My Protanoptic Life

Much has happened since last time I wrote. I’m currently living at 425 Green Street on Telegraph Hill, but will be returning to Vietnam to be with Tien in two weeks. Before I get into the present and future, I should probably dive into what’s been going on since I got back to America.

When I got back from Vietnam in Nov , I spent a few days here in America, had Thanksgiving with my friends Rob and Nicki, then drove to Colorado. The drive was tough because I was of weather and because I was pretty tired. I even slept for several hours in my car at the side of the road, but that didn’t help much. I finally arrived in Silverthorne Colorado where my sister was spending the holiday weekend with her husband’s side of the family. We went sledding and ate leftovers and I got to talk to a lot of people I had never met or hadn’t seen before, like Tom Tonelli, Tom Burns, and Holly. I spent the night there and left the next afternoon to continue on to Colorado Springs.

I got pulled over for speeding by the police in South Park. The officer was really nice and let me go even though my California plates were expired and I had no proof of insurance. This was an extra nice gesture since most police were on edge this day due to an event that had happened earlier where a man walked into a coffee shop in Washington State.

I spent the next month in Colorado with friends and family. I caught up with Jake and Rachel, who had just bought a new house, my brother, who was now back from Iraq and out of the Army, Aimee Rich, who I hadn’t seen almost since high school, and a whole bunch of other folks from Colorado Springs. I spent several days in Littleton with my sister and nieces, which was great because it seems like I don’t often spend long periods of time staying with them. While I was in Littleton I finally met up Bridgepix, a fantastic photographer and master of HDR.

I went to Aurora and stayed with Dan and Cass at their place for a few days. They took me out to a nice dinner and then to a The Clocktower Cabaret burlesque show that was really entertaining and fun.  They also had a little get together and my good buddy Nathan showed up and we all played the new Super Mario Wii game, which is highly addicting. After that I met up with an old friend Helen who is a fellow world traveler and another person who I hadn’t seen in years.

On December 2nd my dad called from the hospital and said he had a tiny accident. Actually, he had had a pretty big accident involving ice, a stairwell with no handrail, a rock shaped like a pyramid and his head. It ended up with 100 stitches and him high as a kite on pain killers. I went to get Jeff in my car to pick up my dad’s truck from where he left it before being carted off in an ambulance, but on my way to pick up Jeff my car window rolled down and wouldn’t roll back up. Cold weather and stupid cars be damned. Luckily Jeff’s room mate Jeff is a car mechanic and was available for an hour or so to whip my window back into somewhat working shape.

On December 15th my brother and I got hist car stuck in the snow by The Crags and had to shovel snow with the police for like 8 hours, well into the night.

On the 19th Jeff and Chelise hosted a Christmas party at their house. I met some new folks and caught up with some old friends there.

Since my family usually celebrates Christmas late because it’s easier to schedule, my brother and I have a tradition of going hiking on Christmas day. We continued this tradition, meeting up with Gerald and his girlfriend Loridna and her dog Misty.

I actually had way too much free time on my trip. The weather was terrible and I had continual schedule conflicts with people. I worked on some projects like the christmas light wine bottle lamps for gifts and some whitebox product style photography. Christmas was fun. Tien joined my family over Skype from Vietnam since she was still in Vietnam.

On the 28th I headed out of town for that long drive back to San Francisco. It’s funny how the details of such a long drive can disappear completely. I do remember sleeping in my car in the middle of a snow storm in the middle of nowhere. I also remember getting to Donner Pass and being refused passage because I had no snow tires or chains, so I had to wait for a few hours for the weather to get better.

When I got back to San Francisco I headed to BLT’s place and met up with Donna, who happened to be in town.  I spent the next month and a half there, subletting a room from Brianna who was trying to save money. Blake’s buddy Scotty was in from Denver and we hung out for most of New Years Eve, but I ended up retiring early this year.

I spent of January trying to figure out how to get my photography rolling on a serious, profitable path. I did some marketing work for Tara at GroundWork, but other than that it was all charity work and portfolio building with Terresina.

Lila and Wil let me stay with them for the second half of Feb, which is always wonderful. I was running short on cash and needed to make some money quickly. I hadn’t had a steady job in 9 months. On top of that, I had some car repairs that needed to be done. My mechanics was right next to Julian and Sadek’s place, so I took the opportunity to stay with them for a few days and catch up. It was good times like when we all used to work together.

At the beginning of March Tara referred me to an IT position at her company.  It fit my schedule perfectly, and I managed to land that and get my current sublet on Telegraph Hill for the same amount of time within a day of each other, so for the past month and a half I’ve been back to the daily grind of 9-5 IT work, catching up on finances and patiently waiting for immigration to contact Tien about when she will get her visa interview.

I’ve had some good social times in there, but no traveling. In fact, I don’t even drive my car anymore except to move it from one street cleaning zone to another every week or so. My friend Dan Lopez hired me to photograph him for some media stuff he had coming up with Linux.com. I finally met up with Hanik, a local house DJ that my friend Jonathan knows.  SugarCon was this week, so I caught up with some old friends there, and also happened to run into Chris Nojima on Market Street.

A few days ago my good friend Rob got hired on at Boxee and will be moving to New York, so that will surely be a trip I will be taking in the next year.

I bought an iPad after a lot of back and forth and waiting a few weeks from its release. I’ve always loved the tech, and always wanted a tablet, but aside from that I think it will be very useful on my trip.  It fits my travel needs, which are pretty lightweight compared to what I do with my laptop, and I can probably sell it in Vietnam for a profit since they aren’t for sale there yet.

At the beginning of the month I had called USCIS about the status of Tien’s visa, and they referred me to the US Consulate in Ho Chi Minh City. I contacted them via e-mail, their preferred method, but never heard back. I called them after a week and a half, but they said they couldn’t answer questions over the phone. Luckily Tien is living in Saigon now, so a few days ago she went down there and discovered that they had sent her interview letter in February, but it just hadn’t arrived. This was both good and bad. It sucks that we’ve wasted two months, but also in that time I’ve been able to make some money and some good business contacts.

Today I began shifting back into traveler mode, focusing on what technology I need to bring on my trip, how to go about packing my day-to-day things back up, and things of that nature.  I have exactly two weeks to finish my job and move out of my apartment.

My plan is to travel to Vietnam and see my fiancé who I haven’t touched in 144 days. We’ll travel north to Hanoi and Ha Long, and hopefully hit Danang and Hue on the way back south, then return to her home town to see her family. I’m thinking we may go to Ha TIen beach, and maybe to the island of Phu Quoc that we had considered going to last time.

That being said, now that we’re back in touch with NVC things could change, especially if Tien gets her visa interview soon. Either way, I’m planning to return to my where my girl is and live happily ever after with her by my side, not 8,000 miles away in a country on the other side of the planet.

Friday I woke up sick as a dog in Rob’s place. I had full on flu symptoms on top of the ongoing digestive problems and was not a happy camper. I slept well though, amazingly. I took a shower and played online a little while Rob kept sleeping. I decided to look up H1N1 symptoms and saw that I had most of them, so I thought I should take this more seriously just in case. I left Rob sleeping and went to find breakfast and medicine. I loaded up on NyQuil, ate a banana and drank some Odwalla Mo’Beta.

I noticed I was near Brianna’s house so I went over there. There was an older Asian lady in the entryway where I thought Brianna’s new place was, and I thought I might have the wrong street. I got out my phone and it signed onto her wireless network so I knew I was in the right place. I don’t have cell phone service in the USA yet, but I used Skype on my iPhone to call Brianna. She said she was at work and wouldn’t get off for many hours.

I was feeling ill and was getting tired so I parked my car on a quiet street and went to sleep. The sun came out so I drove to Golden Gate park and found a shady area under a tree near a public restroom and slept for several more hours.

I headed back to Brianna’s place around 5pm. Shortly after I got there she showed up with a big smile and gave me a big hug. We went inside and she made me some green tea and a snack while we talked about what had happened in the two months that I was gone. Her new house was really cool. She shares it with Lily and Terresina, but they weren’t home.

Lauren called and then came over. She had just recently gotten back from a three week trip to Australia. We caught up a bit while Brianna talked to some boys on the phone and then showered. Terresina showed up around 9pm. She had two new tattoos and a heavy gold chain around her neck.

One of Brianna’s boyfriends came over with a bottle of tequila and Terresina and Brianna made dinner for all of us. We listened to Corinne Bailey Rae and talked and drank and and a good old time reminiscent of dinners at 4211. The three of them went out to party in Mission and I stayed home on the couch to sleep off my illness, the medicine in full effect and doing its job of alleviating symptoms. In a new apartment but on the same old couch I hoped to get a good night’s sleep.

Thursday morning I woke up above the Pacific Ocean somewhere off the coast of Japan. I knew this because right after I saw the clouds and ocean below I looked at the helpful map showing where we were on the planet. I was given breakfast and the loudspeaker announced that we were one hour out from Tokyo.

After eating I dozed some more, opening my eyes once in a while to see what was outside my window. Blue ocean with tiny white caps under hazy clouds. Nothing but a cloud. Picturesque rice paddies that were unharvested and nobody and no boats in sight. Soon we were on the ground and I was sleepily waiting in the security checkpoint line to get back into the international terminal. I looked around at all the unfamiliar people and heard them speaking in accents, some that I didn’t recognize. I heard a japanese girl speaking in deliberate, clear english. I thought about the world and how small my world had been while I was growing up, and my world was larger than many. I still couldn’t help wondering if I’d done life a little wrong. I only traveled internationally once when I was young, and I didn’t travel much on my own volition, and usually not to new places but back to old places. I didn’t learn a second language. As an english speaker it is difficult to chose which language to master as your second, but that’s really not an excuse because two are better than one. The line was long and I had plenty of time to think about these things. Getting through security was easy and they didn’t seem to care that I had a bunch of liquids that I didn’t remove for their inspection. So much of security is theater.

I found a little office area with wired ethernet and went to work trying to find a way to get free internet. These guys had done their due diligence though and I couldn’t find any way around paying. This was a problem because last time when I tried to pay I still couldn’t get online because Boingo’s billing mechanism was broken. On top of that, the Boingo software for Mac is terrible, like so many OEM apps for Mac. They really shouldn’t bother with those kinds of things and should spend that money on something more productive.

I wandered around the airport, plodding along tiredly. It was familiar, I had spent enough time here last time that I knew where I was and where to go to get whatever. My flight wasn’t listed on the display yet though since it was too many hours away, so I just wandered aimlessly. I exchanged some money and went to an electronics shop with some stuff that isn’t available in the USA, which is just a novelty to me but still entertaining. When my flight did appear on the monitor I was 2 gates down from where I needed to be, which would’ve been really convenient if it weren’t boarding in 8 hours. I got some tea, found a power outlet and managed to successfully pay for internet access. This allowed me to kill many hours of my layover while catching up on blogging and chatting with some US folks who were up.

After sitting for too many hours I walked around the airport some more. I noticed the stark differences between Japan and Vietnam. Before landing in Tokyo I looked down at the rice paddies and it was immediately evident that we were not in Vietnam, even though there were rice paddies for as far as you could see. Japan was so clean, so quiet, so organized.

As I was walking around looking for gifts for friends a man offered me samples of sake, which I gladly tasted. It was delicious and I thought about buying a bottle, but the fact that you can’t even take duty free liquids over 100ml through Japan made me wary of what other ridiculous liquid restrictions I would encounter.

After what seemed like an eternity my plane began boarding and I watched everybody line up and get on, then when the line was nearly nothing I boarded and took my seat. I sat next to an older Japanese woman with a dignified demeanor. She began writing a note and when I glanced over my eyes picked up the word “unforgivable”. I was curious, and although I didn’t read the whole note, I did also see that she mentioned her choice of airlines by their reputation vs simply price. She folded the note up, put it in an envelope and gave it to one of the flight attendants. From then on the flight attendants would stop by from time to time and talk and talk and talk, saying “hai” over and over as this woman spoke with calm certainty. I wondered what the note actually said…

After watching some of Cirque Du Soleil’s Dralion, which has an awesome juggling scene, I switched to The Soloist and proceeded to be thoroughly unimpressed. Afterwards I managed to finally get some more sleep…

Thursday I woke up to the ongoing sounds of a boy crying. Not wailing, but genuinely crying. I realized it had been going on for quite a while and wondered why his, who was seated in the next section up, didn’t come back and help him. The first thing I saw was the darkness map of the world with our plane positioned over the pacific right on the border between light and dark. The boy’s dad eventually came back and took the boy off to the bathroom. I closed the window shades on the two windows next to me and went back to sleep. I couldn’t stay asleep though. It was an uncomfortable drifting in and out of sleep. Eventually we were landing in San Francisco and as I carried my bag off into SFO I finally woke up.

About 5 immigration people asked me if I had all my bags as they checked my passport. It seemed like they couldn’t believe that person could have such little luggage. That may have been the thing that set me apart from the rest and made them select me to a full luggage search. The guy going through my luggage also couldn’t believe that I only had one bag. He, like the passport control officer, found it hard to believe that I didn’t have a physical mailing address. The passport control officer scratched off “San Francisco” and wrote in my parents address in Colorado Springs. The man searching my bag asked me “Why did you write down Colordo Springs if you live in San Francisco?” to which I replied that I did not write down c/s. It seems so simple, move out of apartment, quit job, live out of a backpack, yet so many people don’t understand until they stop to think about it.

Sara was supposed to pick me up but I wondered if she’d even be there after my flight was late and my time was wasted while the LEO did a half search of my tightly and intricately packed backpack. She was though and it was great to have a friend there to whisk me away in a sleek automobile. We headed down 101 to Mountainview to meet up with some of the SugarCRM crew. Pretty much the whole local IT team plus Kyung showed up and we filled a nook in the restaurant with loud friendly conversation. Sara had to go and I was bummed that we didn’t have long enough time to catch up with each other.

After lunch I caught a ride back to Sugar where Lila had brought my car. I sat and talked a while about my travels and the way that poor countries and technology fit together, then headed up to Lila’s house to pick up some stuff I’d left there. When I got there I took a shower, which was great because I had been out for over 36 hours without a shower. I also tried to take a nap but couldn’t sleep, so I decided to head on up to SF.

As soon as I started driving I got sleepy. Luckily I’d driven this route a few hundred times so I could drive it comfortably while sleepy. It was lame though, I didn’t want to drive that route. I had quit my job partly because of that drive. Between that drive and the SugarCRM HQ I felt like my old life had been severed and I was having to pick it back up to get to something underneath it. I just wanted to let it go and move on, those times were gone.

The first place I went in SF was to my mailbox which hadn’t been checked in two months. All of the mail fit into the box, so it wasn’t too bad. The post office is right downtown SF, near embarcadero, and it was nice to submerge myself back into the heart of SF, like jumping straight into a pool to help you get used to the water quicker. The weather was kinda bad, breezy with a little rain, but it was familiar and that was great. The air was cool and clean, so different from anything I’d experienced in the previous two months. I also heard seagulls for the first time in two months.

Then as I was driving to the Sunset I witnessed the first crime I’d seen in two months. I thought about how I hadn’t felt threatened in any way in Asia at all. The worst thing I’d encountered were animals and the fear of getting ripped off by agreeing to an inflated price, but I hadn’t been scared fo being mugged or anything while I was there. I was sad that it took less than an hour for me to witness a crime in SF. I love this city and honestly I don’t see that much crime here, so that was a bit of a slap.

Right as I was getting to Golden Gate Park I remembered the microclimates of San Francisco, and even though it was somewhat warm downtown it sure as hell wasn’t warm by the ocean. I turned around and drove all the way back downtown and went to my storage unit to get my jacket and picked up some other gear while I was there, including some camera gear I hadn’t played with in a long time.

The ocean was vibrant and the horizon had a crisp line as I drove to Java Beach to get coffee and internet. I didn’t stay long because Rob told me to meet him at Noriega Pizza, so I headed down there. We talked a little bit and it was good to see a great friend, but I had a hard time saying a lot of stuff about my trip because I still need time to process it. Maybe… maybe this is as good as it’ll get and I should just blab about it without thinking too hard. At any rate we had good convo and then headed to Sea Biscuit to meet up with Rob Taylor so they could record a podcast for (d)NOT.

I don’t know if it’s just the fact that I can understand the language, but I think that San Francisco has more doers than other countries I’ve visited. Aside from Rob and Rob recording their gig in a coffee shop with friendly and familiar folks walking in and out catching up with the latest goings on, I’ve seen a lot of other people around already that look like they’re up to something fun. There is a cool energy in San Francisco that I really really like. Some of it is the natural energy of the city, and on top of that there is the sentimental aspect, the familiar places with so many good memories tied to them. I was really really happy to be back.

We dropped Rob Taylor off at home and headed back to Rob’s place and geeked out with laptops, linux, Star Trek and a sip of whiskey.

Saturday morning I woke up to Tien climbing back into bed. “I have some bad news from the people in my village…” She went on to tell me that the father of her best friend Trinh, whose family lives across the street, was on his way back from taking his parents to the airport when he had a heart attack. Trinh and her boyfriend rushed him to the hospital where they diagnosed him as immediately needing an operation. It was an expensive operation and Trinh did not have the money, but they would not do the operation until they had the money. Trinh and her boyfriend rushed off to the bank to get the money that was needed, but by the time they returned to the hospital her father was dead.

Tien said he was a good man. Good to his family, good to the people in the village. I had met his wife, she is a wonderful woman. He had planned to take her to a tailor to get new clothes made so they could attend the engagement party for Tien and I. This family was close to Tien’s family.

Trinh and her boyfriend were on their way back from the hospital with her father’s body. When Tien and I headed in to Long Xuyen to take care of some engagement stuff they had just arrived at the house and were preparing a memorial.

Later in the day Tien and I went over to their house. Trinh’s father was laying on the bed under a blanket, a flower in his mouth, his wife at his side fanning the flies off of his body. A table was at the end of the bed with a photo and a little shrine with many sticks of incense and cigarettes burning in his honor.

I had never met Trinh, and this was hardly a good time for introductions, so I ended up not even talking to her. Her boyfriend was nice though, he was taking care of most of the folks who were coming in to pay their respects. Tien spent a lot of time with Trinh while I sat at the side of the room and took in the gravity of the situation. I partly wanted to photograph the scene, but didn’t want to actually go through with doing it. The photographs would’ve been amazing though because of the genuine sorrow. It was bittersweet. Clearly these people loved this man, but now he was gone.

I gave my regards to Trinh’s mother and then Tien and I went back to her house. We talked about how unfair it is that sometimes money rules who gets to live and who has to die. It’s interesting that this sort of thing happens in a communist country. We talked about the health of people in Vietnam and how they handle medical problems. She says that people do not go to the doctor, they just take medicine to alleviate their symptoms, and if the symptoms don’t go away then they go to the doctor. She said that they do a bunch of things that probably don’t help serious problems.

The world is really different over here in Vietnam. So much is the same, but so much is different…

As I was planning, and thankfully the hackers were keeping up, I was able to jailbreak my iPhone and install network unlocking software on it which would enable me to use it as a phone outside of AT&T’s network. I downloaded the tools to do this and did so while I was also diagnosing and reconfiguring the shoddy wifi signals at my hotel. I was able to successfully unlock my phone while doing nearly all I could do with the wifi network in order to make access at least a little more than non existent to the 4th floor. There was still one huge core change I wanted to make but didn’t want to risk taking down the upper floor networks due to inaccessible 802.11 APs which were acting as chained repeaters rather than point-to-multipoint bridges, which would’ve been more efficient.

In the end I had chat and e-mail worthy and nearly web surf worthy wireless access in my room, and a jailbroken and unlocked iPhone 3g. With that completed, I headed out to get dinner and to find a SIM card to test out the network unlock. I was already to select from a list of about 10 carriers, but my AT&T card wasn’t working on any of them so they were no more use than information on what was available.

I got dinner at a chain restaurant I’ve seen around here called NYDC which serves east coast American food and offers free wifi to its patrons. I had pizza and my first glass of wine in nearly a month as I played with Cydia, which was somewhere between the glory of my first jailbreak experience and the horror of my second. Some of the things I wanted weren’t immediately available, like iPhysics and Trism.

After dinner I walked around looking for SIM cards and ended up at the Siem Reap night market, which was just like the day market but more cozy and warm and quiet, but with still the same “hello sir, can i help you sir, you buy a t-shirt sir” people. I was offered about 50 tuk tuk rides that I didn’t need, motorbike rides which was maybe a first for Cambodia but was frequent in Vietnam, weed and cocaine among countless trinkets and novelties. I was really just out to see it though, just to verify that there wasn’t anything worth seeing beyond the experience of having visited the night markets in Cambodia. Many people were having fun bartering and buying, but progressive minimalists like myself had no business in a place like that. With that in mind I went to a market, bought a bottle of Singha and an international SIM card and headed home.

I stayed up late chatting with Tien and friends who were waking up on the other side of the planet. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to open the tray that held my AT&T SIM card, so I wasn’t able to try it out. That was OK though, in time I’d figure it out. It was more of an educational experience anyway, I didn’t really need it.

In the morning I woke and chatted, listened to music, which had surprisingly been missing in my entire Siem Reap experience, showered and headed out for the much needed coffee and breakfast. I found a restaurant I wished I’d have found a few days earlier. It was a little hole in the wall stall across the street from the more ritzy western restaurants, and they had bread, eggs and white coffee for $2. I was delighted. I also managed to find a cool trick to get the SIM tray on an iPhone open without using a paperclip. Just shove a round toothpick into the hole snugly, then pull the tray out. There is enough grip to open the tray, and so I was able to swap my SIM and being trying out this Asian mobile scene.

I couldn’t figure it out. I forgot which provider was mine, and the girl at the restaurant didn’t know the logo.

I was getting tired of Siem Reap and wanted to leave, so I wandered a block and found a travel agency to check out what options I had for leaving. It turned out I could leave to Bangkok in 3 hours for $145. I went back to my hotel, grabbed my passport and three $50′s, checked the SIM card provider info I’d gotten, headed back to the travel agency to buy my ticket and on the way saw a man at a fruit stand showing a tiny ~.22 caliber pistol to a local boy of about 13. What followed was a hurried series of events which involved me paying for my ticket and handing over my passport, hiring a tuk tuk driver to take me back to the hotel and wait, packing my bags as fast as I could because it was exactly check out time and I had to be at the airport in 30 minutes, checking out, going back to the travel agency to pick up my ticket and passport and then heading straight to the airport. To top it off, my tuk tuk driver barely spoke english and drove a slow tuk tuk which was passed by more than one on the way to the airport.

I was happy though. The rush was a little bit of excitement in my very lazy Cambodian experience, and I was finally leaving Siem Reap. It was a western town with lounges and western restaurants and expensive drinks and meals. I was tired of not being able to look people in the eye, trying to avoid contact with people for fear of being hounded instead of smiling and greeting and talking with people.

On the way out of town I saw a kid with a Che Guevara t-shirt on, which was more interesting in Cambodia since he was a communist who murdered hundreds of innocent people senselessly, just like the Khmer Rouge.

On the way out of down town I set my iPhones cellular network to the one correlating to the SIM card I had and it soon began working. I had a phone for the first time since leaving SF almost 4 weeks ago.

We passed many large hotels, bigger hotels than any downtown, five star resort style hotels. I felt like I was driving through Aspen until I saw a guy on a scooter with about 20 dead chickens hanging by their legs. I then saw a Nikon D200 advertisement and wondered if it had really been there for years.

We arrived just after noon which gave me slightly less than the suggestion of checking in two hours before departure. That was ok though because checking in at the airport, passing through security and passing through Cambodian passport control was easy. There were few people there, it was a tiny airport with only 4 gates and only one was in service. There were 3 flights scheduled within the hour. Prices were astronomical, $3 for a small bottle of water, $3.50 for a can of soda. I bought a bottle of Japanese “wine” and found out it was 20% alcoholic soju after I poured a glass. I didn’t bother finishing the bottle since it tasted like vodka and I had no intention of getting wasted. Plus there were ants crawling on the marble bar.

I decided to use my international minutes while I still had the chance and called My, my friend in Bangkok, and told her I was pretty much on my way there. It was short notice, way shorter than I’d planned on giving her, but it was notice all the same and if she couldn’t pick me up I was planning on finding my own way. Luckily she had nothing going on and said she’d see me soon.

I walked around a bit and looked at the airport. It was a nice building with decent tropical landscaping outside. It felt like the kind of airport you’d see in a tropical resort, and then I remembered that’s pretty much what it was. A sign in the bathroom instructing men not to wash in the urinals reminded me that I was still in a 3rd world country.

I walked around the shops in the airport and as happy that I could actually look people in the eyes without the fear of them aggressively hawking their goods. It was nice. I was tired of having to pass through a crowd as if I saw nobody, it felt alienating and I was the alienator. I took some photos of the airport and as I passed the bar the bartenders teased me about being drunk, but I wasn’t since I hadn’t finished even half of the bottle. It was funny and we laughed about it. I played around with the networks and stuff on my phone, trying to figure out the details of this SIM swapping thing that is so different from the US. At one point two Japanese girls came running by, quickly passed through the gate and ran for an airplane that was out on the tarmac.

I boarded the plane and the flight attendant gave the usual speech about disabling communications devices and I thought about that annoying sound that the iPhone puts into some speaker systems. There was no safety demo and we were quickly in the air. I was sitting underneath the wing with a prop engine outside my window. We had a meal and I ate my first muffin since leaving SF where muffins were a pretty usual breakfast with coffee. I had coffee with my meal and it was the worst coffee I’ve had in years. It reminded me of the hot black tar we’d drink at Actiontec.

As we flew I looked out at the beautiful clouds and remembered my flight from Hanoi. I looked down at the earth and thought about all of the beautiful places that were hidden in those green polygons. I saw the reflection of the sun passing from rice paddy to rice paddy and then the earth disappeared behind a turbulent cloud.

On our descent I noticed that the land surrounding Bangkok was back to the familiar Vietnamese landscape of rice paddies for miles. The next thing I noticed was that people were driving on the left side of the road. I only had time to listen to two orbital songs before I had been told to take my headphones off for landing, the entire flight was less than an hour and at 2:50 I was in Thailand. The new airport in Bangkok is eye catching and modern. Entering the country was very easy and no visa was required.

After passing through passport control I went and found a new SIM card with a phone number that people could call me on. In Thailand, inbound minutes are free. With Skype, you can have an inbound number in any country that they support, and any state in America. I have a California Skype number. I also have an unlimited world calling plan. Those three things together allow people to call my Skype number in California and ring my cell phone in Thailand without incurring any additional fees for international calling. My SIM card also provided data access, which is actually a little irritating since any network activity on my phone will drain my phone balance, and I can’t disable only data. I had a working phone though and I was again thankful that the iPhone cracking team got the 3.0 unlock out just in time for my arrival in Thailand.

I called My on the phone and told her that I was several hours earlier than I had expected and she said she’d be at the airport in 15 minutes. In the time between I walked around and took in the crowd. There were many beautiful girls, many fashionable people, many people who looked like transvestites, and many girls who looked manly kinda scary and made me wonder about this sex change capital of the world.

My was there in the 15 minutes she said and her father whisked us away in a luxury Toyota sedan. I hadn’t been in a car that wasn’t a Saigon taxi in a long time. The highway system was very modern, the airport surroundings were very modern, the landscape was clean. This was very 1st world and it was odd. There wasn’t a single scooter around, which made sense since we were going over 120km/h. When we got off the highway though things started to look more familiar. I saw some bicycles and scooters and cement apartment buildings that weren’t painted and it felt like the SE Asia I know.

My’s family’s place was more modern though, more like what I’d expect to find in Korea given the Korean movies I’ve seen. It was a three story building with air conditioning, several laptops set around on desks, wifi, and a Wii. There was a book called “Engineering Mechanics Dynamics 11th Edition” that was full of complex mathematical algorithms with diagrams applying the principles to real world things like cranes and roller coasters. There was a piece of paper inside with a hand sketched on it and delicate decorations around the word “sleep” and I could tell what My’s classes for her automotive design major were probably like.

We played on her hacked Wii for a bit, did a round of golf and a round of bowling and played Wario something else that was really crazy, then she, her father Max and her sister Mint went to dinner. I hadn’t had a Thai meal in about a month. I quit eating Asian food a week before leaving San Francisco in order to get my fill of American foods so that I wouldn’t crave them, but I love Thai food and had been anticipating eating here. It was delicious. I got a desert and it was also delicious. It was heavenly. I can’t wait to eat again.

We talked about school and America mostly. Mint is My’s younger sister and she will be going to the USA in a few years for a foreign exchange program. This is the same program that introduced My to Alaska and my aunt Wendy, which is how I met her. My said that she travels 2 hours one way to get to school, which I think is ridiculous.

After dinner we walked around a little sidewalk market and then went home to do what any wired, high tech group of people does; we geeked out. They have a room that they keep air conditioned where most everything happens. There’s a TV, refrigerator, a few computers, cups, a sound system, a few couches, a few guitars, a bunch of desk toys, etc.. Basically a really playfully packed office living room kitchen. The cool room reminded me of my grandmother’s sitting room in Texas where she would sit and cross-stitch while watching the discovery channel or the movie channel.

My friend George helped me test out the inbound calling setup that I had rigged with Skype and it worked great. We talked for about 30 minutes about life and what we’ve both been up to and it was good to catch up with an old friend one-on-one, essentially off the grid. It was also great to have at least the inbound function of my phone working again. It is also good to be in Thailand. I wasn’t really sure what to expect since I’d heard so much about it and it has so many different reputations. I’m still not entirely sure what to expect, or even what I’ll do tomorrow since My is going to be busy all day, but I’m sure I’ll figure something out. There are certainly more options here than in Siem Reap.

This morning I woke up in Hanoi and went to work developing the photos I had meant to develop before I laid down. Around 7am I went upstairs and ate breakfast by myself. I peeled a banana for myself and thought about meals with Tien.

I looked around the building tops and noticed that the clean lines of the architecture were more prominent without fire escapes. I haven’t seen a single one since I’ve been here.

At checkout I caught up on some internet stuff on the lobby. My brother says he probably won’t come to Bangkok, which is pretty disappointing. I really need to find a traveling companion.

The tour split into two groups, and unbeknownst to me I would not see many of them again. I lost the English speaking couple from Miami and my two favorite children. I ended up with the brat, but also with the Parisian couple. We piled into an SUV and headed out.

I saw a girl on the back of a scooter with a cute backpack on her lap and a crowbar in her left hand.

I saw soldiers doing target practice with rifles on the side of a city street.

We went to the capital campus. Here we entered an area where no cameras, water or cell phones were allowed. No talking, no hands in pockets. Lots of soldiers standing at attention. We were a large group of tourists walking silently on a red path through a huge building that looked like a CTF flag area. Instead there was the preserved body of Ho Chi Minh himself, laying in a glass box in a dark room with 4 soldiers posted around him. I was trying to stay close to the Parisians and for some reason all I could think of was the word “morte” as said by the frail man in Amelie. Morte indeed, but he looked just asleep, laying there with even his beard still in tact.

We left and the tour guide gave me my gear back, the we went the Presidential Palace is, which is the equivalent of the Whitehouse, and a few other places that were packed with us lemmings. Some of the Vietnamese people looked at me as much as the sights. There were a lot of white people and it was weird. I think I just hate to be associated with the mainstream American ideal and all the white people reminded me of that.

There was a place called the house on stilts that wouldve been awesome to stay in. There were too many people so I didnt bother taking a picture. Outside the house there were a dozen people standing around a sign that was in French, Vietnamese and English: Do not stand here.

Like a million other placess in Vietnam this place had a shrine. Like other shrines and temples, outside of it were loud children and pedalers. Vietnam is definitely a religious country and the business minded people are monetizing that. I’ve never seen this in America. Nobody set up an ice cream cart and a religious souvenir shop outside of a cathedral in any city I’ve been to in America.

We left the capital and headed to the largest market in the city, both indoor and outdoor. I walked in and out, through streets and up stairs and down small ailes and down stairs. I thought “what the hell is there for me in a place like this?” Then I wondered why I had come on this trip in the first place. Feeling the need to have a purpose I have settled on photography as my primary purpose. Photojournalism, I guess. So with that in mind I began taking photos and wished I had my 10-20mm lens on me.

I saw a dozen k ock-off apple products. They put the apple backwards though. I almost decided to buy a knock-off iPhone just to see what it was like.

I found an ATM and pulled out 2,500,000 to pay the tour guide back the money I owed him and have some left over.

Iistened and thought about bow much easier Vietnamese is than Chinese. For one thing, when I ask what something is called people don’t get into an argument about exactly what it’s called in whatever dialect, they just answer. There is the intonation thing still, which makes sense thinking back to all the VN people I worked with at Actiontec. I think Vietnamese is much prettier when it’s spoken clearly.

It was down to just me and the Parisians on the tour now. We stopped for lunch at a restaurant where the hostesses had tropical patterned shirts emblazoned with the names of placess not on this continent, like Jamaica. As we had only a few words of common language between their broken English and my broken French, we ate in silence and listened to the swank jazz music playing in the nearly empty restaurant.

We talked a little towards the end. They recommended Da Lat like the Couple from Florida had.

On the way to the airport I thought about how the scooter makes the dynamic of the cities here so much different. I wonder what SF would be like with thousands of electric scooters. I thought about what it would be like to roll up to The Irish Bank and just park in the alley, and then I realized that I hadn’t seen a “no parking” sign anywhere in Vietnam, nor parking meters, just garages an paid parking lots.

I saw a banner ad for a resort and golf club and thought about how playing golf in Vietnam is good enough for some people. I wonder what is good enough for me.

I saw an ad for Ford SUVs and thought “who the hell over here would buy a Ford?” I looked at the steering wheel of the SUV I was in and found the answer.

At check in I said good bye to the nice Parisian couple who was finishing off a 40 day tour. On the wall behind the check in counter there was a stencil of Santa Clause which may have been the first graffiti I had seen on the trip yet. There was also a man in shined shoes, pressed slacks, a striped button down shirt and a bright green baseball cap with the word “groove” on it.

I saw a Windows XP terminal and wondered how on earth these people could afford XP Pro, especially with Linux as an alternative. I guess it’s bundled with the PC like in the US, and that’s still expensive.

In the airport I heard English announcements with English accents. I found the business lounge that had internet and food for $10, which is just too much so internet will have to wait. Instead I sat down and wrote this on my iPhone then went and had my first taste of whiskey in Vietnam and listened to Kaskade, got on my plane and flew away.

I am currently sitting on the patio of my hotel room on the 5th floor looking out over Ha Long Bay and the bridge, and watching the moon rise above the hills on the opposing shore. I’m just one girl and a bottle of wine short of the most romantic night ever.

This morning we departed for Ha Long bay and I finally realized that when our tour guide says 8am he means wheels rolling at 8am. I always seem to be the last one on the bus.

We headed out through early Hanoi traffic which seemed to flow mostly into the city instead of out, so it wasn’t busy. We stopped for tea a long while into the drive and I was delighted to find a lot of art at this shop. There were paintings, mosaics, and sewn images showing traditional Vietnamese scenes, and surprisingly some showing nude female figures. Sexuality and nudity have so far been almost completely absent except mildly in advertisements for mobile phones and karaoke bars. There were a group of kids sewing images by hand into canvases, a lot like cross stitching, and it was nice to see art being made.

We stopped for lunch at a temple that had a gondola to take us to the top of a mountain, except the gondola wasn’t running. This was pretty disappointing to many of us. Apparently the lore says that some king left his country behind to come seek enlightenment, then his people followed him and begged him to come back so he did for a while and then left again. He built the temple at the top of the mountain. In modern times the communist Vietnamese government owns both of the temples and doesn’t use them for religious purposes at all but rather just to make money off of tourists like me.

We got back in the car and I adored my iPod as a savior from the wailing screams of this bratty little kid that’s on the tour. He hits and kicks his parents and screams at the top of his lungs when he doesn’t get his way. I’m amazed that his mother lets him get away with it because she seems like a strict type, but then I think he sees through her bluffing threats of discipline. He’s a fucking brat though, that’s for sure, so the music went up nice and loud. Rock and roll in Vietnam.

We stopped at another temple, this one used for actual religious purposes, and I walked around taking photos of the scenes. I was mildly scolded by a monk for setting foot inside a holy place without taking my sandals off. I photographed 3 monks talking to a girl with a motorcycle helmet on. I heard sounds of welding coming from below a secluded corner of a courtyard and couldn’t help thinking that I was supposed to jump off the wall and pick the lock on the gate below, fight the fake monks and find the secret passage down to the nanotech laboratory where evil was being done behind a facade of Buddhism.

I thought twice about that and instead went off to play with some monk kids who surrounded me laughing and saying short english phrases, playing with my arm hair, wrapping their hands around my arms to see how big they were, and patting my fat belly. One of the monks talked in english with me briefly and brought me a book on Buddhism, and then I had to go so the whole group shouted “see you again!” as I ran down the steps of the temple towards the bus, last one in again.

We drove and drove and drove and I listened to louder rock music. Finally we arrived in Ha Long bay opposite its glorious side. We checked into the hotel and I stupidly tried to go make the best of the day. I say stupidly because I was soon drenched in sweat and nearly cheated out of money to use an elevator that goes up to this really beautiful bridge, and later found out that you’re not really supposed to go out during the day. Apparently everybody here naps during the day so they can stay up at night when it’s cooler, which makes so much sense I never thought an entire society would come to that conclusion.

After showering my sweat away I got a beer and sat in the restaurant mooching wifi. Other than the wifi and chatting with my brother about his meeting me in Thailand on the 26th this was a miserable experience. The beer was warm and the room was hot. I didn’t even think to open the windows to let the breeze in until I almost had to go for dinner. Then dinner ended up being in the same room I had been sitting in.

After dinner we went down to the night market. Rows and rows of tables piled with completely worthless shit. Worthless to me anyway. Progressive minimalism and tourism do not see eye to eye when it comes to the importance of physical novelties. I saw a few cool engrish shirts though, so that was cool. The power went out just as I was crossing the bridge to an outdoor techno club on the beach, so I stayed there at the club and had a mango smoothie that cost approximately $1. Lot’s of things here cost approximately $1. The music was freakin awesome and I was dissapointed that nobody was dancing, or rather that there was nobody there to dance. The place was empty, so I sat on the beach drinking my smoothie and enjoying the techno by myself, then I began walking home.

A Vietnamese guy approached me and began talking to me in good english, though with poor pronunciation. Vietnamese people are so nice it’s almost creepy, like there’s some hidden agenda. It makes it hard to guage who you can trust, but this guy and his group of friends were all cool so we walked a while and they took photos with me.

Then I ran into two people on the tour who are Vietnamese people from France. I walked with them, took some photos for them, and they bought me a beer at a stall where we sat and chatted it up with the owner. I barely understood anything they said, but they knew a little english. Charades was part of the game, and that’s always fun.

I came home, checked online for some friends, and came upstairs to write in the comfort of my own room rather than in the hotel lobby. So now the moon is higher in the sky, I may have a few additional mosquito bites, and you know probably more details about my day than is really necessary. I’ll try to keep it shorter tomorrow…

It’s the night of Memorial Day, the Memorial Night. I’m sitting in 4211 #1 having finished a bottle of Bogle 2006 Old Vine Zinfandel with Lauren. I was just developing photos from a day out with Donna and listening to jazz as Brianna got dressed for a date.

I love music.

I love jazz.

I love my friends.

I love photography.

Lauren and I were talking about her upcoming trip to Austrialia. She was melancholy about it, spending a month in Queensland a few miles outside of a small town in a remote location. I was telling her she should find it to be a vacation, a joy to have time off. She was free to ride bikes or motorcycles, paint, draw, take pictures, sleep, tan, read books, do whatever.

It then occurred to me that this is exactly what I will have time to do in Asia. It is exactly what I will have time to do after Friday when I have no job. It was an inspiring realization that the effort I’m going through to take this trip is actually for good reason. So much of this preparation has been going through the necessary motions, and I haven’t taken much time to anticipate the relaxing and awesome free time I will have. I think I’ve just removed myself from the reality and gone through the motions because it’s such a drastic life change, and the effect of that is that I’ve neglected much of the positive excitement that goes along with it.

Sure, after Friday I won’t have a job. Sure, after Friday I will be in a country where I don’t speak the primary language. Sure, after Friday I’ll be 5,000 miles away from the nearest familiar place. It’s still exciting, it’s still great, and it can still be very very very awesome. I sometimes just forget that aspect of this, as if it’s a chore.

Today is Memorial Day and it will be the most memorable for me because as of today my brother is now out of Iraq forever! He’s finishing his second tour and is now officially out of Iraq, waiting only one day in Kuwait before returning to Germany. So so so stoked about that.

Yesterday I didn’t get to go geocaching with Lisa, she forgot it was her last day at work and had to work until 7, so Donna and I went without her. We went to Golden Gate Park with the intent of finding travel bugs for me to take to Asia. We went to two lakes and a waterfall on an island before heading back to the car with a travel bug and a geocoin. Afterwards we went downtown and wandered around taking photos.

As we were walking down Mission near 5th, a photo in a gallery window caught my eye and we went in to see it. It actually didn’t look like a photo at all, more like a painting, but ended up being a photo printed on canvas which made it look more like a painting. We talked to a man working in the gallery and he told us that the photographer, Patrick Davis, teaches photography at San Jose State. When I told him we had to go he invited us to come back and drink wine or coffee and look around the gallery any time we wanted to.

We crossed Mission and went to visit Lisa at work. That was great, I hadn’t seen her in what seems like ages but is probably only a few weeks. Donna and I got coffee and chatted with Lisa a bit, but she was busy working so we let her be and went back outside. The weather was still really bleak and we were both tired from walking so much so we went and took a nap in Yerba Buena Garden. I nabbed another geocache real quick, but there were no trackables in it. A while later we got up, walked by the Zeum Carousel and ended up wandering around SOMA for a while trying to find where we’d parked the car, taking more pictures down random alleys where we found several hidden bars and restaurants next to smashed car windows and empty graffitied lots fenced off with chain link.

We eventually found the car. On the way home it was still overcast and we were still tired, but the day had been good. We listened to Claude Debussy. His music has a way of making melancholy wonderful, so it was a nice compliment to the wonderful day Donna and I made despite the melancholy weather. In the Sunset district of San Francisco it’s common for people to leave unwanted things on the street for other people to pick up, and Donna spotted a beautiful, dark wooden dresser carved and colored with birds and branches. Piano melodies poured out of the passenger door into the greyness as we tried to fit this piece of furniture among the belongings I was already been carrying with me. We fit it in the trunk and took it the one block back to 4211, our final treasure found that day.

Back at her home we geeked out and I nearly broke my head trying to figure out some some WordPress plugin stuff before realizing I was trying way too hard. WordPress is pretty awesome. I helped Lauren move some of her stuff across the street to her new apartment then drifted off sipping on wine listening to the music Donna had on while she played online scrabble with her friend in Chicago.

Ten days left until I’m on my way to the airport.

Yesterday my replacement at work started his job. He fell right into step, so that’s good as I don’t want to leave my co-workers in a tough spot with IT support issues.

On my lunch break I had my last dental appointment before my trip. Nothing special there, but medical things are important to handle before leaving because not only will I be in some questionable spots as far as medical support is concerned, I will also not have medical coverage since I am leaving my job and all of its benefits behind. Goodbye free dental care. Goodbye $5 immunization shots. Goodbye 401k.

After work I headed up to SF to hang out with Shannon, but she was gone by the time I got there. She was in from out of town and left early for some reason. Such is the nature of the traveler; we have to enjoy their company when they are present.

I ended up going to dinner with Donna, Lily and Allison at a great Italian place near Allison’s place up in North Beach, Sodini’s. I have to say, their lasagna was on par with that of The Stinking Rose. It was good to catch up with Allison since she’s leaving SF this Friday to move back to SoCal. When we were done the weather had turned from chilly to really really cold wind and fog, which is weird since it was 90º on Sunday. Donna and I headed back to 4211 where Brianna was nursing a boil burn on her leg and making some kind of Mexican dinner with Terresina. Somehow I drifted off to sleep on the couch, waking up several times during the night as people came and went, and woke to a foggy, wet Ocean Beach.

2 miles south in Daly City the fog was so thick you couldn’t see more than 100 feet ahead.

3 miles south in Colma the sun was out and it was warm.

50 miles south in Cupertino I arrived at the office under an overcast sky. 8 more days of work.

I suppose I should keep track of where I go. I’m looking for a way to embed some kind of map about my journey, it will be great to have a geographically aware journal with geotagged images. For now I’ll just log it.

Friday and Saturday nights I slept on the couch at 4211 Moraga #1.
Sunday I slept on Rob’s couch.
Monday I slept on the beanbag in my office.
Last night night I slept on Kyung and Kat’s spare futon in San Jose off Oakland and Rock.
Tonight I’m staying with Bernadette in Scott’s Valley.

In other news, my stuff is still partly in my car, partly in a storage unit, and partly in Lauren’s place across from 4211. I need to consolidate that shizz, sucks to have things spread around. I’d almost rather get rid of the stuff than have it scattered around.

It’s been cloudy and raining since Friday, but the sun was up this morning. Saturday I met up with Rob, Zach and Ben, hadn’t seen Z for a long time. We ate at a place called The Pork Room to spite the swine flu.

Afterwards, Rob had me come with him to cover the masturabate-a-thon for the blog. It was entirely underwhelming and not at all what I’d expected. It appears we went at one of the least active times, though I still wouldn’t have really wanted to go if it weren’t for a story.

That night I went out with Donna and Lily for dinner in Chinatown, then to Matt’s (Lily’s friend and old roomie) birthday party for a bit, then back to 4211.

Sunday was dull and wet. I went to REI to look at packs and buy some hot weather shirts that will travel well. Hacked teh linux with Rob late that night, trying to hook Boxee up to his TV.

Monday I went to dinner in San Jose with Reem, Julian and Dana and caught up a bit. Reem had just gotten back from Dubai. Dana and I talked about her travel dreams and a little about photography.

Last night I went to Trials and met Kyung, Kat, the other Kyung, Chris Bennett, Sadek, Julian and Martin.