VIDEO-Making Money While Travelling

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Want to know how you to can travel the world while making money at the same time??? Just watch this instructional video, follow the easy to follow steps and soon you too will be wondering why you hadn't thought of this earlier!

VIDEO-Recording Bells in Chiang Mai

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We had been wanting to get some good recordings of the bells that they have at the Buddhist Temples in Thailand, but you have to get there very early in the morning to do so. Wat Doi Suthep is high on a mountain overlooking Chiang Mai and we braved the rain on the motorcycle to get up there at dawn before any visitors arrived. Needless to say, we got some great samples which we hope to use soon!

VIDEO-Instrument Maker, Chiang Mai, Thailand

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3 years ago, Malcolm visited Chiang Mai and saw a performance of local Thai music. One of the musicians father made the instruments and she gave Malcolm his telephone number if he ever wanted to buy some instruments. Since then however, he lost the number so we had to track her down again to get his number. Luckily, we found her and managed to meet up with him after a wet and rainy motorcycle ride to the outskirts of Chiang Mai. It was worth it though because we were able to see the instruments being made, play them, and buy a traditional Thai dulcumer called a 'Kim.'

VIDEO-Laos-Nam Ou River Trip

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River travel was a big part of our time in Laos. We spent 4 days on the Mekong river which connects Laos with China and on the Nam Ou river. The latter of which has one of the most spectacular river trips in all of South East Asia. This video hopefully will give you a taste of that 2 day journey between Luang Prabang and Mong Ngeau Noi. Music is courtesy of our friend Bassnectar. This is the last of our Laos posts so enjoy. Northern Thailand is up next!

We want to send out a big thanks to our bassist Joe Hauler, who is holding things down for us back in California. He is making sure our bills are getting paid, so we don't to worry, thanks Joe!!!

SLIDESHOW-Laos #2

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Luang Prabang was our next destination where we reacquainted ourselves with the modern conveniences of a larger town. Once the capital of Loas before is was mysteriously abandoned, thus leaving behind the remains of a rich cultural center speckled with temples and permeated by Buddhism. Today there is still a very strong presence of Buddhism in Luang Prabang and with that means there were lots of monks…and where there’s monks…there’s chanting. This was great for us because we had wanted to get recordings of the monks incanting their ancient prayers. It would seem that getting a recording would be pretty easy; just find some monks and a temple and bingo! Not quite that easy. The monks pray several times throughout the morning and into the evening as a part of their daily ritual. The only problem was that during the day there were always motorbikes zipping around, kids yelling, dogs barking and the usual chaotic sounds of daytime. So our only option was to wake up at 4am to catch the first prayers of day during the silence of the early morning hours. Long story short…many mornings were spent walking around for hours from temple to temple hoping to catch the right temple at the right time. Each Wat prays at a different time so you can imagine the goose chase we were on. During one of our interactions with the monks, one of the senior monk invited us to come to his English class to help his students with their pronunciation. We thought this would be a good opportunity to broaden the vocabulary of these monks to include all the necessary English words that we use on a daily basis…check out the video for that! We had a great time hanging out with all of his students, sharing with them as much as we were being given to just by being there. Before class ended the senior monk asked if we would sing one our songs to his class. We obliged and thanked them for letting us turn their English class into our version of School of Rock.
After Luang Prabang it was boats, boats, boats…hours and hours of boat rides along the various rivers that have provided the country with its trade routes with China for centuries. We boarded one tiny boat after the other making our way up the Nam Ou river to the most remote villages reachable only by river, down the majestic Mekong and the Nam Song. These boat rides were where many times we found ourselves paralyzed by the magnitude of the sheer natural beauty we were witnessing. We both experienced a unique feeling of being so overwhelmed with what we were seeing that it seemed no emotional response was fitting for the moment….to laugh, to cry, to feel bewildered, to feel empowered…??? This again is where words seem to fail. Needless to say leaving Laos was sad…like leaving the embrace of a loved one.
The boat ride to the border, however, wasn’t missed nearly as much. The first day was a grueling 14 hours on an overly full boat, using boxes of fruit, fish and god knows what as seats because there was no where to sit. This combined with the 110 decibel growl of the tractor engine being used as the motor, pouring rain and the caustic fumes of the engine because we were sitting in the back of the boat. The second day was just a little less crowded and this time only 10 hours long! Summed up, we had 24 hours of boating fun as we inched down the Mekong river on our way back to Thailand. All traveling discomforts aside, we managed to hang out and talk with a couple of the local Laos people on the boat and met one particularly adorable 7 year old girl who loved being the focus of attention for our cameras.

VIDEO-Laos "Are you Free?"

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CLICK HERE for High Version or on the image to stream video (56.5 mb).

It's really hard to encapsulate these momentous experiences within the framework of a 3.5" by 5" video or slideshow, but hopefully this video will give you just a taste of what Laos is like. Enjoy

Archives

Just wanted to let you know that you can view all the posts, videos, and slideshows we have posted since we began this adventure by clicking on the archives links on the right hand side. Only the last 10 posts show up on this page but you can always view the archived posts as well. Also a reminder that you can listen to 3 new songs of ours by clicking on the links on the right hand side as well. Enjoy!

LAOS

Think of a movie you’ve seen where the shot opens up with a dramatic long pan across majestic mountain range where the clouds obscure the highest peaks and the sun casts an angelic amber glow over the valley below. Now imagine getting up out of your seat and walking into the silver screen….welcome to Laos! When we chose our course for travel, each destination was with specific intention. Bali was to seek out master craftsman of Gamelan instruments. Cambodia was for the inspiration of taking in the massive manmade works of architectural art at Angkor Wat. And Laos was for it’s sheer majestic beauty. Every creative person has their muse, for us, the staggering natural beauty of Laos was just that. Our hopes for our journey to Laos were to immerse ourselves in a landscape where just the simple opening of our eyes each morning would be the inspirational backdrop for our musical thoughts and ideas. The intention was set, the destination chosen and the results…nothing less than what we had expected and in fact quite a bit more.
Laos just opened its borders to travelers in the early 90’s so tourism is very limited and the locals in many parts of the country are still getting used to seeing foreigners. This is very exciting when coming from a place like Thailand which has been entertaining visitors for over 50 years. Starting off in the lower portion of the Northern arm of Laos, we made our way up from Ventiane, the capital, to progressively smaller and smaller towns until the towns became villages and the villages then became nothing more than a collection of a dozen bamboo huts. From the beginning of our time in Laos we were captivated by the scenic, picturesque landscape. Upon arriving in each new town we were convinced that it couldn’t get anymore amazingly beautiful than what we were seeing at that moment. Yet with each bus, boat, or tuk tuk trip to more and more rural areas, we found ourselves saying that same thing each time. To use words to describe what we saw would be a rather pathetic endeavor. Some of the video we took might give you a square inch of entire football field sized picture of what the landscape of Laos actually is. It’s hard to imagine that Laos and all its seemingly untouched natural beauty is THE most bombed country in all the world. During the Vietnam War from 1964-1973, the US spent 2.2 million dollars a day dropping the equivalent of an areoplane load of bombs every 8 minutes for 9…yes 9…9 years straight! This weighed out to be almost ONE TON of explosives for every single man, woman and child in all of Laos. Its hard to imagine that Laos, a stunningly beautiful country even after all the senseless bombings, was a place of perpetual hell for nine years straight, not to mention the civil war that wrought havoc on the country for the next two decades.
Needless to say we spent a lot of time taking advantage of the nature and all the fun things it had to offer. Because we were in Laos during the rainy season all of the water activities which were normally considered a casual, relaxing affair were transformed to a down right adventure. We spent one of our days taking a trip down the river on inner tubes, which normally takes about 4 hours but because of all the rain it was accelerated to 45 minutes! Although we didn’t go straight down…there was far too much fun to be had on the river banks where locals had built a jungle gym of various ziplines, rope swings, treetop jumps and other assorted ways for passers by to risk their lives. We managed to make it down unscathed…for the most part; aside from me falling through a missing board of a bridge and Ben forgetting to let go at the end of a zipline (check out the video for that one!) And the river was just one of adventures. Spelunking in mountain top caves, swimming in natural springs deep inside a mountain, climbing around massive, pitch black caverns and kayaking through river gorges were just some of the ways we burned off our caffeine highs from drinking the local motor oil…I mean Loas coffee. Most of these adventures were had while visiting the small backpacker town of Vang Vieng, known for it’s wealth of natural beauty and opium…no trip to Vang Vieng is complete without sampling both of the local delicacies.


Below you will find some videos and and the first of 2 slideshows from Laos. There will be more videos and photos to come.

VIDEO-Professors Guess and Jones

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While we were in Luang Prabang, Laos, visiting a monastery to record samples of the monks chanting we were asked if we would like to teach an english class to the novice monks that night. That had been one of the things we wanted to do, so it was great to have the oppurtunity come to us. It was definately a wonderful experience and very surreal standing in front of a room full of safron robed monks teaching them "drums, kaura, hard rock..." It was fullfilling being able to give back to the country that we fell in love with.

VIDEO-Tractor Ride through Laos

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Transportation in South East Asia and particularly in Laos, is not your standard bus, train, taxi as in the States. We needed to get out to some caves situated high in a limestone cave where there was a Buddha statue deep in on of the huge main caverns. The only way to navigate the roads was by a tractor pulling us. The tractor engine was controlled by long gears that this guy used masterfully. We only got stuck in the mud once. Check it out.

VIDEO-Tubing on the Nam Sou-Laos

Tubing Video-Click Here or on the image to View.
Laos was literally a dream come true and its because of things like this. In Vang Vieng, Northern Laos, you can rent a tractor tube and a lifejacket and cruise down the Nam Sou river. There are bars, caves, and stop offs all along the sides of the river with rope swings, zip lines, and jumps where twenty-somethings can act like they are 11 years old. Ironically, everyone's lifejackets were made by and had emblazoned upon the back "Gro Up." Not yet...

SLIDESHOW-Laos-Jewel of the Mekong

Laos Slideshow #1
Here is an introduction to the majestic country called Laos. Please be patient when waiting for it to load, it is well worth the wait. We shot a lot of footage and took a lot of photos and will be uploading them in the next week. Thanks for all the e-mails!
Click Here or on the image to watch

Some thoughts on America

As we travel here in South East Asia, it becomes apparent how many freedoms and liberties we take for granted in America. We have been travelling in some communist countries like Laos and Cambodia and the people often are very restricted with what they can read, print, or proclaim. Demonstrations against the government are forbidden and can land peaceful protestors in jail for years if not the rest of their lives.
This is why we feel like the rights that we have in America need to be exeercised or the people who fought so hard for them did so in vain. We are appalled at the reports we have received from home about how George Bush and the government handled the tragedy in Louisiana. We are also concerned about the pending Supreme Court nominations which could easily take away some of the freedoms and constitutional rights we enjoy today. This is a pivotal time right now and these decisions could shape the America of tommorow. We hope that you will excercise your rights to question, dissent, and demand a better system where people are treated equally regardless of race or sex.
With the pending Supreme Court nominations, many feel a woman's right to choose could be put in jeopardy. We urge you to learn more about the issue and if you would like to protect that right for yourself, your sisters, friends, girlfriends, or wives you can visit these websites. Knowledge is power.
www.neral.org,
www.plannedparenthood.org

VIDEO-Cambodia

Here is a short video with some of the video images that we collected while in Cambodia from Angkor Wat to the poor children of Seam Reap. CLICK HERE or on the image to watch.

**FOR PC USERS**
The video should start playing after your computer has downloaded a 1/4 of it. If your computer is taking a long time to download it just simply right click as "Save As Target" and save it to your harddrive or desktop. That way you can keep on enjoying our blog while your computer downloads it and watch it later. PC's do not come loaded with QUICKTIME as Mac's do so we have supplied a link on the right where you can download it for free. E-mail us with any questions, believe it or not we really do respond. Thanks

Cambodia-Behold the Light-Angkor Wat

Angkor Wat, the jewel of Cambodia, and a source of pride and inspiration for the Cambodian people was worth all the hellacious bus rides and poverty and hardship we were witness to while there. No photos can do justice to this series of temples which make up the world's largest religous monument. Cambodia was an excercise in opposites you cannot have one without the other. CLICK HERE or on the image to download the slideshow. Enjoy

Cambodia Slideshow

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To see the people of Cambodia today is to look into the past and witness the immeasurable poverty and hardship that shows in the desperation of their eyes. Cambodia has had a hard past…a very hard past. It became a very common sight to see an outstretched limb with no hand at its end, extended, begging for spare change or food. It was an everyday experience to see a little boy, no older than 7, holding his little sister in his arms, sitting on a curb begging for food. When we would sit down for dinner we were literally swarmed upon by local children begging for what was left on our plates. This was heartbreaking alone, not to mention when some of these kids were also missing limbs due to a landmine explosion. On one occasion we had so many kids surrounding us motioning to their mouths and bellies that they were hungry that we decided to ask the restaurant owner to ask the children what they wanted to eat so we could buy dinner for them and their friends to eat. It was a small gesture on our part but it brought a big smile to their faces. Although, sadly, no matter how big their smile in that moment, it would only last until their bellies became hungry again. This was the scene around Siem Reap. If it wasn’t begging for food at the stalls it was begging for us to buy a postcard or a bottle of water…and not only from the adults. Hordes of little kids would swarm us begging for us to buy just one thing from them to try and make a little money for themselves. I don’t know what any of you were doing at age 7 but I think I was playing with toy cars or something, not trying to survive by hustling for a bit of pocket change. A different way of life….very different.
Leaving Siem Reap to head south to the capitol of Phnom Phen wasn’t leaving the darkness behind but rather walking into another world of darkness even more difficult to swallow than poverty of Siem Reap. Without getting too much into the history and politics of Cambodia I’ll just caption a period of time between 1975-1979 (just 30 years ago) when a man by the name of Pol Pot lead a Mao Communist movement known as the Khmer Rouge, wherein he conducted a mass genocide, killing over 2 million people of the countries 8 million population. The focus of this movement was to wipe out educated people and their families…men, women, children and even their babies. The even more disturbing fact of this matter was in the inhumane and tortuous nature of the killing. There’s no need to go into details but suffice it to say that these people were absolutely brutally…fuckin’ tortured and then murdered; and for no other reason than to fulfill the agenda of one man’s sick mind. The reason we’re sharing this is because from this experience we both gained a new perspective of just how fortunate and privileged we are as people. To see the depths of suffering that this country has gone through has only helped us to gain a more profound appreciation for what we often so casually take for granted. If anyone out there thinks their job sucks, their parents suck, their life is hard…come to Cambodia for a week…..and rejoice in the fact that you can leave and go back to your life, which will no longer seem to be so bad.

Cambodia-Heart of Darkness

Cambodia was all about rawness...in every respect. Let me begin by sharing the journey from Bangkok to Siem Reap, wherein lies the ancient temples of Angkor Wat. We woke at 6 AM to get to the bus station where we caught our first of many buses that would take us to the border of Thailand and Cambodia. Packed with Thais, Cambodians and a speckling of Westerners, the bus ride was rather hot and cramped for the 4 hour trip to the border...but considering the means by which we would soon be traveling this was the lap of luxury. Arriving at Arranya Prathet, the border city, we hopped on a rickety tuk tuk, which speed off to take us to the actual border crossing where we spent 2 hours, sweating balls in the heat, getting through immigration. Once we got through the first tier, we then spent another hour passing through 2 more levels of immigration till we were finally packed like sardines into a little bus that took us to yet another bus station. Here we boarded what would become the most hellish 7 hour bus ride from Poi Pet to Siem Reap. This stretch of road is well known for being a completely miserable experience for most anyone who has made the journey. Twenty two people were crammed into a little mini bus the size of a VW Westfalia in addition to everyone’s luggage. It was boiling hot, the AC barely worked, and the road….the road was FUCKED! It was basically a dirt path with huge potholes, trenches, mud, pools of water, dust and few large boulder sized rocks thrown in for good measure. Now imagine this…you know the feeling of what it’s like driving on some old dirt road going up a mountainside, or that gravel driveway that twists and turns with huge ditches running through it…yeah…take that feeling and multiply it by 10 and then stretch it out for 7 hours. All of this in addition to the mental anguish of knowing that the distance being traveled could be done in 2 hours but because the bus never breaks 20 mph it takes 7. Oh yeah and because my seat was in the back in between all of the bags, It was like being in a small mosh pit where heavy-ass bags would fall on me every time we hit a bump or pothole. FUN…pure knee-slappin, guffaw havin’ good times all the way! Once we finally arrived at some absurd hour early the next morning, our worked-asses dropped like bricks on our beds. When we woke to check out and find another place we had our second miserable experience in Cambodia. Somehow between leaving Bangkok and arriving in Cambodia my guitar was stolen. In the haste and disorientation of getting from one country to another some lucky Cambodian is now rockin’ out with my cheesy 80’s hair metal travel guitar. Though it wasn’t the most attractive guitar, it still got the job done. Now having nothing, it’s going to be much more difficult to continue with the writing process like we had been able to before. So, from here on out we may have to forgo the uploading of new song tidbits for you to sample while we’re away, besides some acoustic pieces, if we can pick up an acoutsic guitar. They say you have to travel through the valley of darkness to see the light...