Life in a Box

I work a corporate job and sit in a cubicle now.  I tacked some photos of trips from the past few years (Fiji, Australia, Thailand, Cambodia, Nepal, Philippines, Morocco, Korea) to my cube walls not only to brighten the place up, but to remind myself that I used to do such awesome things.  A lot of people have stopped to comment on them, asking if I took the pictures out of magazines, then expressing their admiration when I say I took them all myself.  They tell me I'm doing the right thing-traveling while I am young and have the opportunity.  But I think those glory days are over.  There is no world tour planned this year.  There may not ever be another.  It makes me sad.  What started out as something fun to do morphed into a passion, and even more, the journey to finding myself.  Those pictures are more than just snapshots of a cool trip-they are moments that defined who I am today.  They're reminders that I'm more than just my desk job.  They were my life and my homes.  It's such an odd feeling to look at them from where I am now.  I remember where I was, how I felt, and even who I was when I took each picture.  I haven't taken any pictures in a while.  It's been months since I've experienced anything new and foreign.  It will probably be a couple years before I am able to do a big trip again, probably not until my second spring semester of grad school which hopefully will begin next fall.  But I will wander again.  It's who I am and who I probably always will be.  The great wide open is calling for me, and this native is getting restless.

Great Ocean Road

Great Ocean Road in southern Victoria in Australia was an incredible experience.  It was well worth the couple hundred dollars spent on car hire, hotels and gas.  You truly felt like you were on the edge of the earth.  Sure, there were throngs of tourists there, buses and buses of them, but when you looked out over the 12 Apostles, you felt like you were alone in the universe.  The heavens opened up just for you and nothing else existed except this moment, right now.  I hated to have to leave.

Walking in Kathmandu

Taking a walk in Kathmandu was quite an interesting experience, filled with temples and tea and monkeys and...sex talk with a Nepalese man...

One day when I was in Kathmandu, I decided I wanted to go to Durbar Square and the Monkey Temple (not it's real name but that's what everyone calls it).  I somehow got an unwanted tour guide accompanying me, which turned out to be an interesting event.  He wasn't just a bum off the street at least.  He was well dressed and youngish and seemed to know what he was talking about.  He told me he had majored in history in university so he knew all about Kathmandu.  Of course he could have made everything up and I wouldn't know the difference, but he seemed legit.  He showed me around town and took me for tea overlooking the square, on my dime of course.  We had interesting conversations about life in Nepal and he mentioned that he was married with children.  More on that later.

View from the tea house

Afterwards he took me to the Monkey Temple, which was super because I never would have found it using the stupid Lonely Planet map.  He was also rather helpful in pointing out my fly was unzipped.

The Monkey Temple is situated on top of a mountain with breathtaking views of Kathmandu.  Literally, breathtaking.  Kathmandu is a mile or so above sea level, which I'm just not used to, so it was quite an exhausting hike.  It was a gorgeous climb though.  The side of the mountain is draped in prayer flags and gold Buddha statues.

True to its name, there were a lot of monkeys at the Monkey Temple.  My guide didn't seem as enthused as I was and he kept walking ahead while I squealed like I had never seen a monkey before and took a hundred pictures of them.  And then one tried to attack me so I ran away and left.

Scariest monkey ever.  She growled at me and chased me down the stairs.

After the close call with the mama monkey, we took a cab back to town and he said he wanted to treat me to dinner.  We went to a place serving momos, which are Nepalese dumplings.  Very delicious.  We ordered a few different kinds to share.  While we ate, he was telling me about his family and how his wife was really ugly (a point he'd mentioned a few times before).  He asked if I wanted to see a picture of her and I said yes.  Of course I want to see the troll he was married to.  But surprisingly she wasn't the least bit trollish.  She looked pretty normal to me and I told him that and he brushed me off like I was crazy.

He told me that he used to cheat on his wife all the time because she was ugly, but once they had kids he stopped cheating so much because there's a high HIV rate in South Asia and he didn't want his kids to grow up without a father.  A noble thought, I suppose....although I did wonder why he would marry and have children with someone he found so repulsive.

I said I felt sorry for his wife because he cheated on her and he said she didn't care, that's just how it's done in Nepal.  I thought he was spouting BS, but now that I've been around to a few more countries and have heard the same excuse, I think maybe there's some truth to it.

Anyway, my guide proceeds to tell me about how slutty Australian girls are and how they always want to have sex with Nepalese guys and basically every time he's taken an Aussie girl on a tour he's hooked up with them.  That's probably why he likes being a tour guide so much.  But apparently his man whoring days are over and he's trying to be faithful to his troll wife.  He seemed pretty bummed out about it.  At least he can always relive his glory days with unsuspecting Yankee tourists.  In any event, talking about his crazy sex life was one of the highlights of my Nepal visit.

Funnest Taxi Ride Ever?

Last weekend, my friend and I were sitting on a park bench near the Caribbean Sea, in a town about 40 minutes outside of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.  We were looking to make our way to the airport when we were approached by a man offering to take us on his motortaxi for $5 less than what cab drivers were charging.  Happy to save money, and even more happy to be taking a motor bike instead of a car, we agreed and the three of us hopped onto the little bike.  As it was a 2 seater, the driver ended up sitting on the frame of the bike and my friend and I occupied the seats.

About halfway through the journey, he explains that he needs to stop un momento.  We get off the bike and he starts pumping the front wheel.  I remember telling my friend that this is the funnest taxi ride ever.  It was thrilling to be driving down the side of the highway, giant trucks and cars speeding past, knowing that one wrong move while swerving to avoid potholes in the road could spell the end of us.  

Our driver tells us to get back on.  I'm sitting in the middle, so he tells me to get on first.  I swing my leg over the seat and I feel an odd sensation in my leg that almost immediately turns to pain.  I pressed my calf against the exhaust pipe and the back of my leg is burned!

I don't have time to explain what's happened before our driver hops on and starts driving again.  The whole time I am gritting my teeth, biting my lip and holding back tears, trying to ignore the pain that's radiating up my leg.  I can only imagine what it must look like.  I figured it would be a nasty blister, perhaps with some blood trickling down the back of my leg for good effect.

We finally get to the airport and I'm able to examine my injuries.  

A nice burn, complete with 3 oozy blisters.  It wasn't as awful as I was expecting, but it hurt like hell.  Luckily the airport had a pharmacy so I went in and made a sad face and said me duele.  The 3 girls behind the counter conferred and eventually picked out the perfect cream for me for $10.  I put it on and put a couple bandages on and in less than an hour it stopped hurting.  

A week later, the red circle has shrunk in half and there are three little scabs where the blisters were.  It's itchy and ugly, so I can't help thinking that I'm a little strange that I still consider that ride to the airport the funnest taxi ride ever.

New Year, New Job, New Resolutions

I made quite a good list of resolutions this year, and unlike most years, I actually set a time limit on them.  It's so easy to say 'I'm going to lose weight this year', or 'I want to travel more', but it's another thing to actually DO what you say you will.  So this year, my goals are:

1. Get a job by the end of January
2. Sign up for PADI certification with my first paycheck
3. Run a 10k in March
4. Finish my stupid book and get it up for sale by the end of April
5. Have at least 1 travel article published by the end of June
6. Move to L.A.
7. Travel to at least 5 countries by December

I'm already ahead of schedule!  I started applying for jobs last Wednesday, I got a call on Monday to come in  to a temp agency to interview, then I got another call on Tuesday saying I got the job I was hoping to get.  I started today.  So that means next week I will be signing up for my PADI class!  2 down and it's not even the middle of January yet!  

Why is it...

That the worse your trip is, the more fondly you look back on it?

Midnight in the Sahara

I went camping in the Moroccan Sahara back in early October.  We slept out under the stars instead of in the tents, which seemed like a good idea at the time and still seems like a good idea now, surprisingly.  I didn't get much sleep that night because 1. it was freezing and 2. I couldn't stop watching the sky.  There was a full moon that night, so we weren't able to see as many stars as you usually can, which was kind of sad.  However, it was a blessing in disguise because it was soooo bright that you didn't have trouble walking around without a flashlight when you had to find a bush to squat behind when you needed to pee.

The sky was so big in the Sahara.  I wished on lots of shooting stars that night (none of which came true.  I'm lucky like that).  You could see satellites orbiting the earth, which was really cool since I've never seen that before.  The coolest part was watching the stars move across the sky as the earth turned.  You could literally follow them with your head throughout the night until they dipped behind the dunes in the west.  It was one of my favorite nights ever.