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Ao Nang...cliff land!· Feb 21, 02:34 PM
Hi All,
One of the last posts here…now that I’m home. Towards the end of the trip, I took fewer and fewer pictures, but Ao Nang, a beach area near Krabi, Thailand was so amazing that I took a lot of shots!
Here’s a few pics!
Later,
Nate
Click on article title for more pictures…
Comments [2537]
There's no place like home...· Feb 10, 08:57 PM
Greetings from Bangkok!
It’s great to be back here eating some of the most awesome food I’ve ever tasted! I don’t think I’ve posted since Koh Phi Phi… in between I stayed near Krabi at a place called Ao Nang for a few days. The limestone cliffs there were amazing…I’ll post some pics for you soon! All in all, I’d say Thailand is a very good place for westerners to travel to. It’s cheap, friendly, with great food and great islands. Consider it! :)
OK, so I’ve got some surprising (for some) news!: I’ll be back in the US in a week! Amazing, huh?! Here’s the deal: Since begin home at Christmas, there have been two big issues chipping away at my travel desire: 1) I’m less and less interested in doing things that keep me away from Jen. I’m still really glad that I took the time to travel…but, now I’m ready to be back home with her! Hopefully sometime down the road we’ll get to do some travel together – which will be much better!! 2) I’ve been working on the details of starting my business…and I’ve gotten to the limit of what I can do from internet cafes on the beach…so I’m excited to come home and really get things rolling.
So…that’s the news! I’ll be traveling to Shanghai to pick up some stuff I left there and then flying home from Hong Kong on the 18th.
Later!
Nate
Comments [9196]
Superbowl and 'The War on Terror'...· Feb 5, 09:52 PM
Hi All!
Well, it’s my last morning on Koh Phi Phi… and even though I liked Koh Tao better, it’s been nice here.
You can see in my pics that I was able to watch the second half of the Superbowl (but no cool commercials – dull international version). It was probably the most enjoyable Superbowl ever for me. Just hanging out with a few other Americans and looking in on a very American sport from across the miles. It’s a new level of appreciation.
You know, everywhere I go, I’m still surprised at the almost complete absense of American travelers. On a popular tourist island like phi phi, I talk with plenty of scandinavians, brits, germans, australians, kiwis, canadians…french…dutch…the list goes on… but not many americans at all. The consensus is that Americans have it too good at home to want to travel…and, I think, we’re sometimes too career oriented as well. So…to the folks back home: there are pros and cons to long travel…but if you have any interest, I’d certainly recommend it as an amazing learning experience!
I’ll use that reflection on Americans as a segue into the introduction of my most recent read, “The Pentagon’s New Map”. After the last few years of ‘the war on terror’, I found myself a little confused…and actually a bit critical…of what the US was doing in Iraq and with ‘the war on terror’ in general. “The Pentagon’s New Map” has been a very helpful read in terms of explaining the US strategy in a way that the gov’t, so far, has failed to do. I won’t get into detail, but I’ll give you a decent quote to sum up the book:
“As a 2002 UN report noted, ‘The Arab region has the lowest level of access to Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) of all regions of the world, even lower than Sub-Saharan Africa.’ Thanks to that stunted connectivity with the outside world, the Middle East’s deficits of freedom and economic development have only gotten worse in recent decades. They come together to diminish expectations of entire generations. Recent opinion polls in the region suggest that roughly half the young people wish to emigrate to other countries – half! How can you build a future when half of your young people would prefer living elsewhere? This is a region desperate to connect to the rest of the world.
Those diminished expectations generated the hatred that expressed itself on 9/11. Strip away the religion and the rhetoric, and 9/11 was nothing more than an act of desperation: the Middle East simply does not work for the vast bulk of the people who live there. The bin Ladens of that region blame the ruling elites there and the West for this sad state of affairs, and are convinced that greater disconnectedness is the answer, allowing these societies to go their own way, which they define as moving away from all that Westoxification.”
So, basically, this author defines the “enemy” as any regime that promotes disconnectedness from the world….because they do this at their own people’s expense in order to build their personal wealth and power. Their people then, in acts of despairation, strike out violently rather than expressing their opinions through the proper channels that exist in a democratic society. There’s a lot more that’s explained…but, for that there’s Amazon.com One more ad: I’m now in the process of figuring out how this concept knits in with my faith…or if it’s just more static on top of the real answer.
OK, enough’s enough! Here’s some pics.
Later,
Nate
Click on article title for more pictures…
Comments [127]
Koh Tao - nice...· Jan 15, 05:25 AM
Hi folks,
Just a quick hi and some pics. I’ve been here on the island of Koh Tao (Turtle Island) for the last three days…having a very nice, relaxed time.
Hope all is well with you!
Nate
1/19: Added two more pics…
Click on article title for more pictures…
Comments [10]
Honesty.· Jan 11, 04:13 AM
Hey y’all,
First, let me say that I had a really enjoyable day.
Now, let me tell you what I learned.
Today I got taken for a ride…ripped off…scammed. It wasn’t too bad, about $60.
When you’re traveling, it’s a constant barrage of folks trying to make a buck…so you have to be pretty aware of what’s going on. 99% of the time it’s no big deal. But a few times, like today, I just don’t see it coming. And after I realize what happened, I’m so ticked off – mostly at myself for letting it happen, but also at the guy.
So as I was stewing this afternoon, I came to realize that this is exactly the kind of opportunity that I’m looking for as I travel through these strange places. After all, how often to I get to analyze the feelings of being ripped clean off when I’m at home where I know how everything works. Never.
I guess it was a book called “Control Theory” by William Glasser that put it clearly in my mind: you can’t ever control what other people do, you can only control how you react to them. In this case, I know that I don’t want to harden up a little more in the name of a lesson learned…I’d like to stay as trusting as possible in life. Not gullible, but responsibly trusting. So, I can control that I’m not going to allow myself to harden up.
And, I can control how honest I am in my interactions with others. And I guess this is my main point. I’ve found that in the course of everyday life, my standards for honesty have slipped. Just now I was taking a small ferry boat down the river and the ticket lady never came around to me. Right away, I saw that even small dishonesties like not paying $0.25 for the ferry are the insidious things that allow for bigger lies to creep into life. (so I found the lady and paid my 9 bhat)
I pass this along to you all as an encouragement for truth!
Ok, I’ll post some pics sometime soon…I’ve got some nice ones now. :)
Take care,
Nate
P.S. Bangkok has been awesome – the food and the temples are both rockin. Tomorrow night I’m heading down the the islands in the south, starting with Ko Toa. Sweet!