2012 on Dan Tasse dot com

"All's well that ends well, that's what I say, Gromit."

Sat, 21 Jul 2012 21:02:00 +0000

I’ve been back in the US for about two weeks now. Maybe I’ll post again next time I do some traveling, but I have no plans to leave the country in the near future. If you’re interested, I’m still blogging over at my regular blog, but that’s less about exciting travel things and more about just some things I’m thinking. If you’re just happening on this page and are interested in doing a big gap-year trip (or just want to talk travel), feel free to drop me a line; my email address is my name (first and last) at gmail.

Thanks for reading! This has been fun.

What was your favorite place?

Fri, 20 Jul 2012 05:05:00 +0000

I have a lot. Here are four.

Dharamsala (by which I, like most white people, mean McLeod Ganj), because it’s really pleasant. The Tibetan government and Dalai Lama live there, the climate is nice, and I found it easy to meet other travelers that I really got along well with. You can take classes in anything, do yoga, whatever; in another universe I just zoned out there for a couple months. I’m not sure if that would have been better or worse than the constant traveling that I did.

Ladakh, because it is really something else. Beautiful gompas, rugged mountains, usually-freezing weather. I am still a little frustrated I was sick my whole time here. If I had to make one trip back to India, I would take a friend or three and go hiking in Ladakh.

Switzerland, because it’s all it’s cracked up to be. Everything is clean and nice, first of all. The Alps, like the Himalayas, are cold and crisp and awesome.

Bosnia, because it’s not. Great roads for motorbiking, rocky hills (or small mountains, if you will), great weather in spring, and super friendly people who gave me hours of their time even though I’m just some guy wandering through. Great food (if a bit heavy).

Other places I really like but didn’t quite make this list: Bhutan, Darjeeling, small cities in the Czech Republic

Some other favorites (feel free to ask me about any of these if you’re interested):

Favorite small city: Wellington, NZ

Favorite big city: Amsterdam or Munich but probably Amsterdam (this surprises me, as I used to think Amsterdam was kind of dirty)

Favorite artists: Frantisek Skala, Czech Republic; Amerigo Tot, Hungary

Favorite food: Bengal, Kerala, Nepal, and Bulgaria

Country I would most like to move to, if I had to move to somewhere: the Netherlands (although this is a cop out, because it’s really just the country most like home)

Favorite beer: Germany. I can’t count Belgium because I didn’t go there, and I got to really like German beers this time. I think I prefer German beers if I’m going to be having a few.

Favorite language: Dutch (still, yes)

Favorite script: Tibetan. Because come on, this is the kind of script that wizards write in: ཀཁགངཅཆཇཉཏཐདནཔཕབམཙཚཛཝཞཟའཡརལཤསཧ

Music to travel the world to

Mon, 16 Jul 2012 05:00:00 +0000

Gang Gang Dance, Eye Contact- lying in bed in Leh, Ladakh, altitude sick, sleeping for 20 hours, in one of the more remote parts of one of the more foreign countries in the world, reliving the past day of driving on the friggin’ moon and sucking down Maggi noodles in parachute dhabas, listening to this bizarre record and wondering where the hell am I, and why?

The Police, Synchronicity- on my next long long distance bus ride, from Leh to Srinagar in the middle of the night, getting again a little freaked out by “Mother” and then just enjoying the slightly-adventure-spooky “Synchronicity II” paired with reading Lovecraft. Picking it up again months later humming “Tea in the Sahara” while drinking tea in the Thar.

Charlotte Gainsbourg, IRM- same as above. Leh to Srinagar by the full moon and songs about lobotomies or electroshock or something. Geez, couldn’t I have picked something a little more uplifting for my first month diving into the deep end?

Cults, s/t- ah, but here’s where things start to get a bit nicer, on somewhat-more-sane buses around the somewhat-more-sane roads of Himachal Pradesh to easy places like Dharamsala. This is fuzzed out pop rock, 3 minute tasty morsels that remind me that my college-radio life exists somewhere.

Big Boi, Sir Lucious Left Foot the Son of Chico Dusty- and let me tell you, there is nothing like stopping overnight in the dark and, well, very dark border town of Mahendranagar, Nepal, rousing yourself at the crack of 4am, drinking some weird bitter lime tea and slamming into the front seat of a bus that you know will take 12 hours, wishing for something to be a little easier, and then this record starts off with “it is on!” and you can just tune out everything else and thump along to this super fun slick rocking hip hop. Maybe the best album I’ve heard in the last year.

Friendly Fires, s/t- in Wellington, New Zealand, I had a week to indulge things that I enjoy: drinking coffee, underground theater shows, working on easy coding projects, and hipster indie music like this. Of those four, listening to this record had the least staying power.

Bill Callahan, Apocalypse- On a late 28x bus in Pittsburgh, listening to a rambling yet surprisingly sticky poem called “America!”, not being able to decide whether it’s praising or criticizing. Feeling about the same way about this country. It’s complicated.

Bot’ox, Babylon by Car- Back to disorienting, this one had me mentally wandering while I was physically wandering the streets of Ascoli Piceno, Italy. Tracks like “Tout Passe, Tout Lasse, Tout Casse” served as a safeguard against getting too positive, I guess, while reminding me that I don’t know languages.

Orbital, Wonky- techno, but… sometimes very human and optimistic? Meaning that “one big moment” is still good music to catch the sunrise on the ferry from Italy to Croatia.

Daedelus, Bespoke- not only is this the first Daedelus record that I would recommend to just anyone, it’s the soundtrack to my putzing around Lublin, Poland. It’s great beats and guest vocals, but a little eclectic and queasy. Kind of like I felt in this foreign place, with a few welcoming friends, but still wondering how to plan a trip around an indefinitely broken motorcycle.

Justice; Audio, Video, Disco- freezing through Alps and Poland on a motorcycle is made a lot easier if you’ve got something this pounding to be singing.

Yeasayer, Odd Blood- sitting in a tower on the old city wall of Pecs, Hungary, realizing that I’ve just been sightseeing for a month and a half and will probably continue to do so, but now I’ve got a day to myself to just wander around and this is fine; in fact I can just sit here and listen to this record for a bit and not keep moving and that is also fine; actually it doesn’t matter whether I’m sitting or moving because this thing is so damn good. Please hurry up and listen the heck out of this. You can start here.

Costs figured out

Sun, 08 Jul 2012 21:30:00 +0000

I’ve updated the Costs page with more info about Europe. It’s tricky to figure out, especially with 2 credit cards and 1 debit card, but I’ve got at least rough estimates. Since I spent such a short time in many countries, I’ve broken it up into just Western Europe and Eastern Europe.

Also, finally got the number for how much the whole trip has cost: about $17300, for 10 months. So I guess if I had spent the whole year, it'd be around $20 grand. Still, I'm under budget, even with a motorcycle and 3 months in Europe. (It's a little shorter than I thought I'd travel, too.)

I won't argue that everyone can travel the world for a year. However, I will argue that everyone who can save up $20 grand (or maybe $15 grand if you spend less time in Europe) can do it.

Back in the States, somewhat indefinitely

Fri, 06 Jul 2012 15:24:00 +0000

It’s true, and only a little bit weird. Heading straight into the DC suburbs and a rental car, from the train-and-bike paradise that is the Netherlands, is a little depressing.

Travels continue for a week, but they’re a little less interesting to you, dear reader, as they consist of DC and Pittsburgh and Cleveland.

Some of the best coffee I've had over a year in India, Aus/NZ, US, and Europe

Wed, 04 Jul 2012 13:57:00 +0000

This guide is for you if you’d rather seek out a cafe than a museum, if you care about quality of coffee first and foremost (but you’re also excited about a place that has good style), and if you like good drip coffee.

Cafe Coffee Day Square, Bangalore, India

CCD is India’s Starbucks. Most of them are diabetes-inducingly awful. But in this cafe (maybe their flagship?) they’re actually serving single-origin beans from around the world, including some from India.

People’s Coffee and Brewtown, Wellington, New Zealand

Especially Brewtown. Run by a real coffee enthusiast. I think they lacked wifi, but they have all kind of stylish magazines and stuff.

Lamason, Wellington, New Zealand

Siphon/vacuum pots! Neat. They let me use the wifi after I asked nicely.

Victrola, Seattle

I mean, of course. My home base. If you’re headed to Seattle, other A+ names include Vivace, Stumptown, Zoka, and Trabant. But Victrola is for me tops.

Miedzy Slowami, Lublin, Poland

The Polish cafe scene is in a sad state. So I was pretty stoked to find this one, complete with a wide array of Turkish coffees and shelves of books.

Kaaba, Prague

I walked in and saw a customer writing something with a fountain pen and a set of different-colored inks. Yes, this is the place for me. Actually good Americanos!

Karma, Krakow

A bit outside the tourist center, but probably in the student quarter. Solid espresso, aeropress, and scones.

Screaming Beans, Amsterdam

They offer barista workshops, which is a good sign. A half dozen single origin beans on V60, Chemex, Aeropress, or French Press. Note that asking people for a good coffeeshop in Amsterdam might not get you what you want.

This shebang is winding down. Instead of real insight, I'll share some facts about houses in Europe.

Tue, 03 Jul 2012 13:16:00 +0000

Hey! In Europe things are like this, and in America things are like this. Let’s take a moment to focus on really quite minute differences. And then let’s compare things and say who’s better. Culture!

smaller fridges. Point: Europe.
no garbage disposals. Point: USA.

- European windows. They have a handle and if you turn it down, it opens like a door, but if you turn it up, the top of the window leans into the room. These are great. Point: Europe.

often the toilet and the sink/shower are in different rooms. Point: Europe, I guess?
sometimes the toilet has a shelf. Stuff lands on the shelf, then the water flushes it down into the hole. Still don’t get this. Point: USA.

sometimes the shower is on the same level as the rest of the floor. Like in India. The whole floor gets wet. This is silly. Point: USA.
usually there’s a hand-held shower head. This looks useful but is actually inconvenient. I need one hand to hold the shampoo bottle, one hand to put the shampoo into, and one to hold the shower head. Point: USA.

sometimes there is no shower curtain. What the hell! Do you sit down to take a shower? Point: USA.
sometimes there is a water heater. This can be kind of neat, in that you actually hear when the gas starts, so you get a little feedback that maybe makes you use less hot water. One guy I stayed with, though, he had to make sure not to ever turn the heater on while the shower isn’t on, or it could start a fire. Usually you don’t even notice.

Well, so much for no-internet.

Sun, 01 Jul 2012 16:30:00 +0000

Here’s the thing: it’s hard to do an intense retreat in a city. It’s harder when the retreat is pretty casual, everyone is all friendly and welcoming, it ends at 5:30 every day, I have three roommates in my hostel, my hostel is halfway across town, and that town is Amsterdam.

So I kicked the intensity down a notch and enjoyed it as a pretty relaxed retreat for a few days. Here's the schedule:

9:30-11:00 zazen

11:00-11:10 chanting

11:10-12:00 chores (if you volunteer to do something)

12:00-12:30 zazen

12:30-1:00 lunch

1:00-2:15 chores (again, if you volunteer)

2:15-2:45 zazen

2:45-3:30 dharma talk (in Dutch; no, I couldn't understand this)

3:30-4:00 tea

4:00-5:30 zazen

By "zazen", I mean "sitting meditation for 25 minutes, then walking meditation for 5 minutes." So we meditated about 4 hours each day. Which sounds like a lot, but it was interspersed with other stuff, so it wasn't really so hard.

The people were nice. There was more ritual than I'm used to, but not a lot more, and they were pretty cool with me just joining in, so that was fine too.

Next up: visit my friend Ross (from when I was studying in Maastricht) in Eindhoven, then back to Maastricht to see Michael and Daniel (again, though Michael wasn't around the first time), then up to near Utrecht to meet some... cousins' cousins? Whatever, it's all cousins.

Switching gears again.

Wed, 27 Jun 2012 19:43:00 +0000

Brian and I spent the last couple days in Groningen, then Arnhem and the Hoge Veluwe National Park, then to Den Haag (The Hague) where our friend Adam is living now.

It's been great fun! The Hoge Veluwe is awesome, one of the few national parks anywhere that I particularly dig.

And then it's been heck of fun in Den Haag. Adam, Beej, and I have been sightseeing and taking it easy in the Netherlands' third city. ("What's fun to do in Den Haag?" "Nothing. Go to Amsterdam." We've heard this a couple times. Not entirely true.)

Adam and Beej. We’re at Madurodam, which sounds South Indian but is actually a mini Netherlands.

Tomorrow I’m going to this zen retreat at Zen Centrum Amsterdam. Oddly, it’s not residential, but I’m still planning to go off the internet for about 4 days. See you in July!

Scooter data

Sun, 24 Jun 2012 10:25:00 +0000

Total cost for me to ride the scooter for 2 months: $1694. Yeah, I was unlucky, but even without an engine replacement (so, $500 cheaper) it would not be cheap.

Total distance traveled: 5278 km (3279 miles)

Total gas consumed: 174.2 liters (46 gallons)

Gas mileage: 27.8 km/liter (64.5 mpg)

Average daily distance traveled: 222 km (138 miles)

Average time on road: 6:41

Average speed: 33.3 km/hr (20 mph; pokin’ along!)

Longest day, time-wise: April 23, Fussen to Zurich, 9.5 hrs. Probably the most climates too. Included a summer valley, ski resorts, a big city, and yaks. Sort of freezing. Maybe the biggest ups and downs day.

Longest day, distance-wise: June 12, Ceske Budejovice to Munich, 355km. The first half was fine, the second half was driving rain, but I was in a hurry to get back. Maybe the worst overall day.

Fastest day: May 12, Kecskemet to Miskolc (Hungary), 52.67 km/hr. This is the one where I ran out of gas and then had to get a battery jump. Started at 2pm, ended at 8pm with daylight running out fast.

Best day #1: Zurich to Savognin (Switzerland). Just alps. A lot of wind, high speed, good roads, good weather.

Best day #2: Split to Dubrovnik (Croatia). Mountains and coast.

Day I thought I was most likely to get lost in the wilderness: Mostar to Sarajevo. In an effort to find a more interesting road, I ended up on a dirt path for about a half hour.

Least favorite countries to ride in: Italy, Hungary, and Poland.

Favorites: Switzerland, Bosnia, and the Czech Republic.

The Netherlands, from bottom to top

Sat, 23 Jun 2012 09:50:00 +0000

From Amsterdam we went south to Maastricht, the southernmost biggish city (120k) in the Netherlands. I studied abroad in Maastricht in 2007. We met up with my friend Daniel who is still studying robots and AI and game theory there. Explored the city, ate Limburgish things like zuurvlees and vlaai, went to some caves. Shopped for shoes.

Maastricht’s nice. It was only a little bit weird to go back there. Next we headed up to Groningen, the northernmost biggish city (190k) in the Netherlands. We planned to go wadlopen (hiking across mud flats), for which we did the aforementioned shoe-shopping, but all the wadlopen was canceled this weekend because of the weather. So now we’re just hanging out here for a day or two.

Hup! Holland! Hup!

Sun, 17 Jun 2012 23:03:00 +0000

Two days ago I was in Heidelberg, visiting my friend Kemal. Great fun to catch up with him, as he’s just started a PhD at the (old, famous, prestigious, impressive) university there. We talked about geeky computery things like Random Forests.

I’m the one without muscles.

It’s a nice town. It’s got a castle and stuff. (My friend Brian informs me that I’ve been saying that about pretty much every town.)

The castle is nicer than most. It’s old and crumbley and has the world’s biggest wine barrel. There’s also a hill called Heiligenberg next to the city. We hiked a bit through a Random Forest and saw an old Nazi amphitheater and a ruined monastery.

Now I’m in the Netherlands. Brian (sometimes known as “Beej”) arrived yesterday and we’ve been palling around Amsterdam, along with Guido and Joyce, who I met in India. Guido and Joyce have been super friendly and welcoming hosts, and it’s great to see Beej again too.

Me, Beej, and Guido, paddleboatmen extraordinaire

Not a ton to tell. Went to the Van Gogh museum, saw the Boom Chicago improv troupe (their main show was meh but their late all-improv show was spot on), paddled around canals, watched the Dutch lose a lot at football. Soccer. You know.

All’s well! Having a good time in the Netherlands. I like this place.

Times five. Six.

Wed, 13 Jun 2012 10:06:00 +0000

The engine kind of stalled out. This happened once before, in Switzerland, on another windy day when I was going fast. Both times, it just started back up again. Along with my heart.
I didn’t get hypothermia. Seriously, Europe? It’s June 13. Chilly temperatures, driving rain (NPI), and a distance of 355km to cover made for the worst day of the whole trip. Good note to end on, I guess; now I’m relieved to get the bike back to John (its owner) and move on.

But man, it’s been fun. Goodbye, little Igel, and thanks for the memories. And thanks John for making this all possible! It’s been the trip of a lifetime, and I couldn’t have done it without you.

In which I'm the kind of the luckiest person ever, times four

Mon, 11 Jun 2012 21:49:00 +0000

Tenuous situation: my health. I can’t seem to stop eating white bread, cheese, and beer. The occasional red meat. Went for dinner with my CS host, we ended up getting tartare (raw ground beef) served with fried bread. Today at lunch I just pointed to something on the menu; it ended up being a jar (a jar!) of marinated cheese, with bread. Tonight for dinner I thought, I will finally get some good healthy food, and I picked something from the “salatka” section… it was a pasta salad.

Luckily: my stomach is made of friggin’ titanium? I don’t know. Thanks again, genes!

Tenuous situation: my cash. If I get $100 poorer, stuff like buying food gets dire. I’m almost out of Poland, making good time, when a cop on a motorcycle waves me over. Shit! I was speeding! I’ve never been pulled over speeding in my life! I guess I blew through a god damn two-bit burgh without noticing the sign that said I was officially in a “city”, which means the speed limit drops from 90kph to 50. So he has me doing 90 in a 50. (Kilometers, but still.) Yikes. We talk in German because ya nie rozumiem Polski. He looks at my papers. He asks: “Alkohol?” Stunned, I reply “Me? Nie!” He looks at my papers some more.

Luckily: he returns with one German word: “Langsam!” (“Slow”) and lets me go. Whew, good thing I passed the sobriety test!

Tenuous situation: my bike. It just had its engine replaced, a veritable heart transplant, and now I’m riding it over 1000km at max speed in 4 days. Something’s bound to go wrong, right? In the middle of day 1, I am driving down the road, when all of a sudden I lose steering control. Ever have a blowout on your back bicycle tire? It felt like that. I pull over, drive a few more feet to make sure I’m not imagining things, and pull into a gas station. It is 3:02pm on Saturday in the middle of nowhere in Poland. Everything is closed until Monday. You may note that a 2+ day delay would really ruin all sorts of stuff right now.

Luckily, part 1: this gas station has an attached diagnostic unit- for car exhaust or something? Like an E-Check booth? I don’t know. There is one guy working there, just about to leave, and he has some wrenches and stuff. He’s by no means a motorcycle mechanic, but he’s able to look at my bike and figure out what’s wrong. There’s one particular nut missing. Zakrętka. You can get one from a mechanic, or a hardware store, but everything is closed. Also there is a bit of hose that has come undone and is kind of just flapping around.

Luckily, part 2: the hose doesn’t seem to matter. What?! I still don’t know what it does. It’s been disconnected for 2 days now and everything still works. … okay.

Luckily, part 3: the guy’s friend, who lives next door, just stops by. He thinks he has something. He comes back with a zakrętka that just happens to fit exactly. These two guardian angels vanish into the… mid-afternoon… without even letting me pay them. Two days later, the nut is still attached perfectly.

Nothing tenuous about this: I’m in the Czech Republic, and stuff’s pretty again. I like this country. Here is a bit of Czech humor; my dad will be confused, and Brian Gray will think it’s great.

One more day to Munich! In the words of Han Solo, “Hear me, baby? Hold together.”

On the road!

Sat, 09 Jun 2012 09:56:00 +0000

I’ve got a functional bike (knock on wood), a helmet, 450 zloty ($130), 80 USD, 40 Euro, and 300 Czech koruna ($15). It’s a lot of cash, but I have really completely no way to get more until I get to Munich in 3 1/2 days. Still, lodging is the only major expense, and credit cards and Couchsurfing will see me through.

A lot of stuff going wrong puts you in the mindset that things will continue to go wrong. Here’s hoping that’s not the case. Tonight I’m heading to Czestochowa, Poland; tomorrow to Olomouc, Czech; the next day to Ceske Budejovice (aka Budweis), Czech; and then Munich. Let’s rock!

This is why it's hard to be poor.

Fri, 08 Jun 2012 17:48:00 +0000

Remember when I said yesterday was the total final deadline for getting the engine for my scooter? Well, as of 8:30am this morning, Ninja Serwis received the engine, worked on it all day, and fixed the dang thing. Guess I can stretch it a day. Didn’t expect this! Good news.

Went to the bank at 4pm on Friday to get some cash to pay them. I had 500 zloty ($140) in my wallet and needed 1750 zloty ($550) total. I paid off my Mastercard’s cash advance (plus hefty fees) and luckily it had gone through, so I was able to withdraw $500 again.

… except it was denied. What!

Luckily, I had my Visa card too, and that has only a $250 limit, but maybe I could scrounge together enough extra cash. … but that was also denied.

(My debit card, you may remember, is not working, because my bank got bought by another bank and they canceled all the existing cards. My new debit card is in the transatlantic mail as we speak, thanks to my wonderful parents.)

Turns out I never set up a PIN on my Visa. Note to self (and everyone else): set up a PIN on your credit cards. It’s sort of stupid that this isn’t automatic, but it’s not, and you have to request it and then they mail (mail!) it to you in 5-7 business days. Argh, etc, but “not possible”.

As for my Mastercard, general fraud alert on the account. Apparently one cash advance in Poland doesn’t trip their system, but two does. At least this was fixable via a phone call.

Oh, one more thing? My helmet. I thought I had left it with Ninja Serwis, but it’s not there. Our current hypothesis is that I left it with Skuteromania (the first guys who took a look at my bike). So first thing tomorrow, I’m going there to try to find it. Second thing, I’m going back to Ninja Serwis to (hopefully) pick up the bike. Third thing, I might actually get back on the road. Fingers crossed.

Where did the title come from? Why is it hard to be poor? Because your problems are all super urgent. While I’ve been traveling, I’ve had to deal with issues like “where will I sleep tonight?” And even so, my problems are easier than a poor person’s problems, because even when I run into money problems (like now) it’s just because the money is in a different place, not because it doesn’t exist. Imagine being poor, and every night you have to worry about where to sleep. You can’t concentrate on other stuff. You can’t think about making a resume and wearing nice clothes and getting a job because you have to worry about scrounging together a few dollars right now to make rent, so you don’t get kicked out on the street with nowhere to go. You have to worry about actually going hungry today.

Happy Corpus Christi.

Thu, 07 Jun 2012 13:08:00 +0000

I’m in Lublin, Poland, anxiously waiting for my scooter to get fixed, or not.

May 19: bike broke.

May 21: one guy finally looked at it and decided he couldn’t fix it, so I took it to Ninja Serwis. They estimated about a week.

May 26: they realized it was seriously broken and they needed to order parts. They waited a few days to get a piston, connecting rod, and crankshaft.

May 31: I talked to them again and said don’t wait around, just order a new engine.

June 1: They ordered an engine, it was supposed to arrive Monday, June 4.

June 4: No engine.

June 5: No engine.

June 6: “It’s still not here, and we don’t know why.”

which brings us to today, June 7, which is finally the point where even if the engine appeared in front of them, they couldn’t fix it up for me in time to go meet my friends Kemal and then Brian. This is also fine; now we consider other options like transporting it (how do you transport a motorcycle?!) or selling it (the bike’s owner is cool with this). But like I said, I have to move fast. Every day counts.

Poland is very (96%?) Catholic. So whenever a Catholic holiday comes up, nobody is working. For example, the ninth Thursday after Easter is the Catholic holiday of Corpus Christi. Today is the ninth Thursday after Easter.

Enjoy your holiday!

Bring it on! This wouldn't be any fun otherwise!

Tue, 05 Jun 2012 14:22:00 +0000

My trusty bank, Watermark Credit Union, got bought by Sound Credit Union. I remember an email saying something like "we will send you a new debit card. You should use this instead of your old debit card." But you know, "should" means they won't mind if I wait a month until I'm back in the US, right?

Nope! Last night: it's Monday and my debit/ATM card is now completely unfunctional. I'm in Poland. I have 90 zloty (~ $25) cash. I owe a hostel $80 for 5 nights, and I'm leaving the next morning (Tuesday). On Wednesday I will owe a guy about $550 for fixing the scooter. (This is tricky even in the best of times, because my bank only lets me withdraw $500/day.)

All right, cosmic hand of fate, trickster god out there, let's rumble! Call up bank. (TGIM.) Can you reactivate my card for just a week? Can you overnight a replacement card to Lublin? No and no. They send me to 1-800-VISA-911, which is what it sounds like, except my new bank doesn't participate in their emergency card program. Okay okay. Western union? I guess, but then I've got to ask my family to wire me at least $630, and even that takes... a day? I can do better! Credit card cash advances. I've never used these, because they carry a 3% fee, but they let me withdraw (internet internet...) $500 and $250. Bingo. Of course I set up a PIN before I left home. My wallet is fat and I am happy.

(Except I'm still just waiting on a bike engine to arrive. I think it will be soon, but all the guys can say is "let's hope it arrives tomorrow." Kind of getting sick of waiting on this.)

Calm before the storm in Krakow

Mon, 04 Jun 2012 12:38:00 +0000

I've been here for 4 days now, and this will be the last time I'm in the same city for 4 days in a while.

It's a pleasant place to spend 4 days: nice cafes and restaurants and cool sights. Reminds me of Hampi, India: I arrived somewhat spontaneously to kill some time before my end-of-trip plans start, saw some famous things out of obligation, met other people who were all partying a lot, but personally just relaxed. Both places occupy a strange place in my memory: they're cool spots but I am just too mentally worn out to do anything.

Oh, except I did visit Auschwitz. And I feel weird about that too: a bit sad and rather tired. As soon as I go to any museum and start reading things, my rational brain takes over, and it's not the kind of place best processed by the rational brain.

The sizes of things surprised me. Auschwitz is not big. Maybe 20 buildings that look like about 2 suburban houses each. You can see the whole thing pretty easily. Weird that everything that you've read about Auschwitz happened in that small area. (Well, and at Birkenau, which IS big. But still:) For the amount that has happened there, I expected it to be a whole city.

Next few weeks (fingers crossed): pick up bike in Lublin. Ride 1200km in 4 days to visit Kemal in Heidelberg. Ride 300km back to Munich to return the bike. Get up to NL somehow, meet Brian, head to Amsterdam, Maastricht, maybe Utrecht and the Hoge Veluwe, and Den Haag. Whew!

Let's visit Big Cities in Europe.

Fri, 01 Jun 2012 21:39:00 +0000

It’s a bit weird to go back from places that no tourist goes (Lublin, Ivano-Frankivsk, Miskolc, Kecskemet) and places that a few tourists go (Lviv, Pecs, Kosice) back to places where all the tourists go (Prague and Krakow). At first it’s refreshing: Back to the Future! Arriving in Prague’s central station is like going to the shiny Tomorrowland.

Also, in Big Cities in Europe the central squares are really pretty:

But Prague is all full of tourists, and tourist infrastructure, and tourist “infrastructure”, which is kind of soul sucking. Instead of a generally pretty good experience like in a small city in Europe, you get a few really amazing moments (like the Strahov Monastery) and a lot of wondering why are there so many terrible souvenir shops and nightclubs.

Whatever. It’s also got good coffee shops. And I got to spend some time with my ever-delightful friend Victoria, whom you might remember from Halloween in Uttarakhand last year. We explored coffeeshops, restaurants, and bars with many basements, cooked amazing zucchini/potato pancakes, and of course played Bananagrams. It was a good couple days.

Now I’m in Krakow, which is another Big City in Europe. It’s got a famous salt mine called Wieliczka, which has a lot of tourists and is kind of soul sucking but also really cool. (sensing a theme?)

Here are some gnomes carved out of salt, but what you’re really looking for is a photo of the famous underground chapel.

Scooter update: they can’t get a new piston, so they’re swapping out the whole engine for a new one. ETA Tuesday? Wednesday? It depends on when the engine arrives, so there’s nothing they can do, but I hope it is no later than that. :O

Thoughts on Ukraine and Ukrainianness

Tue, 29 May 2012 15:47:00 +0000

First: It is not some backward primitive place. I was ready for it to be, based on Long Way Round, in which Ewan McGregor and his friend Charley notice that all the roads go to pieces and people are driving horses and buggies as soon as they cross the border into Ukraine. (they are later hosted by a vodka-swilling AK-47-owning maybe-mafia guy.) I’d say if Germany is 100% “modern”/just-like-home, Poland and Slovakia are like 90% and Ukraine is 80%. There are just a few weird difficult things in Ukraine, like buying train tickets and managing with Cyrillic. (this makes it also more interesting.)

Second: It’s not very culturally different from Poland. I guess eastern Ukraine is. Western Ukraine (for reasonable historical reasons) is not.

Third: so I’m a bit Ukrainian. Okay. Given that it’s 80% just like home, I’m not sure if I learned anything. I mean, the guy I stayed with in Lviv was (entirely coincidentally) an almost-coworker at Google. I’ve seen some old-style houses in Ukraine and in Poland at cultural museums. All this ancestor-following kind of confirms what I imagined: in Poland/Ukraine it’s dark and rainy and you make fences out of bent slices of wood because nails are too expensive; in Italy it’s beautiful and you hang out on piazzas and drink wine. (guess stereotypes exist for a reason?)

Fourth: well of course people who lived 100 years ago don’t have much bearing on my life now. It’s just cocktail-party interesting, like Myers Briggs tests or astrology.

I guess I might as well update, given that I'm two countries away

Mon, 28 May 2012 16:06:00 +0000

Hi! I'm in Prague. My poor scooter will take another week to fix, and I don't want to miss the chance to visit my friend Victoria in Prague, so I went ahead and did that. Lviv, Ukraine to Zilina, Slovakia to Prague, Czech Republic in just 20 hours.

European trains are different than Indian trains, and I was trying to articulate how, but then I realized it is mostly just this: they are ten times as expensive and half as full.

You can still get tea. (And it's still pronounced "chai".) That is ten times as expensive and half as sugary.

All is well! I feel like an international superhero, hopping countries every three days. It's a tough life, right?

Ivano-Frankivsk and Yaremche: now I am officially Off The Beaten Path

Sat, 26 May 2012 09:49:00 +0000

Well… off the American beaten path. I managed my way to a slice of the Ukrainian beaten path.

I went to Ivano-Frankivsk because it was another place besides Lviv in Galicia and there are relatively many couchsurfers there. Then I had a free day there and no idea what to do, but my cheerful host Anna mentioned that a lot of folks come to Ivano-Frankivsk on their way to go hiking (or even skiing) in the Carpathian mountains. And the easiest way to get there was to go to a small town called Yaremche.

Language confusion is sort of the best and the worst here in Ukraine. I guess it is one of the least English speaking places that I might normally go to, at least according to one guy. I muddled through Pimsleur Russian enough that I can invite Mr. Pronin for a beer at Cafe Savor (unless he would prefer wine), but western Ukraine is the most Ukrainian-speaking (and least Russian-speaking) part of the country. Nevertheless, the languages are close enough, and enough people speak both, that you can get by with Russian just fine. … if your Russian is good enough to also understand Mr. Pronin’s response to your invitation, which mine isn’t.

In short, it’s the hardest place to get around. I know less Polish/Czech/Balkan than Russian, but whenever something serious has come up, there’s been an English speaker near enough. Ukraine is the only place where I’ve felt that we might just have to abort the conversation.

Me, in broken Russian: “Do you going Yaremche?”

Bus driver: something I didn’t understand.

Me: “Uh, you travel Yaremche?”

Bus driver: “No.”

Me: “Okay, thanks.” (gets off bus)

Bus driver and everyone on the bus: kind of looks at me funny out the window

Me: (getting back on bus) “I don’t understand. Yaremche, da?”

Bus driver: “Da!”

Me: laughs, sits down.

Bus driver: “Hah! I don’t understand!”

Everyone on the bus: laughs.

Anyway, Yaremche was nice. There’s a waterfall totally surrounded by souvenir stands. Where am I, Nepal? I guess there’s also a nice trail to walk on.

Me: (again, broken Russian) Where is the “way of Dovbush”?

Guy: (laughing) Go autobahn, there. (points to road)

Me: Okay, thanks.

Guy: (still laughing)

Me: Excuse me, where is the Way of Dovbush?

Lady: (pointing, says something I don’t understand.)

Me: Uh, okay. (starts walking one way)

Lady: (something else, pointing the other way, the way I just came, where there is clearly no Way of Dovbush)

Me: Oh! Okay. (I start walking the other way, then pause, turn around, and scurry past, the way I was originally going, while she’s talking to someone else.)

So I didn’t go hiking.

Ivano-Frankivsk is nice too. Anna gave me a thorough tour. It has lots of iron art sculptures, because there’s an iron-art festival every year.

It also has this cool pond.

It also has at least one great cafe/wafflery, where I am now, and where I’m going to leave because it’s crowded, and I’ve been sitting here for a long time.

Lviv is a great place to eat and drink.

Thu, 24 May 2012 10:10:00 +0000

Over the past day and a half I:

drank coffee lit on fire (with some liquor) and dripped through metal pipes in an underground coffee mine (which is funny when you think about it)

- had lunch in a bunker dedicated to the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, which fought against both the Nazis and the Soviets. You have to say the password ("slava Ukraina", or "glory to Ukraine") to enter; Seattle bars take note!

- stumbled into a bar themed on torture instruments. When I was done, the waitress put a wood block on the table with the check on it, then chopped through it with an ax.

- ate dinner at a nice cafe on the central square

- had a drink with some Couchsurfing folks in a 5-story multi-room cafe where each room has a different theme

They really do their theme restaurants/cafes right. Remind me to put this place on my list of "places to go write an app for a week".

Other sightseeing: some churches and museums and stuff. Really cool cemetery. Kept looking for Warcabas, but no luck.

Famous writer Ivan Franco.

Also went to the obligatory high place to get a view of the city:

It’s nice here! Very lively; there are some performances and stuff for the upcoming Euro 2012 soccer tournament, and just a lot of people out around town. This is definitely a city where there are old guys playing chess in the park. And everything is cheap. As my CS host Yuriy joked, “when I went to the US, the prices stayed the same, except in dollars instead of hryvnia.” 1 dollar = 8 hryvnia.

Moving on today to another Galician city, Ivano-Frankivsk. Careful readers may note that it’s named after a famous Ukrainian writer.

"It, uh, problem! Big!"

Mon, 21 May 2012 18:01:00 +0000

Shop 1 couldn’t fix my bike, so they sent me to shop 2. The guys at shop 2 seem pretty good, they speak English*, and they have a van that can transport my broken bike. I think it’s in good hands. They said it’d take until about the end of the week, so tomorrow I’m going on to Ukraine by bus. Hang out there a bit, come back and hopefully pick up the bike in Lublin again, and charge on!

whenever I say something like this, I want to put a lengthy disclaimer about how “they speak English” is sort of incidental, not the reason that I think it’s in good hands. I feel weird pointing it out. Interesting thought: talking about speaking English feels like talking about race.

Here is a sunrise in Lublin.

Sun, 20 May 2012 15:23:00 +0000

In Lublin, I’ve been hanging out with my friend Anu from college, who is now in med school, currently studying for some exams. She also goes to this circus group sometimes. They juggle, spin poi and hoops and staffs, slackline, aerial silk, and other amazing things. So that’s cool.

We juggled and spun with them on Friday, then hung out afterward and drank and talked and stuff until the sunrise. (that is not quite so late here; it’s summer, it’s far north, and it’s on the eastern edge of the time zone, so we’re talking 3 or 4 AM. still.) Cool folks! They’re very friendly, and we can communicate well enough, due almost entirely to their speaking English. Some students, some other young people, all very creative.

Anu and I have also walked around and seen things in Lublin. There is a very cool cemetery. There is also a castle and a pretty old town. (there must be an old town factory in Europe. every city has one. maybe it’s the same factory that makes Chinatown gates.)

This is in the cemetery. It’s not the castle. Also, that’s Anu.

On Saturday night, Anu had to study, and I am on a surprising extra weekend in Lublin because of bike woes, so I juggled and partied with the circusers again. I think I have now seen more sunrises in the past week than I had in the previous 6 months.

Dancing lessons from God, dancing lessons from God

Sat, 19 May 2012 16:17:00 +0000

I was just on my way out of Lublin when something sounded kind of explodey in my little scooter’s engine. My handlebars got all wobbly and I had to coast to a stop. Luckily, I safely pulled it off to the side of the road. Then it made a noise like a big gnashy metal monster when I tried to start it back up. I suppose I am not going to Ukraine today!

A nice guy at a local car shop called a bunch of scooter mechanics, but they were all closed for the ~~day~~ weekend. (Europe, man! Weekends are serious business. Or rather, serious not-business.)

I clumsily walked it down the road to a scooter shop that I passed. They were just closing up, but they took it and will get to it on Monday.

This is fine. I had to quickly notify a few couchsurfers in Ukraine that I would not be there today and perhaps not at all but I don’t know yet. I had to pass on the worrying news about the scooter to John, its German owner. I am inconveniencing my friend Anu and her roommate Tara by staying at their place unannounced for a couple more days. (I am attempting to make up for the last part by cooking them some good food.) But this is life; as a traveler I am continually inconveniencing a lot of people.

It is nice that there’s no reason to get all fussed about all this. I am glad that the explodey incident did not go a lot worse, I’m glad that I’m safe and among friends, and I’m glad that today too has had too much life to write down. Thank you for everything, I have no complaints whatsoever.

Poland, where the forests are cold and dark

Thu, 17 May 2012 14:40:00 +0000

Do fairy tales come from Poland? I would imagine they do. There are a lot of forests, and they’re dark. There are some farms too:

For the last couple days it’s been about 50F, overcast, and spots of rain. It’s about as cold as I’d want it to get to keep riding, but it’s still okay. Yesterday was actually fun: I wanted to get to Lublin (and off the road) as fast as possible, so I drank a bit of coffee and blasted through a Brothers Grimm forest. Unfortunately, I can see where some people get the need for speed. (fortunately, I can’t do much about it. also fortunately, 50mph feels pretty fast on my bike.)

Just previously, I stopped in Kolbuszowa, Poland, near Rzeszow, where a couchsurfer named Mateusz kindly invited me to stay with his family. It’s a small town, but they have a neat museum area there were you can see how things were in the old days.

And then yesterday, I arrived in Lublin! Probably the northernmost point I’ll hit on my bike. It’s so far north that the sun comes up at something stupid like 4 AM. My friend Anu is in med school here, and I’ve arrived just in time to interrupt her studying for finals. I’ll hang out here for a couple days, then head to Lviv, Ukraine.

(geez, and I didn’t even mention Kosice, second-biggest city in Slovakia, where there was a cool bunch of CSers and a nice old town. life is happening too fast to record. this is a good thing.)

Gear update

Thu, 17 May 2012 14:04:00 +0000

Socks are all terrible. Nobody in the world makes a good pair of socks. Pricey ones from Smartwool etc are too warm, and my recent ones (cheap Dockers whatever black socks) have holes after <10 wearings. Replaced with some more nonsense socks by Nike or Umbro or whatever.

My poor shirt has seen the end of its days. I wanted it to last the full year, but after a couple of rips I think that continuing to wear this garment

makes me officially at least a little bit slovenly. Replaced with new khaki colored shirt:

Oh yeah, and due to cold weather, the Cool hat has a new life as the Cool neckwarmer.

I'm in Poland

Wed, 16 May 2012 08:38:00 +0000

Went through Slovakia, spent a nice couple of days in Kosice, and am now in Kolbuszowa, Poland. Look that up on your map!

In short, all's well, Couchsurfing a lot which is mostly great, weather is cold, but the bike and I are still alive, so I'm doing fine. Details later!

Let's Generalize About Hungary!

Sun, 13 May 2012 16:05:00 +0000

Here are some things I think about Hungary, after my in-depth research based on four days of being there.

The land: I hate a lot of it. Much of Hungary like a Thomas Friedman book: Hot and Flat. (not crowded, though, thank god.)

Once I got up into the northern part, though, around Eger and Miskolc, it got interesting and hilly and forested and full of castles and pretty.

I think I would have liked Eger (and Lillafured, in the national park between Eger and Miskolc), but I had to speed through as the sun was setting.

The cities: Pecs was pretty cool. Student town, bikers, people out in the main square, etc. Kecskemet and Miskolc were a little less active. As with other post-communist countries, Hungary is full of ugly blocky apartment towers. These are really soul-crushing.

Miskolc

Completely wild speculations about people: I’ve heard that Hungarians are kind of pessimistic. My hosts agreed with that one. I also heard that Hungarians were really smart (Erdos, Liszt, von Neumann, a bunch of nuclear physicists, etc) and my hosts could neither confirm nor deny that. I think Hungarian art is kind of neat, based on the one museum of modern Hungarian artists I went to. It’s all a little blocky and abstract but not minimalist or nuts like Rothko or Pollock. This guy made some neat things. Also, all the restrooms have interesting yet recognizable men/women signs.

Food: again, I know only the junk food. Langos is my favorite Hungarian pastry. No wait, Pogacsa is my favorite Hungarian pastry. Cancel that, Kürtőskalács is my favorite Hungarian pastry. I guess they have goulash and peppers and all sorts of other things, but they do have good pastries.

Nothing ever goes wrong ever.

Sat, 12 May 2012 23:23:00 +0000

Today I ran out of gas. Here is why I ran out of gas:

I was going through Heves, Hungary, about which my hosts had warned me “you probably don’t want to stop there. A lot of gypsies.”
As soon as I entered said city, my gas tank light went on. But I figured I had another 30km or so.
The next town, Fuzesabony, was hard to navigate; I wandered around houses for 15 minutes wondering where the hell the y’know businesses are.
Gas station #1 in Fuzesabony was closed.
Gas station #2 in Fuzesabony was closed. A couple guys in a truck driving by saw my plight and said “Eger.” (Eger was 20km away.)
On the road to Eger there was another gas station. Said gas station had no gas. “Benzene. Nem?” “Nem. Eger.”
0.5km from Eger, I ran out of gas. It was all downhill from there. I rolled and walked into the gas station. Yessss!

Also today I almost blew up my bike, and some guys in a car worked some magic. Here is how this happened:

My battery died because of the gas thing I guess. I try it every five minutes just in case it will magically start working. Nope.
I asked the guys at the gas station if they could give me a jump. “Are you sure that would work, from a car to a bike?” “Nope, I’m not sure at all!” (confer confer) “Actually, it will not work. It would make your battery explode.” Oh.
A guy in a scooter pulled in to get gas, and we convinced him to jump my bike. No luck. “Well, I think it is not the battery then.”
“Ahh, it is Saturday evening, and all the mechanics are closed. There are mechanics in Eger, but it is Sunday tomorrow and they will be closed too. Do you have anyone you could call?” “Um, not really. Hmm.” “Hmm.”
Another car pulled up. The gas station guy conferred with him. “Can you start the bike?” “Okay, I’ll try.” It starts up!

Finally, today I almost did a dumb thing, but I was saved because nothing ever goes wrong ever. Here is an internal dialogue of these events.

“My bike is running! My bike is running! I will not turn it off until I reach Miskolc, where I am going to sleep. Worst case, I can deal with it in the morning.”
“Well, the closest route is through the national park. 50km, no sweat.”
“Boy, those clouds look threatening.”
(25km into this 50km road) “I wonder why all those cars are stopping. Oh, a truck is on fire in the road. Okay.”
(pulls over, stops the bike, instinctively turns it off.) “fffffffuuuuuu–”

(long pause while the fire department takes care of the truck on fire in the road.)

Nothing ever goes wrong ever, the battery was the problem all along, and it starts back up instantly.

Turns out Sarajevo is really nice and the politics are a hopeless soup

Thu, 10 May 2012 13:18:00 +0000

Sarajevo! Do you think of wars and stuff? Don’t: that was all 17 years in the past and now it’s a really neat place.

Skippable political interlude: Bosnia and Herzegovina, the country, has two parts. They are not "Bosnia" and "Herzegovina." The major ethnic groups in B&H are Bosniaks, Serbs, and Croats. When Yugoslavia split up, Serbia got most of the Serbs and Croatia got most of the Croats (of course), but some of the Serbs and Croats were living in Bosnia and didn't really want to move, so now they are "Bosnian Serbs" or "Bosnian Croats." There were a lot of Bosnian Serbs, so they set up the "Republika Srpska" within Bosnia and Herzegovina; it's like there are two states within Bosnia and Herzegovina, and RS has 49% of the political power while the "Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina" has 51%. (FoB&H has mostly Bosniaks but also some Croats.) As far as religion, Serbs are mostly Orthodox Christians, Croats are mostly Catholic, and Bosniaks are mostly Muslim.

Whatever! The relevant part for a traveler is that Bosniaks are really friendly. (Serbs and Croats probably are too, but I can't comment as much.) Sarajevo, capital of B&H, and within FoB&H, is a city where you go in to get a minor bike fix, and they not only drop everything to help you, but the owner takes you around sightseeing on his bike and buys you lunch in the meantime.

It is culturally neat, because it's mostly Muslim, but with lots of Orthodox/Catholic things too. Islam came from the Ottomans. Bosniaks are pretty easygoing, and the Ottomans were not terrible rulers, so they mostly adopted Islam, and it worked pretty well. As my couchsurfing friend said, "You go to Paris, you see a lot of things built by kings for kings. Here the kings built things for the people." Examples include the water fountains (like the first picture above) and various Waqfs/vakufs: buildings donated to the common good. Lots of mosques here are waqfs.

The white things in the foreground are a Muslim cemetery. It’s a very European Islam: very similar to things that are familiar to us, just a little different.

But time is marching on, so I moved on to Banja Luka, another biggish city in B&H, but this time in the Republika Srpska.

It's cool too. Supposedly the greenest city in former Yugoslavia. Also supposedly there are 7 girls per guy. I think the latter number is inflated, but it is very green.

Twice I saw big groups of old guys playing giant chess in the park. What a great idea! Why are there not giant chessboards (and groups of old guys) everywhere all the time?

Finally, the food here is pretty heavy but surprisingly I love it. A couple of main genres I've been able to enjoy:

- burek. Take fillo dough, roll it around meat ("burek") or cheese ("sirnica") or spinach and cheese ("zeljanica"), then roll that food-stick into a spiral. Served with yogurt to drink.

- cevapi. Spiced meatballs in a pita-ish bread. I guess this is nothing new. I heard that there are no factory farms here. Maybe that's why the meat tastes so good.

As promised:

Sun, 06 May 2012 21:26:00 +0000

Red = past, Green = future, peppers (“paprika” in Europese) = where I’m spending a night. Well, except Ancona and Split; I only spent one night between them, on the ferry.

Croatia! What a nice ride!

Not sure it was entirely worth it to go out of my way to visit Dubrovnik, as I am tired of tourist towns, but here’s the thing: I don’t know where else to sleep. Especially in Croatia. There are a million rooms along the road, but I am guessing they are all out of my price range. In Dubrovnik, a room costs about 50 euro; I’m sure it’s less on the road, but I don’t know how much. In a tourist town like Dubrovnik, there is a hostel, which keeps me in the 20-euro range. Oh and I guess it’s kind of nice to have an ancient city there to walk around or whatever:

Same with Mostar.

So I guess nowadays I’m thinking:

actually talking meaningfully with people who live in a place is probably the best thing to do while traveling
hanging out with other travelers is nice too, about equivalent with:
walking around and looking at things

For #1, I have Couchsurfing. That’s about it; I don’t know how else to interact with strangers in a non-customery way. So when I can find a couch, that’s a fun thing. When I can’t find a couch (and my luck has dried up in Italy, Croatia, and most of Bosnia), I’ve mostly been looking at things. It is pretty solitary, but not in a bad way. I am kind of enjoying the chance to be totally anonymous.

And it’s not like I have a ton of spare time anyway. Riding takes most of the day, by the time I suit up and get out, drive halfway, stop every so often for coffee or lunch or gas (and to get out of my helmet, which hurts after a couple of hours), get lost at least once, maybe end up stuck on a gravel road in the middle of nowhere (hup, today), arrive at my destination, find a place to sleep, and eat some food.

A friend said in an email “hope you’re having the best time!” and I was going to reply something wishy washy about how I mean it’s pretty good, but sometimes difficult, sometimes lonely, sometimes scary, sometimes worrying (why is the bike so loud recently?), sometimes tiring, and then I stopped, because if I’m going to quibble here, what the hell do I want?! There is a lot going on, I am seeing places and people and times shoot past at 100 figurative miles per hour, and that is the kind of diverse multicolored experience I was aiming for here!

So all’s well. Sarajevo seems pretty swell so far too. Good night!

Quick update from Bosnia

Sat, 05 May 2012 19:26:00 +0000

I think if I got to design heaven it would be an infinite downhill slope, and there’s really great scenery, and you have a bicycle, and sometimes it gets snowy and you can switch to skis, but you still get to keep going downhill, unless you want to take breaks for mild uppers and downers.

The difference between that and the past couple days is that I’m currently creating my own “downhill” by riding a scooter (it’s like bicycling but cheating), and that in the real world you can’t take mild downers and drive.

My route has been Ascoli Piceno, Italy to Ancona, Italy to Split, Croatia (ferry!) to Dubrovnik, Croatia, to Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, where I am now. Tomorrow I’m heading to Sarajevo where I’ll rest for a day (whew!). I’m on an internet cafe computer so I’ll have to say the following are coming soon:

photos!
a bit of description about Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Croatia for that matter
maybe a description of the ferry trip and pondering living in a sort of bubble where I don’t meaningfully interact with any people for a few days but this is okay
a little bit of Bosnia border shakedown
maybe a map if I’m feeling creative

Another fun thing: eating food in Italy

Fri, 04 May 2012 11:29:00 +0000

So this isn’t some grand sweeping post about the best bresaola and risotto and capellini and vino and oh my god even the fennel is the best in the world. I didn’t eat a lot of awesome things. I’m sure all these great things were here. But I don’t know much about them, they’re expensive, they require sitting down to a meal, and even then, I don’t really care. It’s all meat and cheese and white flour, none of which I really want to incorporate into my diet more.

However! I did take this chance to get well acquainted with three of the many Italian food groups:

Coffee. (duh.) “Caffe” is always espresso (always), it’s always right around the corner, and it always costs one euro. I’m no espressoman myself, but in my humble opinion they ranged from good to great. I mean great, from roadside shops and gas stations. This is a nice surprise, because you’ll never get a good cup of drip without seeking out a shop that specifically makes good drip coffee; in Italy you can drink coffee wherever and sometimes it’s great.

Espresso is weird, though: it doesn’t last very long! As a result, cafes have a bar where they serve the espresso, people stand up and drink it, pay, and leave. Takes about two minutes start to finish; feels like you’re shooting up. If you run into someone on the street and you say “let’s go for a caffe”, it means “let’s do conversational pleasantries and then leave.” If you want say a 15 minute conversation, you go for an “aperitivo” (drink); if you want to hang out for like two hours you go for a meal. This leaves a big gap in the 30-60 minutes range, which is almost always the amount of time I want to spend with someone while we’re consuming something. Dear Italy: the way you prepare your coffee has social consequences that I don’t like.

You can put sugar in your espresso, I guess. If you want milk, you can order macchiato* or con panna or cappuccino. (But don’t order cappuccino any time besides breakfast or you’re a goofball.) Also, some (usually cheap) shops have started advertising “caffe ginseng” and “caffe orzo”; these sound interesting, but do not be fooled! they are travesties on the level of gas station “cappuccino.”

this is “caffe macchiato”, or “marked coffee”, which is to say, coffee marked with a little milk. It’s not a Starbucks “macchiato.” The confusion happens because a Starbucks macchiato is short for “latte macchiato”, “marked milk”, milk marked with a little bit of coffee. In the US I guess this causes baristas headaches when they make a caffe macchiato for someone who ordered a “macchiato” but meant “latte macchiato”. Hard to say what went wrong, but I think it was when Starbucks started convincing people that “latte macchiato” is the main “macchiato” and furthermore that it is an acceptable “coffee drink”.

So how do people make coffee at home, if they only drink espresso? They use a Moka pot. This is a cool device that I want to explain how it works here because I just figured it out, but it’s hard to explain without having one to look at and take apart. It makes strong, bitter coffee, somewhere between drip and espresso. If you like sugar, you can take a bit of coffee from the Moka pot and mix it with some sugar and it sort of makes a coffee-sugary cream, which you can then put in your Moka coffee and it looks like the crema on top of an espresso. I guess this is desirable?

Pizza. I think I subsisted mostly on pizza here. Always thin crust, usually crispy and delicious. The toppings provide a solution to the conundrum of wanting to try some intense food (say, prosciutto) but not wanting to buy a whole damn sausage. If you sit down at a restaurant, you’ll get a whole pie, while take-out shops just sell slices. Either way, it’s pretty good, and definitely the cheapest/tastiest way to survive.
Gelato. Gelato shops are everywhere! Always get a small cone; it costs about a buck fifty and it’s plenty. You get two (sometimes even three?) choices of flavors, and they’ll be confused if you only pick one. All the flavors look so good, so you’re forced to make a difficult choice, and I can’t help you there. You could try the popular “zuppa inglese” (“English soup”?) which is (un)fortunately not as gross as it sounds. (It’s some mix of cream and fruits.) Oh, also, I can’t help you figure out if a place has good gelato or not; I’ve had mixed experiences. You will have to try a few until you find a really good one, and then just wolf down gelato nonstop until you have to move towns.

I wish I were lower-maintenance.

Fri, 04 May 2012 11:24:00 +0000

I don’t mean “low maintenance” like most people, like not wanting fancy cars or jewelry or whatever. I mean it like my friend Daniel means it. I wish I could photosynthesize and generate my own heat. I wish I didn’t have to think about what to eat or where to sleep, so I could just take off whenever and wherever.

This trip is so fast-paced, more stuff is happening than I can mentally process.This is not a complaint; it’s somewhat by design. But it still means that I’m slightly frustrated by the amount of time it takes just to get up, brush teeth, shower, eat, dress, etc.

(another cool idea for a trip might be to not try to mentally process anything! don’t blog or take pictures! it would probably be rather freeing. don’t worry, not planning on it this trip.)

Bosnia, let's do this.

Wed, 02 May 2012 20:57:00 +0000

Or, “another post in which Dan says he’s going to somewhere that sounds dangerous.” (this one really isn’t, though! even the ever-cautious US state department is not warning against it!)

I’ve got a ferry ticket from Ancona, Italy to Split, Croatia. Then I’m headed north to Poland. Google Maps is pretty weak in Bosnia and Herzegovina, so it routes me around through Croatia… but Bosnia is more direct. And interesting; who’s been to Bosnia? Croatia sounds cool too, like Dubrovnik and the Plitvice lakes, but y’know those are crowded. But then, maybe Bosnian roads are sketchy?

But maybe maybe a lot of things! Whatever! This sounds like an adventure! Let’s go through Bosnia!

The plan now:

Tomorrow: get to Ancona, Italy, and take the ferry to Split, Croatia

May 4: hang out in Split

May 5: Split from Split (har har!) to Mostar, Bosnia

May 6: Mostar-Sarajevo

May 7: Sarajevo

May 8: Sarajevo-Banja Luka

May 9: Banja Luka-Pecs, Hungary

May 10: hang out in Pecs

May 11: Pecs-somewhere else in Hungary

May 12: that somewhere to Kosice, Slovakia

May 13: Kosice

May 14: Kosice to somewhere in Poland

May 15: that somewhere to Lublin, where my friend Anu is living.

How about this! Now this is an adventure. Let me know if you have any suggestions. Yes!

In search of Giuseppe Tassi: Ascoli Piceno and Offida

Tue, 01 May 2012 20:42:00 +0000

So my dad is Jeff, and his dad is Leo, and they were all born in the US, and that’s as far back as I know. But I’ve heard that Leo’s dad (my great-grandfather) was one Giuseppe Tassi, who was the one to come over to the US from Italy. And then I heard that he (and some other relatives) came from a town called Offida. Here’s the story of how I sought it out.

First stop, Ascoli Piceno:

It’s the biggest town in the area, and I had a name and address (no phone number) of a Lino and Germana Francheschi who lived here. So I got a place to stay and sought them out. Found their place, but no answer at their door. So I went on to Offida itself.

I had a couple of possible connections here. First, Enrica Tassi at Via Cipoletti 49. Turns out Via Cipoletti ends at 47 (hah!). But I asked a guy and he asked a lady and they said “Tassi? They live over here at the piazza.” I rang the doorbell, and no answer. As I was leaving, a nice younger couple was exiting the house. I said “Signor, Signora Tassi?” They were a little confused, but she spoke English, so I explained my goofy situation and she said yeah, two Tassi sisters live in the other rooms in the house. Turns out Giuliana was home, so we rang her bell again, and she came down to say hi.

Another Tassi, Elvira, was at work at the theater (taking tickets; it’s a tourist attraction) so we went to visit her too. They were nice folks, but I couldn’t figure out anything to say other than “good to meet you” and sort of explain my situation in broken Italian, so I left it at that and moved on.

They said “oh hey, another Tassi, Peppino, lives around the corner on Via del Merletto.”

I went for a look.

No! Giuseppe Tassi! Could it be? I mean, he’s my great grandfather and dead, but… is this his house? Did he used to live on this very street, walking through these cobblestones and stuff to get to farming or making barrels or whatever the heck he did?

Short answer: nope, it’s another Giuseppe Tassi.

He’s a friendly guy. I think. At first when I rang his doorbell, I sort of said “hi, my name’s Dan Tasse, uh, my grandfather’s name is Tassi, uh… ?” and he looked out of his window sort of annoyed and said something that sounded like “No thanks, I’m not interested, what are you doing, leave me alone.” But then he came down and invited me in, he poured us each half a beer, and we talked for about a half hour in broken Italian. (I mostly just spoke Spanish. It was a silly mess.)

Long answer: Well, he is Giuseppe Tassi. (He’s also Peppino Tassi. Giuseppe = Peppe = Peppino. It’s a nickname.) But he’s not the Giuseppe Tassi I’m looking for. (of course. because my great grandfather is dead.) He had no children, and as far as I can tell, he knew none of the other people I was talking about. Strange coincidental name? More distant relation? Why did all the Tassi’s keep naming their sons Giuseppe? God (or a fluent Italian speaker) only knows.

I had one more name in my notebook. Given my half-luck so far, and the awkwardness involved in explaining why the heck I’m there, I almost just gave up. But it started to rain, and I found myself right outside Luciana Tassi’s house, so I figured might as well give it a shot.

She started out equally confused, but then became quite excited to see me once she realized what I was on about. She invited me in, made me a coffee, her energetic little dog jumped all over me, and explained as much history of her side of the family as she could. The story gets a little more confusing from there (and involves at least one more Giuseppe!) but I think I figured out that we actually are related, and learned about some of the folks that she knows. Email me if you want the details.

Giuseppe (her father), center; Cesare (top right), her grandfather, who went to America.

I leave you with a couple of other things that were in Offida that day:

Santa Maria della Rocca. Cool church. Crypt on the first floor, church on the second. Looks like they built the crypt first then smashed a church on top of it just for kicks.

Boxing! Why not?

Even just being around Offida, it was neat to think that my actual forefathers did actually ramble around these streets (probably just like they are now) on their way to the fields or the barrelmaker’s shop or whatever the hell they did. Made it all the way here, and I’m calling this a success. A little bit of roots: discovered! A+ all around, good job team. More photos!

How it is to motorcycle through Italy

Tue, 01 May 2012 20:08:00 +0000

Here is how I’ve gone:

A was the starting part from Switzerland in to Italy. It was awesome.

B was when I got lost all the live long day trying to avoid Brescia (just because it’s a big city). Argh argh! Navigation is difficult on a motorbike because I can’t take my eyes off the road or my hands off the handlebars. I can’t even write stuff on my hands because I’m wearing gloves. All I can do is memorize the next couple turns, then try to do them, then pull over to the side of the road to check my phone to see if I did them right. (thank god for phone + google maps + gps. the ability to quickly check if I’m going in kinda the right direction or not is incredibly useful.)

C was uneventful and mostly crummy, going through developed flat parts of Italy. It made me think “Italy is like California: nice weather, overdeveloped and tacky, and super popular, and I don’t see what all the fuss is.”

D was also uneventful, but at least it was mostly a straight shot on the same road, so navigation was easy. Just follow the road to Rimini. (but not all the way to Rimini. ugh.)

E was when I decided “hey, I am near San Marino. I wonder what’s in San Marino. I might as well visit San Marino. Worst case, I get to check another country off my list.” This was a mistake. (but hey, checked another country off my list.)

F was small hill towns through Emilia-Romagna, Umbria, and Tuscany. (Hi Mom, I’m riding a scooter through Tuscany.) It was awesome.

Eventually I made it to Ascoli Piceno, but that’s a topic for another post.

Stories from the road:

I am glad I have a full-face helmet, not only because of accidents but also because more than a few bugs have hit me in the face.
Most of the gas stations here in Italy have no people, they’re just 24-hour pay-at-the-pump stations. Which is fine, except they don’t take my credit card. You can pay with cash, but my bike takes about 15 euro tops to fill up, and they don’t give change. (I guess you can take the receipt to get change later?) So I’m hoarding 10-euro bills to fill up 5.37 liters at a time.
Tunnels are surprisingly fun.
Corners are surprisingly difficult. I find myself braking a lot before turns. I think it’s like skiing: I err on the side of caution and bleed off more speed than is necessary. This is fine. Someday, if I keep riding, I’ll take some classes and get better at cornering.

I've just seen two bits of life that I envy in two different ways.

Sat, 28 Apr 2012 19:34:00 +0000

First I stayed with a couch surfer named David in a mountain town in Switzerland. (I posted pictures last time.) Wonderful solitude! This picturesque valley, little Swiss houses, big Swiss mountains. He said "Do you like deer? They come out at night and hang out over there." (pointing to some land literally next to his house)

Last night in Breno, Italy, and more so tonight in Modena: wonderful socializing! They both have cobblestone old city centers, and both were full of people. Especially tonight; it felt like a grand festival, but I'm pretty sure it's just another Saturday night. Perfect 70 degree weather, restaurants and cafes with outdoor seating. Beautiful people out, y'know, being beautiful.

Italian city centers are what we lost when we moved to car-centric suburbs, and Swiss mountain towns are what we never quite gained.

Here's one bit of life I don't envy: slogging through flat bits of Italy and getting lost a lot. I went 200km in the right direction today; pity that I also went 100km in the wrong direction. Well, I guess not all the roads can be Swiss and amazing. (I think I may be spoiled for the rest of the trip. It's hard to compete with riding through the Alps.)

It's like the Kashmir/Nainital/Darjeeling of Europe

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 20:54:00 +0000

Zurich. I stayed with Shauna and Steve, whom I knew from Google Seattle. Shauna’s now working at Google Zurich. This was fun. I like how traveling allows you to visit people you might not have known super well, and you get to know them better, just because you are in that city. Dear everyone who I only kind of know: come visit me in Pittsburgh, let’s do this thing in reverse.

Zurich is so pretty. There’s only occasional graffiti. There was a map store and comic shops, and a pretty nice art museum with some things that I liked. I had an awesome cup of pour over Panamanian coffee at a place called Henrici.

Another new record: that coffee cost $7.70. This is the most expensive city in the world. Restaurants will run you about $30; even a kebab or falafel is over $10. I don’t want to tell you how much I spent getting an oil change and a brake pad replaced. On the other hand, walking up to the Uetliberg (where I took the picture above) was free. Cooking meals with Shauna, Steve, and their roommate Alena was also cheap. Once we did fondue. (we “fondid”?)

I biked through all of this. I wish I had a helmet cam so I could not constantly be thinking “should I stop and take a picture here?” It is a strange feeling, wanting to capture everything; you know you can never capture everything! I was riding towards the Alps over the Zurichsee all day and I might never again have those visual glimpses. It’s like food. But like food, it’s important to remember that even though it is fleeting, it is very nice to have these sights/foods.

Biking was much warmer today, but quite windy! Always a new challenge. Tonight I am staying here. Couchsurfing with a cool fellow named David. CS has been awesome in Europe; there are a lot of hosts and I’ve gotten along with them pretty well.

Germany -> Austria -> Liechtenstein -> Switzerland

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 17:08:00 +0000

Did you ever play Moto Racer? When you set a record, it would say in a deep ad-salesman voice "New Record!" Now, I'm not going to be setting any speed records on this bike, but 4 countries in one day is a pretty good one, I think.

It was a long day! 9am-7pm, all told. I was a little worried that I wouldn't even make it. Luckily, we are at such high altitude (same as Seattle) that it stays light approximately forever.

It was a beautiful day! Austrian valleys, then Austrian ski resorts, then Liechtensteiner, um, nothing, then Swiss hills again until the uneventful but rather pretty way in to Zurich.

I'm here in Zurich today and tomorrow, and then will head south towards Italy. (if I can find a mountain pass that's open. Hah!)

Things I learned from one day of scootering

Sun, 22 Apr 2012 16:39:00 +0000

It’s cold! I guess I’m not used to 50 degrees with constant 35mph winds, because it is super freezing. When I ride for like a half hour without wearing all of my layers, I get this deep shivering cold and it takes a couple hours after going inside before I warmed up.
Bikers know what they’re doing. The leather gear is not just to look cool; it helps with the insane coldness. (perhaps more importantly, it also helps in accidents.) Same with the gloves and ankle protectors and neck warmer and all the other things you might see bikers wearing. When I think about scootering in everyday life, this is a little annoying; “suiting up” adds friction. I mean, if it takes 30 minutes to bike somewhere and 15 to scooter there, but you have to spend 5 minutes on each end changing clothes, you’ve lost most of your time advantage.
Getting out of Munich is nuts. Look at this:

Munich’s streets are a maze of twisty passages, all alike, and the street names even change every 500 feet. It’s a lovely city to get around on public transit, and I’m sure even a bicycle wouldn’t be too mad, but it is not made for driving. (nevertheless, I still maintain that this is a good thing.)

It is really not hard. The first hour I was riding, I was glad I got a scooter, because I didn’t think I could manage the gear shifting, but I think I could now. (the question is: do I want to? it sort of feels like busy work, unless you’re really into the high-performance thing, which again I am not.) Anyway, scootering is easy and I’m quite comfortable with it.
It is a lot of fun.

I ended up at Füssen, near the famous castle of Neuschwanstein.

Neuschwanstein was built by King Ludwig II of Bavaria. He started it when he was 24. He wanted it to be, y’know, a real medieval castle (unlike the actual medieval castle that was crumbling in that spot). So he commissioned this whole thing to look like an 11th-century castle, but bigger and grander and decorated with scenes of knights and kings and fair maidens etc from Wagner operas, because he sweated Wagner pretty hard.

What a champ. This is pretty much equivalent to me, at my age, saying “I like Lord of the Rings. I want to build Minas Tirith. And I like Harry Potter too, so throw in a Quidditch field.” It’s totally nuts, but hey, now this exists; if he were sensible (or not a rich king) he’d have some house that’s not very noteworthy at all. I’ve been reading Steve Jobs’s bio too, and wondering if it’s bad to be a supreme dictator after all.

Anyway, things are going well. Today the weather was bad so I stuck around an extra day, and tomorrow it’s off through some serious Alps to Zurich.

Munich: why are you so nice

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 13:07:00 +0000

Everything is shiny and clean. They still have buildings with Gothic Germanic letters advertising “Biergarten” and “Gaststätte” unironically. Everything is kind of expensive but not out of control, especially beer. I found a nice outdoor market and a board game store, just walking around. Everything works. The public transportation is out-of-control good. Even so, if you have a motorbike, you can park it on the sidewalk. It doesn’t interfere with the bicyclists because they have their own separate sidewalk. There are even a lot of couch surfers. In the utopian version of the future, every city looks like this.

But I don’t get why everyone is so excited about this “rat house”.

Back on two wheels!

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 21:56:00 +0000

There's a Modest Mouse lyric that goes "One time out of ten, everything goes perfect for us all." I don't feel like I've suffered through the other nine yet, but here is one of those ones.

I go to Germany preparing to do all of the following things:

- buy a bike

- buy insurance

- register the bike

- get license plates made for the bike

- get a helmet

- get gloves and some sort of protective jacket or at least something warm

- figure out if the bike is in good shape or not

- withdraw about a thousand Euros (easier said than done; my bank limit for the ATM is about $500 ~= 380 Euros/day)

And I contact the local Horizons Unlimited group for direction in doing the above, and a guy named John responds and says "want to just borrow my bike?"

What! In one fell swoop, almost all of those problems are solved. Even the problem of selling it afterwards as well. He's got insurance and I don't need to do any registration things, he's got an extra helmet, gloves, leather jacket/pants I can borrow, helped me look over the bike and told me what's up with it, no worries. He just got back from a round-the-world trip of his own and he's got this extra bike, so he wants to help enable my epic trip.

Pictures!

Aprilia Leonardo 125 from 1997. Don’t worry, Dad, I’ll be mostly mowing lawns with it :D Plus, this guy got around Europe on a 125cc scooter, so at least I’m not the first.

Yep, that’s its license plate.

“Hey, who’s that guy?” “Which guy?” “The one who looks like a total badass.”

A couple more thoughts about Bulgaria

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 14:04:00 +0000

First, if Western Europe is 1 and India is 10, Bulgaria is about 2. It’s the same basic way of life.

It’s a little poorer and a little pessimistic. Low on jobs and has some corruption. This can be very depressing. In the US, I’ve always thought “if there were no jobs, I’d start a business.” Easier said than done, sure, but much easier said than done when entrepreneurship isn’t woven into the walls of your country’s culture.

The relationship between men and women is not great. It’s kind of like America 50 years ago maybe, or India in 20 years. Men can do whatever they want, women are supposed to cook and clean and care for kids (and maybe hold down a job too). I’m sure it’s subtler than that, but the main feature I could figure out about gender relations is just this pretty much straight up gradient of equality across different places. Oh, it’s better in the city than in the villages too.

This week, I ate a lot better than I do in the states. I don’t mean “healthier”, in the modern messed up Western sense, I just mean better. The family I stayed with grew a lot of their own vegetables, got cheese and meat from fresh local etc vendors, started each meal with a big salad, distilled their own rakia. Drank a lot of milk, and by “milk” I mean “fresh actual real milk from real cows, mildly fermented like yogurt.” CAFOs/factory farms are not part of their life.

The food’s delicious too. Meals started with salad and cheese and olives, and then there would be some main dish, with some meat or something. Really good stuffed peppers, chicken, egg dishes, soups. Banitsa. It’s not quite “fresh ingredients minimally processed” but it’s closer to that than “throw everything into a big curry stew”. There’s some weird stuff (soup made from cow stomach, slices of pork fat), but by and large it was all pretty normal Western-style food with really good ingredients.

Travel-wise, something feels not quite right, and I think it’s homesickness. So it goes. Now I’m in Austria (for a few hours) and everything about this place is beautiful, and tomorrow morning I’ll be in Munich and (to paraphrase Churchill) I’ll be less homesick but this Alpine region will still be pretty.

Happy Easter, Bulgarian-style!

Mon, 16 Apr 2012 16:08:00 +0000

I happened to be around while my couchsurfing hosts were heading to their old village for the Easter weekend. So they invited me to go with them. (Of course, right? You just invite random strangers to go with you on holidays, right? Bulgaria, Couchsurfing, and this fine family are so kind.)

Stoyanka, Petar, and Vesi

Their village (where Petar’s parents live) is called Morava. Here is how it looks.

Morava is small and shrinking. Very pretty. I guess everyone is moving to the cities, so the population is aging and dying. On the other hand, property is cheap! You can get the former biggest house in the village and its land for 7000 American bones. I guess the English fellow who moved in next to Petar’s parents has figured this out. Also, Hemingway was here once.

(train station reconstructed to film a movie about Hemingway)

Root cellar. This is when it’s empty. So many jars.

We went to Svishtov also, where Petar went to school. Svishtov, a small town on the Danube, is a site of many Bulgarian firsts. It’s nice.

Oh and there’s Roman ruins too.

So, Easter! Celebrations? Churchgoing? Nah. I guess Bulgaria is pretty atheist these days, and this family is no exception. We did a little gardening, touristing around Svishtov, reading books, looking for mushrooms, eating all sorts of good things and drinking Rakia (fruit brandy/schnapps). Low key time but super interesting. Petar and Stoyanka, if you’re reading, thanks again for taking me!

At one point, they showed me a family tree, on a couple sheets of paper. But that was not the full tree; it only went back a couple generations. “Do you want to see the full tree?” SUPER YES:

On the way back, we stopped by Veliko Tarnovo, the old capital from the 1100’s-1300’s, before the Ottomans moved in.

And that is why I’ve been off the internet for four days! Okay, tomorrow I’m flying to Munich, to try this motorcycle-buying thing over again.

Yikes bikes.

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 15:08:00 +0000

Short version: It turns out, if you don’t have a Bulgarian passport, it is “not possible” to buy a motorcycle in Bulgaria and have it registered in your name. I might fly to Germany and buy a bike there instead.

Long version: I woke up early today to head down to the KAT, which is the Bulgarian DMV. I don’t know why I thought this would be anything other than a Kafka-Brazil-FRRO nightmare! I wandered around about a hundred different desks with numbers, asking people who looked official as well as people who didn’t, “Govorite le angliski?” (“do you speak English?”) and then when they said no, “uhh, um, motoziklet registratiya?” and then getting pointed in the vague direction of another 10 desks. Eventually I had to leave to meet my motorcycling friend Ilian.

After we examined some choices last night, today he took me to a dealer who was selling a BMW F650. Now, before you look at the BMW name and think me a rich jagoff, or look at big number and think me a fool, this is a pretty reasonable choice. It was in good shape (Ilian thought), and cost about $2000, but the same dealer had a bunch of scooters, so I inquired about those as well. Found a Peugeot 250cc for $1800. But then I found out about the registration issue. Well, I’d read it on the internet before, but everyone I’d talked to (until now) seemed to think there’d be a way to get the registration done.

I kind of don’t want to deal with about three issues at once: I’m new to bikes, new to paperwork required for bikes, and new to getting things done in Eastern Europe. The worst case in the last two is that I’m out about $2000 (if I can’t sell the bike) and I have a bike that I have to get rid of somehow; the worst case in the first one is that I crash and die. These are all pretty bad. Let’s deal with only two of them.

New plan (I think): head to Germany, buy a bike with “export plates” which means I can register it for 3 months and sell it anywhere; there’s an additional cost (still not sure how much, but somewhere in the hundreds of euros counting insurance) but at least it’s rather by-the-book.

Funny side note: when I was waiting to meet Ilian, I saw another guy who looked like him from behind, so I walked up and said “Hey, how’s it going?” and we had an awkward half second eye contact and he started walking with me, surreptitiously shaking my hand and saying under his breath “Hallo. Ivan.” By this point I had realized it wasn’t Ilian and sort of stopped and said sorry. Did I just walk into the middle of something?

So far, Sofia, so good

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 20:59:00 +0000

The “Sofia” chapter of this story is not done, but now’s as good a time as any to upload some photos.

I landed in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria, on Monday. Went to the home of my Couchsurfing hosts Petar and Stoyanka, in Lyulin, which is a district a few km from the center of Sofia. It looks a little like this:

Looks so Soviet-era! Big concrete block buildings as far as the eye can see! What the hell, communism. The apartments are small and the buildings look kind of worn-down. On the upside, once you know where you're going, it's not bad. It's dense, anyway, so there are little squares with places to eat and supermarkets and stuff, and there are a lot of people walking around. Beats US suburbs in that sense. Still, it's not really a "neighborhood" or a "suburb"; more like a "housing complex."

Petar and Stoyanka (and their young daughter Vesi, and Stoyanka's mother) are great hosts. They've really made me feel at home here, even though I sort of landed with no idea what to do besides a vague mission to buy a motorcycle and not much of a notion of how to do that. I've met another fellow, Ilian, who may be able to help with the motorcycle, and in the meantime, Petar and Stoyanka have supplied me with a room and lots of food, even in their small apartment. So generous!

The main part of Sofia, however, is pretty:

(the Free Sofia Tour came highly recommended. it was pretty good.)

It's an old place: Roman, medieval, Ottoman-Turk era, communist-era, and modern.

Fun Fact #1. In communist times, there was one big "department store" that sold everything. Foods like sugar, appliances, etc. I guess it used to be a big deal if you lived out in the country to come into the city and buy something. Anything! There weren't things all over the place!

Fun Fact #2. After communist times, they tore down all the Lenin statues, which left them with empty spaces, so they were trying to fill them. They came up with this lady on a pedestal in the right of this photo (right under the traffic light):

(better photo from someone else here)

Why? Because she's St. Sophia. This is such a mess:

- St. Sophia was Italian, not even a little bit Bulgarian

- the city of Sofia is named after its Hagia Sofia church (not to be confused with the one in Istanbul), not St. Sophia, because she's not even a little bit Bulgarian

- St. Sophia became a saint because the Romans murdered her three daughters when they wouldn't convert to Roman pagan ways and she died of grief; this is not the triumphant statue you want above your city

- they put a bird on her left arm and some leafy thing in her right hand; the leafy thing symbolizes victory (the opposite of St. Sophia) and the bird is some other pagan symbol (which annoyed Christians)

- the Christians were further angered that she shows a bit too much cleavage.

Hello from Bulgaria!

Mon, 09 Apr 2012 13:36:00 +0000

I’ve made it another halfway around the world. Sofia, Bulgaria. Adventure Part 1 completed, Adventure Part 2 just beginning. Starting here in Sofia, I’ll head around Bulgaria and some of the former Yugoslavia countries, scoot North to Poland, Ukraine, Czech, then cross through Germany to the Netherlands. I leave from Amsterdam on July 5.

The guiding principles for Adventure Part 2 are:

Go where my friends are
Go where my friends have suggested I go
Go to Ukraine for a little bit at least
Go where people might appreciate the tourism

All that said, I am much less prepared for Adventure Part 2. I hardly read up on history or language or anything. Given my tendency towards eggheadedness, maybe a bit of winging it would do me some good.

Pittsburgh and Cleveland: same as it ever was

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 21:33:00 +0000

I went to Pittsburgh. Had a great time at the CMU HCII. Caught up with some friends in Squirrel Hill. CMU is nice, Squirrel Hill is doing well, Shadyside is upscale, Friendship and Bloomfield and Lawrenceville are still hip, Downtown is downtown, and the Strip is still awesome.

Now I'm in Westlake, Ohio, hanging out with family and trying to decide between CMU and UW. Cleveland is still surprisingly cool (went to Tremont for the first time the other day). Westlake is still a suburb. I'm iterating on aloo gobhi, palak paneer, and chana masala; putting my bottle caps and ticket stubs into collections; doing a little bit of planning.

On April 8 I leave for Bulgaria. I'm planning to buy a motorcycle there, ride it up through the Balkans through probably Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hungary, and Slovakia to Poland and Ukraine, then back across through Germany to the Netherlands. That's about all I've planned here.

Toronto!

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 03:59:00 +0000

EDIT: I suppose I should be more clear: the following is a post about how much I like Toronto.

This is a city! This is a city with the tallest building ~~in the world~~ whatever, and parks from which to ~~look~~ scoff at it.

This is a city as griddy as New York. If Bombay’s a grid and Delhi swings, well, Toronto doesn’t swing. Which is nice. In Toronto’s case, it’s easy to find anything and easy to get anywhere. You can ride bikes and people do.

There’s a nice subway but you don’t even need it. The University is right in the center of everything. Fifty thousand students clustered at the heart of the town.

Churches. Old churches!

Neighborhoods where one might live.

Shiny downtowns, if that’s your bag:

All of the cultures. (I wandered through at least an Italy, Portugal, China, and Korea.) A guy named Kevin who knows what’s up.

Umm… architecture! Museums. Big city niceties. Biggest-city-in-the-country kind of clout.

Occasional weirdnesses.

Art galleries just hanging around. You can get your fancy coffee or your 50 cent donut and coffeepot on the same block. The Second Second City, the world’s biggest film festival, and even some sports if you like. All of the wonders of being in the biggest place, and seemingly more affordable even than Seattle.

Toronto! How about this place!

Planning again

Sun, 11 Mar 2012 01:41:00 +0000

Well, if I’m going to ride a motorbike through Eastern Europe, I have to plan some things, and there are a ton of choices.

First: where to go? I'm thinking about starting in Bulgaria (or maybe Turkey) and heading up to Romania, Moldova, and Ukraine (or maybe through Albania, Serbia, and Montenegro) and then across to Poland and the Czech Republic, and then to Holland through Germany (or maybe south through the Alps and Switzerland). Well, at least I know I want to end up in Holland. But knowing where to start, well, that is important, if I'm going to buy a plane ticket.

Second: is it even remotely possible to buy a motor scooter in, say, Bulgaria? I guess it is not very easy in Turkey, because you have to have an address there to register it, and you have to get a permit to take it out of the country.

Third: will I have to get a carnet de passage, to prove to some countries that I won't try to sell the scooter there?

Fourth: wait a minute... then how can I sell the scooter at the end?

Fifth: most motorcycle tourers use big bikes. I think it's because most motorcycle tourers like big bikes, but is it possible that I'm going to get totally schooled trying to ride a little dinky thing around a whole continent?

Frustratingly, I rather need to have answers to all of these before I start, or else the plane ticket I buy will go to different places. Hmm hmm. Let me know if you have any advice!

Seattle!

Sat, 10 Mar 2012 00:44:00 +0000

Man! This city is the most beautiful place! Even the air smells better!

And I have a lot of friends here! This is very pleasant. Daniel and Killian have this cat:

I have not created many great stories this week. I have met up with friends, drank some uppers with some, drank some downers with some, ate some food with others. Board games have been played, a little bouldering and meditation have happened. No camel safaris or Himalayas or visa issues or idlis and vadas. But I would just like to record, as a memo to my future self, that I am thankful for weeks like this one, as well as months like this one and years like this one.

I could have the same alma mater as Mark Price

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 23:57:00 +0000

So I’m doing the grand tour of grad schools, and I thought Georgia Tech would be a bit of a backup. I mean, it doesn’t have the brand name of a CMU or an MIT, it’s not a known entity like UW, and it’s not in an awesome location like Toronto. I mean, it’s in (ominous voice) the south. But it turns out I’m hella excited about it.

I’m not sure the research is all that exciting to anyone on this blog, but I met with one lab that’s all about wearable computers and one lab that’s about all sorts of stuff (somewhat relating to home networks but not necessarily) and that I’d be stoked to work with either. They’ve got a whole school of Interactive Computing, their building is new and inspiring, they’ve got tons of connections, and the department feels like a big happy family.

But more about Atlanta: it’s nice! Think about Pittsburgh: if you’d never been there, you might think of old factories, but it’s actually a great, happening, up-and-coming place to live. I guess there are parts of Atlanta that have problems, but overall, there is a chance that even bike-riding farmers’-marketing coffee-swilling Indian-cooking I could find a place there.

Concrete upsides:

housing is reasonable (cheaper than Seattle or Boston, pricier than Pittsburgh)
it’s bikeable (I guess car ownership is common, but all the neighborhoods I might live in are within 4 miles/30 minutes)
it’s pretty (mostly houses and green space)
major airport
weather is nice (I do like clouds and cold weather, but I could deal with springlike weather for most of the year)

Concrete downsides:

once you get outside the city, it’s (ominous voice) the south. (maybe this would be an upside; a bit of diversity might do me some good.)
you can throw a stone without hitting an independent coffeeshop
I guess bugs get in your house sometimes. (again, this might do me some good. I’ve got a bug phobia and, well, good to confront it sometime.)
summers are hot. (more incentive to get an internship somewhere else!)

I've been here a month exactly.

Sat, 25 Feb 2012 01:03:00 +0000

That's a bit of a surprise; I didn't expect to be here so long. It's been nice to have no time pressure. This leg of the trip has been the most vacationey, I think. New Zealand is culturally easy and naturally pretty.

It's been rewarding too. I learned I can bike a long distance and that I can do productive work for at least a week at a time. I've caught up with family a bit and seen some sights. I've met a few excellent Kiwis and absorbed a bit of NZ culture. It's all "shallow" culture (Cricket! Marmite! "Sweet as"!) but if you dig deeper, our cultures are really similar anyway.

I've got an exciting 3 days ahead: WLG-AKL-SYD (catch up with friend Anika)-LAX (catch up with cousins Jessica, Matt, and Colette)-IAD-ATL (see the city with friend Brad and visit Georgia Tech).

And then, here I come back to the States, inspired again. Inspired by a couple of fresh canvases, of the next few months and the next few years, and the confidence that I'll paint awesome stuff on them. Inspired by all the grad schools I'm going to visit, and the chance to work with some people who will help me turn my enthusiasm and energy into actually useful things. Inspired by an increasingly constant notion that everything is okay, and an urge to create and hopefully inspire creation and otherwise forward progress in others.

And let's not lie, inspired by some more great coffee. (Seriously. All over NZ it's good-to-great, but I think Wellington rivals Seattle. New favorite: Brewtown in Newtown, next to, and affiliated with, People's Coffee.)

Well, I didn't leave.

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 13:50:00 +0000

Here is what I have done in Wellington this week:

started and finished Radiohead or Horse_ebooks?. Err, it's a little internet-memey. But I think it mostly works, and it's live, so that's a good feeling. Exciting showing up in a city and working on a project.
saw The 37th Situation. Brilliant! The premise: some guy once wrote a list of 36 situations that encompass every play ever. This ensemble staged a short 1-2 minute bit for each of the 36, running through them all in an hour. Reminiscent of Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind, which is exciting because either:

they saw TMLMTBGB and were inspired to do a similar show (sound familiar, Sarah, Julie, Todd, Josh?), or
they developed it independently, which means there's a bit of subgenre of this kind of thing, and therefore more of it

met some Wellington CSers, and went to see another show that was not so good
planned all the travel (this takes a surprising amount of time)
drank all of the coffee; I think my favorite spots are Lamason downtown and People's in Newtown, but Memphis Belle is a close third.

"Careful, you won't want to leave."

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 04:35:00 +0000

So said a fellow I met on the bus up from Christchurch, about Wellington.

It’s like a small San Francisco, with the hills, artsy reputation, and cool rainy weather. I’m couchsurfing with a cool guy named Joe, who lives in a pretty great spot, where the above picture is taken from. It’s up in the hills, but only a 20-30 minute walk (through a gorgeous lush park) to the city center. Best of all worlds.

I kind of don’t want to leave. It’s big enough to have a good downtown, a couple of arts festivals, alternative newspapers, restaurants from all sorts of different cultures, etc, but still small enough that you can walk around it all. It’s got all the consumable things I like: single origin coffee (at Peoples and Flight, at least), amazing ice cream (Kaffee Eis), craft beer (e.g. Hop Garden), and even passable wifi throughout the city center. (in NZ this is a big deal; you usually don’t get it free with your coffee) And the weather is perfect.

What have I been doing in Wellington, besides talking about how great it is? The other day I went to the Weta Cave, a tiny museum and gift shop by the Weta movie-special-effects company. The company is super cool: a video showed a short bit of how they make effects for all these films (incl LotR). They’re the second biggest such company in the world, after Pixar. That’s neat. The Weta Cave itself is… really small. Not sure it’s actually worth a visit.

I did meet this guy though.

Other end of the spectrum: Te Papa. This is like four museums in one. I got museum fatigue, but still enjoyed the modern art bit and the colossal squid.

Also, I went to my first ever live cricket match.

The pitch before the match

tl;dr: American goes to foreign country, loves foreign sport. It was great, though! New Zealand beat South Africa in 20/20 cricket (a short form that just takes 3 hours, not all day or multiple days). Pretty down to the wire, too: they needed 6 runs from the last 6 balls (not difficult, but not a given), and they got them. Martin Guptill hit something like 73 not out on 58 balls, which is really good.

This week, I had planned to go to Tongariro National Park, to hike the famous Tongariro Crossing (and climb Mt. Doom). Look at the pictures! But you need good weather, and this week is all rain and gale force winds. So now I’m not sure what to do.

I’m thinking about hanging out in Wellington for a week. Cons: vague feeling like I’m missing out on something. People would scoff at me because you don’t go to NZ to hang out in cities. Pros: I’m thinking about working-vacationing, like my friends Jay, Raph, and Gary have done, and this could be just the rest period/kickstart I need. Also, it’d be pretty cheap. Also also, seeing things because other people think I should see them is boring, and the only thing I know of that I personally wanted to see on the north island is the Tongariro crossing.

Goodbye South Island, goodbye bike

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 03:24:00 +0000

I thought the last 150km to Christchurch would be easy. Not so: headwinds, crosswinds, three truck near-misses, rain, and Christchurch’s large size made them actually quite hairy.

Two days ago, I made it 80km from Arthur’s Pass to a small town called Springfield. Nice Alpine climate and scenery, lots of hills and wind. A few folks I met invited me in for tea. Yesterday, I went another 80km to the Fosters’ place in Sumner, on the far side of Christchurch, through occasional rain. And today, I biked 30km across Christchurch to return the bike. This city sprawls a bit.

In total, 660km (390mi) over 9 biking days + 3 rest days. Some days, I felt like I could do 50 miles more, but most days I was sore and tired. I feel kind of the same as I do about hiking: it’s got many good sides, and the right people make it all the better; but it’s still an endurance sport, and it’s hard to get excited about doing something that will be mostly crummy. Still, I’ll probably end up doing it again occasionally.

Going north as we speak: tonight to Picton, tomorrow to Wellington. And then we’ll see what happens.

EDIT: some stats, for future reference:

Feb 4: 60km, 2pm-~7

Feb 5: 78km, 12:30-6:20

Feb 6: rest

Feb 7: 56km, 10am-1:30

Feb 8: 83km, 9:30am-… 4?

Feb 9: 80km, 10:30-4

Feb 10: rest

Feb 11: 102km, 10am-6:30pm

Feb 12: rest

Feb 13: 82km, 10:15-6:55

Feb 14: 79km, 11:15-5:15

Feb 15: 29km, 12:00-1:45

Some photos from this biking trip so far

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 03:17:00 +0000

By a winery on the way to Hanmer Springs

View from Conical Hill, Hanmer Springs

Somewhere around Lewis Pass

The towns are not much. Mostly friendly people though. This is Reefton.

Scones, tea, biking, and I tried to fit the lake below in this photo too but it didn’t fit.

Doesn’t look so steep here! This is the route up to Arthur’s Pass.

A good day plus parrots

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 07:02:00 +0000

Today I rode 100km horizontally. That was actually quite nice! Not too sore or painful, making good time for some reason, and the scenery was great. Good stops for an awesome scone, and then coffee and a good chat.

In the last 10km, though, I gained about 500m vertical, which was nuts. I had to get off and catch my breath 5 times (but only in places where the road was wide enough) or I might have keeled over. At one point a crowd at a scenic lookout gave me a round of applause when I finally made it up to them.

(When you're doing tough guy things, you have to pretend it's no big deal. But I, and I think secretly ever other guy, really want to shout out "Yes! Look at me! I am such a tough guy! I am so tough I cannot even believe it myself! I'm, I'm... I'm goddamn Spartacus or something! I'll be acknowledging all the desire from the ladies and fear from the men now!")

Anyway, so I made it most of the way up, and now there I was, huffing and gasping, 9km into this massive ascent, going up a shallow hill which I could just barely manage in my lowest gear, and I heard caws. And here came two keas circling me. Google "kea". These guys are cute, majestic, super intelligent, and occasionally known to be aggressive. So here I figured I'd just made it up the toughest goddamn hill in my life, and I was gonna get pecked off the road by a couple of bloody parrots!

(But nothing happened. Good story, right?)

I guess I could have changed this ticket more radically, but I'm not sure how.

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:52:00 +0000

Wellington-Dubai? Nope! Now it’s Wellington-Washington DC.

Here’s the deal. I was going to go to Dubai, then to Turkey, then bike through Europe. But then I got accepted to somewhere between two and five grad schools: I’m in to Georgia Tech and UW, and I’m still waiting on U. Toronto, CMU HCII, and MIT Media Lab. So I’ll definitely have to make some decision. And despite my hopes while planning this trip, the right answer hasn’t appeared in a dream, so it’d probably be smart to visit these schools.

Also, I’d like to be back in the states for a while! I don’t know what I want to do with the rest of my time until grad school starts. I want to keep traveling, and probably in some kind of European direction, but beyond that it’s not super clear. Maybe some time back at “home” would help me decide. (I don’t know why I think this.)

Anyway! NZ until Feb 25, mid-air flying limbo until Feb 27 (including long layovers in Sydney and LA), Atlanta on Feb 28 for a few days, Seattle sometime after that including March 13-14. If I know you live in any of those places, I’ll probably hit you up soon; but if you live in these places and I don’t know it, give me a shout!

Sandflies!

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 06:44:00 +0000

They are kind of like mosquitoes, but smaller and more numerous. On the plus side, their bites are much less itchy. I’m not camping, so I’m only mildly annoyed by them. Still, it’s tough when you can’t stop for a rest without getting swarmed.

Sandflies and uncertainty about where I would sleep made day 4 tough, even though I only went 56km (33mi). Today, day 5, went all right too. Longest day so far at 83km (50mi), and I made it over Lewis Pass, the highest point, so it only gets better from here!

The mood swings on this trip are remarkable. While I’m going uphill, I want to pack it all up and go home. On the downhill, I’m pretty sure I thought “I would be mostly content about my eternal future if heaven is just like this forever.” In flat places, my mind goes everywhere, occasionally returning to “eh, I’d kinda rather be sitting drinking a coffee or something.”

The First Day is the Hardest

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 02:08:00 +0000

Like they say. They say that, right? I hope they say that.

Rented a bike. It's nice and lightweight, but then I loaded it up with my 12 lbs of gear, so that's a new challenge. It's got drop handlebars. That's new for me too. Oh, and "motorway" means "highway with no bikes." That's somewhat terrifyingly new! The good news is, folks honking at me weren't just a bunch of jagoffs.

Still, I rode into a headwind on a boring road for the first day. Only 60km, but it felt like more. I got a flat tire.

Slept in a converted rail car. That was pretty neat. There are lots of hostels (or "backpackers") here in NZ, and that is really nice. USA, get on that.

Second day went better; I made it 78km up to Hanmer Springs. At about the 50km mark, I really got into it. Phew! I'd hate to be in for a 10 day ride if it was all going to be kind of crummy.

Or rather, I guess it's all going to be kind of crummy, but sometimes it's okay. When I asked my friend Pete about the "runner's high" once, he said that there is no magic runner's high where it all of a sudden feels good. And yet, he likes running anyway. Something to keep track of; ask me how I'm doing in a week.

Then I met my friends Marty and Jackie (from Dharamsala) and Marty's parents, which was quite nice, and now here I am, resting a day in Hanmer. So all's well!

South Island, take two, slower this time

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 23:17:00 +0000

My family left yesterday morning, after we’ve toured quite a substantial bit. It feels like my mind has been running a lot of programs for a while, so I can’t even collect my thoughts (right now I’m in a crummy convenience store which is of course playing terrible radio) so instead here is a list of some things we did since we last spoke:

- went to Nelson, where my family went on a somewhat ill-fated kayaking trip to see some seals, while I stayed back, skyped some professors, and got accepted to the University of Washington

- went to Kaikoura, went out on a boat to see literally hundreds of dolphins doing flips and stuff

- went to Christchurch, met our friend's brother's wife's parents, the Fosters, who kindly put us up and helped me as I:

- got a bike lined up to go biking!

My route looks something like this. I am excited to get back on two wheels, excited to have a bit more time, sad that my family has left, and only a little nervous about biking so much.

New Zealand!

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 04:19:00 +0000

This place is something else! I have to dash out to visit a bike shop before they close and before our internet runs out, but here are some photos:

Queenstown

Milford Sound

Franz Josef Glacier

Some local fauna, including the quite common Homo Photographicus

You might be surprised to learn that this place is called Hokitika

A bridge.

Finding tennis in Nelson, New Zealand

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 05:01:00 +0000

Well! We’ve been in New Zealand for almost a week now. We landed in Christchurch, drove to Queenstown, then went on to Milford Sound, the Franz Josef Glacier, and up to Nelson. Every day except for two, we’ve driven for 6-10 hours.

We’ll go on from here to Kaikoura and then back to Christchurch.

Most evenings, we’ve stumbled into our lodging and immediately hurriedly set out to find a bar that’s serving food, playing the Australian Open, and staying open late enough to finish the Australian Open. We’re 2 time zones east, so the matches start at 9:30pm.

This time, we asked around and found one bar that showed it until 12:15am. We moved on to the next place that showed it until the end of the fourth set at 2:30am. Then we came back home and fought with the Internet until we got a radio feed and live scoreboard until the end of the match at about 3:30. Great match! Our man Djokovic (who I think I like because he looks like Rory from Doctor Who) outlasted Nadal in five long sets.

I’m tired! I’ll upload photos of some great things in New Zealand when I have some bandwidth. (literally. we’re paying $15 for 512mb/one day, and today’s is almost used up. Aus/NZ, what the heck.)

An unexpected perspective benefit of traveling

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 07:09:00 +0000

is that you fear governments more. I thought I’d visit Iran, so I was at first afraid of the US government, and then I got afraid of the Iranian government. I went to Singapore, and I was afraid of the Singaporean government. (not for any good reason; ask me sometime)

Being afraid of a government is awful because the worst cases are really bad. At least with crime, there’s someone there to help you out if bad things happen. But if you get Guantanamoed, you are (and I hope my casual language doesn’t make light of anyone’s tragedy) terribly hosed. The way we usually respond to fears of the government is to ignore them, to say “that won’t happen to me, because I’m not a criminal/terrorist/vaguely-brown-person”, but over these travels, I’ve had a chance to imagine the possibility that that might happen to me. As a result, it gets harder to ignore stuff like this.

More Australia

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 11:08:00 +0000

My family and I were in Melbourne for a couple days.

We saw a bunch of penguins near here.

Australian open! “Professor” Lleyton Hewitt beat a dude.

Cricket going on around town. I was riding a rented bike. Melbourne’s bike share system is great.

It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.

I met up with Jay and Raph again. Did I mention what neat stuff they’re doing? While they’re traveling around the world, they’re working on actual productive programming projects. I won’t talk about specifics until they release them and conquer the world. Anyway, it was good to see them again.

Then we went to Sydney.

Sydney Harbor Bridge

Super cool art exhibit at the Museum of Contemporary Art: “Recorders”. everything records you in some way. This bit had tape measures that would automatically extend if you were in front of them until they snapped. I love this stuff.

yessssss

I like both Melbourne and Sydney. Makes me want to live in a bigger city. We are seeing more wonders per hour than I ever have before. I am tired!

We're in Australia, which seems a lot like America

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 11:12:00 +0000

I can’t put my finger on the difference between Australia tourism and India tourism without resorting to a bunch of backpacker cliches (“it’s more real, man”), but heck, the trip is different in so many ways. First, instead of traveling with nobody or with friends, I’m traveling with my family. Second, we’re staying in hotels and stuff. Third, we have a rental car and domestic airline tickets.

It's all different, and I'm enjoying it now. Yesterday we went to a rainforesty tourist town, but hey, we got to feed kangaroos and hug koalas. And today we went to the Great Barrier Reef and snorkeled. Life's good!

On the way out to the reef

Our boat docked with this platform, and we swam from there.

The only downside is that it’s hard to get internet at a reasonable price. You know, in this backwards part of the world. I just got to post a bunch of things about Singapore though, so read about three posts down.

Further thoughts: Singapore is a city optimized for consumption.

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 10:53:00 +0000

Struggling for a headline about Singapore, I’ve ended up with this: I can’t say it’s “good” or it’s “bad”, but I can say that the city revolves around consumption. I’ve heard multiple times that people go to Singapore to eat and to shop. Food is cheap and goods are glitzy. There’s a mall on every corner, each one with more posh brand names than the last.

I traded my poor-country problems (mosquito bites and bottled water) for rich-country problems (canker sores from all the sugar, upset stomach from the rich food, sunburn from too much lazing around) almost instantly.

Well, and so? I can spare you the litany of anti-consumerism, but I do want to point out that it’d be a worthy critique. Life in Singapore seems partially the hyper-Western nightmare I’d expect from a city optimized for consumption. School starts intense, with bell-curved classes where 10% of students get A’s, and woe to those who fall off the good-grades wagon. Those who succeed, after completing their 2 years of National Service (military, or “kind of a bad job where people yell at you”), get high-powered, high-paying, high-blood-pressure jobs at banks, government offices, or international corporations. After marrying, they can afford glamorous apartments, but at the cost of working 7 days a week.

It seems not an easy life, nor an ideal one. I realize it’s pretentious to visit a city for four days and then start leveling criticisms, but there’s mine.

On the plus side, though: as Jay pointed out, maybe consumption is not the best thing to optimize for, but at least Singapore is optimized for something. Every building placement, every district, every street name is carefully chosen by the government. They cut clever deals to make the city work smoothly. (“want to build a casino? okay… if you build us a hotel, convention center, museum, performance venue, and by the way you can’t let any Singapore citizens in unless they pay $100.”) And so, again, Singapore works, in its own way. I complain that it’s not Shangri-la, but it’s worth keeping in mind that it’s also not Buffalo, Delhi, or Houston.

Back in Singapore, a rich country, and now food is not just something you have to do

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 10:32:00 +0000

I had no idea! So Singapore is multicultural, sure, and you’ve got Indians, Chinese, Malays, Japanese, Indonesians, Arabs, Westerners, and all sorts of smaller groups mixing it up. And they all bring their best food.

A popular place to eat in Singapore is a “hawker center”, which is like a food court of dozens of very specialized stands. Often the center as a whole will have a theme (like “Indian food” or “seafood”), but you might go to one stand for biryani, a different one for North Indian curry, and still another for the Singapore-created murtabak. Of course, drinks and desserts demand a stall each. This is the ideal method of food production: everyone does a couple things very very well. And it is usually quite cheap.

Here are some things that I ate:

the aforementioned murtabak, a heavy omelet-bready thing from India. Take paratha to the extreme. Hope you’re hungry.
char kway teow, wide noodles.
mee soto, spicy spaghetti-like noodles.
hokkien mee, more savory noodles with shrimp.
black carrot cake. Not a dessert, more like a sweet omelet.
white carrot cake, more savory and less sweet than the black.
satay, marinated grilled meat on sticks with peanut sauce.
kaya toast, toast with sweet coconutty jelly.
chicken rice. Chicken with rice.
laksa, a coconut curry with noodles.
popiah, unfried spring rolly things with some kind of pickled cabbage.
chili crab, the “national dish”. A lot of the meat falls into the sauce, which you eat with delicious buns. Not actually spicy; actually delicious.
cereal prawns, big shrimp with crunchy cereal flakes. Why not, I suppose.
stingray! Now here is a winner. It is like the most tender richest beef, with a wonderful thick spicy-sweet sauce.
frogs. Like really tender chicken in a thick soy/scallion sauce, served with porridge.
durian ais kacang, a big snow cone with some sort of creamy durian topping.
cendol, sort of like a coconut snow cone, with some pickled green thing and sweet beans. Sweet beans.
bubur cha cha, warm coconut soup with various things.
peanut/sesame pudding.
matcha shirataki crepe. A bit of Japanese there too.
barley water, which is a little sweet and a lot tastier than it sounds.
coffee. Thick and so black that the copious condensed milk doesn’t change its color.
grass jelly drink, which is maybe the least sweet thing I had, and thank god.
teh tarik, like a Thai iced tea.

and let’s not forget:

fresh durian. The king of fruits! It’s been a couple years since I had it fresh, and even then, I didn’t crack it open myself. Wonderfully pungent, creamy, and sweet. Dangerously spiky, hard to carry through a crowd, and don’t eat it with alcohol or you might have a stroke.

My friend Nick gave me a checklist, telling me I couldn’t leave without trying chicken rice, char kway teow, murtabak, popiah, and laksa. This was quite helpful in narrowing down my choices, so let me make a list of my own, in case you’re headed there anytime soon: stingray, laksa, hokkien mee, cendol, and by god a fresh durian. But you can’t go wrong.

Nothing seemed particularly healthy; it’s all meat, noodles, and sugar. And I can’t see myself cooking this stuff a lot. But where it falls short health-wise, it makes up with taste in spades. Singapore will make you wish there were twice as many meals in a day.

Singapore is the greatest city I'm supposed to hate

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 10:26:00 +0000

Singapore! What comes to mind? Perhaps a few executed drug dealers? Fines for chewing gum? Canings?

Let me tell you a few more grisly facts about Singapore. Their drug policies are notoriously harsh, including mandatory execution for dealers from any country, sure. Other drug laws include imprisonment for possession, which is nothing new in “War on Drugs” USA, except that “possession” includes in your body. Singaporean citizens can be imprisoned for taking drugs in another country and then coming back to Singapore. (foreigners with drugs in their system just get sent back.)

What else? Well, 2-year mandatory military service, fine. Some “undesirable” activities, ranging from graffiti to skateboarding, are not prohibited, but they’re only allowed in one tiny part of the country. (There’s a graffiti park.) Another such “undesirable” activity? Public protest. A few people tried to organize “Occupy Singapore” via the internet; they were all arrested the night before the event.

It’s illegal to sell chewing gum, yes. Fines for eating or drinking on the subway are $500. The P.A.P. wins all the elections. (This year, an opposition party got an unprecedented 5 seats in the 86-seat parliament.) Oh, and gay sex is illegal.

But for all this utter nonsense which ranges from kinda goofy to downright draconian, there’s another side: it really works. It’s cleaner than Seattle, bigger than Berlin, safe as Tokyo, and rich as Croesus. Maybe I’m only seeing one side of things after Delhi, Kolkata, Bangalore, and Phnom Penh, but I found it really pleasant. You can walk anywhere anytime, the metro is extensive and costs a dollar, and everything is delicious all the time. But more on the food later.

It helps that I had friends. I met Ambreen via Jay, and the three of us hung out in exceedingly posh malls and played Scrabble; I met Carrie via Brian, and she showed me around the best seafood and cocktail bar (“Bar Stories”); and I met up with Yu Hsien from Scotch’n’Soda, and we rode bikes and roamed Chinatown at Chinese New Year time. Wonderful to meet/reconnect with all of them, and one couldn’t ask for more thoughtful, expert, and generous hosts. I didn’t see a ton of the sights in Singapore, spending instead most of my time with these lovely folks, and I’d have it no other way.

The sights I did see, though, included the most famous ethnic neighborhoods (Chinatown, Little India, and Arab Street), as well as the iconic Marina Bay Sands hotel. Why is there a boat on that hotel? It’s fine, don’t worry about it.

I got to swim on the roof. I know people. (Particularly, Jay. Thanks, Jay!) This kind of made my month. I don’t like flashy things, except when they’re as awesome as the pool on top of the Marina Bay Sands.

So thanks, Singapore, for a great long weekend. Politics aside, I really enjoyed exploring a modern metropolis. I haven’t done that for a while. No hawkers or tuk-tuks, no piles of trash, no dusty roads, no shady areas. In their place: cool districts to hang out at night, very specialized foods, a clean metro, and walkable neighborhoods.

I kinda can’t take the heat, though.

Note: I’ve got a lot more pictures of Singapore; you can get them from the “photos” link above. I’m in Australia now, and the only way we can find to get connected while paying less than $6/half hour is sitting in on a McDonalds’s crummy wifi. Weird when the bottleneck to blogging is inserting photos (that are already in picasa) into a post.

Khmer Rouge, what the F

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 17:51:00 +0000

After relaxing on the beach, Jay, Raph, and I made our way to Phnom Penh. Perhaps the most popular tourist sites there are the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum and the Choeng Ek Killing Fields. A jolly day out it is not, but I heard multiple times that you really have to see them. Like visiting Auschwitz, I guess.

Of course, seeing the story of the Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge taking over Cambodia in 1975-1979 is sobering and depressing. I can’t imagine what these people must have felt when they welcomed the Khmer Rouge into the streets of Phnom Penh, only to be immediately forced to evacuate to the countryside. I have no idea how they’d keep on with their 14-hour days of forced labor, trying to make the rice fields triple their production while eating almost nothing themselves. To say nothing of those in the most helpless of situations, in the prisons with barbed wire over the windows so they couldn’t even commit suicide, or in the trucks on the way to the mass graves. Jesus! This is almost unimaginably grim.

Pause to let these emotions sink in. I guess that is the advantage of visiting this place; you can feel real grief and sorrow, which we thankfully don’t get all that often. And I guess in doing so, we honor those who suffered here.

A cell, 0.8m by 2m. You can barely lie down in this.

Tuol Sleng prison. I guess it doesn’t look so bad from here. It used to be a school.

The killing fields don’t look so bad either. Well, I didn’t take photos of the particularly brutal stuff.

This is very terribly mind-blowingly sad. That’s one conclusion you can draw from learning about this mass murder. Another one is that the Khmer Rouge was really inept at governing! Honestly, they took all the city people, declared them “New People” (inferior to countryside-dwelling “Old People”), and set them to work in the fields with only the clothes on their backs. Then they decreed that they must produce more rice than ever before, with strict quotas. How did they even imagine that this would work? City-dwellers don’t know a damn thing about farming, they had no good tools or teachers, and even expert farmers couldn’t get this much rice. Threatening and beating them won’t get the job done.

Plus, they traumatized the people. Families were universally separated and marriages were arranged by the state (because the state is everyone’s parents), loved ones were murdered left and right for crimes such as having a couple of bananas, and no trace of anything relating to their old lives was allowed.

Oh! And they demolished the education system! So even if the Khmer Rouge’s plans had succeeded, Cambodia would be a nation with… a lot of rice. Guys, this is not the best of plans! This would be hilarious if it weren’t unspeakably horrific.

And on that note, good night, and thank god it’s not 1970’s Cambodia.

Amir Hekmati, and why I'm not going to Iran

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 16:05:00 +0000

So this fellow Amir Hekmati was an American citizen who went to Iran to visit his grandmothers. The Iranian government detained him in August for supposedly being a spy and sentenced him to death a couple days ago. Story from BBC.

This is the first case I’ve heard that indicates that I might be in danger if I visit Iran. Every argument against visiting Iran up until now has been either a vague worry that their people hate us (false) or a statement about international politics (unrelated to my visit there, unless war breaks out while I’m there). But here is a case where an American visited basically for reasons of tourism, and now might be executed.

But there must be some mitigating factor, right? I mean, they couldn’t have just picked up some tourist; there must be some reason they think he’s a spy. Well, he was a dual citizen, which Iran doesn’t recognize, so they saw him as an Iranian citizen, which I’d think would make him less suspicious, but what do I know. Also, he worked for a company that made video games including one called “Assault on Iran”. So that makes him different from me, right? I haven’t worked for a company that Iran thinks is a “spying tool”… wait, yes I have.

Huh! Well, this raises in my mind the possibility that I might be, erm, executed, from 0% to 0.01%. Too high for comfort. Especially because I’m restricted to a group tour, which might be expensive and lame anyway.

Well, dang. Guess this adventure will be… indefinitely postponed. Hey, if you’re somewhat less at risk than I am from Iran, and you’re thinking about going there, please hit up Pars Travel Agency, as they’ve been nothing but helpful to me in getting my visa and planning my trip, and I can’t even pay them any money.

What to do instead when I arrive in Dubai on Feb 22? I’m thinking either just fly on to Turkey real quick, start on my bike trip early, or hop over to Oman for a week or so first.

I'm trying not to be entirely autistic about beach vacationing

Tue, 10 Jan 2012 12:21:00 +0000

We’re in Otres Beach, near Sihanoukville, Cambodia. This is a resortey area, but it is the quietest and nicest beach around Sihanoukville.

Jay: So what do you do at this beach?

Me: I don’t know. I don’t know what do you do at any beach. What do you do at the beach?

Jay: What do you mean, “what do you do at the beach?”?

Me: Everyone’s just sitting around! I guess you sit around for a while. And swim for a while. Sometimes you have to eat some food. Then what?

But this confused spell only lasted a short time. So the food is very good, first of all. You can also drink coffee or beer. Swimming is fun. I’ve caught up on all my internetting. You can walk on the beach. Also you can rent things. I went paddleboarding, where you can stand up on a board and paddle like a gondolier. And we’ve played a lot of chess. We’re evenly matched, so that is fun.

We are staying here, “Mushroom Point.” It’s very good.

It’s a nice place! Really relaxed, quiet, not crowded. Spending only two days here is a little rushed, but I could see losing a lot of time if we didn’t have a definite ending point, and there are things to do and places to go! Phnom Penh tomorrow, Singapore the next day, and then Australia.

Visiting the So O Choam School

Sat, 07 Jan 2012 10:43:00 +0000

Over two years ago, we got a bonus at Google, and some coworkers and I decided that we wanted to donate it. So we met a couple times, picked an organization, and sent them about $14000, which after Google matched it, became $28000. That organization was American Assistance for Cambodia, and that $28000 was more than enough to build a school in rural Cambodia.

Yesterday, Raph and I, along with Chamroeurn from AAfC, got to visit that school. Wow! There are 138 students who now have a place to study.

They had an opening ceremony with local officials and all the students. As one of the donors, I was asked to give a short speech. This was all a bit weird, but I guess for every school that AAfC opens, they hold an opening ceremony. This was the kind of thing I hated as a kid. I can't imagine it was fun for anyone. Well, at least it was kinda short.

But then we got to visit the classrooms and talk with the students. This was kind of awkward too (what do you ask a group of 40 9th-graders that you share no languages with?) but it was fun to just hang out with the students for a while. They seemed pretty enthusiastic. A lot friendlier and more eager than my friends and I in middle school. I got a sense that they saw this school as an opportunity, not just some dumb place they had to go.

9th grade

8th grade

7th grade

Some info about the school: it's a 7th-9th grade school, AKA "secondary." After the students finish, they can go to the high school, which is 30km away- a 40 minute drive, if you have a ride. They learn a bunch of subjects- Khmer, English, math, physics, chemistry, biology, history, and more I guess. Our money paid for the school's construction, while the teachers are paid by the Ministry of Education. (which means that the school won't stop running if the money we donated runs out.)

It's awesome that this school is here. It's way out in the sticks, 2 hours off the main road; if these students didn't have this school, I don't know how they'd get to another school. It's in the Samlot district, in the Battambang province. This was an area with a lot of fighting. When Chamroeurn asked the 8th grade class how many of their parents were (conscripted) Khmer Rouge soldiers, about 80% of the class raised their hands. This is a place that needed a school.

Some downsides: it's just 3 rooms. Few improvements, no electricity. When they asked what we should do with the extra money, we said "whatever you think is best for the school." Apparently, our lack of decision has led to the money sitting in the bank. But it's clear that the one thing that students and teachers both want most is computers, so I can ask AAfC to spend the money on computers and solar panels.

After visiting the classrooms, we took pictures and played games, as classes were over for the day. I only got about 2 hours total to spend there before we had to head back- it was about a 6-hour drive from Siem Reap, where we were staying and where Jay was recovering. But still, great to see that our money's gone to a great cause, and that they seem to be doing well.

Towards the end, the English teacher, even though he's the one doing the hard work and we just wrote some checks, approached me and said: "Thank you for giving me a school."

Lots more photos here (thanks to Raph!)

Vacation mode engaged. Oh, and I guess I saw a world wonder.

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 16:23:00 +0000

Things feel different in Cambodia. I feel like I’m on a regular ol’ vacation. Given that I’ll only be in this country for about 9 days, I have about as much time as I had on regular ol’ vacations too. Next I’ll be in Singapore for 3 days, on another vacation in Australia/New Zealand, and soon after on a guided tour in Iran. I’m switching modes, from India mode to bunch-of-vacations mode. It’s different and pleasant. But fast moving! Here’s what’s up.

Jan 3: finally leave Bangalore, land in Bangkok at 6:40AM, meet Jay and Raph at their hostel. Skytrain to Mochit Bus Station, bumble around until we finally found a bus to Aranyaprathet, eat a waffle, take that bus, pass Cambodian immigration, take a shuttle to the bus depot, get herded onto “the last bus of the day”, stop somewhere for some unknown reason, finally get to Siem Reap.

Jan 4: sleep until noon. Get out and about at 2pm. Realize it is not worth going to temples today, as they close at 6. Find and take a cooking class.

Go to the market first

Raph and Jay cookin'

Raph is proud

Jan 5: Angkor! This place is so huge. I had no idea. It has dozens of temples. Angkor Wat is just one of them; it is the biggest, but by no means the best. Bayon is another cool one, mostly because it has big faces all over it. It looks kind of like it was made by aliens. Ta Prohm is the third most famous, mostly because it is sort of overgrown and was used in the movie “Tomb Raider.” (really? it takes a movie based on a video game based on a woman with big boobs to make it famous?)

After those three, there are some other ones, like Preah Khan, Baphuon, and Ta Keo. When you’re zipping through them all day, it’s easy to get jaded. The LP says “don’t do Angkor in one day!” and I think it’s not because you can’t, but because you’d probably get more out of it if you took a couple days. Well, one day is what we had.

My reactions? Well, I don’t need to tell you that it was amazing and that you should go there if you’re nearby. Everyone else on the planet is already there. It feels a little like Disneyland- timing your visits to avoid crowds, sweating to death, etc. But the temples are so cool, it’s worth it.

Photos!

Angkor Wat, and this photo is the highlight of my collection

Bayon

Ta Prohm

There is a dinosaur there! How did the Angkor people know about dinosaurs?

Many more photos in the photos link above! Tomorrow Raph and I visit a school (Jay is ill; wish him well!), and soon after that we go to a beach.

Practical tip: generally you ride bikes or hire a tuk-tuk driver to see the temples. As Jay cannot ride bikes (you can mock him when he gets better), we hired a driver. His name was Sam and he was pretty good. His phone number is 107691328. Also, our hostel, the Angkor Wonder Hostel, is pretty great.

A bit of reflection on India, and why I'm going to Iran

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 15:38:00 +0000

I was thinking about the top most transcendent experiences in my India/Nepal/Bhutan trip. Not the most fun ones- those would be the times I met up with my friends- but the most out-of-the-ordinary and memorable ones. They are something like this:

And I realized, these all have two things in common: a little lurch in my stomach and a sense of "yes! let's do an adventure!" Not a big lurch- these are all things that are not at all dangerous. But they each took me a bit out of my comfort zone.

I feel the same way about biking through Europe, and I feel the same way about visiting Iran.

Here is a google map of all the places I went in India.

Tue, 03 Jan 2012 15:42:00 +0000

Feast your eyes on this! I’d embed it, but it’s got so many points it almost freezes my tiny little eeepc.

So what do I think about this trip through India? Beats me! I’m just starting to get perspective on about the first couple months of the trip. Give me a few weeks.

(by the way, I just fixed the “photos” link above. if you’ve been unable to see any recent albums, try it now.)

An Unparalleled Practice Experience in Equanimity

Mon, 02 Jan 2012 18:08:00 +0000

My meditation teacher and friend from Seattle, Ven. Dhammadinna, quite eloquently used those words to describe Delhi. These past 24 hours have been as well.

In short: I had a lot of bureaucratic run-around and got stuck in Bangalore for an extra day. In long…

6pm last night: arrive in Bangalore airport from Trivandrum, ready to head to Bangkok. My flight doesn’t leave until 1:30am, but it’s not enough time to go anywhere, and I’m tired.

7pm: eat a terrible Cafe Coffee Day sandwich, as it’s the only thing to eat in the limbo before checkin.

10:30pm: check-in opens for my flight. I have 3 hours; what could go wrong?

10:35pm: get to immigration. I survey the 12 officers; who looks friendly? I pick the wrong one.

10:36pm: “…sir, I think you will not be flying today.”

Let me explain. Remember my lengthy rant about trying to figure out the ins and outs of the “two month rule”? After literally two days online, the best I could figure is: you’re not allowed to re-enter within two months of leaving, unless you get a re-entry stamp from an embassy in the country you’re visiting in between (Nepal in my case). You can get that stamp if there’s an emergency OR if you’re just touristing in neighboring countries. The stamp says “visitor must register at the Foreigner’s Regional Registration Office (FRRO) within 14 days of re-entering the country.” So I tried to do so in Darjeeling, but the guy there said “you only have to register if you’re staying in the same place; since you’re touristing around, no need.” I pushed him a bit, but he wouldn’t register me. So I figured, that sounds reasonable; the registration is probably for the “emergency” case and not the “tourist” case. Heck, I don’t know if I even needed the stamp from Nepal. And what can they do? I’m already back in the country. I put it out of my mind until… now.

10:38pm: he sends me to the officer at the end of the line. That officer confirms, yep, see, you didn’t register, and the stamp says “you must register.” I explain that I tried, but there is no reasoning with him. He tells me to wait over there.

11:30pm?: a couple times, different guys explain the same thing to me. I try all the reasonable arguments: “I tried to register”, “but I just need to leave the country”, “please isn’t there anything you can do, I have to meet some people”, and “look at me I’m pitiful”. I don’t know what has even a remote chance of working; obviously none of these.

11:40pm: officer #2 gives me the address of the FRRO and says “you just go there tomorrow, get the stamp, no problem.” Yes problem! Goddamn…

12am: From just outside the airport, I try to contact someone at Bangkok Airways to change my flight before it takes off. Of course, they fly one flight a day from Bangalore, so there’s no counter, so I have to call on the phone. Both their local office in Bangalore and their office in Bangkok are closed, of course.

12:30am: A kind Bangkok Airways representative is helping me. He asks where I’ll stay. “I don’t know! I’ll go hunting for a hotel at midnight?” He points me to the hotel-reservations counter. I take a place as close as possible to the FRRO; it’s still 5km away and costs $20. I don’t have much choice.

12:35am: I take a cab to the city. Again, not much choice. It’s the absurd-for-India price of $15.

1:30am: Arrive at the Hotel T.A.P. Silver Square. At least it’s clean. Ignore the garbage on the stairs and the nightclub one floor below. For once, I thank God for the 11:30pm city-wide closing time.

6:30am: Wake up, snooze my alarm, then finally roll out of bed and catch a tuk-tuk. tuk tuk tuk tuk tuk. It is important that I…

7:30am: Get to the FRRO before it opens at 9am. I am the first one there. I start reading Game of Thrones on my Kindle.

8am: A couple early birds show up.

9am: The FRRO is ready for business. I get a form and a number. My number is 001. So that means I’ll be out of here quickly, right?

9:15am: I talk to a fellow at the Scrutiny Desk (yes) and find out that my required documents are mostly just passport copies (easy) and proof of where I’m staying. So… my hotel. For some reason, they need proof that I am staying at my hotel for one night. And this proof comes in the form of a letter, on hotel letterhead, stating my name, passport number, and duration of stay, with the hotel manager’s signature and (I kid you not) official seal. I head for the hotel to get this thing.

tuk tuk tuk tuk tuk. (I usually only take tuk-tuks when I’m in a hurry. I took a lot of tuk-tuks today.)

9:45am: Ask my hotel guy for a letter on letterhead. His printer is broken, and he has no letterhead. The other hotel owned by the T.A.P. group has letterhead, but it is 5 traffic-choked kilometers away. He does have an official seal, though! I decide to type up a thing, have him sign and seal it, and plead that official letterhead was “not possible.”

10:00am: Find out that the only internet cafe around opens at 10:30. This city runs late.

10:30am: Show up there. It’s some fancy-pants Reliance rent-an-office deal and the least money I can pay to type for 5 minutes and print is 225 rupees. Whatever! Okay! Please, my wallet is too heavy! Also, their computers are terrible. Well, at least I have 4 whole hours of internet. I type a thing and print. I type some other letters too (“dear FRRO, I would like to request blah blah, here is my itinerary”) just in case.

tuk tuk tuk tuk tuk

11:00am: I hand the guy at the Scrutiny Desk (indeed) a stack of documents. As he paws through them, I realize I never went back to the hotel to get the manager to sign/seal that letter. It ends “Signed, (blank)”. Oh god. I just bluff my way through; somehow, in about a half hour of scrutiny, he never notices or cares.

11:30am: “You go upstairs.” Woo- level up!

11:31am: I go to Desk 5 and am told, no, go to the IO/ISH desk. Okay. There is a brief interlude when a lady distributes Happy New Year cake to the workers.

11:40am: IO/ISH Lady scribbles something.

11:45am: Desk 5 Guy scribbles something.

11:50am: “You go to the bank, ask for a DD. Demand Drop.” What? “Demand Drop.” I get the sense it’s a money order. I also get the sense that I have to pay 1395 rupees ($28), y’know, because I was late registering. Because of Darjeeling FRRO guy. This is why you build money cushion into your travel budget!

12:00pm: I find a Bank of Baroda. They give me a form for a Demand Draft. (oh.) The cost, including DD charge, is 1505. Ah, but they cannot debit the money from my account, I need cash. I have very little cash, because I thought I was leaving the country. I go to use their ATM; it is broken.

12:10pm: Find another bank. Withdraw 3000 rupees. Realize that they might balk if I give them 2000 for a 1505 bill, so I look for a way to get 5 rupees change. Spy a coconut guy.

12:20pm: One delicious coconut later, coconut guy has no change. I marvel at the fact that, in the critical path to get my FRRO registration and thus to leave the country, I am trying to find change to pay the coconut guy. If you give a mouse a visa… Luckily, a nearby guy has change.

12:30pm: Get the DD. I recall that Desk 5 Guy also said I should get a xerox of the DD. Why? Was it just for my records? Well, I’ll try anyway. At the first xerox shop, the guy is out, and they don’t have xeroxes anyway. I get it at the second shop.

1:00pm: Desk 5 Guy sends me to Desk 2 Guy to hand him the DD. Desk 2 Guy gives me a receipt and sends me to “the desk that way.” Up more stairs? Nope, the people upstairs are confused about why I’m there. I ask Desk 2 Guy again, and he says Desk 5. Well, why didn’t you say so? Desk 5 Guy asks for the xerox, which I hand him, and breathe a sigh of relief that I got it. And then: “You come back, 3 o’clock.” That is a good sign!

1:10pm: Eat a biryani at Kebab Palace, let slip a sigh of relief, and figure I better get on to my next task: rebooking my flight. I call Bangkok Airways. Prakash and I are having communication issues, so he invites me to just go there in person. It’s near MG road, so near my hotel, but far from the FRRO.

tuk tuk tuk tuk oh shit

1:15pm: Realize I left my bag, including a few probably-inessential documents and my Kindle case. My Kindle case contains two months’ worth of bottle caps and ticket stubs, and my Kindle. Not the end of the world, but … damn! We’re almost at Bangkok Airways, so I just figure I’ll get it later. Now there are three major things I’m worried about.

1:30pm: Prakash at Bangkok Airways is friendly, but can’t rebook me, and can only refund $80 of my $240 ticket. This is because it was for yesterday, and I just didn’t show up. But but but I was trying to call, and I only just had this visa issue, and and … to quote They Might Be Giants, “Lose, sucka! Lose again!” I would be slumping back to the FRRO, but I’m still panicking about my Kindle, so instead I high-tail it to Kebab Palace.

tuk tuk tuk tuk tuk

2:00pm: They’ve got my Kindle! Yes yes yes hooray thank you thank you. I don’t know how to thank people a lot in a short time, or I would do so.

2:15pm: Kill time by looking up ticket-to-Bangkok prices. There is really only one flight to take, and I guess it will cost me $180. What can I do? I dawdle and don’t book anything, because I’ll just book after I get my FRRO stamp, just to make sure.

2:50pm: I am so excited, like a kid on Christmas, I can’t wait, so I go back to Desk 5 Guy at the FRRO. He has me sign a paper, writes something in my passport, and I am done! Sweet sweet victory, and in under 8 hours too.

3:10pm: Back at an internet cafe, I find that my $180 ticket has jumped to $250. What! In those 20 minutes! There is much wailing and gnashing of teeth. I figure I’ll call Prakash, maybe there is something he can do. He’s busy but he says he’ll call me back.

3:30pm: Is there ever something he can do! I thought my ears deceived me as he said “It will be just 1500 rupees.” ($30) I guess he found some loophole because it was a one-way ticket or something? Whatever, I am not asking questions. I am motoring it over to Prakash’s office.

tuk tuk tuk tuk tuk (I am getting good at this by now. All the tuk-tuks have meters, but they’ll actually pull the “meter is broken” nonsense and ask you to pay a higher fixed price. If they do that, just walk away instantly. They’ll track you down and magically their meter will be working. Also, grab the guys driving down the street, not the ones waiting; they’ll usually just give you the meter fare. The waiting guys will try to get meter + 20 or worse.)

4:14pm: Cosmic shout-out of thanks to Prakash for working this out. Ticket, FRRO paper, and Kindle in hand, I am a happy man.

4:30pm: I go back to my portable office to handle some other future airline ticket bookings. My credit cards are declined, and my frequent flyer booking has an unspecified error. Lose again!

6-8pm: finally shower, take a nap.

8:30pm: head to the airport.

tuk tuk tuk tuk bus bus bus bus

10:30pm: boarding pass in hand, I approach the immigration desk with some trepidation. A kindly older fellow inspects my passport. I explain how I went to Nepal and Bhutan for three weeks in November. He points to my FRRO registration and even the re-entry stamp from Nepal and says, as the camera zooms in for the punchline, again I kid you not:

“You were just visiting Nepal and Bhutan? Then this was not necessary!”

It is the full southernmost point only

Sun, 01 Jan 2012 16:57:00 +0000

Ram, Nicole, and I spent a couple days in Kanyakumari, the very tip of India. There’s not a lot to do besides look at the sea, but we gladly did that. I guess you could also buy some cheap junk. You could get sick and spend a day in bed (Ram did that). You could go to the Swami Vivekananda memorial rock or watch a magic show, but we just missed the timings to do both. Nevertheless, we enjoyed looking at the sea, reading some books, and nomming awesome-as-usual food.

This is so far south. Can you tell how far south it is?

One of these people is really cool.

And then New Year’s happened, so we watched fireworks on the roof. That was nice.

Practical tips: we stayed at Hotel Krishna for Rs1000 for a 3-bed room, the cheapest option we could find. It’s about 3 hours from Trivandrum by bus (direct or change in Nagercoil) or train.