Pack It In, Pack It Out

New Years Resolutions and Trip Financials

2012-01-25T22:39:00.000-08:00

Now that the holidays have passed and I'm not working everyday, I'll be writing a bit more. For my first post of the new year, I figured it'd be appropriate to share and talk about new years resolutions. Also, I want to make good on a promise to go through my trip financials.

To start with, I'm not huge on resolutions. They always seem to me to be promising to make up for some default in character, something that you don't like about yourself or change something that you are doing wrong in life. Here's a few typical resolutions - get in shape, lose weight, get a better paying job, give to charity, etc. Those to me seem to be focusing on the negatives that exist in your life. While they may be steps towards positive improvements, the resolution and improvements will constantly remind you of what the negative thing was to begin with and so you never quite rid yourself of the negative feelings associated with the pre-resolution. Plus, we should aim to let go of attachments and aim to be happy with the now. I know that is harder said than done and that sometimes it takes effort (and therefore resolution) to bring oneself to that point.
So, instead of trying to change stuff you don't like, why not focus on positive things like your dreams and try making a "Dreamline". A dreamline is a document that Tim Ferris made popular in his book 4HWW. The point of it is to write down your dreams, of course, but the difference is that it is only for 6 to 12 months (depending on the timing you feel works better). Reducing the time frame to a year or less makes it more "real" or tangible. It gives the dreams a sense of urgency and purpose. When filling out your dreamline, you'll later prioritize all the dreams down to about 4 that, "if you accomplished them, would change your life today". The document makes them even more realistic by requiring you to put the steps you will take to making those dreams become a reality today, tomorrow, etc. If you follow the steps required by Tim, you'll also put in your expenses on another linked sheet and requires you to make an educated guess at how much accomplishing each dream will cost, which, when you take both, will give you the income you need daily and monthly to see those dreams become reality.
Here is mine, Dreamline 2012. One thing I particularly like about the dreamline is that it doesn't try to get preachy about your dreams being these grandiose, moral dreams. Look at mine. One of mine that I put on there was a motorcycle. Pretty materialistic, but that's something I really really want. Some are pretty simple, like learning Reiki. That's the beauty, it's whatever your dreams are without judgment just as long as you are actually willing to make an effort at making them come true.
Anyway, I highly recommend switching away from the negative idea of resolutions and switch to the positive idea of making your dreams come true.

Now, for what many have asked for, the Trip Financials.
To begin with, as I was planning the trip, I estimated that it would cost around $25,000. That number was to include lodging, transportation, food, and fun. I knew that this was probably not going to be totally accurate because it becomes extremely difficult to predict changes in exchange rates and flight costs a whole year out. A good example of this was Australia, which hit it's highest ever (and is lower now) exchange to the dollar while I was there and ended up costing about $500 or more extra because of it. Also, I had an excellent discount travel agent who was getting me excellent deals on airfare (my first 6 months cost about $2k and included flights from Seattle to Belize, Belize to Costa Rica, Panama to Colombia, Chile to New Zealand, and New Zealand to Australia). Then, she up and quit her job and I couldn't find one as good as her and had to rely on internet deals, which are usually at least 30% more than she could get and had more restrictions.
I want to make this really clear - I didn't have a really clear schedule of what I was doing. I knew some major spots I was going to hit up, but I certainly did not plan the trip like one does on vacation. In other words, there was must sees and general guidelines, such as stay in the summer the whole year, which dictated what region (or continent) I'd be in and loose timing, or see machu pichu, but that was about it. The rest I left up to chance and how I felt about the place I was in. This makes estimating a little bit harder cause it's up in the air. How I came to the $25k number was using blogs, books, and guides that dealt with daily living expenses, then added in a bit more to cover other stuff.
As it turns out, here is what I spent -
$5,500, Air tickets (plus a $500 ticket that I used from credit card points), includes domestic flights too
$1,000, Travelers checks (probably would not get these again. They are a pain in the ass)
$21,200, in capital for food, buses, board, and fun (sorry, I can't break it out into each of those)
$400, in clothes (full wardrobe replacement, including footware)
This comes out to about $28k. I was actually gone 54 weeks. Since the last 2 weeks were in Scotland (muy expensivo), I had to spend an extra $1k. Plus, I got about $400 in interest from my bank over the year that I used. When all was said and done I spent about $30k.

There were a few things that made it more expensive than it should have been. I was robbed for $250, I missed a flight for $300, I splurged in some places because friends were visiting, and a few minor misjudgments along the way that threw me back a hundred here and there. Since I left with more money (about $27k), I was only about 15% over budget and less than 20% over on my original estimation.
I had also taken into account that I would need some money for home, and I never touched that till I got home. While I set aside about $3k for not having a job, I ended up spending about $1k before I found some income. It helped that Ivy let me stay with her rent free until I found an income.

The big question that you should be asking is, "how much is my trip going to cost me?" There are several things to take into account when judging my expenses vs. what yours may be.
1. I did a ton of movement. I traveled the globe. I was on 4 continents and 27 countries. The longest I spent in one spot was 10 days. If you stay longer in one region, less countries, and longer per place, you will reduce costs significantly, esp in the airfare department.
2. I traveled alone. In many areas, traveling with someone will help not only reduce costs, but get you nicer rooms for what you'd spend by yourself.
3. I avoided long periods in big cities. They are expensive and are fun only for a few days.
4. I spent about 5 of the 12 months in "1st world" countries. For some this is a comfort thing cause they are scarred of the "3rd world" even though they've never been to it. Most people who go to 3rd world countries end up loving them. Why? They aren't scary, they're cheap, they're beautiful, and the people are usually way cool. If you stay in a 3rd world region for a year, you'll spend less than half what I did. I estimate that when I go to Argentina for a year (several years in the future), the total expenses will be about $12k for 1 person for a year (roughly double that since I plan on taking Ivy with me and maybe a kid).
5. I didn't work at all.
6. I stayed in hostels. Obviously, hotels will be more. That's not to say that you can't get a nice room for two in a hostel, esp in 3rd world countries, cause many have nice options. People are just scarred of the things they aren't used to. I also didn't book in advance. If you can book it over the internet in advance, it's usually more expensive than finding a place that you can't.
7. I cooked a lot. With the exception of SE Asia and certain parts of SA, I did a lot of my own cooking. This will reduce costs, esp if you are in the 1st world and don't want to eat healthier - and by healthier, I mean paleo. It will also help if you are traveling with someone.

Those considerations will vary the price a lot. Just remember that you can make it cheaper and still have a great time. In SE Asia, I had to rent a whole room to myself cause they didn't have hostels in most areas. Go around and bargain, and if you have someone to travel with, you can lower your daily expenses to about $15-20 a day. That's MUCH cheaper than home - that's $7k a YEAR, living like a king. If you are able to have a mobile income, you'll make way more real income than you did at home and live somewhere exotic.
Many people are baffled by how cheap travel can be and in the end don't believe it cause they are stuck in the binge vacation paradigm. Mine was more than it could have been due to inexperience. Everyone who has ever dreamed of traveling needs to get this into their head - there are truly amazing places out there that are dirt cheap. Yes, Europe is cool, but there are lots of places out there just as cool for 1/10 the cost. Stop making excuses about costs cause most places you can get work (if you can deal with bartending or other service jobs, gasp!) and actually live somewhere for awhile. GO! Seriously. Save enough for tickets and a couple months in the region and you can make the rest work out if you really want to.

Dream. Dreamline. Live it.
D

A Short Update - Nearing Christmas

2011-12-10T16:17:00.001-08:00

I know there hasn't been too much activity here recently, but I have been super busy. I have been running packages for UPS during the day as a driver helper. Surprisingly, I actually kinda like it. The pay could be better though. Some days I work overtime and get home around 8pm, others it's 6pm. Then, I may have some time to read (currently reading Essential Reiki, Tao Te Ching (Mitchell translation), and The Complete Idiots Guide to Feng Shui) or I may have to cook. If Ivy happens to be home, I tend to not read. I also started working at Zoka Coffee starting today. I'll be working weekends till my gig with UPS is done. So, I hope you can understand why I haven't really had time to write. There are a plethora of things I got floating through my mind that I would like to share and hopefully once I am on a regular part time schedule with Zoka, I'll be able to do so.

I do want to share a few things, like progress on some of the things I talked about doing when I came home from my trip. First, I will be taking a qigong class in January. I found someone that seems, on paper, a pretty good fit. I am supposed to talk to him this weekend to see about maybe trading some work for the classes or some sort of financial help since the classes are over $100. I'm still looking for a reiki master, tai chi master, and maybe someone from the Form School to teach me Feng Shui (which is super fascinating).
The idea behind my choices come from three categories of chi - healing, inner martial arts, and a deeper understanding of chi and how it moves through space and how it changes. I may not follow follow all to their end points, but I want to better understand them and see if they are right for me. Along my travels, reiki seems to have presented itself to me as a way. I feel like it was calling me to it. Tai chi (and qigong, which is similar) interests me because it not only is meditation and self defense, but it has to do with inner alchemy and interacting with chi within and without of the body. This is one that I'm not sure how far I'll go with it. My fear is that I'll get frustrated because I don't feel chi or other benefits, or that I'll "not find time" to do it. The thing is, eventually I want to move, as will naturally fall into place, into meditation techniques.
One thing that many people don't understand is that meditation doesn't have to be sitting silently trying not to think. Meditation is the silencing of thought. In doing so, the mind becomes a vacuum to which the universe fills. In other words, you are one with god, Tao, nature, pure being, etc. Athletes can tell you that at times they have felt this. They usually call it "being in the zone". At certain moments they acted without acting (what has been poorly translated, but is what is meant when sages or monks talk about inaction) - they were void of thought and their bodies didn't require conscious effort. They were connected to the universe for that instant. They'll also tell you how amazing it feels to be in the zone. I have felt that playing sports a few times - you feel an amazing connection or energy and you kinda black out without losing consciousness. I am in the zone a lot when I ski, which is probably why I love it so much. Anyway, the principle that I'm getting at is that there are two types of meditation, silencing the mind through contemplation and through movement. The reason that tai chi appeals to me is that I have a very hard time quieting my mind through sitting around trying not to think. On the other hand, I have had some success, as mentioned, through movement. I think that this may be my path to the way through meditation.
Lastly, feng shui. I experienced some things during my travels that were life changing. One was that I felt, on a few occasions, a current, or ebb and flow, of "energy". Feng shui is more than the others, an intellectual approach to understanding how chi moves and changes through space and time. It doesn't try to explain the why - that is for Taoist philosophy (Tao Te Ching and others) - just the how (see acupuncture and like healing concepts for how it moves and changes within the body). What is interesting isn't that it's scientific, at least by Western ideas of science, but that science seems to agree with it. Take for example how psychologists (which have only existed for less than 200 years really) have described how colors affect mood or how clutter raises stress levels. These things were known in feng shui over 2000 years ago, they just used different words to describe why. What I find truly amazing is that we, the West, are actually behind the East in knowledge of the natural world. Sure, their science seems a little wacky to us, but then again it goes both ways. We tend to feel like it's just a few strange cultists who believe in science performed in these fashions, but it's 3+ billion people that feel their approach is more scientifically sound. Not to mention, it's been around a lot longer than Western science. Anywho, I find it very cool and it helps me visualize a lot of things and understand some concepts about chi better. I don't think I'll go too far with it - maybe just a couple books and if I feel like I'm not getting it, maybe a class or just talking with feng shui masters. I think the most that will happen is personal practice with it within my home and a better understanding of chi.
My progress on simple living has been slow. There are things that are going well and that aren't. Taking a part time job with not a lot of responsibility is a start. I still want to do things like ski and go out occasionally for beers, and it'd be great to have health insurance. Hopefully, Obama will get off his ass and the rest of the country will pull their heads out of theirs so that we can finally have health care for all the citizens of the US. Part of the reason it's been slow is that I am living in a studio apt with my girlfriend. That means that there isn't room for anything. Most of my stuff is still in my parents storage unit. I'd like to be able to pull that out and sell most of it. Why do I have 5 pairs of skis? Why do I have golf clubs? Why do I have most of the shit I have? It's gotta go. I'm going to do my best to persuade Ivy to purge many of the things she has too, though she's going to hate me for it. Here's the basic idea, clutter sucks. If you aren't using your belongings but infrequently, that belonging is clutter and it needs to go. How do you know what belongings are clutter? Do a Pareto analysis on an annual basis (if you wanna step up your simplicity game Pareto your stuff on a monthly basis). The easiest stuff is the things that you use once or twice a year. Many clothes will fall into that category. After that you start getting into sentimentality, but trust me you don't use things as much as you want to believe you do. Learn to let go. You won't miss it when it's gone!
I haven't made much progress in the learn new and travel transferable skills. I know it's only been a month and a half, but I was hoping to get more in in this department. In particular, I want to learn bartending, basic auto-mechanics, learn better English - as in grammar, and improve my Spanish and possibly learn French (good for parts of Africa and Europe and some random other places). It's a lot to do and it'll happen at it's own pace, so I guess I shouldn't worry about it too much.
In addition to those, I am hoping that part time will afford me the time write (hopefully a novel, but I've been toying with some non-fiction ideas), start a business, and continue my studies on nutrition, fitness (I want to get my level one crossfit), agriculture, and some other things that are more just for pleasure. Some people may think I'm nuts not to try to get a full time, well paying job, esp if it's within my capability to do so. The thing is, not only am I not ready to do something like that, I have the above goals and working part time is probably the most effective (and efficient) way of achieving them. At some point, my goals may change and I may be forced to work a higher paying, soul crushing job, but for now I should take advantage of the freedom I have. The strange thing is, I actually kinda like these jobs. They pay shit and sometimes the hours aren't favorable, but they have something about them that I like that I can't put my finger on.
That's all I got for now
D

Final Few Days, Returning Home, and Job Searching

2011-11-17T23:39:00.000-08:00

It’s been a few since I last wrote. A lot has happened… I wrapped up my trip in Scotland, flew home, reunited with Ivy, trying to get a job (or a least an income), and beginning to scope out some of the spiritual thingys out there. It's going to be a long one...

I'll start from the beginning, the last I wrote I was on my way to Edinburgh. I did stop over at Aviemore to look at our “mountain”. The mountain that they set on fire was actually mostly a cliff face and the rest was a craggy hill. I snapped some photos and hiked around for awhile in the park devoted to it which was really pretty. After a few hours, I caught the train to Edinburgh. Side note: One thing I like about most of the trains in Europe is that you buy a ticket without a time. For example, the train runs every 90 min during the day from Aviemore to Edinburgh. If I had have missed the one at 3, I just show up to the next one. No need to change my ticket or anything. End note. On the way to Edinburgh I passed through Sterling. The only reason why I mention it is that Sterling hosts the William Wallace monument.

That's not my picture, by the way. When I rolled through it was very dreary. This giant tower thing has a cliff (not shown) facing the train side. When I saw it I immediately thought of the Lord of the Rings tower - the one where the evil wizard lived.
I spent about 4 nights in Edinburgh. It's a must stop for those rolling through Scotland. It has a long, fucked, history and has maybe the coolest looking castle I've seen on my trip, right in the center of the city. It's a fairly large city and really the tourist area, the area within a square km around the castle, and Aurthor's seat is about the only place a tourist needs to see. The first day I checked in around dinner and met some fun people (a couple Ozzie bloaks, a girl from Chile, Vanessa, and a chick from Toronto, Beth, who ended up staying there the whole time I did). I ended up going out with them to a club. Well, that was a disaster. I tried to imply that I didn't have much money and that I couldn't afford going to a club. We went anyway and I almost got in a fight. Trying to make the most of being in a club, I was dancing with the girls in the group while the guys were at the bar, and the place was crowded, but not so much so that people needed to be moshing you. There was a dude that kept throwing his body into me, so I gave him a gentle butt bump to kinda let him know I was there and to maybe knock it off. This resulted in an elbow to my kidney. When I turned to see what his deal was, he palmed my face. For those of you who know me, I don't even need the 2 beers that I had that night to be sent into seeing red when someone does something like this. So, I shoved him pretty hard and was about to throw a punch when his friend put me in the full nelson and dragged me off. Luckily, this guy didn't try to get in any cheap shots, though because I wasn't struggling with the guy who had me in the nelson, I could've kicked him in the face had he given the indication of harmful intent. Obviously, I was too fired up to stay. I tried. I tried to blow it off, but the guy kept staying in eye contact smirking at me, so I told the guys to watch my back to make sure I didn't get jumped or something and headed home.
The next day the guys took off. Venessa, Beth and I met another Ozzie, Micheal, and a Canadian, Jonny, and we became team success. I can't remember why or how that name came about but it did. Everything we did worked out splendidly. I really had a great time with these folks. They stayed the entire time I was there. The first night we hung out we met a Scot who is teaching there trying to make enough to go to Spain to save his girl friend (weird story). We ended up getting him drunk and he kept talking about banter and chat and viola we ended up at a salsa bar. I refrained from dancing too much here, but enjoyed watching others. Here, the Scot earned his name Crazy Legs, which is why I don't remember his real name, and became a full member of Team Success.
Beth, Micheal, and I spent the next day wandering about seeing the sights, but there isn't much to report other than Beth is insane about food. If she isn't thinking about it, she's eating it. She's in the industry, but still, it was extreme. The next night we went on a ghost tour. Edinburgh is supposed to be a hotspot for those into the afterlife. We found a tour with the creepiest guy around. If you could think of someone creeping around you, this would be creepier. It was an act, but it was dead on. He had some of the group that was waiting around to start the tour freaked out before we even started. The creepy dude took us to two spots, one was under the south bridge and the other was a grave yard. The bridge was supposed to be cursed and was really more interesting from the point of view of history than paranormal stuff. Occasionally, the guide would drop his act, and he seemed like a guy that'd be fun to grab some beers with. Oh, sorry the graveyard (Grey Friars). The grave yard was crazy. It is guessed that there are around 500,000 people buried under it. The topside, it is about a half acre, but it used to be street level with the street under the bridge. Today it is almost level with the bridge. The reason being is that it hold mass graves of 3 rounds of plagues and the victims. There are fantastic stories about drunks (in Scotland???) falling into plague pits in the graveyard. Also, there is a famous story about a dog that visited his masters grave every day. The scariest story is that this was the first death camp. There is a side part of the graveyard that at one point in time held the prisoners of a religious rebellion against the king of England. They were chained to each other during the winter and not allowed to talk, move, and were fed less than a slice of bread a day. The only way they'd be let go is if they renounced their oath to the rebellion (and essentially god). I can't remember the amount that survived, but it wasn't much more than 5%. There are many attacks on people who enter that walled side mausoleum yard. The tour guide got into his serious, not playing the creepy guy mode here and explained what his experiences had been, what he would do while we were there and how long we could stay to the minute and everything. We didn't know it until later, but Michael had a run in with something. He told us later at the bar that while we were in one of the mausoleums he had something squeezing his wrist. We had one of the deepest spiritual conversations I've ever had at that bar.
While something squeezing your wrist might not amount to an experience in your mind, I can assure you what he had to say at breakfast did. That night, he was attacked several times in his bed. During the night he was awakened by a force sitting on his chest so that he couldn't sit upright and started strangling him. The first time it happened, he didn't know what to do and finally turned on his side and it was gone. The second time it happened, he tried to fight against it, but it tightened around his throat and he tried calling out to anyone in the room, but couldn't get the breath out to make a noise. It abruptly stopped and he didn't know what to do. He was scared to sleep. He eventually did, but it happened one last time and all he could think was to yell out that he was sorry to trespass and that'd he stay away. You could see in his eyes the fear of reliving the moment when he was telling the story to me in the morning. I remember reading some of the experiences from a book that the creepy dude kept that people from the tour wrote. Many described what ever attacked them in the graveyard had followed them home. Even the guide had this happen. He was so freaked out that he slept at his brothers, who threw him out because some menacing force was in the room. For me, esp cause I wasn't attacked, the tour was not scary, but it was worth the money for how well the guide did.

The next day we decided to do some life affirming things like ride bikes, climb hills, and take in cozy joints. It was a vintage day. We went up to Aurthor's Seat, which is a mountain in the middle of the city. You don't find too many cities these days where there is a mountain bam! right in the middle. All and all, I really loved these guys and it was a magical time. I decided it was in my best interest to stay in Glasgow (where my flight home was) overnight instead of try to get out there the next day and go straight to the plane.
It was a good idea, yes, cause Ivy was starting to get pissed. Before I get to that though, let me just wrap up my trip with saying that I met up with a couple girls I met in Inverness who were from Germany, but going to school or something. I had dinner with them and a drink at one of Glasgow's only areas worthy of note (iow Glasgow isn't worth going to). It was nice to have some friendly faces see me off. OK, so Ivy... Ivy and I, while broken up, had kept in more or less contact along my trip. She ended up coming out to Thailand to see me. After that, I think we both saw that there was likely a real future for us. As about a month approached to when I was flying home, we were pretty much deciding on not only were we for sure getting back together, but that I would most likely be living with her temporarily when I returned. Part of that reason is that if I lived with my mom for a month + one of us would be in jail for murder. The other part is that, well, why not. We're young, we're stupid, fuck it. Anyway, I had given Ivy the option of picking me up at the airport or not knowing when I'm coming home. She told me times and days that she could not do it and since they wouldn't work, she didn't get to know. I let her know that I'd be home for a friend's halloween party, but as time drew near I had to rely on tactics to throw her off course of my return. Maybe, she can add a comment below to describe what was going on with her. My tactics involved telling her that the internet wasn't working and trying to stay off it. Of course I couldn't do that for a full week to her, so I did talk to her one night, but I was doing my best to throw her off while trying to mitigate her agitation of being over schedule. Anyway, she had friends and family on notice for my return and was sending irritated messages.
I flew home on the 27th of Oct. My mom picked me up and of course cried. It was sweet of her though. My dad in his usual fashion was not there. Not because he didn't want to be, but because he got the times screwed up (not the first time, he is truly not good with being in the right place at the right time). He thought something may have went awry when I called him from the airport. Don't worry, Don and my mom, my brother Dan and his gf Heidi, and my dad all went out to dinner when I got into the Seattle area. It was extremely tough for me to sit there and talk after we'd had dinner. I think it was pretty evident what was on my mind cause everyone started wrapping up conversations and skulled their beer. At about 9:30 I showed up at Ivy's door with a wooden flower (not to be mistaken for anything but the literal meaning of those words). She had just removed everyone off Dylan watch and had gotten ready for bed. It was one of those moments in life I will never forget. Izze of course barked his god damn head off and freaked her out, but she peaked through the window not expecting me. But, and get this, it was me! Bam! She had a good 20 minute cry in my arms and I didn't want to let go. The feeling was such that if I let go, I'd wake up and be somewhere in the world and realize that I had only been asleep, and so I couldn't and didn't.
Sometimes I feel like, is it fair that I got the trip of many lives and the girl in the end? No, but life's not fair :)

So, that was my homecoming. Then, reality set in...
The next day I felt major depression. It set in that I was no longer on this amazing journey. I hadn't really even ventured out to see what had changed, if anything, and all I wanted was to either leave or curl up in a ball and pout. Luckily, I had Ivy. She came home and consoled me and I felt a lot better. Without her I think the transition into the wacky non-real world of American life would have been a lot more difficult without her. So, I pulled my head out and started trying to play the silly game of getting in the swing of American life. First step was obviously to get a job. But I've returned with a voracious hunger for knowledge. Don't get me wrong, I've always enjoyed learning, but it's different; it's as if I'm making up for lost something. Sure, I learned more in the last year than I did in the last 28 years, but it isn't enough. The cup always feel dry. What I'm saying is that I need a job, but I shouldn't be so eager to stop being a kid. Iow (in other words), I shouldn't be so eager to jump into something "career" like. I realized a few days ago, that I should be applying for part time work. Money will be tighter than I've ever had to deal with, but it will provide opportunities that full time won't. Learn to bartend for free? Learn reiki? Ski backcountry when conditions are right? Freedom to learn things like car mechanics or to start one of the business' I've been knocking around in my head? It's time I put my money where my preachy little mouth is. It's time I start living simply; Learn reiki; Learn Feng Shui; Learn Tai Chi; Learn skills that I could take to other countries and work there with or that would aid with my goals; set a new dream timeline; make the world a better place. Yeah, lofty, right? Near impossible fulltime. Having a big wage would be awesome, but all it would accomplish is me saving enough to leave again soon. Yes, I plan to LTR in Africa, India, Tibet, and more of Asia, Europe, and live in Argentina for awhile, but right now there are other goals I want to accomplish first. The more I think about it, the more I think some part time work would help accomplish those goals. I plan on posting my new years dreamline (I'm replacing resolutions with this from now on). So, look for that. I'll also post detailed financials (including budgeting on return) and maybe a wrap up of sorts.

One last thing before I sign off, I want to discuss a little of the spiritual things I've looked into since returning. I tried looking around for some reiki training and tai chi. I haven't found any solid leads on reiki that's not advertised. I'll check that out, but it seams a little off if they are advertising. Like it's about money and not the practice. Plus, what I got from my trip is that you can't force it, it'll come when it's ready. I'll check out the people since I haven't had any leads elsewhere, but if I have the slightest vibe, I'll kick some dirt. I figured tai chi would be free since I see people do it in the park, but that doesn't appear to be the case. It may be more like a gym membership and I can't afford that without a job. I might be able to work a work exchange with the teacher, but I need to start meeting with them to see if I jam with them.
Ivy has been putting up with my spiritual quest well. She has come with me to the two things that I've gone to so far. The first was a meditation class. It was one type (and there are many with many different intentions). This one was one of the simplest I've heard of. It involved finding a comfortable position, closing your eyes gently while looking at some point straight ahead in the darkness. To control your mind from zipping this way and that, you repeated the name of whatever god you believe in. Only really experienced meditators can preempt their mind from wandering and clear it totally, but this method helps those of us who have a hard time because it occupies the mind. Well, the newer you are to it the more it will wander, then you'll realize it is and realize you kinda slacked on repeating the name and doing so will bring you back from wandering. The only trouble that I'm having with it is that I don't have a name for god. I don't subscribe to any religions. The closest thing I have right now is Taoism, but I don't know any names of god other than maybe yang. It distracts me and makes it hard to meditate. I'm going to email some of the people I met and see what they suggest.

The second was meeting a shaman. I had the opportunity to listen to what a real life shaman has to say about spirituality. Some of it was very interesting and had parallels to what I've learned and experienced. Some of it I really felt was fluff or was even too much for me. Two things that drives me nuts about most religions and about what she had to say are a human centered universe and simple solutions to peace on earth. The first is that we were created not just for a purpose, but that the universe (or god) is conspiring to help us and that everything that exists is part of that help to us. This is not true, no matter what you believe. We are no more important than a tiger, slug, trout, etc. We've been blessed with some pretty amazing gifts that we don't understand, but being meaning more than anything else is not one of them. There is no special purpose for us, get over it. The simple solutions like, "if we all do this, than we'll all feel love stop doing bad things to each other and the world will be saved", are bullshit. I don't get why all people who are spiritual have some phrase like this. That is stupid. There is no easy answer like that. There are very hard answers and I know most of them and they are not love and joy. Those are amazing things, but not answers. I feel like most people live in the following situation: they have just fallen from a window and they close their eyes and tell themselves that gravity isn't real. Is there a way to save themselves, yes, but they refuse to open their eyes cause they are too scared to do it. Instead, they'll go on trying to convince themselves that gravity isn't real and break their neck.
There are some very hard truths we are going to have to deal with in order to keep some semblance of a life we are accustomed to. The current thinking towards it is not a solution, but nor is pretending that love is going to save the planet.
I don't want to end on a negative note like that, so...

P.S. To settle the bet from the beginning, I gained weight. I gained about 6 or 7 lbs. Sure that doesn’t seem like that much, but consider that in Europe I was eating primarily carbs. I looked at my body when I returned and it was definitely a different composition. I most likely lost some muscle and put on a bit more fat. So, in reality I probably added about 10-15 lbs of fat. I’ve only been home for a couple weeks and eating strict paleo has already started making a visible change in my body. YAY!

A Little Grantime

2011-10-22T02:27:00.000-07:00

It seems fitting, in some way, that although I left without any need to find myself, I am here in the land of my ancestors finding shit out about myself. Well, not really about me, just about where I came from; my roots, if you will. I'm glad I saved this part for last (or close enough to last). It seems to wrap things up well. This post will be about Inverness and Grantown, but mostly about the Clan Grant, so if you don't care about cool shit this will bore you.

First, Inverness (pro
nounced in.ver.ness). Inverness is located at the north end of Loch Ness, the famous lake with the monster, Nessie, which I'll talk about my experience with later. It's fairly small, but then so are most cities in Scotland. It has a castle that they rebuilt after destruction, but you can't go inside unless you are going to court. The town also is along the sea, though there aren't many great places to hangout along it.
The historical importance for the Grants is that this is where the public record of the surname pops up. The first Grant of record was Sir Lawrence le Grant, sheriff of Inverness in 1260. As time went on the clan took as much advantage of feudalism as possible. The system makes those who own land powerful. Over time, the Grants main territory was that of the northwest Loch Ness and that of Strathspey (this is where more than half of the scotch whisky distillers are) and Rothiemurchas in the highlands. Some of my favorite legends are that the Grants decended from Odin and that the name was given for their grand feats of valour, and another was that they were descendants of the first king of Scotland along with the MacGregors.
Anyhow, the part that lived on the west of Loch Ness at one time were given a castle by the king of England. We weren't the first, but we were the last. The story goes that the king Alexander in the 1200's established the early design of the castle (though there was likely a stronghold there before that was owned by local picts) when he defeated an uprising and used it to put some loyalists there to control further uprisings. Later, during the time of Scotland's war for independence, think William Wallace and Robert the Bruce, the castle switched hands a bunch. Then, the MacDonalds came and started fucking shit up trying to gain power. They held it for a time till the Crown seized it back and gave it to the Grants. The Grants had it mostly, every now and again the MacDonalds would come and raid it or briefly take it, for two hundred years till they were ordered by the king to blow it up in 1692. Then a big storm and local inhabitants taking materials finished the job a few decades later and you get what you see today.
I decided I would ride a bike there as the weather had been decent recently. This proved to be wet and cold. It was 16 miles, mostly uphill, to the castle from Inverness and the rain came intermittently while the headwind was constant. It was enough of a pain in the add that I took a bus back. I did stop at the Nessie museum, but didn't feel like paying to go in. Mostly, it was to get out of the rain and dry off a little. The castle is obviously in ruins, but it is really worth seeing because it sits on a corner of land right on Loch Ness and still has enough structure left to be interesting from that perspective.
Back in Inverness, I had a great time with the guys and gals working for the hostel, as well as some people just visiting. We went out 2 of the nights I was there. Nothing hard, just cause we didn't want to sit around. The first night there was a bar with an authentic "band" playing. I put quotes because its not a band in the traditional sense; the musicians don't really know each other, or at least don't practice together. They just show up and jam out traditional Scottish folk music. It was neat to see, and really amazing how good they were without practicing with each other. I was told that it is rare to still find this today. After returning to the hostel, each female staff member tried to have a 3 some with another female staff member and her boyfriend. The boyfriend wasn't super thrilled (nor would I have been if you follow me) scared one away, who was a lesbian, by chasing her around the kitchen with his dick out. Good times...
Anyway, the next stop was Grantown-On-Spey, or just Grantown (pronounced Gran.ton) for short. As the name implies, it was a town that was built by the clan in the latter part of the 1700's. It was an effort to keep the Clan strong during a time when all the wealthy land owners were clearing their lands (including the Grants) by bringing in industry and jobs to keep the Clan from moving away. It turns out the Grants did a pretty good job, esp compared to other clan's wealthy members that just told their the poorer farming members to fuck off. Sure, its not a city, just a small town, but it has everything you need. Plus, its surrounded by awesome forests, mountains, rivers, lakes, and the ocean is only about 30 min away. I was welcomed to the town with the weather alternating between snow and sun, my favorite things. I spent that day walking around the streets and if I felt like it, could've walked the whole town in a few hours. But, instead I went the museum, which was funny it a way only a small town could do.
The whole area is full of Grant things. The clan center, which is in an old church and graveyard is in Duthil (pronounced doof.il). I went there on my second day but was thwarted because it was closed. I asked a the only villager I could find (it was the only house with smoke) and apparently it is never open, though they say so on their website. Bummer. So, I came back to Grantown and walked to the Castle Grant. It's a mile through some country roads from town. Unfortunately, the Grants hadn't been keeping the castle up and it began to go into ruin. Also, coming on hard times, the Lord of the Clan decided to sell it. So, now its outside the family and we aren't allowed visits. The roads do provide some nice views though, and I probably freaked out the family when I was staring at it trying to imagine what it was like awhile back. I didn't mind so much that its outside the Clan now, esp considering that it wasn't built for us. We seiged it cause the last owner was pissing everyone in the area off, and cut off his head. Then, we took over the castle and the Clan hung his skull in the castle and no one tried to take that castle back (I wonder why? Oh yeah, I wouldn't want to fuck with a bunch of violent wackos either)
There were two other places I wanted to visit of clan importance before leaving. One, is another castle, Ballindalloch, which was built and has stayed its entire life under Grant ownership. However, right before I was going to attempt to make an enormous effort getting there, I received an email from the Lady of the castle, telling me it'd be closed till Easter. Side note - An interesting thing I learned about it, is that apparently one wing is haunted - end. Instead, I wandered the woods nearby having a one sided dialogue with my ancestors. Oh, and the effort I mentioned to see the other castle would have most likely consisted of the easier part being hitching a ride back, which I did the day before from the clan center; my first hitch hike! The guy was some sort of ski instructor to ski instructors worldwide.
The other place, which I will try to visit tomorrow on my way to Edinburgh is a mountain next to Aviemore. The story behind it, is that it is the mountain on our clan crest. On the crest, there is a hill/mountain, called Craig Elachie, on fire. To call the Clan together for war, they'd set the mountain on fire. Our motto is "Stand Fast Craig Elachie". The stand fast part came from a legend of our supposed real name barer, a Norse king Haakon Magnus, that when ambushed with no weapon at hand, he ripped a tree from the earth to defeat the enemy and protect his men.
There are many more cool stories of treachery, legendary acts, and feuds if you go look us up on Wikipedia or our clan website. Some interesting facts are, the "black watch" tartan was our hunting tartan. We have 4 scotch whisky distilleries - Grants, Glenfiddich (voted best scotch whisky in the world), Glen Grant (only scotch whisky with owners name), and Glenfarcas. We were the last clan to use the fiery cross - clans used to light a cross on fire and go village to village to gather men for an emergency. The last time it was used was in the late 1800's when a Grant was running for governor and his opposition surrounded his house and was threatening the family. The Lady of the house (I'm assuming its a giant house, almost a castle), sent a messenger to a nearby Clan village and they lit the fiery cross. 800 pissed off Grants showed up and the threat quickly disbanded. The mayor of the town had to beg the Grants to not destroy the city for allowing the thing to happen.
It has been so awesome being here, I'm almost giddy. Growing up, I haven't really gotten a great outlook on my heritage. I was told that we were thieves and pirates and are almost cursed to fuck shit up. After being here, I see that while that may be true for some Grants, it hasn't been our heritage. What an amazing time, so glad I came. Tattoo. That's all I got for now.
D
PS I tried haggas. It wasn't awful, but I definitely couldn't set more than several bites.

Holland, London, and a Quarterly Check-in

2011-10-16T06:26:00.000-07:00

Even though this is my one year check-in, I'm going to try to keep this one brief. I left Ostend a couple days after writing the last post. I needed some slow down time and it offered it. I mainly just kept to myself, walking the beach when the sun was out and eating when it wasn't. They have a sweet park there that I spent some time in. I even got the room to myself on the last night. When I left it was with the intention to go to Antwerp, but every thing was booked up. So was Amsterdam.

I was able to get a hostel about 30 km outside Amsterdam, on the beach. I stayed two nights and spent my days on the beach again. There is surfing and kite surfing there and the town is very quaint. I kinda wanted to stay a bit longer, esp because I made some really good friends (Jeff from OZ,
However, they were going to Amsterdam the next day after me, so we all met up later anyway. Amsterdam was quite interesting. We walked the red light district a bit, which is awesome. While its not the only one in the world, sure, but it definitely is the most interesting one I've seen. Part is along a canal, which almost makes it seem classy. The red light district has sections so that you can easily find your preference. It's also fun to just sit and watch the dudes trying to negotiate, esp when the girl turns them away. There were a couple times when I had to question myself, if I had the money, and since it's legal and acceptable, would I get one. Most of the time I was able to right out say no, but there were a couple times when I couldn't answer at all. We also visited coffee shops, taking full advantage of the legality of pot. We saw a live sex show, which was too disturbing to write about, esp when high. We saw a dude hovering. We had truffles. Went to the flower market. Walked by Anne Frank's old house (too many people and too much money for me to go in). We took a boat tour of the canals at dusk, which was funny because by this time the group had dwindled to just me, Jeff and Tommy and the tour was on a "love boat". Speaking of the canals, that is where Amsterdam really shines. All the other stuff is nice, but the canals are amazing, especially by water, so I spent most of my alone time just hanging out around them.
It was really great hanging out with those guys and gals, but London was calling. I stayed with Andy, a work colleague from GC. Back about 4 years ago I was in an intensive training program and they sent several reps from the London branch. I stayed at Andy's place, but met up with a few of the other guys, Dave, Mark, and Jimmie. Naturally, we had some phenomenal curry and a pretty wild night out. Jimmie was on fire to say it nicely.
My days I spent seeing things like big Ben, the parliament house, buckingham palace, the tower of London, having my flop break and walking London barefoot, etc. I also tried a couple traditional pubs, watching a Man U vs. Liverpool soccer match and drinking a bitters. One evening I went to Camden st to check out some live music, but ended up not finding any place that had music I wanted. Instead, I met some Brits, Tom, Pete and Pete, who took me under their wing for an hour or so. London seems alright. It definitely has some fun things about it, but its still just a city. Today, I moved hostels to a suburb called New Cross Gate and found I liked it out there more than the other places I stayed. Just seemed more authentic.
Tomorrow night I am taking a sleeper train to Inverness. I am contemplating trying to see stonehenge, but with where I am and checking out and a couple other reasons, I might just put it off for another visit.
OK, now for my quarterly check-in.
Body: my health is fairly good. I had some stomachs issues in Belgium, which basically kept me around the hostel during the lunching hour. That has pretty much gone away, so that's good. I've been quite tired lately and can't see to catch up on sleep. I think it may have to do with my poor diet of nonstop carbs. But those two things are relatively minor really. My knee still bothers me from time to time.
Mind: I haven't really been cultivating my mind. I have been having trouble finding time or comfortable places to do quiet reflection. I'm still reading, but at a slower pace than before. My writing has obviously because more sparse. The one thing I can say that's positive about this subject is that I've had many deep, meaningful conversations in Europe and it has been wonderful hearing these points of view.
I'm ready to come home, though still have more time. I'm excited at the prospect of starting an adventure at home. It's time to put into practice all that I've learned. Still, I'm trying not to focus on it and live in the moment. My travels will not be done when I return, nor will this blog. Obviously, it will change focus to things like simplicity living, lifestyle design, following your dreams, back to basics, my spiritual progress, and topical discussions, but rest assured, if you are following this because its the travel part that is interesting to you, I have a minimum of 7 more big trips I will do and several particular ones that will probably be only a few months here and there. Oh yeah, and living in new places within and without the States.
Spiritual: I haven't really had any overt experiences with chi other than the butterfly thing. But, it makes sense because the pace here is faster and its easy to be distracted, and chi requires sensitive focus. I look forward to being in one spot for some time so that I can focus more in this direction.
That's all I got for now. If I can think of anything else, I'll post it as comments. Later,
D

Beer Tour Belgium

2011-10-05T12:38:00.000-07:00

I have not been thrilled at the availability of internet. Why they charge in many hostels, even for WiFi, is beyond me. It's up to about $5 an hour here, which judging by the speed of the connection is not much more than a normal deal you'd have at home, means they pay off the entire months bill within a day or two. Luckily, the hostel I'm at in Ostend has free internet (from a computer) and free WiFi for an hour or two at a time (its a weird system). Also, this is from my phone and not proofread - FYI. I'll explain how I came here and how I found some time to write this post...

I last reported that I met up with Elmar and was headed to Maastricht with him. We took his car so it was only about an hour away. Most of the places are very close now, maybe two hours max. Maastricht is in Holland (aka the Netherlands, take your pick on what to call it) in the very lower right hand corner. It's set along a river and is pretty chill. I think there is only one hostel, but its set along the river so its quite pretty. It also has an old town, squares for drinking, eating, and chilling. Elmar, who is 40+, is a big drinker, a bit too much for me. If I didn't cut myself off each evening I'd have maybe died trying to keep up with him. So, most of our days were spent visiting pubs that had seating along nice parts of town. We also managed to sneak some sightseeing in, which is good cause the town is quite green. The only thing worth mention is that, being Holland, there are pot cafes. I'm not sure really how it all works in legality terms, but these cafes can apparently get around the illegal to sell pot law. It's legal to smoke it everywhere, just not sell it, which more and more of Europe is following. However, Holland is becoming more strict while countries like Germany, France, and Belgium are getting closer to total legalization. Holland is apparently letting each city decide its rules on legality and foreigners. Maastricht was making it illegal on Oct. 1st for certain foreign countries like the US. Not sure about what Amerstam finally decided, as they have been waffling, I decided to take the opportunity to smoke a joint legally.
I must say, I wasn't all that impressed with the cafes or the weed. First off, you have to smoke in a strange designated room. Most of the cafes sell food and drink, but in a seperately quarters, so it gives a sort of quarantine feel. It's legal to smoke in public, which I'd prefered to find a park. For being legal, you'd think weed technology would be much further in the sense of growing specific types that elicit certain highs. Since I don't like being stoned (where I'm incapacitated), I asked to have one that was a happy, not stoney and not too mind oriented. What I received hardly had any affect after a full joint. To be honest, it didn't have a strong weed taste; more like it was just a big spliff. I think America and Canada, while illegal for most healthy people, the weed technology is much better though I'm only vaguely familiar with the industry.
All-in-all, it was quite a pleasant place to spend a couple days, and it was good seeing Elmar, whom paid for too many things (thanks for the generosity), again. Later Elmar went back to Germany and I headed to Belgium. My original plan was to visit a couple smaller areas that had Trappist breweries. Trappist breweries are the monks that brew beer to support their abbeys and philanthropy. There are other beers made they call abbey beers, but they are run by companies who either bought recipes or have a contract to brew in that style the abbey used to use. There are a shitload of abbey beers, but only 7 trappist in the world; 6 of which are in Belgium. I was going to go to Rochefort, Chimay, and maybe another. My plans were thwarted by the difficulty in getting to these locations. Belgium has an excellent rail system so I thought it wouldn't be a big deal. Wrong. To get to Rochefort required connecting through Brussels, plus since I couldn't prebook the hostel and since I'd get in late, I figured I'd stay in Brussels and scrap that one. Not a big deal since I can get their beers back home anyway.
Brussels is a strange town. It is a stewing pot of everything; beer, cultures, art, governments and (not government, as is the current case). I don't know how it is operating so well with not having a government in almost a year, but none the less they are doing just fine. The things I liked about Brussels was the art, music and beer scene. While most art is lost on me, I like the culture that a good art scene stirs up. One of the unique art things is that they have "comic strips". What this actually is is on some buildings a strip between the two is created. Instead of leaving it bare, some artists have painted murals. Most are of a cartoon quality, thus comics. See FB for a couple pictures. Most of my reason of coming to Belgium is to try the beer, esp the beer not available in the States, but I also did some sight seeing, attended a free concert along a canal, and made some new friends in a local pub. There were two pubs I was recommended that turned out to be of Leny's character. In one, I met quite a variety of age groups and peoples. An old Belgium guy recommended a beer to me and I'm pretty sure the drunkest French girl I've ever seen walked in on me in the men's room to examine my junk. I made friends with another American and we went out that evening to try some more beer.
Belgium beer has a way of wormholing time. As in we got to a certain bar at about 9 and when I checked my watch, hoping to be in bed by 11:30, it was almost 1am. I was hoping to visit Chimay the next day and go to the abbey so this didn't help. As is also the case, more than just a couple will give you a hangover. So, I tried to sleep in a bit but not too much that my day would be shot. I rose at 11, hungover, and didn't get on a train till 1. With missed connections and limited buses, I didn't get into Chimay until 4pm. I was concerned about the bus schedule so I found out the last bus left at 7pm. The monetary is 9k out of the town and I failed, due to lack of French ability, to rent q bike. I'd have considered walking if it wasn't so late in the day. Luckily, Chimay is about 2 hours interesting. I walked around the town and found a place serving Chimay's red cap on tap. I was hoping to try the blue cap on tap, but that may only be capable at the abbey cafe. Still, I've never seen the red on tap, so it was definitely cool anyway, and awesome. After coming home in defeat, I vowed to make it to at least one and set my sites on Westvleteren.
Westvleteren is in the upper left corner, so I figured Bruges was the best bet as a base. Bruges is a funny town. They hate the fact that it was ranked as the most romantic town in Europe a few years back. It's not that they hate tourists, just that they are bit different and like it. Bruges is certainly one of the best preserved medieval cities and have very unique qwerks. They are called Bruges Zots, like the beer of the same name and origin, because they threw a party for a prince, several hundred years ago, as an apology for rebelling and chopping off the tax collector's head. They filled the streets with clowns, mimes, and jesters. When they thought it was time to talk to the king they asked for him to build them an asylum for their "fools" (some apology). The prince then replied, "I've seen almost only fools in Bruges today, just close the gates of the city." referring to the clowns and jesters, if you didn't catch that.
Another thing is the swans. The city has a annual allocation in the budget for the hundreds of swans found throughout the city's canals. This was somehow related to the rebellion too. After cutting off the tax collector's head, they were called something like long necks and somehow swans got associated with a reminder of this punishment. There are plenty mote stories, but the gist is, they're a bit different, but in a goofy likable way. And the really funny thing is that occasionally someone will call the place a shithole (see most recent case of "In Bruges". I think the quote goes, "if I was retarded and lived on a farm, Bruges might impress me. But I wasn't, and it doesn't") the more people come to it.
I spent a couple days in Bruges, bikes around to the sites and to be honest, I lean more to the quote above. There's a couple cool things, and the huge bell tower is leaning slightly, but mostly it's unimpressive. I tried to see the only Michelangelo sculpture outside Italy, but they wanted $8 to see it and I told it was free. Also, I wanted to see Jesus's blood. Some priests came back from the crusades with a vile of what they claimed was Jesus's blood. Obviously, being 1,200 years after his supposed life, and having no lab equipment or way to get blood, assuming there was any dried Jesus blood laying around, the only way this could be true was if it was from a blood defendant of Jesus. Meaning, that if that they believe this vile of liquid is the blood of Christ, than it must be that they acquired it from his long lost offspring. Anyhow, I'll never know cause the vile was not anywhere visible, though I was told it was (and for free), but I didn't checked the paid parts of the church.
My best day in Belgium though was going to Westvleteren. I made an early start and got to a town called Poperinge around 12 missed connections again. It's not a town to write about really, but the fortunate thing was at least there were English speakers here. The abbey is 9km out of the city near a village called Westvleteren. I had some trouble getting a bike because shops close for lunch and some places were totally closed for the season. I did end up renting one and luckily they didn't even ask for a passport or deposit, neither of which I would've been able to supply. Instead they just told me they'd shoot me if I didn't bring the bike back. I was hoping they meant shoot as in flesh wound or minor injuries, and not fatally. The actual name of the abbey is S.t Sixtus, but the breweries are often named after towns. The special thing about this abbey is that they are so small that they don't distribute and limit the amount of cases that can be purchased to one per person. In other words, you can only buy the beer from the abbey's cafe (where it's on tap). According to my friend Jordan, there 12° beer is ranked #1 in the world by the magazine Beer Advocate, though I didn't know that at the time. The people in the state if Flanders believe that to be true, however, and were happy to claim it as the world's when any mention of it is made. The 12° was quite good, but I'm not a huge fan of the syrupy, alcoholy taste of some of the higher percentage beers, and that was my only qualm with this beer. A truly good beer can have all the complexity that this one did, but mask that affect I mentioned. I found that I still like Chimay's blue cap better for a dark Belgium beer.
One thing I found is that I vastly prefer the Belgium blondes. They can have just as much complexity in the taste and up to 12% alcohol as well (though most are around 7%), but are generally lighter, crisper, and have a good amount of bitter (I love hoppy beers) or not as sweet as their dark counterparts, yet can still be quite complex in tastes like their darker counterparts. In this instance I think drinkability comes into play. Can I drink these at anytime of year or temperature? Can I drink them at any speed? Can I drink several of them? I can say that the dark Belgium's answers are no, no, and no. The blondes are the opposite. They are not only limited to summer, some can be consumed quick, and some can be had in severals. This was definitely true of the Westvleteren blonde (5.8%). It was the best Belgium blonde I had. In fact, next to some IPAs I love, this may be the best beer I've ever had. It may even beat those IPAs if you take into the refreshment/drinkability part (oh, and some German lagers are not far behind, but lack the complexity and hop that this ones does). After having a few of those, I hopped (pun) on my bike and made it back to Bruges safe and sound.
The beer at Westvleteren was worth the trip, but so was just spending the perfect sunny afternoon riding around lost in the countryside. It's times like those where you really appreciate how wonderful life is and that spending my time lost in my head and in reality, doing what most would consider as nothing or as a waste (and doing it slowly), was a considerably better use of my time than earning a few bucks. I even realized at one point I totally had forgotten, or maybe lost track is a better word, that I was abroad. All of a sudden, I realised I'd been biking for 20 minutes and had no worries in the world. Not where I was going, not where I was in the world, not how the world was doing, it was a complete peace with everything that had me. In a way, it was spiritual. Yes, it cost money to rent the bike and obviously you need money to survive these days, but how much of it do we really need. Isn't the best times in your life the ones not at work? Maybe lost in your mind in your garden or hiking up the side of a river? How much do those cost? Wouldn't it make sense to have more of these PRICELESS moments and less getting moments getting paid? If anyone says its impossible, they are a fool and a coward. Why is it that the happiest, and most generous, people I've ever met are generally those who don't work hard and those who are the poorest? seriously, figure out what really makes you feel at peace. Now, quit making excuses like kids, homes, careers, etc. Those will always be available for you later and the kids can actually enhance some of, or be an integral part of some of, your dreams.
If I can, I'll link a free dream timeline from Tim Ferris (if you don't know what it is, it is a chart that helps you figure out what your dreams are, puts them in practical terms with steps to get there, gives you ways to budget, and gives you a timeline). I've decided that from now on, instead of making new years resolutions, I will fill out a new dream timeline. I really suggest everyone do the same.
Anyway, so that day was magical. More so, it reminded me I was trying to do to much. I didn't have one second to write or to spend leisurely for the past week. I realized i needed some downtime, so I left the next day for the coast. Unfortunately, my incredible luck with the weather in Europe may have come to an end. I've been blessed with only about five days of rain or clouds since July 18 in what most Europeans have told me is the worst summer they've ever had. It didn't rain on me, and it did have about 3 hours of sun for me to sit on the beach, but now it's looking like clouds and rain to the end. That's fine with me cause I'm used to it from home and because of how unbelievablely lucky I've been this whole year. In a way, it's sort of fitting. I left rain and now I'll be reacclimated back to it.
The one story of note here is that of the creepy German at the hostel. I was lucky enough to get a super creepy German dude. First off, he is biking western Europe at the wrong time of year. Next, he looks creepy; he was wearing a hospital scrubs top 4 sizes too big and missing a tooth. He also mumbled things in German with a really deep rough voice. Lastly, he seemed way to interested in where I was going next and how long I was staying here. I mean, he legitimately freaked me out. I tried to lose him a few times, but I didn't want to leave the hostel cause I had business to attend to on the internet. when I finally went to bed, thankfully he was already in bed, but a new problem arose. A basker (professional street performer) moved in to my room. I didn't trust him for second though he was personable. Eventually, he let someone into our room who was not staying at our hostel, or at least hadn't been able to check in. He was around a good part of the day and talking to reception, so he may have been on the level. Still, I didn't know that then. I used my bag cage for the first time since South America. I was hoping to sleep with one eye open the whole night, but didn't need to. At 5 in the morning the German started clearing his throat, hacking, and talking to himself every 30 seconds. I let this go on about 20 minutes and realised I wasn't going back to sleep, so I got up and had time to write this post.
Oh, and the basker used my shower gel that I put in a cubby with my contacts and toothbrush shit. Glad, I locked my bag.

Prague Through Berlin

2011-09-26T08:38:00.000-07:00

I have had a surprisingly hard time finding time, for writing. Mostly, it is a combo of lack of accessable computers and doing stuff with friends. That should be at least calmed down a bit as I don't anticipate seeing anyone I know till I get to London next month. Maybe I'll have better access to computers, but I doubt it.
To get on with the trip, not really much in the way of cool stories happened in Prague; a lot happened in Munich; and Berlin was pleasant, though different than expected.

I can see why people love Prague though. It's beautiful and a bit wild still, though that streak is dying out. The city is really well kept from time and war. The buildings are well preserved in the old town and around the castle. The castle is across a large river from old town and sits atop a hill. I spent some time at it cause part of it is free. According to Jordan and Chelsea (I'll refer to them as J&C from now on) the real good parts aren't well known and inside (like a dungeon). As for the the free parts, you can walk through the interior, which was fun to try to imagine back in its hayday. It's not much of an architectual acsthetic interest because it looks like most palaces in the sense of style, but the chuch in the middle is quite unique - see FB.
The hostel I was at was a bit of a let down in the sense of meeting people. They had a "bar" in the basement, but people weren't all that social. I really went out of my way to talk to people, but most were not responsive. Because of this atmosphere, I paid to go on a Microbrew tour. I knew it'd be overpriced, but it was better than hanging out at the hostel. The tour, which I was late to, went to 2 microbrew pubs and one bar. The most important thing to come of it was a map with all the microbreweries in town. The tour itself was weak. The map was important because these places are impossible to find. Most are hidden in basements of what appear to be very small pubs from the street level. You'd never expect there to be a huge complex below. Every place that I went to, microbrew pub or just really cool bars, had this unique character, which really adds to the experience because you feel like you found something secret. So, if you can get your hands on a map of the places and have some friends, you can avoid a tour. The end result of my tour was having some people to hang out with afterwards. There were 2 Isreali girls, a woman from Brazil, and a couple from the US. The ladies wanted to go to the biggest club in Europe, which is a 5 story complex next to the famous Charles Bridge and waterfront. I was of course not interested and was able to convice them for a short time to go to the "Beer Museum", which had a pub with 30 Czech beers on tap.
Other than that and my last night, where I tried to meet up with some Ozzies from the hostel at a bar where you could pour your own beer and ended up at a club with some Brits, my time was unventful and I just enjoyed wandering the amazing streets. The streets that don't go anywhere and make no sense, but usually hide some gem. Oh, I did learn that weed is now legal in Czech. Well, except to sell, not that I was looking. Also, I learned that wheat beer was considered the highest quality beer, but shortages during wars caused Germany to make the beer laws and for most beers everywhere to be made with barley. Lastly, I had to try the original Budweiser company, which the one from the states blatently ripped off in every way except taste. It was good, but German beers are better, and of course it was better than the State's Bud. The reason they ripped it off was because immagrants associated the name and logo with good beer.

The trains here in Europe coninue to surprise me. Sometimes in good ways and sometimes in bad. The "direct" train from Prague to Munich fit into the latter category. At first things seemed fine, but due to construction on tracks that we were supposed to use, which I don't believe they were unaware of till that day, we had to switch cars. The strangest part was that when we switched cars, the other train was on the same platform and tracks that the original was. So, it seems to me that it wasn't neccesary. The only thing I could think of is that maybe only some trains are allowed on only some lines, and that our original one wasn't allowed on the new ones. Still, they had to have known about this for some time and they didn't do any sort of planning. The new train we got was a car or maybe two, short, meaning that there were less seats. The new car appeared to have lost all the seat reservations that people made and was a free-for-all. I lucked out and got a good seat. Everyone on the train was English speaking and was definitely the most Americans I've encountered; way more on this one train than in my entire trip combined. Anyway, people with reserved seats from the original train were trying to claim them on this one though the evidence was strong that they no longer applied - every reserved seat is always marked and since these cars were smaller some people with higher reserved numbers no longer even had a seat that existed to try and claim. I had a guy come and try to claim my seat, which was of course fun and surprisingly didn't end in a fist fight.
First, he asked if I had a reserved seat and I told him that they didn't exist. hen, he demanded to see my ticket, which I was damned if I was going to let him touch. I explained the issue and asked, well more told him, that I would sit in the seat until a conductor came by to resolve the matter. I was full willing to give up the seat if I was mistaken, but I had a pretty solid reason to believe I was right and I didn't want to stand in the aisle for the next four hours. He reluctantly conceded and went out of eyesight, though within earshot, and started talking shit. After about an hour it was clear that no one was going to come by to check tickets and that no one would resolve the issue. I felt that since it wasn't 100% clear as to who was right, that I could comprimise in some way. I approached him and told him that if he wanted he could take the seat the second half of the journey. By this time though, I think he understood that I was probably right about the lost reservations and since he was with other people that were going to also have to fight people in my compartment for their seats, he told me I could keep it. While I was out in the hall, I decided to pee. The guy told me there was only one working toilet on the train, and that it lacked toilet paper (I didn't need it though). On my way to the toilet, I saw why he'd figured it out and conceded; there were literally hundreds of people without seats crowed into any space available. So, it was a fun train ride.
I got to Munich in the afternoon and wasn't to meet my host family till around 8PM. So, I locked up my bags at the station and walked into the center to check some stuff out. After walking around, I thought I should check my email and found a coffee shop that had free wifi. Jo, the guy I shared a room with a couple times in Laos, had emailed me saying that he could show me around a bit. He came and picked me up and explained some of the significance of the tourist spots, like the HofBrau Haus and some of the 700 year old buildings, and he showed me some of the non-tourist spots of the center, like a place where a river comes out from under the city and creates a perpetual wave and there are tons of surfers that are surfing 24 hours a day on it. If you didn't have a local show you these spots, esp the surfer spot, you'd have no idea they existed. We also went to a beer garden for dinner. There were about 1,000+ people at this beer garden. Jo explained how everyone loved these beer gardens. I know I did. It had a real feeling of community. Many of the tables were long benches and strangers would sit with one another and gossip and make aquaintance for the evening. The food was good too. I would have had a 1/2 chicken, but Jo said the best were at Oktoberfest (aka Wiesn), so I had some good sausage and 'kraut.
Afterward, Jo dropped me off at my host family's flat. My host family was the mother and father of a friend (Nadja) I made on my second trip to San Diego. She was a friend of some of my brother's friends and we hit it off pretty well and we have kept somewhat in touch through the intertubes. Originally, I was hoping to stay at her place because it'd have been nice to hangout with her. She thought that maybe her boyfriend would not see it in the correct light, and offered her parents place. I gladly excepted on the condition that her parents knew, and were ok with, that I was going to Wiesn and would likely come back intoxicated on those nights. Her parents were really neat. Her mom, Maria, was an interpreter and travelled around Germany and sometimes elsewhere, doing official interpreting services. Because of this, she was only able to stay till Sunday night, which was sad cause I really enjoyed talking to her. Nadja's dad, Ilja, was originally from Stallingrad (now St. Petersburg), and spoke very limited English. He was a structual engineer and could be home often, so on a couple days we ate breakfast or lunch together. They were sooo kind to me, it was hard to believe.
Using Jo's secret insider handshake password advice, I was able to get into the Schottenhamel tent, which is the tent where the mayor gives a big speech and taps the first barrel to begin the festival. It was quite a site. I did have to wait three hours and beg a bouncer to let me in (cause he kept letting other people behind me in), but it was worth it. The energy was insane and there was almost nowhere to sit. I found a table where the people who reserved it hadn't shown up so I took that. Within a couple minutes others came and we had a table going. The table behind me had a few Americans who were visiting their colleagues from Germany and later when my table fizzled out, I joined them. That's the way it works. Everyone is there to have a good time. After hanging out at these two tables, I went down to a table infront of the band and joined them. I wanted to do that cause that area gets really roudy.
I left the tents around 6pm because I needed to meet up with J&C. This never happened. I think it was a combination of a few things, none the lesser for my having drank 3 or 4 Wiesn beers. When I got to the square I was a little early. Since I had been drinking and my memory was hazy at best, I asked someone where the glockenspiel was and they pointed to a cafe by that name. I didn't think J&C would have meant a cafe, but I was early and wanted to make sure I didn't get any emails from them. I went to the cafe and didn't see them, but the cafe didn't have Wifi, so I went back to the middle of the square. I did this rotation serval times, and at one time got a staff member in the cafe to let me use the computer. When I talked to them in Berlin, it sounded like we were no more than 50 meters away at anytime, but that we kept moving on eachother. I'd chack a spot they were, but they'd have just moved shortly prior. I even checked a dinner place they said they ate. I really have no idea how we missed. Unforetunately, I didn't have their hotel info and nor did anyone I could think to contact back home. I did receive an email that said when they'd be at Wiesn, the next day, but even if you know what tent people are in and what area of the tent, it can be extremely hard to find people. So, I didn't see them the next day either.
Instead, I went to meet up with Nadja. I didn't find her cause I was a little late to the Schützen Festzelt tent. I searched the tent, but nothing came of it. This tent had a shooting range in the back of it, which I thought was a bit dangerous. After searching, I thought I'd try to meet up with Jo at a tent he said he was going to go to at a certain time. I got there a little early and waited by the entrance he said, but never saw him. I gave up after a while and went to see what the Vintage Wiesn was like. Vintage W. is how the tents were supposed to be like back in the day. They aren't too different except that they are much nicer. They look really nice, people are dancing, it is much more low key (more my kinda thing), but still had the flare. I think they may have been my favorites out of the tents that I did go to. I was able to borrow a cell phone and text Jo that I was going to see if Nadja (they didn't know eachother) was at the original tent we'd agreed on. When I got to the tent it was even crazier than before and my hopes were dwindling. While the first day was fun, the prospect of hanging out with strangers the entire time was not appealing. As I was b-lining it for the toilet, Nadja and her boyfriend, Chris, were walking the opposite direction and grabbed me. This in itself was miraculous luck, but seconds after I sat down, Jo spied me. This was truly near impossible luck since no one had a solid idea when or where to meet. We all had a good time.
When I returned home that night, I saw that I had an email with J&C's contact info. I called them and woke them up and we made arrangements for them to pick me up the next day in a rental car and drive to some cool spots in Bavaria. The next day, probably due to Wiesn, they couldn't find the place and possibly they were calling the wrong phone #. So, we didn't meet up again. This actually may have been a good thing cause I felt sick. I didn't even leave the flat till after 3pm. When I did leave, I walked around and saw more of beautiful Munich. I have to say that I really loved Munich, though it may have helped my feelings to have friends there. I saw an awesome old palace, though I don't know what it was, but it was amazing. Plus, I stopped for dinner at the Augustiner Brau Haus. I stopped here because I wanted to try some of their beers based on the fact that this is what Munich, and much of Germany, considers the best beer. Jo was saying that when someone tells a friend to bring beer to a get together, this is the required beer to bring. It didn't disappoint. I tried a couple types, but my favorite was their original.
The next day I had the option to try to meet J&C in a town up North to see a death camp. Having seen one prior and not wishing to do so again and because it seemed unlikely we'd find eachother again, I opted out. Instead, I met up with Jo after work and went to BMW Land and the Olympic park. He works for the market firm for the park, and his office is in the Olympic stadium. BWM land had a lot of things to explain how the features work and wierd machines that I think clean the floor, but the coolest thing was that an elevator brought your car up and moved it to a viewing spot at the angle towards where you'd drive it out of the place. Olympic park was much nicer. Because Jo works there I was able to go up the needle (similar to the space needle) for free. Plus, he showed me one of the halls that was used in the games that is now used for concerts. And, we got to walk around the Olmpic stadium, through the back halls and secret places like staff party rooms, but also onto the field. Lastly, on our way to meet his friends at Wiesn, we stopped at a memorial at the University where a couple students threw anti-nazi leaflets out the window of the school during the late part of the war. They had been found by the nazis and killed because of it. On the ground, in between the stones that make up the walkway, are what look like the leaflets and have their faces and names on them.
I have to give a HUGE thank you to Jo. Not only did he give me insider tips for Wiesn, tour me around for 2 days, party at Wiesn with me 2 days, but he also got me a gift of some tradition gingerbread treats and some sort of juice that they drink everytime they go skiing. So, Thank you Jo if you ever read this!

Here are some things I learned while in Munich:
- There are about 14 main tents, plus two in the Vintage area, a few beer gardens, and a dozen tiny ones that are more food tents than for drinking. Each tent holds thousands of people. Plus, there are tens of thousands walking the fair grounds. I'd estimate that there are probably close to 200,000 people there at any given time.
- 98% of the people are dressed in traditional costumes. However, for the Munich people these are more than costumes, esp the liederhosen, which are handed down through generations. They are supposed to be made of deer leather to be good, and you're supposed to pee in them the first time to soften the leather. One guy told me his dad gave him his saying, "they have too much beer and sperm on them for me". The cheap outfits cost $150 minimum just for the pants. I didn't buy any.
- The beer in liters is not a gimmick either. At any beer haus or garden or many bars and restaurants, you have the option of .5L or 1L glasses. I never did see anybody using a decorated stein though.
- The beer brewed especially for Wiesn is only served here, which is only brewed by about 7 breweries (while each tent only serves one beer, there are a few tents that serve the same ones). They may be the same companies that you can find in the copies of Wiesn in the states, but it is NOT the same beer. Nor is any beer that calls itself an Oktoberfest beer remotely close in taste to the originals.
- The roasted chicken is amazing at Wiesn. A MUST
- Germans are constantly reminded of Hitler. At least once a week there is something on the news about nazis as well as all the constant reminders around the cities. In fact, it is punishable by law to have anything to do with nazis. I feel somewhat bad because it is obvious that they are sorry for it, even those too young to have anything to do with it. While it is important to keep these things in mind as to make sure we don't allow them again, I think it may be a little overkill on the amount of guilting we are doing. Remember, most of the Germans alive today weren't alive during this period and they aren't the only ones guilty of genocide on a mass scale. If you can't think of the other ones of the top of your head is it possible that maybe we are over doing it to people no longer associated with what happened then.

On to Berlin. I highly recommend getting a day train to Berlin from Munich. The Bavarian countryside is simply amazing. It just exudes a slower, happier, ascthetic way of life. Just this one train ride sparked another future travel idea - ride a bike through Bavaria and into the alps for a summer. When I got to Berlin, it was a stark contrast to Munich. It was hussle and bustle and confusion. The main station was huge and I couldn't find where to go right away. Also, I couldn't find the map I thought I had with me of Berlin. After some time, I did finally figure out how to get to my hostel. It required two connections and 30 minutes. If anything can be said about Berlin it's that it has the most extensive public transport I've ever seen. The city is massive with only Moscow and Bangcock on the same scale in my mind. There are trams, subways, buses, and trains connecting even the tiniest alley of the city and running something every 5 minutes. Still, with all that stuff, it does get slightly confusing of what you need to do with it. One thing that I liked about the city is that it has lots of the cool neighborhoods that remind me of Portland and that I love. I spent one afternoon in one before J&C showed up and found myself a restaurant/pub called Fargo. I also found that some beers are only made for special distribution, like in Portland and sometimes Seattle, so I had one of those which was really good. I visited a section of the Berlin wall that they left standing and allowed artists to paint. It was interesting to note that they only let the artists paint the east facing parts of the wall. There is a section with a park and a piece of the inner wall and it too has painting only on the east part. I also found that the major city park is one of the most beautiful city parks I've been to. And then a giant anti-pope protest because he was in town, though I never saw him.
By day one, I hadn't found I love Berlin. Everyone I talked to said their favorite European city was either Prague or Berlin. Belin doesn't have the beauty behind it, but it does have a lot going for it. Perhaps it was too much for me though, cause while I liked it ok, it never put the wind in my sails. Compared to Munich with it's smaller feel, homlier, outdoors, community, bike, beer garden things, maybe it was just too much.
I'm glad then, that J&C and I were able to meet up.
So for that, I'm grateful that they came. I'm not sure I'd have liked to stay an extra two days had they not come. We were staying at the same hostel so thankfully it would be hard to miss eachother. Though they had a really funny debaucle on the night they came in, we were able to connect right before I was going to leave them a note that I was getting dinner. It was soooo good to see them. Their first day we walked around to see some of the highlights and I took them to that park I loved. We had lunch there at a beer garden and then took a free row boat out on the lake. Later we visited the wall and a beer hall. I'd say most of our time when not visiting the important memorials, was spent going to eat, get coffee, or get beer (most important). It was mostly relaxing for them cause it wasn't as much running around as they had been doing so I think they really enjoyed it. Plus, it was great for me to see some of my best friends for home. It really lifted my spirits, though they had not been low, and probably helped in the transition process of what it will be like back home being around my friends and whatnot. I'm running short on time here, Elmar (a guy I met in Alter do Chao) and I are going to Maastricht in a few minutes, otherwise I'd have written more about my time with J&C. Suffice to say it was really nice and I'm glad that we were able to meet up after all the craziness in Munich with no hard feelings from either party.
Anyway, take care of yourselves out there.
D

Lots of Flying Butts in Poland

2011-09-13T08:49:00.000-07:00

I am of course speaking of the only thing I retained from my college art history course, flying buttresses. Being that there are a shit load of massive, 5+ story, churches here, there are a ton of flying butts. Flying butts are not anything impressive either, but appear to just be a waste of time and money. Then, again, that's what the church loved more than anything back in the day and still does to some degree today. That may be the name of the post cause I like playing on words, but I don't care about churches so I wasn't going around looking at them and really, it won't be a focus of this post.

My first experience that I'll mention is that of the night train, which is almost as crazy an experience as the alcohol. To keep it short, I bought a ticket from Vienna to Krakow. They had me switch cars at one station because they were going to split the train up and half the people would go to Prague. However, I had to ask several times which car I was supposed to be in before I found anyone working for the train that had any idea that this would occur. They appeared to believe that it could magically go to both places and I shouldn't worry about it. Next, after being told that this train would go to Krakow, an old lady in my cabin figured out that I'd need to switch trains at some random station. I was very lucky to have met her cause in the middle of the night, she woke me up in somewhat of a panic. She had figured out that I needed to switch trains by running to another train at the station we were at. Then, she ran (again) me to the correct train. Very nice of her. Also, luckily on the next train was a guy who spoke English and told me which station was mine since they don't announce the stations and only give you a minute or two at max to disembark. This may not be that bad during the day, but throw in disorrientation from sleep and exhaustion from lack of sleep (they check your tickets a bunch and wake you up), it becomes quite rough.
Krakow is a pretty little city. I say little but I guess there's a lot more people than Seattle, though you'd never guess it. Some of the cool things are a really sweet Jewish quarter, a castle/church, nice parks, and a nice old town. I was really tired when I got to my hostel around 8am and the owner let me sleep in an unoccupied bed before moving me to my room. After I got all straightened out, I spent some time looking for a book store that'd trade me some books. I didn't find it till the last day, but along the way I stopped and saw the old town, castle, and Jewish quarter.
It's best to look at my FB pictures for these things to get an idea of them. I will say though that in the castle grounds is the coolest church I've ever been in, and I've been in some neat ones abroad. It was pretty much a museum with some amazing things that I can't even begin to explain other than to say that there was enormous complexity and detailing of reliefs, scultpures, paintings and rooms. They also had the remains of some famous Polish musicians and writers/poets in a basement. Unforetunately, pictures were not allowed inside. Too bad. Also, the Jewish quarter was sweet cause it had a lot of character. Similar to the ruin bars, the pubs and cafe bars here used the area to enhance the experience. One that I went to was called Singer, named after the sowing machines. The tables were old sowing tables.
When I got back to the almost empty hostel, which, by the by, the hostels in Poland are 3rd world prices and some of the most upscale ones I've stayed at, the few people there were planning on going out. One of the guys was working at the hostel and took us around with him and we ended up hanging out with some of his friends. Meeting cool locals is always a cool thing so it was a good night, though for most an early one due to Polish vodka.

I felt obligated while I was in Krakow to visit Auschwitz. I want to make it very clear that I do not want to belittle what happened there or what these people went through, but I am also going to give my honest impressions of what I saw and felt and at times they may seem insensitive. The next thing I want to say is that what I had in my head and what I saw were nowhere near the same thing. I also decided on a tour rather than trying to do it myself, which is not usually how I do things.
Ok, so Auschwitz is actually not just one death camp. Side note - I don't want to call them concentration camps because, while there they were ultra concentrated, they were more about death than anything else - end. There are 3 main camps, but a couple dozen smaller ones around. What the Nazis did was clear a 40km^2 area and let no one in so that they kept what they were doing there - the mass extermination of people - pretty hush hush. The first camp is completely not like I expected. It was an old Polish army living area. This means that the buildings were brick and actually kinda nice. It looked more like what I would think of a Jewish Ghetto than a death camp. Still, it was a death camp in purpose and there was no doubt about that. The first people really to go here were Pols and not specific to Jews. Also, originally, there were no gas chambers. It wasn't for a few years when Hitler made it the goal of the 3rd Reich to exterminate the Jews that they added those and the crematoriums. Instead, they'd just lead those who couldn't work (women, children, the old and sick) away and shoot them and bury them. So the purpose of the death camps was slave labor till death. Ironically, the entrance has a sign above it that says, "work will set you free". What it really meant was free from the bonds of mortality. If you were to follow that saying, you'd surely as I sit here typing die. This is because you were fed very little food (what most of us would consider a light breakfast) a day and worked harder than most ever will in there lives every day. Obviously this led to starvation. These jobs had high turnover in the form of people dying, so they constantly brought new prisoners in. Many were policital, many were Pols, many were Jews, and then of course minority groups like Gypsys and actual criminals, who were made into Capos (prisoners policing prisoners). The Capos were given nice living quarters and food. They were just as brutal as the Nazis in the treatment of other prisoners, and unforetunately were the most likely to survive their stay.
There was also an actual prison there where they'd hold make believe trials that involved being accused and convicted without being able to state your case, then dragged outside and shot in the back of the head. This was reserved for criminals in the area, mostly politcal. The other things we visited were the only intact crematorium and gas chamber in the area, and some museums that housed. One museum was particularly difficult. It had a ton of belongings that the prisoners were ordered to bring and then stolen by the Nazis. This is shoes, clothes, cooking stuff, jewlery, etc. However, the absolute hardest thing to see was the women's hair. They shaved the women's heads before killing them and shipped the hair to be used like wool would be. In the museum they had about 2 tons of their hair.
Next we went to Auschwitz 2. This was the one that was more on par with what I imagined. The Nazis took all the matierals from the villages in the area and built about 150 houses, which resembled a giant wood version of the old military tents from the 1800s. This is the camp that has the train that comes into the middle and what is typically show in movies or pictures. It is the camp that the Jews were sent for extermination. They had 4 massived gas chambers and crematoriums. The Jews were in horrific living conditions, even worse than the other death camp. Still, the purpose was work. I don't know which is a worse version of slavery: to work about 2 months until you starve to death or to work your whole life as a slave in slightly less appaling conditions. I guess in both cases you do slave labor till you die.
The thing that really struck me as strange was the effort the Nazis went through to fool the Jews, and to a less strange degree, the world. What I mean by this was that they made the Jews to believe that they were going to work camps, not extermination camps. Why did it matter? I guess it was to try to make it so that less will try to escape or something. But the deception gets even stranger. The gas chambers were designed to seem like changing rooms and gym showers. Why? Once they were in the camps it's not like, "oh wait, where are you taking us? No, I think I don't feel like going in this death chamber". When the crematoriums were too backed up they'd just lead them to the forest and kill them in mass graves, burning some alive. So, I really don't understand the deception. Also, some deceptions were just plain fucked up, but still you have to ask from a economic point of view during war, why they'd do it. In the living quarters in camp 2 they put in "fire places" that strecthed the length of the cabin. Except the Jews were never able to use them. So why make them. I think maybe I understand. I think it was for mental torture, but the Nazis didn't really seem to physically torture (in the sense of like torture chamber torture or POW torture from the Vietnam/American war), so why this? Lastly, they tried to cover up their activities when they started losing the war. But why? If they knew what they were doing was wrong, then I don't have any simpathy for those soldiers in the war that said they were just following orders and didn't want these bad things to happen. But these orders were coming from higher up, so even the high ups may not have believed in it. If they had, they'd have left the buildings and documents and other evidence. They had already made it a decree that they were about blood purity, so they'd have just been like, "yeah those are our death chambers. So, we are doing what God wants us to do. Fuck you". Anyway, obviously, you can see I was left with some really perplexing questions about motives. I also wondered how it compared to the atrosities of other genocides in the last few hundred years.
The whole tour was fucked up beyond belief in what human hate is capable of. When I got home I noted I hadn't uttered a word the entire day. It really affected me and I pray that these things can never be repeated anywhere. I know that hate will never go away, but hopefully we can keep it from manifesting itself like this.

Moving on to less depressing subjects. The rest of my time in Krakow was pleasant. Even though the weather turned, it wasn't too big a deal. I used the time to see The Hangover 2. I only recognised a couple places in the movie. I also found a second hand book shop, which I felt was a rip off. I had three good books in good quality and they wouldn't even trade them for one used book off their shelf. For Tandia, they offered me 25 cents. Fuck you. I kept that one and traded the other two and still had to pay about 4 bucks. I'll trade Tandia with another traveler.
Oh yeah and I had a funny thing happen at a cheap food place I had been going to. I tried to order a salad and add meat and they tried to charge me an outrageous amount. For the price I could have gotten two kebaps bigger than any burrito I've ever had. In other words, I could have gotten double the meat and double the veggies, minus the cheese in the salad, for the same price and it would have given me 2 days worth of food (seriously the kabaps were two meals). I didn't pay them that amount though. Still, the food and beer in Poland is dirt cheap and GOOD.
The next place I went was Wroclaw. I had a friend I made in Vietnam living there and she told me it was the best city in Poland. I took the train and since it was an early train I was trying to sleep. The train was fairly empty and I had my own compartment for most the trip. The only time anyone came in was after one stop a guy came by and opened the door. I figured he was looking for a seat and other compartments may have had more people in them. I told him he could sit there and so he did. While he was sitting there, he got some beer out of his back pack and offered me one. It was odd as I was obviously alseep when he opened the door and still obviously trying to sleep. However it wasn't odd that someone would be drinking that early in Poland. Granted many places have the people absolutely hammered walking the streets at 10AM, and Poland had this problem too, it was common to see people having a .5L beer with their breakfast (not with the purpose of getting drunk, but more like having a beer with dinner). I turned him down since I was trying to sleep, but he insisted. Not wanting to offend his hospitality, I took one and put it unopened on the floor. He then grabbed it and opened it and handed it to me. I gave him a, "uh, thanks" and he demanded $2 for it. The dickhead. Being that I was in a very vulnerable situation and having been woken from sleep I was in no condition to confront this guy to the point of a fight, which seemed likely by his body language now. I didn't have exactly the money he was looking for so he took it a little bit lower and left; I assume to go fuck some other travelers.
Wroclaw was definitely beautiful and had a really great vibe. I think I liked it even more than Krakow. I'm going to try to keep it short, but the basics are this. Wroclaw was actually German till they lost WW2. The city had been leveled and rebuilt. There is a river that flows through it and a couple islands that are parks. There are monstorous churches in Wroclaw. They are known for these little (one foot tall) copper or bronze gnome statues that are all over the city. I know there are 50 minimum, but I heard upwards of 200. I liked them, but only saw about 20 and took photos of each.
Other than that, I met up with Marta and her boyfriend Nick and toured around with them for two days. The first night we went to a concert/fireworks display. It was pretty sweet and about 30 mins long with thousands of people crowded into the streets to watch it. I also got to meet some of their friends. The next day we took a boat on the river and walked around with them filling me in on the history of the town and cultural things.
My hostel didn't have room on Sat. night so I couchsurfed for the first time on my trip. This was fine by me as the hostel had the worst selection of people yet. There was a 70 year old dude in my room. He obviously felt that this hostel should treat him like a hotel. At 2AM he had them bring an extra matress in for him. 2AM really? Don't worry about the other 5 people in the room. Which he didn't cause he made a ton of noise otherwise, talking or banging around. The second morning he even woke me up to tell me they were serving breakfast (the breakfast in Poland is toast with jam and cheese, and cereal). What the fuck. If I wanted breakfast I would have woke my own ass up.
Anyway, I moved to a girl named Asia's flat. My first experience was quite a nice one. She had a comfy couch, a funny cat, a nice clean place, she prepared and cooked dinner the first night and breakfast the next day. Her family came by and we went to a really strange fountain music show. It was a bit too artsy for all of us and no one "got it". Asia and I met her friend at a bar to watch a big boxing match that was going on that night at the new stadium in the city. The Polish dude lost. The next day we went with her family to a flea market. The market was set up around an old German mill and had anything you could possibly want, including uzis (hopefully fake, but I don't think so) and chain mail in case you might find yourself in a sword fight (also sold there). Next, we went to her parents for lunch and they made a huge lunch. Her dad, Jack, Asia, and her littlest sister, Julia, played Jenga (27 levels, new record) and talked and I had a wonderful time. I helped her dad move a 100+ lb TV for Asia's grandma, which wasn't so bad. Later, Asia and I went to the zoo.
The zoo was tough to see. I've heard Europe has some bad conditions. Most of the exhibits were bad and people can feed the animals. That means that the animals do tricks for food and get fed whatever shit food the people have. One funny thing that happened was that I told Aisa, because she was astonished at how her cat, her family's cat, and her grandma's dog and cat loved me, that animals have an affinity for me. I was half kidding around. While we were at the zoo, we went into a butterfly exhibit where they are free to roam around. At one point there was a big one flying about and I knew, as if it was telling me itself, that it would land on my finger. So, without moving anything other than one of my fingers, stuck one out. Within thirty seconds, it landed on it. We took a couple photos, see FB, one with me bringing it up to my face. Up close their faces are very odd looking. It apperently really liked me cause I had to try really hard to finally get it to fly away. She told me that the mother behind me was sicking her arm out at butterflies and saying, "I don't get it, he does nothing and they just come to him". Later, Asia also laughed about it saying, "I get the cats and dogs, but butterflies, come on". What is interesting is that I just knew with 100% that it would happen; I think I even saw it happening before it did.
And now I'm in Prague.

All in all, I loved Poland. I highly recommend it for anyone travelling Europe. It is cheap, $35 a day is doable, the food is good, the hostels are good, the people are super friendly and good humored and beautiful, it's lovely scenery and culture, and they have good cheap beer. Go! Seriously, GO!
D

Book Reviews: Tandia, The Valkeries

2011-09-06T11:03:00.000-07:00

Tandia, by Bryce Courtenay -This is the follow up book to The Power of One, and it is equal to the first. I really liked this book and if you remember, I was complaining about the ending to the first saying that it lacked the closure that was built throughout the book. This one starts right where the other left off. Peekay, the Tadpole Angel, is headed for Oxford to learn law and bring it back to South Africa to try to change things during the time of Apartheid. At some point he realizes that the law taught in England won't really apply to this system. However, he goes about trying anyway. There is a new introduced named Tandia. She is a colored girl who really has a shitty life. First, she is a child of an Indian man who is slightly connected to Peekay from many years back. He cheated on his wife with the black help and this is where Tandia comes from. She is raped after her father dies mysteriously, and almost killed by the police to cover it up. She ends up living a whore house and the madam takes an interest in her intelligence, and beauty. She sends her to school, and eventually Tandia gets a law degree. However, it's not all fun and games. The villian of the story continues to be a force of brutality and terror in her life. This ends up leading Peekay and her together.
However, the book doesn't lose sight that Peekay, who ends up realizing his dream of being welter weight champion of the world, is the driving force with a destiny to unite all of Africa. This is why I'm divided on the end. The end of the book does, but doesn't, fulfill his destiny. You are lead to believe in these superstitions and medicine men and other supernatural things. Even Peekay, who is reluctant to believe that he is suppose to be the one to bring peace accepts much of these things in the end. However, we never find out how he does. That being said, the end still could be fulfilling his destiny, it just seems like it should be a little more than it was. It can still be a good ending, but I wanted more and I didn't like certain things about it. Anyway, I still highly recommend this book.
The Valkeries, by Paulo Coelho - this is the same guy that wrote The Alchemest, which is a huge seller. I haven't read that one, and would be willing to give it a chance even after reading this rubbish. This is supposed to be a mostly true account (according to the author) of a trip he took earlier in his life to the desert. He goes there to see his guardian angel. I didn't really know what this book was about before reading it and since I didn't have to buy it and recognised the author, I figured I'd give it a whirl. It appears to be one of those books that is really trying to be spiritual in a how to way, like the Celestine Prophecy. However, this guy who is supposed to be a magus (think new age wizard), is super Christian. None of it really makes sense together since the riturals and things contradict Christianity. Anyway, he writes as if you not believing every word makes you an idiot. But most of it is totally crazy bullshit, even for me whom just underwent many spiritual awakenings and am open to a lot of things now. But this is over the top even for me. Could the book be ok if the guy wasn't trying to say it was all real? Perhaps, but only because you wouldn't have to going, "god this guy is full of shit." Anyways, I wouldn't recommend this book unless you believe in what the bible says about all those crazy angel wars and levels of spirits and what not word for word.

Well Then, I'm Happy to Tell You That God Loves You

2011-09-02T12:40:00.000-07:00

This post is Croatia to Vienna, so it'll be long...

Croatia is lovely, but really, it's kinda dull. It's expensive (min of around €40 a day), and while nice, it lacks anything really special to hook you. It's got nice, clean beaches in warm Mediterranean clear water; it's got walled cities and intact fortresses; it's got mountains; it's got somewhat interesting cultural things. But so do other countries around it that are much cheaper. Originally, I was going to spend a bit more time, but the cost really put a damper on that and I only stayed about 5 days.
I came into Dubrovnik via an overnight boat from Bari, Italy. In my last post I mentioned that I was attempting to skip Croatia, but that the trains were full up and I didn't want to stay in Bari cause it wasn't very nice. Dubrovnik is called the gem of Croatia (or something like that). That's because it is a UNESCO Heritage site due to it's immaculately preserved old town and the wall that surrounds it. It's also located in an island littered part of the Mediterranean that looks more like the islands near Stockholm than those of Greece, but still has that amazing Mediterranean waters. There aren't any advertised hostels on hostelworld.com, so I didn't think there were any and ended up going with one of the guys peddling their guesthouses at the port. Later, I found out that there was a hostel. Bummer.
I say bummer because this guy, Slav, ran his guesthouse like a hostel and a shitty one at that. In other words, he was a dick. He was stressed out of his mind all the time, zooming back and forth between the house and the port and bus station. If you were sitting around, he'd go out of his way to say hi and ask how you were doing, but it was awkward and came across contrived and uncomfortable, like he was watching you. The first night he put me in a tiny room with two single "beds". Mine was actually a converted chair. Then, in the morning he came in about 3 times around 8-9AM, asking me to move rooms. He tried to get me to move into a room with a couple, and I told him I wouldn't. So, he went about the house going into rooms, without knocking, trying to move me. Ultimately, I moved to a room with two Swedes. All this hassle and it was still €20 a night, and that was cheap!
The first day, I had no Kuna and had a bitch of a time finding an ATM. There are plenty, I just couldn't find any. I ended up walking all the way into the old town, which was about 90 mins away. I walked around the old town, which, to it's credit, is really really nice... and too expensive (double the normal price for anything). You can walk the wall, but it's 10 bucks so I didn't. Also, the town inside the wall is small enough that you can see literally the entire thing within two hours. So, I got bored and went back to the guest house.
The next day, I spent laying around in the sun and swimming, since that is pretty much the only other thing to do after seeing the walled town. That night I cooked in the guesthouse's "kitchen" and ended up talking with a guy from the UK, Jo, who was headed to Split the next day like me, so we decided to make the trip together.
The next day, there was a flurry of activity at the house cause that couple that I was supposed to move in with (Jo got moved in with them instead) left at 4AM for the airport and didn't pay for their last night, or maybe couple nights. Slav, was totally consumed with finding them and fucking them. He gives free transport to the bus station, but we were zooming around little detours while he looked for them and bitched about it to us. Jo, who was upfront with him, tried to change the conversation more than once, but it was a wasted effort. If the place I'm staying tries to do good by you than I'd have their back, but this guy was a dick and running a guesthouse, probably somewhat illegally, like a hostel, so I was glad that they bailed without paying him. Jo and I would've done the same thing if we could've gotten away with it. Luckily, there was no chance they were going to get caught since they caught a flight at 5AM and Slav hadn't started his search till about 8AM. He also had the nerve to try to enlist our help in convincing some people at the station to stay at his place. I told him I was in a hurry, but Jo's English gentleman wouldn't allow him to just walk away. He did get the message across with his eyes though not to go.
One interesting aspect of Croatia is that the buses leave not on time, but early; always. So, we missed our bus. The next bus broke down an hour out, but this was very fortuitous for Jo. It broke down next to a specialty cake place and Jo went to get some water. We don't really understand what happened, but Jo thinks she asked for €10. Jo had Kuna and gave her 20 Kuna, which is about $4 or €3. She then gave him 500 Kuna ($100) in change. We couldn't figure out any sort of reason mathematically why this was the change; it wouldn't even make sense if he gave her €100 or if she meant to give him 50 Kuna. Anyway, he didn't tell her. The next bus that came to get us didn't have enough seats to take our bus too, so people had to sit in the aisle for 3 hours.
There is pretty much nothing to say about Split. The old town (also walled) is doable in 15 min and there is a beach. Mostly, I made some friends, Dan from Zimbabwe/OZ, Brad from OZ, Lance and Paul from UK. The main highlight is that we went to the beach and drank and went out and drank - this is pretty much what makes up the majority of Ozzies time abroad. Oh, and Jo bought us some beers with his winnings from the cake lady.
On a recommendation from my dad (thanks pops) I decided to go to Plitvice Lakes NP. The bus is about 5 hours from Split so I didn't arrive till about 1PM and had no idea where I was since the bus stop is not at the town but the actual park and all you see is a bridge of the highway and a parking lot. I was hoping to not stay in the area cause it was expensive so as I walked towards where I thought the park was, I came across a hotel where I was able to get the bus info. There was one leaving at about 6PM, which was perfect. I was able to get cash for the bus and stow my bags at the hotel, which was really nice of them since I wasn't staying there.
The park fee is $20 (steep!), but that's mainly cause they include the use of a bus and boat ride in the price even though they are unnecessary. The lakes were definitely the highlight of my time in Croatia. I won't do justice to them in my description, but basically this is a enormous park with plenty of hiking and virgin forest. The "lakes" is a series of turquoise and emerald lakes that cascade via a ton of waterfalls into each other. You aren't supposed to swim, but I saw and subsequently joined some locals who were. Also, much of the trail is walkable without shoes :) I made a timing error in trusting that the little boat ride would get me back in time for the last bus to Zagreb. The boat only left every half hour and took about 20 min to get from one side to the other. Having missed the bus, I came across an info booth that I missed earlier in the day and asked them if there were any cheap places in the area; knowing that there were. The lady only made one, half hearted attempt to help, then ridiculed me for traveling alone, "it's better to have two people. There are few single rooms in the area and they full. If you have two, it's easier. You need friend or girlfriend with you. Why not". Thanks lady. I asked a bus driver of a tour company if they had room to take me with them, but they were full too. I ended up asking the lady to call the place back and see if they'd put me up for an additional €10. They agreed. The guesthouse was affiliated with a booth nearby selling cake-like things and some local blackberries. While I waited for an hour to get my ride to the guesthouse, I chatted a little with the guy running the booth. He gave me a cake thingy and berries for free and I learned that he was a plumber from Pula - a few hours away. He comes every year on his vacation time to help his mother with the booth and guesthouse.
After checking in and them knocking about $5 off the price, the guy drove me to a nearby restaurant at the bottom of a "ski" hill. It was the most reasonably priced meal I'd had in Croatia. The guy ate with me and we talked a bit more, but there wasn't a ton to talk about so it was a little awkward. I found myself stretching for things to say.
They took me to the bus stop the next day two hours early, so I read a bit and finished one of my books and the tourist info on the park. At one point I walked to the area where the booths were to hang out with that guy, but they hadn't set up yet. While I was there a teenage girl came jogging up to me and asked if I spoke English. I replied and she came back with, "well then, I'm happy to tell you that god loves you". It was odd, but at the same time it seemed perfectly natural. It was odd cause she didn't appear to be one of those people who hang around to tell everyone that will listen that. She seemed to purposely choose me only, then went on about her business of going to the park without any expectation that there should be more made of it. And, it seemed so natural, almost like I was telling myself it in my head. In the past I may have scoffed at her, but the feeling of the whole thing was that this was supposed to happen. I felt honored, and gave a sincere and big smile, "thank you very much". I was a bit charmed by the interaction and felt a compassion for this girl who went out of her way to speak English and tell a stranger this with no motive other than perhaps an intuition that she should. Anyhow, I never got to say goodbye to the dude I ate dinner with, and caught my bus to Zagreb and connecting train to Budapest.

Budapest seems a bit seedy, like I got offered sex the first night I got in while trying to find dinner, but for the most part it isn't. Just appearances. The city is split into two sections - Buda and Pest - which is split by the river. Each side is quite different. Buda side has a giant palace and the presidents house, where you can eat the fruit in his yard. My apple had a worm in it. There are many luxury baths (similar to Turkish baths) and the hillside is mainly made up of rich homes. Pest side is mainly 5 story buildings, some parks and baths, and museums and monuments and is spread out grid like. The Pest side has the feeling of left overs from the communist regime with the uniformity, slightly rundown, and grid features. It could be easy to get lost in without a good sense of direction. There is also a Jewish quarter where they have awesome bars called "ruin" bars. The story behind them is that the city was going to destroy the buildings and locals decided to preserve them and create really unique bohemian pubs, cafes, clubs and whatnot. They remind me a lot of Portland's really unique places, but on a much granduer scale or even further out there. One that I went to had cars that were cut in half to make tables and seats, old bathtubs for couches, hidden rooms everywhere, and five bars, and I'm not even doing it justice.
I got in to the city about 10:30PM, which as you know, I hate. The place I had hoped to stay was super hard to find because they had no advertising outside to let you know where it was. Luckily, a hotel let me use their wifi because they didn't know where it was (it was across the street). The place was full up, but they had a sister hostel that had rooms. The sister hostel wasn't that cool. Partly, cause it seemed to be run entirely by people staying there and poorly at that. I talked to the girl who checked me in the next day about a key card and some other stuff and she was like, "oh, you're staying here?" Plus, it was all kids and all they wanted to do was party (they weren't even good at it) and be self absorbed. By the time I finally got checked in it was about 12:30, so I went to bed. For the most part my days in Budapest were pretty uneventful. One thing that annoyed me is this skinny loser UK kid sleeping in the bunk next to me woke me up two of the three nights having sex. It didn't even sound like good sex; just a lot of jack hammering. The second night he didn't even get to finish cause she hit her head on the metal frame. Also, at 7am one morning an alarm in someone's locker was going off and the guy wasn't around to turn it off till about 9:30am. I'd really love some good sleep, which won't happen by the time I post this as you'll see.
The next day, as usual, I walked around the city trying to get myself lost. I find it is the best way to understand a place and see things that you wouldn't normally. Since it is nearly impossible for me to lose my bearings, I don't have to worry about actually being lost either. I took an afternoon "free" tour of the Buda side. The guide was quite funny, but in the sense that he wasn't trying to be. That night I passed on going to a big party or rave at one of the thermal baths. It sounded cool to have a big pool party, but it just isn't my scene any more. Not the drinking around bodies of water thing, but the whole, kids who annoy me, way too drunk, etc. Plus, I didn't have anyone to hang out with so I know I would have just hated it.
I did go to the thermal baths the next day though, but to use them for their intended purpose of relaxing and recuperating. The bath complex had something like 13 baths, 8 saunas, some cold pools, and 3 giant outside swimming pools. It was also set in an old building (some baths here are 500 years old) so it had some really neat architecture too. I only spent about 3 hours there, but I felt better leaving than I have in quite some time. Oh, and I also went to a museum in an old castle and Hungarian foods festival. The museum was included in the festival, otherwise I wouldn't have gone. The festival was pretty good and I had some interesting sausages for lunch (one was apparently liver of, I think, a cow). All of it was tasty. On the way home I stopped at the ruin bar I mentioned, which was sweet.
But, like I said, it was mostly uneventful. It'd be worth coming back though. There is obviously a lot to this city that requires time to see. You know, little hidden things. It'd also be nice to come back and actually have someone to hangout with at the cool places that are littered around the city *cough, Ivy, cough*. But, because I didn't really connect with anyone, I decided to cut my stay a day short. Vienna being my next stop.

While I was traveling through Croatia and Budapest, I think I finally hit the wall. Maybe it's because I wasn't meeting anyone really interesting or maybe it's just time, but either way, I am ready to return state side. I won't of course, I have obligations and things yet to do - I can't leave without visiting Grant castle, etc. Plus, I feel there is a purpose for me to make the full year and with it so close... Still, I feel like it's getting more difficult to connect with the people I'm meeting, or at least to put out any effort to connect. At the hostels here, they were all 20, if that. If I go out on my own, I am all out of small talk; It's the same shit all the time and it's boring. I don't care where you're from or what you do for work, tell me something interesting about yourself. Fuck, tell me you're afraid of griffins or something, anything besides the normal droll. I don't want to hear about your job and why do you want to know about mine? What difference does it make? Who really wants to talk about how they make money to do the things that are important to them? Tell me about those important things. Rant or enlighten me on something I didn't know that you care about. Tell me what blows you're fucking hair back? what is it that you're all about?

Vienna definitely helped with invigorating me again. It's strange. Is it the people thing or is it the energy that the cities put out? Maybe both, but Vienna was uplifting. I immediately liked it from when I left the train station. It's clean, it's got really pretty buildings, it's got a vibe that feels livable. I got in at a reasonable time and even though the first hostel I went to was full, I was able to find my second choice fast enough. My second choice ended up being a disaster, but I'll get to that later. The hostel recommends this restaurant around the corner for reasonably priced, authentic Austrian food, of which it was neither. There was an English guy, who is a character, running it so I don't know how it's quite authentic, and it was a bit on the expensive side. Anyway, there was a woman named Suzy, UK, who was just sitting down to eat by herself so I asked if I could join. She turned out to be interesting right off the bat without all the superfluous light talk I mentioned above. She wasn't traveling alone; her friend Tom whom came around after dinner. But, it was really nice to have someone who was actually worth talking to.
The following day, I set out like I normally do - trying to get myself lost. I was wondering if Vienna had a good pub and music scene and began to wonder if there is enough commonalities in cities that have cool scenes like Portland, Seattle, Boston, Austin, San Diego, that given a few questions answered by a local (like is there an area that has a bunch of used book stores or something) and a map (constraints like main arterials vs lesser ones or open spaces like parks), you could walk into any city and automatically predict a few areas where there might be that kind of scene. I never really came to any conclusions, but thought that if anyone could come up with that type of thing for different types of interests that it'd probably be the most useful tool any traveler could have. It's hard a lot of times to express the type of scene you are into or what you're looking for, esp to a non native English speaker, so that'd help solve that problem. Anyway, I ended up walking into the university campus and came across some girls setting up a slackline and they had a crank. Now, for those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, this is me on one about 5 years ago:

One problem with slacklining was it required a few people to pull it taught and we always wished for a crank. Now they have one! I jumped on and remarkably did reasonably well on it even though I haven't been on one more than once a year for the past few years. Also, it generally attracts a certain type, so I figured they'd know the type of area I would be interested in. I asked them and after a phone call and some hemming and hawing, they told me there was one place that would have some blues.
I kept wandering and found two festivals going (one was a opera film fest set with the screen in front of a sweet ass building - see fb) that looked really fun, though I didn't stay for them. I also did one of my favorite things (and probably one of the best/easiest ways to get a good feel for a culture) for each country, I stopped at a grocery store and picked up some things. If you think about it, there might not be a better way to really be a part of a place than hanging out at the grocery store. Besides being around every day people who aren't pandering to tourism, it will give you a good idea of what the real "authentic" foods are. Europe has good grocery stores, and Austria has well priced and good meats - FYI.
Anyway, I ran into Suzy and Tom when I returned and found out that they were going to go to see some blues and I mentioned the place I was recommended. They felt a local recommendation was likely to yield better results than the guide books so we went and scoped it out. As it turned out, we were late and only caught the end of the show, which was still worth going to see their take on blues. We later learned from a local who hung out with us a little while and took us to another bar later, that there isn't really any music scene because Austria has so little people that it can't support one outside of concerts or the symphony. Oh, and on the way home we passed a red light distinct. Not appealing woman, though they were not street hookers and one would expect a bit higher class for the ones behind glass. Suzy thought it'd be interesting to inquire about services and prices at one of the bars. It was not interesting. Not only did the place not give any detail, but Tom and I had a feeling of we'll get stabbed by one of the hookers. We didn't linger.
The rest of my time in Vienna has been disturbed by my hostel and by an incident one night, all of which has fucked my sleep and consequently not allowed me to do too much during the day.
First thing that happened was due to one of the strangest and worst reservation systems I've ever come across, because I didn't use the hostelworld.com to make the reservation I got charged more and could only stay in the room two days though I wanted more. I asked for some money back cause I was being over charged and they just kinda laughed like I was crazy. Due to it being less expensive and so that I wouldn't have to come down at 9am to make sure I could stay in the room, I used the internet to book the additional days. When I had my new reservation I asked reception to write a note and to make sure that this new reservation meant I wouldn't have to move rooms. I did this with several receptionists. Surprise, I got a call at 9 in the morning telling me I needed to move.
Next, in my new room I had two asian roommates, and for those who know my track record with them, know that things inevitably didn't go well. For whatever reason I was having trouble sleeping and then when I finally did, one of the roommates decided it'd be appropriate to start feverishly masturbating. Being a light sleeper, this woke me. I gave a cough, still unsure if my judgement was accurate and it stopped immediately, confirming my suspicions. 30 minutes to an hour he was back at it. This time I said something like, "you better not be doing that shit again". Stopped. 30 minutes to an hour later I think it started back up again. This time I opened the blinds so that it was completely light in the room. But of course by now I was too awake to sleep so I left the room to ask reception to move me. Having only got about 2 hours max of sleep that night, I was hoping they'd have the linens changed for me ASAP by 10 so I could try a nap in a bed, esp because I was obviously pissed off. I tried to sleep a little in the common area, but couldn't. Low and behold my linens were ready for me at noon. Too late for me and I had to power through the day like a zombie with a giant lack of sleep fog and headache.
I tried an attempt at maybe going to see the palace and even went to a Starbucks for coffee to help me. I was so exhausted by the time I got back from Starbucks that I couldn't go out of the hostel for more than a few hundred meters, max half hour. My day was completely ruined.
Luckily, my train to Poland leaves at 10pm so I had all day today to catch any things I missed. I went to the palace and yep, it looks like a palace. Most palaces (all that I've seen) are rectangular, two or three stories, blocky, and symmetrical. Sure, they can be pretty with all the adornments, but the buildings themselves are pretty boring once you've seen one. At least with castles there are a bunch that are weird or have to fit the natural environmental limitations, or just had a weird person design it (though I'm sure most castles get pretty predictable and boring too). This palace was yellow. They usually either come in a yellow gold or a lightish blue. I didn't even bother going in it (esp cause they wanted $20+ entry), but I did walk the grounds and there were some things worth seeing, most notably were some fountains you can see on my FB. Next I just took a bunch of trams, buses, and subways around to see as much of the city outside the main area as I could. This included the river front which is almost completely park land.
Vienna is a very liveable city. I like how clean it is, how easy it is to get around, the history, cool old buildings that are well preserved, museums, cheap beer (if you buy it from the store) and food. You don't need a car here either; it is so bike friendly it borders on ridiculous. The only thing is that things close extremely early - want groceries? Most stores close at 7pm! There isn't a great music or arts scene either, which would make it tough. I would definitely come back here again and maybe use it as a base to explore other parts of Austria. I think it'd be sweet to drive around the country with somebody *cough Ivy cough* Sorry I've being coughing a bit during this post, must have a cold.

For those interested in future plans: I am leaving for Krakow tonight. I will stay at least 3 nights and may go to some mountain town for a day or two after that. Then, I will go to Wroclaw for 3 or 4 nights, then Prague until I go to Munich for Oktoberfest. I don't know my plans to well after that. I do know I will go to Berlin following Munich, then no idea... Belgium, Netherlands, Scotland, England?
Also, I gave Ivy till Sept. first to find work in London and since that hasn't happened I am going to turn down the job. Though some of you may think I'm nuts for "throwing away an opportunity like this", I can assure you it is going to better for me to not take it. It won't be the only opportunity to work abroad, though it will likely be the highest paid opportunity abroad I'll get. That being said, no, I haven't bought my tickets home yet. Interestingly, I had a very vivid dream a few nights back. All the players who were involved with or giving their input on it were involved. Dave (the guy I'd be working for) and I had a long conversation about it and I ultimately told him I wouldn't be taking the job. He was bummed and asked if I had bought the tickets home yet. I told him no and with a very dramatic and important focus in the dream, he told me clearly "wait until the 6th or 7th to book the tickets". With what I've learned on this trip, I am taking that seriously. Do I know why? No, but I'm going to listen to it. Still haven't figured out what day to book back yet.

Take it easy yall

Easiest Way From Greece to Croatia? Italy

2011-08-22T09:10:00.001-07:00

In my last post I had made it to Rethymno and met some cool people. Even did a tour of the Minoan Knossos. I left the day after that post for Santorini, Greece's poster boy. I must say that Santorini is dramatic. Three of five towns are built not just on the top of 500 meter cliffs, but down parts of said cliffs. The town I was able to get a hostel was Perissa.

Perissa doesn't have the whole cliff thing going, but its at sea level with a black sand beach. I was recommended the northern part of the beach by an Ozzy working the restaurant next to the hostel. He recommended it cause it was more sand that pebble. As I walked to it that day, I noticed three things immediately; a church built within (or under) the shadow of a massive cliff, what looked like a prison atop a mountain, and that the town was 95% tourists. There were some homes in the town, but most were seasonals. Seriously, at least half of the businesses were owned by foreigners and almost all were staffed by tourists who decided to linger. Still, its worth staying there cause you're near swimming (with cliff jumping up to 8 meters), which is great since it gets crazy hot here. If you stay in Fira or Oia you'll need a pool since they don't have great beaches, and that means a nice hotel $$$. The buses are cheap to go to the pretty places and run frequently, although never at the scheduled time. Plus, they get packed to the brim. After spending my arrival day at the beach, I decided my full day would be to go to Fira and then Oia for sunset, which everyone raves about.
I had gone out with some people from my hostel; Dave from Toronto (looked and sounded like a young and tall Silvester Stalone), Cassy from Brazil/France, and Ryan from OZ. We shared a meal of grilled octopus (my choice) and some veal. Later, Ryan knew a few bartender at one of the bars, so we got a few free drinks. Ryan was a little slow and self centered, but made up for it in enthusiasm. He'd make a great promoter cause he's super out going and almost gives you no choice but to get along with him. When you go out in Greece, it usually means you're hitting the pillow by 4am at the very easiest and most likely you may be watching sunrise. Even if you are taking it easy on the drinking, you look at your watch and have no idea where two hours went.
I woke around 9 only to fall asleep again till noon. I was upset with it, but it was probably the best decision cause I felt like shit at 9 and totally fine by noon. I caught a bus to Fira and spent about four hours there. So amazing. The Greeks, esp here, are masters of open space architecture. The insides of most houses or local restaurants (upscale ones are excepted) won't blow you away, but they will all be amazing from the outside. The cliff towns, like Fira, have one or two streets for cars and the rest are walkways that wind through the town, slithering up and down the cliff terraces with no perceptible rhyme. Or maybe that's the point cause it gives it a really tranquilo feeling, which the houses, cafes, and restaurants mirror. The feeling is like, where you going? What's the rush? Sit and have some wine, the Persians won't be here for years.
I didn't do any of that. Had I, I would have missed sunset in Oia. Well, I missed it anyway, but not cause of the relaxing sirens song of the town. I walked down to where the cruise ships come in to get a view from below of Fira. Not really that exciting and unless you want to pay €8 for round-trip tram rides or for a donkey up the walk path, you will walk through a ton of donkey shit and literally jump out of the way of the jackasses. Twice I jumped onto the wall and one time I got real close to slugging one in the face cause I couldn't get out of the way and it was basically trying to run me over. The Greek guy leading it and the pack didn't seem to care either. Anyway, don't bother going down, the tram isn't much better cause all the French people will try and cut and its no use being angry at two dozen people.
After going to a viewpoint at the top north part, I started walking an aimless walkway to what I thought was the road. It went a bit further than I though so I missed the bus stop. I walked the road a little and did find a stop but it was seconds after the bus pulled away. I was not going to sit around and wait and noticed a trail that went to Oia from somewhere near me on the map. It only took about five min to discover it and so I began my walk. I figured all along I'd just catch the bus from a further stop, but also get in some good walking. However, as I went I noticed I was making great time. So much so that I figured I could walk all the way to Oia. Even with running into someone I met the day before and a couple of stops, it was doable. That is, until I got to the top of the second mountain.
At the top of the mountains, and some hidden spots in the cliffs, are these random churches; simple and beautiful. Most are painted similar to most buildings in the towns - whitewashed walls with blue roofs. The top of this mountain had one and looked over Oia. Also, besides a couple stragglers that came behind me and carried on after I stopped, I was alone. I didn't see any reason to go down into Oia to join the thousands of people there for the same sunset I'd be seeing. The only difference was that I was looking down on Oia and the sea, and Oia was only looking down on the Mediterranean. I arrived at the church about 30 min before sunset, so I walked five minutes up a side path to the actual top where there was a lone little pillar about a meter tall. No idea what it was for. There was also a big old rock, which I climbed and practiced the meditation techniques Peter showed me while waiting for sunset. As I sat there the wind gently rocked me, the swallows came out for their dinner, dodging and darting close enough to sound like variations in the wind and lifted my spirit, while the rock kept me grounded. When I opened my eyes the sun was starting for bed and I was so tranquilo that I didn't move a single muscle while on that rock. It was a pretty spectacular sunset in its own right, but it wasn't as good as others I've seen. Maybe if there were a couple clouds or something. I'm used to that though; people over rating things or having experienced better. The thing is, if you hold on to those things, even the most amazing sunset you've seen or other great things in life (not just anger or disappointment), you can't see present for what it is. It's still incredibly beautiful in its own right. In fact, after the sun went down, there was an aura of gold above the sea for about 15 min to which I laughed and thought to myself, "now you're just showing off". For that hour, everything seemed right with the universe.
I left Santorini the next day though I could've easily stayed a few more days. I took a night boat to Athens, which is Bullshit. These night boats (excepting the one from Rhodes to Crete) have it set up so its hard to sleep unless you buy a room for a couple hundred bones. This one had a broken seats so only a few people could reclined and there was hardly any floor space. The one to Bira had seats reserved for those who paid more. I tried to sleep on a sofa in the dining area, but the staff made me leave so they could open the dining area at midnight after closing it only an hour prior. Stupid. Then I was asked to leave the seating area even though there were empty seats going to waste. Luckily, I found a platform in a stairwell. This was foiled by the fucking French having a loud conversation on the platform above. This went on till 2am, then picked up again around 7am. I see why people hate the French; they have zero consideration for anyone else and think they are entitled to everything. Anyway, when I got into Athens and took the train to the center, I still hadn't heard about a couch so I started looking for a hostel. Props to McDonald's for the free WiFi. The first place I went was full and they sent me to another. I was told it would be €10 a night, then when I got there, the same guy was there (he owned both) and told the manager it'd be €10 a night for me. The room of course took 3 hours longer to prepare than it was supposed to and when I finally was able to check in, the manager asked for €14 a night. I told him that's not what we agreed upon, so he "called the owner" who confirmed that I was mistaken. Fitting for Athens.
Greece, esp Athens, runs corrupt. The manager, George from London, though ripping me off like that, had some interesting thoughts on Greece that he shared with me on the last night. Half British and half Greek, he has lived in both places. He said that the government likes to spend money to be popular, but it has too many problems with corrupt employees that it doesn't collect enough to pay for the spending. He estimated that only about 15% of taxable income is being paid. He mentioned a doctor who claimed €15,000, but had a yacht, house on an island, lavish condo in Athens, nice car, and just a ton of money. Sure, that could be inherited wealth, but George reckoned he was like others he knew who also bribe the tax man. Bribing is just assumed to be a way of life. He also said that when the euro came, prices went up cause things cost lower than the lowest denomination of euro cents, but wages didn't increase. So all in all, he wasn't shocked that Greece was under water. Greece doesn't want to change either. Sounds like they are not going to be able to repay the bailout. They just say do it or we'll take you (eu) under with us.
But enough about that. Athens center is a ghetto. It's dirty, its got crime problems, prostitutes everywhere yelling all hours of the night, etc. Needless to say, I didn't leave the hostel either night I was there. According to George and Isabella, there are much nicer places away from the center, though without a local guide to take you, you'll never find them. One was working and the other was sick, so just the center for me. Because my sleep has been fucked by the boats, I woke early to beat the heat and see the famous ruins of the city, but was so disoriented, I couldn't focus enough to dress myself. So, I went back to bed for another few hours. At 11am, I forced myself, still a bit sluggish, to get a move on the day. I wish their filtered coffee was more like that back home, but still, it was better than nothing.
The temple of Zeus was cool cause its huge, though only a little corner is not crumbled. The acropolis is amazing. It has a bunch of cool stuff around the base to check out like amphitheaters, caves, statues, temple ruins, etc. The top can only be accessed by one entrance and is quite overwhelming. The top is basically the entrance, the Parthenon, another temple, and rubble. The Parthenon has a bunch of machinery in and around it, which really detracts from its coolness. In fact, the angora had a better temple cause it was almost wholly intact. They are trying to rebuild the Parthenon, which would be nice. My take on fucking with the old stuff is this: I've seen the ruins and it is nearly impossible to imagine most things just by the floor plan that has been left, which constitutes most ancient ruins. What they should do is rebuild much of it but clearly distinguish what is new from old as well as have photos of the before and after so you can see what it looked like as a rubbish pile. Some are purests about this, but unless you are a total expert on this and excellent with visualizing, without this, they are really hard to understand. No matter how much I tried to visualize how life was then and what the buildings looked like, I couldn't do it. The other option is making 3d renderings next to the ruins, but even these don't capture the grandeur and imagination. The angora is next and has only a couple non rubble things. One is that temple, a few statues, and a rebuilt law hall that now is a museum. Lastly, are some lesser ruins and the stadium. Of these, the notable ruin is the tower of the winds. the stadium was extra money to go in and completely viewable from outside. The whole ruins experience costs €12 for 6 sites. Not bad. Not bad at all.
Now, I'm writing this on my phone in Bari, Italy, waiting to see what life is going to throw me. I thought for a minute, that I'd cut out Croatia and go up to Venice and enter Austria from there. However, the train tickets are sold out, so now I'm back to maybe Croatia, but the ticketing office has been closed all day. It all depends on what happens in the next few hours. I'll let you know what happens.
Update - went to Dubruvnik, Croatia.

Book Reviews - Celestine Prophecy, One For My Baby, and The Big Book of Chi

2011-08-15T08:51:00.000-07:00

This is what happens when you don't write for awhile, you get a back log of stuff. That's why there's three.

First, lets start with The Celestine Prophecy. If you remember, Golden Moon (the level lone reiki hippy chick I met in Sapa), recommended this book to me. It wasn't easy to get a hold of either. I found it in other languages or the book stores had other titles (sequels) by the same Author. Finally, a book shop in Chang Mai that had a lot of books I wanted (I bought the chi book there too) had one hiding in the store room. This book has a little bit of mystique behind it; it is usually passed down instead of bought.
To begin with, you need to understand why Golden suggested this book to me. Remember that we were talking about this energy flow and that I was trying to understand what I felt. Therefore, this book is sort of spiritual, but written as a novel. The plot is that the main character becomes aware of the existence of an ancient manuscript that has nine prophecies/secrets of the world (called insights) written within it. This manuscript is in scattered pieces in Peru, and the government and Catholic Church are trying to destroy and cover it up by any means possible. Most of the book the main character is running from people with guns.
There are nine chapters and each one reveals one of these insights. Some of the insights are really ridiculous (esp. the last one), but some described some things that I experienced pretty well. I don't buy into the books insights as truths about the world, although some are fairly Tao influenced which I feel is pretty legit, but the message that the book is trying to put forth is a good one. Basically, how we should first become whole people (like I've mentioned), to listen to your intuitions, and how we should treat people with compassion.
I really enjoyed the first half of the book, then the insights and some technical things started to get to me. The insights started getting too ridiculous; the last one is too ridiculous for me to even paraphrase it. Also, for a book based in Peru, you'd hope that the author had researched or been there. That doesn't seem to be the case. For example, this character travels to Machu Pichu by road and stays at a house right next to the ruins; neither being accurate. They drive to Iquitos. Iquitos doesn't have any roads into it; you have to fly or boat. Things like that. Odd.
Anyway, I liked it for the most part, but it isn't for most people. It's one of those books that you have to be ready to read or you'll absolutely hate it.

The next book is One For My Baby. If you like self deprecating humor, which the British are so good at, and love based novels, this one is for you. I thought this was an excellent book. There were of course some takes on love I disagreed with, but it is full of great lines on the subject. Also, the self deprecation is up there with Hi Fidelity (one of my favorite books and movies).
The plot is that the main character, Alfie, meets the love of his life while working in Hong Kong. They get married and she dies, and most of the book he is punishing himself. He has a series of meaningless relationships, does things he's not proud of, his family falls apart, etc with the bad things. He meets a Chinese family and starts learning Tai Chi (which he has actually researched and does justice to), but can't stick with the commitment. Eventually, of course things take a turn for the better and things work out the way you hope - or maybe not. Give it a go.

The last book is the Big Book of Chi: An Exploration of Energy, Form and Spirit. It's essentially a text book on what chi is and where the concept came from and the beliefs that it influenced (Buddhism, Hindu, and all eastern culture). It's a survey of some of the more commonly known forms, techniques, etc that deal with chi like Tai Chi, Acupuncture, Feng Shui, Reiki, Japanese Gardens, and more. If you are interested in the Tao and chi, this is a fairly good introduction; it really brings helps bring it all together.

Island Hopping in Greece is the Bee's Knees

2011-08-13T12:56:00.000-07:00

I took the ferry from Çeşme to Chios (pronounced kios) on the 3rd. I was the lucky recipient of being the sole person to have to empty the entire contents of my bag for border control. The guy thought I'd some how come up with a way to fit cocaine into the air pockets of the foam cushioning in my bag. I was almost certain he was going to slice it open. Then had me answer a dozen times that this was indeed my bag. Thanks for being a dick just because I was American.
Chios isn't much to write about. The town is like most island towns here, it is built around the marina as the main focal point of the city. In Chios, the main road goes along the harbour and splits the shops and restaurants from the walk path. The affect this has is that it sucks; you don't want to sit in a cafe cause you have cars in your face and you don't really want to walk the path cause its uninviting. it does have a wall around part of it, but compared to other towns in Greece, its impressive. There is nothing resembling a hostel, so its not a great destination if you are traveling alone. I spent most of Wednesday morning trying to find a cheap place to stay. There are the hotels and pensions, but Greece has places that have a sign outside advertising rooms for rent. These are your cheapest option next to hostels. In the end I got one for €20. Always ask if they have cheaper rooms or will go less. Almost all will show you a room that isn't their cheapest, or they'll drop the price €5. The place I stayed had a great typical Greek lady running it. She was on the heavier side and hilarious. She spoke some English, but it was heavily accented so it was tough to understand.
It also turned out she was a level 2 reiki. She mentioned it to me when I asked her some places to see on the island. She said there was a sea cave that was great for reiki. She asked if I knew what it was, so I grabbed my big book of chi and turned to the reiki chapter. I tried to see if she'd do a session on me, but she said she couldn't for some reason.

For the most part Chios is kinda boring. It has some unique things to check out like mastica, which is a tree that only grows on that island. They make all sorts of veal out of the tree, or I think maybe the sap - gum, lotions, liquor, etc. The liquor is quiet sweet and really unique tasting.
I only planned on staying 2 nights, but Greece's ferry system is unpredictable and some routes don't run a lot, so I had to stay an extra night. I wanted to go to Rhodes, but there wasn't a direct way anymore. When I asked the picketing agency how to get there, they told me some way that included 3 transfers over the same amount of days and went through the cyclades, which is kinda the opposite direction. After hearing that, I decided Rhodes was not in the cards. On the last day I took a bus to the beach that Atome recommended. It was described as a black rock beach because a volcano had blown millions of black rocks there. I think they must have some special value to people cause it was mostly normal rocks; I saw 3 deep black ones. I tried to find this cave she mentioned too. Based on the accuracy of the black rock beach, I think I found it, and it wasn't as cool as she made it out to be.
In any case I pretty much had to go to the island of Samos. When I got there, I found out that there was a way to get there via the island of Kos the next day. I decided it was back on and stayed overnight in Pythagoria, Samos island. Pythagoria is really pretty. They really know how to work the harbour area to make it gorgeous. The town is small with the harbour surrounded on all sides by gentle hills. The affect it has is that streets and the houses seem to spring from the harbour. The harbour area has many nice restaurants geared toward tourists and the walkway is large and welcoming. There is a beach on the north side beyond the harbour and at night, the restaurants there set up tables almost into the water. It also has a castle and a really neat monastery. I'd consider staying there longer, but there isn't a hostel and the cheapest place is €25.
The next day I caught an early boat to Kos and transferred to Rhodes. On the way, you stop at other islands to pick up passengers and I must say that each town we stopped at seemed more beautiful and amazing than the last. As we pulled up to Rhodes, the first thing you'll notice is the wall and towers. The old town is completely surrounded by a wall and moat, with guard towers in key spots. The old town is pretty well preserved and if you can look past the tourist hordes and shops, it is quite a beautiful town. The side streets meandering, twist, turn, or abruptly end. There are arches down them, some with plants hanging their vines off. There is a big ass castle, restored mostly to its former glory. The moat is walkable and pleasant to just lay around in. I did manage to find one hostel. If a city has a hostel on the islands, it usually doesn't advertise itself on the internet. This particular one was a dump. It was probably the third crappiest one I've stayed at; I think the order is the one in Sorata Columbia, then Bangkok Thailand (not sure it counts since it didn't have dorms and was a brothel), then this one.
For €10 you got a bed in a room where he crammed more beds in than was meant to be. Serious, no floor space. You got a bed sheet but no sheet to put over yourself. No TP, no soap, no towel (hand or bath), no WiFi, one outlet to charge phones in the entire place, not allowed to bring in alcohol, no guests, no place to store valuables, check out at 10am, if you wanted to shower in the not so nice showers after check out it was €3, no doing laundry in the sinks, etc. Add all that to it needing upkeep badly or it will crumble to the ground in 5 years and you got a pretty shitty place. The guy tried to be nice, but it was clear he just wanted money. With as little effort he was putting in and corners he was cutting, I imagine he was making a killing. The one nice thing I can say is that the courtyard area was quite pleasant.
Even though it was cheap, I couldnt bring myself to stay in that place any more than two nights. Plus, I couldn't afford anything better and because the boats to Crete didn't leave everyday, it limited my time to less time than I would have liked.
The second day, some Spanish girls (Eva, Mariona, Judit, Helena) invited me to drive around with them to see some things a couple Greek guys recommended. They were really nice and Eva reminds me a lot of my old roommate Nicole, so I immediately took to her. It sounded fun and way better than anything I had planned. They rented a car (I chipped in), and we drive to "seven springs" and several beaches. Seven springs was a dud. It is just seven small spots where underground spring water is coming out. You can drink the water but we didn't. There is a restaurant practically sitting on top of them. You could probably hike around, but we didn't. The beaches were nice. We stopped at three. One was a normal, run of the mill, beach another was set in amongst some really beautiful hills, and the last was set in two separate coves. The last one was the best. There wasn't any sand to lay out on, but the coves were climbed in and the water was crystal clear and turquoise. Side note - the water here is such an amazing color. Next to the islands it tends to be bright turquoise and very clear, and further out it is a deep dark blue lighter and more blue than black than the pacific ocean, but similar to the color of my old room at my moms house - end. Oh yeah, and we saw octopus.
The next day I walked around Rhodes, mostly out to some ancient stadium. It was a bit of a walk and I forgot my map, so I just hoped I'd end up in the right spot. The ruins were really my first intro to the kind you'd think of if I asked you to close your eyes and picture Greek ruins; tall ass pillars and stuff. I was slightly concerned about time cause I didn't want to stay in that shit hole any more nights, but my boat was a few hours late so I didn't need to worry. Some of these ferries are the size of cruise liners, but you don't have to book a room. Mine was overnight and, like many many people, I slept on the floor under a set of stairs. At first I had the spot to myself, but right before I passed out, some Polish people came in mass. They tried to talk to me, but I basically blew them off cause I was tired. They even wanted me to drink some whiskey with them, but I just laughed at them.
The ferry for Crete stops in Heraklio, but I was staying in Rethymno, which is an hour and a half bus away. Heraklio is the biggest town on Crete and is kinda a zoo. Don't stay there if you have a choice. I chose my city cause it had a well ranked hostel. One thing I learned for Greece is to buy your ferry ticket the first chance you get. It sucks cause you can't decide after knowing whether you like the place; not really go with the flow. But, that's what you have to do during high season cause, like what happened here, they're booked out. Luckily, it was only an extra day and not five.
Crete is peculiar. While it's not as pretty in the areas I've been on Crete vs other islands, it has a vibe that really makes you wanna stay. Some of the people in my hostel have been here for weeks, some came intending to stay a few days but found themselves here much longer, some can't leave cause the sea won't let them. The people in my hostel were great. The ages vary quite a bit, but no one is excluded. There are some girls my sisters age mingling with forty year olds, and all the rest like me, in-between. Ryan, a guy from Cali, is working contract military jobs in Afghanistan. He doesn't strike me as the normal military guy. In fact, I wasn't sure I believed him when he said he served four years in the marines. We talked some about what he was doing out there. The rest of the group were some Ozzies, Marcus, Carmen, Dave, and Lexi; the last two of whom I may cross paths with again or may travel with a little. Also, a Greek chick, Isabel, and a crazy Brit named Steve. That's pretty much the group with some rotations occasionally. I haven't really been out since my bday and since everything happens so late here, I've gone out with them twice. I actuallymanaged to spend only about €10 each time. Anyway, its been nice to have some people to chill with.
One Danish guy here named Peter turned out to be a reiki master. That makes it that I've met every level and I met them in order of the levels. Masters can teach, but he said he was rusty at teaching and needed more people anyhow. I'm not sure I'd choose him as a teacher anyhow because I wasn't completely comfortable and he is super long winded. Really nice guy though. We talked a lot about it and he gave me really helpful insights into the practice and also some meditation techniques. Even though by no means did he teach me any reiki, he did show me an exercise where I felt chi in my hands. It was incredible. All this is too much for coincidence. I'm definitely looking up some masters when I get back and take a level one instruction.
My last day I went to Knossos, which have the ruins of a Minoan palace. This palace is mostly in crumble, but Author Evans has restored much to resemble what it may have look like. The palace is a huge labyrinth of rooms from about 2000BC. This palace is, in fact, where the legend of the minotaur came from. If you got some time to kill and aren't doing some gorge hiking or whatnot, they are easy to get to and worth a peak. TIP - if you are staying in Rethymno, tours leave only on certain days of the week and the one on Fridays is €15. It is a guided tour of the ruins, plus shopping. However, you can substitute shopping for a self tour of the museum while others shop. The other tours are €30 or doing it yourself by taking the bus costs €18 and no guide. Also, they have a stupid setup at the ruins. I didn't pay the entrance fee. If its busy, the ticket booth won't see you, and like normal Greeks the ticket checker at the entrance to the ruins will be yacking away. The exit and entrance are at the same spot and its just way too easy to not pay. I followed some other people who did the same. Just keep in mind you may not enjoy them as much cause you may be partly concerned about caught by someone.
Tomorrow I leave for Santorini. Keep your fingers crossed.
These are some observations I've had on Greece so far:
Greece has a lot of ancient ruins, but also modern ruins. There are many many abandoned houses or mansions crumbling away. Even in the middle of towns you'll see these. It may add to the mystique of Greece and it may remind you that Greece is hurting. The EU wants to get hold of gold and oil here. They gave the bailout with the condition (and probably intending Greece to fail to pay it back), that if they can't pay it back the EU gets some of the islands. Atone speculated that they'll allow Greece to keep the islands but force them to give them the rights to the goods.
The food is stellar. I try to splurge a dinner every few days. I had some fresh mussels in tomato sauce that was to die for. I had some grilled feta and fried cheese. I really want to find some grilled octopus.
Lastly, this place is so great, I'm adding buying or leasing a sailboat and sailing the isles and other locales in the Mediterranean to my dream list. Obviously that's way down the line, but its on there now.

PS sorry if there are a bunch of errors on this, I did this from my phone

Turkey Post, Finally

2011-08-07T12:44:00.000-07:00

I've been neglecting posting lately. Mostly that's because of access to a computer. I'm writing this from my phone, which I hate. It's hard to type long prose and I basically can't proof it, not that I do too much proofing anyway. So FYI.

After all that fuss that the picketing agent gave me in Bangkok, all I had to do was walk up, say I wanna go in Turkey, and they gave me a visa. When I got to immigration, the hardest part was the 5 min. line I had to wait in. I'm not sure one person looked at me to see if I was even the same sex as on my passport. I guess it may be because they have women with burkas comings through all the time and checking a passport against a small slit where you can only see their eyes really means nothing. No, they don't have to remove them, but yes, you as a man will need to remove your hat.

I know I sorta mentioned all that before, but I wanted to transition into burkas. It was really strange being around that many people with burkas (about 30% of the woman in Istanbul). The purpose is supposed to be for men, so they don't get sex crazed. The bridge of the nose, neck, ankles, and some other spots are, according to the culture, the sexiest parts on a woman. So why not get a one for all? I think its a power thing really and I feel sorry for them. At least I think they aren't as repressed as they used to be. One odd thing is that after I left Istanbul, I rarely saw burkas. I did see full body attire that was obviously meant as a burka alternative. Even full body baggy swim suits. The other odd thing is that they have some pretty racy things on tv and print like sex scenes and chicks barely dressed.

The other thing I don't get about them, and this goes for the men too in trousers and long sleeve button ups, is how do they deal with the heat? I've heard the explanation that it's more efficient use of body moisture or that it keeps you cooler. Bullshit. I've had to wear the same thing as those dudes for work or just cause I didn't plan well from a bus trip, and I sweat my ass off. The first chance I can, I change into shorts and a normal shirt and feel way cooler. I don't buy that explanation.

Anyway, the day after I got in I had a mission. I wanted new shorts cause the crotch of my blue shorts wore through and was gaining ground. I went shopping and within minutes felt really under-dressed. Like I mentioned, they all wear slacks, nice shoes, etc. It looks like they are going to work, but someplace really swanky. Like everything I shop for, I can never find the right requirements all in one. Most of the time I comprise, but I couldn't find anything close and all I wanted was some cargo shorts with deep front pockets made with a durable material in blue. Nope, too much to ask. I had to wait till Ürgüp to find them.

As I was walking about, the food vendors would harass me. It's Turkey's version of the tuk-tuk. They will try to shake your hand and if you oblige, they won't let go till their routine is through. I never tested it, but many would say if you don't love it, I'll buy it for you. They're pretty nice though. Some will give you stuff if you're a visitor. One guy I saw twirling what looked to be pizza dough, started up a conversation. It turned out to be ice cream. After I told him I didn't want any, he told me that it was his treat.

Another thing about the food is there are no paleo dishes, save salads. I did have a few of those, but they don't keep me full for very long. Everything else is sugar packed. Sandwiches are huge here in more ways than one. If you see something at a buffet place that looks paleo, they'll throw rice in it or it'll have tons of potatoes. I even saw fresh muscles being served. Nope, they were precooked with rice, then reshelled. There were a couple places in Turkey that I found paleo dishes, but to fill up, I would have had to have two dishes and that would cost $20. Plus, they are known for their sweets (Turkish delights). No wonder 90% of the dudes here are fat, they couldn't escape carbs if they wanted.

So, after a failed day of shopping, I figured I'd do some sightseeing. They next day I went around to the big mosques. From the outside they are very very impressive. From the inside, they are basically one giant domed room, with separate, hidden from view, spots for women. Oh, those women! Always trying to be equal! Bah. The inside does have very nice pattering painted all over, but nothing that really reaches the over-doing it thing that the catholic church has going for it.

After that I kinda just wandered. I walked to the palace, but didn't feel like paying to see the harem, which I learned only mean private. So, it was the private area for the king and his family and mistresses, not solely where he'd bang his mistresses. In fact, the kings mom often taught the mistresses how to do shit like read. Some of the harem slave girls he doesn't even fuck.

Since I didn't want to pay I just wondered some more. One of the things that I loved about Turkey is that they really treat you well as a guest. They take pride in playing host. Well, other than the occasional jerk or money scam guy. Or if you're Portuguese, you'll get purposely ripped off by the guy carrying cherry juice by the mosques. I often got asked if I need help finding something or needed help with getting somewhere. Or the ice cream thing. Or some things I'll mention further on. The only problem was that English isn't that common. So, most of the help came in Turkish.

Side note - I might be in the back ground of a Turkish movie. They were filming, and unlike the rigamarole of our movies, they didn't close off the streets and stuff. They did try occasionally to get people out of the way, but it only worked sometimes. I was leaning on a street light watching and I think because I wasn't acting like a idiot and staring at the camera, they didn't care. So, maybe...

I met up with Evan one night. He was the kiwi from NYC I met in Kanchanaburi. Not sure what to make of him. He did give me some good advice. He told me to go to the islands outside Istanbul. They are 7 Lira (L) ($4) round trip. I took his advice. Afterward, I advised others to do the same.

There are 4 islands that the ferry goes to. They all have a nice little port area for tourists, but the last two have other things you can walk to like a beach or viewpoint. I went to the last one on Evan's advice. I did forget what he told me to do, so I just started walking uphill. The islands have no cars except that of maintenance vehicles, but they still have nice roads cause they have horse carriages. I walked to the top of a hill and there was this massive wooden house. Luckily, a group happened to arrive at the same time. One asked, in English, for me to take their photo, so I asked what the building was. The girl told me that it used to be an orphanage and is the second largest wooden building in the world. I took some photos for FB.

I walked around a bit more, mostly looking for a place to swim, but all the beaches are pay. I think it's clear that I have a hard time justifying paying for things like that, but it doesn't help their case that they wanted $25 L. Does the beach come with a blow job? I did find a spot near the marina that had a pier with a ladder where I saw some people swimming. I swam in my boxers and since I neglected to bring my towel, I had to throw on my shorts with wet undies. I got some strange looks, probably cause it looked like I pissed my pants, but it's probably because I'm so sexy.

When I got back, the hostel was supposed to have a party. It was a really odd party, involving about a dozen people yelling over strange music in a really dimly lit basement. It kinda reminded me of some beta parties. I didn't expect much since my hostel was weird to begin with. They had a ton of anti-capitalist and anarchist propaganda everywhere. That stuff attacks a strange crowd. Not to mention that most neohippies are stuck up dicks. So, the non hippies talked to each other during the party, not being allowed in the few hippies that graced us with their presence discussions.

I had to stay a day longer than I wanted because the buses were full to go to Samsun. I couldn't get a bus straight to Sinop, and I should've connected through Ankara, but figured Samsun would be just as nice since it is on the black sea not far from Sinop. But, when I got to Samsun I immediately caught a bus to Sinop (it was that nice). I never want to take a long bus again. Anything is better. I was confused as to why we stopped a few times in the middle of the night, like in SE Asia, but each time was 20+ min. I found out later it was cause none of the buses have bathrooms in Turkey. Thats new. I still don't get the 20+ min. That's excessive even for shitting. With the exception of SA, the buses are terrible and hard to sleep on. Plus, it brings out the worst in people. Stupid little things like cutting in line or walking through you, or being rude to people. Or they decide 2:30am till 6:30am is the best time to have a conversation. Please, don't even make an effort to have it quietly. What needs to be discussed for four hours at that time? I'm not sure I can have a four hour conversation at any hour. It's not just other people though; I find myself being cynical on the buses as well.
I arrived in Sinop and through some struggling found a place that would rent for 30 L a night. What I found is that Turkey is not set up for the budget traveler. There are some camping grounds, but I don't have any camping gear and sent my sleeping bag back with Ivy.

Speaking of people from home and related to this whole job thing in London, I have been talking with Ivy and my parents. The gist of it is that it is the same thing I was doing, but in London. Originally, it was looking like Sydney or Singapore, but a lot of things have been going on staffing wise with GC. I also don't think he wanted to pay for my flight. I'd been talking to Ivy about it and mentioned that it might be London. This got her super excited for some reason. My parents too. The guy, Dave, wanted me to start this month, but that was a bit unreasonable. I told him a couple demands I had, which basically amounted to if Ivy can't find a job in London, it means she can't come. If she can't come, I'd rather go home. I'm not going to go into detail as to why this is the case or what my other reasons are. It just is the case. Plus, and this won't make sense to a lot of you, but the fact that I'm not super excited to do it sticks out to me. After what I've learned this year, listening to my intuitions is a big one. I should be excited, but I'm not. This is most likely a once in a lifetime opportunity to work for 4ish months, doing cat analyst work in London that I don't plan on ever doing again after that. But, I just can't get excited. When I think about it, I get more excited about being a mechanic, which I have no training and no interest in. I'm not against this job in London, I just couldn't care less if I don't get it. It's not even close to the end of the world, and, because of my intuition, I think that there's a good chance that something more in line with my ambitions will turn up when I get back. Maybe it will be in another place as well.

My parents are pushing me to do it pretty hard and what seems like to take it under any conditions. Not entirely sure why. My guess is that they're scared that I won't be able to get a job when I get home cause I have a giant gap on my resume or something. The thing is, I've seen how many possibilities their are out there. I'm no longer concerned about jobs. There are endless ways to make living (and other alternatives) to pursue a dream. It's hard though. I don't want them to think I'm fucking up my life. As I mentioned in my last post, I'm finally seeing things clearer than ever. I know what's best for my life; know what my ambitions and dreams are; know that these are things that can't take a back burner to making a comfortable living; and know that you must always be striving to them with deliberatation. I'm not underestimating things. Taking the risks necessary to continually realize your dreams may sometimes mean failing; may not always be easy. I think it might be hard for my parents cause they're not seeing things the same way. Maybe its a generational thing; maybe its that they've done it one way their whole lives and have a hard time seeing things from the angle I am now seeing things; maybe it's cause they worked hard to give me a comfortable life and this lifestyle choice may seem like a slap in the face. I assure you it's what you raised me to do, just not exactly how you thought I'd do it. In any case, mom and Don, please don't worry so much, because I'm not. Its probably tough to let go of me being your child, but, I got this one coach. There might be some unorthodox plays, but everything will work out.

Back to Sinop. I love having conversations where neither party speaks the others language. The older the person the less attempt there is to understand too. I've had a couple of these in different parts of the world. The other person is maybe telling you about their life or family or maybe even that you Americans suck. You are telling them about the time you drove up the east coast of OZ or when you ate a guinea pig or about your family. They are most likely unrelated topics, but neither of you seem to care or make any attempt to understand. The 80 old guys running my pansiyon (guesthouse) were like this. Neither spoke a lick of English, one was a little bit grumpy and the other was super pleasant and would chuckle at the littlest things, and he wore suspenders which always is adorable. The giggly old man and I would exchange some words if I wasn't in a hurry to go somewhere.

Sinop is located on the Black Sea, on a norrow strip inbetween the mainland and a peninsula. At the entrance, there are ruins of an old fortress and further into the town there is a wall that is about 2,000 years old, but has been built up, knocked around, fixed, etc. over time. There are still a few spots where the old part of the wall is still visible under the newer (1000 year old) additions. There are also a couple beaches. One is on the northern part to the strip near the old fortress. The water there is really cold. If know someone with a car, or you are willing to make a really long walk, there is another beach where most of the locals go on the southern side, outside the city. The water is much more pleasant here, but it's more crowded and I think Mehmet was trying to warn me that there are fights and people will steal your belongings.

Mehmet is a deaf guy I met from a cafe that I went to a couple times. Side note - Turkish coffee, and Greek for that matter, is not good. They leave the grounds in it. You get only a few sips before you hit them (Greek gives you a little more room). You can try to add some water again, but it doesn't do much. Sinop was the first place (and last) I tried it - end side note. I mainly went to the cafe to check emails and IM since my pansiyon didn't have wifi. The last evening, I swung by and was just sitting on the steps IMing, and Mehmet who I'd seen with the owners each time I went in there, started "talking" to me. Later, a girl whom was associated with the owners, and the owners them selves all started "talking" to me. At first it was just really the same old where are you from, what is your name, yada yada. I must point out that no one spoke any English, so the talking was a lot of gesturing, slow speech, and occasionally a translator. I forgot I have a language translator on my phone that works when I have wifi. After a little while, IMing was impossible because I didn't want to be rude to these folks. They seemed like nice people, they wanted to show me the waterfront walk (which I'd already seen), and when we walked it they struted around a bit. I think they were showing me off in a way - look we're friends with an American... We came back to the cafe and they went to an ice cream place and brought some back for everyone, including me. Later, when I realised it was past midnight and my pansiyon was locked up, they woke the giggly old man for me. They also invited me for breakfast with them and Mahmet was keen on taking me to the locals beach I mentioned.

I arrived for "breakfast" at noon. I had spent the morning wondering the town, seeing the last few places that I hadn't been yet like to the top of the wall tower that over looked the marina. Lunch, or as they called it breakfast, was eggs, sliced tomatoes and onions, a dish of freed fries with sliced hot dog, olives, some fruit, and of course bread. They also served çay (pronounced chai, but not related) tea with it. Later they gave me some sort of juice soda as well. Mehmet was running around for most the day so we didn't get to the beach till about 5. Turned out that Mehmet was the easiest to communicate with, probably due to only relying on gestures to get him through life and gestures don't rely on language. He was pretty funny too. There really wasn't much to look at at the beach. He wanted to show me some cute woman, actually wearing as little as swim suits, and the big buff beach guys you see at LA beaches. It was just families and he was visibly disappointed.

After the beach, we came back and Mehmet went home to sleep. He had to take some drugs that make his head fuzzy. I was a bit worried when him and one of the others drove off with my stuff in his bag. It had my phone and a couple other things in it. I just had to tell myself that it'd be fine. I was let out at the cafe, so I told the other owner that he had my stuff and he called to make sure his colleague brought it back. I had nothing to worry about as he brought it right back after Mehmet went to his apartment to sleep. A couple hours later I was on a bus headed for Ürgüp via Ankara.

As luck would have it, I was fortunate to sit next to the surliest old man. He brought his own cushion, had a sour look on his face the whole trip, grunted about nothing the whole time, got upset at the person in front of him for reclining, but decided it was fine for him to recline, he sang to himself in a really mean sounding tone and loud enough for others to hear, turned on the tv attached to the chair in front to play the entire night even though he slept, and sat with his legs spread way apart. To top it off I'm pretty sure he was farting or he just smelled strongly of old man, which I'm pretty sure he tried to blame other people for the smell. Luckily, a row open up across the aisle after a couple hours. Still, I didn't sleep much cause the seats are made just slightly off so that it is very hard to find a comfortable position.

When I arrived in Ürgüp it was midday and we passed some of the cave dwellings that the area is famous for - Google Cappadocia or see my FB. Not having slept though I took a huge nap after checking in. My plan for Cappadocia was to see a 2000+ year old underground city and to visit some of the hidden churches and dwellings carved into the strange rock formations and cliffs of the area. There were some of the dwellings in Ürgüp, but they aren't spectacular. The better known and easier to get to are in a nearby town Gorëme. I did like the town of Ürgüp a lot though. The main part of town is really tiny. It has a row of shops about one street wide and three long, with a couple of open areas for cafes and just sitting around. There is also a ridge that over looks much of the town, but the best part is a dramatic semicircle part that stands 250 meters above the square I mentioned. The views from the cafe that sits atop this are pretty spectacular. I woke with enough time an energy to walk this ridge, grab dinner, read some back at my place, then back to bed.

Perhaps its them wanting everything to run smoothly for guests to their country or maybe they wanted to give work to a friend (probably both), but both my hotel guy, so other random, and the driver of my bus into Ürgüp said my plans would be quite difficult for me to do, esp. cause I don't speak Turkish. They all recommended I take a tour because it'd be easy. I did not. I found that English was quite easy to get by with in Ürgüp and that even the tour operators were helpful regardless of my interest in taking one. To see one of the more famous underground cities you have to take two buses. I found it as simple as taking a map with the names of where you want to go. Tell the bus driver the name and they will alert you to the stop to get off at and may provide some detail in where or when the connecting bus will be. Seeing the things I wanted here was, in fact, easier than anywhere I've been. I found myself laughing about how hard they said it'd be. And then, bam! Food poisoning.

But first, the underground city, which was awesome. It is a series of interlocking chambers like kitchens, living rooms, wineries, living quarters, and tunnels (you must be comfortable in tight spaces). This city dug into a a rock outcropping on a hill, and housed tens of thousands of people. It was a defensive maneuver. They were hard to find and once you did, unlike a city, you couldn't just bulldoze your way through. You had to follow their disorienting tunnels, where they fired arrows or spears at you through little holes in another chamber you have no idea how to get to. They also built in rolling stone doors where once your army was inside, they'd roll behind you and escape by rolling another behind them, trapping you in. Oh, only after starting a fire so that you'd be smoked to death. The obvious downfall was food. They had enough food storage for a long time, but if the enemy was patient enough, they could've starved them out. I highly recommend seeing one if you find yourself in Turkey.

I ate lunch in Kaymakli, where the cave is (the town is a shithole), before going back to Ürgüp. The food poisoning either came from this or from about 200 grams of cherries I bought off the street when I got back. In any case, as far as food poisoning goes, it wasn't that bad. Though I was in pain from cramping stomachs and felt nauseous, I wasn't exploding out either end. I didn't sleep well during the painful period, so I slept a lot, restlessly, afterward. I forced myself up around 1pm to eat. I was weak and a little dizzy, which required me to stop a few times. My appetite was shot; I couldn't even finish a salad. After lunch, I went back and fell asleep again. I forced my self up again for dinner. Same thing though. This time though, I started feeling better by the time I got back to my pansiyon. So I read a bit and back to bed.

I was able to see the Christian churches carved into the cliffs at the open air museum outside of Gorëme because my bus to Çeşme left in the evening of the next day. Side note - ç is "ch", and ş is "sh" - end. I'd recommend the open air museum too. There are some well preserved art inside some of the chapels. The best one is the "dark" church, which is extra, but worth it. I might be imagining this, but of the art I saw, it seemed as if the exposed skin of the paintings, esp. the faces, were particularly worn, or I think, scraped off. It seemed too coincidental to not be the case that some people at some time purposely fucked up the white skinned Christian images. Anywho, much of the museum was closed for reconstruction or something, so I visited the town of Gorëme before my bus back. It was pleasant to the eye. It had nice shops and open spaces, with a canal (dry at my time) through the middle. Still it was a little to Disney for me and was glad I was staying in Ürgüp.

Çeşme was the next stop. It is on the Aegean sea, right across from Chios, Greece. I didn't have much reason to choose it. It was between three cities where I could connect to Greece and that was the closest. There are supposed to be much better Turkish cities along that coast, but I didn't have time. The town isn't much to write about, there is a fairly intact fortress next to the bay and you can visit it, though I'm saving my money for a fortress or castle of a little more grandeur or importance. The city's bay is remarkably clean, esp. compared with almost every city boardering any body of water I've been to this year. There isn't a spot to swim right in the center cause its for boats and there are no ladders out, but there is a great swimming hole within five min. One that has a little 2 meter shelf you can dive off of. The water is the perfect temp right now and the most amazing thing is I can float here. For those that know me well, they know I sink like a stone. I am aware of the tactics used to float on one's back, hell my brothers were on swim teams, but within no more than five seconds I am vertical and going under. Here, it takes almost no more effort but a kick every couple minutes. Because there's so much more buoyancy here I can swim much longer and easier. So, that's been the majority of what I did there. Wake, read, eat/people watch, swim, eat/people watch, read, sleep. Not a bad way to spend a couple days there.

Oh, and I want to mention for my purposes really, the great convo I had with James, an expat from England, on the day before I left. His wife, whom he was avoiding like the plague over a few lunch beers (she was in cleaning for guests mode), was from the Twin Cities. From what James described, they seemed to share a lot of the characters as my family from the same area, and turned into quite a funny conversation. That's it, just a really pleasant old chap.

Another little note is that the older gentlemen in Turkey, and so far in Greece as well, love playing games. There are a bunch of cafe bars specifically for them, some which are small and some which have three dozen or more old men shouting, slamming dice or what look like rumicubes, laughing, smoking, some drinking. It's great to see. They are everywhere; not tucked away at some social club. Main street areas will have these places, but you'll sometimes see a couple outside on a stoop playing. The other great thing is the stooping. Seriously, hours a day are spent sitting on a stoop, alone, with friends, heckling or cat calling (all playfully), or making new friends. Sometimes, they'll pull out some food or drink from nowhere and share it with you if you stoop it up with them for a little while, even if you can't talk to each other. The stooping is mostly men, but women do it too, and the ages are generally older, but you'll find younger people doing it too. It's as if they have all the time in the world. Beautiful.

P.S. I left for Greece on the third. I'll write about that separately and try to do it with some more frequency so that the posts aren't this enormous. Plus, two book reviews.

Quarterly Update 3, A Little Late

2011-08-03T11:08:00.000-07:00

Sorry this is a bit late. I hit 9 months on my birthday and there was no way I was writing then or the following day. Then, I was traveling, then I was behind on some other posts, and then I didn't have access to a computer. I am going to include the last couple weeks in this, so consider it a quarterly update, plus Turkey. I still didn't when I "wrote" this post. I used the speech to text function on my phone and am borrowing a computer from a guy at my guesthouse. That means that this will probably be full of spelling and formatting errors. So without further ado:

Health - my health is been pretty good. with the exception of 1 more bout of food poisoning in Turkey, which was not that bad as far as food poisoning goes, I haven't really had had to deal with any sickness.
My external health is a little bit different, but still pretty good. I tweaked my knee a little on the Gibbon Experience and it is been bothering me slightly. About 4 years ago I had tendonitis in my left knee and this feels exactly the same, even the same knee. I've started doing some stretching to see if that will help alleve it. In doing these stretches I've realized that I've lost almost all flexibility I ever had gained. All that yoga and crossfit, totally gone. I can't touch my toes from a standing, legs straight position, nor do any of the soccer stretching without discomfort. Okay, so it's not all my flexibility, my shoulders and back haven't lost any, but my legs and hips have none, although for some reason I can still squat to ground for length without any problems. I think most of the problem is coming from how tight my hip flexers are. I've always had problems with lower body flexibility but now I know this is gonna be something I'm gonna have to do the rest of my life so that I don't become decrepit. I don't think I'll go back to yoga, as its purpose is more to ready the body for meditation, and crossfit did the job pretty well. I also think I might take up tai chi which will help to that end.
Foods - I did not eat bugs while in southeast asia because they seemed more like tourist attractions in anything the actual locals ate, but I did eat a venomous snake and its still beating heart from its chest. I also tried durian; the smelliest fruit on earth. Seriously, they have laws about it being in public places. It is wild looking with large soft spikes over it. It's pretty big, so they sell cut up portions. I tried a very tiny piece of somebody's. I didn't throw up, but it crossed my mind.
I do have to give special mentioned to Thai food. It is really that good, even know they won't spice it up to their standard for a phalang. Still, it isn't the best food in the world like some people make it out to be. There are hidden sugars in most dishes. However, it is up there with some of the best. Of the countries of been to and the food that I've had I would rank it with Argentinian and Chilean/Peru.
Funds - dangerously low. I have about $4,500k left of my budgeted amount and that has to also pay a ticket home. I have hinted that I might have a job lined up in London, if that goes through I'll have plenty of money and the whole budget issue will be irrelevant.
Things I've learned - for the first time in my life I feel like I'm finally seeing things clearly, like a vail has been lifted off my eyes. I feel like I've learned answers to questions I didn't have. But, they are the big truths and questions of life. Why are we here? or what's our purpose? How does the universe works (not in a mathematical meaning)? And, what does it take to become a ladyboy hooker? All these little dots, truths about the world, from all these different places are all coming together. Books, people, experiences, conincedences, etc.
Things that once seemed ridiculous to me, seem plausible. The endless possibilities of life seem easily obtainable. Not because I'm special, but because I'm looking at things from a different angle/perspective, something that anyone can do and see.
After finding a book on Taoism, but more specifically about chi and eastern disciplines that deal with it (thai chi, accupuncture, yoga, to name a few), I found that I might be Taoist. Who knew? I was in no way looking to find any spiritualism, but some of the things I experienced, unintentionally, really peaked my curiousity. Enter a series of conditioned random events, led me to Tao, which seemed to be in line with exactly what I experienced and doesn't upset my delicate principles or reasoning.
Thoughts - Of SE Asia, Laos was my favorite country. Vietnam was okay, and I'd give another chance to Cambodia. Laos had the nicest people and wasn't over touristed. It had the nicest town I stayed (Luang Prabang). I didn't like thailand that much. The southern part, in the islands was nice, I definitely go back there, but other than that the rest of the places I went were small versions of Bangkok, which I hated. Maybe it was just that Ivy wasn't with me anymore, but I just didn't like the last couple weeks I was in Thailand. I kept thinking, this is too easy, too similar. kind of like, why am I here? I imagine that I'll go to south Thailand again, but maybe as part of a trip to somewhere else. As far as SE Asia as a whole, I liked a good portion of it, but none of it was a place I could see myself spending a long time in - as in want to live at some point.
Turkey was fucking awesome. The people are absolutely great; funny, welcoming, and everything one could hope for. Plus, it has a great atmoshpere becasue it is a stir fry of east and west. Mostly Muslim, but has also changed hands so many times that it is just nuts; in a good way. On TV there'll be scantily clad women in shows or really racy things, but then you'll step outside and a quarter of the women are wearing Burkas. Also, the environment and history and how they feel entertwined. Ah, it's cool. For a better explanation, you can read about it more in the post I hope to get out in the day or two.
Gear - I had to get a new pair of flops and a new backpack. Making the total of each 4 broken pairs. Also, I had to replace my blue shorts cause they had a rip in the crotch.

Ok, that's it. Short and sweet. I hope to get a Turkey post out tomorrow or following. At least before I leave Chios, Greece (where I am now). Take it easy.
D

Getting Tired of Vegetarians

2011-07-23T09:59:00.000-07:00

Aren't we a bit self righteousness

I'm seeing a lot of stuff like that picture above lately. I'm even reading some of it in unlikely places. I'll save my review of Walden for when I finish it, but I can tell you this much, it will be a long post for good and for bad. There is a part in it that really illustrates what my point, "I believe that every man who has ever been earnest to preserve his higher or poetic faculties in the best condition has been particularly inclined to abstain from animal food". There seems to be this belief throughout society that eating vegetarian is of a higher moral plane. It is not.

Let me first begin by saying that I am not against eating only plants. If that suits you, do it, but get of your high horse. Although, the only argument I have ever heard that is acceptable to be vegetarian is that the person didn't like the taste of animal. There is no morality in what we choose to eat.
We were designed to eat meat and plant (and to some degree fungi). That's it. There is an overwhelming body of evidence in anthropology that leads to this conclusion. Yes, when we look at nutrition we start getting confused and I've gone over why these quack-scientists are to be ignored completely. What I'm getting at here is that there is no physiological reason for us to be vegetarian. Period.
So, lets turn to morality. There is a theme that is constant through every non-hunter/gatherer society, that we were put here to turn the Earth to our needs. We try to remove ourselves as far from the animal or natural world as possible. One way we do this is abstaining from participation in the eating of other animals. Partly, it is also our ability of abstract thought and how awful it must be to be a prey. And this is particularly true when we see human traits in or perceive a higher intelligence (I would say soul, though I don't want to tread into religion). We then try to apply humanity to the natural world. This is impossible because natural world is the true law (of god, if you must). What this amounts to is that true morality is derived from our place in nature and not our perceived place. Herbivores are moral when they eat plants. Carnivores, when they eat animal. Omnivores, when they eat anything. Clearly, there are ethics involved in the treatment of animals - as in, killing them for sport, for a piece of them (like a tusk), because they compete with us for food, "farming" them, or just killing out of spite - but, for the most part, these are outside the discussion of eating them for sustinence with the exception of "farming" or killing competition.
Is it more moral to raise them for the specific goal of eating them or to give them a chance of living (aka hunting)? I'd say the latter. I understand this is how we get our principle amount of animal food, however, this doesn't mean that vegetarians are more moral than those who eat a steak. Is it more moral to displace animals (now days, to the point of endangering the species) or to kill them because they are destroying our crops (killing competition) that you vegetarians so cherish. No, it's not. It's way too grey of an area for anyone to say what is more moral to nature, to grow animals vs. killing them off so we can eat plants. If someone comes out claiming this is more or less moral, they are full of shit.
Like I said, the highest morality is nature's law and therefore to hunt (and gather). So, stop thinking you're saving the world by eating vegan or vegetarian or other extremes. You are killing animals too, but not for the purpose of sustaining your life directly from their sacrifice. In my opinion, if you have such a hard on for animals, you'd believe that their lives are worth more than some grass that you are going to turn into bread.
I suppose since that the picture above talks about going green, I should mention that agriculture as it is today, is likely THE leading cause of environmental damage to the earth. For those who are so concerned over that still unproven global warming destroying the earth theory, agriculture is by far the leading consumer of oil (I vaguely remember a number like 90% of oil consumed in the USA) and is more a contributor to greenhouse gas than the personal use of cars/suvs/trucks. Also, it requires more and more land to support growing populations and new bio-technologies. What does that mean since trees are an enemy to an efficient field?
So, to reiterate my point, I don't want you to get hurt should you be bucked from that tall fucking horse you're on. You aren't any more moral than anybody else, you're just an asshole who wants to be better than other people. In other words, shut the fuck up.

Tigers

2011-07-21T03:53:00.000-07:00

As a sorta birthday present to myself, I decided to go to hangout with tigers. There are a couple places you can do this in Thailand. The Tiger Kingdom in Chang Mai and the Tiger Temple in Kanchanaburi are the only places that I know of. Before visiting either, I had heard mixed reviews from travelers and definitely polarized reviews on the Temple.
After getting a positive review on the Kingdom from the Irish couple doing the Gibbon Experience, I decided that it would be wise to go to that one, and perhaps if I felt up to it, do the Temple as an additional one.
The Kingdom is set up as a breeding facility for Tigers that will go to zoos. There isn't many controversial claims about this one, but I will comment on the ones that are used for the Temple, just to make sure that I address them. They don't make any claims that the tigers will get released or anything. When you arrive, you buy 10 minute passes to hangout with different age groups of tigers; five in all. I bought one with newborns (4 weeks-8 weeks), small tigers (6 months - 12 months), and the big boys (full grown tigers near 2 years and up). When you aren't visiting them, you are free to wonder about the zoo-like grounds for as long as you want. The place isn't huge, you can walk the grounds in 10 minutes.
I found this place to be quite nice. The tigers were definitely not drugged. I was there in the midday and sure they were a bit tired, mostly sleeping, but when aroused they were alert and showed no lethargy. Some walked about at a slow gate and an occasional one in one of the cages who'd been sleeping looked tired, but that doesn't mean they were drugged. I'm the same way when I'm tired, I move slower and can have a fog. If you waited a couple minutes though and observed them, you could see that that's all it was.
The other negative reaction out there is that the tigers are physically abused. For the Kingdom, they carry around small bamboo sticks. Every now and then they will hit the tiger with it. Now, that sounds abusive, but the way they did it I didn't find so. Never did I see any trainer, handler, or any staff hit a tiger out of malice. I found with the Kingdom, that everyone involved really enjoyed the company of their tigers and that there was a bond between them. The smacking was playful in nature, like you do with your dog when you get him riled up. You bat him around a bit. Imagine your dog was 500lbs. You may have to be a bit rougher. Nor did it appear by the reaction of the tiger to be anything but an invitation to play a little.
My only complaint was that I felt the tigers living quarters were a bit small, considering that in nature they have a territory of a few square miles. A volunteer (so take it with a grain of salt) told me that they originally had larger enclosures, but the tigers would only use a small portion of it, so they made them smaller. I'm not sure I totally buy that, but I do have to say that the tigers did seem happy. Well, except the ones that were temporarily in cages about 10ft x 10ft, they looked bored and longingly at the enclosures.
All in all, I really really enjoyed my time there and while their goal isn't some moral crusade, they don't try to make it seem like one. I also felt the staff was much happier and enjoyed goofing around with each other and the tigers. I would recommend this place.

Now, the ultra-controversial one; the Tiger Temple. I decided I wanted to go to this one to get a handle on what is going on. Many of the claims are pretty outrageous, and I needed to see for myself since there are a lot of bleeding hearts out there that blow things out of proportion. The story of the temple is quite unique and interesting. When I say temple, I mean that this place is a Buddhist temple run by monks. They are kinda out in the middle of nowhere on a huge piece of property (I think I heard almost 300 acres). I believe one day a person brought them a tiger whose parents had been poached. Monks are offered animals all the time. Most of the time it's cows or dogs or cats. The reason being is that Thai people don't believe in birth control for their animals, then they breed and they have too much. They don't want to kill them cause it will bring bad luck, so they give it to the temples for good luck and a nice life. They also will "save" animals, like buying cows destined for slaughter, and give it to the monks to receive good luck. The monks aren't supposed to turn them down and are bound to "take care of them".
So, this temple received a tiger, then another, and they became known as a a refuge for animals. They have wild boar and deer that came to them naturally, roam about the grounds, and are free to leave. They have a ton of cows, some donkeys, a very fat bear, an ostrich, and a pair of lions. The last three most likely are there cause some rich asshole bought them either to protect his estate, or because he wanted cool pets, later realizing that they are dangerous wild animals. The original goal was to release the tigers back into the wild, though I don't think this has happened. Instead, they began breeding them. Remember, that they don't believe in birth control (that extends to not even separating them into different cages when a female is in heat).

The controversy is quite polarized. There are major animal rights groups that are claiming abuse, like that they are chained to a short space, that they live in cages when not paraded around with the monks, that they are beaten, taught to fear their handlers, and some general neglect like poor facilities and vet care. Every criticism seems to point at them being drugged, claims that their are bribes to government to overlook things, and everyone questions where the money generated from tourism is going.
Before I get into my observations on the Temple, I'd like to point out that there are different degrees of abuse. Captivity is abuse. It's probably one of the lowest degrees of abuse, but it still is abuse. It is exactly the same as if a human being was born into a jail that they'll never leave. But there are degrees, and most have to do with intent.
Here is my take from what I observed:

The grounds - the grounds are located in the middle of forest type land, but seem to be pretty barren; more a kin to a desert than a jungle. They have some pens or enclosures built for the tigers, and there is major construction going on. They have been working on what they call "tiger island" for 4-6 years. It seems like it should be done within the next couple weeks. One leniency that people have offered in their complaints is that the money was going to building this habitat, which is quite huge with 8 or 10 enclosures that would be considered their living quarters. There is an elevated walkway that winds through the middle of all the enclosures and beneath it are tiger cages. I found that tiger island will be quite wonderful upon completion. However, this leniency has dwindled because of the amount of time it is taking.
I think most people see it through their home eyes. If it were the US, it'd have been done about 4 years ago (and probably be a bit nicer in standard or at least not a bit nicer looking). Like many less developed countries, building things usually takes a bit more time. I heard Thailand is not an exception, generally speaking. However, the only thing that seems left to do is put up some fencing. That even at a snails pace, shouldn't take more than another month. In the meantime, they could utilize the enclosures that currently have the fencing in place. Are they, no. In addition, they have enclosures with waterfalls and stuff for general, non-living quarter type viewing, but will have the tigers in cages behind it. The tigers may prefer it as a hiding spot from the public, but leave the option open to them. These I find no reason for and I would put under the category of medium abuse and complete bullshit.

Where are the tigers?

Oh here they are

Obese bear

Drugs - the tigers didn't appear to be sedated, save maybe one. I was trying to pay close attention to their eyes to see if they were "all there". The ones in enclosures were playing and obviously not drugged. The ones CHAINED (I'll get to this in a minute) in the quarry, didn't appear sedated either. There were a few 6 month olds that were paraded about the premises by monks. One of them seemed off. I observed that he seemed to want to get down from a perch, but seemed unable to figure out how. He didn't seem too alert, but he was awake. The monk gave him a water bottle to play with and he did, though I felt a bit slower than normal. Lastly, I noticed that the stump he was laying on was wet. I couldn't figure out why. It could have only been water (from that water bottle) or urine. I don't think it is common for tigers to lay in their own urine. I hope that it was water.
I'm not an expert on drugged up tigers, though I've seen dogs doped up, and I've been on pain killers which are a bit similar so I at least know what it looks like to some degree. I will give the temple the benefit of the doubt since all the other tigers seemed normal (like the tigers at the Kingdom). Plus, the tiger may have been on medication. However, why would you make him hang out with tourists.

Here are some videos. The last one is of the tiger that may be drugged. You can decide:

I am unsure if that's urine or not. I didn't see where it came from

General health - To an untrained eye, the tigers looked physically healthy, though dirty from being chained in the dirt all day. They didn't quite look as healthy as the ones at the Kingdom. I did observe the ritual of the head monk bottle feeding a 18 month old tiger. This is very odd. At that age, why is he being fed milk? Seriously, I'm totally confused and don't know if it's fucked up or not. It seems fucked up.
Their mental health seems in line with animals that have to put up with being around a ton of people touching and prodding them. I don't know what a depressed tiger looks like, but at the Kingdom, they were definitely visibly happier.

Physical abuse - I didn't see anyone hitting the tigers with malice. I did see some things that I didn't like, but that on the scale of things, I think the critics can prioritize towards the end of the list. The tigers that were chained in the quarry (they call a canyon) were harassed by the staff. The staff are not the same as the monks. They are volunteers or paid Thai. They didn't seem to share the same compassion and bond as the staff at the Kingdom. They were also very pushy with the visitors. Annoyingly so. Anyway, occasionally I'd see one pulling the tail, or pulling it's nose up. There was some innocent play going on, but there was some abuse of power going on. The intent may have not been quite mean, per say, but it wasn't for the tigers benefit. I also, saw one staff member poke a tiger in the balls. WTF? Even if the tiger was into that kind of thing, GROSS!

Those are the staff, not monks

The monks - this I think I found the most disturbing. After learning about the Buddhist principles from a monk in Chang Mai, I found that these weren't quite legit monks. I'd call them jack monks. Almost all had tons of visible tattoos, were smoking around the tigers, I saw some eating after 12PM, etc. They definitely to a lax view to the Buddhist principles.
I mad a snap judgment, which are usually the best, in a few minutes of watching the abbot (head monk). He took some weird pleasure out of feeding the 18 month old tiger milk from a bottle. Afterward, he sat with a peculiar expression. It wasn't the jolly, whimsical, "whatever" look that most of the monks have. To me, and this was just my opinion, there was something dishonest about it. It was almost a smug, self satisfaction, saying, "yeah, I am in control here. Now give me your money and leave". On their website, they really try to drive home the point that the abbot doesn't want these responsabilities, that this just kinda happened. But, if you look at the picture of him bottle feeding the adult tiger he definitely is enjoying being in control. Plus, that smug self satisfied look he had...

In conclusion, I found that the tiger temple, while not as bad as most of the criticisms make it out to be, still wasn't in the tigers' best interest. The critics have to understand the Thai culture and the Buddhist thinking. The relationship between the human animal and other animals is much different here, and criticisms are from western eyes, which doesn't make them anymore correct. In that perspective, most of what they are doing isn't considered bad. In their mind, they are behaving the way that is holy. Even so, there are some things that don't quite add up when you look at it in that perspective, like why they cage them when they can just as easily let them be out in the enclosures. That being said, I have a final couple things that really pissed me off.
One thing that pissed me off, is that they were building other structures, like a really weird Tiger monument that was hollow inside and what I'm going to guess will be a hotel. These two things are being constructed at a much faster pace than the enclosures.

They had more plans for constructing some additional enclosures in a different area of the park and improvement of the grounds, even though they can't complete the island. They also had plans for some giant, crazy massive, Buddhist playground called Buddhist Park Project (see also). This project is estimated at 1 billion baht (35 million dollars)! WTF! How unnecessarily extravagant for monks.

The other thing that pissed me off was that the intent has changed from saving tigers, to breeding them. On the surface it seems like a good thing because of how endangered they are. However, being born in captivity and not being taught how to hunt, these tigers can never be released. It's cruel to breed an animal that will never be free. Esp. to use the guise of doing it to save them. Buddhists believe in helping animals when given to them, but they also believe in letting the universe play out the way it's supposed to. In other words, they should help sick tigers given to them, not breeding them. Bunch of dickhead monks if you ask me.
This obviously is a money making operation under the guise of good deeds.

Book Review, Walden

2011-07-20T11:51:00.000-07:00

One of the more fascinating books I've read, this year (and all time), is Walden (this one has a different introduction than mine and comes with annotations for some reason). Written by Henry Thoreau in 1850's Massachusetts, it was a book far, far ahead of it's time. I would go as far as to say that this is definitely a classic that should be read by everyone. It's not an easy read. It took me about 20 days to consume this 330 page book, which is quite some time for even me. There are two reasons that it's a tough read. It is written in 1850's language and prose. Some sentences are literally a page long and therefore easy to start zoning out or to get lost. I do like the old language, though I found I had to look up a few words that are out of fashion today. The other reason that this book is a tough read is that it's heady or heavy, requiring breaks every so often to contemplate.
The plot of this book is that the author, Henry, decides to head off to live "in the woods" for a couple years. That's really it. He writes about his experiences and philosophies about things.

What makes this book good:

He does an incredible job of nature writing. Some of his descriptions, which are very unique, are the best I've ever read, or heard. Not only can you tell that he is deeply in love with nature without him directly saying (he does say it additionally) and not only is it so well written that the reader, me, can actually see this world, but love it with the same depth that he does. It's infectious and brilliant:

"One afternoon I amused myself by watching a barred owl sitting on one of the lower dead limbs of a white-pine, close to the trunk, in broad daylight, I standing within a rod of him. He could hear me when I moved and cronched the snow with my feet, but could not plainly see me. When I made noise he would stretch out his neck, and open his eyes wide; but their lids soon fell again, and he began to nod. I too felt a slumberous influence after watching him half an hour, as he sat thus with his eyes half open, like a cat,winged brother of the cat. There was only a narrow slit left between their lids, by which he preserved a peninsular relation to me; thus, with halfshut eyes, looking out from the land of dreams, and endeavoring to realize me, vague object or mote that interrupted his visions. At length, on some louder noise or my nearer approach, he would grow uneasy and sluggishly turn about on his perch, as if impatient at having his dreams disturbed; and when he launched himself off and flapped through the pines, spreading his wings to unexpected breadth, I could not hear the slightest sound from them."

The other thing that I really admire about the book is that he is making the case for simple living and inwardness, which fits perfectly with what I've been promoting. However, he does it from a practical, how to do it way. What makes it even more amazing though, is that some of his predictions have come true and most of his arguments for simple living have become even more meaningful. His observations on society and life even more true. He was an advocate of nature, sure, but even more an advocate of simple living and self improvement or inward focus. When he writes about how the farmers house or tools own him, enslave him, it means more because we've gone even more extreme today; we are even more materialistic, in more debt, and work longer hours to maitain this lifestyle. He has observations on the news, claiming that it is a distraction not worth the ink. What is the point of the news? We spend all our time listening to what is, year by year, more akin to gossip and fiction than to anything important. Henry advocates that we can spend that time listening to ourselves, learning about ourselves and becoming a more solidified person. Which he also later says is the highest type of philanthropy out there, and I am apt to agree with him.

What I didn't like:

Henry, came from a wealthy family, so he never had to concern himself with money. In the first chapter he talks about economics - how much money he spent/makes. Besides criticizing those who work every day, hard, and for long hours so that they can afford their houses, he ignores the fact that his math doesn't add up. First, he came to Concord with what I think was a decent amount of money in those those times (he has enough to buy a house in Concord just to use the wood to build his out in the woods). He never says where this money came from and blows it off as irrelevant. However, I have a hard time when he criticizes the farmers trying to make and hopefully save some money. He acts as if everyone should have some magical lump sum of money that they can tap at will. Sorry, some have to work to get that lump sum before they can up and move to the woods. Also, if you follow his little cash flow chart, he spends more money than he makes, but then says he made enough money in six weeks to survive off of for a year. Not without that magical sum of money he had though, but again, everyone has a magic purse.

Next, I had quite a problem with his agenda on god and food. Enough so, that I wrote at the beginning of the book, "Ignore all references to god and food. [the chapter] Higher Laws was complete bullshit". My complaint on god is that, like many, he is writing as if Christian god is proven and that everyone accepts that as an obvious truth. But, what I especially don't understand is why everyone and their dog thinks they need to give their two cents on food. It doesn't seem to matter if the book is a fictional novel, philosophy, spiritual, travel, etc. Everything I seem to read, the authors take it upon themselves to describe what we should and should not eat, even if they have no idea what they are talking about. 99% of the time they are completely wrong. Henry feels that we should be vegetarians, though he does eat meat himself when it's easy enough to get. One of his arguments is that it takes more effort to collect, clean, and cook the animal than it's worth. However, he talks about how simple fishing is and how uplifting it is to the soul to spend that time leisurely awaiting a bite, and how he must till the soil constantly for his beans. To me those two arguments conflict. I won't get into what we should and shouldn't eat, I think most are aware of where I stand, I just wish all these people would shut the fuck up about food. Esp. when they try to advocate vegetarianism from some sort of moral high ground - don't worry I have a post coming out on that soon.

His tone throughout the book is I am smarter than you and better cause I lived way out in the woods, but he was squatting on his friend's land near a town (Concord). Just like the magical purse thing, he seems to believe that everyone has friends that own massive pieces of mostly unsullied land that they can just up and live on whenever they feel like it. He, conveniently, never mentions that he got permission to do this from his friend and without the reading John Updike's introduction I'd have never known that. Not only that, the property wasn't really out in the woods. He was within a couple hours walk to Concord and was close to a road and neighbors. It's more like he's living in a neighborhood where the plots of land are a hundred acres or so and undeveloped. He seems to overly glorify that he is out in, and living off of, the wild-erness. He still is part of his little Concord society that he talks shit about. He wants to have his cake and eat it too. No dice, Henry, you don't get off that easy.

However, my biggest criticism is his view on travel. He believes that one can learn everything they need to know about themselves and the universe by living by oneself in the woods. He says that it is pointless to "travel to Calcutta to count the cats" (which sounds like it could be full of adventure). But that's a very narrow, limited view. When he talks about his woods, he is a "life's a journey" type, but when he talks about those who journey abroad, he's a destination/solitary goal point of view. I don't think he gets it cause he hasn't done it. He's just as scared as everyone else. In fact, the two - living simply in the woods vs. longterm travel - have many similarities esp. in the living simply and living deliberately department. I'm not going to go into detail why since it's all over the rest of my blog, but I'll say that I believe that not only can you accomplish the exact same things by traveling, but also much much more than what he did. Travel has all the elements that living simply in the woods does, but with additional elements such as language barriers, cultural differences, or new points of view to experience. These two experiences are, in reality, compliments to one another.

Even with those criticisms, the book was definitely a must read. Just remember to ignore the references to god and food...

Beer Wıth Me

2011-07-19T03:14:00.000-07:00

I have several posts that I'm working on simultaniously, including my 9 month check in, so bear with me. Also, if you were one of the people interested in beer with me, Oktoberfest is fast approaching and it'd be prudent to get tickets soon. Jordan and Chelsea have informed me that they just purchased theirs!
Ok, so quick update - I'm ın Istanbul now. Yesterday was brutal.
But, before I get to that, I'll start from where I left off last time. Last update found me talkiıng with monks. I ended up spending a couple more days in Chang Mai before moving on. While I had been invited to go back to the islands by Jason and Angie and a couple people I met in Laos, it was too much for me and I decided against ıt. Too much travel and too much money. Also, as a bday present to myself, I decided to hang out with tigers. There are two places in Thailand that I know of where you can get close to them - Chang Mai and Kanchanaburi. I have a full post planned for those so I'm not going to discuss them too much here. Suffıce to say that the Kingdom was awesome and the Temple was depressing.
After visiting the Kingdom and spending time out of Chang Maı at waterfalls where I was the sole person there, which always prompts me to consider skinny dipping (I did), I felt it was time to head closer to Bangkok as my time in Thailand was fast coming to an end. I headed to Kanchanburi because I didn't want to spend a single second more than I had to in Bangkok. Kanchanburi is 2 hours west of Bangkok and is located along a slow, meandering river. There is are 2 main streets - one is along the highway and the other ıs along the river and has the restaurants and hostels. I was a bit surprised to see all the backpackers there. I expected them all to stay in Bangkok, esp. the ones that were of the party nature. I arrived in Kan. on the 14th and rented a moto to try to make it to the Tiger Temple that day, just in case it was really bad I didn't want to visit on my bday. However, I didn't make it to the Temple till about 3:45pm and they stop letting visitors in at 3:30. Damn. I went back to my guesthouse (70 baht or 2 bucks a nıght) and called it an early night.
After waking up to Skype with Ivy and my family who were having a party with CKW and some others, I hit up the Temple. It wasn't as bad as some of the claims, but I was really disappointed in the monks, who had obviously been corrupted by the massive amount of income generated by the tigers. It turned out that my bday coincided with a national holiday. Since it was a Buddhist holiday, the nation was supposed to be dry, but since it's Thailand, while not as easy as going to the store, it was still possible.
Long story short, I hung out with some guy from Europe and we found a bar a couple bars that were serving. One of these bars had a lady boy prostitutes. He couldn't tell so I got to watch him make out with a dude, which I found amusing. Afterwards, and because the town was completely dead due to the holiday and the lady boys had no prospects, we talked to them about both the whole lady boy thing and prostitution. It was facinating. In Thailand, for a full sex change, it was either about 2k dollars or 7k, I can't remember. Scary cheap though. There were some other things I found interesting but I don't want to offend any delicate ears.
On the way home, there was a group of locals playing guitar. When they saw us, they switched to some English songs and we joined in for a couple. Singing Oasis out of key, not remembering all the words, with locals, one who shared my bday, was a nice end to my bday.
The next day, after sleeping in, my goal was to finish The Celestine Prophecy. That didn't happen though. I ended up being invited to drink with a local who said to just call her June, some gırl who also only gave me her nickname, and a dude from NYC named Evan. Later we invited an older couple from the UK to hangout, Audrie was the woman's name but I forget the man's. He ran a microbrew busıness called Sussex Ales, so obviously Evan and I were pretty interested in that. Not much to report after that.
The next day was off to Bangkok to stay the night and get an early flight out to Istanbul. As usual, it's always fun and games. Again here's an abbreviated version of that: the night before, I realized that I should check to see if I need a transit visa to go through Moscow. I couldn't get a straight answer, so I was worried for awhile. Before I went to bed, I made a point to ask, think positive thought's, and then I saw myself arriving in Istanbul. I took that as a good sign, and after thinking the worst case scenario is I either get deported back to Bangkok or to the States and more likely could bribe my way through, I was no longer worried and fell asleep.
Travel days are always a pain in the ass. Everyone tries to extort as much money from you as they can. A taxi driver tried to get me to pay him 200 baht (about 8 bucks) to take me to the traın 10 minutes away. He kept insisting on taking me to the airport. He even went as low as 300 baht. I only had 170 baht on me and since it costs 5 bucks to get cash out in Thailand... So, I flagged down another taxi and got him to do it for 100 baht. I went to get my tickets, but naturally that can't be smoothe either. The agent tried to tell me that I needed to buy a flight out of Turkey in order to get a visa and that they needed the flight info before issuing the ticket. So, now with a slight concern for time growing, I headed for the internet cafe. Being the airport, the cafe cost 5 times as much for internet. I didn't have the cash to pay, but they took credit - with a minimum purchase of an hour at 300 baht (10 bucks). Fuck them. Anyway, to get around this whole flight out thing, I went to British Airways and paid for an unrestricted ticket. It was a trade off; do I pay for the cheap ticket in case I can't get a full refund and lose about 200 bucks, or try for unrestricted ticket that cost about 5 times as much (in this case 600 euros). I put it on my credit card so that I could cancel the purchase if my hunch about this ticket was wrong - even though I read the rules for cancellation and all that, I was under time pressure and I wanted to make sure I had a backup plan in the good chance I fucked up. I printed up the info, using every last baht I had and ran back to the ticket counter. I made the plane 30 min before boarding, which seems like plenty of time, but customs and security went really smoothly and you never know with them. Had lines been longer or I had issues with either, I'd have been running onto the plane as the doors were closing.
Moscow, surprisingly went rather smoothly. They put us through a really poorly organised security and a passport control that only involved showing them that I had one on me. They even had free wifi at the airport. It was the same one I flew into a couple years back for Jenya's wedding and brought back some really nice memories and a little bit of longing to spend a little time there. I jumped my plane and arrived in Istanbul around 8:30pm. I hate arriving so late. I don't have the money to take taxis from the airports these days, and I need ample time to get to destinations before it gets dark. I feel very vulnerable carrying all my gear and not knowing how exactly to get to my hostel. As it turned out, Istanbul's immigration was the easiest so far. I walked up paid 20 bucks and gave them my passport. That was it. No questions. I don't think they even looked at me. Excluding waiting in line, the whole thing took 2 minutes. So much for needing the plane out for a visa.
After that, it was an hour and a half of trains and walking before I showed up at the hostel I was hoping to stay at. A taxi tried to get me to pay 15 bucks to take me about 200 ft. I was a little lost, but still close to the hostel and I almost did it cause it was now 11pm and I was getting a little concerned. Had he went under 10 bucks, still a rip off, I'd have taken it. However, I asked some more people directions and found out it was literally around a corner. It was also full. They sent me to another one up the hill. They were also full. Thankfully, seeing how beat up I was, they offerred to put me up on the couch for 5 euros (comes with breakfast and coffee and tea). Had it been daylight, I'd have went looking for another place, but it was late and I was exhausted and the place seemed nice. I booked beds for future nights to avoid the problem.
The last part of this story ends with me getting on the computer and cancelling that flight. Nice way to end the night. Because it was an unrestricted ticket I got refunded every penny of it.

That's all I got for now. I'll try to get those 4 other posts floating around mostly finished out soon.
D

Reduce, Reuse, and if Those Fail, Recycle

2011-07-11T03:36:00.000-07:00

An interesting thing has happened since the "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" campaign came about. To hint at my point, they should rename the slogan, "Recycle". The slogan was not just put in that order because it has a better ring to it. It was put in hierarchical order. If you follow this slogan in your life, in that order, you will also find that you are living more simply.

I want to first say that I am all for recycling, lest I get attacked unjustly. The majority of this post will be to point out why the other two are more important. Also, I will write a separate blog post to try to explain why you will be happier living a simpler, what that world would look like, how it doesn't require drastic changes, and how to get there. This is not that one though, and I will operate all my simplicity posts as if it's a proven fact.

Lets just go over what exactly this means and where it fits into the human waste cycle (these are not my definitions). From best to worst:
Reduce - to buy less and use less. Incorporates common sense ideas like turning off the lights, rain barrels, and taking shorter showers, but also plays a part in composting/grasscycling (transportation energy is reduced), low-flow toilets, and programmable thermostats. Includes the terms Re-think, Precycle, Carpool, Efficient, and Environmental Footprint.

Reuse - elements of the discarded item are used again. Initiatives include hand-me-downs, garage sales, quilting, travel mugs, and composting (nutrients). Includes the terms laundry, repair, regift, and upcycle.

Recycle - discards are separated into materials that may be incorporated into new products. This is different from Reuse in that energy is used to change the physical properties of the material. Initiatives include Composting, Beverage Container Deposits and buying products with a high content of post-consumer material. Within recycling there is distinction between two types:

Upcycle- converting low-value materials in high-value products (more desirable)
Downcycle - converting valuable products into low-value raw materials (less desirable)

Generate - capturing useful material for waste to energy programs. Includes Methane Collection, Gasification and Digestion, and the term Recover.

Incinerate - high temperature destruction of material. Differs from Gasification in that oxygen is used; differs from burning in that high temperatures consume material efficiently and emissions are controlled.

Devastate - to discard into the natural environment, or to "trash" the planet. Includes Litter, Burn Barrels, Unnecessary Vehicle Idling, and Dumping discards onto land or into water

Ignoring the non 3Rs, we can see immediately why recycle is lowest on the 3Rs. It uses resources or energy to convert the products you are done with into other things. What does it mean when we say resources or energy? At the simplest level, energy is referring to the heat required to change one the properties of your product into another. This amount is still much lower than to create new products from scratch. To a much lesser degree, there is also a diminishing return to the products, where varying amounts of materials are lost in each cycle. In this sense, the other 2Rs don't use any energy and are therefore better at this bottom line.
As you can see above, there is only that minor distinction of energy usage between Reusing and Recycling. The definition of Reusing is a bit too "community" based for my tastes. At a personal level, it's putting tap water in that plastic water bottle you bought instead of getting a new one; it means finding new purposes for that grocery bag; cutting the bottom off a liter bottle of cola is a favorite of funnel of the lower developed countries (though they just throw the rest on the side of the road); some artists reuse materials to create; even bums make drums out of what would be garbage.
But by and large, the most important one to the environment and the one that will contribute the most to simple living is to Reduce. Specifically to the USA, but the rest of the world more and more, we need to stop buying so much shit. I'm not making a case here against materialism entirely. We already know it will use way less resources not to make someone than to recycle it and therefore is better from that level. More, I'm saying that we buy a ton of stuff that we don't need and never use. Or, my favorite, we buy stuff to save the environment. What would help the environment more, buying those rims (don't worry their green) and then buying a carbon offset, or just not buying them? You're a dumbass if you make the argument that you need them.
And this leads us to the most important principle in living simply; Pareto's law (the 80/20 rule). It's application to living simply is that it requires us to think about what we truly need and what we actually use. For those unfamiliar, it goes like this, what are the 20% of things (or effort) that I use (or contribute) 80% of the time. Look in your wardrobe. How many t-shirts do you have? 30? What 6 shirts do you where the most? You probably wear those 6 shirts about 80% of the time. If you are unaware that you are doing this, perhaps ask someone close to you how often you wear them. Hopefully you understand what Pareto's law is now. At it's most basic application to life, it is asking, what is most important? what do you need and what is just excess?
We want nice things like granite counters and such, but are they really part of that 20% of the stuff you own that contributes 80% to your happiness? That may seem like a false question, but who knows, maybe there are people out there who it does. I'm not trying to judge anyone on what that 20% is actually important to them. I implore all readers to try this around their place of residence. Also, you try this reversing it, what things are you spending 80% of your income on? You'll probably end up finding two things. One, that the rule may actually be closer to 90/10 than 80/20. Two, you may laugh at finding your hidden habits or likes.
I would then suggest getting rid of the 80% of shit you don't use or that aren't contributing to your happiness to a significant amount. If you are too afraid of actually selling, lending, or giving away these items, may I suggest putting them in a storage shed for a couple months as a test period. Most likely, there will only be a few things you'll find you couldn't live without. Trust me, if I can live perfectly content out of a backpack for a year, I think you can jettison some stuff.
Anyway, that was a bit of a jaunt away from the point of reducing, but in doing what I suggested with the things you have already, you'll get an idea of the things that actually mean something so that when you feel like buying something, you can ask, "is this something I need or will make a real contribution to my happiness?" As you may have picked up, it also means that because 80% of the shit you own, you don't really need or use often enough, and you've theoretically figured your habits out, you will buy 80% less shit. Possibly even use less electricity or other utilities. That's a significant reduction in consumtion. This is going to do the world way more good than buying some t-shirt where the proceeds go to saving the forest or recycling those water bottles.

What are you going to do with all that money you I just saved you?

Ever Had Fresh, Right Off the Tree That Almost Fell On You, Papaya?

2011-07-10T05:18:00.000-07:00

No?! Well, it can't be beat.
I'm sure the big question, esp. after I posted the ziplining videos on FB, is how was the Gibbon Experience? Well, for most of the men out there, it was like living out a childhood fantasy. I lived in an awesome treehouse in the jungle, hiking and zipping around the jungle at my leisure. For the women, I guess it's the equivalent for you would be if I got to get married and cook and clean for 2 nights. Isn't that what you fantasised about?

Here's what went down. They go through some safety video, you buy a pair of "gloves" (I didn't check mine and ended up with two right handed gloves, not that you need them anyway cause the brakes were built into the sliding device) and socks that go about knee length. I should have bought some golf like shoes that had nubs on them, but I was afraid with all the hiking that I'd get blisters (and I would have - some girls bought them and had blisters). The trade off was blisters vs no traction and sliding around all over the place in the slick that comprised 80% of the trails. The only shoe I had was my toe shoes and they are meant for everything except mud, although I think they may make some specifically for backpacking now.
I joined a group of 9 others - three couples, two friends, and one other dude who was traveling solo. Lets see, of the couples we had Irish, Antone and Anne, German, Peter and Anne, Dutch, Tuon and I never actually caught his girlfriend's name nor the two Danish girl's names, and a South African, Greg. The drive is about 3 hours, but during the rainy season, and this last couple weeks has been really bad, once the road turns to dirt, you usually end up walking much of the road to the village. This was true for us. We stopped after 15 min. in and had to carry our bags and food (about 20 kilos) up and down the muddy ass road 30 mins till we got to another car setup on a more stable portion of the road. It definitely gave you appreciation for the villigers that do that on a regular basis. After riding in that truck for 30 min, we stopped again and had to walk 40 min to the village. While in the car, we passed gringos walking out of the village who looked absolutely miserable (that wasn't foreboding at all). When I say village, I don't mean where we stayed. What I mean is where we eat lunch. From there, you walk a narrow super slippery trail an hour to a hut in the jungle where you'll pick up your equipment and guides. How much more walking depends on which treehouse you're staying in. If the group is over six they split them into two treehouses. Mine was the furthest away, so two more hours, luckily part of it required zipping. We did all the safety briefing this day.
On the way, we heard a bunch of noise in the tree tops. Some of the group got a better view, I only got a millisecond view of the gibbons, and some behind me got nada. How this whole thing got started was because of these gibbons (hence the name). These gibbons were believed to gone extinct due to human encroachment and habitat destruction. They were "re-descovered" about 10 or 15 years ago. Originally, this company was set up to save these guys. Eventually, they convinced the government to make it a national park. This doesn't mean as much as it does in a lot of places, so the company tried purchasing land and employing people to help protect the park. This cost money, and the donations weren't cutting it. To pay for all this, they set up the "experience". The experience has about 25 ziplines, hours of trails, "kitchens", and 7 treehouses set up around the jungle. They employ the locals to help run, maintain, and protect. It is still considered lucky to even hear the gibbons, let alone see them. There are other animals like lizards, bugs, monkeys, snakes, and cats. I only saw the brief glimpse of the gibbons (and heard them "sing" on the last day) and some bugs and lizards.
By the time we got to our treehouse it was time for dinner and we were pretty beat. The guides zip in the food from the kitchen nearby. It is remarkably good food considering. After dinner we all took turns showering. That's right, it had a shower and toilet, however, the plumbing came in (and was drinkable at least from the sink), but there was none out. Just holes. I felt conficted about how "green" it was to have soapy water and human waste just fall to the jungle floor. It's only 8 people at most per day, but it's still going to run off into the nearby creeks. There are inexpensive alternatives. Anyway, our guides Valo and Bachaou (spellings?) joined us for dessert and tea. It started raining pretty hard so they took off for the night and we stayed up talking till about 9:30.
The next day, they woke us at 7 for breakfast (also, pretty good considering). We had a big day ahead so we were out the door, so to speak, before 9. We zipped around and the guides gave us some minor critiques on safety and style. Also, we visited some of the other treehousestreehouse for lunch, the sun came out and pretty much stayed sunny the rest of our trip. The sun, of course, being crazy hot and humid, but luckily most of the trails were shaded.
After lunch, we were left to our own devices. The guides had decided we were safe enough to zip ourselves. The entire group decided to nap, but it is extremely difficult for me to do nap. Plus, I was in the jungle surrounded by ziplines... So, I decided to zip by myself, which might be ironically safer. I've noticed the same thing with skiing. When you are on your own (or maybe just me), esp. in a potentially dangerous situation, I excerise more caution. Way more. After zipping out the treehouse, I was walking by the kitchen. Not 5 seconds after walking under a tree next to the kitchen, it fell across the path. I of course muttered something like, "holy shit", which the guides later ribbed me about. It fell across their make shift clothes lines too, so I was helping their family pick up some of the clothes and noticed that the tree was a papaya tree. There was one ripe one. The guides and I split it, and I have to say it was the best papaya I've ever had. It tasted slightly sweeter than a normal papaya. I assume that was the sweetness of escaping death. After sharing the papaya, I talked with the guides a bit about their lives. They were H'mong and lived in the village we stopped at. They earn $3 a day, plus whatever tips they get and free food. They work everyday and don't get vacation unless there's an emergency. Despite all that, they couldn't complain. Partly, because Laos people are so easy going and partly cause they are living in the jungle and zip around all day, which was, in their opinion, better than a rice patty. Valo, was 24 and had 2 kids. I don't know how old Bachaou was, but he had 5 kids. I didn't get too much else out of them and could tell they wanted to go back to napping, so I bailed. After zipping about for an hour, I came back to the treehouse to the rest of the group waking up. We all zipped for another couple hours.
After dinner, we asked our guides if we could night zip. They were understandably reluctant at first. Truthfully, Antoine, Greg, and I were going to do it even had they said no. But they finally agreed and at about 8PM, it was sufficiently dark enough. It was just the three of us, plus our guides for the first line. I'd say that night zipping is up there with one of the coolest things I've ever done. We had flashlights, but we tried to only use them when we were approaching the brake zone. I say tried, but your depth perception and timing is all screwed up in the dark, so we'd turn them on after only being on the zip 1/3 through, thinking it was near the end. Our guides walked us to the zip back into our treehouse and kept throwing shit into the jungle and gasping. The first couple times scared the shit out of the three of us. Oh, they had a good little giggle.
The next day we spent the morning zipping an area we hadn't hit the day before that had an amazing view of the national park. Then, we headed down to the village to rejoin the part of the group they put in the other treehouse, whom, by the way, had been waiting there about two hours. Felt only a slight pinge of guilt that passed when they told us that they seen the gibbons a couple times near their treehouse. A couple of them had over 200 hundred mozzie bites, but I took the cake on leeches having had 12 bites. If you're curious, leeches look like inch worms, at least till they suck some blood and swell up. You don't feel them bite because they have something like Novocaine, and when you pull them off the bite bleeds like crazy cause they have some sort of blood thinner they inject. They don't carry any diseases to worry about, they are just a nusense cause of the bleeding. Oh, and I tweaked my knee from all the sliding around on the trail, but it seems to be back to it's previous condition now.
Also, we got lucky. The sun had dried the road enough that we didn't have to walk the road out like the group we saw when we came in! All in all, it was one bad ass experience.

I haven't done too much since returning to Thailand. I find that the north an middle of the country are not that exciting. I think the real gem to Thailand is the south. What have I done since returning? I met up with a friend for the day to go rent motos, get a little lost, see a waterfall where the fish nibbled at my feet, go to the top of the mountain adjacent to Chang Mai, get poured on, and also see the night market. Not a huge fan of the markets in the world. They are all pretty much the same. Considering I'm not a shopper unless I have something I need to buy, wandering about looking at the same shit they sell almost everywhere doesn't really appeal to me. Other than that, I thought I'd try my hand at seeing a movie, but the theater, which was a fair walk, was only showing Transformers 3 on all seven screens. I couldn't bear to torture myself with Micheal Bay, so I walked back. Today, I went to a temple that I took some pictures at the day before. I returned because they have a place where the monks who are studying English can practice with you as well as you can learn stuff from them.
I sat down with one whose name is pronounced Tone. Funny dude. Although, their jokes may seem a little racy in our culture; as in later a Chinese dude sat down and Tone made a joke about how he knew he was Chinese based on his facial features. I really learned a lot from Tone, for example: females can be monks, but they have two ceremonies that they must follow to do so and one is now gone (and that is why there aren't any female monks in Thai); every male in Thailand at one time is sent by their parents to monk school; they must live at the temple; there are 3 principles - avoid doing bad, try to do good, and purify your mind; as novice monks they have ten rules they must follow - don't kill, can't lie, can't hurt (except in defense), no sex, can't touch money, can only eat before noon, no alcohol or drugs, and some others he didn't talk about; the first four are the main rules and if you break them while a monk you are expelled forever from the practice; however, if you don't break those four rules you can quit being a monk at any time, maintain a normal life, and return at any time later in life even if you broke those rules while on "sabbatical"; at the age of 20, or older, they can decide to be practicing monks, at which point they have to follow 210 rules, some as strange as how to pee (not allowed to stand and pee); everything is meditation not just sitting in silence - the way you move, talk, breathe, act, sleep, all is meditation; Thailand military service is lottery based and compulsory. A monk must quit for service, but can return afterward; the temples and monk life are 100% based on donations; they believe in heaven and hell, but they are temporary because they believe in reincarnation. Your reincarnated form depends on your actions, like a karmic thermometer; certain things like tattoos, smoking, cell phones are acceptable based on purpose - if it's for defense (tobacco was considered a defense against leeches) or necessity (like for your family to call for emergencies), it is ok; the Thai monks can eat meat. They can't kill it, they can't have it killed for them, if they are told it was killed or will be killed for the them, they can't eat it. Basically, if they think that the animal was killed for the purpose of giving to the monk, they can't eat it. When can they eat it? When they go out for their food and some vendor lops some meat in their bowl that they intended for all people and not just the monk; they can't eat certain sacred animals (dog is included); According to Tone, Buddha was a prince in India. He saw three truths - we all get sick, we all age and become weak, and we all die. An angel told him of a way out and that was to be a monk. So, he started the what would later be considered the monk way of life. However, he first went out into the forest and fasted almost to death. Then, he realised the way was through purity of ones self (particularly the mind) and he found enlightenment;
Tone became a monk student at the age of 12. He found he loved the simplicity of monk life so much that when he turned 20 (he's 21) he decided to become a practicing monk. He said that he sees his family about twice a year for a week each. He can't stay with them during his visit and must return to a neighborhood temple. That's about all I got, but it was all fascinating. He, as well as the Chinese dude (whose name was similar to Merlow) did ask about the US and personal inquiries. I learned that China's one child rule doesn't apply to every ethnic group.
Today has been quite interesting with people. At lunch I met a guy name Ted Coombs who is here for dental work cause it's about a third the cost and considered the best in the world. He was here with his deaf "partner", Tice. I sat at a table near them and Ted struck up a conversation, asking me about where I was from and what I was up to out here. Turns out he was a pretty interesting character. He roller skated across America to promote a movie in the 70's. I can't remember the name of it, but it had John Ritter in it and was about what America would be like in 1994. He made the guiness book of world records by doing it. Now he lives in Hawaii with his partner. He runs a website, futuristyx.com in which he helps people decide about their future plans. I guess, it's mostly for investing, but he also described it as people will come to him and tell him they want to be a car mechanic. Having spent all his free time looking at what he called scenario something or other in as many fields as possible, he'd say something like, "robotics need mechanics. That's a field that will be around awhile and trends are looking bad for mechanics in 15 to 20 years". I'm paraphrasing. Personally, I didn't really know how to respond because my inner skeptic was giggling when he told me he was a futurist. Still, I feel I should at least check out his website before knocking him, esp. considering if you told me about Reiki and whatnot a year ago, my inner skeptic would have giggled at that too.

I don't have many more plans for Thailand. I figure I'll attend a monk prayer service, go to the tiger temple, and maybe just try to keep out of the heat. So, for those of you who keep pestering me with my plans *cough - mom*, I'll probably leave Chang Mai on the 12th, catch a connecting bus from Bangkok to whatever town it is that the tiger temple is at and stay there till the 17th. At which point I'll return to Bangkok, stay a night and I leave for Turkey on the 18th.
That's all I got folks. Expect to see a few soap box posts coming out because vegetarianisms been up in my grill, and the book I'm reading has inspired a couple things.

Blurb to Update Cause I Don't Plan on Internet for the Next 5 Days

2011-07-01T03:07:00.000-07:00

So, really briefly...
Three things I forgot in the last post. One, the power in Luang Prabang cuts out randomly for random lengths of time. One day, part of the town didn't have power for five or more hours. Maybe that particular one was due to the storms that have been hitting the area, but the power would cut out at least once a day even on the sunny days. Two, I was a bit in a funk when I was writing the last email. I don't really know why. It was after hanging out with the elephants. I came home and practically passed out, only to be awaken by my "take malaria pills" alarm shortly there after. When I woke, I was in a fog and a bad mood, but that mood lasted the rest of the night and I tried to avoid seeing anybody I knew. On the bright side, the next day the "boss" of the coffee shop allowed me to download music. I walked away with about 600 songs. Most hadn't heard, and a lot is jazz (there are a few gems but I will be deleting most of the jazz). I've gone through about half and am deleting about 1 in 8 songs. The third thing was that I found out that I will most likely not being receiving $1,000 of which I had budgeted into my trip. It involves a friend back home whom I lent money to. I don't know all the details or all the sides of what has transpired so it's not fair for me to speculate on here. Suffice to say that a combination of job loss and legal problems will no doubt put paying me as a last priority. I hope this not to be the case and I want to trust that this person can get their act together enough to pay me before I come home. It would be a bummer to have that issue waiting for me upon my return.

OK, now to the reason for this post -

I am in Huay Xai, a typical boarder town. I guess you could say that Savannakhet and Vientiane are boarder towns as well, but they don't really look or act like them. Huay Xai is a bit more typical and what I mean by that is that boarder towns generally are run down, ugly, and usually you need to use a little bit more caution with safety and security. Huay Xai isn't as bad as others I've been too, but it definitely has those elements. All throughout Laos I have felt very safe (with the exception of being outside the casino in Savannakhet late at night - I was with a bunch of travelers that wanted to go cause it was the only thing open past 10PM. I wouldn't have gone if I wasn't with them), but here, as I walked around today, I felt uncomfortable in a few areas of town. As in, I won't be going there after sunset.
The reason for me being here was to get a spot on the Gibbon Experience. I had talked to about a dozen people during my time in Laos that did it. Every single one said that it was the best thing they had done in SE Asia. That's not exaggerating their reaction; it was the best. It's a bit pricey - about $250, but it sounds incredible. So, regardless that I'm low in funds due to the above, I am going to do this and scrimp a bit in Europe (hopefully, the friends I've made will shack me up). Usually, you need to make reservations in advance (up to 6 weeks) and I did try to email them a few days ago without getting a response. So, basically, I came up here hoping that maybe there were cancellations and I could, being only one person, sneak in. My visa runs out on the 7th and the Gibbon Exp. is a three day venture, so I had planned trying every day to get a spot up till the 4th of July. If I wasn't able to get a spot, no loss, Huay Xai is on the way to Chang Mai, Thailand anyway.
I took the slow boat on Wednesday from Luang Prabang. The alternative is a long ass bus ride or a speed boat. The speed boat is more expensive, uncomfortable because the seats are wood, it's not covered, and there's no bathroom, and lastly, it's really dangerous. It's a shitty little wooden boat going up a river with no visibility and you are supposed to wear life jackets and HELMETS. I've heard some unverified horror stories about them. So, they were out. I decided against the bus because with all the rain, there are a ton of land slides. A couple I talked to on the elephant trip had taken a 12 hour bus ride that in reality was 22 hours of clearing out slides and debris and assisting other drivers ahead of them while the Laos people just sat around amused. No thanks. As it turned out, the slow boat, while taking 2 days, was quite nice. The seats were minivan seats that had been removed and put on the boat and there was a bathroom (nicer than the ones on the Amazon boats). Plus, with the exception of one brief storm and a couple "rapids" (they were hardly a class I), the boat didn't rock back and forth, allowing for me to sit along the side and soak in some rays.

I loved the boat, highly recommended. In fact, all my boat travel has been wonderful (even the craziness of the Amazon boats) and I recommend water travel when possible. It does stop at towns along the way to let people off, and at a town over night whose name escapes me. I think it's called Pak Beng, it's almost exactly half the distance in between Luang Prabang and Huay Xai. The town's sole purpose seems to be to take in people traveling in between the two cities. It isn't very nice. Although, I did have a lovely dinner with some travelers - a Dutch girl named Marin and I think a brother/sister duo from Montreal, named Tom and Victoria.

The next day, it was back to the boat and up to Huay Xai. I had hoped to get to the Gibbon Exp. office before it closed, but totally walked right by it and didn't find it till about 10 min. after closing. I grabbed a room (most here suck) and convinced a couple other people from the boat to stay at the hotel I was. The three of us decided to have dinner together. The girl was a Korean university student named Say, who spoke little English. We did find out that she is going to school for TV entertainment with the goal of being a host on the Korean version of QVC. The dude, Pat, was originally from England, but had been living in Perth for some time. I found him fascinating. He had been an oil engineer, mostly platforms, for the last 30+ years. His job allowed him to travel extensively and sometimes live in really incredible places. He had many, many stories of his travels. Like how he bought a land rover in South Africa and, accompanied by two NZ chicks (too bad for him), drove out into the Savannah. This was in the 70's, so they were alone for two weeks. The way he described his experience was, "I'm not Christian, but I felt I had experienced Genesis". He also had been to Argentina during an oppressed time. To the Amazon. To SE Asia. Most of his what he felt his best stories were from the 70's where travel was much "wilder". Also, being a platform engineer, he told me that the accident in the gulf wasn't an accident. I didn't follow the technical jargon, but the way he put it was someone pretty high up had to make the conscience decision to avoid safety and engineering protocols. I now from my own studies in industrial accidents for my old job that BP has a history of ignoring safety protocols, so this came as no surprise. Pat really wanted to buy us dinner and I could tell it meant a lot to him to do so because we reminded him of younger him.
The next day I woke early and waited outside the Gibbon Exp. office. I was told there was no spots for today and that I was to return at 10AM to find out whether they could sneak me in another day. As it turned out, I was able to aquire a spot on the 3rd. So, after tomorrow, I will be zip-lining around and sleeping in tree houses in the jungle. Don't expect to hear anything from me till I get to Chang Mai, probably around the 6th of July.
Later peeps, super excited about the Gibbon Experience

Just a Brief Update From Laos

2011-06-28T04:45:00.000-07:00

I know I haven't written in a while. The one computer that is free to use at my guest house, has been occupied non-stop. Not that there is a super amount of things to write about.
I stayed in Vang Vieng 3 nights. The scenery there is quite beautiful, but the town is solely designed for young partiers. If you so chose, you could rent a moto and go see some caves or lagoons or just hangout in the beautiful countryside. Then, you have to go back to town and see all the drunk or otherwise kids roaming around being fucking annoying. Why are they so intoxicated? They go tubing. There is a river that goes along the town that is usually calm enough to go tubing down. I've always been a big fan of grabbing some beer and taking a leisurely tubing trip with friends. Vang Vieng takes it up a notch. There are bars along the river, about a dozen in total (though I heard yesterday that most got washed away in the storm that's been hitting SE Asia). These bars not only sell or give away cheap shitty whiskey called Lao Lao, but some bars offer "happy" shakes or food that can have mushrooms, opium, or pot in them. Therefore, you can begin to see why there are so many people wandering town bandaged up or why they have a dozen people drown a year.
For the sake of, I don't feel like dying, I stuck to alcohol. I made friends with a couple, Ray and Silvia, at the first bar from Holland and we went down the river together. The buckets are cheap so we shared one at each bar we stopped after the first. The buckets have a ton of Lao Lao in them though and it is hard to gauge how much you're drinking. So, I got a bit drunker than I wanted and had to spend the next day nursing a hangover. A couple bars have things like mud volleyball, soccer, or games, a couple have water slides, most use to have "high dives", but they were all roped off because too many people were getting hurt jumping off them into murky water where the depth is unknown. I managed to stub my toe jumping in with my tube at the designated put in area, at the first bar, so bad that I later thought I broke it. Anyway, that night Ray, Silvia, and I met up with some people that had taken the same bus as me from Savannakhet. I'm sure we were a sight. Most of them went swimming at a hotel, but I knew I should just go to bed so that's what I did.
Like I said, next day wasn't fun for me. The one thing I did was buy a couple things like a dry bag (very very useful) and a bus ticket to get out of there. That's about it. Go there if you want to party for a day or two. Don't stay longer.
Next, I headed to Luang Prabang. LP is my favorite place in Laos so far and with only one stop left before heading back to Thailand, will likely end that way. It is a world heritage site and the Laos people call it the Ancient City. It is by far one of the prettiest cities I've visited in SE Asia. The main part of town is about 3 blocks wide and 10 blocks long. It's almost like a peninsula created by two rivers. There is a mountain smack in the center with a golden stupa on the top and the whole thing is covered with temples and Buddhist decor. It was my favorite Wats to visit, next to Angkor Wat. The rest of town is quite nice. I spent the first day wandering around the outskirts looking for a mythical bar where they had a pool. It was about 90 degrees in heat and humidity, and I wanted to swim. I never found it, but I did get to see parts of the town that most tourists don't go. It's all lovely. Since I didn't find the pool, I tried to find a swimming hole in the Mekong, but that requires luck. What I mean is, unless you see people swimming in it and specifically where they do, I wouldn't.
I did end up seeing some kids swimming in it the next day, right where a ferry docks to pick up cars to go directly across the river. I tried later, but the ferry sat there for about 30 minutes and I gave up. Most of my time here has been spent lounging and doing nothing. I found a western style coffee place (I'm pretty sure the owner is from the States. I met the "boss" today. I was hoping to copy some music they play there to my phone, and I believe he was from the States. Don't know if he owned the place though). Other than hanging out, I went to a waterfall by tuk-tuk with some friends and some strangers, met up with Angie and Jason who flew into town, and lastly I learned how to guide elephants.
The waterfall was a series of turquoise pools with one giant waterfall at the top. I ended up hiking to the top with my friends, Anna and Sheila. It's a good thing it was a dry day cause it was steep with foot holes carved into the mud hill. It would have been too dangerous on a wet day. At the top, we found some monks swimming. We joined them which was kinda a cool experience. Later we swam at a couple of the swimming holes and visited a bear rescue zoo at the bottom. The other people that joined us also saw a green mamba. I highly recommend the falls.
Angie and Jason came over the weekend, flying in from Chang Mai, Thailand. It was somewhat strange to hear how they were traveling. They flew here, as they were doing everywhere they were going for a couple weeks, for 3 nights... Huh? Don't understand why. Seems like a waste. They stayed in fancy hotels and ate at fancy places I couldn't afford. They were binge travelling, but not for any reason I could see. Usually, you do it because you aren't mobile. Jason is the only one working and he is doing it remotely. All he needs is an internet connection. Whatever. It was good to see them, but also sad. They feel like they have a firm grasp on the culture and people, but they since they are binge (and luxury binging at that) they can't (see Travelling Techniques and Levels of Understanding). Anyhow, there were a couple of things that I would warn them against. They have a tremendous opportunity that many don't have or take and I hope they take advantage of it. Don't pigeon hole yourselves and careful that your technique of traveling isn't elitist. Only sampling the most expensive hotels and restaurants and flying is dangerous in the sense that it is elitist. You will not get a fair sample of real life in the area you are in. Also, it struck me that you guys expected a lot of things that were unrealistic of places like this. Learn to look at them light hearted. Don't pigeon hole yourselves either. What you described to me about the reasons you love Koh Samui were not that different from many places I have visited, and not just on this trip. They exist everywhere and I think fresh coconuts are not a valid enough distinction. Thai food is not the best food in the world, it is one of the best. It is definitely in the upper echelon. Not the best though, nor the healthiest. So far, it's up there with Argentine BBQs and ceviche. Remember though, when I ate those, they were the average foods. When I've eaten with you, it's been really good, but not better. Yes, I didn't get to try Mama Thais or Nukes, but that is only a few places and those exist for any type of food even in the states (if you are willing to pay). Just want it so you guys can really travel by taking each experience as it's own and not comparing it to everything else. I am jealous that you get the experience of living somewhere though, that is good, and I think you have gained a lot from it. I hope I can do that within a couple years.
Lastly, the elephants. Super cool. Be careful here, there are several companies here and all are not equal. You will pay for what you get. Read the reviews before hand. The only one I heard was legit was Elephant Village. They rescue elephants, the others buy them solely for profit from tourism and they treat the people and animals as such. So I went with Elephant Village and shelled out quite a bit more to do so. I did the one day Mahout training, which is where you learn to "control" or guide the elephant. The elephants you ride are all female in their mid-life. Male or young can be difficult. The village is alongside a river and is quite lovely. You can opt to stay there overnight, but it's super expensive. First they teach you commands and you do a brief ride. Then, you go for about one hour riding on the back with the mahout guiding. Elephants are really fucking slow most of the time. A horse would have done our path in 20 min. The elephants were funny cause they were always trying to sneak off to eat. Ours stirred up a bees nest and the mahout nearly fell off he was so scared. Luckily, the bees just saw a big ass elephant and didn't sting us.
The first elephant I boarded was nervous. They put their trunk in their mouth when anxious. It was pretty cute. As a mahout you ride around on the neck of the animal with your knees resting on the top of their ears. You really don't need anything like a saddle. The neck is wide enough and the skin is thick and rough enough that it's really comfortable.
We were allowed to feed them too - they love sweet fruit like mangos and pineapples. Then, we ate. As we ate it started raining pretty hard. We were supposed to wash the elephants in the river and take a boat to some waterfalls, but the rain was not showing any signs of letting up. Our guy decided it wasn't going to, so we did it in the rain. Cold. The river and rain were cold. Really cold. But, washing them was the best part because their personalities really came out. One kept sticking it's head under water, another kept trying to get out of the river. Mine didn't want to lay down in the river while I scrubbed her with a brush. At one point she objected to the mahouts commands with a small trumpet, and another time with trying to spray him. Another thing, they can hold their breath a lot longer than I thought. That was definitely my favorite. Finally, we guided them home and the real mahouts (not us) took them to their camp off in the jungle.
Then we took a boat in the driving rain to a sweet waterfall, which judging by our guides excitement, was stronger than he'd ever seen it cause of all the rain the area has gotten. We swam in a safe area and the rain started letting up as we got out and back to the boat.
All in all, it was a great experience. I wish I had taken more opportunity of the down time in-between activities to go hang with the elephants, but oh well, it was still really bad ass.

So, that's the exciting things I've done over the last 10+ days. I accomplished my goal I set in Vietnam of staying in Luang Prabang for 8 days. Today, the day before I leave, I found the sequel to Power of One, Tandia (rare), somehow sticking out in the randomness of the book store organization like, "hey fucker! Look here!" My next plan is to take a slow boat tomorrow to Huay Xai. It will take two days, with a sleep in a village halfway. Once there, I want to do the Gibbon Experience, which is three days in the jungle canopy, zip-lining around and staying in tree houses. It's pricey, but everyone I've talked to that did it said it was their top experience in SE Asia. Usually, people book way in advance, but I'm hoping to show up and get a spot. I have a little wiggle room cause my visa goes till the 7th. Ok, that's it. Later

Book Review - Into the Wild

2011-06-25T04:49:00.000-07:00

I finally read the book Into the Wild, though reluctant because the character in the movie pissed me off.
Well, the character in the movie was slightly mis-portrayed. What appears to be going into the wilds of Alaska with absolutely no experience and blatant disregard is not quite true. I think what pissed most people off was that he mis-identified some plants which ended up stopping his body's ability to absorb nutrients from food. It appears to be that he correctly identified the plant, but there was nothing written about the dangers of eating a part of the plant he had to start consuming. He was eating wild potato, but during the summer they dry up and he started eating another part of the potato, which was impossible to know would be bad for him since it was though edible and there was no record, save one rare account from a couple hundred years back, of it being an inhibitor. While some of my opinion of Chris McCandless has changed, I still don't care for him.
I think that his death was inevitable. Not because he was ill prepared - he spent his childhood backpacking, he learned how to hunt and prepare animals - not because he was an idiot - he was actually very intelligent and had street smarts - it was because he had such a chip on his shoulder of anything that society touches, that even had he survived this time he'd have gone bigger and badder, if you will, next time with the same disregard for precaution and general backcountry safety. Strangely, while he found that society produced nothing but putrid consumables, he loved and consumed books. A bit of a contradiction. Anyhow, what ultimately ended up killing him was assuming past experience and forgoing normal caution that backcountry people consider essential - maps, compass, knowledge of the area or getting local's knowledge. I mean you don't go surf some spot because you saw that it had big waves. You ask local's for their knowledge or you go with a local till you have sufficient knowledge of the idiosyncrasies of the break and whatnot. But these types of things pissed him off so he avoided them, believing because he survived a close call in Mexico for a month, that he could do it again in Alaska. AND he almost did. Had he asked local's about the river flows or bought a proper map he'd have made it out. BUT that would have just confirmed his misplaced faith in himself and he would've eventually pushed too far.
That's not to say that I liked him aside from that. I can't say how I'd feel had I actually met him, but from what I read (the author seemed to really like Chris, seeing himself in him, and therefore wrote a very positive spin on the kid), I felt like he was someone whom would irk me. What I think drew most people to him was his passion and unwavering vision of going into Alaska. A strong passion for any purpose seems to really polarize people. They either get swept up in it or absolutely hate it. There are a lot of things that I could see a little piece of myself in with Chris, though he was extremely radical in them. I think that goes for a lot of people, and this is why I think he charmed so many people along his spiral. However, his hatred of his parents seemed to be a bit undeserved and he really seemed like a dick most of the time. I've mentioned holes in buckets throughout my blog and he definitely had a huge one. He just did stupid shit because something didn't go his way or annoyed him. He loved his car, but abandoned it in the desert cause the battery died. He wanted to see how far he could go to being alone (in ways, that's what my Amazon trip was), but he used people at times or sometimes put up with the system (working) while at other times damned the system (burning his cash). What it all boils down to is that he was confused combined with high intellect. Meaning, he was high and mighty and able to justify all the jackass things he did, but they were still jackass things he did. A polished turd is still a turd.
I'm all for seeing how self reliant you can be. I think his idea of spending the summer in the Alaska backcountry by himself, living off the land, is in itself commendable. If that's what he needs to do, good, however, unless you're an asshole, break yourself in with some smaller undertakings, use essential things like survey maps, and ALWAYS have a contingency plan.

Bottom line is that, even though Chris seems to be an endearing asshole, the book is still good. I enjoyed the read and there are many additional stories and questions about society that run parallel that are enjoyable. There was one question that Chris raised that particularly stood out to me. There were some people in his book that wanted him to get a law degree. He was so passionate about change and they suggested this so that he could make a change from inside the system. He didn't see it this way, and I think he may be right. That's what's always suggested. In a way, it's really saying, "don't make waves". The thing is that trying to change it from the inside is the safe way to go. The safe way is never really a way that results in much. It also validates that the system works. "It's not flawed cause look it can compromise". It's a naive way of thinking though. Not to mention the fact that that it's built in that if the system must compromise at some point you must comprise at some point. I had trouble looking back at the big changes in societies throughout history and I had trouble thinking of large changes that came about by people following the system. Peaceful and hostile protest, revolutions, civil wars. These are results of going out of the system. The problem is that to make waves is dangerous and most of those people end up dead or in jail. And that's it - that's why we always suggest making the changes from the inside. We don't want the people we care about to get hurt. We'd rather see them compromise their beliefs then dead or in jail.

Dylan Is the Most Awesomest Being Evar - Guest Post by Ivy Gahn

2011-06-22T01:04:00.000-07:00

OK, the title is my own.
I asked Ivy to write about the experience from her point of view. I wanted to give you guys a view from a different perspective. She remembered a few things that I had forgotten as well. It was nice for me in another way as well. I had never read anything that she wrote. I didn't even know she had written or even enjoyed it, but it turns out she is pretty good. Check it out:

To say I was excited for my trip is such an understatement! I've always wanted to go to Thailand, and since Dylan and I decided I would meet him there, I’ve been counting down the months, which is not easy let me tell you. It was so far off, and combined with hopefully getting time off, and actually getting a ticket, there were times it seemed nearly impossible. It all worked out though, which I'm so grateful for. Anyway, the wait time was ridiculously slow, and in the last few weeks I ended up torturing Dylan (oops) with my near daily "guess how many days now!" reminders. So I had to silently count down the days until Dylan said we were close enough for me to resume my reminders.

My flight was perfect, and I slept tons. The guy next to me ended up moving seats before we took off, so the girl on the other side of him and I had some extra space between us, which made for a more comfortable ride (as comfortable as a 13 hour flight can be). The only downside I'd say was the weird meal of what I would have to call "Beef Flavoured Tapioca.” I was a little worried about the layover in Taiwan but everything worked out smoothly. It was very early in the morning when I landed and the airport seemed vacant. I had a whole bathroom to myself to freshen up as slow as I wanted go, and then an entire gate waiting area to do my nails. Whatever you can find to bide your time right? Then the shops opened up for me to browse through, and soon it was time to board the next flight.

Dylan and I planned to meet at my gate, so I was a little bummed to see he wasn't there, but that just meant he had to get his bag so we'd meet at baggage claim. The customs line was huge and was what took so long. Once through, I had to locate which baggage consul (of a hundred I swear) was mine. But right then Dylan saw me and came over with both our bags. It was so nice to see him. In his opinion, it was awkward but I have to disagree a little. I didn't think it was that awkward at all. Maybe I was a bit delirious. He looked like a mountain man because he hadn't shaved since his hair trimmer had been stolen. Good thing I had brought him a new one! Once he shaved the old Dylan was back, it was hard to tell under all that scruff.

We took a cab to a neighborhood we had decided on earlier and looked for a place to sleep. After a few looks around we were hot and tired of walking with the packs and wanted to have some food and a beer, so we picked a nice comfy brothel. Except we didn't know it was a brothel until Dylan heard brothely noises in the night. Yay! Needless to say I touched as little as possible and tip-toed around in my flip flops. Next morning we were off to Cambodia. Of course Mr. Thai lied to us (he seemed to be the nicest and most honest) and the van didn't come when or where he said. So we had to walk a couple blocks with our heavy bags to follow this guy who had somehow figured we were with his group. The van later drove by where we had been waiting the last 45 minutes, so why we had to walk to the van is anybody's guess. Turns out most things wouldn't make sense, but little did we know. Then our van broke down and we had to sit in the 90 degree humidity on the side of a freeway for an hour, until another van came to rescue us. After a few hours we stopped to fill out visa docs and I got to experience the infamous squat toilet. I discovered later, that in the public restrooms, if you pick the handicap stall you don't have to squat because there is a normal toilet. Shhhh.

Finally we ended up at a decent guest house where we were too tired and fed up to even argue the fact that we were basically forced to stay there. After we settled in (without A/C even though Dylan confirmed we had paid for it, so we had to pay extra for it, again) we decided to get some dinner. Dylan got some cash out and had it exchanged to Cambodian currency. Later, when this bartender guy laughed at us, we found out that the exchange guy had given us a fake or expired bill. What a crap day. The next few days were spent hanging around the guest house and wondering the town. The temples were very beautiful, but like Dylan said, once you've seen 20 temples you've seen them all. I was ready to get back to Thailand and catch a tan. I know Cambodia must have more to offer, but honestly I wasn't impressed, at least with Siem Reap. Every corner we turned we were getting screwed. Except 'screwed' isn't the exact word we used, but I'll save it. It ended up being something to laugh about which is good I guess. One of my favorite memories in Cambodia was when our tuk tuk driver lead us through the neighborhoods and we got to see where the locals lived. Their houses were so quaint, with open walls and everything. It looked like most houses had a big commons area, like a living room, with all the bedding stacked up in the corners. All the houses had hammocks hanging below (the houses were all on pretty high stilts for flooding). It looked so comfortable, in a simple way.

After Cambodia, we decided on this island near Jason and Angie called Koh Tao. Once our ferry docked, we rented a scooter and drove around the island nearly all afternoon looking for a nice place to stay, since this was where we'd be splurging. I had my heart set on a beach hut/bungalow type place. We found some to be too far from the beach, some too expensive, however we did end up finding the best spot. Complete with two private beaches and hidden bar with a deck over the water to lounge on. They had the best watermelon shakes too.

One of my favorite days on Koh Tao was spent laying around our resort's beaches. I was able to read and swim, and bask in the sun while Dylan was out diving. I ordered a cab to a different beach on the other side of the island where Dylan met me once his boat came in. Then we had a sunset happy hour and a late dinner. The reason why I loved that day so much was not because we weren't with eachother all day, but because it was almost like a normal day where we could talk about our days at the end of the day. And I love laying in the sun to read, and I know that's not something Dylan is interested in doing all day. I needed some time to relax since we had been go go go the entire past week. I really loved Koh Tao. I was happy to report my day's activities of "flipping over a bunch."

While swimming at one of our beaches I was attacked by a sea cucumber and had to limp around for a few days. Actually I hit my ankle on some coral, but I like the sea cucumber story better and it made us laugh. It's still bothering me though, 3 weeks later. I've gone to the doctor and the x-ray shows a piece of coral still in my ankle, but it's too deep to get to without causing other possible damage. Have a follow up appointment this week. I'm getting tired of wearing flip flops, since anything with a back hurts.

Next we were off to visit Jason and Angie on Koh Samui, which ended up being perfect because I had chose that island as a stop, before I even realized they lived there. We were both really excited to see them and have them show us around and take us to their favorite spots on the island. The next few days were spent eating, swimming, and laying by their pool. One of the days we signed up for an all day snorkeling tour, which ended up being a whopping 20 minutes - if that - of snorkeling. The rest of what should have been our snorkeling day we looked at a lagoon, had an OK lunch, kayaked (Dylan nearly capsized us at sea because he was leaning over the edge making dolphin noises in the water), and visited a weird island campground with a cave? The other tourists on the boat decided that actually they didn't care to do much snorkeling after all. No idea why you'd pay for a snorkeling tour to sit in a boat all day, kinda lame. Dylan tried to complain at the day's end, but the employees pretended to not understand so it was pointless. I must say though, that the 20 minutes of snorkeling we did get was by far the best I've seen.

One afternoon on Koh Samui Dylan and I went to see what Grandpa and Grandma rock was all about - we found Grandpa but Grandma was being shy. A storm was coming in so we decided to take cover in a nice looking bar with a covered deck, have a beer, and wait until the rains passed. We chose the upstairs deck which was empty, and immediately this fidgety cracked out guy came and interrupted us by jabbering and blaring this CD he’d just made. Dylan was polite enough to make small talk and offer some compliments to his music, but I happened to be very interested in the storm so I didn't really talk to the guy. We thought it would be rude and uncomfortable to up and leave in the middle of his CD so we had to have another round, and I quickly volunteered myself to go downstairs to the bar and order since I didn't want to be left alone talking to the guy on drugs. Downstairs was a young Thai bartender girl, an old guy, and a dog. The old guy and I started talking when the girl left to grab the beers, and his dog looked interested in a little pet. I reached down while talking to the guy and the dog totally snapped and growled and nipped my hand! I pulled it away and the guy yelled at me "SHE'S PREGNANT!" Of course I didn't know that and I definitely didn't move in a way that should have startled the dog so I don't know why he had to get upset with me. We didn't continue our conversation and waited in an awkward silence for the girl to get back. She laughed and gave me two beer bottles that were stuck together. I can see how that's funny but I wasn't really in the mood since I'd just been yelled at, so I took the conjoined beers up for Dylan to break apart. I told him about how I had got in trouble and officially hated the place. It was all so odd. Imagine all that weird stuff going on, while looking out across the ocean only to have your view partially obstructed by a big penis shaped rock. Hmm.

Soon it was time to leave Koh Samui and fly back to Bangkok where Dylan picked another lovely brothel for us to stay my last night. It was more expensive than the first brothel, so I guess price doesn’t matter. Come bedtime, we discovered that the place doesn't issue blankets, but bath towels instead. Um what? Oh and then we noticed the nice little sign in the bathroom, "Do not flush used condoms!" Again, what???? Gross! Luckily there were no strange noises in the night this time. Just a tip: if you're ever in Bangkok with Dylan, don't let him pick your hotel because you'll end up in a brothel.

All in all, my trip was so much fun. I enjoyed every minute and it was an adventure I will remember forever. I was able to understand what Dylan meant when he said that time slows down when you’re travelling. Even into the second week of my trip, it was almost as if the week prior was just a blur. I don’t know why that is, but it was pretty cool. Dylan’s talked some about this energy he feels so I tried to grasp the concept but I think two weeks is too short, since essentially I was on vacation and not a longer term travel. I’m sure more time would allow that to happen. Sometimes when everyone would be exchanging information of where from/been/going/etc. I felt a little out of place. It was like everyone we met was several months into a journey similar to Dylan’s, and nobody could get their heads around the fact that I was in Thailand for only two weeks. It wasn’t even worth explaining that it was actually rather hard getting two consecutive weeks off, because it was such a foreign concept to them. I agree it doesn’t make sense to fly across the world for such a short time, but that’s just the way it is, and it was interesting being exposed to this other way of life that’s basically unheard of here. For us, what Dylan is doing is so “out there” but where he’s at it’s normal and almost expected to take a year or so and travel the world. It was refreshing though, seeing all these people travelling about without a worry that their life at home would suffer. I might not enjoy a super long trip that’s constantly on the go, but it did open my eyes to the possibilities.

Dylan is right in that it is easier than when he left in October, but only because we're used it now I think. I really can't wait until October and miss him so much. Hoping the summer flies by.

- Ivy Gahn

Savannakhet, Loas Update and Book Review

2011-06-16T23:14:00.000-07:00

After my last post, which ended with me dropping Ivy off at the airport, a couple of nice things happened to me to help cheer me up a bit. After leaving her at the airport, I took the train to the city. It doesn't stop anywhere near where I was staying, but I figured I'd just take a tuk-tuk the rest of the way. However, when I got to the last stop I was in no mood to do so. I guess I needed a good walk. On the way back a couple temples caught my eye, so I wandered in. I arrived at the second temple just as the monks were wrapping up praying. I was lingering about and one of the monks motioned me in as the last trickled out. He showed me how to pray and while it's pretty simple, involving three head to floor prayers, there is no way I'll remember what the speaking parts were. I talked to him a little bit in broken English and he said his name, but it was impossible for me to even pronounce. He also made me take a picture of their Buddha shrine. It was a really nice moment. Next, I stopped at another temple that was at the top of a "mountain" as the sun was waning. When I got back to my guesthouse, I went to the roof to find rabbits in what used to be a bar and a laundry girl that spoke near perfect English. I talked to her a bit about her life and then got some recommendations from her. The recommendations were spot on. I ate some fantastic baby clams and then had a beer in a tucked away deserted bar (I didn't want to be around anyone).I realized that Bangkok isn't the shit hole I thought it was. It has hidden little gems amidst a see of crap. Although, I'm not sure that I'll ever find a reasonably priced and not a dump, place to stay. So, those two things helped to cheer me up a little. Also, the next day I found a guy who reinforced the stress points on my new backpack (Ivy brought my dad's backpack which was identical to mine and we switched). He didn't do quite the job that the guy in Peru did, but it will definitely help to keep it from breaking.
Still, I needed to get out of Bangkok as quickly as possible. The first thing I did the next day was book a bus to Vientiane Laos. Then, the backpack thing. Then, a couple new books. I've been looking for The Celestine Prophecy based on a recommendation from Golden, and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. I didn't find either. Not that they aren't out there, just that when you go to a book store or whatnot, the books are stored happenstance. It is quite frustrating trying to find specific books as I'm sure you can imagine. However, there is something to it. In a way, it allows you to find things you weren't sure you were even looking for. I ended up picking out Dan Brown's new one (see book review below) and Into the Wild. I didn't know I was looking for them, but as I was looking for those specific ones above, they were the books that vividly stuck out.

It was a night bus again. They are never fun. Never. No matter what, they always are doing something that doesn't make sense for a bus you are supposed to be sleeping on. This one decided that even though we left at 7PM, dinner should be at 12:15AM. That means it totally fucks up your sleep. I didn't even bother going to sleep beforehand. Another thing that they like to do is turn out all lighting at 8PM. This is when they decided you need to sleep, although no white person coming out of Bangkok has been going to bed prior to midnight the entire time they were there. The last thing that this bus did, which many do, is play loud Thai music. Thankfully, this one was just the drivers speakers, but I was close enough that even with earplugs it was still quite loud and annoying.
Oh, Valium here is over the counter and stronger than in the states. I haven't bought any, but two guys on the bus provided us some needed humor on a tiresome trip. One Brit in particular was handling it quite poorly. When we stopped for food at midnight, he was visibly disoriented and tried to get on the wrong bus. Thankfully, the Thai guys with the bus company were nice guys and not only saw to it that he got on the correct bus, but later filled out all his Laos visa docs, had them process it, and almost practically carried him over the boarder. This guy was still disoriented when we arrived at 9ish in Vientiane (that's over 12 hours after I'm guessing he took it).
During dinner, I ended up talking to Chris from NZ. He knew of a good place to stay in Vientiane, but we couldn't check in because we were to early. With the exception of a 3 hour nap I took, we ended up hanging out the entire day. First, we had a couple beers at 10AM, then after said nap we met up to eat and have a couple beers, followed by meeting up with some Laos people he had befriended during a previous visit, including a girl he was sorta dating when he'd come to Vientiane. This girl ended up taking all of us around to a few places that night. The next day I saw Chris back in the bar pretty early. I realized that even though he is only a couple years my Junior, he is still very much in party mode. He was a nice enough guy, but I had no interest in that lifestyle.
I decided I needed a couple days to decide what my plans were. In the meantime, I found that the cafe next door served excellent real coffee (ie drip coffee, not espresso). I also rented a bike and went to see some of the national monuments. The symbol of Laos is a Golden pyramid, but when you get close you'll see that it needs a lot of restoration.
You'll notice as I write about the places I've been, there isn't much to say. That's because there isn't much to Laos in the excitement department. That's not why people come here though. If I were to write a slogan for Laos it'd be, "Sleep and Smile" and maybe throw a beerlao in there. People go to Thailand cause of the beaches, the food, the diving, the cool/cheap things to do, and the anything goes attitude. People go to Laos to chill out, meet really great people, and not spend hardly any money. It is is conceivable to spend $15 a day here for everything.
I took a bus to a place called Kong Lor village, which has a massive 7km cave nearby. I shared a bus with 5 other travelers - three from Germany: Jo, Sonja, and Max, one from Holland: Martha, and one from Spain: Ima. If you haven't noticed, I've gotten extremely good with names. For those that have known me a long time, you'll remember that I used to be terrible with names. I am a numbers and visual information person. I could remember a face from a brief encounter years back and usually place the person, but a name of someone I met 3 seconds ago? I don't know why I've gotten better at it, I just have. And it's not just that I've been working on it, it seems to have happened virtually overnight a few months ago. The most I've done so far is a group of eight off one round of names. Though, I have to say if it's a hard name in, say, Thai, I won't register it. Forget it. Back to the story... In normal fashion, the bus took a few hours extra to get there, so we couldn't go to the cave that day. We all divided into twos and split rooms. I shared mine with Jo. I think out of all the people there, I got along with Jo the best. Plus, I found out that Jo was from Munich and I told him I was aspiring to make Oktoberfest this year, to which he gave me his info and told me he show me the ropes from a local's perspective. Or, he'd show me the best tents and how to get into them without a table reserved (you have to reserve a table almost a year in advance now in the best tents).
The village of Kong Lor is very tiny. There is no store, no gas station, and don't even think about an ATM. There are a few home stays and two guesthouses with restaurants attached. They are so trusting in Loas, that we didn't even pay for dinner till we asked to pay as we checked out in the morning. We woke at about 7:30AM to see the cave. Everyone wanted to get out of the village to Savannakhet that day, but I was debating on whether or not I wanted to stay another night or two, to go to another town to arrange a moto and do what's called the "Loop", or go back to Vientiane. I figured I'd decide while we were spelunking. When we got to the cave, we were a bit lost on what to do. Jo was quite concerned with organizing a tuk-tuk back to town for after the tour, but the Laos guys thought he was confused. You take a boat into the cave and they thought he wanted one of those, so when he'd say tuk-tuk they'd exchange looks and then stare at him. I tried to tell him that it was fruitless, but he kept trying. Eventually, I convinced him that'd we'd get one easily when we got back from the boat cause that is how they knew things to work. By the time we were organizing a boat, it started pouring rain and they wouldn't take the boats out till it let up.
As it does, the rain stopped after about twenty minutes and off we went. The cave is a limestone cave that is 7km long and connects one village to another through the mountain. I've never been in a cave where you connect out the other side. Inside the cave, you putt around in boats that have two Laos people and three tourists. Bring a headlamp if you have one. Even though the guides have them, it's still really dark as you go by boat. There is one section you jump off at and walk where it's lit so you can seem some stalactites/mites and columns. Exiting the cave on the other side was my favorite cause you come out surrounded by jungle and giant cliffs. A Canadian couple that ended up joining us in the tuk-tuk later and I enjoyed the cave, but the others were complaining a bit that it wasn't spectacular. I mention that so that you don't go expecting something and having it turn out to be opposite. It's a big long cave that you take a boat through to the other side (and back) of a mountain in almost total darkness. If you don't like the sound of that, it's probably not for you.
In any case, there was a large tuk-tuk waiting for all of us when we got back. We picked up our stuff and at that time I decided to go see about renting a moto. The tuk-tuk took off trying to catch up to a bus that supposedly left already. It never caught up and ended up taking us to another town three hours away so that the group could catch a bus to Savannakhet. Along the way, I tried not to listen to Max and the Canadians: Alexa and Pat, talk about the worlds problems. I usually find that people either talk about them from a western perspective of how to fix them, which means they don't understand the people and motivations, or they perceive problems that in my opinion don't really exist. Max (German) kept talking about how most solutions revolve around the poor and uneducated. I got the sense that he was classist because he seemed to equate poor and uneducated with dumb and unmotivated. That's a very easy thing for someone who has had money his whole life to say. These are the people who feel societies faults the hardest, and when it comes to a point that they feel is too far... Well, expect a revolution. Being that he didn't seem able to put himself in their shoes, he couldn't see that just cause they are poor and uneducated that they may be quite happy. One of the things I've noticed the most and heard from fellow travelers, is that those who have the least give the most. And generally, just cause they don't have a formal education or many material possessions, they are still happy (sometimes more so than those that have those things). It is difficult for most of us (even I have to constantly remind myself to open my mind) to think that someone who is poor or who didn't get to go to school could possibly be happier than us. I mean, they have nothing and we have everything.
Where most of the problem comes from is when they see us with all these things and throwing money around when traveling or on TV, and they don't understand the differences in our cultures and the sacrifices they'd have to make to have all these things - things they have in abundance like time and what comes with it: ability to enjoy much of the little things we can't, time with family creating strong families and amazing children, etc. Because we are wealthy and can't understand their world, we assume that ours is the one correct way to live. But it isn't. There are many, many ways and most cultures have a way that works well for them already in place. I employ people traveling, no matter what type they are (see travelling techniques) to tread lightly and if they encounter want, try to show them what we have to give up for material wealth. What I mean by tread lightly is to not wildly spend money. I don't mean you can't have any fun or occasionally splurge, just be discrete.
The most complained about thing from travelers is when a place is spoiled by westerns. Let me be totally clear, it is impossible to leave no trace in traveling. You will always leave a footprint. Your goal should be to leave as small of one as is possible. This will help preserve a culture's independence (and thus why you want to go in the first place) for as long as possible.
Though I've gotten wildly off track on my soapbox, this will end up applying later to a discussion I had with a Savannakhetian. Lets get back to the story for now and you'll see what I mean when I get there.
When we got to the place where I could either organize a moto or continue by bus south to Savannakhet, I felt the "push" to go with them. I rationalized it as it is the rainy season and renting a moto would be expensive and wet, and that I enjoyed these guys company and wanted to go with them. However, I felt that I should go with them. So, I did. When we got to town, out come all the LP's that people can't live without, to which the Canadians shared my views on. We followed the LP to a place that was not only much further than the LP said it was from the station, but was also no longer in operation. Surprise, the Lying Planet was up to it's old tricks. We ended up walking to a place nearby cause it was getting late for Laos (9PM) and things would be closing soon. The place was a dump, but we were all too tired and worried about missing dinner, that we settled. Jo and I split a room again for a total of 35,000 Kip ($2 each).
We skipped showers for the moment and found one place still open for food. If you come to Savannakhet, know that almost everything closes at 9PM. You may find a bar outside the downtown area (about 5 square blocks) open till 11PM. The group decided they'd move on in their separate directions the next day because they felt that there was nothing to this city. I decided I'd switch guesthouses and stay a few days. I didn't want to have come down this way just to turn around the next day.
The next day we all parted ways after finding a really great little cafe. I told Jo I planned on his expert local suave for Oktoberfest. Then, I found a guesthouse for 40,000 Kip ($5) a night that was infinitely better. I walked about the downtown area. Savannakhet is a strange place. It was a French colony, then housed Chinese and Vietnamese. There are many buildings left over from the French, all of which are crumbling. They are pretty cool to see, but get old fast, no pun intended. The downtown area is along the Mekong, which is pretty wide at this point. Thailand is on the other side and this is one of the larger boarder crossings with Thailand. My first impression was kinda that this place had nothing to it other than a few old buildings. But it grew on me over the next couple days.
That afternoon, I had a conversation with a monk student, Leen (I think), who was charged by his monk to plant a tree. He, as well as some other Laos people, stopped by to check out the Phalong (what they call us whities and is not disrespectful). He spoke some English so we chatted a bit about nothing in particular. I felt like helping them with shovelling some dirt for the tree, but he wouldn't let me. I figured it would have been disrespectful, so I didn't push. I was hoping I'd run into him again over the next day or two, but never did. It was threatening to rain, so I headed for a tiny public plaza along the river that was covered.
As I was writing in my journal, another Laos person started talking to me. Phalongs are local celebrities here - everyone wants to talk to you and you get people following or rubbernecking. Kids love to shout the only English they know at you, "hello" and "fuck you" though I don't think they really understand what it means. Everyone says "hi" in Laos or just smiles at you. Anyhow, this guy starts talking to me as I'm writing. What seems like just another conversation with the basics of where, what, how long, etc. turns into a really in depth confusing conversation. After some high school girls leave he dives right into what he really wanted to know; why westerners are like they are about sex, drugs, appearance, money, and some other stuff. Also, it begins to rain too hard to leave so this interrogation into western society lasts over a half hour.
He grouped all white people into Europeans, so every question was "why do Europeans..." One thing about Laos people is that they don't really care about things. This continues into conversations. What we'd consider tacky to talk about with a stranger, they don't. Some specific funny questions I got was "why do Europeans shave their genitals?" "Why do they not where underwear?" "Why do they have sex so easy?" (as in promiscuity) "Why do they love drugs so much?" "Why do they come here to have sex with lady boys?" and some others I forgot. He told me about a European girl he had sex with a few weeks ago in detail. He wanted to know my experience and why there are differences between girls of different ethnicities. I didn't have a lot of answers for him, but that didn't matter. A lot of what he wanted to know was in the sexual department, but there was deeper things on his mind. There were two things that I think were particularly troubling him.
One, was "why do they come here to have sex with or marry our women?" He even had a guy ask him to find him a Laos woman to have sex with. He didn't outright say it, but his eyes were saying it, "this is fucked up, please stop". I say, I have to agree with him. I couldn't provide an answer. I think it is a bit fucked myself that people go with the sole purpose to have sex with someone from a specific country or ethnicity. I can't really explain why it bothers me, but I can totally understand why it bothers him. I think it's a bit like they are hunting for a head to hang on their wall. The people are materials for collecting, not people. I know we can argue that it takes two to tango, but when you listen to why he believes that these girls "give it up", it really seems one sided. The way he describes it is that they see it as "a way out". Sure they are using the man, but it's like saying the gambler is using the lottery. They are banking on a one in a million shot that anything comes of it. The other part of that is the old men who come to find a wife. That's even more fucked on levels I can't even begin to literate. I don't have a problem with people who come and end up fucking or meeting someone that they end up marrying, it's the pre-intent to do so that is disgusting.
The second thing that bothered him was western, esp. travelers, ideas of friendship. He told me how he made some friends in Vang Vieng and they never wrote him any emails or anything. He was visibly hurt by this. I was going to try to explain how many westerners view friendship and the possible reasons for it, but it was a bit complex even for me. FB gives a bit of insight into this. If you look at most profiles (ignoring the friend whores, who get some sort of validation from having as many "friends" as possible), people have many friends and of these many friends, they speak to about 3% on a regular basis. They may speak to about 10% on rare occasions, but never speak to the rest of the 90%. I do the same thing so don't think I'm getting high and mighty. I'm using this as an example of how westerners view friends. We have an elite inner circle, followed by an small amount of people we will talk to if need arises, then the rest were what travelers know well, friends of the moment. These are people that we spent time with, maybe even had a real bond with, but that we know and they know, that we will likely never speak again even though we exchange info. There are people you meet that you have a real connection with and may fall into the 10% category above. Very very rarely, there's even the 3% person (I don't think I've met one of those yet), but 90% will fall into the friends of the moment. You may laugh, you may cry, you may do things with these people you wouldn't do with your friends back home, you may spend a very special bond, but you will probably never talk to them again. And you'll know it during that info exchange ritual too. Now, try explaining that to someone whose English isn't good and doesn't have any understanding of western culture. I'm probably the first person he asked about such things. The only thing I could come up with was that we have very different cultures. I had noticed something unusual in his behavior too. He kept a physical distance from me. He spoke quietly, so I would have to take a step closer to hear him. He'd very casually step away after I started answering him. It was subtle though. I ended up "chasing" him for about ten feet before I noticed and would back away as I answered. He did this the entire conversation and I think it had something to do with the friends thing.

Bringing this back to the above request I made, I tried my best to explain that the cultures are very different. Esp. when he was talking about certain things like money and family values. I did my best to ever so subtly explain that in order to have and do these things we give up a lot of things and that he is rich in things that we are not and want to have. However, do to our sacrifices for material want, we gave up those things, as would he.
The most interesting thing I took away from this conversation though, was how Thailand and Laos feel about one another. I found out that the town across the river was part of Laos until "war 2". Now part of Thailand, I asked if they recognized themselves as Thai or Laos. He told me that Thai for sure. Thailand is more developed and they think of themselves as higher class. They apparently look down on Laos. So, the people of the town immediately starting thinking of themselves as Thai. He said they talk shit about Laos, even though it was not long ago that they were themselves. What I really liked was what he said next. "They talk down on us, but Laos don't give a shit. We proud to be Laos". I had to appreciate this point and I hope he was able to see connections to the other things we were talking about. He should be proud, Laos is super cool and the people are super cool. But more than that, be proud and happy with who you are. Be tactful, but proud. Every good person of every culture is the best person on earth.

The next day, I rented a bike and rode around the outer neighborhoods of Savannakhet. I highly recommend doing this everywhere because this is where the heart of most towns/cities is. Seattle is the same way. Downtown sucks, where the cool places are to go surround it - Ballard, Fremont, Greenlake, Capital Hill, U-district, Greenwood and Phinney, Wallingford, etc. These places have real character. That's the way most cities work. I know San Diego is the same way. Austin. Portland. Boston. Blah Blah Blah. It turns out that Savannakhet has a lot to offer if you look behind the veil.
Anywho, I'm on my way back north to Vang Vieng via Vientiane. I'll spend a couple days there. I might try to go to the Plain of Jars for a day. Likely, I will do the famous tourist activity of tubing the river, which is lined with bars, then spending a day recovering before moving on to Luang Prabang. Other than a book review below, that's all I got for yall. Later peeps.

Book Review: The Lost Symbol. This new one by Dan Brown doesn't disappoint the Dan Brown fans. As in, it's classic pain in the ass Dan Brown story telling. I love and hate him at the same time. I hate how it takes him 40 pages to reveal one thing. It goes on and on slowly drawing out some piece of the puzzle. When I read it I go, "god damn it! Quick blowing smoke up our ass and out with it already. Knock it off asshole!" Plus, some of what he thinks is major plot twists or puzzles are predictable. One of the biggest plot twists in the book I had guessed about 3/5ths of the way through (and then had to wait 150 pages before he was finally out with it!).
What I love about Dan Brown is he does his homework and isn't afraid to punch religion or societies in the nuts. Many things that references or reveals I never knew before. Things like the origin of sayings, symbols and traditions, or how historical people of mention had more to them then we are taught.
I enjoyed this book. I'd put it in between my favorite The Da Vinci Code and the lesser Angels and Demons (I know he has others, but I couldn't even deal with the absurdities of Deception Point so I'm ignoring them). It was cool cause it has a ton about the beginnings of America and a lot of the Masons and other societies. Though, he didn't sell me on the big secret at the end like he did with the other two books. In fact, it was a little bit of a let down finding out what the "lost symbol" was. And the main character seemed a bit too suspicious of everything given the secret at the end of the Da Vinci Code, which is referenced a couple times in this book.
What I found particularly interesting about this book, is that much of it focuses a lot on atonement; or it's origin of "at-one-ment". At-one-ment being man's search for his relationship to the universe. I pondered a bit as I read it, why it was that this book really stuck out to me. I'd be seeing it around at the street vendors because it's a popular book, but I still felt a strong desire to read it. I ignored that desire until the bookstore, where it impressed itself on my conscience out of all the books there. It seems quite fitting that as I have begun my unwitting search for my at-one-ment, that this book would find (force) it's way into my hands. It even provides some ideas further reading in the story. I found myself really amazed with the Mason's beliefs and how close to what I've felt and slowly am putting together famous powerful people in history did.

PS. Ivy has agreed to do a guest post about her side of her time traveling about with me. I was hoping it'd be done prior to my next (this) post, but since it's not, they will be slightly out of order. Just keep in mind that it was supposed to follow Cambodia, Thailand, Ivy, and Jason/Angie

Cambodia, Thailand, Ivy, and Jason/Angie

2011-06-08T08:31:00.000-07:00

Sorry folks, but this will probably be a long one. It encompasses a little over two weeks of stuff and Ivy.
Originally, I planned on going through Laos to Thailand and meeting Ivy in mid-June. However, her work and idiotic bosses had other plans. They nearly made it so that she would never be able to visit. Why? Because two weeks off is too much. It is a sad, sad state of affairs in the US. First, we only get about 3 weeks off a year - maybe 4 if you're lucky or upper management or spend 20 years at the same place. Then, most people can't take more than a week off at a time. Most of the time it's just stigma. I mean, if we get our work done, or if it's shared work when we are out (as in Ivy's case - coworkers are required to cover for people on vacation), then shouldn't we be able to do whatever we want with our vacation time. When talking with European or Australian people, or even some of the third world, they are baffled about how we view work. Even British get twice as much time off as us, and they are workaholics too.
Our work paradigm is better spent for another post, so getting back on track, Ivy's work had another person out for a couple days of the original time, so they wouldn't let go on our original plans, then they were reluctant to let her go for two weeks. I'm not sure I would have allowed her to come if she could only get one week, it's simply a waste of money and we'd likely have not been able to Bangkok. We'd have had to take tours out of Bangkok for a couple days, but going to the islands in the South would have been out because we wouldn't be able to afford the time to not fly and we'd not have been able to fly there cause we are on a budget. Thankfully, her bosses came around, though I (and my parents) was about to have words with them had they not.
So, I flew from Hanoi to Bangkok for under $100 and was scheduled to arrive thirty minutes before her. I figured I'd go to her gate and meet her, you know, all romantic like.
The Bangkok airport is confusing. They don't have screens with the arrival times or gates of the planes when you are in the terminal. They do have a screen that tells you which of 3 different customs baggage claims your gear will arrive in. So, I tried to remember where her connecting flight was coming from and figured I'd meet her in front of that customs place. However, I couldn't remember the city in Taiwan that she was coming from. I asked a few people, but their limited English made it too difficult. I hadn't seen her for about forty minutes, and since there was no way to tell if the plane had come in on time, I began to worry that she either made it earlier or was going to be much longer or that she missed her connection. I really, really, really don't like leaving my bags unattended, esp. in a country where English isn't a strong suit, so I decided to go through customs and get my bag and wait there.
TIP: always look up a hotel and write it down and address before going through any customs. They get confused or annoyed that you don't have a place to stay. I know it's weird that they'd get upset, but they almost always do (unless you have someone help you through a land border or you are traveling in SA). Just do it, even if you aren't staying there.
So yeah, I went through a great deal of hassle and having to go to a secluded booth and everything because I didn't have a place to stay. They even told me to just give them a name of a hotel and that would suffice. I should have tried ones like Hilton or Four Seasons, but it didn't cross my mind. After about 15 minutes with another lady trying to describe that I didn't have any reservations and that I'd just find a place when I got into town, she finally got annoyed enough to just pass me through. I got my bag, which by now was the last one from my flight and looked for Ivy's flight again. I thought Taipei sounded familiar so I headed that direction.
I saw my dad's backpack, which looks identical to mine, so I knew I was in the right area. After waiting for another 20 minutes for Ivy to make it through customs, we finally saw each other.
As we had thought, it was a bit awkward. We had discussed prior how strange it was going to be given that we hadn't seen one another in seven months. Though we emailed, and on a few rare occasions even Skyped, it was just unfamiliar; almost like a first date.
We headed into the heart of Bangkok with the plan to head to Cambodia the next day. We booked our bus with a friendly guy at Mr. Thai (we don't like him anymore), and booked into a cheap guesthouse, which I'm pretty sure was just a place that people rent for the night to bring hookers. We actually shopped around too. Bangkok is strange with accommodation. You can either pay $20 a night and get a really nice place, or you can pay under $10 and get a really shit place. There may be a rare inbetweener, but I've looked and haven't found one that is in an area where there is anything to do/see. And trust me, since Bangkok is so central, to go anywhere you have to stay there a night. Meaning, I've been to Bangkok three times already and I still haven't found a nice place with reasonable prices (esp. if you are by yourself). In fact, the first place we stayed flooded and soaked my backpack and the last place we stayed, the one before Ivy left, had blawels (large towels that they gave to use as blankets).
That night and part of the next day we ate street food and checked out the main tourist drag, which is quite the experience. Still, we were glad to be getting out of there. However, unbeknownst to us, despite being forewarned by a traveler I met earlier in my trip, were going to take it in the pooper with scams going to Siem Reap, Cambodia.
TIP: If you have all the time in the world, don't mind walking long distances with your bags in 30 degree humid weather, and are really willing to argue and get pissed off for hours, just calculate in $20 to what it will cost - in addition to what you already paid - to cross the border and get to Siem Reap. As far as I can tell, all buses stop at this one or two restaurants about 3km from the boarder. Here is the first scam - visa assistance. It will cost you about $35 total. It comes with the visa (I read it's $20, but I heard ranges up to $30. The restaurant will tell you their service is only $5 more than the visa) and assistance crossing the boarder. If you got an E-visa, they will still drive you to the boarder with everyone, but you don't get assistance through. I've heard that the crossing can take forever, but with Ivy's and my guide we got through in about 30 min, including all the walking. I was told that part of the reason is that they have a health inspection portion. If you have a guide or a bribe, I think you can make it through that without even talking to anyone. Our guide was the one who told us this so take it with a grain of sand. The next scam comes after you make it to your connecting bus on the Cambodian side - upgraded buses. They get on and tell you that you can either take the scheduled bus, which will leave in something like an hour and stops all the way there, taking 5 hours, or you can pay $3 and take the VIP bus which "just" became available to your group. This bus "will not stop and will take you to the center of Siem Reap". This one is an out right lie. We stopped for 40 minutes at a restaurant at 4PM. No one was hungry and no one wanted to stop there, but the driver said if we didn't like it to "get a taxi". All buses get commission to stop at places. This is true in SAm (South America) too, but not to the degree that it is here in SEA (South East Asia). So you'll just sit there and watch other buses come and stop there and nobody buy anything. Finally, we got back on the bus and, lo and behold, we stopped at a backyard bus terminal about 5km out of the center, where there were a horde of tuk-tuk (motorbike taxis with a covered backseat) drivers there to take us to the hotels they were commissioned to. "If you don't like the place they take you, they drive you to another for free". I don't know how true that is because the place they took us was nice and was only $10 a night and we were sick of all the shit.
Here is another thing to keep in mind if you want to avoid these scams: get a good group of people. We had a British couple who were pissed off too, but had stomach problems and just couldn't deal with trying to stop the bullshit, but that was it. The Germans on our bus were all too happy to fork over any money and not make a fuss. Why they didn't just give their bank cards away to save themselves the time and hassle it'd take to reach into their wallets every few minutes to throw cash away, I'll never know. So, we didn't have a strong group to argue. It's hard to not get fucked when the majority of people are excited to throw away money. Had the whole group gotten pissed off, there's a reasonable chance we'd have been taken to the center of town.
Another curious thing is that we were told, by the same guy that lied about the VIP bus, that we should change money at the border. Mr. Thai told us not too under any circumstances so we didn't. I think the border rates might be really poor or something. This guy though told us that if you use the Cambodian currency (Riel) you can get things for cheaper than if you use US $. Ivy and I waited till we were in town to change any money. Cambodia is the first country I have ever been to where, if you are a foreigner, the only money you can get out of an ATM or bank is US $. I went to several banks to test this. I ended up taking out $50, then converting it to Riel, which was a mistake.
TIP: Don't change your US $. At least in Siem Riep. That guy was lying to us again. Nothing is cheaper - any place you go to has everything listed in US $. If you have Riel, they just do the conversion from dollar. You end up paying the same amount, sometimes more, if you use Riel. Also, you end up losing a little bit from converting it in the first place. It's funny too, they'll tell you an amount, but then that amount will go up as they are talking. You really need to be on your toes and make sure you get enough sleep because you will need the energy to argue with them all the time about sneaky prices.

Ivy and I didn't visit the temples the next day cause we were both just tired - taking it in the pooper for 10 hours will do that to you. Plus, I wanted to give Ivy some time if she had jet lag, to adjust. I have to admit, I was pretty amazed that she only had minor lag. We just walked about town, took in a couple pagodas in town and listened to monks praying, which is really cool (I have a 15 second clip on FB, which isn't long enough).
The next two days we went to the temples. There is what seems like 100 temples in the area. You can hire someone to drive and you walk around, or a guide, or a tour. We opted for just someone to drive us around. Angkor Wat is pretty impressive. However, people need to shut up about it. My expectations were set at breath taking and all I got was "hmm, cool, you ready to see some others?" I'd put Machu Pichu in the rain above this bad boy. In fact, I think I enjoyed the Mayan ruins more. Don't get me wrong, it is cool and impressive. I don't know though, I think I liked some of the others that we saw more. Angkor Wat had size and grandeur, but almost seemed to prefer that to character. There were other temples that had more character, like one that had faces everywhere and another that was kinda a water temple. There was a few that had trees growing in or on them. Anywho, at the end of the first day, we were taken to a "mountain" to watch the sunset with all the other tourists. At the top is a temple and you can get 360 degree views of the area. We watched a fake sunset - where the clouds cover the horizon so you don't get the real one. There were a lot of snobby tourists or travelers up there. They looked down there noses at us when we left after the fake sunset. You could feel them thinking, "look at those stupid tourists, leaving before the actual sunset. Run along tourists, you have a time schedule and trinkets to buy." I'm used to these dicks cause they are everywhere, but even Ivy picked up on it. Sorry, we wanted to walk down before it was dark and didn't want to stick around to stare at clouds; get over yourselves.
Cool things, not related to the temples - monkeys are running about along the roads. There are elephants that you can pet, but are supposed to be for rides. If you leave the temple area (which is in jungle) at dusk, there are these crazy bugs. I won't do it justice in my description, but the noise was loud and haunting. I mean, these bugs made the jungle, which already is kinda mysterious, sound really spooky and ghostly.
That night we had foot "massages" given by little fish. You'll find this everywhere there. These little fish nibble on your feet. Yes, it tickles - bad! If you can make it through about five min. it stops being so ticklish. Then, we had a Happy Angkor Pizza and went home. The second day of temples, we only made it till just after 1PM. At this point, they started blending into one another, and we were hot.
We spent a total of about 3 full days in Siem Reap and were certainly ready to head to the beach. Ivy had done a bit of research ahead of time and wanted to go to Koh Tao. Oh, and we didn't get scammed going out of Cambodia, although they did stop us at the same restaurant that we paid for the visa service at. I found that pretty brazen. If they had normal toilets, I'd have left them an upper-decker. Anywho, you gotta go through Bangkok, but you don't have to spend the night because the bus to the ferry to Koh Tao is overnight. We met a cool guy named Jordan from Toronto that was traveling on his own. We kinda joined forces with him cause I know what it's like to be traveling alone in the midst of couples. Couples tend to keep to themselves, so when you are the only one-off, it's tough. He was going to do some diving there for awhile and we talked a bit about our diving histories - his being much more extensive than mine.
On Koh Tao, Ivy wanted to splurge our accommodation. I had agreed ahead of time to doing a beach hut, if it was under $30 a night per person. In order to do this without pre-booking, and trust me, pre-booking through the internet is a good way to pay more and not get what you wanted than doing it when you get there, is to hire a motobike (you can store your bags for free if you rent with shops). After looking around the island a bit, we found a place that we liked for $25 per-person. It was on the south end, had mostly private beaches (3), we were about 10 stairs from door to water, and one of the restaurants was some of the better food we have had for about the same price as everywhere else. Plus, it was close to a smaller, less busy, town and we didn't have to drive up crazy mountains. If you aren't going to stay in the main town, rent a motobike, one day will be cheaper than a one way taxi anywhere.
Ivy wanted to lay around and soak up sun. I wanted to dive at least one day. I did a full day and the diving was really good. 3 dives were about $110. However, since I have pretty good breath control, I got to dive longer than the other guys in my group. The diving is really good in Koh Tao; probably the best diving I've done next to Belize. Since it's cheaper, it may be better than Belize. There really isn't much more to report about Koh Tao because we purposely took it really easy - mostly laying around in the sun, dipping in the ocean, and eating. The only other thing I can think we did was I made Ivy walk up steep hills in the mountains while I rode the moto up.

Koh Samui is about two to three hours by boat from Koh Tao. My friend Jason and his wife Angie moved there about five months ago and I had always planned to meet up with them since I'd be going through the area. Jason is a software engineer, so he can work remotely. He finagled his boss into letting him do it in Thailand and has pushed back his return date a couple times. They had recently moved apartments and their new place had a separated private bedroom and bath for Ivy and I. Jason and Angie are somewhat food snobs (sorry guys, it's true). We had counted on this, and had planned on using their taste to eat some great food, which we did (thanks guys). For the most part we spent the first part of the days to ourselves, and the latter part going to late lunches and dinners with Jason and Angie.
I hadn't realized this about Thailand until J & A pointed this out, but the reason that Ivy and I had thought that the food here is not spicy is because Thai people will not make it spicy if you are not Thai. Every meal we went to they'd ask for Thai spicy or Phet Phet (very spicy), and they wouldn't do it. Sometimes we'd get laughed at. Other times, they'd ask "you can have spicy?" Still, they wouldn't do it. One time we did get a reasonably spicy dish, but it still wasn't that bad - I've had spicier Mexican dishes. We discussed why this is and the conclusion is that, Europeans can't eat spicy foods and Thai can't tell the difference between us and since they couldn't they didn't want to waste the food or offend anyone by making it too spicy for "Europeans". They were even reluctant to bring out their flavor trays, which included ground chili. Thai believe that there are only 4 flavors - spicy, salty, sweet, and sour. That's what comes on the flavor trays. It was almost comical how pussy they thought we'd be, and then the horror they'd have when all four of us added a ton of chili pepper purposely in front of them.
Ivy and I did do a couple other things like visit a dick shaped rock and a vagina shaped rock called grandfather and grandmother rock. While there it started to rain and when it rains, well, it's not fun to be out in it. We decided to tuck into a little bar for a drink and wait the rain out. Little did we know we were going to meet a weirdo from Kirkland. Ivy thinks the dude was on coke. He definitely was ADD. First, he interrupted us, then put on a bad CD which he gave me so I could give to Clinton Ferron, and then he smoked a bunch of weed. Needless to say it was very weird.
It was nearing time to get back to Bangkok, so the next day we took a boat and flight. Ivy's last night and day was really tough on us. It was almost as hard as when I originally left. I don't need to talk too much about it, just that it was hard. There were a couple times where the thought of buying a ticket home with her flashed through my mind, but I knew that I couldn't do that. It just felt wrong not having her with me. In the end, I think that it was always supposed to be this way. It was supposed to be a test, so to speak, and I HAD to pass it. It turned out to be easier on both of us than last time. I'll miss her a lot though.

Topical Discussions - 060611

2011-06-07T03:28:00.000-07:00

I read the news today oh boy...

Today, as I was drinking a coffee, I noticed a Bangkok newspaper in English. Curious, I picked it up to see if there was anything interesting going on or anything about Thailand. Generally, I use a person filter to get my news and it works really well. But, I was curious. Oops.

3 things caught my attention: The pope sees his shawdow - 6 more weeks of winter, drugs are bad m-kay, and an interesting thing about India.

The first thing was actually called, The Pope Hails Parenthood. I think it was in the paper cause some people like the pope and they didn't know how to fill the paper today. It was a lot of fluff with the general point being that the pope echoed the normal message of get married, don't have abortions, and be Catholic. He was quoted as saying, "don't be afraid of commitment", referring to marriage and he put down people that live together prior to or instead of getting hitched. I don't think fear is why people choose to live together, but maybe I'm wrong. If they are like me, they feel marriage is an unnecessary institution. Does getting married prove you love someone? Yes and no. Can we mate for life and not get married? Yes. All marriage is, is a legal document and a religious tradition. We certainly can love someone and prove it day to day without ever getting married. It's a grand gesture, but a relic. The unfortunate byproduct of marriage is that we get complacent and expectations start to put unnecessary strain where it doesn't need to be. If it proved we loved someone, then why do we need divorce? We proved we love you. Ah, but love under stress caused by expectations and complacency eventually changes. We all know people who went from being ecstatic to depressed (and ultimately divorced) just because they had a wedding. Just because it's tradition doesn't mean everyone wants to risk that undue stress for a couple tax breaks and the exact same living situation they'd have had had they just lived with one another.

Of course, the pope wants you to have kids. The Catholic creation myth, a well as all religions creation myths, tell us that we are the ultimate desired creature. We were put here, just shy of godliness (man was created in His image), to be owners of the world. It was necessary to have as many kids as possible before cause more than half died in infancy. Now it's not. If someone wants to have an abortion, let them. What if it's Einstein? Well, what if it's the next jailbird (the more likely case for children growing up in family that didn't want them). We all hear the survivorship bias of, "I am so happy I changed my mind about it. I can't imagine my life without [son or daughter]". It's a downer and the News thinks inappropriate, to do stories like, "I'm so happy I got an abortion 10 years ago". To be honest, I have no idea how I'd feel if my girlfriend wanted one. I am not set in stone that it is wrong or right. It's too huge a decision to say how you'd react ahead of time if it came about. However, it is not my business, nor anyone else's to tell someone they can't. The church doesn't like you using birth control either. We must fill the earth to it's breaking points, but don't worry, a mystical being will save us all from our self inflicted destruction. Not to mention that it means more Catholics running around to compete with the other major religions.

The second piece was actually an op-ed. The topic was a report released by the Global Commission on Drug Policy stating that the war on drugs is a failure and the best thing that governments can do is to legalize them. The op-ed was against that. The arguments against the report were, that commission members didn't said the opposite while they were in politics, that the current US drug czar has only had minor success in reducing penalties for non-violent crime drug related incarcerations, that drug dealers and mafia are bad, violent people, and that drugs are harmful. If you think that I am purposely talking down there points to make them seem silly, you are mistaken.

The one example of members not following was George Schultz (US secretary of state 20+ years ago), who "praised and helped to fund the Thai struggle to chase heroin warlord Khun Sa out of the country". Eliminating warlords is always a good idea, but perhaps there are better ways to do it. Also, people should never change their minds, even over 20 years when they are presented with new information (as in the war on drugs is totally unsuccessful). Besides, they were worried about a job rather than doing what is right, which is unfortunately all to common in politics. Now, he can speak his mind.

The success of the current drug czar is irrelevant, unless you are trying to argue that someone is more suited to do the job of reducing penalties, which was not the argument of this op-ed piece. To me. that appears to kinda support the conclusion of the commission's report.

The worst argument, and they were all bad, was that "drugs and dealers threaten lives, cause violence and ruin livelihoods". He goes on to say, "Ending the struggles against drug traffickers would not ease the attempt by organised criminals to attack society" and that the mafia would still exist even without drugs. OK, first - these are two conflicting statements. The author is making an emotional case that dealers are bad. Then, he concedes that dealers would be gone, in order to make another case. It's confusing because he blurs what would happen should the world legalize drugs. There are a ton of longer reaching affects like vacuums created when the international drug market falls out, but I want to focus specifically on the authors cases. What would happen if we legalized all drugs in the above? Drug dealers would not exist and nor would the violence that surrounds that black market. Hell, they might actually become the first legitimate businessmen in those industries. Many people claim that drug usage would sky-rocket and society would fall apart. These people aren't aware, in my opinion, of just how rampant drug usage is now, and society is still intact. There would probably be a short spike in usage that would be created by the few people who stayed away before because they didn't want to go to jail, but this would be short lived and relatively manageable. Drug crime would clear up and the mafias would find other ways to illegally make money, just like they are doing now all over the world. However, without the enormous profits from the drug trade, they'd be much weaker. Mafias will most likely always exist, but we don't need to support them with drug money. Also, internationally, we'd be lowering the amount of money available to radical groups and terrorists weakening their ability to train, hide, recruit, buy arms, etc. Speaking of money, tax revenue...
The op-ed guy wanted more specific streetwise advice of cleaning up drug problems, but he missed the point of the report. He could have wrote his whole op-ed piece about that without bringing up the report. The report didn't have to do that because legalizing would eradicate the crime and violence. What wouldn't be cleaned up would be the users destroying their lives. This is out of the report's scope anyhow. Streetwise advice - use part of the enormous tax revenues to objectively (and not overdo it like tobacco) inform people about the drugs and let them decide for themselves. Most people won't want to destroy their lives just because drugs became legal. For those that are and will, use part of the tax revenues to help them when they realize they need help.

The third and last thing that caught my attention was that a Guru in India is protesting corruption in the government by fasting. The government allowed him 5,000 protesters, but 50,000 have shown up so far. The police then broke up the illegal gathering with tear gas and beating them. This Guru demanded that the government accept "all his demands, including introducing the death penalty for corrupt officials and withdrawing large-denomination bank notes used in illicit cash deals". Sounds reasonable to me. The whole situation is interesting, but what I really found amazing is that the "Prime Minister [and staff] tried to talk him out of the 'fast unto death', nervous that his campaign could spiral into a mass challenge to the governments authority". I feel like in the US, the government would look at him and go, "fuck it" no one cares. And no one would. There, even with only 50k people behind him out of over a billion, the culture is such that one person with the right intentions can have that kind of affect to scare the government.

Alright, that's it for now

Book Reviews - The Power of One & Blink

2011-06-06T03:28:00.000-07:00

Take a guess at which one is a novel and which is a non-fiction essay type book. Also, take a guess at which one sucked monkey balls and which I thoroughly enjoyed.
The first book, The Power of One, is an epic. I want to say it is about 700+ pages, but excellent. It starts off with a young English boy growing up in the countryside of South Africa just prior to the start of WW2. He gets shipped off to boarding school dominated by people who hate the English. The first part of the book he is shit upon (almost literally), and after he is out of boarding school he meets some really great people that turn things around. The essential message as you guessed it, is the "power of one" that he eventually learns. The power of one is a bit ambiguous and mysterious because the author changes the meaning slightly as the kid ages. The jist is that it is believing in yourself and having the courage and strength, along with using compassion and wisdom, to take a stand. There are a lot of motivating and inspiring parts that have to deal with that.

The kid, Peekay, is supposedly brilliant, though, because of the bad things that happen in the beginning, he has to come to grips with letting it shine. Also, because of previous experiences, he is hell bent on becoming the welterweight champion of the world when he grows up. I wouldn't say I hated the end, but it was sorta disappointing. I won't spoil it, but something comes full circle, and while I was all, "yeah! Take that you bastard! You show him Peekay", all the momentum that the book is building for his greatness (there are elements of spirituality and fate and how it is Peekay that is supposed to lead and unite people) just disappears. Or rather, it seems as if the author was planning a sequel for all that stuff. Seriously, if there isn't a sequel, the books ending is sorta a let down.

I just checked and there is both a sequel, called "Tandi", and a movie called "The Power of One" starring Morgan Freeman as well as others that combines both books (I knew the story seemed similar to a movie I saw in the 90's). That explains the ending and makes it better. Knowing there is a sequel makes this classic one of the better books I've read - Top 10 for sure. The strange thing is that the book makes no mention of a sequel or a movie. Maybe, I got an early edition or something. It did reach me free of charge in a hostel in SA, but I put off reading it till I got to Vietnam. When I finished, I left the book at a guesthouse in Siem Reap, hoping it would find it's way into good hands, also, free of charge.

The second book, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, was a flop (as Ivy can attest to because I forced her to listen to me rant about statistical method, survivorship biases, unsupported jumps in logic, weird fetishes with musicians, etc). The jist of this book is that humans instinctively thin slice experiences as they are happening and make decisions immediately. These decisions, according to the author's research, are using better than the decisions made when we gather a lot of data and try to come out with strategic ones. However, sometimes prejudices and intense moments can distort those judgments. Good news being that we can cultivate and improve this ability. Sorry, it's a little hard to explain in a couple sentences.

It seems pretty obvious that we naturally make snap decisions, what was a bit novel was to claim they are better than the one's that we gather info for and take time to decide on. I started the book agreeing with the author, but as the book went on, I felt he was making a lot of poorly supported assertions. I wanted to be on his side. I loved his previous book, The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. However, The Tipping Point used a lot of case studies and logic to back up his argument, whereas in Blink he tries to use mostly psychology. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but he gets lost in the application of such to real world examples.
Also, being well versed in statistics and method, I scrutinized his "evidence" a bit more than I would have a few years ago. Red flags popped up all over the place. The first, using a "study" as support. For any readers of my nutrition posts, you'll recognize why that's a red flag. Plus, he makes outlandish claims that can't be verified, but seem just. Claims that are similar to, "Bob Golomb is an amazing car salesman [while all the others aren't], because he sees everyone as a potential buyer. He thin slices better than anyone, but doesn't let prejudice take over" (that is a paraphrased quote). This seems like a reasonable claim and I'd probably have swallowed it if I hadn't have read The Game. Sales people sarge. In the terms of The Game, this guy is known as a natural. Every sales person on earth is taught to treat anyone as a potential buyer. Fuck, I was taught that at Sears. You simply wouldn't have a job if you didn't. There is a certain skill set to be a good salesman and it is very very similar to the skill set that PUAs use. I would venture to say that Neil Strauss has 100 times more insight into what made this particular guy the best salesman in the region than this wildly unsupported claim that it's because he doesn't listen to prejudice. Was he tested to find out if he does or does not? No. In fact, a lot of the claims that Malcolm Gladwell (author) makes to support his Blink argument (this person is better at this than that because...), inadvertently venture into the social dynamics arena and they come out sounding ridiculous when compared to theories and field experience of the PUAs.

There's other problems statistically, like when Malcolm surveys the CEO heights of the fortune 500 companies yet provides zero details, just his conclusions. Look, if you are going to do your own research, you might want to be a little bit better at documenting. How big was the final sample (aka response rate)? Did you look for any biases in your sample? etc. I'm not saying I think he manipulated data or anything, he just can't throw around these claims without giving readers the chance to verify his conclusions.
Lastly, what the fuck is up with his strong push to make Kenna famous? That's a leap of faith to claim that it's the radio industries fault. We live in a day where it's easy to get his music. If he was that good, what about tipping points (did Malcolm think about his last book)? Not to mention that not just that entire portion, but most of the rest of the book, would be thrown into question by readers who didn't find Kenna some amazing artist. I remember Kenna from MTV in highschool. I like his song, "War In Me" and another that I found in college, but he didn't stun me. It was good, not great. Not to mention the survivorship bias he's using when writing about him. He mentions by name some record label execs that loved him. Did any execs hear him and have my reaction? Probably, but we don't hear about them. Oh, and that duesh bag, Fred Durst liked him? well then he must be good. The author apparently has not noticed that the only music that record execs want to produce (unless they are indy labels) are almost always garbage musicians. They play what will sell A LOT of records. Most people have no taste or don't know enough about music to pick up on talent. Maybe kenna is talented, but too niche for mass production and maybe that was why he didn't explode. Oh, he had fans tell him he was great? Well, that settles it, he should be a rock god. OK, I have to stop, I'm getting riled up over a shitty book.

To sum everything up, the idea that it exists and can be nurtured is good and makes sense logically, however, the bottom line is that this book is heavy on prose and light on real evidence.

Buy The Power of One, use Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking as toilet paper.

Last Part Vietnam

2011-06-05T07:08:00.000-07:00

Last you heard, I was in Hanoi eating snake hearts and pooping. I spent a couple more days there, but mostly just walking around the city. Ho Chi Minh has his corpse mummified there, but unlike Stalin, you don't get to look at it and they have a changing of the guards every now and again in front of the mausoleum. Also, there are all the ministries - on that subject, surprise, the biggest ministry was defense. It may have been on more acreage than our Pentagon. If not, it at least looked like a resort. Those defense strategists need their spas, but don't worry it's all inclusive. Moving on, I decided to go to Sa Pa.

Sa Pa, is about 8 hours away in the mountains. There is a little lake in the middle of the town and it's flanked on the east and west by hills. It also has a bit more "natural" architecture - as in, not the same 3 story, skinny, apartments with shops at the bottom. I found the town to be quite nice. It wasn't big, but still had enough to do. And the setting is phenomenal. The day that I got in, I ended up falling asleep for 3 hours once I checked into the guesthouse, (which, by the way was $5 and nice). The next day, I spent the day trying to find out how to get up to a tower overlooking the town. When I couldn't find it, I ended up walking the whole town to get to know it a little better. There is an obvious tourist street, but the rest of town seems more designed for the people that live there. I met someone who said that they had been to Sa Pa several years ago and it wasn't nearly the size it is today. I had a fantastic meal that included apple wine. The apple wine, like Vietnam's rice wine, has an ironic name. Why they call it wine, I don't know cause it's around 30% alcohol. The apple wine is home made and most places will serve bottles (reused Coke plastic bottles). I hated the rice wine that I had with the snake (though it wasn't home made), but I enjoyed the apple wine. I was still pretty beat, so I went to bed at a decent time.
The next day was quite nice, so I rented a motorbike and headed off into the hills. Up, to be specific. I had asked the guesthouse lady what to do on my own and she mentioned some waterfalls and walking about an hour up the road. Turned out to be decent advice. The waterfall was pretty, but they built a complex of stairs and shops around it, which also means $. Expect to pay for parking and "entrance", though it should be less than a dollar total. Next I continued up the road to see what else was up there. Had I continued on for an additional hour from where I turned back, I'd have made it to Laos. Satisfied at seeing the tallest mountain (3,000+ m) in Vietnam I head back to what turned out to be the entrance to the national park, including trails to said mountain summit (3 day hike). I just wasn't feeling hiking around to any of the nearby attraction except a little tower I noticed. After a good 200m stair climb, I reached some gazebo-esk thing. In the middle was a big metallic bell; the kind you'd see in a pagoda. Nobody ever came up the time that I was there, and I took the opportunity to do some meditation-lite. Meditation-lite being I sat up there, and just let myself be. I listened to my thoughts, then let them kinda wash away as I sat looking out over the jungle covered mountains. I closed my eyes and focused on what my other senses thought of the place. I didn't have a purpose for it, it was just nice to be alone in such a nice setting that I wanted to take as much of it in as possible without anyone thinking I'm a weirdo sitting around with my eyes closed, consciously breathing. After about 20 minutes, a group of flies decided it was time to bring me around, so I got up and hit the bell a few times before leaving.
On the way down, I stopped a few places to take pictures and at one location there was a couple dudes in orange jumpers with a guitar. They were Vietnamese, and naturally, I was curious to hear what they were playing. As I approached, I realized they were with a couple of foreigners. The foreigners (a guy, Martin, and girl, Sole) were from Argentina and it was Martin's guitar. They welcomed me and played guitar, and we talked about Argentina. I mentioned where I'd been and my future plans to live there for a little while. The Vietnamese guys turned out to be out there to work on the power lines, but were super curious to talk with some foreigners and a few more showed up. They didn't speak much English, but we all got our points across. They loved (as did all Vietnamese) my toe shoes.
That night I went to the same place for dinner. I don't usually do that unless it's sooo good that I can't help myself. What happened though ties into this universal energy thing. Last I mentioned, I was looking for some reading on it and had asked for some advice on what books to check out. Of course, I never heard from anyone, but I'll let that slide. Anywho, there were several open tables, but the owner sat me across from a girl who was by herself as well. My guess is that he assumed that I was single since I was alone and was trying to do some sort of setup (the Vietnamese don't like people to be single). I asked if it was OK and she said alright. Her name was Golden and was Australian. We got to talking a bit, and as things naturally proceed in a conversation between travelers, we started talking about our travels. I think it went this way because she asked something about what my friends would think about stuff, but I'm not totally sure. I told her they'd be surprised, especially cause I've never really been a spiritual person. She probed. I told her about my experiences with this energy that I don't understand. She laughed. She said, that she had no intention of eating at a restaurant that evening (she had planned street food). However, when she was walking by this place she suddenly felt like it and changed her mind.
I came to find out that she had had a similar experience during her travels. A Reiki master in Peru had commented on her aura and that had sparked the same interest in this thing as mine. Now, the jury is still out for me on coincidence. It seems that people don't want to believe in it. I'm not convinced. With the experiences in my life including educational ones, I'm more in the randomness category. That being said, I believe in free will and this energy thingy. Even if randomly we were put in the same vicinity, we were still being drawn together and free will allowed us follow that to make the meeting possible. Maybe randomness and things happening for a reason don't have to be mutually exclusive. After all, there are patterns (short and long) in randomness (esp. at infinity). Getting back to the point, we talked about this energy thing and she gave me some guidance on where to look at Reiki stuff in particular. I was seeking, and somehow someone who just went through a similar thing and could provide the first baby step were "subtly pushed" together. It does seem hard to call these things coincidences though. After she gave me some recommended reading I bid her ado and went home to get some sleep.
The next day I planned on taking the moto back out, but it turned out to be bad weather, so I just milled about town. One thing about Sa Pa that can be quite annoying is that the people from the surrounding villages come into town to sell shit to the tourists. They dress in traditional garb, which I later found out they wear at home too so it's not just to get whitey to buy crap. I'm pretty good at saying "no", and usually I will be left alone after the first time I say it. However, I met a woman named Cho Cho (you'll laugh if you speak any Spanish). She caught me on my way to lunch, and as all the village women do, they follow you. They don't stop after you say "no". They will walk with you, breaking down your will till you cave. I don't have that problem, but Cho Cho didn't seem to care. She spoke decent English (I'm guessing thanks to the Christian missionaries in her village. I smell a catch 22. Better English, loss of tradition - because it's evil to Christian's - that English tourists would rather see) and she joked with me about stuff. We saw a guy crash a moto and she joked that he was drunk, either that or he had a serious concussion from the accident. I stopped and got some lunch and Cho Cho took off to look for someone who was actually going to buy something. Later, she came running up to me when I came out of the ATM. She tried her usual tactics, but I think she knew it was pretty futile. Again, I bailed and again we met up later at some point. Mostly, she'd joke with me and some try to playfully guilt me into buying something, "you think I rubbish woman! you bad boy". By this point I had warmed to her and actually didn't mind her following me around. I decided to go to a place that had happy hour beers cause I felt like seeing if there were any travelers around to talk to. I stopped in there and pawned Cho Cho off on a couple of girls sitting outside the place. To my surprise, when I came back out to see if Cho Cho was gone or harassing them, she was still there and all were having a fun time. I sat down and told them she'd been following me the entire day. After a little while, it was decided that we, and another girl who showed up, would go to see Cho Cho's home the next day. We also decided that we should get to know one another a little bit, so we all went and got a late dinner and sang some karaoke with it.
The next day, we headed about 2 hours down to her village by motos. She showed us about and we spent a few hours talking with her and part of her family and just generally sitting around in front of her house looking out over the rice paddies that filled the valley. Her family was awesome, her house a little depressing - though it had satellite TV - but the view and the gardens made up for it. She showed us how they die their clothing and the plants she uses to make things. Meanwhile, her daughter tried to sell us things. I did buy a little musical instrument for cheap from her. I felt that, since Cho Cho took us to her home and spent time with us instead of peddling and harassing the other tourists, and did so without expecting compensation, I ought to throw her a small token of my appreciation. Being that she couldn't get me to buy anything earlier, I hoped that it would mean a little more than just me giving them money. I also told her I'd try to get her the pictures I'd taken of her family.
Anywho, that was the jist of my time time in Sa Pa. That night I took the night train back to Hanoi so that I could fly to Thailand the next day. The only thing of note from that is,
TIP: if you can climb, take the top bunks on the sleeper. You can store day packs above the door and therefore they are a bit safer. Also, you won't get stepped on by people going to their bunks. The soft sleepers are more expensive, but may just be worth the extra $5-10.
Also, I had a strange convo with an Italian, who initiated the convo by slapping me on the shoulder - while I was sitting on a bunk reading in my compartment; he was in the hallway walking by. At first I thought he was going to try to pickpocket me, but after about 20 minutes of him jabbering on about places he'd been, I felt safe enough to take my hands out of my pockets. I still can't find my wallet... Just joking.