Finally, Photos!

Jul 29, 2006 in Photos, Travel

I’ve finally managed to upload my photos from my Southeast Asia trip. It’s amazing, I actually had all of them edited by the time I got back to the US, it’s just that I needed a couple of days to upload them to Smugmug. Anyway, check them out — I’ve got photos… Read on…

Wedding Destination

Jul 26, 2006 in Photos

I know I owe you all pictures of Southeast Asia, but, hey, first things first. Specifically, friends’ weddings first — because what could be more important than the happiness of ones’ friends? And a destination wedding, in beautiful Waikiki? Granted, I had to fly there right after arriving home from Southeast Asia, so, thanks to a 14-hour time change, I mostly slept through my mini-vacation. Read on…

I Think There's Some Kind of a Rule That All of My Entries About High School Teachers Must Include The Words "Sic Transit" in the Headline

Jul 25, 2006 in True Life Stories

One of my favorite teachers in High School was my freshman year history teacher. This teacher was one of those portrayed-in-TV-movies-style teachers, intense, engaging, committed to learning and to his kids and, in return, loved by them. We all were thrilled to be in this teacher’s history class, and even after we left he knew our names and our faces for the rest of the four years and would engage us in meaningful conversation in the halls. Read on…

The Train to Lo Wu

Jul 23, 2006 in Otherwise Uncategorized

When I was in high school I took a class in creative writing; at the end of the semester, I held in my hands a forty-some page computer printout of some many-times-revised writing achievement, ready for submission to some writing competition for high school students. My story, of course (coming as it did from a freshman in high school), was macabre, and, worse, it was written in a run-on style that sat somewhere between Faulkner and Sweet Valley High with all of the punctuation removed. I was proud, but, when I read my friend Blaise’s submission to that same competition his simple, clear sentences made me put aside any thought of my story receiving awards. I tried, later, to write using plainer language and clearer themes, and briefly fancied myself as having some skill; but then a new student came to my school. Jess wrote ethereal prose, each sentence stripped down to the fewest words possible, hinting only obliquely at conversation or exposition, sort of like some Zen koan from whose hidden meaning we should understand the world. I couldn’t approach Jess’s writing, and, after a few feeble attempts, I took another creative writing class and turned out a baroque and bloody term paper story that sported a sentence all of a page and a half long. It didn’t help that I was reading Joyce at the time. Read on…

Hey Look, There's A Swift Boat!

Jul 21, 2006 in Travel

I was going to the worst place in the world and I didn’t even know it yet. Weeks away and hundreds of miles up a river that snaked through the war like a main circuit cable - plugged straight into Kurtz.

No wait, sorry, wrong trip up the Mekong. Mine was actually kind of nice. No “terminate with extreme prejudice” or anything, although, you should be aware, this entry does not exist, nor will it ever exist.

After Saigon, my next stop was Cambodia — specifically, its capital, Phnom Penh, and the famous ruins at Angkor Wat. Now, I could fly up there, which was both quick and inexpensive (thank you Vietnam Airlines, Air Asia, and Bangkok Air!), but what fun would that be? No, I decided to take a tour up the Mekong river, seeing the sights and the local minority peoples and drinking with other English-speaking tourists. Yes, it promised to be a bang-up time. Read on…

Don't Know How Lucky You Are

Jul 20, 2006 in Travel

I’m back! That’s right, I survived four hours of flying from Bangkok to Taipei — including an unexpected and free upgrade to business class — followed by a five-hour layover in Taipei, capped off with an eleven hour flight home (it was supposed to be twelve, but I guess we caught a tailwind, which was good since it took an hour for my bag to come off the plane). Read on…

So That's Why the Sky In All My Photos is a Flat White

Jul 18, 2006 in Travel

I’m back in Bangkok, picking up a few last gifts before I get on a plane home tomorrow (if you’re reading this entry, it’s probably too late to put in a request for a tchotchke or a small Thai slave). But it’s not the tourist goods that I’m thinking about now, it’s the evil-looking gray cloud that grabbed my attention as I flew to Bangkok from Chiang Mai. Read on…

The Thai Pac-Man Goes...*

Jul 17, 2006 in Travel

Chiang Mai is a small city in Northern Thailand, but Thais seem to think of it like their second city. I came here because it’s in the hills, and I thought I’d like a little cool weather to end my vacation. The weather has been quite reasonable for this area, although of course with the humidity of the jungle. Yesterday, I tromped about town — it only takes a half hour to walk from one end of the old walled city to the other — visitng as many of the city’s old and beautiful wats, or Buddhist temples, as possible. Read on…

Return to the Land of the Controlled Intersections

Jul 15, 2006 in Travel

I’m back in Thailand, whose traffic had scared me a bit, it’s true, and I’m still surprised to see the oncoming traffic on my right, not my left, but the fact is that there are lights at the intersections here, and everyone’s instrument cluster works (how does the entire population of Vietnam get along without a single working gas gauge or dipstick?) so I must be back in civilization! We’ll see later when I take a moto ride with a friend who I’ve unexpectedly discovered is living in Chiang Mai. Read on…

Best Food Ever

Jul 12, 2006 in Travel

Until today, I had, in all honesty, been disappointed by the food I’d had in Cambodia. Khmer cuisine was supposed to be the undiscovered jewel, but it had seemed bland compared to Thai cuisine, which was spicier, or Vietnamese cuisine, which was more flavorful. And then I got a cookie on the street, and had dinner at what is purported to be Mick Jagger’s favorite place in Siem Reap. That Mick, he’s a smart man. Oh, and I also saw that wonder of the world, Angkor Wat, etc. etc. etc. Read on…

Miss Saigon Traffic Accident

Jul 11, 2006 in Travel

I know I owe you all a few entries from the week I missed back there earlier on my trip, so here’s part one of two: Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City, also known as “the expensive place in Vietnam.” Which is to say, sure, I’d go back in a minute. Read on…

Phnom Penh: the Dark and the Light

Jul 10, 2006 in Travel

For an introduction to Cambodia, I’m not sure how I could have done better than today. I saw the bad in the city — the Killing Fields, the infamous prison of Tuol Sleng — and paired it with the good — the Royal Palace, atmospheric traditional music at Wat Phnom — finally ending things by eating grilled meat and drinking rice wine with moto drivers on a dirt field in the middle of the city. Read on…

Along the Perfume River

Jul 3, 2006 in Travel

I’ve been out of the country for more than two weeks now — in fact, I passed the halfway mark on my trip yesterday — and I was starting to worry that I would soon need a relaxing day off. That was before I took a boat ride down Hué’s Perfume river and visited the tombs of the Nguyen emperors. Let me tell you, those emperors knew how to pick a spot for their mausoleums! Read on…

Country Town Hué

Jul 2, 2006 in Travel

I’ll admit that my first impression of Hué was “hicksville” — after all, I arrived on Saturday and found the kids all hanging out at the gas station, leaning on their motos, while the sidewalk seems to peter out a few blocks past the main drag, in a few places; and, of course, there’s no in-room internet in the mid-priced hotels, like there was in Hanoi. Read on…