The Rack Workout Station

 

This commercial made me laugh. I saw it on TV in New Zealand. I couldn’t help but laugh because it looks like a walker. Sometimes I really have to stop and wonder how well these magical workout programs work. Do you think this would work for you? Definitely not my type of workout. I think I'll stick to my two feet and a pair of running shoes.

Random Fact: The longest Monopoly game ever played was 1,680 hours long, that's 70 straight days!

I Can't Stop LAUGHING!

This video has had me laughing so much. I have replayed it so many times. It really needs to go viral! It is simply cute, fail, and a win at the same time. Who knew a Manatee was so squishy. Anyway, enjoy my silly little video.

Random Fact: An elephant trunk has no bone but 40,000 muscles.

Team Rugby Safety Video

On our flight from Cairns Australia to Auckland New Zealand we flew on New Zealand air. Most safety videos that they show you on the plane are soooo boring and lame. But wait… what’s this? A rugby team? An old granny with a picture of a SPICAAAAY man in a Speedo? Is this really a safety video? I must say this was the first airplane safety video that has really captured my entire attention in a very long time. It was really great so I even found it on YouTube so you all can enjoy it as well.

Random Fact: Kiwis are the only known bird to have nostrils located at the tip of their beak.

Don’t Rock the Boat

Ever since I was a little girl I have wanted to go to Australia. I got my diving certification with my dad when I was just 12 years old. Put both of those together and there you have my dream, to dive in the Great Barrier Reef. The Great Barrier Reef is not only the largest natural reef but also boasts the most biodiversity of nearly anywhere in the world. We got on the boat quite early at 7:30 am and set sail shortly after that. They gave us a safety briefing and passed around sea sickness tablets. Knowing myself, and the fact that I was not born with an iron stomach, I graciously accepted some. Lindsey was only able to do snorkeling because you had to be 12 to do an intro dive. Mina and Jared were able to do the intro dive program though and they loved it! They did 3 different dives but were not allowed to be down as deep or as long as my mom, dad and I.

Now for the fun stuff… and the not so fun. The wind was pretty bad and it was causing some massive waves. We had a really large boat but it was still rocking pretty good. I swear we all should have started singing “Don’t rock the boat baby”. It was really bad. Mina was the first to lose it. Before long over half the boat was praising the great porcelain gods. Lindsey and I were the only two from our family who survived the trip without sharing our food with the fish. Once we got out to the reef though it was really calm but those 40 minutes to the reef were a built in roller coaster ride. One awesome thing that made those 40 minutes worth it was that we saw a humpback whale! He was so cute! He kept slapping the water with his flippers so it looked like he was waving at us. He also would jump and fluke in front of the boat. A couple of dolphins even joined in the fun. We watched him for a while before we got to the reef. All the humpback whales are in Australia giving birth to their calves and enjoying the warmer waters. 

A Giant Moray Eel we saw

Time to dive below the water. We slid into our freezing cold wetsuits, put on our gear, and descended below the ocean waves. My mom had a bit of trouble getting down at first but then it all worked out. I could not believe how many fish there were! There was a huge variety of fish, coral, and sea slugs. Tucked away in a crevice I was lucky enough to see an octopus. The parrotfish were swimming around picking at the coral and I got a picture taken with some clownfish. My dad took tons of photos so I’ll be sure to put those up on Facebook later. It was so tranquil down there that I didn’t want to return to the surface. After nearly freezing to death one of the crew members gave me an extra wetsuit to put on. We had a mandatory 30 minute wait time before we could go back down again. That passed quickly and we suited up and dove down but went a different way along Milne’s reef. It is amazing how just a few feet away you can see completely different fish. 

White Tipped Reef Shark that was sleeping in the sand.

After this dive it was back into the boat to grab some grub and we went to the next reef for our last dive. It was great to get some warm food and hot cocoa in our systems. This boat also had WARM showers. I kid you not they were almost too hot at times. It felt amazing and I was so glad they had them. The crew was very helpful and friendly which made it fun to talk to them about their various adventures on the Great Barrier Reef. When we descended the waves for our last dive I was shocked at first… ummm where was the reef? There was nothing but sand below us but we soon spotted some shadows off in front of us. That is where we went. Giant coral landscapes and channels were there. It was breathtaking. We swam through some and saw the largest turtle I have ever seen in my life. It must have been about 5 feet long and about 4 feet across on its shell alone. Talk about an amazing specimen. (yes the nerd in me coming out again) We also so a couple of white tipped reef sharks sleeping on the sandy bottom and a small ray. The variety was stunning. It was so different from the other place we went it blew my mind away. I would definitely recommend this to anyone. It is a MUST SEE if you go to Australia. 

This turtle was huge! Seriously the biggest one I have ever seen.

The trip back was even bumpier than the way out there but for some reason or another we didn’t get sick at all, which was a huge relief. It was actually really fun! Mina went out on the front of the boat and got a bit of the ocean spray in her face. The waves were really big and the boat sometimes caught them just right so that it was almost like we were flying. It was bittersweet when we saw the mountains looming in the distance. It wasn’t far until shore now and that meant bye bye boat. It was definitely a chance of a lifetime and I loved every second of it. Guess I can check that one off my bucket list.

Random Fact: A ball of glass will bounce higher than a ball made of rubber.

And we just wanted a muffin

When we finished at the Aboriginal village we went to Nondo’s for lunch. It is a delicious chicken place and would highly recommend it to anyone if you can find one.  We walked around town for a while and stopped at a local grocery store called Woolworths. Mina wanted a muffin so we walked over but as we got in the store the lady who worked there told us about a drawing and entered us all into it for a $25 gift certificate. They picked the winner a few minutes later and my mom won! We were so happy because Australia is quite expensive so we bought muffins and various sodas along with some gum. It was all quite tasty. It was a great day and now we had some yummy food for our breakfast before the trip on the reef the next day. They were really good muffins too. Just shows you that surprises can happen on vacation too.

Random Fact: Americans did not commonly use forks until after the Civil War.

Ladies Didgeridon’t but Guys Didgeridoo

After arriving in Australia we caught a cab to our hotel. It was Mina’s birthday so we went to eat at this restaurant called Outback Jacks. It is very similar to Outback in the states and the food was pretty good but the service sucked. They don’t have a set waiter they just kind of rotate so they don’t  keep track of your drinks very well. We only got one glass of water and they were really slow bringing the food. Mina and I split the ribs and they were delicious. Most everyone else got steak. Living in Thailand we are all kinda deprived of our meat. Luckily for us Australians love their meat and it is in abundance here. We walked around the Cairns city area before heading “home” at the Hilton. We were wiped out!

The next day we went to a traditional aborigine village called Tjapukai. The aboriginal people have lived in Australia for thousands of years. This specific tribe had their own language, which is different from all the others. They had their own territory and were known as the Rain forest people. Based on the location of the Aborigines they adapted to their environment. The people from the desert were much taller with blonder hair while the rain forest people are much shorter with dark skin and wiry hair. Rainbow was the name of a guy who grew up in this particular tribe of aborigines. He told a few stories of his family including one about his grandfather who lived to be around 100 years old. But now they only have a lifespan of about 30 to 40 years before they pass on. He said this is due to the new processed food that they eat. Speaking of the food they eat they actually eat more toxic and poisonous foods than any other group of aborigines. They have this “black bean” that they have to soak for 5 days before all the toxins are all removed.

The men all go out to hunt and would use different types of boomerangs, spears, and shields. Kangaroos were a common food source along with other marsupials and deer if they could be found. A large majority of their diet though was just fruits and grasses. They have a plant that looks kinda like a large pineapple, but the name eludes me, that was like a giant caffeine shot. It is the equivalent of 50 cups of coffee and men would eat it before hunting. There was also something called the cheese fruit, which smells like cheese and supposedly can cure Cancer. Pretty neat! We were able to throw a boomerang and Jared nearly caught his but tripped as he ran for it so the guy let him keep it anyway. None of us came that close and Dad barely got his off the ground. We all had a good laugh watching everyone show their warrior skills. Next we got to throw a spear and Jared and I were by far the best of the family. We didn’t hit any of the “kangaroo targets” but at least our spear went straight. It was a lot of fun.

Another awesome thing was the Didgeridoo… only men could play them and they were used in ceremonies. Women were not allowed to play them or even look at them for fear that they would fall pregnant. *insert awkward humor* We couldn’t help but laugh at that. Rainbow one of the aborigine men played for us and told us how to play it. We tried later in the store where they have tons of them but were not very successful. Didgeridoos can be made out of several different woods but they need to be hollow. Termites do most of the work and hollow out the middle then they are cleaned up, stripped of their bark, and painted. Some of the ones in the shop were really ornate and the price tag that came with them showed. The most expensive one was  $5000! That is in AUS dollars, which is about $1.18 US dollars. It was all hand carved and beautiful along with being a huge hollowed tree. The longer and wider the didgeridoo the lower the pitch and it was interesting to see the difference between them. Rainbow said it took him a year to learn how to properly play the didgeridoo. It took him 3 months just to get the breathing down which is circular meaning that you breathe in as you vibrate your lips and breathe out. I certainly couldn’t do that. Overall, it was a fascinating to see the equivalent to Native Americans here in Australia.

Random Fact: Emus and kangaroos cannot walk backwards, and are on the Australian coat of arms for that reason.

Jabba the Gut

First of all I must pay my respect where it is due and thank my brother Jared Edwards for inspiring the title of this post. Like any vacation you go into it excited to relax and eat yummy food. And just like any vacation you find yourself like a caterpillar engorged and ready to hull up in a cocoon for a few days just to get rid of the “fat sweats”. Yes, it is the infamous food coma. Somewhere between Gelato ice cream and delicious Satey it hit me. Now for those who have seen me eat before they know I can put away a lot of food for my size but in the summer months when I am not hustling from class to class my appetite tends to trail off a bit. But I can’t pass up that one more bite of delicious oven fired pizza or fried Balinese banana pancake. It would be a shame to let it go to waste right?

So now as I am sitting in the airport in Bangkok waiting for my next flight to Brisbane before heading on to Cairns Australia I’m regretting that extra bite of Oreo blizzard. One cannot live off of fast food alone! Well, or plane food… but that is hardly food. Still, I must say the last flight from Bali to Bangkok had decent food. I normally am not coherent when they come along asking whether you want chicken or some other concoction but this time I was determined to stay awake. The winner? Chicken curry and rice with some sort of vegetable that looked like Swiss chard. It was actually quite tasty. Even the cake dessert was good. It was moist and not dried out like the rolls. Jared ate most everyone’s salads cause they had tuna. That is the one downfall of planes, if there is anything remotely potent like tuna is it stinks up the plane for the rest of the flight.

About that flight…. It pretty much was a flying torture chamber. Yeah I guess you could say I’ve become kind of a frequent traveling snob. I know what I like and don’t like on flights and this one had well, good food I suppose, but that is it! There were no air nozzles that you could turn to relieve you from the stagnant disease ridden air. There were no televisions on the back of the seats to relieve your boredom. It did have a large projector in the middle but it was so poor quality that the people directly in front of it probably couldn’t have seen it if they tried. The seats were not the best but manageable and the blanket they gave you if you could call it that was rather ratty looking. When we first got on the plain I could have sworn they were trying to boil us. I’m not going to lie as they approached with the drinks the ice bucket looked rather refreshing. Needless to say it was a long 4 hour flight. I survived though and I hope and pray the next flight to Australia has comfy seats and some nice movies to watch. Above all I will be excited to slouch into the bed at the hotel when we arrive. Last but not least I’d like to give a birthday shout out for my sister Mina. Happy 17^th birthday! For you we give you an Aisle or Window seat and plane food galore :P Sounds like a great birthday right? Well we will land in Australia before dinner so we’ll treat her right then. Our flight takes off at 11:59 so we’ll sing her happy birthday in the air. That’s all for now… next time I post I’ll be in a land down under.

Random Fact: Farmers in England are required by law to provide their pigs with toys.

Gone Bananas

The town of Ubud in Bali is home to a place where you can go and interact with the local Macaques. These monkeys live in a special area specifically dedicated to them. To tourists and locals it is known as the Monkey Forest. You have to pay to get in and you can buy bananas by the bunch to give to the monkeys. Surprisingly you really don’t even have to go inside in order to see a few monkeys. They wander around the streets near the sanctuary and they even came to breakfast one morning before the staff scared them away. These monkeys were a barrel of fun to say the least. From their sporty Mohawk hairdos to their funny little beards they had us all laughing. At the front gate we bought 3 bunches of bananas for about 50k RP or 6 US dollars. Before my mom could even hide them away in her bag a rather dominant and rambunctious male macaque came and snatched a whole bunch of bananas away from her. He scurried off and sat on top of the statue at the entrance of the forest proudly enjoying his feast. We were all laughing and saying how “Bananas equal death”.

The bad part about the first monkey grabbing the bananas is now all the other monkeys at the entrance knew that we had them too. They are smart little critters. A few of them followed us but a rather brave one jumped up onto my mom and climbed up her until it could reach at her bag. Of course the natural reaction for my mom was to scream and start spinning around and shove the monkey off. One of the Balinese workers started yelling… “Madam give the monkey the banana madam. Don’t shove the monkey. Just walk away and it will jump off.” Well this was partially true. It did get a banana and it did jump off when she started walking away. The guy later explained that they can get aggressive and bite if they don’t get what they want. It had rained earlier that morning so the ground was all muddy and well now so was my mom.

The next person to be accosted by these particularly cheeky primates was Lindsey. She is the smallest of all of us and was trying to hide a banana in her fist but to no avail. They can smell it. It climbed up her and tried to get it as she squealed and threw the banana. We had a bit of fun with the monkeys passing off the bananas from person to person and watching them try to guess who had it. We even saw some other tourists playing Monkey in the Middle, literally, with a few furry friends. We were all laughing, as the monkey would run back and forth before they eventually got the banana. They are really fast!

It was really pretty in the monkey forest and they had trails and temples hidden within its depths. There was a stream that ran through it and statues too. We learned from a local man that the local tribe uses the cemetery there and their dead are buried there for 5 years before they are dug up and cremated. Their ashes are then carried to the sea. I thought it was rather odd to just bury your dead for 5 years and then disturb them to cremate the remains. Seems kind of disrespectful for the dead to not allow them to rest in peace. Apparently the cremation ceremony is a big deal for them as well. To each his own I suppose. 

Perhaps the best part was just goofing off with the monkeys. There is a reason why they say monkey see monkey do. We saw some absolutely tiny baby monkeys and it is funny because they are so dark compared to their lighter parents. They almost look black! My dad as we were walking around saw one monkey and said “wow that one has a tumor.” After looking at it closer we discovered that it was really just a baby monkey clinging to its mother’s stomach and he had seen its feet. We all laughed at that. Those silly monkeys could get quite cheeky with one another and it was fun watching them groom each other and check for bugs. They really do a thorough job. It makes me laugh looking at their behavior and some of our own human behaviors and I think to myself we really aren’t so different after all and yet so far from being the same. The Monkey forest was tons of fun and a highlight of our Bali trip.

Random Fact: Of all the candy that is produced in a year 65% of it is consumed by American adults 18 years and older.