything but journalism! I don’t think I’m suited to that… I know I’m not suited to that!

My volunteer work at the Menzies Research Institute has been fantastic and a real opportunity. I assist the communications and events manager and I’ve figured that’s the field I’d like to go into. Not only would I like to do it – I’ve figured out I’d be very good at it!  Unfortunately convincing other people of my great possibilities is a bit trickier! I’m over job applications. I have put SO many in and had a handful of interviews and had a lot of “very close seconds” but my gut instinct is saying I’m not going to get a job like this. Not in this economic climate anyway…

So – here I am. Feet in two camps. Accepting every ounce of teaching and performing that comes along. Volunteering at Menzies. And for the past few months, being employed there as a casual for data upload. Data upload… Paid work but not exactly mentally stimulating! I’m now working four days a week – but temporarily. So I can’t rearrange kids lessons and my teaching and stuff. I have to keep it all where it is because I’m not going to be doing this temporary job permanently. Am I?! I don’t think so! Eventually the new website will be up and running and they won’t need me to upload data any more.

So – I’m chewing over new ideas for earning money in the future. Surely there’s some way for me to earn an income?! A regular one… Not a permanently temporary one. All this temporariness is very stressful…

I think I’d like to run a B&B. I just need some money to buy a lovely building first. A nice big one. In the city. With lots of land around it. And a commercial kitchen. And a pool. And fairies and leprechauns…

Ok – so I know last time I was on here I said I’d tell you about the last bit of our trip.

It took a lot of hours. It was very boring. We were very tired.

I think that sums it up!

Now – on to more interesting things!

Firstly – I’ve put in three job applications so please wish me luck. I’d really like a job! I’m sure I could do all three jobs but I’m equally sure I suck at job interviews so we’ll see how it pans out. Not exactly the greatest economic climate for trying to enter the workforce! If none of these applications come to anything I might change direction a little – will just have to wait and see.

Ooh – a rather young and very buff Arnold Schwarzenegger is on tv. I’m momentarily distracted…

15 year old sons. Tricky they are. Has anyone else got one? I’ve been very big on keeping my boys away from violent and graphic computer games. Once Dory turned 15 he pointed out that the age thing on the game says 15+ and all the other kids play them. So I’m having to let go a little and he’s got a few games. He’s downstairs now playing something. “Fear” I think it’s called. I hate them. Why do they exist? Couldn’t the game makers create the same game play without the blood and guts? What’s wrong with our society that these things even exist? Apparently there are no decent teenage boy games without the violence… It’s the graphicness of it all that really bothers me.

But I guess parenting is just one big letting go process and somewhere along the way I’m supposed to let them make their own way. I’d rather not…

Thankfully Dory (my eldest) is a pretty mature kid. And on the whole, reliable and trustworthy. So he does set a pretty good example for his younger brothers. I just hate these games… But then I hate the thought of my kids being the only kids that don’t do something. Teenagers need to fit in. Don’t they? I never fitted in and it wasn’t a good feeling…

Ok – so most of you probably know I’m actually back in Australia now! But I didn’t finish keeping track of our travels so thought I’d share the last days of our trip with you!

Hoi An is the most gorgeous little town anywhere! Full of beautiful buildings, lots of lovely shops, the gazillion tailors and shoe makers of course, and excellent food. Outstanding food! Have I mentioned the Cargo Club Bakery? Divine! Try the crispies – banana or mango – or if they run out of crispies, the White Chocolate Kahlua cake is definitely tasty. And delectably melt in your mouth kind of food!

The boys really enjoyed Hoi An and I think we took more photos in Hoi An than the rest of the trip together – with the exception of Angkor Wat of course! The lanterns and the lake decorations and the streets … All so pretty!

After our five nights in Hoi An we headed off to Hue – our last destination in our month long journey. We booked a minivan – so much easier than finding five bus tickets! – and it was recommended we stop at the marble mountains on the way for a bit of a look-see. We had no idea what to expect at the marble mountains. We kind of expected a mountain with a scenic lookout. The whole place was extraordinary!

The mountains are literally made from marble – well bits of it are! And there are ancient temples and carvings throughout the mountain. The mountain itself is five craggy peaks and the temples seem to have lots of chinese and japanese influence. There are sculptures in caves carved straight out of the stone. We could have spent a whole day there and were very sorry to only have an hour! Down in the township at the bottom of the mountain are more marble carvers and shops than I would have considered humanly possible. Next time you need a marble fountain for your front garden, I know just the place to pick one up! Even the three boys thought the place was amazing!

After the marble mountains, we travelled the scenic route through the Hai Van pass to Hue. Hue turned out to be a bit of a disappointment really. Or maybe we were just really tired and ready to go home by the time we got there! The only real tourist thing we discovered was the Citadel.

Part of an ancient city within a city within a citadel, with a citadel. I think I’ve got that right… We were just so tired! It is amazing how different Vietnam is to Cambodia and Thailand. Vietnam seems to have a much more distinctive Chinese influence.

Our hotel in Hue was the Orchid hotel. A lovely little place. We had the family room which came with a 32″ plasma tv, dvd player and a computer. And most exotically – a lift to the upper floors! My calf muscles became pretty stiff and sore after travelling up and down four flights of stairs at all the hotels!

After a month of eating out in restaurants continuously, we really enjoyed the opportunity to buy noodles at the supermarket and eat them back at the hotel. Very nice to finally have a hotel with a kettle! And on occasion we even took the kids to KFC – aka Ga Run Kentucky. Somewhere we have never taken the kids before. Ever!

On our last day in Hue, we caught a dragon boat up the perfume river to Thien Mu Pagoda. (I think that’s what it’s called! It’s been a while now!) It was really interesting and well worth a visit. Watch out for dragon boat riders trying to increase charges, sell drinks and goods you don’t want and generally try to rip you off! But overall, the day was quiet and peaceful and a nice outing from the hotel!

I’ll leave it there for today and tell you all about the trip home on another day!

I haven’t update things in a while, so thought I’d start doing some reflecting on Vietnam. Of the three countries we’ve visited, Vietnam is by far and away the best. It is AWESOME! SlowCoach was a reluctant tourist when we set out, and on many occasions through Cambodia he’d get frustrated at the things that went wrong and say “I hate Asia!”. But Vietnam?! He loves it and wants to come back. And so do all three boys. We started in Saigon. City of three million motorcycles.

I swear all three million of them were on the road every time we tried to cross. The Lonely Planet guide described crossing the road in Saigon as an extreme sport – and that pretty much sums it up! Having said that, we really did get the hang of it. You just slowly venture out into the traffic and meander your way across (remembering that they drive on the opposite side of the road to aussies!) and it’s kind of like wading through peanut butter. Eventually they start going behind you and you make it a bit further across!

Every time we went outside in Saigon, Sparkle would light up with a big grin on his face and say “I love Saigon!” He was enchanted by the traffic and had no concept that it could potentially be dangerous. He bought himself a lovely little rice paddy farmers hat – the conical straw hat thing – and wore that every day. All the Vietnamese people, young and old, would pinch his cheeks or hold his hand and smile and ask where he’s from and how old he is and say how adorable he was.

He’s a bit tired of it now and refuses to wear the hat, thinking that will lessen the compliments. It doesn’t!

We spent three nights in Saigon and could have stayed longer. We did a half day tour to the Cu Chi tunnels. They were interesting but the tour felt too long and drawn out – lots of standing around listening to war stories. I just wanted to see the tunnels and get out. The tunnels were the last thing we saw. We’d been “touring” for four hours before we saw the tunnels then 15 minutes later they were all over and done with. Having said that, the tunnels are worth having a look at. And if you’re brave enough (I’m not!) going through them! They’re 1.4m high and 80cm wide and the lowest level down is 8-10m underground. I went down to the entrance and was going to through but I just couldn’t summon the courage. It’s dark!!! And narrow! And there’s no turning back! SlowCoach and the boys all went through. I don’t feel I missed out on anything!

We went to the Ben Thanh Market several times. Under cover. Lots and lots of stalls. Lots and lots of “Madame! Madame! How much you pay!?” I’m getting tired of haggling! Picky’s getting really good at it. He offers about a third of the starting price and haggles to half way between. Sparkle listens to the price then tells them the amount he’s actually willing to pay straight off and gets haggled higher. It’s definitely an art and not one I’m particularly keen on learning! We have got some great bargains though!

The only other thing we did in Saigon – aside from eat eat eat – was the Dam Sen Water Park . My undying thanks to Troy for this recommendation! The kids adored it and so did SlowCoach and I! It may well be the best $20 we’ve spent in a long time! A lovely cool, fun way to fill in a whole afternoon.

We discovered Pho noodles in Saigon. Yum! Even the boys have taken to eating local food – although they do still try and eat pizza any opportunity they get! But noodles are WAY cheaper than pizza and I’m penny pinching. So noodles it is! We’ve all just about mastered the art of chopsticks – although I’m finding my skill comes and goes!

We had planned to go to Dalat and then Nha Trang after Saigon, but alas, I had not anticipated the huge holiday that is had by the Vietnamese on April 30 and May 1. Every bus and train going anywhere out of Saigon was booked so in the end the only thing we could do was grab a plane and fly to Hoi An. Which is where I am now. And when we arrived in Hoi An our booking had been lost so I had a moment of panic. But two doors down from our (not)booked hotel, we found Thanh Xuan and they’ve looked after us beautifully!

We’ve had four nights here and will spend one more. In all honesty, five nights here is probably a bit much. Maybe if I wasn’t running out of money it wouldn’t be so bad! But all we do is sleep late, have a lazy breakfast, wander around the town and eat lunch for a few hours, watch a movie on the laptop, wander around town and eat dinner for a few hours, watch another movie, then go to bed. Actually, upon reflection, it’s not all bad! And we’ve been measured up for all sorts of clothes which I’ll be picking up at 6pm today. Nice cheap tailor-made clothes! Not quite as cheap as the markets … but these will actually fit me perfectly! And SlowCoach has a lovely new tailor-made suit jacket with red silk lining. Very beautiful!

Hoi An is a stunning little town. The ancient buildings and streets and all the lanterns everywhere are truly beautiful. We’ve spent a bit of time sitting on the water’s edge just admiring the town. We’ve found the best bakery ever (The Cargo Club) and treat ourselves to something hideously decadent every day! Usually I get a banana crispy but today they were all out, so it was the white chocolate kahlua cake for me. Life’s tough! The food is fabulous everywhere but our favourite little cheap vietnamese place is Jean’s Cafe. Great meals. Plenty of it. And we feed a family of five for $15. Can’t complain about that!

Tomorrow we’re hiring a minivan and driver to take us up to Hue. Apparently it’s about a four hour drive. We will spend our last four nights up there then start the long journey back home at the end of next week!

Urinary tract infection. There’s nothing more to be said really… Thank heavens for drugs!

We’ve been away from home for three weeks now. There are a few things I really miss!

1. Hobart’s weather (Yes – I know it’s cold and cloudy. That’s what I miss!)
2. My washing machine
3. Free drinking water. Straight out of the tap!
4. My shower. With proper water pressure!
5. My bowl of muesli for breakfast every day
6. Coco. My cat.
7. Having four computers in the house – not having to share!
8. All Saints
9. My bed – and a whole night’s sleep.
10. My wardrobe

Angkor Wat. There’s little more I can say! It is extraordinary.

The sunrise was a let down because of cloud cover, but everything else was fantastic. Except of course Sparkle, who managed to moan and groan the entire day about how tired he was. Seeing sunrise meant a 4:30am start to the day. He wasn’t so happy about that!

We saw Angkor Wat itself, Bayon (temple with all the faces), the Elephant Terrace, Ta Prohm (from tomb raider) and Pre Rup. We walked around temples from 5am to 5pm but came back to the hotel for four hours in the middle of the day. We saw elephants, monkeys and a skar (spelling?! It looked like a cross between a fox and a squirrel). The highlight of the morning was definitely Bayon – the temple with all the faces. There are 54 towers, each representing one of the provinces of the time. And each tower has four smiling faces. It was a great temple!

We had a tour guide in the afternoon and if I went again I’d have a guide for the whole day. We learned so much from him. We did the “tomb raider” temple in the afternoon – Ta Prohm. Great trees!

The children at every temple swarm around to sell you stuff. “Three for one dollar Madame. I give you three for one dollar. Madame. Please Madame. Three for one dollar.” It goes on and on and on and on and on … All these sad little faces swarming around you. At the very last temple I bought two Cambodian flutes for a dollar. I could have got three for a dollar at the other temples but this little lass only had two. The kids were utterly exhausted yesterday so today I’ve promised them we’ll stay at the resort all day to swim, play pool and surf the net. Tomorrow we fly to Vietnam.

Well Phnom Penh turned out to be a so-so experience. I’m trying desperately to get used to the heat but it’s a struggle. I don’t know what the temperature is, but when we come into our air-conditioned room and it says it’s 32c I feel like it’s really, really cool – so I think it must be awfully hot out in the sun! I have to watch the heat – if I overdo it I get really nauseous. I have bought lots of handheld fans to keep as cool as I can! We didn’t really see a lot of Phnom Penh. We went to the Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda – they were wonderful! Pity the heat got to us – we would have enjoyed seeing a lot more. It’s similar to the Bangkok Grand Palace only more spacious, no crowds, and the king still lives there. The Silver Pagoda temple was crammed full of Buddhas and artefacts and has a floor made from 5000 silver tiles. It was quite lovely. As we were heading to the exit, I followed the sound of some live music and found three musicians playing traditional Khmer music. They let Sparkle and Picky have a turn each on the xylophone. The only other activity we managed in Phnom Penh was going to the air conditioned mall twice. The boys are now the proud owners of a large collection of dvd’s and computer games. Tuesday we boarded a bus and spent six hours travelling up to Siem Reap. The scenery in Cambodia really is fascinating. The people and the towns and the culture and the landscape. Siem Reap seems even hotter than Phnom Penh – if that’s possible! I really hope Vietnam is cooler than Cambodia! Our accommodation is quite nice with a brilliant pool, pool table, really nice restaurant and awesome staff!

Today we visited a silk farm and a little school that teaches disadvantaged kids the ancient Khmer arts of wood and stone carving. The silk farm was fascinating and SlowCoach bought a lovely silk shirt. I tried on a gorgeous dress that looked absolutely awful on me – so that saved me some money! We went out to the night markets to find dinner. We ended up eating Indian – which isn’t as nice as the Indian I’m used to. I think we should have stuck with Khmer food! And then we went and found the the massage fish – do you know what I mean?! You sit on the side of a little pool and fish come and eat away dead skin. It was hilarious! Sort of creepy tickly feeling. Doubt that I’ll go back but I’m glad I went. They leave your feet feeling extremely soft! Then tomorrow we’re off to Angkor Wat. We leave here at 4:45am to catch the sunrise. We’ll spend the whole day doing temples, but will hopefully come back to the resort for a few hours at lunchtime to escape the heat! A visit to the Angkor National Museum has given us some history (in air conditioned comfort) and a gaze over the room of a thousand buddhas. Now we need the real thing!

We have made it to Cambodia! I had a few hairy moments when I thought we were all going to die and it was all my fault, but then I got over myself and we moved on and here we are! We were a bit sad to leave Koh Chang – the resort was divine and the people wonderful. We had one last day trip to White Sands to soak up the real Thai island kind of feel. It was very beautiful but the heat was starting to get to me – couldn’t go near the water. It’s boiling!

SlowCoach and Picky enjoyed the very elegant fruit cocktails! So did I for that matter. Pineapples here are fantastic and we get pineapple flavoured everything whenever we can!

The resort owner drove us to the Cambodian border. It was absolute luxury in his mercedes van! Just blissful. I’m so glad we had the opportunity to be comfortable and feel safe before hitting the border. We crossed into Cambodia at Hat Lek. It was truly awful. We had the wrong denomination. They overcharged everyone. Very corrupt. Nothing we could do. Heat was overwhelming. Paid through the nose for a boy to drive us to Koh Kong in his taxi. We had thought Thailand was poor, but Cambodia is really poor. Abject poverty. And very filthy. We did find a nice little hotel but they were charging double (because they can) and so we only had one room. Two single beds for five people. It was a rather unpleasant night! At least it was very clean and on the waterfront. The view at sunset was quite stunning.

The people in Koh Kong are so poor. The children are delightful – calling out Hello Hello Hello! every time we passed. Mozzies are bad and I’m grateful we decided to take anti-malaria tablets! A walk into town is the most frightening adventure I’ve been on for quite some time!

We were charged three times the going rate for the bus ticket to Phnom Penh but we hated Koh Kong so much we didn’t care! It was a relief to get on the big air conditioned bus and just watch the scenery going past. It is certainly a very beautiful country. A really interesting bus trip with lots of beautiful rivers juxtaposed with poverty stricken villagers and everywhere lots of rubbish. The bus attendants opened the bus windows to throw rubbish out…

After our miserable 24 hours we were keen to stay somewhere nice in Phnom Penh so after much searching, I found a little gem called Kabiki. It’s an absolute oasis and we love it! It costs four times what I’d hoped to spend and we’re completely blowing the budget when we still have another 19 days to go, but I’ve decided that if we’re going to visit dirty, dusty, poverty stricken places, we need somewhere clean and comfortable to relax in afterwards! And besides … I am really struggling with the heat. If I get too hot I get really nauseous. I’ve skipped several meals trying to avoid throwing up in the heat! So an air conditioned oasis with pool and poolside restaurant service is perfect! I know I’m a wimp, but I no longer care! We’re spoiled westerners that need a bit of tlc every now and then!

We are now in Koh Chang and having the time of our lives. While the news shows Bangkok to be under siege and a dangerous place to be, in reality we didn’t see anything untoward. Quite a lot of military and police personnel around, but otherwise we saw nothing political. I think the riots were happening in a few streets close to the interior ministry or something like that – and we were nowhere near that! Mind you – I was very glad to leave Bangkok and I’m thrilled to bits to be at this resort! Sparkle is going to miss the tuktuks though. He adored them!

The bus trip here was about five hours and very enjoyable. Nice air conditioned bus and we stopped a couple of times. The scenery was beautiful all the way down and there were heaps of things to look at. I was itching to stop at one of the fruit markets with all the huge baskets of durian fruit, pineapples, bananas and coconuts. But alas, the bus ploughed on. The bus took us to Laem Ngop where we purchased ferry tickets, jumped into the back of a big ute thing with all our luggage and a dozen other people, and drove to the ferry. The ferry ride was about 30 minutes. On the other side we were met by the resort’s minivan and taken to paradise.

It is divine here. Even better than the pictures. The resort is all holistic and environmentally conscious. There’s a wonderful pool and spa, steam room, yoga and meditation centre, massage centre and a great restaurant. Our rooms are all fitted out with the equipment for DIY colonic irrigation but I think I’ll give that a miss! The resort has 26 cottages. All separate from each other. We’re staying in an upstairs cottage and the boys are in the downstairs one beneath us. They love it!

They’re going to get a bit of a shock once we leave here and go very down market in Cambodia. Very, very, very down market! I’m trying not to spend all our money in the first week we’re away! Now we just need to decide whether we should do a day trip to explore the island and go on an elephant ride ($300 for the whole family) or just stay at the resort and lie on banana lounges for four days. I’m getting a lot of resistance from SlowCoach and the boys – they don’t want to leave the resort! I think we’ll be disappointed if we leave the island having never seen anything more than the resort we stay at. Which is a totally rainforest setting – nice mangroves by the swimming pool. And the resort is quite isolated from other areas – nowhere to walk to – so it looks like we’ll be trapped here eating our three meals a day. And if you take into consideration the restaurant is classified as one of the 50 best in the world, perhaps that won’t be too hard to take… Back to the pool for me now…

And back from the pool … We’ve enjoyed a torrential down pour and decided that for today at least we’d stay here and laze around! I ended up watching a dvd – “Australia” (seems a bit surreal that I travelled all the way to Thailand to watch “Australia”!) And we’ve discovered we can hire a car – we think. So tomorrow maybe we’ll do that. Wander around the island trying not to crash…