Category Archives: Around the world

Around the world

Costa Rica Part II

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The Digs

Following my father’s advice (who is also my husband’s domestic partner… we have an interesting family dynamic, but that’s for a different blog post), we stayed at a vegetarian, self-sustaining kibbutz-like hotel called Lands in Love in the middle of nowhere owned and operated by 19 Israelis (insert any number of jokes here). The place was surprisingly modern, with functional internet and nice looking furniture.

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Israeli decor in the lobby.

Though we were skeptical at first, we ended up loving the vegetarian dishes that they served (their soy hamburger is surprisingly delicious and similar to the real thing). Plus Marcos got to eat as much hummus as his little heart desired, which was fun for him and not-so-fun later in the room for me.

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We forgot to take eating pictures during this vacation, so we had to dig into the stash of past Marcos-stuffing-his-face-with-hummus photos for the post… this one is dated May 2013 in Israel.

The rooms were set up in such a way that no matter where you stayed, you had an amazing view of the jungle around you. According to my dad there were monkeys all around us in the trees, but we didn’t end up seeing any.

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Mexican decor outside of the room.

During the day, the hotel organized several tours that we could attend – we went on a few, which will be described in separate posts.

December is clearly not the height of their busy season, because the place was deserted during our whole stay – there were maybe 10 other people in the whole place, which made for a romantic – if not slightly creepy – stay. All in all, we really enjoyed our time there and would recommend them to anyone desiring a vacation in middle of nowhere, Costa Rica.

Around the world

Costa Rica Part I

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After a decidedly slow year at The MKX®, the CEO, in a desperate attempt to revive this rapidly declining blog, has once again hired me as a freelance correspondent and sent me on an all-expense paid trip to Central America for some fresh material. I couldn’t turn down this offer, and that’s how I found myself deep in the jungles of the tropical and beautiful Costa Rica for four days of nonstop rain and nonstop excitement. As per my boss’s instructions, I will post about said exciting days in a series of blog posts spread out over several days in order to keep the ratings high and leave you, dear readers, on the edge of your seats desperately awaiting more (coincidentally this is the same strategy my boss used in the years leading up to our courtship – I’m still waiting for the good part).

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Beautiful Jungle
Middle of Nowhere, Costa Rica

Around the world

Romantic Adventures in Cambodia

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Well, it’s finally happened… the years I invested in courting, becoming engaged to, and most recently marrying The MKX® head honcho have finally paid off, because I’ve been given the world’s first ever guest spot! It was no easy feat, but let this be a lesson to you all – dreams really can come true, with the right combination of prayer, hard work and determination.

So what I want to share today, in what I hope is my first of many guest posts, is one of the adventures Marcos and I experienced on our recent trip to Asia. We were in Siem Reap, Cambodia on an intense, packed three-day itinerary planned by our wonderful tuk tuk driver, Barang. We had an awesome time exploring Angkor Wat and saw many incredible temples. Barang promised us a romantic, sunset boat ride to end our three-day experience, and we were looking forward to it – he had Marcos at “romantic”!

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Barang, Marcos, and Tuk Tuk

So finally, the day arrived. It was pouring rain and we had to drive through many unpaved dirt roads to get to our boat. If you’ve never ridden in a tuk tuk while it’s pouring on unpaved muddy roads… then you really should get out more often! But you should also know that it gets a bit bumpy. And by that I mean I swear I could literally feel my brain bouncing around inside of my skull the entire ride [editor’s note: too much empty space?], which isn’t as pleasant as it may sound. Upon finally arriving at our destination, bodies somehow still intact, we were told that the cost per person was $20. This may not seem like a lot by American standards, but to put it in perspective, a two-person dinner at a nice restaurant in downtown Siem Reap with milkshakes and beers, including taxes and tip, cost us $9. So we were skeptical, to put it mildly, but at that point we were already way too far into the journey to turn around (plus I couldn’t put my poor head through the drive again). We figured that for $20, we would be going on an elite cruise with dinner and drinks included, which sounded fun, so we paid and began our adventure.

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Around the world

Kopi Luwak

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There is a scene in The Bucket List where Jack Nicholson is making some of the most expensive coffee in the world in a complex machine. He explains to Morgan Freeman that the beans go through the digestive track of some animal. I thought it was all made up for the movie. Turns out it wasn’t.

On our recent trip to Indonesia, we went to a small farm in Bali. In there they made Kopi Luwak. This is known to be the most expensive coffee in the world, sometimes sold for $50 USD or more a cup. Thankfully, if you don’t factor in the cost of getting my butt to this place, the coffee ends up being no more than your regular cup of Starbucks Iced-Venti-Mochachino-Espresso-Latte-Double-Skim-Vanilla with whipped cream (hold the sugar).

This is what a Luwak, a.k.a. Asian palm civet looks like:

A caged Luwak is probably not a happy Luwak.

Turns out these things like to eat mature coffee beans. But they can’t digest the beans. So they poop it. The final product looks just like my poop after eating lots of corn:

Luwak shit is the shit.

Alone, these would make excellent biscotti replacements. But in Bali they take it further. The coffee beans are thoroughly washed – supposedly (and I certainly hope so) the beans are perfectly fine for consumption – but their chemistry is altered due to the animal’s digestive juices reacting with the beans. Then they are traditionally roasted, ground, and prepared as normal Turkish coffee. Yummy!

So how is it? Honestly, it’s very good. Yes, you can tell the difference. It is less bitter and less acidic than your usual coffee, yet it tastes very much like coffee. I wouldn’t pay $50 USD for a cup – maybe I’m just not rich enough. But I was able to afford about a pound at Balinese farm prices, I had an outstanding cup of coffee, and I get to blog about rat poop drink. All in all, undoubtedly a worthy investment.

Handsome tourist.
Handsome cup of Luwak coffee.
“Hmmm… doesn’t smell like poop.”