One Man Luge

Vote Blanc> Travels

2006-12-18T21:38:00.001+01:00

What I failed to mention in earlier posts was I had a hidden agenda for traveling to Haiti. As readers of my blog may know, I am pretty dissatisfied with the US government and have suggested several “big ideas” on how to fix our country. I figured Haiti would be a good place to test out the popularity of my ideas and I began a last minute campaign to become the mayor of the town of Camp-Perrin.

Being the only white person for miles around and that most Haitians refer to foreigner’s, no matter what color they are, as “Blanc” (which of course translates to “white” in English) I decided to go with the slogan, “Vote Blanc.” Using my 5 big ideas (Renewable Energy revolution, Take the money out of politics, Independent judges fix the countries gerrymandered voting districts, universal healthcare, remain religion neutral) for the Democratic party, I carved out a somewhat nonsensical platform that seemed to go over everybody’s head. (Although being Voodoo neutral was a vote getter.) My campaigning was mostly door to door hand shaking, but I also had some local street toughs spray-paint “Vote Blanc” on every surface they could find.

Apparently my message resonated with the citizens of Camp-Perrin as I won with a 10% margin of victory. While I was proud of my win as a write-in candidate, the truth is I benefited heavily from ballots that had not been filled in, which were liberally interpreted to be votes for me. The following morning before my flight back to Port-Au-Prince, I gave a victory speech in a packed town square full of my jubilant supporters. I explained, through an interpreter that I would bring good times to Camp-Perrin. I asked that all able bodied men be assembled for a raid of Antigua. (All-inclusive package resorts= Good plunder. Also I figure an easy victory could be good for morale and help me get elected to a second term as a war mayor.) I would also enact a “no broken windows” NYC style police force, consisting of the one police officer in town, a man by the name of Dartigue, who would guard the one unbroken window in town 24-hours a day.

I then announced that I would be running my office from Washington D.C. using the interweb and I did not plan on coming back to Camp-Perrin for at least a few years. I would try to get electricity to the town, followed by phone lines, DSL and eventually a computer so that they could receive my orders and of course, read my blog. I can already hear the chants of 4 more years…

Fun with Democracy> Travels

2006-12-17T18:03:00.000+01:00

December 3^rd, 2006

The next morning we were supposed to meet at 4:30 AM to drive out to Camp-Perrin, the location of 4 out of the 5 voting locations we were scheduled to observe. Hohengo was running late so I knocked on his hotel room door to make sure he was getting ready. I could clearly hear the voice of a woman in his room so that explains why he didn’t come downstairs until 5:00AM. Jerry decided that he would pair up with John and I would be paired up with Hohengo for the day. Hohengo and I, along with my invaluable driver Fabrice took the 45 minute drive over unpaved road to our first polling location, Mercant. Mercant was a school with roughly ten classrooms, all made of cinderblocks that allowed air to flow through during the hot tropical days. All ten classrooms had separate polling stations which were called BVs. If you want more information on the process let me know and I can send you a report that I wrote. Instead I will just give you a rundown and some of the highlights.

First off, we had pretty much no instruction on how to go about our jobs. All of the work I did was just my interpretation of what seemed right in relation to the questionnaire I was given to record my data. My teammate Hohengo was thoroughly confused by the process and ended up just copying down everything that I wrote like a kid who didn’t do their homework. When he wasn’t copying me, he was making some stupid and often highly entertaining mistakes. To begin with he did not understand what the word observation meant, (Nor did John and Jerry for that matter) and he would try to get the poll workers to seal the boxes, straighten out the people in line, etc. I explained to him that we were supposed observe and write down our findings so that future elections could be run better. My favorite part was when I explained to him that we should keep an eye on the voters and make sure that nobody is violating the secrecy of their vote. He immediately walked up behind a voter filling out a ballot and leaned over him to watch what he was doing. A member of the polling staff yelled at him and I just shook my head. For most of the day I worked with my driver and let Hohengo wander around hoping he would keep himself out of trouble.

One of the best ways to find voting irregularities was to listen for arguments. Now perhaps running over to groups of 20 or more angry people yelling at each other may not be a good idea in a country with more guns than butter, but I was armed with my volunteer police training from my beat on the Prague streets. Throughout the day Fabrice and I would listen in to various arguments, which were for the most part non-violent. That was until 3:45 PM, only 15 minutes before the polls were scheduled to close. A crowd of 30 people had assembled around the entrance of one the polling stations and they seemed particularly angry. Fabrice, Hohengo and I made our way through the crowd into the cinder block classroom and through Fabrice I started questioning people to find out what was going on. A man had been accused of attempting to vote twice. I don’t know if he was innocent or guilty, but I was bit worried he was going to get lynched as Haiti is well known for street justice. Outside a pretty big fist fight broke out that tuned into a small riot. It was quickly broken up by the security guards who sprayed the crowd with tear gas. People scattered in all directions with their shirt held over their mouths. Some of the gas came into the polling station but sadly I didn’t cry a tear. This was no “field of dreams” moment for me. In retrospect I wish I had made a stronger effort to enrich my tear gassing story by running outside and spinning around sound of music style in the gas.

Soon after, I went over to a polling station to witness the closing. Right away they committed a major error in the counting process that could have affected the integrity of the results, but as an observer all I could do was write it up in my notes. At about 5:30 the sun went down and from there on I was able to experience Democracy by candlelight, which is pretty romantic. The count finished at 10:23 PM, several hours longer than any other observer in Haiti had witnessed. While voter participation countrywide had been a paltry 10% my particular polling station had a turnout of about 70%. Poor Hohengo missed two dates because of the late closing, but had gotten the phone number of one of the polling station workers. My favorite part of the night was that throughout the count there were many people peering in through the breaks in the cinder blocks to observe the proceedings. It was amazing about how much these people cared about this local election. We got back to our hotel 18 and a half hours after we had left, but all in one piece. Later on that night I would be woken from a deep sleep to be informed that I had been elected mayor of Camp-Perrin.

The Erection Monitor> Travels

2006-12-11T04:51:00.001+01:00

December 2nd, 2006

At 5 AM Hunter and I woke and he drove me to Port Au Prince's airport. There I caught a 7 AM flight aboard a 10 passenger puddle jumper to the city of Les Cayes, a relatively safe city in Southwestern Haiti. The flight followed the Northern coast of Grande Anse, that long stretch of land that juts into the Caribbean towards Jamaica. before crossing over a small mountain range and onto the Southern Coast of Haiti. I was met at the airport by my driver, Fabrice, who luckily spoke English and was a pretty smart dude. Without him I couldn't have done my job properly, but I'll get to that later.

I was driven to a hotel and met my fellow observers for Les Cayes, who had been flown down the day before. All three of them were Haitian Americans that had been living in the US at least 25 years each. In order to protect the innocent I will change their names to Jerry, John and Hohengo. Jerry was assigned to be the leader of our group. He had not been in Haiti for 27 years yet seemed to feel like he owned the place. He did all of this “I am a man of the people” kind of crap that irked me in a big way. John was an OK guy.. The gift of unintentional comedy to the group was Hohengo.

Hohengo was from this area and visited once every few years. He was pudgy, bald, had a goatee and lived in Chicago. He was a nice enough guy, although I was to learn he wasn't all that bright. What Hohengo lacked in brains he made up in virility, although fortunately I can only write this from anecdotal evidence. While Fabrice was driving us around town Hohengo would get Fabrice to stop the car when he saw an attractive woman. He would then wave her over to the car, chat her up and then hand her a stick of gum with his number written on it. Some women seem revolted, some seemed enticed and other seemed to like chewing gum. During his three nights in Les Cayes Hohengo would sleep with at least 5 different women. He was the erection monitor.

We were supposed to spend the day before the election scouting out polling locations, establishing a route and checking for mobile phone reception. Instead, my co-workers decided we would go to Hohengo's home village and hang out for the day. However, visiting Hohengo's village did give me an insight into why so many Haitians risk their lives to make it to the US. I know there are plenty of reasons, but what I was able to see first hand was how Hohengo interacted with the people from his hometown. Most of the people in his village were somehow related to Hohengo and I imagine a lot of them received money from him. Mind you Hohengo is not a rich man, I think he is a cab driver. But like many citizens of developing nations, Haitians depend on the remittances of the diaspora. He was not overtly lording over his hometown, but you could tell he expected to be treated like a returning prince. Again, Hohengo wasn't a bad guy, I just think he let his position in society get to his head. Heck, as a white traveler in developing countries I am sure I act similarly despite my best intentions.

We first visited his family tomb, which like many Haitian graves in the countryside is actually on their front yard instead of in a graveyard. He told me it contained the remains of many of his family members. We also visited his brother's home, one of the only solid modern concrete building in town. His brother had also been to the US, but had moved back to Haiti to raise his kids. We also met one of Hohengo's half brothers, who had never left Haiti. He lived in a small shack and ran a tiny store. He brought us coconuts which we drank and ate under trees from where they had come.

Later we ate lunch at one of Hohengo's cousins, a really nice women that had lived in the US for many years but returned to Haiti to take care of her mother who was suffering from severe Alzheimer's. She showed another side of the diaspora. She had grown up in a small primitive hut, but one of her sons was now going to Johns Hopkins medical school and another had a law degree from Harvard. You can only imagine how hard she had to work to provide her children with the opportunities to get into the world's top Universities.

Whether you want to give your family a chance for a better life, or be a pimp, you can see why people risk life and limb to become Americans. One of the greatest rewards of traveling in countries like Haiti for me is getting a better perspective of just how lucky I am. Wow, this turned out pretty sappy...

On that note, did you know you can hunt the elderly in Haiti? It's just like the movie “Hard target,” staring Jean-Claude Van Damme, only the targets are much softer and can be lured to their deaths with bowls of hot porridge. As lawless as Haiti is, this is only a luxury that foreigners can afford, so again, I feel pretty lucky. Lucky enough to try to get three stuffed octogenarians through customs.

Bad Idea Jeans> Travels

2006-12-11T03:48:00.000+01:00

January 1^st 2006.

OK, I have been a lazy bastard. My apologies, but now I have something I feel like writing about. I have spent the past few days in Haiti, volunteering as an election monitor for Haiti's recent municipal elections. Last month my friend Claire sent me an email asking if I wanted to go to Haiti. I said sure, why not. Claire works for an NGO called Haiti Democracy Project that is trying to help consolidate and improve Haiti's unstable Democratic system. I thought it would be really interesting to see a third world election up close and try to a be a bit of help to a worthy cause.

So I applied to be a volunteer and was accepted, however HDP did not receive their grant money from US AID until 2:30 on November 29^th, a day before I flew to Santo Domingo (I flew into the DR because I figured I could combine the monitoring with a brief trip to the Dominican Republic). Claire had been in Port Au Prince, one of the world's more dangerous cities, for the past three weeks arranging the ground logistics for 50 observers without knowing whether or not they would actually get the grant money to make the project happen. Needless to say she was put in a shitty position, but ended up doing a great job. Meanwhile the director of HDP was in the US getting together the grant money. For some reason he didn't send the potential observers any instructions whatsoever on how an election monitor is to go about doing their job.

Anyway, the funding came through and I flew to Santo Domingo arriving in the afternoon. I had enough time to check out the old town, which contains the New World's first church, Western built military structure, Monastery, Hospital and oddly enough, fax machine. The next morning I boarded a bus to to Port-Au-Prince. I was asked several times why I was going to Haiti and people seemed to feel it wasn't the best place to be. If you don't follow these things, Haiti doesn't have the best reputation for safety and lawfulness. In fact the government recently passed a bill that anything goes once the sun goes down. Total amnesty. Just read what the US State department has to say. “Travel in Haiti is dangerous and not recommended” does not make for a great slogan for the Haitian tourism bureau. Port AU Prince, PAP, is considered by far the most dangerous part of Haiti and kidnappings, gun fights and jaywalking on a massive scale are a daily part of lives for Port-Au-Princians. That said, you are much less likely to have your pocket picked here than say, Paris.

When I crossed the border between the DR and Haiti it was like going from the developing world into the undeveloping world. Did you know that Haiti was the richest Colony in the world in the mid 19^th century. After a successful and terribly bloody slave rebellion between 1791-1804 the GDP has gone down pretty much every single year to the point that Haiti is the poorest country in the Western hemisphere with a median income of 44 cents a day. This country isn't just backwards, it's shifted in reserve and has had the peddle to metal for the past 50 years. For instance, Haiti's national flower is the Florentica Nobalis Duvalierus, which is a purplish grey flower that only grows in piles of garbage. It's technically a mold.

I arrived in PAP as the sun was going down and my friend (and Claire's boyfriend) Hunter and a friend of theirs named Darrin were supposed to pick me up, but were stuck in terrible traffic so were late about 45 minutes. I spent the time standing next to the bus's security guard, who carried a big shotgun. When Hunter finally arrived I was surprised to see that he was driving the car, a large white Montero. The streets here were crazy and I would have been freaked out trying to drive, not to mention the security threat. I was also surprised to find out that I would be flying to Les Cayes, a city in the South West the next morning at 7AM. Anyway, we picked up Claire and took off for a guesthouse on the other side of town. Hunter and Claire seemed pretty comfortable just driving around past slums and had come to the conclusion that it was highly unlikely unless you had a fixed routine that you would be kidnapped. Why? Because the traffic is so bad it would be very hard to make a getaway.

One of the first thing I noticed is there were just a ton of people just hanging out on the “streets” in complete darkness. PAP only has city wide public electricity 2-4 hours a day so the streets are pitch dark with the only light coming from burning piles of garbage and car headlights. Speaking of garbage, the “streets” were covered in piles of it as Haiti has no public garbage collection. I write “streets” in quotes because they are more like a series of potholes and craters that run through Haiti where cars tend to drive.

Later that night we drove to the Hotel Montana, one of PAP's most expensive hotels and where most of the election observers were staying. (Claire, Hunter, Darrin and I stayed at a great Catholic Missionary guest house) There we were supposed to be briefed on what exactly being a election monitor entailed. For some reason the head of HDP, Claire's boss decided not to and all we were given were the questionnaires we would have to fill out to report our findings. Yeah, all of this work and money to get us out there and none of the observers knew what we were doing... yup.

#38> The 100 Most Underwhelming Tourist Attractions in the World

2006-10-06T03:04:00.000+02:00

One of Brussels most famous tourist attractions is the Manneken Pis. It's a tiny statue of a little boy seeing a man about a dog, so to speak. It's a close call, but it is not quite as underwhelming as Copenhagen's Little Mermaid because of it's 17th century cheekiness. Also, it is a bit closer to the center of the city, so it's easy to get to, unlike the Mermaid which is a bit out of the way. You can see by the collectible postcard below that tourists in my photo are looking for something interesting to enjoy, turning away from the blight that is Manneken Pis. I suppose if you have a liking for urology or pedophilia this is well worth a visit... You sick bastard.

So Tired> Re-pated

2006-10-04T01:31:00.000+02:00

I am back in New Jersey now, visiting my parents for a spell while I figure out where I am moving to next. This morning my landlady came to my apartment in Prague to inspect the apartment and give me back my deposit. A long story short, I got my deposit back, but only after some strong languaged threats and some physical intimidation. I hate Prague real estate so much. My flight was pretty uninventful. Lufthansa played two chick flicks for the in-flight movies, the devil wears Prada and some shit with Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves. That was painful. My mother picked me up at the airport and I noticed there was some smoke coming out from the front wheel of the car. Another long story short, we had to call AAA and my father is currently waiting (2 hours and counting) with the car one town over. I am off now to watch the Yankees first game of the playoff. Get angry boys!

Small Hands, Smell like Cabbage> Travels

2006-09-30T16:52:00.000+02:00

Yesterday Kyra and I stumbled upon a little bush-league amusement park. Oh, the smell of cabbage was in the air. All of the employees here were authentic carnies and without exception drunk. We found an old school shooting game and I did pretty well. After hitting the bumper cars we went on one them tilt-a-whirl dealies and both got thoroughly nauseas. (In fact several people in line for the ride actually walked away after seeing us get off, we were that green.) It was then that we stumbled upon these strange and dated Beverly Hills 90210 characters painted on the outside of a haunted house. And yes we went in there too. A cut out wooden Shannon Doherghty would yell at us for looking at a cut out wooden Dylan with and I quote, "Man-stealin' eyes."
Scary shit.

Amazing Race> Stuff

2006-09-28T12:56:00.000+02:00

Sorry about the long absence. I now have an interweb connection, but alas, I have been a bit lazy. Kyra and I have been enjoying our last week together, in Prague. She is off to London on Monday, I am off to the US on Tuesday and that's about all I will write on the subject.
Last night we watched the second episode of this seasons Amazing Race. It took them from Beijing to Mongolia and was shot in the places we first met. The travel logistics in Mongolia happened to by handled by Ger to Ger, the non-profit that took Kyra and I into the Mongolian countryside. Ger to Ger will also be putting together a Mongolia tour for this summer for my new tour company. As we watched I told Kyra that this would be a great promo to reference to on my website. That was until the girl riding the horse was clothlined by a tree and in slow motion fell off her horse. And cried. AND then some other chick feel off her horse and was dragged for 15 feet. And cried. AND then one of the ox got spooked and ran off, nearly running over a one legged contestant. And, yes, she cried too. Yeah, I guess we will have to leave this out of the brochure. The thing is, none of these were flukes. I nearly fell of my horse several times and the ox cart nearly ran over my leg a few times also. Anyway, very entertaining to watch other people go for a similar adventure. Also, watch the Amazing race. I don't ask much.

Salt In The Wounds> Expated

2006-09-21T12:27:00.000+02:00

Surprise! One Man Luge is still being written from a wi-fi internet cafe. That's right, I still do not have internet at my apartment and it won't be installed until Monday at the earliest. This is after my landlord promised it would be ready the day I moved in, this past Friday. Then later they promised it would be up on Tuesday. Then I found out that they had in fact never ordered the internet. So I had to order the internet myself and the internet company told me it would be ready by Thursday, today. I called them today and they told me it won't be installed until Monday. All this so I can have internet for one week to do my job. I am so sick of this shit.

Brazilian Sugar Ethanol> Politics

2006-09-20T16:15:00.000+02:00

Today's NY Times has an op-ed from Tom Friedman on Biofuels. Just read the first three paragraphs to further illustrate how backwardsass our energy policy is.

"I asked Dr. José Goldemberg, secretary for the environment for São Paulo State and a pioneer of Brazil’s ethanol industry, the obvious question: Is the fact that the U.S. has imposed a 54-cents-a-gallon tariff to prevent Americans from importing sugar ethanol from Brazil “just stupid or really stupid.”

Thanks to pressure from Midwest farmers and agribusinesses, who want to protect the U.S. corn ethanol industry from competition from Brazilian sugar ethanol, we have imposed a stiff tariff to keep it out. We do this even though Brazilian sugar ethanol provides eight times the energy of the fossil fuel used to make it, while American corn ethanol provides only 1.3 times the energy of the fossil fuel used to make it. We do this even though sugar ethanol reduces greenhouses gases more than corn ethanol. And we do this even though sugar cane ethanol can easily be grown in poor tropical countries in Africa or the Caribbean, and could actually help alleviate their poverty.

Yes, you read all this right. We tax imported sugar ethanol, which could finance our poor friends, but we don’t tax imported crude oil, which definitely finances our rich enemies. We’d rather power anti-Americans with our energy purchases than promote antipoverty."

Girfacts> Stuff

2006-09-19T14:03:00.000+02:00

I was surfing around on the interweb and I stumbled upon these “Girfacts”. Good times!
-Larry
------------------------------------
Girfacts!- Fun facts about the animal that stand out in a crowd

Even though giraffes are often seen together in groups, they do not form the complex social groups of many plains species. Theirs are loose associations, constantly changing in make-up. A group of giraffes is called a “caboodle”

The giraffe has the same number of vertebrae (seven) in its neck that most other mammals have. They are just really big and elongated.

When giraffes were first brought to Rome in 46 B.C., they were thought to be a cross between a camel and a leopard. Although we've long since learned the giraffe is not a combination of these animals, the scientific name camelopardalis, which means "the fast-walking camel-leopard" stuck.

The word "giraffe" comes from the Arab word xirapha, which means "really tall animal".

Giraffes enjoy watching television

The giraffes life span is 20 to 25 years

The giraffe has the highest blood pressure of any animal in the world. One giraffe heart could pump the blood for 108 human babies!

The giraffe's heart weighs 24 pounds.
The giraffe has the largest soul of any animal.

An adult giraffe's tongue is 18 – 27 inches long

Males and females tend to eat from different parts of a tree to ensure that the sexes do not compete for food.

Newborn giraffe calves begin their lives by falling 6 feet to the ground. (Authors note: My life sadly began in a similar manner, but I survived and it only made me stronger)

Every step a giraffe takes is 15 feet long

A giraffe's kick can kill a lion and propel a football the length of three football fields!

The gestational period of a giraffe is 14 to 14.5 months. It is a popular misconception that male Giraffes can become pregnant. This is simply not true.

A giraffe can drink 12 gallons in one sitting. Milk makes them kind of gassy.

Giraffes rarely lay down; they even sleep and give birth standing up.

A giraffe usually sleeps for only 1 - 12 minutes at a time. When a giraffe goes into a deep sleep it curls its neck back and rests its head on its rump. Giraffes sleep no more than 5 to 30 minutes in a 24-hour period.
The Giraffe’s predators include Lions, Hyenas, Wild Dogs, Leopards and Bears. Fortunately bears are not native to Africa. (In 1993 tragedy struck when the ill conceived “Jirafas y Osos!” enclosure opened to the public at the Parc Zoològic de Barcelona in Spain.)

Giraffes are non-territorial and sociable. They live in loose, open herds.

Giraffes feature in African cave paintings and in ancient Egyptian art and designs.

The Giraffe is considered by the Chinese to be a “rich man’s horse”

A giraffe has 3 speeds: walking, galloping and sauntering.

Giraffes are fast and can reach speeds of up to 35 mph.

Although scientists agree that there is only one species of giraffe, there are many kinds of giraffes in the world : Kordofan Giraffe, Angolan Giraffe, southern Giraffe, Nigerian Giraffe, Mexican Tequila Giraffe, Reticulated Giraffe, Masai Giraffe and Rofts Giraffe.

Giraffes are one of two animals born with horns. The other is the Orangutan, which is born with prehensile horns that fall off within six weeks of birth.

Giraffes live in the African savannah, scrub, and open acacia woodlands south of the Sahara

Like human fingerprints, each giraffe's coat is unique.
The only animal in the world taller than the giraffe is the blue whale, standing upright on its flipper.

Evicted!> Angry Rant!

2006-09-17T17:48:00.000+02:00

So I am now in a new flat in Prague. How did this happen? On Thursday Kyra and I had just gotten back from a nice walk and lunch in our neighborhood. We were in our wonderful apartment and I received a call on my mobile from the owner of the apartment. She told me in very broken English that three Finish girls, who had come by and seen the place the day before, wanted to rent the apartment for a year and then buy it. She told me that Kyra and I would have to move out the next day. Fuck.

Normally I would have had a contract with the landlady to protect me from this kind of shit. I had in fact signed a month long lease with full paper work, but that had expired a few days earlier, on the 9th of September and we had agreed verbally that I would stay until Oct 3rd, when I fly back to the states. I had even paid her full rent up until the 3rd. Without a contract I was shit out of luck and the real estate agent that had found me this apartment informed me that the three girls would move in at 4 on Friday and that she would try to help me find a new apartment for the two and a half weeks I have left in Prague.

I tried to fight it by making both the real estate agent and apartment owner feel terrible about throwing us out. It was incredibly unethical to do that when they could have easily told the Finnish girls that the place was rented for the next two and a half weeks and that they could find them another place until we moved out. This didn’t work and the next morning I went to see the only place the real estate agent could find on short notice that would rent to me for such a short time and that could be equipped with internet by Tuesday, when I start my next contract.

I considered just leaving all of my stuff at a friend’s flat and going on a short vacation with Kyra until the 2nd, but my Swedish client needed me to get to work as some my consulting is tied into a mailing that they have already sent out, making my work time sensitive. So we took the flat after a good deal of bargaining. They wanted 17,000 crowns for the two and a half weeks and I was able to get them down to 13,000 crowns, which was still a big rip off and still more expensive than the apartment I was being kicked out of. To top it off this apartment is run down, with less comforts of home (toaster, nice plates, cookery, towels, bed sheets, etc.), I can’t be guaranteed the internet will be up by Tuesday, the kitchen is hard to work in, the bed has a foam mattress which is f-ing up my back and it’s a much smaller apartment than the last one. Yeah, I am pretty pissed. Once again I have learned the importance of having a contract for everything.

So I am done renting Czech apartments. The one I had from Jan-May was a pain in the ass with internet, the gynecologist toilet and in the end they tried to rip me off on the deposit. This debacle has pushed me over the edge.

One Man Luge Endorses Kinky Friedman> Politics

2006-09-13T11:54:00.000+02:00

It's election time in the US and I am going to throw the weight of opinion carried by this blog behind Kinky Friedman, a "compassionate redneck" running for the governorship of Texas. If you haven't read about him check this out. Also, check out his myspace page. He's a singer, comedian and now populist politician. His campaign really wasn't taken seriously in the beginning and still few people think he can win in the four way race to run Texas.

He's Jewish too and was recently accused of racial insensitivity. This was because he blamed the sharp rise in crime in Houston on Katrina refugees, which is in fact the cause for the rise in crime in Houston. This dude isn't giving into ethnic pandering. One of his quotes I like is, "I don't eat tamales in the barrio, I don't eat fried chicken in the ghetto, I don't eat bagels with the Jews for breakfast," said Friedman, who is Jewish. "That to me is true racism."

His platform carries most of my "Big Ideas", such as getting Texas on 20% renewable energy by 2020 and big tax breaks for biodiesel. Hell, he will make Willie Nelson his energy Czar. He advocates Universal healthcare and he also wants to take the money out of politics. These are some of his other platforms as listed on his wikipedia entry.

* On the death penalty, he previously summed up his position, "I am not anti-death penalty, but I'm damn sure anti-the-wrong-guy-getting-executed". More recently, he has clarified his position, saying: "The system is not perfect. Until it's perfect, let's do away with the death penalty"

* According to his official website, Friedman's answer to the question "How does Kinky feel about abortion?" is "Kinky believes in a woman's right to choose." In person, however, he hedges his bet, saying "I'm not pro-life, and I'm not pro-choice. I'm pro-football."

* On social issues he has supported gay marriage, answering an Associated Press reporter's question on the subject on Feb. 3, 2005, he remarked "I support gay marriage. I believe they have a right to be as miserable as the rest of us" (Friedman himself is not married).

Finally, someone is standing up for what I believe in. And not suprisingly he isn't a Democrat, but an independent. I hope Kinky wins and inspires other independent non-politicians to run for office. Our two political parties have failed us and it is time to kick the bums out.

More Thoughts on Russia> Rant

2006-09-06T13:03:00.000+02:00

I just read an interesting article in Foreign Affairs Magazine entitled “Russia Leaves the West” by Dmitri Trenin. It explained why Putin and Russia have been paying less heed to Western criticism lately and what the future portends. I knew the main reason was that the price of oil is very high and they have a lot of oil. The other reason, which seems pretty obvious, but I hadn’t really though about it, is that Russia doesn’t like the way the Western world treats it. Since the fall of the Soviet Union we have treated them like a developing country instead of the 1st world nation they think they are. Just one example is we let them into the G-7, but they haven’t been given full membership privileges. They feel like the West gives them shit no matter what they do. (Gee, can you think of another Superpower that gets shit no matter what it does?) So much like a pregnant teen on Jerry Springer they said fuck it, “We do what we want… Whatevah.” Anyway, I understand their perspective more now, but I still have some serious problems with Russia. I wrote this in my journal while traveling but forgot to add it to my blog:

“What really jerks my Tolstoy is why Russia is so backwards ass. All over the world places are backwardsass you may be saying. True. I can handle it when it is because people are inept, incompetent and lazy. The thing is in Russia things are this messed up because they want it like this. By "they" I mean the government, the mafia and sadly the people also. I think they like being miserable. One example is playing pool here. The balls are almost larger than the pockets. They need to be wedged in to go down. I played a one hour game of pool that was only finished through some miraculous shots and a tub of Vaseline. Fucking Russia.”

Streets of Shanhaiguan> Traveled

2006-09-04T17:18:00.000+02:00

Bolshevik Rage> Anti-Belarussian Propaganda

2006-08-30T18:20:00.000+02:00

In this article some guy goes off on Belarus. Maybe I was not allowed into Belarus as precaution to protect their elderly population. Fair enough I guess, but they could have let me on the train and kept me shackled to a seat, outside of striking distance from any sectagenarians, octogenarians and nonagenarians. Fuck you Belarus...you goddamned peasants!

Ancient Chinese Scaffolding> Doug Moldover, Guest Blogger

2006-08-29T21:57:00.000+02:00

My friend Gus Jenkinberg, a construction worker I know back in Wisconsin, told me that while I was in China I couldn't miss Lao Long Tou, the first section of the Great Wall located in a small town called Shanhaiguan. When he was there in January for Christmas vacation he saw some triple gated Kingston style scaffolding, only it was made of bamboo! I just had to see this! So I drag the wife and kids out to Shanhaiguan (They wanted to stay in Beijing and go shopping.) and we enter what I think is the entrance gate to Lao Long Tou. It was only after a few minutes and several wasted admission tickets later that I realized this was not the LLT but instead some Great Wall Museum. Fuckers. Fortunately they had one room where they had a life size reproduction of the construction techniques that were used when building the wall. You can see by my picture that the scaffolding they use was a death trap. No wonder so many people died building the wall. I had to fight the impulse to reinforce the joints with duct tape. I wouldn't have had time anyway because Billy pissed all over the reproduction Emperor Qin Shi Huang. That's no way to treat China's first emperor. We finally found the LLT but the triple gated Kingston style scaffolding had been removed (see picture) as the restoration had been finished. What a disappointment. -Doug

#81> The 100 Most Underwhelming Tourist Attractions in the World

2006-08-28T13:07:00.000+02:00

I visited the Terracotta Warriors over two months ago and I still can't quite shake the sense of disappointment they inspired in me. I went pretty far out of my way to see these guys only to find out that most of them have not been uncovered and the ones that have been are all under a huge airplane hanger. Where's your sense of showmanship Shaanxi Province? So they are over 2,200 years old and there are several thousand individually unique soldiers. It just wasn't all that impressive. Check them out and you will feel it too.

Searching for Adventure> Traveled

2006-08-27T11:24:00.000+02:00

Norway
Norway
Bergen, Norway (With Bentine)
Nara, Japan
Itsukushima Shrine, Hiroshima, Japan
In front of Seoul Tower, Seoul, Korea (With Xavier)
Seoul, Korea
At the top of Tai Shan Mountain, Shandong Province, China
At the top of Emei Shan Mountain, Sichuan Province, China
Train to Xian, China (With Shirly)
Big Goose Pavilion, Xian, China
Simitai Section of Great Wall, China (With Jen)
Jinshanling Section of the Great Wall, China
Jiao Shan section of the Great Wall, Shanhaiguan
Temple of Heaven, Beijing
Beijing to Ulan Batur Train
Terelj National park, Mongolia (In Oxcart)
Terelj National Park, Mongolia
Irkutsk, Siberia, Russia
Olkhon Island, Siberia, Russia
Trans-Sib Railroad, Russia
St Basil's Cathedral, Moscow
Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic (With Kyra)

The Cough God> Travels

2006-08-25T12:09:00.000+02:00

I found this in Shanhaiguan, a town at the start of the Great Wall of China.

Now with Pictures> Traveled

2006-08-24T22:00:00.000+02:00

Last night I had this dream that I was in an argument with someone and we both kept trying to get the last word in. I was awoken by the ring of my phone. A friend of mine in the US thought I was home and the call had been forwarded to my Czech Cell phone in the middle of the night. The thing is, I was still half asleep and for 5 minutes kept trying to argue that the letter T could be used as a vowel. I have since been proven wrong.
Anyway, I have gone through my whole Asia trip and illustrated it with pictures so now you can see the 50 kilo tuna I sold as sushi on the streets of Tokyo, Angelo the 6 foot 9 Dutchman and of course, Chairman Combover. The trip starts in June so you will have to go back into the archives to get the full experience. You can click on any of the pictures to see a larger version of the image.

Going to the Country, Going to Pick a lot of Mushrooms> Expated

2006-08-22T21:22:00.000+02:00

This past weekend I went with some friends for a weekend out of town in a small village 2 and a half hours from Prague. There we camped, went to a party for Blacksmiths and picked mushrooms. Allow me to elaborate. We began the trip with Kyra, Nate, Katka and I on a bus playing 20 questions across several rows of non-descript, somewhat interested Czechs. The best answers:
"Wind shield wiper"
"That thing that breaks the glass on a bus when it flips over"
"A first base coach"
"Djibouti"
"Kyra's Belly"
"Two Iains in a wheat egg"

The bus took us to a Karlovy Vary, an old Czech spa town. If you ever wanted to find a lot of old Russian women drinking urine flavored natural mineral water in square-ish shaped ceramic mugs with handles that double as straws, well, you are a sick freak. Oh and this is the place for you. There was lots of nice looking architecture, spigots with different tasting and temperatured water and tourists. Ummm...tourists.

From there we took a train to this small village where we went to some small castle for a blacksmith party. I wish I could say that those blacksmiths know how to party, but to be honest, I am not sure they do. For many, many too many hours, two different blacksmiths would heat and bend pieces of metal, surrounded by a crowd of onlooking blacksmiths and well-wishers while ABBA and Simon and Garfunkel blared in the background. Don't these guys know that blacksmiths are tough and that tough people do not listen to Simon and Garfunkel. Oh, they also dress as pirates.

From there we went to a friends house and camped in his backyard for the night. The next morning we woke up and went mushroom hunting. Apparently this is a very Czech thing to do. You basically wander around forests and find wild growing mushrooms and try your best not to poison yourself and the one's you love/like/loke. Mediocre times! After a long day in the forest we caught a train back to Prague and went to a friends house for some mushroom soup, made from the day's haul. Nobody died or got sick so all in all the mushroom hunt was a winner.

Kamikaze> Doug Moldover, Guest blogger

2006-08-18T12:39:00.000+02:00

On Larry's suggestion I took a vacation in Asia this Summer as well. Here is a photo of Yakumoto, a man I met in Kyoto. As you can tell by the scaffolding, he's a painter. I liked the guy, but come on man, that scaffolding is putting you and passerbys in grave danger. In fact I was so worried I said to him, "Ohio my Japanese friend. Your scaffolding is weak. Are you on some kamikaze mission." The bi-latteral connecting joints looked terrible so I climbed up on the scaffolding and reinforced them with some gaffers tape. I know, it's a quick fix, but I also used a layer of 1/4 inch steel wire to give it some more strength. Hey painters, leave the scaffolding to the big boys!

Buy Me Some Udon and Cracker Jacks> Travels

2006-08-17T12:48:00.001+02:00

Here are some pictures from a baseball game I went to in Hiroshima. The last two pictures are of people blowing up balloons. I am not sure why they were shaped liked penises or why everyone in the stadium had them but us. They were all released at once, which was quite a sight. Also, isn't that the Philadelphia Fanatic on that bike? How did they get him?

Urinals with a View> Travels

2006-08-16T10:57:00.000+02:00

These two urinals are in the highest buildings in Seoul and Shanghai.

Fushimi Inari Taisha Shrine> Travels

2006-08-13T12:47:00.000+02:00

This shrine outside of Kyoto was one of the highlights of the time I spent in Japan. There are thousands of these Tori gates rising up a f orested mountain.

Homeless Men in a Tokyo Park> Travels

2006-08-12T11:08:00.000+02:00

Wow, my very own toilet!> Expated

2006-08-10T13:00:00.000+02:00

I managed to find a new apartment on my second day back in Prague. The one I was supposed to move into is still under construction so I ended up hiring a Real Estate agent and paying through my nose, teeth and 7 out of my ten fingers for a pretty stinking nice flat. It is the apartment of a nice woman who owns a 60's antique store. She is using the rent money I am paying to go on a vacation and possibly buy a small island in the Caribbean. The apartment has two bedrooms, a living room, dining room, piano, kitchen and an Eastern European torture toilet. (If you don't know what one of those is, a clue is it involves a shelf within in the toilet. By the way, this is not a plus for the apartment.) I have three beds in the place so if you ever wanted to visit me in Europe, now would be the time. It is well decorated with stuff too. In fact it was featured on the style segment of a Czech TV show, linked to right here. Fast forward to the 20th minute of the half and hour show. There is my landlord showing some of her things. Anyway, good times. Also, just in case you were wondering, I do not have to share the toilet with a gynecologists office. The realtor thought it was strange when I insisted this specific clause be entered into the lease, but better to be safe than sorry. Sorry= Venereal Disease.

Around the World in 95 days> Traveled

2006-08-08T17:50:00.000+02:00

25,278 miles, 11 countries, 3 continents, 1 tired rogue/traveler/business consultant. Uncountable good times. I'm back in Prague biatch!

Fuck You Belarus> Travels

2006-08-07T09:00:00.000+02:00

Allow me to explain why I hate Belarus and what I am going to do about it.

A man gets on a train. He has been traveling for a while now, a bit weary at this point. He is on his way to Lithuania. He is more than ready to leave Russia, has in fact spent all of his rubles. His Russian Visa is going to expire the next day so he in fact must leave Russia and the night train to Lithuania seems to be the best and least expensive way to do so. The ticket lady inspects his ticket and he boards that train, as stated before. He begins to unpack his things, exchange greeting with his fellow passengers and so on. Then the ticket lady comes onto the train and asks to see his Belarussian transit Visa. The man explains that he is going to Lithuania, not Belarus and that he was not informed (By his lonely planet guide book or the woman selling him his ticket) that the train would infact being transiting Belarus to get to Lithuania. He does not have a Belarussian transit visa. He is asked to leave the train.

Now how much of this is Belarus's fault? Probably not much, but I am blaming them because it feels good. Instead of seeing lovely Lithuania right this minute, I am back at my non-hot water having, non-Visa Card accepting hotel. I have booked a flight to Germany because I have to get out of the country today and that was the only flight I could find under 300 dollars. I don't mind this too much as it will give me a chance to see my good friend Yann, whol lives in Berlin and Steven who happens to be flying into Berlin today also. But still, this was a bit of an inconvienence which is why I am Boycotting Belarus.

That's right. I am boycotting all Belarussian products and will not travel in their country until they revoke mandatory transit visas. I am not sure what products are Belarussian, but they have got to make something and I call upon all of my readers to join me in this boycott. Also, from now on this blog will act as an anti-Belarussian mouthpiece. Quake in fear Belarus, I'm coming for you.

Moscow and Final Thoughts on Russia> Travels

2006-08-07T08:32:00.000+02:00

A good way to come to a final conclusion about your experience of a country is to think what phrase popped in your head the most whilst you were in said country. For instance, in Japan I kept thinking, "Japanese people are weird." Over the past two weeks I have muttered the words "Fucking Russia" so many times I have lost count.

Kyra and I arrived in Moscow on the morning of the fifth. With the help of different friendly locals we were able to purchase our onward train tickets, (Me to Lithuania, her to St. Petersburg) navigate Moscow's incredibly beautiful metro system and find the hotel we had booked online. It took us about 25 minutes to check into our room, but our hotel room was good value for the money, very modern looking and nice. For some reason we had to go down the hall to use another hotel room in order to use a shower with hot water, but hey it's Fucking Russia. Russia is a very expensive country for being as backwards ass as it is. Moscow is a very expensive city on top of that. From what I learned, apartments cost almost as much to rent as in NYC. This could be because the property development here has been done piss-poorly. Don't get me started.

Kyra and I were lucky to get a ride around the city from this nice, wealthy Russian couple. Russian people are great when they aren't being assholes or outright sketchy. The next day we waited online for and hour and a half to see Lenin's preserved body. It wasn't worth the wait. I have seen Ho Chi Mihn in Vietnam, but I skipped seeing Mao while in Beijing so I missed out on a punching my card for the embalmed Communist leader trifecta.

Red Square is nice looking, but they don't let anybody in it so it is oddly empty. St. Basils cathedral looks pretty cool, kind of like it was meant to be in a theme park.
The Kremlin itself wasn't too interesting. Some old churches on the top, but after waiting on several more lines, to buy the ticket, to check my backpack, to actually enter... I was a bit embittered. We also saw Arabat street while in town. This is meant to be a tourist attraction. It was like one big souvenir stand/Casino.

I have many other things to gripe about in regards to Moscow and Russia, but I'll hold my tongue. I may come back one day to see St. Petersburg, but other than that I have no longing to return here. Last night, while I was walking to my hotel, some 7 year old kid said to me, "Kiss my Ass!" He had a big smile on his face and I could tell someone had taught him this phrase and he did not know its context or meaning and didn't understand that he shouldn't say such a thing to a weary looking man who had just had a good day turn into a bad day in the span of two hours (more on that later). I decided I would teach him a couple more curse words. Fucking Russia.

The Thermos of Doom> Travels

2006-08-07T08:12:00.000+02:00

After our adventures on Olkhan, Kyra and I returned to Irkusk to catch the train to catch a 3 and a half day, 4 night, train to Moscow. We got on board the train at 1:30 AM and were a bit annoyed to find that the tickets I had been sold were in the lowest class, refugee class. In this class your train car is packed with beds with no closed rooms. You can hear the snoring of a man at the other end of the carriage and also smell his B.O. We tried to upgrade, but the train was full and none of the conductors could really speak enough English to understand our request. In the morning we awoke and decided we would just deal. We were both on top bunks, which limited our accesses to the table, making meals and cards a bit of a pain. The bottom bunks were held by an older woman named Tatania, who am I am pretty sure wet her bed and a guy named Sasha, who said he was a Urology student. He could have meant Uralogist, studying the Ural Mountains rather than penises, but he didn't speak enough English to clarify either way. It turned out Kyra and I were the only foreigners on the entire train other than a German acrobat.

In the end spending that much time on a train isn't too bad if you have good company and enough whisky. To liven things up, Kyra and I pretended that this stainless steel thermos that I had (Which looked like it would be great for storing plutonium), was carrying some dangerous material on the inside. I would always carry it with two hands and carefully set it down on the table. After putting it down I would wipe the fake sweat off my brow and breath a sigh of relief. Later, Kyra would mishandle the thermos and I would pretend to get very angry at her irresponsibility, repeatedly yelling, "You are putting the whole train at risk!" I think our fellow passengers were honestly scared of the mystery thermos until I opened it up and made some tea in it.

Larry IV> Travels

2006-08-07T07:34:00.000+02:00

After spending a day in Irkusk and visiting Lystvyanka, a cute little town on Baikul, I met Kyra at the train station. The next day we set out for Olkhan Island, six hours north of Irkusk by minibus. We had to take a ferry to get onto the Island from the mainland and fortunately we got to see a big fist fight between 5 locals and the crew. It seemed to be over getting there car onto the ferry. The best part about the fight is there was a woman with a camera taking pictures of it the whole time. She was using a point and shoot film camera. They look so dated now that everyone in the West uses digitals or if still on film, nice SLR's. The fight was a sort of forshawdowing for the battle that was to take place on the island.

Olkhan Island was a Beaut. Lake Baikul is the deepest lake in the world. In fact you, can't even fathom how deep it is. The water is really clean and steep Mountains rise around the lake, making for postcard quality landscapes. The main youth hostel on the island is owned by a guy named Nikita, Russia's former National ping pong champion. It was a great hostel and although they were full, they were able to arrange for us a homestay with one of their neighbors.

I quickly let it be known that I was infact unofficially America's Former Ping Pong champion. Word got back to Nikita and a challenge was issued. We met later that evening in the hostel's ping pong room. A large and rowdy crowd of Russians, drunk on Vodka and national pride, cheered for Nikita loudly. We started the first game with Nikita edging me out 21-0. The second game was a bit closer as I almost returned one of his shots, but the score was also 21-0. Through that game I could hear spots of cheering when I would serve. I lost the third game 21-0 also, but again, I seemed to be winning over the crowd, who were no longer cheering for Nikita. By the fourth game the cheering was loud and at 17-0 I returned one of Nikita's shots hard and his return went into the net. A sudden hush filled the room. Like a missile crisis kind of hush. The Russian was cut! The crowd then suddenly erupted in cheers. Covered in sweat I took a short water break. Kyra leaned over and said to me, "He's worried! You cut him! You hurt him! You see? You see? He's not a machine, he's a man!"

After the game, which I lost 21-1, I gave a speech and this is what I said. "When I started this ping pong match, it seemed none of you's liked me all that much, and I really didn't like you's too much either. Over the past 15 minutes, two men having been killing each other on this ping pong table. During the game, I've seen a lot of changing, in the way I feel about you, and the way you feel about me. I guess what I'm trying to say is that if I can change, and you can change, everyone can change." This seemed to be lost on the crowd as none of them spoke English.

Fugee> Travels

2006-08-05T18:54:00.000+02:00

Today Kyra and I arrived in Moscow after 4 days and 4 nights on a train across Russia. We somehow ended up in refugee class, which was a bit uncomfortable, but gave us plenty of time to interact with the locals. Before that we spent 4 days on lovely Olkhan Island on Lake Baikul. I have some good stories, but they will have to wait as I am in a bit of a rush. I am off to Lithuania tomorrow night and then will be heading across Poland, back to Prague, a few days after that.

First Impressions of Russia> Travels

2006-07-26T13:33:00.000+02:00

Based on a 19 hour ride on a Russian crewed train and about 6 hours in Irkutsk, here are my initial impressions of Russia:

The conductors on the train were all robust women who behaved like angry scolding mothers. They didn't speak any English and when you would try to communicate with them they would either ignore you or yell at you. The border crossing took about 5 hours, which seemed like a lot of time to me. During this time you are locked on a stopped train. The air conditioning is turned off and the bathrooms are also locked, making for a pretty rough time. So my first impression, "Get it together Russia!"

There was a Russian guy on our train that was incredibly drunk. By incredible I mean he was fall down drunk, but like for the entire trip without passing out. He would just roam the corridor falling down every once and a while, generally creeping everybody out.

Once I got off the train I met a quick succession of helpful, kind Russians that seemed to be sober. That said, there seem to be lots of people clearly drunk during day light hours. In China I took a series of photos of people sleeping on the job. Here I am going to try to find people drunk on the job.

The store owners here don't trust the shoppers as far as they can throw them, leading me to believe that shoplifting runs rampant. I went into a Supermarket to pick up some snacks and I had to lock my backpack in a locker at the door. Once inside I encountered what could best be described as a very disorganized sting operation. There were employees all over the place, communicating with headsets, eyeing everybody suspiciously.

The fire escapes on the buildings are shoddy at best. There, I've said it.

Either the women here like to wear tight clothing or the top down Soviet style of sizing clothes has gone terribly wrong...with mixed results running the gamut of jaw dropping to uncontrollable spasms of cringing.

I think, and don't hold me to this, they smell worse than Czech people.

If bad haircuts were bees, Russia would be the worlds leading exporter AND importer of honey. Bad economics you say?

So I guess my first impressions are a bit negative, but perhaps this place will grow on me, and I will grow on this place, like a certain aging boxer from the fighting streets of Philadelphia. Hopefully Russia will not crush me. (And if you didn't think I was going to throw in any Rocky 4 references, you don't know me well enough. Right, I am off to bench press some Horses.)

The Flying Yurt> Travels

2006-07-24T12:22:00.000+02:00

I just got back from 4 days/3 nights in the countryside of Mongolia. I went there with a program called Ger to Ger. It's a non profit and they have helped organize some nomadic Mongolian families to play host to travelers. I traveled there with Kyra, a top notch Singaporean girl I met on the train from Beijing to UB. On Friday morning we took a local bus about 2 hours to get dropped off at a golf course in the middle of nowhere. Yes, we were certainly into the wild, or at least soon to be. There our first host met us, riding up on Ox-cart, or technically Yak-cart and we took a 10 minute ride to his family's Ger.
You may be asking yourself what's a Ger. Well a Ger is the Mongolian word for a Yurt and a Yurt is a round, white felt covered one room home, somewhere between a tepee and a circus tent. The size of the inside would go for about 1500 dollars a month on the Lower East Side in NYC. So in other words it is pretty damn small. You should expect to find in this small space: Two rusty army cot beds. One or two beat-up suitcases filled with clothes from the Gap and various major league baseball teams, circa 1986. One Buddhist shrine laid on the top of a highly decorated wooden cabinet. Another highly decorated wooden cabinet with a mirror and many photos of the family pasted to the sides. (All Gers have a least one photo of everybody on horse back and one photo of a family trip to UB with everyone standing in front of the ugly communist era Capital building.) A stove in the middle of the Ger with a long chimney poking out of the roof. (The stove is taken outside during the day so as not to overheat the Ger in the Summer.) Several horse back riding trophies proudly displayed. Lots of unrecognizable animal meat hanging from the ceiling to dry. Oh, AND like 10 people. Not even extended family. Everybody seems to have 8 or more siblings. If you have ever wanted to get to know your family, become Mongolian.

These Gers sit in indescribablely beautiful valley's set in lush green rolling hills and mountains with a nearby stream always within earshot. There, cows, yaks, horses, sheep and goat graze, being guarded from wolves by several family dogs, which I am told are trained to be just on the edge of homicidal. In the distance are a few other gers, often belonging to the same family. At night this valley will be filled with more stars than anyone would hope or want to count.

Kyra and I camped in three different valley's with our tent next to the Ger's of three different families participating in the Ger to Ger program. Some highlights of the trip:

Getting outside of the tent in the middle of the night to take a piss and finding the silhouette of a very large Yak standing in front of my tent opening. "Move along Yak, nothing to see here."

We went on horseback for over 20k from the Ger we were staying at on the first night to our next ger. I have only ridden a horse twice before and both time for less than an hour. This horse ride took about 4 hours. My balls hate me so much. I think my kids are going to be Mongoloids. How fitting. The two most exciting moment of the ride were when the back of my saddle became unbuckled while at a fast canter and I managed to slide up onto the base of the horse's neck and pull the rains. Did I mention the whole time we were riding we had no helmets. While I cheated death, one gopher/prairie dog was not so lucky. Again, at a fast canter, I was looking down while riding and I noticed a small grassland creature look up in horror just before my horse stepped on him. Kyra told me she heard a terrible squeaking noise from behind.

Working on my screenplay for my first feature film, "The Flying Yurt." Just you wait, it's going to be a homeless man's "The Sound of Music."

We took an Ox cart the following day to the next yurt, about 10k away. Our host from the previous night gave me the rains and I steered the ox there pretty much the whole way. Like most children raised in the 80's and 90's, I had plenty of theoretical experience having played hours and hours on Ox cart simulator games. On the game you could you use different kinds of beasts of burden in different numbers and colors and do up your cart rig in about 5 different set ups. You could also choose your location, The Wild West, The Silk Road, Newark and of course my favorite, Outer Space. Steering an Ox in zero G is a lot different then being in Mongolia dealing with the real thing.

At another Ger we played a game where you roll the ankle bones of goats and then flick them at each other with your finger depending on which side they end up on. I was the big winner, crushing Kyra and a six year old child. The buzz of my victory reverberated throughout the whole valley. I think that this may be my calling and I plan on giving up consulting for a year and concentrate on my training so I can take next year's Naadam festival by surprise. I feel with Western training facilities, better diet, finger exercises and the use of wind tunnels I can be the very the best. We tried to purchase a set of 20 ankle bones from the ger owners but they seemed to be a valuable family heirloom. That night under the cloak of darkness I snook up on four goats, clubbed them over the head and now they are walking on stumps. I still need four more so I plan on going through the trash here in UB until I come upon a discarded goat carcass. Wish me luck!

I left Kyra yesterday as her Russian Visa starts two days behind mine and she is spending two more nights in the National park. We plan on meeting up in Russia in a few days. I took a horse cart ride to the nearest road. All the while my driver, a 15 year old sheep herder, was listening to my ipod. He is now all about The Beta Band. Once on the road I began waiting for a bus that wasn't to come for another three hours. Luckily I managed to hitch a ride back into to town with a Mongolian sports writer and his family. He spoke English well and we chatted about the NFL and NBA. When we got into UB his brother, an older man named Gelenkhuu, who doesn't speak English, invited me to stay the night with his family. I accepted this generous offer and after dropping off some camping equipment and finding my lost ATM card I went to their home for dinner. With dinner we drank many shots of Mongolian vodka. Gelenkhuu would make very long speeches in Mongolian, which while I couldn't understand,but almost brought tears to my eyes for their beauty. His daughter would translate and say that I was the first American he has had in his home and he was very happy to have me there. One note on Mongolian vodka: When you are chasing vodka with a mug full of fermented horse milk, your head is in big trouble. Big trouble. On that note, I am off to Russia today. I'll try to post in the next few days.

Mongolia> Travels

2006-07-20T13:57:00.000+02:00

OK, so I am finally out of China, so I can access my blog now. Thanks for looking after the dog Pink Wizard, but did you have to let him crap all over the carpet, and toilet seat? Right, I'm in a bit of a rush so I will make this quick. The train ride from Beijing to Ulan Bator was pretty cool. Mostly played cards and tried to learn Mongolian. Sain Times! Ulan Bator is also nice. These Mongolians are tough. I saw some guy getting strangled on the street by a meter maid. Some other guy explained to me that the guy was parked illegally. So that is what a Mongolian parking ticket looks like. I am heading into the wild tomorrow morning for some horse riding, camping and Gerring. www.gertoger.com. 5 steps to becoming a nomad. It's not a tour really, just some gers that know I am coming and will make sure their dogs don't attack me.

Final Thoughts on China> Travels

2006-07-17T14:08:00.000+02:00

I am back now in Beijing after a few days in Shanhaiguan. Some updates:

While playing cards on the train to Shanhaiguen I realized that I only had about 300 yuan, about 30 euro, on me. Even in cheap China that isn't enough for two days. Long story short, I got a cab to the two hotels in town that accept foreigners. Unfortunately Visa wasn't everywhere I wanted them to be as they did not accept plastic at either. I then asked the taxi driver to take me to the bank of china. He did, but sadly they, nor any other bank in this town had an ATM. They informed me at the bank that I would have to go to the closest city, Qinhuangdao, to get some. Just another travel headache. The funny thing is last night I dug out my Japan and Korea guides, that I was going to give to some other travelers I met who will be going that way. When flipping through the book I found 1100 Yuan, or about 130 dollars, which had been stuffed there for two weeks now. I actually came back to Beijing early because i was running out of money. Anyway, just further proof that I am not all that bright. (You were wrong Mom.)

After checking into a hotel I rented a bicycle and cycled around town. (Of course with no bicycle helmet. I have yet to see one and with the regular occurrence of failing brakes I reckon one might come in handy at some point.) This was the smallest town I went to while in China and I was once again the only white guy around. When I wrote that blog entry about playing cards there were 7 locals stareing over my shoulder at every word. It was weird.

The reason I had come to Shanhaiguan was to see the start of the great wall and do some hiking. The next morning when I woke up I went to asection called, Jiaoshan. The first bit, a steep ascent, had been thoroughly restored and was swarmed by Chinese tourists. Still no white people to be seen. Quickly though the wall petered out to ruins and then to breadcrumb trails of rocks. I spent two hours following this trail, which had lots of rock climbing sections that scared the crap out of me. I was alone and there wasn't any set trail so i think it would have been a while before someone stumbled upon my rotting broken carcass. When I got to the top of a mountain that the crumbled wall had snaked up, I gave a shout of "New Jersey!" (Can you tell I have no love in my life?) I found that my voice echoed pretty loudly across the valleys. I figured if I broke a leg I could shout for help, but nobody would understand that. I had my Chinese phrasebook on hand so I guess I could have said "help", "Jiuming A!", but it is so hard to pronounce Chinese words correctly that this would probably come out as meaning "wheel burrow", "Leprechaun" or "I want postcards," which would have certainly brought some help come to think of it. Anyway, I made it back alive, although very sweaty.

The next day I went to the section of the wall called the old dragonhead. This is where the Great Wall starts, rising from the Bohai Gulf. This picture actually shows a view from the start of the wall.
Again, lots of Chinese tourists, all of whom wanted to take a picture with me. Chinese tourists travel in packs with matching hats. The matchinghats can be very useful in sorting out your friends and foes in aknife fight or bilingual bloodfest. In this picture I got them to all yell "SpringBreak" instead of cheese. This of course sounded more like "Spling Bleak" which I imagine would be a lot of fun. It started raining while I was there and then it started pouring. Blah blah blah, my clothes got wet. I saved you about 5 minutes of your life there.

On my train back to Beijing I met a Chinese girl in her 20's who wasreading a magazine meant to practice one's English. The articles were all about Madonna and Huey Lewis and the News. I showed her my guidebook and phrase book and she spent the next 5 hours copying down all of the vocabulary she could. The only word she asked me about was Chrysanthemum. She tried to pronounce it about 20 times, but to no avail. I told her that it doesn't come up much in conversation unless you work in the flower or tea business. I was so impressed with the energy she put into studying my books that I offered to give her my Chinese phrasebook, which I had received earlier from a friendly Canadian leaving China. She happily accepted the book and explained that they do not sell them in China. This could be the public relations revelation that that US so badly needed.

So now I am back in Beijing. I actually was not allowed to stay in my previous hotel because my passport was at the police office for the visa extension and the temp paper they gave me had apparently expired. Thanks again Prague Chinese Embassy for the 23 day visa that started all these problems. I hate you so very much. I picked it up this morning after a long wait in line and fortunately had no problems.

In China one thing you will notice is there are no large dogs. At first I thought that this was because they ate the larger ones because they were meaty, but apparently this country has a small dog policy to go along with the one child policy. Kids actually go the zoo to see larger dogs. On a side note I believe there is an ugly dog policy too.

Yesterday I stumbled upon a eyeglass's store and thought I could pickup a new pair to replace my old beat up, out of prescription ones. I found a great looking pair that at first I thought were "Silhouettes", a luxury brand that costs a bundle in the US. Upon closer inspection I realized they were knock-off "Sandwich" brand glasses. It is written in the same exact script that Silhouette uses so it was hard to tell the difference. Why they thought Sandwich was a sexy substitute beats me. A woman took my prescription the old fashioned way by puttingd ifferent pieces of glass in front of my eyes and asking me better or worse. Two hours later my glasses were ready. I put them on and things looked a bit funny, but I just figured my eyes needed to adjust. It took me about 20 minutes to put my finger on just what was funny about them. Everything I looked at was curved. It was like looking through a wide angle lens. I walked back and tried to explain the problem. The glass on glasses was thin on the nose sides and very thick where the frame met the glass, which I believe was the cause of the curving. After a protracted negotiation they took my prescription again and an hour later they had a new pair of glasses, which still had the same thin/thick problem and when I put them on had the same distortion. They ended up giving me a discount. Advice: Do not buy anything China that costs more than 50 dollars.

I wore them a bit more and I have a theory that they are in fact allowing me to see the curve of space/time. If this is the case I suppose I have gotten a great deal. While this is kind of cool, the novelty wears off pretty quickly. I am going to have an optometrist friend back home take a look at them for me and see what she thinks. I guess I will also drop them by a physicist friend too.

So that's it for China. Tomorrow morning I will get on an overnighttrain to Ulan Batur, the Capital of Mongolia. Once there I should beable to access blogspot again and will post up my own stuff instead ofrelying on the pink wizard. I haven't been able to check what's onthere since I left Korea. I hope he didn't post anything dealing withbathroom humor. He has a tendency towards that.

Chairman Asshole> Travels, from Larry B

2006-07-12T21:36:00.000+02:00

After being so impressed with the section of the Wall I saw earlier, I
decided to venture East to start of the Great Wall, around the small
town of Shanhaiguan. When I purchased the tickets last night, all of
the hard seats had been sold out (hard seats are the cheap seats,
benches with 3 people facing 3 people) and so I had to get a soft seat
(Proper seats, that cost 30% more, with two people facing two people
with a little table between). They are of course more comfortable and
you are more likely to sit across someone who speaks a bit of English.

This was not the case for this 5 hour train ride as my three neighbors
knew the words hello and thank you (Which coincidentally is all I know
in Chinese) and that's about it. The man sitting next to me was a young man, aged 30, with a neon emblazoned t-shirt that gave me the same
vomit-in-the-back-of-the-throat reaction that I get to Italian
backpacks. Shudder. The man across from him was 55 years old
and had a broad, tough face and was kind of doughy, a bit like a
Chinese Boris Yelstin. Across from me sat a 55 year old man with a
terrible combover. Double Shudder. For the first hour of the ride he
kept stretching out his legs, encroaching on my personal space with
reckless abandon. He would then fall asleep for just enough time to
allow a really loud snore and then immediately wake up, presumably
from the sound of his own snore. I imagine him trying to sleep at
night, constantly waking himself up. That would suck.

After a while neon took a out a pack of cards and the three started
playing a card game in the same phyla as one of my favorites,
"asshole." Like asshole, a deck of cards is split between the players
and they have to get rid of their cards. In asshole you can only put
down singles, pairs, triples, quadruples, etc of the same kind. In
their game, I was seeing combinations of straights, flushs and pairs,
combined with a seemingly random order in which players get to throw
the cards. In asshole, the first person who gets rid of all of their
cards is the president, the second person to get rid of their cards is
vice-president, and so on and so on, until the last person left with
cards becomes the asshole. On the next hand the president gives the
asshole their two worst cards and the asshole gives the president
their two best cards. The VP also exchanges a card with the
Vice-asshole, the second to last guy to get rid of his cards. The
asshole also has to shuffle the cards each time, which is laborious
because you usually play with 104 cards, two decks, and then deal them
out to the players. They are also called asshole, which doesn't feel
good. Of course, the president can become an asshole in the turn of
one hand and vice-versa. (In actual politics one can be, and usually
is, both at the same time.)

After watching a few hands of their game and not quite figuring it
out, I dug around in my bag and found my pack of Santorini playing
cards. Purchased on my recent trip to Greece, they display 52
pictures of perhaps the loveliest island in the world. I showed them
the cards and they studied the amazing pictures with mouths agape.
One showed a series of tightly packed white washed houses with typical
baby blue domed roofs. Another showed the crescent of the main
Island, like a sliver of a moon rising sharply from the ocean.
Another showed a black sand beach with hundred's of umbrellas covering
thousands of sunbathers. I took my glossy cards and shuffled them in
with their grubby plain ones and then dealt them out. Without using
any English or Chinese I was able to explain the rules of Asshole to
them in about 40 seconds. They took to it right away as it was pretty
much a cruder, and crueler, version of the game they had been playing
earlier.

Now I am actually pretty good at Asshole (Please don't take those
words out of context when I run for office) so I won the first few
games without breaking a sweat. George Washington? Franklin Delano
Roosevelt? Three terms are for chumps. I held my competitors off for
7 rounds. Neon and Boris jostled for VP while Combover sadly was not
able to escape the poverty of the bottom fourth and kept contributing
high cards to my coffers. Then neon was finally able to unseat me and
put me in the Cheney seat (although not hidden deep underground in an
undisclosed location like the real Cheney). We swapped positions back
and forth several times while Boris settled for third and poor poor
Combover just couldn't get his shit together. That's what you get for
encroaching on my personal space, bitch!

As the dirt from our hands spread to the cards and then back on to the
hands of our neighbors, we all felt the bonding effect that cards can
bring between four strangers. They picked up some English too,
"pass", "president", and of course, "asshole", which I believe they
know was was not a nice word and by now were savagely taunting
Combover with. Besides words, they were also learning about
democracy, American style. There is plenty of room for advancement for
the person that works hard, is talented and has a bit lucky with their
draw. This social advancement can allow the poorest of the poor to
become president (Uh, Abe Lincoln). It can also have the President
come crashing down out of power (Nixon?). However, much like reality,
often the asshole stays the asshole, and often the president stays the
president, or at least becomes VP, then becomes president, then loses
the presidency only to have their dipshit son become president and
fuck up the whole card game. But I digress.

We took a break for lunch, with neon sitting a top the throne. Boris
ordered four bowls of instant ramen and some beers and three of us
shared a lunch together, slurping up noodles. They would occasionally
slip some strange something or other into my soup and it gradually got
very spicy and mysterious. Adding to the mystery was a clear spirit
that combover produced from his bag. They offered me a sip and the
best way to describe the flavor would be a brick wall placed across a
highway with similar consequences to my throat, gut and sobriety.
My recently purchased fake rolex (2 Dollars!) kept counting in
faux-swiss time and we finished off the remainders of our meal.

Combover shuffled the deck again and 10 minutes later, he was still
Asshole and Neon was still president. I guess all the taunting had
gotten to him because he snapped. He yelled something in Chinese at
us and stormed out of the train car. I looked at Boris and Neon but
they just shrugged. We were just about to shuffle the cards again
when 3 minutes later Combover returned with an angry mob of hard seat
ticket holders. They brandished chop sticks menacingly, swinging them
this way and that. Combover shouted some orders and they grabbed neon
and threw him and his nauseating shirt off the train. I caught a
glimpse of him out of my window, tumbling down a hill as the fast
moving train quickly left him far behind.

With a cold steely look in his eyes Combover took his seat. He picked
up the cards and stared us down while he shuffled. He pointed to
himself and said, "Chairman." Then he pointed to Boris and I and
shouted, "Assholes!" The angry mob chanted "Assholes! Assholes!
Assholes!." Their were hundreds of them yelling. We could hear them
coming from the train cars on either side of our own and for all we
knew the whole train may have been under Combover's control. He then
began ripping each card in half and passing them out to each member of
the mob. Two Santorianian families were no longer neighbors. The
crescent was now two separate islands. The black beach no longer had
any water. This is what a cultural revolution is like. I am not sure
what game he intended on playing with the cards now equally
distributed among the passengers, but i didn't want to find out. He
threw a corner of a King at me and said in perfectly clear English,
"This is your stop." The train came to a halt at a platform and I,
along with my bags, were left there when the train pulled away. The
steady chant of "asshole" slowly faded as the train sped into the
distance. To be honest, I'm still pissed about the whole personal
space thing.

Monkey Stick!> Travels

2006-07-12T01:39:00.000+02:00

Today I arrived in Xi'an after a few days in the Sichuan province. I
spent my first day in Chengdu, relaxing for the most part, drinking
tea with an interesting Tibetan guy who has lived in the US since
1997. I learned that a lot of the West's notions about Tibet are
pretty off. I'll write about that at some point. We also went to a
park and threw around a disc, which attracted a huge crowd of
onlookers. Some kids joined in at some point. I also got to sample
some Tibetan food, like butter tea (strange) and a stir fry with yak
and green beans. While in town I also had some spicy Sichuan food,
which i can honestly say, like pretty much all of the Chinese food I
have eaten so far, I did not enjoy. Maybe I'm not really Jewish?
The next morning I took a two hour bus ride to Leshan. Leshan is home
to the world's largest carved Buddha. You can see it was pretty big. In one of these pictures you can see me with a woman who was trying to get a picture with her hand in perspective touching the Buddhas nose. I just wanted to get one shot of me with the big guy and she was taking forever so i just went up and put my arm around her.
After seeing the big Buddha I caught a bus to Emei Shan, another holy
mountain in China. It was a tough two day climb to the top.
(3100meters) On the first day the hike took me mostly through lush
bamboo forests with the occasional monastery along the way. I found
one a bit off the trail and ended up playing some monks in Ping Pong.
I lost, but not by as much as I should have to bunch of Chinese monks
who have nothing better to do than seek enlightenment and play ping
pong. Perhaps he was showing me compassion.
My second day up the mountain was more arduous, an 8 hour climb. Most
of the time I was stuck in a cloud so the views were not all that good
until about an hour from the top when I finally got above the clouds.
At one of the many small drink stands along the way I encountered a
women who insisted I buy a walking stick. I told her I didn't need
one, but she kept following me along the path, begging me to buy one,
seemingly for my own sake. She said in this scary tone, in probably
the only English words she knew, "Monkey stick!" She then took the
stick and stabbed it an imaginary monkey, spearing it through the
head, then kicking it off the stick. As if to emphasize her loathing
for the invisible monkey she spat on its non-existent carcass. Good
salesmanship!
With my new monkey bashing stick I set off, ready to defend myself
from what I imagined must be some pretty nasty simians. I first
encountered one big male, who followed me for a while at a safe
distance. No problems at all. Then I came upon a pack of about 30 of
them guarding the path above. They bore their teeth and growled at
me. I brandished my monkey stick and swung it around Jedi style.
They could tell I had some moves so they kept their distance. Later
on I met some other westerners that showed me scratch marks from their
run in with the terrible monkeys.

Eventually I made it to the top and i was well above the cloud line, as you can see in this photo.

On the 4 and a half hour ride back to Chengdu I figured out a good
way to describe Chinese driving. They practise Realpolitik when they
drive. Might makes right. Right of way is determined by who would
come out best in a collision. Buses pretty much do whatever they
want. Cars pretty much ignore people. The young pedestrians plow
into the elderly and wheelchair bound just to flaunt their might.

One last point. I think the Chinese word for "right" is "left." This
would explain a lot of the poor directions I have received.

This blog has been hijacked > from the Pink Wizard

2006-07-10T14:28:00.000+02:00

I decided that in Larry's absence -- continuing through his return -- I will take over his blog. I will blog about whatever I want. And I want to blog about what I eat -- so stay tuned, and I will update this blog and tell you what I have eaten. I used to do this on my own blog, but like the New York Times, I lost all my readers.

Breakfast:

I skipped breakfast this morning, which is unusual for me.

Lunch:

Went to Simmons, a soul food joint here in Charlotte, NC. It is frequented by African-American B and C-list celebrities who post their autographed pictures on the wall. I sat next to an autographed picture of 2 Live Crew.

I had ribs, green beans, mashed potatoes and cornbread. I drank water.

Dinner:

A hard-boiled egg and a smoothie made from cranberry juice and frozen fruit.
Miscellaneous ingestions:

And by the way -- why do people still write checks at the supermarket? All banks give their customers debit cards, which are the exact same thing as checks only they don't take a half hour to fill out. I can understand if one is not adept at technology, but come on, its not hard to slide a card through a card-reader. A monkey could do that.

Great? No, the Greatest!> Travels

2006-07-10T14:19:00.000+02:00

Over the past two thousand years millions of Chinese people were involved in a seemingly never ending building project. A grandfather, father and grandson would labor next to one another on a structure that had and would become the life's work of their ancestors and descendants. They were building a wall, a Great Wall. When the grandfather was asked by his grandson, :"Why do we toil in the hot sun building this wall?" the grandfather might have had the foresite toa nswer: "One day people from all over the world will come to this wall that we have built. They will enjoy the scenery and purchase postcards, t-shirt and beverages from our descendants. This will be our legacy."

The GWC was never particularly effective at keeping out invading armies. Kublai Khan simply bribed one of the gate guards to let his whole army through. It's most useful function happens to be getting tourists to come by the busload and buy things that say they had come there.

Reading this blog I am sure you can tell much of what I have seen on this Asia trip has been between underwhelming and somewhat interesting. I spent yesterday hiking 10 kilometers up and down a section of the Great Wall and it was just about the greatest thing I have ever seen. Better than the NJ turnpike and Garden state parkway combined. Combined! As you've seen in pictures, the wall snakes along hills and is plenty wide enough to walk on top. The section where I went was only partially restored and not frequently visited by tourists, unlike Badeling, a section mobbed by tourists and apparently so restored it looks like new. No, this section was crumbly and ruiny and in that way that adjectives and adverbs fail to describe. Kind of like Clint Eastwood in the form of a wall. The comic relief on my hike was provided by the postcard saleswomen, spread along the wall almost like sentries. They would ask you in very broken English whether you would like to buy souvenirs, that they carried in large shopping bags. The thing is they would follow you, informing you that you could by later. Like 4 hours later. That's commitment considering the wall is a pretty strenuous climb. At first we (I was traveling with two American girls) would shake them off by explaining that we weren't going to buy postcards. This isn't as easy as you might think. For instance, we found if you say "Postcard" three times in a row, one will appear seemingly out of nowhere. All the while walking along you half expected them to come up, climbing up bothsides of the wall, a pack of postcards clenched in their teeth.

I have spent the past few days in Beijing, visiting the Forbidden City, Summer Palace, Tian'anmen Square and the Lama temple. None really wowed me all that much, despite their significant sizes. Last night I watched the world cup final in my hostel's bar with a pretty large crowd of backpackers. The game was pretty boring other than Zinedene Zidane headbutting that guy in the chest. Right, so thats it for now.

Fun With Larry's Identity at the Xianxianxian Hotel> Angelo

2006-07-07T20:06:00.000+02:00

Guttenshmeltzen!

This is Angelo Vandergluten, Larry's Dutch friend. I met Larry in China. We had good times together. Very erotic at times and not at all awkward.

But I needed money. So I stole Larry's wallet and left him in China to fend for himself.

I am now in the Chinese City of Xianxianxian where fortunately for me, and unfortunately for Larry, they take Visa. I am staying at the luxury hotel called the "Xianxianxian Luxury Hotel."
Below is a picture of my room.

Using Larry's credit card, I then took a subterranean rickshaw to Jianjianjian -- the fashion capital of China -- the Chinese Paris (if you will). I went to a fashion show and saw the latest of what's HOT in China. Here's a picture from the event:

Then I went out to eat in China's fanciest restaurant "McXianjian's." It was awesome. I wish Larry was there with me. I snapped a photo of the main course: "xiandudu." It was like shrimp, but crunchier.

That's all for now. Auf Vanderpooten!

This Blog Post Dedicated to the Woman With Tire Marks Down Her Back >Larry

2006-07-06T16:38:00.000+02:00

Piece of advice: Always check the brakes when you rent a bike (or for that matter motorcycles, cars and pottery wheels too). I was peddling down a sidewalk in Xi'an, winding my way through umbrella wielding pedestrians when a women jukes to the left, directly in the path of my bike. I quickly flexed the hand brake on the bicycle, but instead of a sharp reduction in speed I got a sharp snapping sound. This blog entry is dedicated to that women, whoever she was. Actually I dodged her by a hair, but the rest of the day I had to drive on the bustling, lawless streets of Xi'an with no brakes, reducing me to Flintstone style feet breaking.

While in Xian I took a bike ride along the 17 kilometer wall encircling the city. This was the biggest city in the world 2000 years ago and from the area inside the wall I can see why. Also while in Xi'an I saw the Terracotta warriors, many thousands of human size clay warriors that were created to guard the tomb of China's first emperor. They were discovered in 1974 by some peasants digging a well after standing underground undisturbed for over 2,000 years. They have only uncovered a thousand or so of the warriors for fear of exposing them to the elements, which are just a small fraction of the army. Each sculpture has a unique face and were discovered fully armed with weapons still sharp enough to cut a cantaloupe. I'll be honest; I was a little underwhelmed by the site. I guess I was expecting more of them. Or maybe it was the airplane hanger that covers them, crowded with large Chinese tour groups that took away from the atmosphere.

This morning I arrived in Beijing after a relatively comfortable ride in business class from Chengdu. I found out that you don't have to beat anyone up to avoid becoming someone's bitch. That's for prison. Lesson learned. I picked up my ATM card from a friend's friend here in Beijing and hopefully tonight I will be able to draw money out for the first time since my wallet was stolen. I also applied to get an extension on my visa. If you remember I was granted a 23 day visa to China, the first one of its kind as I am informed from the people at the visa extension bureau. They only give them out for 30, 60 and 90 days. Lucky me. 23 is an auspicious number in China, and sports. Unfortunately I need 26 days so I get to pay 20 dollars for some Chinese bureaucrats mishandling of my paperwork. OK, venting over.

A Newer Land Speed Record!> Travels

2006-06-30T19:28:00.000+02:00

Yesterday morning I went for a walk in the stolen and fake electronics
market with some friends in Shanghai. Everywhere you go people walk
up to you trying to sell you a fake rolex. The lowest price we could
find was about 7 dollars for a decent one. I considered making a
purchase, but decided that bling could attract unwarranted attention
and how embarrassing would it be to die over a fake rolex? So instead
I found a 2 dollar watch which has Mao Tse Dong waving frenetically to
what you imagine are his adoring comrades. It's pretty entertaining.

Later that day I caught a maglev train to the airport. It's the only
commercial maglev train in the world and I shattered my previously set
land speed record with a smoking fast 267 MPH. As the train started I
commented to the people sitting next to me that I had a need for
speed. Perhaps they felt the same, but they weren't vocal about it.
The train ride was really smooth and as you would expect, we passed
cars on the parallel highway like they were standing still. After the
ride I tried to give some fellow passengers high fives, but they
totally left me hanging, forcing me into the self high five.
After waiting a long time in line to check in I found out that my 7:10
PM flight was delayed and would not leave until 10:30 at the earliest.
Being a three hour flight, I would be getting to my destination,
Chengdu, pretty damned late. I found the customer service and luckily
the manager there spoke English quite well. I explained my situation
and that I was worried I wouldn't be able to get into my hotel at such
a late hour (which it turns out would have been the case.) I asked to
be switched to another flight to Chengdu. He sympathised with me,
checked the other flights and told me that all of economy on those
flights was full and that there was nothing he could do. After a
bunch of unsuccessful pleading and prodding I was just about to give
up. It was then that I looked at my watch, to check the time. Mao
was still happily waving and I decided to appeal to the man's
communist brainw...upbringing. I showed him the watch and said with
complete sincerity, "Is this what the chairman would have wanted?" He
looked at the watch and he was immediately hypnotised by Mao's waving
hand. Wasn't it Mao who said, "Regardless of wealth, status or
employment, we are brothers and must do for one another as we would do
for one's own brother."? He nodded. Didn't he also say that " A small
favor to a stranger is the equivalent of a big favor to your uncle."?
He nodded again. He said he would try his best to get me on standby
for another airline's 7:50 flight to Chengdu.

We walked down to their ticketing office where I waited for 20
minutes. While waiting I tried to argue that Mao believed in a
classless society and therefor he should bump me up to business class,
but I think he thought that was a bit of a stretch. In the end I got
the thumbs up and made my flight with a few minutes to spare. Good
work Mao! Self high five!

This was my first time flying on Air China and it's a bit different
than your Western airline. The plane was pretty old, a 757, with the
engines stalling out a couple of times in mid-flight. The toilets
were squatters and not well kept at all, although the putting contest
made up for all the negatives. Yeah that's right, they had a putting
contest for the 100 people or so seated in economy class. They have a
hole in the middle of the aisle way and one at a time, once the seat
belt sign has been turned off, you can take a shot at hitting a seven
foot put. The winners get to take the empty seats in first class.
China is a land of opportunity where even the most common peasant (who
can save their entire life to afford a plane ticket) can sit with
China's wealthy and influential.

As I have not seen one mini-golf course so far in China I thought I
had a good chance at winning one of the two empty seats. What I
didn't count on was turbulence. My one attempt missed the cup by 5
inches and the gallery growned as I seemed to be the crowd favorite.
In the end a set of twins sunk back to back puts. Somebody should
sign them up. Remember, Tiger Woods is half Asian.

It's Fun To Stay At The 青年会宾> Travels

2006-06-29T15:04:00.000+02:00

Cars here have a license to kill. I have never been to a country where the cars will not stop for pedestrians, even if the pedestrian in question shows no hint of yielding to the car. They will hit you rather than slow down or alter their course. You really take your life into your own hands every time you cross the road here. On top of that cars run red lights all the time. That's why, when traveling around a city you are much safer taking a taxi or a bicycle rickshaw.

Last night I hailed a rickshaw to take me back to my hotel, which happens to be a Y.M.C.A hotel. It's a nice three star hotel with some dorms and young male Christians I suppose. It's fun to stay there and they have everything. Although I would avoid hanging out with all the boys. One of the big issues in this country, more important than their hidden Aids crisis, population explosion and, I'll censor myself here, massive g-ment r-pression, is the fact that only 1 cab driver in a hundred will recognise the words "train station." This must me mandated by the gov just like the one child policy. Get it together China! They also can't read latin letters so showing them the name of your hotel or street is useless, and trying to say it yourself won't work either as it is a tonal language where 30 words are spelled the same way, just sound slightly different from each other. So I tried to get this rickshaw driver to understand where I wanted to go. I pointed at my map to no avail. I had a couple too many drinks in me so i started singing the YMCA song, even throwing in spelling out the letters for him. This drew not even a hint of recognition from him. I then realized that my hotel key had the YMCA written in Chinese letters, "青年会宾" , and showed it to him and a big grin appeared on his face. I guess he had a few too many drinks also as he then started singing a song in Chinese to the same tune as YMCA. When it came to letter part he contorted his body into very odd shapes that I suppose represented the Chinese letters. This guy was flexible. I jumped in the rickshaw and we took off. The only thing is, as I wrote earlier, this guy had a few too many drinks in him. After crashing into a light post, a mailbox and an elderly man, I insisted that he hand me over the peddles. He jumped in the chair and I started peddling. I made it back to the hotel just fine.

I Wear My Sunglasses During The Day> Travels

2006-06-28T02:59:00.000+02:00

[Posted by bigcitylawyer, who is happy to take a stand against totalitarianism. Clearly the commies are no match for the internet--how easily we circumvent them]

I am now in Shanghai, home to over 20 million people. About a quarter
of them seem to be old women with umbrellas, rain or shine. I guess
they want to keep their skin as light as possible. Or they have a
paralyzing fear of rain. Or, and this seems entirely plausible,
someone has put out a bounty out on my eyes. You see, navigating
through so many umbrellas, which are wielded in a wild,
uncontrolled manner, has resulted in several very close calls of one
of my eyes being spoked. If this scenario is correct I wonder what I
have done to deserve this. Umbrella Karma?

Today I went into the charmingly run-down old city of Shanghai, which
has been a slum for a very long time. I suspect I was in Triad (local
mafioso) territory so I made sure I wasn't wearing an offending
colored bandanna. I don't want to end up on the wrong end of
organized crime again. While in Tokyo I inadvertently stumbled upon
several Yakuza beating a man to death. They took a shine to me and
offered to either kill me, or let me finish the guy off as my
initiation to their organization. I chose the latter. I am not sure
how I will explain to my parents the full back and chest tattoo. It
looks like a dark haired Asian Cookie monster, with real hair. I am
not sure how the Triads are getting along with their Japanese
counterparts these days so I best not make waves here unless I want to
get the traditional Triad triple tongue piercing.

Lastly, another comment on Chinese interweb bureaucracy. As you know,
i cannot get onto blogger while in this country. Well at webcafes in
Shanghai, and I assume other parts of China, I needed to show my
passport to the cafe and they scanned the cover, profile page and my
visa and then submitted it to a government web site before I was
allowed to get on a computer. If you are reading this, Mr. Censor, I
just wanted to let you know how much I like your country. It's super!
-Larry

Hard Travelin' in China> Travels

2006-06-25T23:17:00.000+02:00

Well, quite a bit has happened since I left Korea on Thursday. First a note, this is being posted by the Pink Wizard for me because China blocks blogger. Anyway, on Thursday I boarded a ferry that would take me overnight across the China Sea to Qingdao, China. I actually booked a bed in business class, which has four beds per room rather than economy, which has 20-30 people per room and was only 20 dollars less than business. I had heard all of the stories about business class and I wasn't going to become somebody's bitch for the night. As they say, you've got to kick someone's ass on the first day to prove you are not to be trifled with. I got into the room before any of the other passengers and hid behind the door. When a short Korean man walked into the room I clubbed him over the head with a lamp and he collapsed to the ground. I then kicked him in the kidneys, shouted in my best Korean, "That's right, I ain't going to be your bitch. Yeah, that's how i roll." Needless to say I wasn't anyones bitch that night.

While on the boat I met a guy named Angelo from the Netherlands. The world for many years has stereotyped Dutch people as speaking fluent English, being very tall and often wearing the color orange. Well Angelo fit that description quite well. He is in fact 6 foot 9 inches and just about the tallest guy I have ever met. (he also wore orange and spoke english quite well) Angelo and I just spent the last two days together, just separating a few hour ago so he can go north and I can go South. Now throughout Asia I have always drawn attention by being white. People want to talk to you, they look at you and giggle and you can very easily become the life of the party. Angelo was a freaking circus walking down the street. There are 5 different ways people reacted to him, and pretty much every single person we saw had some reaction, and keep in mind their are a lot of people here.

1- Stop, stare and shake head in disbelief and/or fear.

2- Point and laugh and call over their friends.

3- Take out their mobile phone and take a picture of him.

4- Raise their hand in the air as high as possible as if to explain to Angelo that he was in fact very tall.

5- Socialize with Angelo in a friendly way and eventually ask to take a picture with him.

Fortunately Angelo wasn't freaked out by all the attention.

So this is the 50th country I have been to so I would like to think of myself as a very experienced, savvy traveller. The following is a warning to all travelers, that no matter who you are and where you have been, there are still some things that make us all the same. You, me, them, everybody. Everybody. We can all have an off days sometimes.

Angelo and I got off of the boat at around 10 am with the goal of locking up our bags and seeing a bit of Qingdao before heading to Tai'an,about 7 hours inland by train, where we would spend the night. The city was covered in a thick, creepy fog. First thing we did was take a taxi into town, who of course tried to rip us off and with whom we had a nice yelling match with in the street. Then we went to the train station, where we could not figure out how to work the lockers and where we weren't able to find out how to get to Tai'an, our next destination. Then we found the tourist information office not to faraway, where the women working there spoke very little English and gave us very little information, which all ended up being very wrong anyway. She told us to go the bus station, a 10 minute walk away. We went there and through a translator found out that the buses to Tai'an in fact went from a station way across town and were three times as expensive as the train, which we were informed only ran in the early morning. We then got on a bus, still with our big packs on our back to head to the other bus station. After a minute on the bus we decided that we would screw the bus plan and go back to the train station and go to Ji'nan, a major city not too far from Tai'in. Angelo talked me into eating breakfast at McDonalds, because we were in a rush. Bad travel karma! After a very cheap chicken sandwich we saw an old german church, which is what Qingdao is know for, as it was for several decades in the 1800's a german owned city. From there we to the train station, were able to buy tickets for Ji'nan, which left us an hour and a half to go to an ATM, draw out money and then check our email before boarding. We first went to the ATM, which worked for me and not for Angelo so I loaned him about 125 dollars and took out 250 for myself to add to some Yuan I had traded for in Korea.

It is from here things went awfully wrong. At some point during the twenty minutes where we were checking email I lost my wallet. Whether it was pickpocketed or I left it on a table, or it fell out of mypocket i don't know, but when I went to pay for the internet it was gone. Of the 40 people in the room no one spoke english, or at least volunteered to. Angelo and I searched and even frisked the two people who were sitting next to me but it was to no avail. [Did you frisk Angelo? You should have. - ed.] My credit card, bank card and about 360 US dollars worth of Chinese currency were gone. (Also lost was my diving licence, driving licence, really cool wallet, several pictures, swisscard pocket knife and perhaps most important of all, my University of rochester student ID card. Yeah, I graduated in 2000 but I have saved roughly 20,000 dollars in the past 6 years on student discounts. I am now officially in the real world.)

So that sucked. Angelo could have given back the money I had loaned him and headed out to Tai'in by himself, but being a true Dutchman, he stayed by his fellow traveller to be of help [and to see if anything else could be stolen from his American friend. - ed.]. We went to a post office, which had a Western Union wiring service available and with the help of some great non-English speaking, non-homicidal, postalworkers I was able to contact my mother, who is a saint. I woke her up at about 2:30 AM to ask her to wire me 700 dollars. A half an hour later I had the money. Thank God (or Buddha, or I guess Mao?) forM others and Western Union.

From the post office we went to the mcdonals again to eat a pre-5-hour-train meal. Yes, I ate in a mcdonals twice in the same day. I also used a squat toilet there too. It was a weird day. From there we caught a train to Ji'nan and luckily were able to find a train from there to Tai'in. While waiting for the train we entertained about 40 or so Chinese people crowded around us in the waiting room. I spoke Chinese phrases from Angelo's Mandarin phrase book (Such as, "Are you interested in Fang Shui?) and Angelo was tall. Very very tall. The train left about a half an hour late and was packed and then for more fun, stopped for an hour for apparently no reason whatsoever. We got into Tai'in at 1AM where we were helped by two really nice Chinese college students in finding a hotel near the base of the mountain we planned on climbing the next day. The hotel was not allowed to have non-chinese guests so we were checked in under assumed Chinese names. Mine was Wu Tang. The room cost us 4 dollars each. China may be totally dysfunctional but it is cheap.

Today we woke up and with our Chinese friends we had met the night before and climbed Tai Shan, a 1545 meter high Mountain. It has been considered China's most sacred holy mountain since hundreds of years before Christ's birth and I'll say they picked a good one.

I'm now in Qufo, Confucius's hometown, which has one of China's biggest temples in his honor. Got to run. -Larry

Banned in China > by Larry Beethoven, edited and compiled by the Pink Wizard

2006-06-25T23:09:00.000+02:00

Like forks and spoons, blogspot is banned in China.

So Larry has sent me what he has to say, and I am to post it for him. Here it is:

Initial Impressions of China> Travels

Most of you reading this have been to a Chinatown in a Western city,whether it be in NYC, San Francisco, Toronto or London. An island of something different in a sea of white people. Well what I have seen so far looks a lot like those few blocks of Chinese writing and Chinese food. It's just a lot grubbier and chaotic and those blocks stretch into cities with many millions of people. Chinese people. Chinacities in a Chinacountry. Did you know there are more Chinese people in China than anywhere else in the world? It's a fact. I looked it up and I have anecdotal evidence to back that up. So my initial impressions, disregarding getting my wallet stolen:-People here are pretty nice. If they do speak English they will go out of their way to talk to you and help you when you need it. That said, it can be very difficult at times to find an English speaker. Strangely, several people have offered to help in an unusual dialect of Welsh.
When I walk down the street people all look at me and often smile and say hello. It's always a strange feeling to be an item of interest, as I often am in places that don't see to many foreigners.

-It is a stereotype in the US that Chinese Americans drive poorly.Well Chinese Chinese people are frighteningly appalling drivers, or to put it kindly, daring. My taxi driver usually passed slower moving cars by crossing into oncoming traffic. On a six lane highway. Yup. He also would beep his horn constantly.

-Getting from city to city is very difficult. Ticket sellers for buses and trains never seem to speak English and even if you get someone to translate for you, seats always seem to be sold out or a route non-existent. For instance, I am stuck in Qufo for an extra day because there are no sleeper train tickets available tonight. It took me me several hours to find this out.

-They like to spit. I think Mao gave them spit amnesty during the cultural revolution.

-Things here are cheap and there is always room to bargain. I boughta "I climbed Tai Shan" T-shirt for $1.50 and my hotel room costs $8.Bargained down from 10 dollars and $30 respectively. Dinner lastnight cost $1.

-Chinese people know who Andre Agassi is and think I look like him.

-The sites here are really really old. I just went to a huge forest that is exclusively a graveyard for Confucius and his descendants.All 100,000 of them. That's 2,500 years of one family being buried inone place. It's quite amazing and unique. The Mountain that i climbed yesterday was also climbed by Confucius 2,500 years ago.

-All developing nations have wild street dogs. Luckily the ones in China seem to all be very small and puntable.

-I have been asked about 10 times so far to pose in pictures withother people. Maybe they think i am actually Andre Agassi? If that'sthe case I am going say, "You've got to be kidding me!" and tell them I am in fact Vin Diesel.

Blixed>Travels

2006-06-22T05:02:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I went into to the DMZ on a half day bus tour. It was raining the whole time and visibility was crap so I couldn't spot that missile they plan on testing, that could reach targets in the US. We did get to go into one of the 4 found infiltration tunnels that the north Koreans dug deep underground for future invations of the South. Again, no missiles down there. I guess this is what Hans Blix felt like.
This afternoon I will board an all night ferry to China. I am not sure if I will be able to blog from there. Larry B may write some things that the (China)man just isn't ready to hear.

What's on TV in Korea?> Travels

2006-06-22T04:49:00.000+02:00

Currently:

Channel 1: I believe this must be the Kimchi channel.

Channel 2: Some kind of dance contest variety show. The host looks a bit like Kim Jong Il.

Channel 3: Lois and Clark: The Adventures of Superman.

Channel 4: US Army programming. Wow this is creepy. They have US television shows interspersed with commercials specifically aimed at our forces stationed in Korea. Also lots of PSAs informing the army soldiers to wear motorcycle helmets, avoid raping the locals and too report any sex slave trafficking. They even have a news show anchored by a woman in fatigues. All of the news in Iraq seemed pretty rosy. Looks like Bush is doing a good job. I guess I will vote Republican next time.

Chanel 5: Smells like rich lady

Channel 6: Soccer highlights

Channel 7: Korean game show called "Name that fish."

Channel 8: Korean soap opera?

Channel 9: Some show about cockfighting

Where the streets have no names> Travels

2006-06-20T12:57:00.000+02:00

I arrived in Seoul yesterday and have spent the past two days going to tall places to look down upon this enormous city. It's ringed by mountains so all of the smog gets trapped in, which makes for foggy pictures. Like Japan, they don't name the roads here. (Maybe Bono would want to live in Seoul.) To find an address you need to know which neihborhood it is in and then the name of the block. The actual building numbers are handed out in order of when the building went up. I wish I were making this up. This makes for a tricky time in finding anything: restaurants, hotels, bail bondsmen... Come on Asians, get it together! You invented gunpowder, paper and kareoke yet you can't name your streets?
So last night I decided I would take it upon myself to name some of the streets. Tonight, with the help of a French couple I met, I will go around town with a permanent marker and write some street names on the buildings. My hope is these will eventually be accepted by the city and used in future maps. They can thank me later.

Annyeong Korea!> Travels

2006-06-18T14:14:00.000+02:00

Thank you Arrested Development. Having an adopted South Korean child as a character that is mistakenly called Annyeong (hello) has seared that word into to my foreign language deficient skull. So my first impressions of Korea:

These people really like to hike.

I have seen lots of couples wearing identical shirts.

It would be lonely to be single here. Many of the meals can only be ordered for two or more people.

Korean food is spicy.

They smell like cabbage. (They also have small hands. Perhaps they are descended from Carnies?)Even though they are pretty much a first world nation, in comparison to Japan, there is a very big difference in the cleanliness, modernity and wealth in Korea from what I have seen so far.

The woman here are not nearly as attractive as the Japanese.
The Korean temples are much older and less attractive than the Japanese temples (remember attractive is subjective).
Which may be a result of the Japanese pretty much destroying everything in this country at some point (1590's and 20th century).
Which makes me think they must hate the Japanese.
Ok, so they don't smell like cabbage.

Thoughts on Japan>Travels

2006-06-18T13:41:00.000+02:00

I really enjoyed my time in Japan and I would like to have the chance to live there at some point. Actually, I'd recommend teaching English there for a year to anybody who has just graduated college and is looking for something to do before getting a real job. The Japanese people were for the most part very nice and tried to be helpful. Their culture is wonderfully different than ours and I guess the best way to describe them for me would be cute and weird and I mean that in the best possible way. They have actually inspired me to write a book I plan on titling, "Japanese are cute." It's the sequel to "Canadians are polite" and the prequel to "Koreans smell like cabbage." Some tips for those who plan on visiting Nippon:

Go out of your way to see a baseball game. Try to see one in Osaka or Tokyo for the best stadiums.
It is pretty easy to get templed out. Try to figure out which ones are unique and seek those out.
Make sure you stay at a few Ryokan and at least one night in a capsule hotel.
If you want any nightlife in Tokyo, stay near the night life districts as the subways stop running at midnight and the taxis are expensive
Eat as much shaved ice as possible
Always carry around a trash bag or small plastic garbage can. They have no public garbage cans so this is how they do it. I told you they were weird.
Avoid direct eye with people older than you. Wait for them to look you in the eye first. Otherwise you will be showing them a great amount of disrespect.
Get any travel guide other than the lonely planet Japan, which sucks.
Putting wasabi in someone's green tea ice cream is NOT funny.

Somewhere between a womb and a tomb> Travels

2006-06-18T13:17:00.000+02:00

So the capsule hotel was great. I think I may have gone to an upmarket one as the place was pretty flash and looked like a three and a half star hotel from the outside and the inside. I actually lost a bit of face when I didn't take off my shoes when walking into the lobby. One of the receptionists quickly ushered me to a nearby locker and had me lock up my shoes. I then checked in and recieved a key that was on a plastic bracelet like you would get at a water park. I was told to put all of my things into another locker on the second floor and change into pajamas. The PJs had an asian design and were kind of silky. The top was short sleaved and bottoms were shorts. I then took the elevator to the fourth floor to find my capsule. It was in a very large room with hundreds of other capsules stacked two high. I had an upper capsule. Inside there was a pretty large screen tv, radio, alarm clock, fan and enough headroom to sit up.
I then went upstairs to the rec area where I found many hundreds of 40-50 year old Japanese business men in identical pajamas eating, watching soccer on personal tv sets or reading manga cartoons. It was odder than that sounds. Please note I was the only white guy in the hotel (Also, this, like most capsule hotels, is men only) and I got a lot of strange looks.
I then went to the top floor spa. I kind of followed the actions of the other pajamed men and disrobed, storing my PJs in a little locker and then went to one of the sit down showers that were arranged in rows. They had tooth brushes, disposable razers, shaving cream, hair stuff, brushes and so on. I sat on a stool and washed myself up good before walking over to one of the many multi tempertured onsen bathes (hot tubs), all the while keeping a little wash cloth over my junk as all the other men seemed to be doing. Later I watched some world cup soccer on a big screen tv in a sauna. It was too hot to cheer.
The whole things reminded me of the Sienfeld episode where Kramer had three Japanese men sleeping in a dresser. I actually slept pretty well that night. My capsule felt somehere between a womb and a tomb, which I guess it technically is.

It's not a virgin, but it's still under warrenty> Travels

2006-06-16T14:56:00.000+02:00

I am now in Fukuoka on Japan's western tip. this keyboard has a lot of trouble with caps locks so please just let it go already. enough! anyway, I am staying in a capsule hotel tonight which i can write about later and also just drank a big glass of warm sake. thinking about it I also took a lot of pictures today, so i guess i am turning japanese. i really think so. interesting fact: Fukuoka was the original target of the second a-bomb, but after several passes of the city which was covered in clouds, our pilots flew over to nearby nagasaki which unfortunatly for them had a break in the clouds. have so many lives depended on a cloudy sky in any point in history?

Before coming here i spent the day in the Aso-san region. Aso-san has the world's largest active volcano caldera.
On a side note, my cheap digital watch, which i use for travel, somehow had a function turned on over the past five days where it beeps on the hour every hour. this is pretty damned annoying. well today i needed it because I was in a time crunch to do my hike and turn around on the trail in enough time to make it back for the last bus. Well I noticed the watch wasn't beeping anymore and then i noticed that it was stuck on the date function and i could no longer see the time. So it was now useless instead. listen, I am no charity and if you can't be usefull you're not going to be on my wrist for very long. This watch had pissed me off one to many times. I attached it to a big rock and approached the edge of a caldera with a smoking lake of sulfer boiling below. it was then that the watch started working showing me the time.
unfortunatly for the watch, that time was 2:59 and 58 seconds. three seconds and one beep later the watch was well on its way to a very painful end. yeah, that's how i roll. i hope i appeased the volcano gods with this new gift. luckily i had my ipod to keep time for me, which thankfully still works. (and if you don't think that was a thinnly vieled threat to the ipod, you don't know me well enough)

Kyoto-Himeji-Hiroshima-Beppu> Travels

2006-06-15T10:59:00.000+02:00

So Kyoto has a lot of temples.　Yup. I will post some pictures at some point, but there were many and they were varied. I also went to Nara. There were plenty of temples there too including the biggest wooden building in the world. Yesterday i left Kyoto early in the morning and went with Jeff, a fellow traveler from Seattle, to Himeji castle. There we killed a ninja. I am not sure what his intentions were, but when in doubt, club with a stick and ask questions later. In retrospect, it may not have even been a ninja, but instead a toursit dressed in all black.
After hiding the body and finishing our tour of the castle we got back on the bullet train and randomly bumped into a guy I had met back in Kyoto, Mike from Toronto and went to hiroshima together.
There the three of us saw a baseball game. Hiroshima Carp V Fakuoka Soft bank hawks. It was pretty different from your average Yankee game. First, the players are all Asian　(besides this one big black guy). 2nd, the fans cheer often and very loudly, but in unison, led by trumpets and drums. They also rhythmicly clap together pieces of plastic.
After a couple of beers (poured by a woman wearing a beer backpack) and a few bowls of udon soup we became a bit rowdy and desided to cheer for the visiting hawks. When I yelled out, "It's Hawk Time!" the whole section turned and looked at me. In general people seemed entertained by our chacanery. The Carp came out on top 2-1 in the end on back to back home runs. Good times were had by all in attendance. After the game we got some dinner and walked by the hypocenter for the A-Bomb. It just had a little memorial and was next to a parking lot.
This morning the three of us went to the peace museum, which kind of gives you a holocaust museum feeling. Interesting though. We then got on board another bullet train and arrived in beppu, a resort Onsen town. Onsens are Japanese saunas and are an important part of their culture. We checked into a traditional Ryokan, a japanese style hotel and went to a sand bath where they buried us in hot sand for ten minutes. Good times also. Got to run.

A New Land Speed Record!> Travels

2006-06-12T14:18:00.000+02:00

I took the bullet train down to Kyoto yesterday. I think I may have set a new personal landspeed record at 200mph. The rice paddies intermixed with ugly concrete cities wished by pretty fast. Mt Fuji was hiding out there somewhere in the clouds. Two Taiwanese guys sat across from me on the train even though there were plenty of open seats. One of them, the one pictured on the left, nervously introduced himself to me. He explained to me, voice shaking, that he had never spoken English to anyone outside of his classroom and I was the first white person he had ever spoken to. He kept explaining that he was very nervous, but excited for this opportunity to communicate with me. Over the course of the two hour ride he would ask a question, I would respond and then he would sit back close his eyes and think carefully of another question. Here are some that I can remember:

Do you like Baseball?
Who is your favorite player?
Do you have any siblings?
Are you left or right handed?
Are you scared of spiders? (He was, I am not)
Have you ever been to a Turkish prison?
What are your feeling on Chinese/Taiwanese relations and how do you feel the US would react in case of a Chinese of Taiwan?
Is there a God and if so, how does he/she tolerate so much suffering?
If you were a color, which color would you be?
Do you like Ron Howard more as an actor or a director?
Why don't women find me attractive?

Thank You Very Much Mr. Roboto!> Travels

2006-06-12T13:59:00.000+02:00

Tokyo was OK. It is a big bustling city with the attractions pretty spread out. Lots of modern architecture and interesting uses of technology. My favorite bit of the latter was the 200 or so robot guides they have throughout the city. They are humanoid in shape, but have wheels, kind of like Rosie from Jetsons, but instead of complaining (Like Rosie) they help tourists get the most out of the city. I met one named Akira. It was hanging out by itself near the Imperial Palace Park standing still. I walked over to it and its motion sensors must have noticed me because it asked me first in Japanese, then in English, then in German, then in Spanish, then in French, where I was from. I said the United States and it then said in English, "Ah the good old USA. Well welcome cowboy." It then told me that it could follow me around, but not up steps, and answer any questions I might have. It was great. It guided me around the gardens and then to the Ginza section of town. Besides answering my questions it occasionaly threw in some strange banter that seemed to be US themed. Some tidbits that I can remember:
So how was the game last night?
I worry about terrorism.
You are pretty slim for an American.
Boy do I like ketchup. I wish I could jump in a tub of it right now.

The other funny thing about the robot is it didn't like physical contact. I touched it to see what it felt like at somepoint and it politely said, "please don't touch me." I touched it again and it said, "I wish you wouldn't do that." I then left my hand on the robot's head and it said, "I am not very comfortable with this" and "you are going to regret this." Then it started yelling for help so I let it go. Anyway, domo arigato Mr. Roboto for being there when I needed you.

A Most Unwise Decision> Travels

2006-06-08T09:52:00.000+02:00

I woke up really early this morning, at 4:44AM, totally on purpose, so I could go to the Tsukiji Fish Market. It is here that all of the restaurants in Tokyo buy their fish. Between 4-6 AM they have auctions where they sell huge frozen fresh fish in these enormous warehouses. I watched one of the auctions for a 250 pound tuna. The auctioneer talked really fast to lots of guys wearing hats with numbers on them, standing on bleachers, bidding occasionally. Everything was very rapid fire and it looked like a lot of fun and in a moment of stupidity I raised my hand to place a bid. The men looked at me and the auctioneer said some more things and before I knew it I had bought a linebackers worth of fish for 500$. One of the other bidders offered to buy it from me for 400$ but I understand that it is important in Japanese culture not to lose face so I carefully loaded the fish into my backpack with the help of some of the other bidders and set off. My first stop was a sushi restaurant very close to the market. I traded them a chunk of the fish for nine pieces of sushi. It was probably the best sushi I have ever had, besides the squid, which made me almost throw up. After that I set the fish down on the sidewalk and sold chunks of sashimi to passerbys. Sales were slow as the Japanese are very mistrusting of white people with Swiss army knives. After several hours I became worried about the freshness of my once frozen fish and decided to move my operation into a mall in nearby Ginza. Mall security didn't' like that. In the end I carved the remains of the fish into that shape of a bigger than life size baby. Like the meat baby, only more healthy. An art dealer bought it and I think I've finally been discovered!

Pack your bags kids>Travels

2006-06-08T09:38:00.000+02:00

So I arrived in Tokyo yesterday and I was overwhelmed by new experiences.　I have used the word "weird" to describe so many things here. I am pretty much constantly lost and confused and that's great. Within an hour of walking around I wanted to uproot my wife and kids and move them here. Until I have a family I will have to put that off to a later date and time. Even the fight clubs here are a refreshing change. Their martial　arts training makes the beatings a whole new experince. According to the encyclopedia britannica, 1953 edition, Japanese people are the most agile race in the world! Well it showed! It was wierd how I blanked out for twenty minutes. Maybe it was the daze induced by the 17 hours of flights or perhaps it was the concusion, but yesterday left me in a very happy place.

Sayonara Bitches!> Travels

2006-06-06T01:34:00.000+02:00

Tomorrow morning, 6/6/06, I will fly to Tokyo to start two months of travel in Asia. I'll try as often as possible to post about my adventures. The past two weeks in NJ were fun and somewhat relaxing, although I could have used and extra week. The picture is my parents home, taken with my new camera. It's an 8.4 megapixel Panasonic DMC-LX1 with a 28mm Leica Lens with 5X optical zoom that shoots panoramic shots like this one with out cropping the original. My shots should look a little more epic from now on. Anyway, I'm off to Japan.

London> Guest Blogger, Doug Moldover

2006-05-30T17:49:00.000+02:00

I have just returned back to Wisconsin from a week long trip in London and my friends back at the work site were pretty enchanted with England... and it's jolly old scaffolding! To begin with I visited Greenwich and went to the royal observatory. You were right Larry, the scaffolding was worth the trip. It's the first time I have seen construction being done on an observatory and it made me wish we did more star gazing in Sheboygan.

Even better, if you go inside the museum you can see old photographs of a construction effort from the early 20th century. If only I had a time machine! I would go back and explain to them that 1/2 inch beams just aren't enough when working with a circular structure. You've got to go at least 3/4's of an inch! I'd tell them about the wonders of safety netting and quad fold magnesium joints.

Now this one was a bit of a shocker. I always thought London was a pretty safe town but apparently they need to install security systems on their scaffolding. I guess that's another reason why I am proud to be American. Here in the land of the free, a man need not to live in fear that another man will steal his scaffolding. The funny thing is that scaffolding is terrible. It looks like the work of a painter. Hey buddy, stick to painting walls and let the big boys handle the scaffolding.

Lastly we have some scaffolding on Westminster Bridge in London. (On the left of the shot you can see Big Ben.) Now if I hadn't seen this work I would have thought that the British building industry doesn't know their asses from their elbows but this piece of work was impressive. They aren't messing around. Those are steel girders! When working on bridges you've got to have a strong structure, as my now deceased friend Bob Jadinski so fatefully learned on the Ashby bridge. Why Bob, why!

Vigelandsparken> Travels

2006-05-26T15:36:00.000+02:00

These Photos are from Vigelandsparken in Oslo. This park had some great statues designed by Gustav Vigeland in early 20th century.

Norwegian pedestrian Crossing> Travels

2006-05-26T02:57:00.000+02:00

Here are some pictures I took of the pedestrian crosswalk lights in Oslo.
As you can see there are two red dudes on top of one green dude. What's the freaking deal? I asked the people working at the tourist info office and they claimed they didn't know why. So I am left to speculate what the extra red guy is for:

-To make it really clear not to cross?

-Showing off the city's largesse?

-Bad urban planning?

-Papal Decree?

-Punk kids up to no good?

-Something to do with cross country skiing and/or whaling?

-Some sort of two tiered system where the elderly, disabled and disenfranchised get more time to cross?

-A product of a country obsessed with pedestrian safety?

-A mindfuck for tourists?

-A tribute to Prince Olaf the VIII, sadly killed by a motor car in the early 20's?

Any ideas?

Oh, to be back in the land of Coca-Cola!> Travels

2006-05-25T02:56:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I flew to NJ, coming home for the first time since September. Needless to say, my Mom hated my new tattoos, but I guess you can't please everyone. I think the Chinese symbols make me look more philosophical.
London was OK, but the weather was crap the whole time and my cold was slowing me down a bit. I spent Sunday morning visiting Greenwich, home of the prime meridian and Greenwich Mean Time. Here's a picture of me with one foot in the Western Hemisphere and one foot in the Eastern Hemisphere. I also went to the maritime museum, the Royal War Museum, Science Museum and natural History Museum. Yeah, now I am museumed out. On Monday I hung out with my friend Paul who I met last Summer in Panama and crashed at his apartment in Notting Hill. My flight was rather uneventful other than a crying baby a few rows from me. Again, who would be against knocking out all children under the age of 16 on any flights longer than an hour? There is money to be made here. I saw a few movies, King Kong, The Matador and The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada. The Matador was pretty bad. Three burials was a mildly interesting Tommy Lee Jones pet project and he plays a role that was very Clint Eastwoodesque. I'll be putting up some pictures soon for my past posts on this trip.

My Shakespearean Debut> Travels

2006-05-20T20:22:00.000+02:00

I am in London now and will be here until Tuesday when I fly back to the states. Yesterday I went into the Tate Modern (Modern Art Museum) for a few hours and then walked over to the nearby Globe theatre. This is a reconstruction of the original one that Shakespeare co-financed and where he performed most of his work. I got tickets to a performance of Coriolanus, one of Shakespeare's best political tragedies. It's about a Roman military leader who is valiant in combat, but so openly disdains the plebes that he ends up being player hated. I actually only saw the first half so I am guessing he eventually dies, but where I left off he had been chased out of Rome. The performance was a bit touristy as it is Shakespeare in the round. I bought standing tickets which are both good and bad. The bad is you are exposed to the elements, and it was raining throughout the performance which didn't help my cold. You also have to stand.

The good thing is the actors actually come into the standing area and performed scenes inches away from me. I was also able to participate in one of the battle scenes, which was a lot of fun. I punched some Japanese guy and held one of the peasant's in a head lock until Coriolanus could stab him with a trident. Needless to say, me and Coriolanus were on the losing end of this battle and I too was tossed out of Rome. So I missed the second half, but all the rain and cold was making my head feel stuffy and frankly those peasants (and the Japanese guy's family) looked pissed.

Today I spent 7 hours in the British museum, the largest museum in the world. The British Empire did a great job of "collecting" the world treasures when the sun was setting on them and this is certainly the best collection I have ever seen. I think I got to see everything currently on display. I am all museumed out for a few weeks.

Irish Eddie> Travels

2006-05-20T00:09:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I visited Oxford of University fame and Salisbury (of steak fame). Oxford was worth the visit. Great architecture, tons of history. I met with my friend James who took me for a tour of his hometown and we had proper afternoon tea and scones. Good times! I then caught a train to Salisbury, which has one England's nicest Medieval cathedrals (Medieval Times!) and is about 8 miles from Stonehenge. That night I stayed in a room that a pub rented to me on the cheap and played some pool with the locals. This was the kind of tiny Neighborhood pub that are on every corner in England and by the quality of their play, I am guessing the people I played with were fixtures. There was one short fella who went by the name of Irish Eddie. I'll post a picture of him eventually. He was Irish and acted the part. I played doubles against him and a woman named Caroline who was a lot better than me. (British table have tiny balls and tiny pockets with rounded edges which make the game much more difficult when you aren't used to it. A big guy named John was kind enough to carry me on his back to several wins. He had a black eye and smelled of elderberry. Not unpleasant at all, just distinct. Probably good for my cold too.

There was a Stonehenge monument on the stage that was in danger of being crushed by a dwarf!> Travels

2006-05-19T23:47:00.000+02:00

Earlier today I went to the real, uncrushable, Stonehenge. Was I overwhelmed? Underwhelmed? Whelmed? It was pretty frickin' cold and raining, which detracted from the moment a bit. Also you can't go anywhere near the stones unless you book a special afterhours tour. My guide told us that it had healing powers at a certain axis of the stones. I stood there for a while and for a moment my congestion cleared up a bit, although that could have been the early numbing stages of hypothermia setting in. In the end I'm glad I was able to visit the big ass rocks and check it off my list of CNN time lapse station identification sites. I would say whelmed was just about the right way to describe my feelings towards this famous ancient site. It will certainly not make my list of the 100 most disappointing tourist attractions. Which I'm sure Derek Smalls of Spinal Tap would appreciate. No Derek, to answer your practical question, we are not gonna do fucking Stonehenge tomorrow.

Cambridge> Travels

2006-05-17T22:51:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I was hit pretty hard by a cold that can be described as ebola without the internal bleeding. Despite that, today I walked around in a semi-conscious daze, visiting the various colleges (Kind of like institutionalized frats.
Think Harry Potter). They were all closed to visitors because of testing in progress, but I had my friend Pedro´s ID card so I was able to go where I pleased. The architecture here is pretty amazing. I was actually here in 2003, right when I started consulting, but my memory isn´t too good ever since those motercycle/boating/elevator/soft shelled clam accidents.
I took a pre-dinner nap at Pedro´s and then watched him play in his inter-college series ultimate game. After that I rushed to a formal dinner that Pedro had tickets to but could not go do to due to his double secret girlfriend´s knee issues. I was the last person to show up and I didn´t know any of the 80 post grad student in attendance so I had to wander around the room for a while looking for a seat. Speaking of the room, it was in the oldest building in all of Cambridge, built sometime in the 1100´s as a nunery. I met some nice people who knew Pedro and had lovely dinner conversation. I was going to pretend that I was a taxidermist, but one of the nice people happened to be a zoologist so I have a feeling it would have been hard to pull off.

Wonderful Copenhagen> Travels

2006-05-16T13:43:00.000+02:00

Today I am leaving Copenhagen after having a nice extended weekend hanging out with friends at a big ultimate tournament. I will write more from the UK.

Something Interesting > from the Pink Wizard's Lab

2006-05-12T14:44:00.000+02:00

"Hi, my name is Larry Beethoven and I went to Sweden and went on a train and saw a fjord and I'm a flaming liberal blah blah blah blah"

I know you want some CONTENT folks, so here we go.

Google has introduced a new feature in which you can see what people are googling where. From this valuable resource I learned the following:

Toronto contains the most people googling "metamucil," while London contains the most people googling "immodium." Bangalore takes a more holistic approach -- leading the pack in the quest for "prune juice."

And of course, the wonderful Islamic culture that brought us algebra, couscous, and global jihad, also brings us much internet exploration of "sex" (Cairo), "anal sex" (Ankara), and "child porn" (Izmir, Turkey).

Surprisingly, Montreal beat out Melbourne in the quest for googling "bestiality."

And Larry, I suggest you move to Budapest, where people are googling "Vin Diesel" like there's no tomorrow. There you'll be as popular as you were in Rochester, which leads the world in google searches for "poop."

Oslo> Travels

2006-05-11T19:26:00.000+02:00

A bunch of the past two days need some photos to be best described. Yesterday I took the train from Bergen to Oslo.

During the course of the seven hour train ride I went from the fjords of the West Coast, green with spring, then over the mountains that form the spine of Norway, still ensconced in the snow from the Winter, and then back down along a river that snaked it way back into Spring and Norway's capital. Was that a run-on? It also happens to be the most expensive city in the world and by my 4 dollar gatorade, 10 dollar whopper and 180 dollar prostitute (and that was just to show me a bit of ankle) my wallet was certainly made aware of the costs. Also a convention was in town and when I got to the tourist info building they informed me that all hotels, hostels and park benches were booked out in Oslo and all of the towns within 80km. I faced a similar dilemma in Barcelona in 2000 so I knew exactly what to do. (For my Scandinavian readers: yes I considered using the, "Jeg er ikke her fra byen. Kan jeg sove i din seng i nat?" line.) I put my backpack in storage in a locker at the train station and then I walked around from hotel to hotel asking if they had a maid's room that I could rent. Many hotels do, they just can't really talk about them. Kind of like the fight club. Finally I found one in a pretty skeezy hotel. I ended up paying over 100 dollars to have what amounted to a cot and a sink. In order to save a bit of money I had a hamburger dog. I then went for a walk in this big park with lots of statues. There were plenty of punk teens playing hooky from school, enjoying the warm weather, bbqing and throwing frisbees very poorly.
This morning I woke up, stored my bag at the hotel and then bought an Oslo day pass. Free transport and free museums all for 30 dollars. I made the most of it, running around town. I started with the Viking ship museum which had three pretty complete Viking ships that were found buried in the 1900's. I then went to the Norsk culture museum, which wasn't quite open yet, but I was able to stroll the grounds. And stroll I did. The place looked like a summer camp I went to when I was a kid, only with more eclectic architecture and grass on the roofs of the buildings. From there I went to the Kon-Tiki museum, which was great. They had the raft Thor Hverdale sailed from South America to the South Pacific Islands, proving that Polynesia could have been populated by South American ancestors. I then went to the FRAM museum. The FRAM was the first ship to go to both the Antarctic and Arctic. It's pretty bad ass. Then I briefly looked into the maritime museum, but it was just model ships so I jumped on a ferry and I went to the Castle. It was OK. From there I went to the Edvard Munch museum. They have tons of security as two years ago the scream was stolen, again. How embarrassing. From there I took a long subway ride to a ski jump and ski museum. I took a ride an a ski jump emulator. Good times? Something like that. From the top of the ski jump I could see all of Oslo, which is actually only somewhat majestic. I much preferred Bergen. Then I went back in to town and visited the Nobel peace institute, where they honor and choose the recipients of the Nobel peace prize. It was pretty interesting with great interactive displays. After that I had some mediocre 12 dollar Pad-Thai.
I am now at the train station and in a half an hour I will catch a train to the airport and find a nice bench to sleep on. My flight is early tomorrow morning and I don't feel like paying for a crappy hotel room only to have to catch an expensive train at 5 Am. Tomorrow I will be in Cope, watching some ultimate and catching up on sleep.

Last night in Bergen> Travels

2006-05-10T09:30:00.000+02:00

Last night I went out with Bentine, Jarle and Tonja to play pool and say goodbye. It's been a great time here in Bergen. My mother always told me that I had, "good taste in Norwegians," and although I had no idea what that meant when I was 4 years old, now I know my Mother was right. And a bit creepy too.

More Reflections> Travels

2006-05-09T20:18:00.000+02:00

Look at the ice on this river breaking up the reflection.

Reflections> Travels

2006-05-09T20:12:00.000+02:00

Road trip> Travels

2006-05-09T20:04:00.000+02:00

Yesterday Jarle and I went on a long drive to visit some Fjords outside of Bergen. The following posts are pictures from that trip.

Hauchstemplersburg, Germany > travels with the Pink Wizard

2006-05-08T19:26:00.000+02:00

So the Pink Wizard has caught the travel bug!

Annoyed with a kvetching wife and a crying baby, I got on a plane yesterday to Germany. I then rented a Peugot and drove randomly, taking a right here, a left there, not at all caring where I was going. And I ended up in a quaint town called Hauchstemplersburg.

The building with the spire is the Hauchstemplersburg Castle on Knauchblachstrasse. It was built in 1606 in honor of Duke Maximillian von Hauchstempler, who defeated the Tartar invaders in 1602. The architecture is simply exquisite. I couldn't go inside though because I forgot my papers. The Germans don't let you do anything unless you have your "papers."

While in Hauchstemplersburg, I also had time to visit St. Gunther's Cathedral. Its absolutely stunning. It was partially destroyed by allied bombing during WWII, but they did a nice job reconstructing it. Notice the flying buttresses.

And finally,I visited Schmarpelstadt -- a small hamlet adjoining Hauchstemplersburg. The town square goes back to Medieval times. here is a German pizzeria called "Arturos" which is absolutely disgusting. Stay away fromthe German pizza.

Crossing Guards> Travels

2006-05-08T15:35:00.000+02:00

A stat I left off of last week's NationMaster entry is that Norway has the least pedestrian automobile fatalities per capita in the world. Not suprisingly, they also have the most crossing guards per capita in the world too. The reason: Every 5 year old child must serve one year of National service as a crossing guard. I like this system. It gives those children a year away from school to evaluate their lives so far, get some perspective and maybe even find themselves. I wish I could have had that in my childhood. The pictures below show some of the guards on a break and a pack of them walking to work. Hey Doug, notice the scaffolding in the background!

Norway is Fjordgeous> Travels

2006-05-08T14:44:00.000+02:00

Yesterday Jarle took Bentine, their friend Tonja and me out for a day on his family's boat. We cruised around his local fjord, went fishing and had a BBQ. The weather, company and scenery made for a memorable day. I'll save the comedy and lies for another post.

Left Prague, Now in Norway> Travels

2006-05-06T19:15:00.000+02:00

This morning I left Prague and flew to Bergen, Norway. The flight took me over a spine of mountains that runs down the interior of this country. The landscape was covered in snow, frozen lakes and rivers. Bergen and its sorounding area was where the snow ended giving way to green forest covered mountains and many Islands dotted with suburbs. In 1978 the Farmers Almanac:International Edition rated Bergen the loveliest place in the world. I am visiting my good friends Jarle and Bentine, who I met last year on my Central America trip. Today Jarle and I visited his family home and the fjord, Lyse Fjord, that it sits on. Then we went into Bergen, which is tiny, but really nice. Infact in the 1982 Farmer's Almanac: International Editon they rated Bergen the best tiny city in the Northern Hemisphere, losing the world title to Brisbane. (In 1984 they finnaly took the title, but it was a somber occasion because in that year the prince of Bergen, Sværre, died of tuberculosis.)
--------------------
Right now Larry is at a pre-partey with me, Bentine, and some friends of mine! He definetly came at a good time, cause the weather is amazing in Bergen right now!!!! Any way, we are going to show him all of Bergen in just a couple of days, so he is in for a rough one.. Wish us luck!!! Så god helg alle sammen! Det blir nok kjempe bra skal dere se!!!! :-) Skål!!!

Being Pro-active> Life Choices

2006-04-28T16:33:00.000+02:00

For the past few days people have been asking me what's with the mysterious patch on my neck. Ok, here comes the hard truth. It's a nicotine patch. Those of you who know me may be thinking, "but wait a second here, Larry doesn't smoke cigarettes. He even referred to smokers as society's trash. He hasn't smoked a cigarette in his life. How do I know this for sure? I guess I just do. Call it intuition or my gut, but I've never been more positive of anything in my life. But how does Larry know that I thinking all of this? Damn, he's in my head. I am so freaked out now."

Well, you thought right, I sill have yet to smoke a cigarette. However, the other day, for the first time in my life I saw a friend smoking and I thought, "wow, that looks pretty cool." It was then that I realized I had a problem and I could either ignore it or face it like a man.

You must now be thinking, "that is one shoddy looking nicotine patch." Well, I won't take offence. I made it myself by mixing the contents of two Malboros with hand cream and applying the compound to my neck. I then covered it with a piece of gauze and secured it with some clear packaging tape.

This nicotine patch is a preemptive measure that I hope will save me from a life of yellow teeth, smelly clothing, lung cancer and stupid offspring. I haven't had a craving since and honestly I have never felt better. This patch gives me the buzz that only freedom from addiction can provide. I feel so alive!

Norway> Country Facts: with NationMaster and the Rough Trio

2006-04-25T16:56:00.000+02:00

For the 2^nd in my 193 part series I will look at Norway. On May 6^th I will be visiting this country for the first time. Norway is:

#1 on the Human Development Index. I believe that means they develop humans better than any other country. (Also cats) The USA is #10

#1 in drug offences per capita. The USA is #4

#1 on Electricity consumption per capita, followed closely by Iceland. I am guessing that has to do with heating.

#1 on trust. 65% of Norwegians reported in a 1990’s surveys that people can be trusted. The US, 44%.

#1 on will fight for their country. 90% of Norwegians would fight for their country. Ok, so I guess I will cancel my planned coup d'état. The US comes in #5 at 78%. I am guessing that percentage has gone down in the past few years.

#1 in winter Olympics medals all time. 263 medals collected. To put that in perspective the US is #2 with 193 medals.

#2 in GDP per capita. They would be #1 if it weren’t for Luxembourg. The US is #7. Norway also closely follows Luxembourg in Economic aid donations per capita.

#1 on Norwegians per capita. I figured that would be the case.

V is for Vendetta> At the movies with Larry B

2006-04-22T11:24:00.000+02:00

What a wonderfully subversive film. Like Fahrenheit 911, I worry that it won't change any hearts and minds. At this point you either hate what Bush and the Republicans have done to our country and the world or you are a complete horse's ass that doesn't understand reason, ethics and the consequences born and yet to born of the past 6 years of misrule. We need to throw these bums out before we end up making V's world a reality.

Interesting take on China> I may be a Big City Lawyer, but I do know this...

2006-04-20T18:39:00.000+02:00

When you think about it, their attitude to Iran is really no different from our attitude to Saudi Arabia.

283 Children Killed In Minor League Baseball Team's 'Kill Your Children' Promotion> Link

2006-04-20T14:41:00.000+02:00

Also check out the editorial, "Baby, you mean the World of Warcraft to me" in the same issue.

My visit to Prague> Guest Blogger, Doug Moldover

2006-04-19T14:13:00.000+02:00

Larry B was kind enough to invite me to Prague and show me around town. Well here are some of the sites I encountered along the way. The first picture here is of the Schwarzenberg Palace. Luckily it was under reconstruction and closed to visitors. I wasn't able to get a good shot of the scaffolding unfortunately, but take it from me, you need to be very careful when working with Sgraffito. Delicate shit. I once spilled some Fanta on Sgraffito.

The next photo is of St. Vitius Cathedral, a huge cathedral within the confines of Prague Castle. They were doing some restoration work on the building. I like the use of blue netting. Safety first!

The next building is the Belvedere, a 16th century Summer Palace. Was Mr. Belvedere named after it, I have no fucking clue, but possibly. No, make that probably. Straight forward scaffolding as you can see. Nothing fancy.

Lastly are two pictures of the equestrian statue of Jan Zizka. This is actually the biggest equestrian themed statue in the world. Looks like it has the largest scaffolding saddle in the world too! Prague is truly a wonderful city.

-Doug

Everyone likes cartoons> I may be a bigcitylawyer, but I do know this...

2006-04-19T03:50:00.000+02:00

http://www.exxposeexxon.com/movie/

Natye still thinks we're better off with an oil man for president...
...and vice president...
.... and puppet president.

A Day at the Zoo> Travels

2006-04-16T21:27:00.000+02:00

Before I leave Prague I would like to see some of the sites a bit outside of the center. After a lazy morning I traveled by metro and bus to Troja Palace, a summer palace built at the end of the 17th century for a wealthy family. It had a great sculptured staircase. It happens that the palace is across the street from the Prague Zoo so I figured I’d check that out.
Well, lucky me, for it was a special day at the zoo, dare I say historic. I will explain why momentarily, but first of all, I really enjoyed this zoo. The enclosures are generally OK and they have a lot of rare animals that I can’t remember seeing before at other zoos. Either that or I didn’t recognize the Czech names.
Anyway, I happened to be witness to a zoological experiment. The Prague Zoo was opening it’s one of a kind, previously never attempted, Polar Bear, Alligator, Lion, Tiger, Gorilla, Great White Shark, Dung Beatle enclosure. I know, wow! The purpose of this exhibit was to show that if animals could get along so could we, with our different creeds, colors and nationalities. (Rumor was they were going to add an Arab and a Jew in there too.) With great fanfare they let all of the animals into the enclosure at once. The following ten minutes were the most thrilling/mentally scaring moments of my life. Who won in inevitable melee? Well, technically the dung beetle, but I think us, the audience were the big winners.

Update!: I just checked the interweb and “Zoo Manager Monthly,” the World’s most read magazine on zoo management has given the Prague Zoo their yearly, “worst idea” award.

Scroll to the bottom of the page> Travels

2006-04-16T12:32:00.000+02:00

Because you will find my travel maps of the world and Europe.

Who do I look like> My pretty pretty face

2006-04-15T22:42:00.000+02:00

I figured this warranted it's own post rather than a response to the Pink Wizard's great link to the my heritage site. So going in I figured Vin Diesel would be my best match. Oh how I was wrong. Listed here are the top matches to the pictures I entered.

Picture #1
Tony Bennet
Matthew Fox (The Dr. from Lost)
Jude Law
Jimmy Carter

Picture #2
Gael Garcia Bernal (Amores perros,Motorcycle Diaries)
Patrick Swayze

Picture #3
P Diddy
David Blaine

Picture #4
Rene Russo

Picture #5
Woodrow Wilson (Complete disclosure: I actually entered in a photo of Woodrow Wilson to see if this database was only pretty people. Nope, it nailed Woodrow good.)

Picture #6
Jake Gyllenhaal

Picture #7
Gael Garcia Bernal
Vin Diesel!

Picture #8
Zach Braff (He was friends with my brother and went to the same high school as me)

Picture #9
Jake Gyllenhall

Picture # 10
Jake Gyllenhall

Super Cool Website > From the Pink Wizard Files

2006-04-15T05:08:00.000+02:00

The MyHeritage website is amazing. You upload a pic of yourself and using scientific analysis, it tells you which celebrity you resemble. I uploaded a whole bunch of pics of myself, and surprise -- it said I resemble Jerry Seinfeld.

My wife matched the German composer Anton Webern, who strangely, she does resemble now that I think about it.

Who do YOU look like?

Me and You and Everyone We Know> At the Movies with Larry B

2006-04-15T02:06:00.000+02:00

Tonight I had the pleasure of seeing "Me and You and Everyone We Know." I had never heard of it, but saw it had a very good Rotten Tomato rating of 82%. Well I really liked it. Very original, loopy, wicked humor that will make you laugh out loud. Go out of your way to see this one. Afterwards I went back to my friend Canadian Steve's place with Fancy Pants and Dave and we drank some good Scotch. I think I am acquiring a taste for whisky which feels sophisticated. On a related note I am also acquiring a taste for Earth, Wind and Fire, which we were listening to while drinking. (Which would have been sophisticated in the 70's.)

Vote for Steveo> Link

2006-04-14T00:07:00.000+02:00

This is almost really funny.

Jesse Dee Wise> Link

2006-04-13T20:21:00.000+02:00

At least my name isn't Michael Bolton.

Czech Republic> Country Facts: with NationMaster and the Rough Trio

2006-04-13T19:19:00.000+02:00

Here are some somewhat interesting stats about the Czech Republic. I have been living here since Jan 1 so I figured it should be the first country I feature in my 193 part series, Country Facts: with NationMaster and the Rough Trio. Please keep in mind most of these statistics don’t include all countries in the world and are subjective and flawed like any other statistics. There is also a good chance I am making half this shit up:

CR has by far the most amount of embezzlements per capita. Not sure exactly how they define that, but Czech people do seem to be generally sneaky and up to no good.
In the CR 98% of 17 year olds are in secondary education, which is the highest proportion in the world. Shockingly the US only has 79% of students in school. Yikes and that makes total sense at the same time. Yikes again, but way to go Czechs!

In CR 93% of students age 9 have a calculator, more than any other country in the world. Maybe this has something to with all the embezzling they do.

The CR also has the highest percentage of students from households with more than 25 books.

The CR has the highest percentage of public expenditure on health as a % of total expenditure on health. 91.4%. Maybe I should take care of my knee while I am here. The US, at 44.9%, is tied for Mexico as the lowest percentage. Yup.

CR has the third highest average number of births for every 1,000 girls aged 15 to 19. There are 46 children born to every 1000 teenage girls. Who’s #1? The USA of course with 64 per 1000. Good times! My friend Gus may be responsible for a couple of those.

28> Ageing

2006-04-12T11:58:00.000+02:00

I turned 28 today. Yeay. Some birthday trivia for you all:

I share my birthday with Andy Garcia, Claire Danes, Ed O' Neill, Tom Clancy, Herbie Hancock and Dave Letterman.

I spent the past 4 birthdays abroad- 2003 in Sydney, Australia, 2004 in Rimini, Italy, 2005 in Dublin, Ireland and 2006 in Prague.

I am finally able to buy porn in Vatican City! (Also, I am well past the age of consent, which I think is 6.)

One Man Luge> Mango Airways

2006-04-12T08:04:00.000+02:00

The air's in turmoil, the rain is soaking the land, and at 45,000ft we're above the worst of it.

We've been on the road for a few days now, travelling across the Heartland into foggy dirty skies of the LA basin and finally up to the northwest corridor where America hasn't yet been discovered.

We used to talk about alternative music, we made fun of the Starbucks junkies, and even threw a few cheap shots at the back country hicks that hadn't yet seen the light...

Between the snowy peaks and the Olympia river valley we let down our 42$M airplane at a place that hadn't seen a plane, much less a spaceship. Tom lent us his '73 suburban for the night. When Kristin asked him about gas prices and the middle east, exhaled from his cigarrette and pointed east towards the Cascades. "It was all so easy then," he began. Like a Kris Kristofferson song he continued, "you must be from New York." He hadn't shaved in over a week and his dickies weren't stained from coffee. "Your politics and your priorities come from those recycled newspapers I bet..."

A few hours and several drinks into the bag we put some more coins into the jukebox. The sawdust on the floor kept her DC shoes from overtaking the pint glasses clanking behind the bar. It was dimlit but the christmas lights brought of most of the gray hairs from Tom's beard.

"If gas goes to $10 a gallon, you're probably still need to go places, hell you might even do some walking like you should."

Her parent's DNA had done her favours and she didn't need to walk much like many of the Florida vacationers, but she smiled and responded quickly in a Brooklyn accent.

"Hell, you easterners complain about the weather, snow, ice, heatwaves, hurricanes, but you can't control em...hell, some kid in all black wearing trendy glasses is probably typing on his apple right now about the injustices of life in the middle east and CNN will run a spot tomorrow on how life across thousands of miles needs 15 minutes of your thoughts. How many times have you people ever just sat back and said, shit," he paused as he sipped his domestic beer, "we've got it pretty good here." He was looking at the Budweiser Clidesdales trotting through a wintry heaven on a bar poster.

Perhaps Tom had never taken a steamer to the Old Land, perhaps he didn't even own a TV, but we spoke that night about the elk and deer in the cascades and his weekly trek into the mountain lakes and streams. His life seemed so simple away from hollow politicians and the intracacies of world travels.

"You can't let these assholes rent space in your head, don't let the bastards get you down. Tomorrow you'll be 20 years older wondering why you never did the things you promised yourself back in your youth. You'll realize the world will always change, and some shit, you might not even agree with."

We smoked cigarrettes and drank dollar pints with people that plowed land, fished the streams of america and painted the american dream in a way we only sell in magazines and novels.

It was a late morning when we finally left, and as we drove back we passed a kid tossing papers into the suburbs. Kristin looked over at me and offered me a smoke, Dave in the back didn't smoke but he lit one up too. We rumbled down the road burning gas and cigarrettes as the sun rose without saying much, each with a quiet grin...I'm sure somewhere NPR was reporting the news but there was a empty hole where the stereo had once been....

-jake

Pool!> Expated

2006-04-11T23:39:00.000+02:00

I played pool with my friends Ian and Petr tonight. Good times! No, great times! It's been a while, in fact not since November. I am happy to say my rust wasn't too bad and I played rather well. For the record, I will not rest until I have a home with a fine pool table in it. Then I will know I have made it. Until then, I am a sorry sack of something that begins with an S.

Al Franken v Ann Coulter> Link

2006-04-10T22:47:00.000+02:00

This is the opening speech Al Franken made to a room full of Jews in a debate with Ann Coulter. Too bad they don't have a transcript of the actual debate. I really hope Al decides to run for the Senate.