Inky Stamps

Carpe omnis.

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I had to order a passport renewal this month while back in the States because the old passport only had one blank page left (after adding pages) and was set to expire before I would be back in the States again.  The more I travel the less sentimental I am about my passport and stamps, but it is kind of strange to see my new book with no stamps to bring back old memories.  

I am back in the States for a total of eight weeks this Summer, enjoying all of the things in America I can't get where we live overseas (Mexican, vegetarian, and Thai food rank highest on my "must-eat" list for the remaining five weeks).  

The passport is blank, but soon to be filled with stamps from Iraqi Kurdistan, UAE, Oman, Lebanon, Cyprus, and other countries yet to be determined during our next contract in the Middle East...  

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Home sweet home.  I know this looks like a place to get abducted and tortured for years on end without anyone hearing your cries, but Tammy and I loved living in this converted circus trailer for a couple of weeks while WWOOFing in central Czech Republic.  The farmer purchased this old trailer and converted it into a cozy, 2-bedroom WWOOFER retreat.  The organic farm we worked on was converted in the early 90's from a communist gulag used during the war.  The village we were staying in had a population of 200 and the nearest town had a UNESCO world-heritage church and was within bicycling distance.  We would spend about six hours a day weeding the fields and in the evening have a massive Czech meal followed by biking around the many lakes and forests in the area.  WWOOFing is such an amazing way to get to know a culture and learn about sustainable farming methods.  I've got some big plans to WWOOF Japan sometime in the near future...

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Some street art in Amsterdam.  Looks a little like Tammy...

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These are supposedly traditional Bosnian tobacco pipes.  The one on the left was so outrageous that I almost bought it.  It was so tall that you could smoke and comfortably walk down the street while guiding the roller along the pavement.  I guess that is the intended effect and the smaller ones are made for sitting down or just for tourists.  We found these while wandering around the souk in the Old Town (Bascarsilja) of Sarajevo.  Later we headed over to the Sarajevo Brewery which is a must-see if you like beer and old bars.  The dark beer is decent and the surroundings are of decaying opulence.  Oxidized copper, stained glass, and ornate, dark wood fixtures everywhere.  This was also the city's water supply for a few years during the war.  Pretty fucking cool.  I wish that we had gone to the brewery first before wandering the souk and I probably would have bought a few of these massive walking pipes to cruise around town with.  

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This is one of the most photographed spots in the entire Angkor complex, but what I really loved about this moment was a hilarious argument that occurred between the pictured foreigners and an Aussie tourist trying to grab a great picture untainted by other tourists.  Everyone in front of the tree was admiring the beauty of the scene and I noticed an Aussie guy with an expensive looking Nikon waiting to set up his shot.  After a few minutes he hollered at these two Westerners to move on so he could get his picture and the two looked at each other and just laughed at him.  The woman told him she needed a few more minutes and the man just ignored the Aussie guy altogether.  A yelling match ensued and we left before it got sorted out.  The situation really left me thinking about how we all come to these places for different reasons and have different expectations for our trip.  The Aussie guy wanted a perfect photo to show off when he goes home, the two seated on the other side of the ropes wanted to be part of something spiritual and natural, and I just enjoy awkward and tense interactions between other travelers.  Obviously the two were seated beyond the ropes and they were ultimately in the wrong, but I had to wonder if the Aussie guy would have yelled at local Khmer people to move out of his photo or if he would have been thrilled to capture a moment of "real" people reminiscing over their past.  

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I recently finished reading a trilogy on the life and legacy of Alexander the Great and I was reminded of how amazing this desert town is (this is where Alexander consulted the oracle and confirmed his divine origins).Tammy and I poked around Egypt for a couple months in 2010 and we ended up staying in Siwa for about 2 weeks.  Siwa is an oasis about 30 miles from LIbya and one of the most isolated places I have ever been.  Tammy was elated to find this salt lake after a long bicycle ride outside of town and along the barren edges of the Sahara.  Siwa is dotted with dozens of natural swimming holes, but this was the only place we found secluded enough for Tammy to swim without wearing jeans and a t-shirt. The majority of the local Berber women wear chunky, quilted abayas (covering the eyes too!) and I'm sure the town would frown upon Western women running around the swimming spots in bikinis.  This lake is so salty you can float just like in the Dead Sea in Jordan/Israel.  Directly across from the lake there was a new eco-lodge that had rooms made entirely out of salt (even the beds and nightstands).  Maybe next time...  Most of our days were spent poking around on Chinese mountain bikes, looking for flamingos and eating olives & fresh dates.  

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Hello. We Kurds would appreciate it if you wrote Ranya, Kurdistan instead of Ranya, Iraq because our independent region is nothing like the rest of Iraq.

Of course.  I used "Iraq" to try to bring more web traffic in and educate more people about Kurdistan (most of us are ignorant as to where Kurdistan is even at on the map).  But I definitely understand the politics/power of names/semantics and have no problem with changing my post.  Please let me know if there are any other concerns/constructive criticisms you have regarding past Kurdistan posts or ones you see in the future.  Thanks for reading.  

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Tammy snapped this picture of a prayer bead (misbaha) salesman in front of his shop in Ranya, Kurdistan on Raparin.  Raparin is the holiday that celebrates Ranya ("the gates of the uprising") starting a revolution on the 5th of March,1991 against Saddam's regime.  They successfully kicked out Saddam's soldiers and set off the chain of events that led to Kurdistan's current autonomy in Northern Iraq.  We visited on the day of the festivities to watch the parade and check out some Kurdish pride.  The streets of the old town were packed and the PUK (Patriotic Union of Kurdistan) party had dyed the water in the fountains green and put up thousands of green PUK flags around the city.  People were jovial, but snipers manned every rooftop in the city centre and Asaish (secret police) drove their vehicles up-and-down the street with gunmen securing the machine-gun turrets.  I felt reasonably safe until an excited mob began ushering a famous, local politician through the streets in huge numbers.  Soon after that, a plain-clothes policeman (presumably Asaish) demanded our identification cards and passports.  He said that we were suspiciously walking circles around the town taking pictures of the snipers, etc.  He found it difficult to believe that we were tourists, but after a few minutes he gave us back our identification and asked us to leave the city soon for our safety.  Seeing as how we had circled the city for hours and taken all the pictures of snipers that we really needed, we decided it was as good of a time as any to hit the road and head home.  

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Whenever people ask me what country I've visited that I definitely want to see more of, Ukraine pops up right away.  Before we went, I lectured Tammy about dressing appropriately for the religious sites in Kiev (I had to see the crypt in at Pechersk Lavra, "Cave Monastery") and she bought this very conservative black skirt that almost covered her ankles.  She doesn't mind covering her head with a scarf, but covering her legs and butt cheeks is always a battle between us.  I won this one and we arrived in Kiev modestly dressed and ready for crypt-creeping.  When we got to the Pechersk Lavra, one of the first things Tammy noticed was a twenty-something woman, accompanied by her grandmother, wearing a tiny mini-skirt that barely covered both cheeks.  She was furious at me for lecturing her into conservatism, but later we found that they might turn you back at the actual cave if you were dressed inappropriately, so I was happy to err on the side of caution.  Anyway, the cave is creepy as fuck with its numerous mummified, hermit monks and is definitely a must-see.  The monks appeared to have had their legs broken to fold up into these small display cases.  With the lack of fresh air, candlelight, and bearded priests hobbling around the caves, it was particularly eerie.  

Besides this spectacular Lavra, we fell asleep at an amazing ballet, drank kvas (bread beer), and of course sampled a few too many Ukrainian beers in one of Kiev's green spaces.  I knew that my grandmother's family was Czech, but she recently told me that her mother's family had lived in Odessa for three generations before immigrating to the States.  I've been trying to think of a better reason than bikini-clad Eastern European ladies to drag Tammy back to Ukraine in the Summer and I think this "exploring lineage" line might work.    

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Last year, Tammy and I were teaching at a small University near Khao Yai National Park in central Thailand.  We had friends living in Bangkok, so we went down on the 40 Baht vans a few times a month for shopping and city-life.  We heard about this cosplay convention at MBK one weekend, so we decided this was worthy of a trip.  There were tons of great characters, but I really liked the ones that had massive props.  I could imagine them showing up on the BTS with broad swords and giant gavels and all of the business people headed to Silom in three-piece suits wondering what the fuck these kids were up to.  I'm not that into anime (although I got way too into High School of the Dead), but I love to see extremely dedicated people.  Next year maybe Tammy and I will be dressed up like Deathstroke or Dragonball Z characters wherever in the world we might be... 

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I was standing in front of Yakdonald's in Kagbeni on the Annapurna Trail complaining to myself about not having seen any yaks when this herd of yaks came rumbling through the one road in town.  I could hear people yelling and I took my eye out of the optical view finder just in time to jump back and avoid being stampeded.  I managed to grab a quick picture of the dozen or so yaks as they charged by right in front of their namesake restaurant.  I was really interested in the yak culture because supposedly it is one of the only meats (besides yarsagumba...) that the strict Buddhists in the area allow themselves to eat.  I tried to get more information about why this animal is okay to be eaten, but I think it just has to do with the extreme lack of protein in the harsh winters.  On the west side of the Circuit, yaks were a dime-a-dozen, but I was really grateful to get a good picture and not be mauled to death in Kagbeni. 

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My friends (from right, Doof - an Alaskan fisherman, and Jarno - a Suomi traveler) and I were feeling spun out after a hedonistic week in Bali and decided to check out Bunaken and Sulawesi in Eastern Indonesia for a little peace of mind.  After a ridiculously quiet week on Bunaken, one of the world's greatest diving islands, we took a boat back to Manado and decided to travel 1,900 km by bus to grab a flight out of Makassar (Ujung Pandang).  The bus was supposed to take about 45-60 hours, but after 20 hours we found ourselves broken down on the side of the road and only 500 km away from Manado.  The driver said it would take a couple of days to get the replacement part, so after a quick game of Paper, Rock, Scissors, we grabbed our bags and decided to hitchhike the final 1,400 km.     

None of us were too sad to leave the bus behind.  It was the worst bus I have ever been on.  The driver blared techno music all night, the windows next to our seats in the back were drafty due to being smashed, and every time I fell asleep I would wake up with the young, Indonesian bus stewards sleeping on our laps (if they couldn't find a lap, they would be stuck on the top of the bus all night).  Oh yeah, and it was apparently the mail delivery system.  Our pace was a crawl because we stopped at every town to unload and reload deliveries from the top of the bus.  At 2 AM I was up on the roof handing packages down to the stewards to speed up the process and get moving to the next town.  

Once we got off the bus, we were picked up within minutes (I think people thought our Finnish friend, Jarno, was a girl due to the long, blonde locks.  It definitely helps to hitchhike with a blonde...).  We hithchiked with businessmen, families, and construction workers in all kinds of automobiles.  The Indonesian guy in the picture above is a truck driver and he picked us up near Tentena for a long ride through the center of the island and insisted that we  stay at his house (pictured) for the night because it was dangerous at night for us.  He didn't speak any English, but he was miming assault rifles and the universal throat-slitting gesture, followed by a symbol for sleep and pointing at all of us.  At first we thought we were being kidnapped.  Haha.  Then he showed us some recent looking photos on his cellphone of a decapitated person and a bunch of bloody people that he said was taken nearby.  We were totally ignorant of Sulawesi's recent history of violence and couldn't figure out what was going on.  This was 2008 and we had no idea that earlier in the decade over a thousand people were killed in sectarian violence in Sulawesi and it still wasn't entirely safe in Central Sulawesi.  Sometimes ignorance is bliss.  Anyway, this guy was younger than us and raising his four younger brothers by himself.  He moved all of the little ones into his bedroom and we took the living room for the night.  The neighborhood was really intrigued by us and it was great to get to see a little village life.  Sulawesi is off the beaten path, but this area is really off the beaten path.

The next morning we meandered our way down to a quiet little lake and stayed on the lakeside for a few days, borrowing motorbikes from local police officers and cruising around.  The island is stunningly beautiful, with tons of wildlife and really lush landscapes.  

A week into our hitchhiking trip we managed to stumble into Makassar in the early hours of the morning and grab a cheap room before our flight back to Bali later that day.  

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This is a picture of Tammy enjoying what might be the world's best breakfast (I am beginning to disagree with this audacious claim already, but never mind some "ultimate breakfasts list," this meal is really fucking good).  There were loads of little hole-in-the-wall shops nestled in the hutongs of Beijing, all selling very similar breakfast items.  Tammy is grinding on some fantastic soup and veggie baozi, not pictured are the delicious yóutiáo, think savory churros, meant for dipping in your soya milk, congee, or whatever other soup you might be served.  Unlimited spicy sauce, quick service, and outdoor seating make this breakfast perfect.  The food alone could have me booking spontaneous flights back to China any minute now...

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I really dig Mughal style art.  I particularly like the feasts and wedding paintings.  I love to see the Persian style, influenced by Jainist and Buddhist techniques.  It makes for these beautiful, intricate pieces of art.  This piece is on the side of a wall in Udaipur, Rajasthan.  The artist is Madan Mohan Sharma and he specializes in Phad and Chitram art.  His art is available to purchase here: http://www.miniatureclub.com/madangallery_2.html   

I'm not really sure how it works, but the site says that Sharma will paint a scene for you on fabric or canvas.  This one would be a bit massive for the home, but it is amazing "street art."  

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A local college student we met in a typical Tirane pub summed it up best when he said, "Albania is unlike anywhere else in Europe."  I love travelling in Europe, but sometimes I miss that, "Where the fuck am I?" feeling that I experience in other parts of the world.  

Luckily, Albania is chock-full of these moments that make travel so addictive.  In the same small pub, later on in the night, after experiencing lots of Albanian hospitality, the country's first male ballerina made it rain with napkins and Petey Pablo'd his shirt like a helicopter before wiping out on the floor and apologizing profusely for knocking everyone's food off their tables during his dance sequence.  I like these moments.  Unique food, cold beer, welcoming people, and someone drunker than myself.  I honestly knew nothing about Albania prior to our trip except for the knowledge that the main bad guys in Taken were supposed to be Albanian - smh.  We didn't get taken, but we did have very positive experiences with the people and we learned a lot about the Hoxha regime and how different daily life is for the people since 1991.  It wasn't uncommon to see these motorcycle taxis (?) contending in traffic next to a Porsche, a Mercedes S-Class, Audi A8, and an old man in a suit on a $30 Chinese bicycle.  Save a few days for Albania in your itinerary if you find yourself in the Balkans, you won't regret it.  

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This is one of the most paradoxical things I have seen travelling and it took me weeks to wrap my head around this scene and figure out what was going on.  On a busy street in the middle of Dhaka, this young woman stood completely naked in front of a few mobile shops and restaurants.  I saw her when we walked by and about five seconds later I processed what I had seen and turned around to make sure I wasn't going crazy. At first I thought that maybe she was a mentally handicapped woman and the community tolerated her nudity as part of her condition.  Weeks later talking to one of the few foreigners we bumped into during our time here, we found out that she was a prostitute.  They said that in some parts of town prostitutes stand on display in the street for rent.  From an outsider's perspective, Bangladesh seemed very conservative.  The call to prayer could be heard everywhere and alcohol could only legally be bought at the few 5-star hotels in the country.  When I asked the expat about what the police did when they caught the women, they said that often the police would sleep with the women (for free) in exchange for the right to stay on the street.  This information isn't expert knowledge, but it sounds plausible.

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Editor's note: Originally I published this post with only the woman's face censored.  I think the image of a woman completely naked on the streets of one of the most populated, congested cities on the planet is extremely powerful.  However, higher than average traffic volume and a reblog from a porn tumblr (within minutes) indicates that some people missed the point.  I wasn't in any way intending to sexualize this woman or my experience upon seeing her.  The exploitation of women worldwide is disparaging and ranks high as one of my least favorite parts about travelling in Asia.   If you came to this blog looking for porn, please move on.      

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Tammy and I just got back from a few weeks in the Former Republic of Yugoslavia, as well as Albania and Greece (pictured is Tammy looking out from the fortress above the Old City, Kotor, Montenegro).  In this post I'm going to do something a little different and actually provide some usable information instead of drunken ramblings.  While trying to plan our trip, I came across a lot of trouble figuring out how much transportation was going to cost between cities/countries.  I had to visit dozens of blogs and impossible bus websites just to get a rough idea.  So to make it easier on all of you future visitors to the Balkans, here is some cost information for a common circuit around this area.  All of this info is accurate as of March, 2013.  

Belgrade-Sarajevo = 2510 RSD ($29) Night bus into East Sarajevo.  10:30 PM - 5:30 AM.  15 BAM taxi from East Sarajevo to Center Sarajevo (Mejtas neighborhood).

Sarajevo-Mostar = 11 BAM ($7) Morning train.  6:51 AM - 9:00 AM.   Taxi from Mejtas neighborhood to Sarajevo Train Station = 6 BAM.

Mostar-Dubrovnik = 32 BAM ($21) Bus at 12:30-3:30 PM.  City bus from Dubrovnik bus station to Old City Dubrovnik - 12 KN).

Dubrovnik-Kotor = 143 KN ($24) Bus scheduled to leave at 10:00 AM, left at 10:45 AM - 1:00 PM.  5 minute walk from Kotor bus station to Old Town.  

Kotor-Budva = 4 Euros ($5) Buses run nearly every 30 minutes direct and every 45 minutes through Tivet.  (We were offered a taxi from Kotor to Tirana for 90 Euros from our guesthouse owner...)

Budva-Ulcinj = 7 Euros ($9) Bus 9:30 AM - 11:30 AM.  

Ulcinj-Shkoder = 5 Euros ($6) Bus 1:00 PM - 2:30 PM.

Shkoder-Tirana = 300 Lek ($3) Bus 4:00 PM - 6:00 PM.  Bus leaves from near the stadium where you are dropped off at or more frequent mini-buses (not great if you have more than 30L backpack) depart across the street from the German bank near the large round-about in the city center.  

Tirana-Athens-Tirana = 50 Euros ($65) We saw round-trip ranging from 45 Euros to 60 Euros, but we were happy with the customer service at Osumi Travels near Skanderbeg in Tirana.  Not so impressed with the bus as the journey progressed, but we made it safely.  The trip from Tirana to Athens left at 4 PM or 4 AM and takes roughly 15 hours.  Returning to Tirana, we took the 4 PM bus and it arrived at around 7:30 AM.  In Athens, the bus arrives near Metaxurgio Metro station.  

Tirana-Skopje = 20 Euros ($26) After asking a multitude of bus companies, we found a place at the southern end of Skanderbeg, which had a bus leaving at 9 PM, arriving at 5:30 AM in Skopje.  The bus is a 10-seater, with very rough roads in northern Albania and southern Macedonia.  Both of our border crossings leaving Albania are tedious and require exiting the vehicle and lining up for bag searches.    

Now all of the dirty work has been done for you, safe travels and expect the unexpected.