3 Weeks in Burma - Ups and Downs

Hello faithful readers.
I apologize for the long absence, I haven't been able to update this blog in the past few weeks. So where have we been? Well, we just finished the first week of our one month of volunteering in northern Thailand. Before that we spent 3 weeks traveling through Myanmar (Burma), which on the whole was a fantastic experience. The sightseeing was breathtaking and the people were smiley and helpful, however the food and transportation left much to be desired. On our second day in Yangon I ate a seafood hotpot that lead to one week with a horrible stomach parasite. I could barely eat or drink during that week, and let's just say that the things I did manage to eat didn't stay with me long. Fortunately Tara finally convinced me to go to a pharmacy and get some antibiotics which knocked out the parasite almost immediately. After that we were very cautious about what we ate.

It seemed that with buses in Burma we had some kind of jinx. Regardless of which seats we picked, we always had two (or more) people seated in front of us who insisted on reclining their seats as FAR AS POSSIBLE. On top of that, the roads were dry, dusty, and the bumpiest paths we've crossed since Cambodia. In summary, the things that were good about Burma were some of the highlights of the trip, but the things that were bad were the worst.

I prefer to remember the good things (though I won't soon forget that week with a parasite), so please come back soon to see some of my favourite sights.

Ian