The Youngrens

Saturday, March 6, 2010

iChat Q&A with Colorati

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The day before we left Singapore to return back to the US we had the privilege of being interviewed by our good friend Leon Sandoval of Colorati. We chatted about everything from running a business while traveling around the world to how we got started to the different business roles Erin and I have – it was a TOTAL blast

So, hop on over to the Colorati Blog and check out the video! And be sure to leave a comment

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Friday, March 5, 2010

Lovers of Fried Chicken

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We’re back. If you follow us on Twitter or Facebook, you already know it – The Youngrens are stateside once again.

Jeff and I landed in LAX on Wednesday, which means we’ve been home for a couple of days now. This is the point in our trip where we do two things: (1) analyze just how well our bodies are doing with jetlag (“So am I tired because I’m bored, or because its 3:00am in Singapore?”) and (2) reminisce about everything we miss in Asia.

For example, Jeff and I were driving to an engagement session yesterday (yup, we’re already shooting. We define the term “hit the ground running”), and we drove past a KFC at which we have never eaten nor do we ever plan to. As we passed it, I groaned, “Awww! Look Jeff! It’s that one KFC!”

Jeff looked over and replied in his own groan, “Oh man, I miss KFC so much!”

In order to understand this story you need to understand that Southeast Asians love fried chicken. At least, this is what we gathered by the enormous number of Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurants and KFC knock-off restaurants that are strewn about the region. I’m not kidding. You would expect this of McDonald ’s or Starbucks or Burger King, which are on every street corner as well, but KFC? As in fried chicken and coleslaw? As in The Colonel? Yup, the one and only. With any city or village we traveled to, we could count on finding a night market, a large amount of children selling us scarves, and at least one KFC. Many times right across the street from a Starbucks. So even though we never actually ate there during our two months, by the time our last weeks came around, we started craving popcorn chicken and biscuits with honey like crazy!

Anyways, now that we’re home for a few days, its time to pack up again. Over the next month, we’ll be in Las Vegas for WPPI and Chicago and Costa Rica for weddings. We won’t actually get to settle down at our house until we return in April. Still, I’m so excited to share some more images with you from our adventures, starting with yet another jewel from Erawan Falls in Kanchanaburi, Thailand. Let me know when you get sick of waterfalls ok? Thailand is so stinkin’ gorgeous that I could be poppin’ these things out for weeks! Kind of like popcorn chicken…

As always, we have a good friend of ours living at our house to take care of Gracie, so no need to worry about our poor kitty who doesn’t have any clue that we’re leaving again. Yes, we feel extremely guilty about it. We may never be able to have children if we feel this guilty about leaving a cat behind!

Hugs,
Erin

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Saturday, February 27, 2010

Jumping In

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Right now I’m sitting at the little desk in our hotel room in Kuala Lumpur. Jeff is catnapping in the other room. I’m wrapped up in a robe, with my feet tucked inside those cushy white hotel sandals that you find in the closets wrapped in plastic. Its twilight outside.

I am writing because I want to document this, right now, and put it inside our mental scrapbook. It’s cheesy, I know. It’s like shaping my fingers into a rectangle in front of my face and exclaiming “Click!” as I pantomime taking a picture of a dinner conversation. While winking. And apparently that’s slightly annoying. My friends have made that abundantly clear. So I’m going to set down my finger camera next to my laptop for a few minutes and blog about my most recent finger camera moment instead.

I was sitting by the hotel pool earlier this afternoon listening to an audio book on my iPhone. My eyes were closed and I was letting my body melt beneath the warm shade of the pool deck, when through my ear buds I heard a giant splash and felt a smattering of cold pool water land on my legs. I woke up startled, just in time to see Jeff’s head bob up out of the water. He blinked through the water that dripped down his face, shook the water out of his hair, and smiled his Jeffy smile, unaware that I was watching him and apparently unaware that he had splashed anyone. It was a smile that said he was enormously pleased with what he’d just done, and what he had just done was a cannonball. At our five-star resort. In Kuala Lumpur. Everyone else was laying on their pool chairs, sipping cocktails and soaking up the Asian sun, a sea of tan bodies and black sunglasses. As I watched Jeff slowly circle the pool with just his eyes showing above the water like a kid playing “Jaws” in their backyard (this was his signature move), I giggled out loud, a little too loud because of my ear buds, and startled the waiter that was navigating the pool chairs with a mai tai on his tray. When Jeff got out of the pool, I gave him a kiss and said that I loved him.

“What was that for?” he asked, plopping down on his pool chair and shaking his wet hair over my face, making me giggle violently – deeply – as I pushed him away.

So yes, I’m going to say it and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Click.

I’m not so fond of showing pictures of ourselves in our bathing suits for all of the internet to see, but Thailand is the kind of place that you can easily spend 80% of your time playing in some kind of water, be it river or ocean, so our bathing suits became somewhat of our travel uniform during the trip. This picture was taken in Phuket on our little point and shoot camera in its underwater casing (which we had WAY too much fun with), and its definitely one my favorite images that *may* end up in a frame next to our bed at home. I wouldn’t mind being reminded of this deliriously happy moment right before I fall asleep every night.

Nope, I wouldn’t mind at all.

Hugs,

Erin

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Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Our Last “Hurrah”

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Jeff and I only have a week left in Asia, so what are we doing? We’re sleeping. And eating. And then napping. You know, before we go to bed again.

Don’t judge. We’re on vacation people.

In the middle of all of this extreme laziness, though, we have built up enough gumption to pull ourselves out of our Singapore coma and spend a few days in Kuala Lumpur, which is just a few hours north of us in Malaysia. We’ve decided to live it up in style for this last “hurrah” of a trip, so we booked a fancy schmancy hotel with a real flushing toilet and everything. This means that instead of packing a backpacker’s pack, we’re packing our rolling suitcase – we’re so posh, I know – and I’m finally packing the heels that I brought with me all the way from America and haven’t worn yet. Which has surprised even me. But just try walking around Singapore for one day and you’ll write off heels too, I promise.

Which makes me wonder, is it weird that the thing I miss most about America is that I’ll get to wear something other than my Rainbows? If I start wearing heels to the beach when I get home, just know that I need a little time… it’ll pass…

So we’re sleeping and eating and napping until it’s time for our last trip in Southeast Asia, but here’s a few images from my absolute favorite two hours of my entire life – riding and bathing with elephants in Kanchanaburi, Thailand. This first one is our buddy, Josh, riding the elephant ahead of us. The second is me loving life way too much, AKA feeding an elephant a banana. I was so happy, I think I cried. And I’m being dead serious. I’m pretty sure Jeff got it on video, but that video somehow disappeared. Weird.

Hugs,

Erin

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