Day 249 to 251 Bangkok (again)
After Kolkata I decided I needed the peace and quite of Thailand again so I took a flight back to Bangkok. Here I did a health checkup which was an experience in itself with a super-modern hospital and quite modest fees… If I am getting sick sometime in the future I hope I am in Bangkok… really excellent health-care!
This is not from a 5 star hotel but actually from inside the hospital I went to…
Day 230 to 248 Kolkata (India)
After Thailand I jumped over to India to have a look at another culture… it turned out to be quite a big difference… more than I had expected to be honest. There are so many people there, people honk the horn all the time when you are on the street and there are SO many poor people and beggars on the street. They don’t seem to have invented the waste-basket yet (you just throw the stuff on the the street when you are done… or in the park in the grass etc. which means that the whole city looks like a dumpster.) Oh, and most people live with their parents so it was quite hard to find a couch to surf. In the end I ended up staying in a hostel for my stay… but it was a quite nice place with many fun people around so no worries… was kind of nice to have “my own place” for a while too 
I saw a few cool things when I was there, everything from the South Calcutta Rifle club to the Calcutta Swimming Club. (The name Calcutta was changed to Kolkata a few years ago to show that the are no longer a part of the Imperialist rule of the British… but some old clubs keep their names.)
Oh, and I got a pretty bad stomach flu so I lost a few more kilos… now I have lost 16 kg in total since the trip started, down from 98 kg to 82… quite a change 
Fun people I met at the backpacker place I was staying at
Horses walking free in the park… in the middle of the city… no fences
Victoria memorial… in the foreground is a friend I met at the hostel.
A market… this place sold bananas… and it was HUGE… all the way to the end of this street there where bananas sold… the next one was then oranges and so on…
At the rifle club.
Me doing some shooting.
The place I was staying at, “Hotel” Paragon
A couchsurfer I got to know in Bangkok who I met up with again in Kolkata. Watch the yellow cabs in the background… they where all of this model… every single one I saw… (and the model is from the 60’s or something…)
The view of the park in Victoria Memorial, very nice!
Holi… a festival in colors… and yepp… you do get attacked on the street
Okay… we are ready for Holi.. me in my new white clothes… bought especially for the day
And of course an “after” picture… this is what holi does to a white outfit (I gave the clothes away to a beggar afterwards… he looked happy!)
I did a visit to Mc Donalds to try the local Big Mac… ehm… except they don’t sell beef of course… it IS India after all…
I love this construction… it feels so… ehm… safe somehow
Out looking at a bridge with some couchsurfers and two Norwegian girls I met at the hostel.
A quite common thing was that trucks had signs saying “Obey traffic rules” or “Stop” or “Please Honk” written on them… and yes… I actually do think the text was needed… because no-one seemed to care about the rules…
Is this a forrest? No, it is actually only one tree… but it is the biggest tree in south east asia…
Some info on it
My Norwegian girls did a small movie
Weee… we are flying!
Paddling around with some couchsurfers
Boats are fun!
Last night in Kolkata. We are actually up on a rooftop with a great view in the background… ehm… I guess you will have to imagine it though
Day 207 to 229 Bangkok
Unfortunately I have almost no photos from the time I spent in Bangkok. Mainly because I was wearing a par of pants that didn’t really have space for my camera most of the time… well, there are a few pictures from the first few days though After that I did a lot of massage courses. I am now licensed in Thai Massage (90 minute program) Thai Oil massage (2 hour program) and Thai Medical massage (I have been taught acupressure points to cure 51 different ailments). In total I spend 20 days in school (6 hours a day) while in Bangkok doing massage… a quite hectic period since we where out partying almost every night!
First day in Bangkok. I met the girl to the left on the bus from Koh Tao and we ended up sharing hotel room for the first couple of days to lower the cost (after that I started couchsurfing).
Going to Wat Po for some sightseeing
They have LOTS of Buddha statues like this there… like several hundred.
A huge Buddha lying down. He is more than 30 meters long!
Going to the cinema to see Avatar in 3D… cool movie!
Not the best of pictures… but one of the few I had from Bangkok with CS:ers… well… you can look at my facebook to see some more pics that other people have taken of me
Day 203 to 206 Koh Tao
After the meditation retreat my next step was to go to Koh Tao to do some relaxing with my new friends and to take a Rescue Diver course. We spent a few days in this fantastic Island with white beaches, beautiful diving sites and good parties at night… definitely a paradise Island.
Oh, and after the meditation it was a period where I was not carrying my camera around that often so unfortunately you won’t see that many pictures from this period… I started experiencing things more than documenting them for a while… but here is a few at least (They are all of my friends that I met during the meditation retreat… so probably more interesting for me than to show that much of my adventures this time I am afraid…)
Checking in
Two girls I spent quite a lot of time with in the beginning on the Island
We are on the beach again!
Butterfly cocoon anyone?
Dinner with the gang
I want food!
Hello!
Day 192 to 203 Review of Wat Kow Tahm
I know many of you have asked me to tell you a bit more about my experiences at the meditation retreat Wat Kow Tahm, so here comes a bit of a “review”. First of all I should mention that this was one of the tougher things that I have ever done… to get a feeling try standing up, close your eyes and focus on your breathing for 60 minutes without moving… you will probably realize quite soon that your mind starts to drift away… when it does just note this and go back to the breathing… after a few minutes you probably will feel some pain in your feet… just note this and focus on your breathing. If the pain gets worse (for me my feet usually go numb after about 25-35 minutes) just go into the pain and examine it… how big is it, how does it feel, where exactly is the centre etc. If you can’t stand it any more you could try focusing on your feelings around it… are you afraid that you are hurting yourself, feeling impatient? Well, give yourself some compassion and see if that helps etc.
Ok, so is the hour over now? Ok, well imagine that you do these kind of exercises for 12 hours a day (we started at 4 am in the morning and went to about 8.30 pm every day… with some brakes for food and chores in the middle). And then imagine that you do this for 10 days… yepp… then you get roughly an idea of what it was
To be honest… after 3-4 days it actually started to become a lot easier and you could actually focus more on the things you where there to learn. The first thing that came was patience… with yourself for loosing focus, with time going soooo slow, with everything from standing in queues to following the schedule or not understanding basically. After that came increase in concentration. To be able to stay focused for longer and longer of periods. Once these started to work better we came more into other types of meditation such as compassion loving-kindness (useful for increasing your love for everyone in the world and generally behave in a more pleasant way and have more understanding for others). We also came into other types of reflections, everything from death to what causes us pain in life. One of my favorites was the compassionate Joy meditations. (I had some difficulties at times with this one though). It is about being able to be happy for your own and others fortune in life… to be happy for others joy. Actually not as easy as it sounds at times.
We also learnt some cool “tricks” such as how to deal with pain. Or rather your emotions connected to them which can actually make the pain itself irrelevant so to speak. I mean… it is still there… you just don’t care…. it doesn’t affect you really. (Normally the emotions are much stronger than the pain… think of when you here the sound of a mosquito… I think most of us have a very strong emotional reaction to this… but when you think about it… the pain of when the mosquito bites is actually not that strong at all really…)
The head nun, Mae Chee Ahmon giving a final speech at Wat Kow Tahm
A view of a small shrine at a viewpoint at the monastery.
This is the view from up there
The people in the retreat In the front our teachers are sitting together with the head nun in the middle.
180 to 191 Koh Phangan part 2
This is to give a small update on some more parties we had on Koh Phangan, the New Year’s full moon party (which was kind of big) and my first attempts to learn how to use POI’s
Fireworks and Full moon party at New Year
Kao doing a fire show. (This thing is called a POI… I have started to learn it… but without fire )
Another view from our Bungalow… the sunsets where sometimes quite extraordinary
What can you say… couchsurfers… they kind of have their laptops with them
We had breakfast almost every day at this place… great food and friendly personal. (The woman to the right was the one serving us most of the time )
Paaaarty time! (This time it is the Shiva Moon party)
My camera doesn’t really do the UV color justice… but it looked pretty cool there
With flash
What is a beach party without some fire shows
Annika Practicing with POI’s.
Sushi dinner
Birthday cake for Annika…
Playing pool… eeh… was that not what you are supposed to do with the blue thingy?
Yeay…. waterfall!
A very nice view from a Chinese temple
Kao taking a rest
176 to 180 Koh Phangan
Here comes a first update from Koh Phangan, I will probably stay for a while longer on this island so expect more info to come later
The boat-trip out here was quite interesting. We where on a small shipping boat that they had decorated with rows of bunk beds… you really slept shoulder to shoulder with your neighbor.
Victor on Christmas morning in our Bungalow
The Bungalow to the right and the beach to the left
3 small Santa ready for Christmas!
Swedish Christmas dinner
Well… KIND of Swedish Christmas dinner
I am staying with the two guys in black… the girl to the right I met up with on the boat ride over to the Island…
Half moon Christmas party… was really wild… SO many people there
Foam machine on the beach of the full moon party (the day after)
A lot of people on the beach!
It is a bit dark… but Victor is actually on that slide to the right
Yea… Bevis and Butthead… or? 
These are called bucket shops… they sell a bucket of liquor (about 1 liter) for between 150-300 bath. (About 3-6 euro)
Henri putting UV-paint on Victor
Soo nice
Scary hand!
Then the question came… did the text work? 
Well… Victor got a bit jealous… so luckily Chantal decided that it worked for him too
Typical Thai spelling
From our porch on the sunset.
Barbecue dinner (The thing in the middle is actually on fire)
How many people can you fit on a scooter? Well the extra saddle in the front kind of gives you a hint 
Day 174 to 176 Phuket
These days where quite fun… I got to meet up with my parents again and revisit Phuket. I was there once before in 2005 but must admit a few things have changed… they don’t try to commercialize the Tsunami as much any more for one thing…
I also had the realization that my travels have changed the way I see and react to things in many ways. During the days I spent with my parents I did see them in a new light. Things that just a few months ago would have made feel angry or hurt or upset just flew right through me this time. I also realized that I cannot take responsibility for how anyone else feels, it is totally up to each person how they react to information. To be able to do this requires that you are fully conscious of your emotions and thoughts. And realize that what you feel or think is not who you are.
Once you have stopped identifying YOU with your emotions and thoughts you get a choice. Because once you observe your emotions from a “third person” perspective you realize that you are creating pain for yourself by staying in this mindset. There is no sane person who would ever create pain for themselves and when you then have the choice to react or not to circumstances around you it becomes clear that there is only one sane way forward.
Well, to be aware of this requires that you stay present, that you don’t identify with roles, and that you are very careful with how you react on things that SEEM to be positive things. (Such as if you build your happiness from when someone tells you that you do something well, or that you are beautiful or any other happiness built from external factors. The danger of this is that the happiness you feel from this is just the other side of the coin that brings misery or pain to you, such as when someone tells you that you do something bad, that you are ugly or other things that hurt you.) True happiness radiates from within… and is in all of us!
Well…. that was a few thoughts I had right now, here comes some pictures from Phuket
Mom and dad on a shopping street.
All three of us
A guy that was connecting a new while to the electric net… not quite the Swedish standard
On a restaurant, I love those happy smiles
Day 171 to 174 Penang
After Langkawi it was back to Penang to pick up our Thai Visas and spend the weekend on the CS invasion that was taking place. We had a great weekend touring around the Island looking at beautiful scenery, bathing in waterfalls, eating good food and going out to clubs!
From the Dragon Show the last night:
In the car of our host the first night… we managed to squeeze in 7 people in it… was just a TAD full
Victor in da club… (yea… the sun was very strong that night
Josh partying loose!
Playing with dragon costumes!
Heeello!
Victor doing a cool pose!
Josh on his pink scooter.
The view from the place we had lunch the first day of the CS invasion… really nice!
Michel, one of the organizers at the lunch place
Cool girls…
Me chilling… oh, and the small scrub wounds on the knee is from falling with the scooter in Langkawi.
CS:ers at the invasion.
Group-picture of all of us!
The girls riding a horse… Josh and Victor where more fascinated with the equipment of the horse though…
Don’t they look cute… on the love bench…eh?
Hmm… something tells me I don’t want this one to bite me…
CS:ers at dinner during the invasion.
Victor goes with a mask in the night!
Many of the CS:ers as the waterfall on Sunday
We went up another mountain…Michel is pointing out something.
Dragon show at night… this pole was actually really heavy!
DID
People queuing for free food… wait… did I say free food… eh… forget the part about queuing…. people RAN over!
You can never get enough hugs!
Don’t you like my gloria? Yea… soon new hair color
Ula looks kind of happy!
Day 167 to 171 Penang & Langkawi
Langkawi turned out to be a bit of a paradise on earth after having been in big cities for a long while. Fantastic beaches, parties by bonfires on deserted beaches and loads of clubs without dress-code (where you can enter in shorts!)
The first thing that happened when we arrived at the Island was that we met two German girls who took us with them to a party on a deserted Island called the Monkey Island. When we came to the boat we quickly realized that Me, Josh and Victor where the only non-native guys there though… oh and about 40 blond European girls… well… quite easy to guess we had a really fun party night!
We also rented some scooters and drove around the Island… I had a bit of an accident (going very slowly luckily) and dislocated my shoulder quite bad… two weeks later it still is sore… but is getting better for every day
Partying on Langkawi the first night:
Scootering around on the Island:
With Lukas on Penang (this was actually one day before Langkawi)… they guys had some fun on my hand-gestures on my different profile pictures on facebook so we did a parody on them
On the bus ride to Langkawi… Victor and Josh resting a bit.
A sign when we came to Langkawi…. such a true sign
Cat, one of the German girls we met up with the first night that took us to Monkey Island.
Victor feeling the Love!
Loads of blond girls as i said…
The first night we got a room with only two single beds… Josh kind of occupied a bit more than the whole first one… so me and Victor where cramped up on the second
Me on a scooter with a golden helmet
Scenery on Langkawi… was really a beautiful place!
Victor ready to race!
Flying on the beach!
Josh looking quite happy…. with a Lady boy in the background… (he claims he didn’t know this of course
Tourist place? Naaaah…. not at all
Us with the two cat girls..
