Here’s to girl power! Paul Potts might have been the rage last year for ‘Britain’s got talent’, and this year also we have a budding opera singer (a 13 year old named Andrew Johnston) but it’s the electric string instrument quartet of Scala that’s impressing me.
She’s frequently annoying and Matt is a god. Good pair? You decide.
It’s not easy to write when you are going around the world (it’s taking more than 80 days). At the time I first announced my intentions to travel and keep the rantlust community updated on my adventures, I thought I’ll really stick to it. But there’s been too many ‘I’ll-blog-at-the-next-pit-stop’ promises to myself without much avail. Travelling is a draining activity especially if you are doing too much stuff. It’s been three months since I last wrote (about Tibet) and now Tibet is such a distant memory.
The Internet is everywhere I go and yet, I can’t bring myself to write. I am not even writing on my journal. And slowly over the months, I have attained this stage of travel nirvana where I don’t even see a lot of the touristy stuff. I just show up at places, meet some people (some fellow travelers, some locals) and just hang. Sip a coffee or chai here, sip a beer there, eat some noodle soup here, eat some Thai fish curry there. I sit and watch children play on the beach; young adults canoodle on park benches; Japanese tourists take pictures of me with whatever statue is behind me; get hit on by local men and touristy women. Life goes on. I occasionally pop into an Internet cafe to check on close friends and family and let them know I’m still in it. But even news has lost a lot of the meaning for me. I mean, what’s the point really? Unless you are on a world domination spree, why bother with what’s happening thousands of miles away? Give the conscience a break and be selfish… in your moment for a while. It feels good.
Random thoughts. Observing people and surroundings with nary a care in the world. Feeling good about humanity. Remembering how tough, interesting, life-changing and amazing the last few months of my life have been. Missing those close to me. Wishing I could get a hug.
I am now in a tiny cafe in Hobart, Tasmania. Beautiful weather. A few clouds in the sky, summer is approaching. I can see Sullivan’s Cove from where I sit. A beautiful woman with a Spanish accent sits by herself at a table nearby. Probably late 30s. She’s talking on a sleek looking phone (no, not the iPhone) to probably a jilted lover. She’s angry but the voice is soft but steady. On the only other table sits a young boy with headphones bigger than his head wrapped around. A girl sits opposite him bored and having a cake. He’s reading some thick tome. The waiter likes me. Keeps coming to my table to chit chat. I think I’ll indulge him. He’s cute. Pakistan and Darfur don’t interest me now. I am living in the here and now. And loving it.
Tibet or Xizang as the Chinese call it, has been a dream destination for me and I finally made it out there a couple of weeks ago. And what a journey! I took the recently built Qinghai-Tibet train which is an engineering marvel as it goes through some spectacular scenery at very high altitudes. The journey on this train takes almost 48 hours from Beijing to Lhasa but is worth it just for the Golmud-Lhasa section. I booked a soft sleeper and the accommodations are quite luxurious. The train is pressurized to prevent altitude sickness. The Tanggula pass at 5072 metres through which the train passes makes this the highest rail track in the world. The dining car is decent and there is even a bar on the train. What’s amazing about this rail line is that a significant section of it is on permafrost.
I didn’t feel any effects of altitude during the train ride though I did often feel woozy once in Lhasa. This is a journey that every one who goes to China should take. You will not be disappointed.
Blogging is not easy from China as I found that from some Internet cafes I can’t even access rantlust. Weird. Now that I am finally out of China and am in Vietnam, I hope I’ll be able to blog more about my year off travelling the world.
As regular readers know, I am on the first leg of a year long odyssey away from the Netherlands, starting in China. After more than three weeks here, I am beginning to fall in love with this country…something that I didn’t expect when I landed with some trepidation in Beijing on a smoggy day in late June.
With absolutely no knowledge of the language and having never been in this part of the world before, I was a bit anxious when my taxi made its way through throngs of bicycles and smoke spewing automobiles into the heart of Beijing where I had booked two nights in a very touristy district targeting westerners named Sanlitun. I did this because I wanted to orient myself with the city before venturing into the unknown.
After a couple of days wandering around Tiananmen Square (yes, that square) and the Forbidden City (a truly magnificent architectural achievement), I checked out and moved into a less touristy part of town in the north and while it meant that I had to take public transport to get to the city centre, it was a big relief for a long time backpacker like me. I finally felt at ease.
(Read more…)
I finally did it! I quit my job, sold my flat and am already on my way to a journey that I hope will be life changing. After thinking very hard about this for at least a year and after long and painful conversations with those near and dear to me, I have decided to take at least a year off and travel the world mostly to exotic places that I haven’t spent much time in. Alone. I have no specific itinerary yet but am going to make them as I go along. I am only packing a small rucksack with a change of clothes for a week. I am not even taking a camera. I want to experience everything first hand and have my journal and this blog as my place to record my experience as I travel the world in search of meaning for my existence. I am not sure how much internet access I’ll have during the next year or so but I’ll try to update this blog with my experiences with the curious people, animals and places I will encounter whether it be in the train to Tibet or among the lemurs in Madagascar.
I am sooo shit scared but at the same time the adrenalin levels have never been higher. I am already in my first stop… Beijing, China and am writing this from here. More later… Zai Jian and Ni Hau.
Vive le Gaul. The latest incumbent of the Elysée palace has been caught drunk at the G8 summit. French surrender or not, I say we should give the man a break. He might have had a few too many of his country’s fine wine. Who can blame him for that? Or did he really have some Vodka with RasPutin?
A Dutch (who else?) escort agency has announced a service just for virgins. Computer geekdom is the target market. They will provide a three hour (minimum) service during which the participants will explore each others body, take baths together, massage each other, etc. At the end of the sessions, the virgin geeks will come out knowing how to pleasure a woman. Tall order.
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