For Lauren hell is the million bites she has on her shoulders. We suspect they're from bed bugs at the hostel in Chiang Mai. I was vaguely worried the place might have given me body lice. I don't think it did but everytime I have an indiscreet itch I get concerned again.
For me hell was the bus ride from Chiang Mai to Pai. The bus was designed for people smaller than me, it's that simple. My upper leg was just longer than the space between two seats. With someone on the seat next to me and someone in the AISLE next to me, I didn't have much wiggle room. At some points I couldn't even rest against the seatback because the person standing behind me was holding the seat back for balance. The bus was full, then they started piling bags of rice in the aisle, then, after driving a bit, they started letting more people on bus, and THEN we go to the curvy part of the drive. I couldn't fall asleep becasue I would have fallen off my seat if I had (it was a winding road and I was only half on on the seat in the first place). The people standing up were holding a handrail for balance. While sitting - albeit with only one cheak on the seat - I was holding on to the SAME handrail for balance. It would have been comedic if it wasn't hellish.
