Well, as one can see by the sparse content of this blog that I was not successful in putting any content up whatsoever about the last 7.5 months in Asia. While visiting India, Thailand, Laos, Myanmar, and the Philippines I saw a great deal of things. At the same time, I missed my motorcycle. Granted, I had rented and ridden a number of tiny bikes in almost every country I visited, but there was something missing.
I toyed with the idea of purchasing a motorcycle in Malaysia and touring on that, but in the end I decided to return to California (secretly, to surprise my parents) and take my Suzuki VStrom 650 out of storage. I’m heading to South America on it, at the wrong time of the year (winter) and simply do not care. It’s adventure time and I’m leaving on Sunday!
This trip is a bit more intense (and slightly more dangerous) than my previous galavanting. I’m hoping to keep this updated a bit this time, with a more fluid trip blog of sorts.
If anyone knows someone in Central or South America that would let me pitch a tent in their yard or on their floor please let me know!
In Huntington Beach, headed South!
The trip begins! In 5.5 hours I board a plane and head across the world again. This time my destination is Kochi, India. I’m quite excited. I’ve got my pack (only 40 pounds…) and I’m ready to go. I get the feeling I’m going to be in shape by the end of this trip, just by default of having to carry my home around on my back with me all the time. It’s a strange and yet liberating thought to realize that I literally have no ‘home’ right now. The best I can do in that regard is a storage unit in Walnut Creek. Otherwise, home is wherever I end up.
I’m fortunate to be meeting up with my friend Shameem when I arrive in India. He’s from Kerala in South India and I’m spending 4 or 5 days with him before he returns to Dubai at the end of his vacation. I’m quite fortunate to have a chance to spend some time with him and it’ll be great to see him.
One thing I’m not looking forward to is the endless flying I’m about to start doing. I fly from San Francisco to Tokyo to Singapore to Mumbai to Kochi. It’s roughly 36 hours of travel time in economy class. Since I booked with award miles, my Gold status with United won’t allow me to upgrade to Economy Plus+ for free like I normally do. Life is hard I tell ya.
Anyway, from here on out I’ve no idea when I’ll be updating this. I did not get a SPOT tracker as planned, so I’ll only be posting updates when I do actually sit down at a computer with internet access, and I get the feeling India is NOT rife with wireless internet access.
I’ve landed at the Zurich airport in Switzerland with a 3 hour layover, but I wanted to share my excitement over having been upgraded to Business Class for my flight from Dubai to Zurich. It was amazing, and all of my travel in economy for the rest of my life is hereby ruined. I’ve gotta get used to slumming it soon! I’m on a backpacker budget now.
Well, as many of you may have noticed – I am a horrible blogger. I forget to update this and with the hectic 6 day work schedule I’ve had for the last year and a half, my motivation was low. At this point, I’ve decided to change that. I’ve resigned from my position in Dubai, plan to travel to the United States for 10 days (San Francisco, yeah!), and then on August 27th I fly to Kochi, India to begin an adventure.
I’m planning on an extended backpacking trip, alone, through a large portion of Southeast Asia. The length of the trip depends on how quickly (or slowly, hopefully) I deplete my budget – but here’s to it being a long one. At minimum, I expect to be gone for 6 months, but if I can swing a year, well, I may be gone for a year!!!
My minimum (very rough, non committed) itinerary is as follows:
India – 2 Months
Nepal – 1 Month
Thailand – 1 Month
Sri Lanka – 2 or 3 Weeks (over new years, meeting up with friends)
Vietnam – 1 Month
After that, I re-evaluate the budget and decide if I can continue on. if I can then I plan to visit:
Laos
Cambodia
Burma
The Philippines
If you know anybody living in those countries, I’d be happy to take any advice on what to see. I’d also accept a floor to sleep on for a night or two!
Many of you know I just recently returned from a 20 day vacation that included a horseback trek into a remote part Mongolia (along with a brief 3 days in Korea). I had hoped the trip would get me amped back up for work, but I found when I got back I was still exhausted. So, a couple months later here I am, with no agenda on what I visit in any of these countries. I’m excited for the lack of a ‘plan’ other than general regions I plan to visit. I’ll figure it out as I go, which will be half of the adventure.
I hope to post some photos of my trek through Mongolia and brief visit to Korea before I leave the UAE on the 17th. Feel free to send me a nastygram if you’re interested in taking a peek at some of that to get me in gear =D.
Just a brief update on this end. I’ve been a horrible blogger, but I’ve found a new direction I’d like to take this. I’m hoping to turn it into a travel blog of sorts, motorcycle related content will be most prominent when possible. A good deal of the content will be centralized to the United Arab Emirates and the stupid things I do in this country, but when I have the opportunity to travel elsewhere, I will update this too. Soon I’m going to be backlogging some posts from places I’ve traveled and have not updated upon.
I may also purchase WordPress Pro and aimsomewhere.com. We shall see!
Hello Everyone! I just wanted to give an update here on the blog. I’ve been given an official leave date of January 8th, 2012. I will then spend roughly 3 months in Dubai. During that time it’s hoped that the company I work for will finalize the staffing plans for the Dubai office and I will then return and stay for the duration of one year.
Exciting!
Here is a time lapse video of Dubai, the city I will be living in within the next couple weeks.
Well, it looks like I’ll be moving to Dubai for work (unless something dramatic happens here in the next week or so). Subsequently, I’m buying a nice DSLR and will be blogging the interesting things I see while living in the Middle East. Wish me luck!
This is Dubai
A bookstore in a telephone booth. Unconventional, yes. Yet it is incredibly awesome at the same time.
The Library
I stumbled upon this earlier this afternoon and was immediately captivated by the honesty patrons of this free library have to show. Those who want to utilize it simply leave a book they have already read and take one they wish to read. Completely on the honor system and from what the article states I’ve gathered that people are lining up every day to take advantage of this. I don’t think there are any telephone booths in Hancock, MI, but I’d like to see something like this show up.
Check out the full story here: Quiet at the Library.
Currently I am in Atlanta, GA relaxing after the beginning of the STC National Summit. I’m pretty excited to have the chance to be at the conference for the second year in a row and to have the opportunity to see what’s happening in the real working world of technical communication. I’m looking forward to meeting people and maybe I will even find a job for myself upon graduation in December. That is, if anybody’s hiring. Hah.
Southeast Asia & More, Solo Adventure Travel 