Two days on safari

December 25, 2012

Saw a Cheetah close to the end of the day in Ngorongoro

Safari day 2 almost felt like cheating; it was like fishing in a barrel. I don't understand how Ngorongoro Crater attracts animals in, and then keeps them in, but apparently it does. There is a somewhat isolated ecosystem inside this crater that creates and environment for abundant animal spotting, even with quite a few tour groups in there, hundreds of tour jeeps, but there is a surprising amount of sprawling real estate to spread out into. It was still difficult to find the more elusive animals so it still had a bit of sporting sense to it. We only planned two days of safari on the advice of a friend and it was good advice. I'm not sure we could take another day of animal spotting as it became quite repetitive.

Christmas dinner was turkey and ham and an amazing stuffing which I think was loaded with...more ham. All the food at the lodge was tasted and only once included rice which was a welcomed change of pace from life in Taiwan where every lunch meal at work includes a scoop of rice.

After breakfast we started the trip down to Arusha to transfer to our climbing guide. The Mt. Meru lodge again served as the rendez-vous point. On the first day the tour operator who gave us the overall rundown mentioned that there was a guy from Scotland who would be on the climb with us. Shirley started to get nervous thinking that he would be some super mountain climber born in the Highlands who's veins flow single malt. We met him at the rendez-vous. She might be right.

Masai villages dot the savannah 

On the ride from Arusha out to the safari and back we travel through countryside inhabited by the Masai, the men recognised as being covered in a red cloth carrying a stick, typically herding cattle. They live in round huts with a thatched roof. I wanted to take more pictures but Shirley brought up this idea about cameras stealing their souls. I thought that was the Zulu but I didn't have internet access available to be able to debunk her theory so I just tried to be discreet. I wonder if anyone ever really believed that or if it is just myth.

I bless the rains down in Africa

December 24, 2012

We were picked up at the airport in a Toyota Land Cruiser by our guide, Rizuan, who would be handling the safari portion of this adventure. We made a pit stop for lunch at the Mt. Meru Lodge in Arusha where a representative from the tour company gave us the rundown of the trip. Soon after, Rizuan picked us up to head up to the lodge in between the two game drive locations, Lake Manyara and Ngorongoro Crater.

It rained unbelievably hard all night long. I think the rain coupled with 21 hours of drinking nothing but diuretic (coffe + alcohol) caused me to wake up to pee at least 3 times. Nonetheless I slept quite soundly. I thought breakfast would just be a continental spread, which is how it started but then they came by to take orders for eggs, bacon and sausage. Coffee here is great, I'm looking forward to bringing some home. We rode through some of the coffee plantations on our way to the safari lodge.

Today we went on a game drive at Lake Manyara. The morning was raining but it was light enough that we could pop up the roof on the Land Cruiser which allows you to stand up and peer out for an unobstructed view. Our first sighting was baboons and we thought it was amazing. At the end of the day we would pass the same colony of baboons and it seemed much less impressive after all of the wildlife that we would encounter. A group of female lions that we could barely spot through the grass was the highlight of the day as the leopard eluded us. Tomorrow we have another game drive at Ngorongoro and I'm curious what we will see there that we did not see today.

During our pre-dinner shower back at the lodge we could hear Christmas carollers and found them assembled in front of the lodge singing "O come all ye faithful" in Swahili. Last year we were in New Zealand for XMAS. Sometimes I miss the traditional New England XMAS I experienced as a child but it is exciting to experience in the context of other cultures. I was surprised that Tanzania is about half Christian half Muslim.

2012 Trip to Africa

December 23, 2012

Since the school calendar had a particularly long Christmas break this year we decided to take a trip to Africa as two friends of ours summitted Kilimanjaro this year and convinced us that this was not really mountain climbing but just walking up a hill (sarcastic foreshadow). The plan was to go on safari in Tanzania for a couple days, then spend 7 days climbing the Machame route of Kilimanjaro, then relax on the beaches of Zanzibar for a few days.

Firstly, no, we have never climbed a real mountain before. No, we don't like camping. But we do like skiing, and, well, climbing a mountain is almost like the same thing, right? So we were off to climb a mountain, planning a summit attempt starting on New Years Eve. Getting from Taipei to Kilimanjaro is easy, you only have to go from Taipei > Hong Kong > Bangkok > Nairobi > Kilimanjaro, which is not nearly as difficult as getting from Zanzibar to Taipei (more sarcastic foreshadow). As we boarded the flight from Hong Kong > Nairobi (with a pit stop in Bangkok), we had our first exposure to Kenyan culture. We were seated in the same row but there were 3 seats in between us and we didn't realize this when we got our boarding passes. As people were still trying to board the plane there were people running all over the place, 90% men, and somehow they seemed to all know each other. The guy sitting next to Shirley was shaking his head at the rudeness and said something like, "Welcome to Africa". It was like a big party, but I wasn't in the mood for a big party and I was assuming that even though it was Kenya Airways, there still must be a rule that you can't be running up and down the aisles yelling "Jambo" (Swahili for "Hello") as the plane is taking off. After about 30 minutes of this the plane was finally ready to go and everyone got in their seats. Before everyone had sat down there was still a seat open next to me and I got Shirley to move into that seat. I think someone was assigned to that seat but I took advantage of the fact that there seemed to be no urge for the 300 passengers to actually take their seats so I figured whomever was assigned to that seat really didn't care where they sat.

Shirley checking out a Taiwan history display in HK airport

Or it could also have been the fact that while we were waiting in Hong Kong Airport to get our boarding passes, a family of five was having a big fight with the counter agent because they were being denied access due to visa concerns. The behavior would easily have gotten them tasered in the US but but I would soon come to realize this over emotional arguing would be commonplace in Kenya. I also noticed that throughout the flight people were wandering around messing with stuff in the overhead bins, far from the seats they were sitting in. I think they just randomly scatter their baggage to have an excuse to wander the plane and socialize.

We had a total of 22 hours from door to door which isn't actually that bad and is less painful when the "back" button works on the in flight entertainment system. I, however, wasn't so lucky and I somehow got stuck into the Adele music selection with no "Back" button to save me from this horror. I would rather freeze to death on the Hillary steps of Mt. Everest than listen to Adele for 12 hours so I just shut the thing off and tried to get some sleep.

(to be continued)

These aren't the droids you're looking for

It has been quite some time since I blogged, quite some time since I've done a lot of things, but the last time I wrote I was on a business trip to the Netherlands and as I now find myself in the same predicament, what better time to attempt to rekindle the fire?




Part of my absence from the blog involves simply not having/making the time to do it, but I am in Europe on a Sunday, and guess what? Time stands still! I think you have two choices of activities: blog, or go to church. Neither particularly productive. So far, this trip is awful. I recently went to the States for Christmas, I think it was a total of 30 hours to get from Taipei to Melbourne, FL and I caught a common cold on the flight(s) over and suffered really bad jet lag throughout our trip. After 10 days we came back to Taiwan. I dozed off on the Tokyo -> Taipei leg and literally woke up with pink eye (aka "conjuntivitis"). It's like I was perfectly fine when I dozed off, and 1 hour later awoke to find my left eye totally crusted shut. I had a 3 day respite in Tapei before continuing westward to the Netherlands. It took about 24 hours in the Netherlands before I realized I had a pretty bad flu. I think I've since lost about 5 pounds and haven't slept past 5AM nor 2 consecutive hours since December 17th.



So, is there relevance to all this bitching? I'm wondering if I've quickly become accustomed to life in Taiwan and simply hate being off "the rock". Is this all psychosomatic? I grew up in a city and swore that I could never live in the country. Then after one of the neighbor kids threw a snowball at my wife and called her a "gook" we moved to some affluent suburban areas to avoid overtly racist people and only deal with passively racist people. Our home in the States is in a small town that allows no commercial development, no cell towers, and nothing is open on Sundays. Idyllic, right? I now find myself in the Netherlands cursing the fact that everything is closed except this one coffeeshop, I mean, place that sells coffee, that doesn't even have wi-fi. The malls are closed, boutiques are closed, I can't get cold medicine or a pair of gloves. I can get a joint though, but that's at the other kind of coffeeshop. Not sure if that's the kind of medicine I need for the flu, might help me put some weight back on, though.



I wonder how I could quickly make the switch from small town life in rural Connecticut to life in Taipei, where there are people on top of people, fruit stands that NEVER close, people riding bicycles in typhoons, and nary a coffeeshop or "place that sells coffee" without a free open wi-fi signal. Now I can't imagine NOT living in a metropolis. Am I flexible in adapting or just need to feel a sense of belonging to whatever environment in which I am immersed? Are those exclusive?



Work has been awful this past week. Not much cooperation. I'm supposed to be able to navigate these waters but I've run out of Jedi mind tricks and logic doesn't work against patriotism. I feel like the tail trying to wag the dog. I've been training my Taiwanese staff in some "business English" idioms and remember discussing "Ace up my sleeve". I don't have an Ace up my sleeve. I’m really questioning the European economy. Nothing is closed on Sunday in Taipei. Products are made, services rendered, money changes hands. I enrolled in an MBA program for one semester and thought it was garbage (sorry MBA people). Part of my motivation in taking this job was to learn things about globalization that could only be gathered by being immersed in that environment. A good (non-Western) friend of mine from the States started preaching some Western-economics doom and gloom type stuff about a year ago, citing things he learned in his MBA program. After 8 months in Taiwan and now coming back to work in Europe such predictions are starting to make sense to me. Western economies are crumbling (most recently Spain) and China is swooping in to buy up the debt. OK, maybe some MBA programs aren't THAT bad.



People in Taiwan are upset that the unemployment rate is above 5%. 5%! I had lunch with a Syrian-born guy Friday who asked, "What is America going to export in 10 years?" Internet content? Created in America but coded in India? The Google Tablet is allegedly being developed in a building a block from our apartment in Taipei. Silicon Valley may be calling the shots but where is the real economic impact? I don't mean to sound all anti-American. I realize that the freedom and quality of life there has opened up a world of opportunity to allow me to see things from a different perspective. I worry about how many others will have the same opportunity in the future.



I am scheduled to be in Europe another week but that may be useless if I don't make any progress tomorrow and I may get thrown out of the building if I say what I really think, but at least I can get out of here and back to Taiwan.

One rule in life

I went back to Antonio's for dinner tonight as I am still in Europe on business and this is the only place in town worth eating at. Because it is the only place in town worth eating at, it is notoriously tough to get a seat. My ex-boss's boss is beyond a regular there and one time a group of us had to douche out and drop his name just to get a table. I sat at the bar alone tonight and everyone recognized me from last time. Alle had a boatload more questions about Taiwan and was thoroughly empressed when I busted out some currency at his enquiry and was able to answer, "That's Sun Yat Sen" when he asked about "the guy on the hundred". To answer to his surprise, I said, "Hey, if I claim I am from Taiwan and can't tell you anything about the money, you'd think I was totally full of shit!"

As a rule, I try to not be full of shit, but I really only have one steadfast rule in life. If there's one thing that the whole Taiwan experience has taught me, it is that rules can be too restrictive. If I really follow "the rules" I would have never made the leap to come to Taiwan. Having one rule is OK. The good thing about having one rule, is you have no excuse to forget or break it. Let it define you. Own it. Live it.

The cashier girl at Antonio's sits at the bar and struck up a conversation with me and we talked throughout the night. She was wearing a shirt that said "Doing 9 months inside" and had a baby in a prison uniform on it. The shirt was covering her bulbous belly of 21 weeks pregnacy with here son "Santiago" kicking from the inside. But my rule, my only rule, is I never ask a woman if she is pregnant. If an old friend shows up stashing a beach ball under her shirt, I will lock eyes with rigidity so as to not even glance at the belly until she reveals that she is pregnant. No way, no how.

Last time I got the Bolognese, this time the clams & mussels. If you can't figure out a rule for yourself, here's a good one: "If even in doubt, get the bolognese." It's the true measure of weather or not an Italian place can make sauce. Anyone with a supply of decent tomatoes can make fra diavolo, but bolognese is an art form. It was a good night chatting with Alle and Nicole. Antonio's is packed every night and come 8:00, they are turning away people left and right. Friends and I have a joke about getting "Nine-thirtied". If you are trying to get a reservation and they really don't want you there, they'll offer a reservation at 9:30. At Antonio's they just say "Nee" ("no") and you are shit out of luck. They offered me a grappa on the house before leaving and as I left, Alle said to stop back in before my flight on Saturday, at least for a coffee if I can't make dinner. I left with a sense of accomplishment. Nicole said that she remembers everybody, some people get tables, some get 9:30'd and some get sent to the Doner stand down the street. I left with a sense that maybe I have cracked the inner circle of Antonio's.

My boss is out here now and he has been trying to set up some dinners, he invited me out to dinner either tonigh, tomorrow night, or both; I'm not sure I chose tomorrow night based the rest of the company on the invite. As I got back to the hotel my boss was in the lobby with a bunch of Taiwanese guys from my company and he asked if I was just out walking around or what? I said I just went to dinner at Antonio's and he lamented, "Why didn't you invite me?" I said I thought he had some big dinner planned and he revealed that he got stood up. One of the other Taiwanese guys practically had his eyes pop out of his head and said, "You can get in to Antonio's!?!?"

At this point I felt like the King of Town.Since it's only good to have one rule in life I broke the rule of being full of shit and totally exagerrated my cred at Antonio's and told him if he ever needed a table at Antonio's to let me know. Not sure I can really do anything about it, but for me, Antonio's is on my list of homes away from home.

Choose Toscana

I'll often be out and something quite mundane will occur and I'll make a comment to the unlucky soul sitting across from me to the effect of, "Wow, that would make good blog material". In Taiwan that may involve a guy on a scooter with a Chihuahua, live chicken, rice cooker, and a 20' extension ladder bungie corded to his back.

I am working in Europe right now which sort of shifts the scale, but I had dinner out tonight and three potential blog posts unravelled before my eyes and I've decided to just roll them into one long post, arguably only connected by chronology.

Blog fragment #1: Don't be a cocksucker

There is a restaurant nearby the hotel called, Antonio's, a very good Italian restaurant, the likes of which I have yet to find in Taipei. One of the secrets to Antonio's is he employs about a 50% Italian staff which includes my bartender for tonight, Allesandro. Allesandro started out as a hyper-talkative bartender which for me, being from Connecticut, is naturally tough to deal with but by the end of the evening, "Alle" and I were paisans.

Alle quickly asked me where I was from, which for the first time, became a complicated question. Identity is a strange thing (see blog fragment #2) and saying I was an American but I live in Taiwan brought about an onslaught of questions from Alle. Alle knows that the tunnel from the NE coast (somewhat near Fulong Beach) back in to Taipei is the 3rd longest tunnel in the world so I was not in a position to bullshit Alle about Taiwan and he asked a million and one questions. I was somewhat embarassed that he, perhaps knew more about Taiwan than I did, but that's something you learn to deal with being a travelling American. He grew slightly uncomfortable talking about himself and work but said that he wants to stabilize himself and then figure out "what he wants to do with his life". In bartender simplicity, he noted, "The important thing in life is not to be a cocksucker." Aside from any homophobic implications, I think he hit the nail on the head. I took it as similar to saying, "Don't be a jerk off" has nothing to do with masturbation.

Blog fragment #2: Identity crisis

So it seems now when people ask, "Where are you from?", it becomes a complicated question for me. Alle was much more interested in life in Taiwan vs. life in the U.S. I haven't watched American TV since life in Neihu back in May. I "live" in Taiwan, work partially in the Netherlands, still own a house in the U.S., and in some way, don't feel 100% at home in any of those places. I recently attended a series of orientation events involving Shirley's school and found it to be uncomfortably..."western", unlike my work environment. It's not like I'm ready to pull the trigger on changing my name to Bruce but I sort of feel like a stranger in a strange land. Everywhere.

Such must be the case for Alle. He seemed to be quite friendly with the Dutch patrons at the bar, even though he is from the Italian Alps. At one point a male customer came in and some old man rolled out of the back room (watching soccer games on a laptop so I was told) to give the guy the triple kiss on the cheek so it really is an Italian sort of place. I envy the ability to pull off the triple kiss, even just with a woman, not to mention a mention, a man. I had flashbacks of childhood life where on XMAS eve it was a real family fest. There was a sense of neighborhood where when people asked you where you were "from", it meant what part of town which also indicated your ethnic heritage. Now it's effectively like, "So which Starbucks do you go to?" Times have changed. One tough thing with Taiwan is you are ALWAYS on the outside, wei guo wren.

Blog fragment #3: Choosing sides

Choosing sides is an important lesson in life.  Only douchebags fail to pick sides. You can't root for the Yankees AND the Red Sox. One great thing about sports, regardless of where you live, regardless of what Seinfeld says, it is critical to pick sides. Teach them young. I asked Alle for a "red wine". He said, "I have a house wine, or I have a Toscana, it costs a little bit more." This is an opportunity to choose sides, you have to pick the Toscana. We spent the good part of 2 hours talking about everything from tunnels to women (ubiquitous bartender topic) to sports betting. Every once in a while, in between the chaos, Alle would duck in to the back room to check the football score on a laptop to see how his 26:1 parlay was working out. One could make a case that sports betting is for douchebags but I wasn't going there, not tonight. I had picked my side.

So these guys sit down at the end of the bar and Alle gives them the house vs. Toscana pitch and the guys insist on the house wine (bad idea) and Alle says, "C'mon man, I need to eat" to which one guy says, "You eat just fine." And at this point I could tell this would end badly. Of course, when it comes to wisdom, bartenders are a step behind Master Yoda and Alle was no exception as he retorts, "You must be German" and you could see these guys faces sink into their house wine. Then Alle looks at me and I started laughing, being one to pick sides and knowing who's side to pick. I thought it was genuinely funny that I was presented the same decision point but realized that there really was no "choice". As Henry Rollins would say, "your choice is fish".

Alle tried to make light of the whole thing but as they were walking to their table, head douchebag said, "nice tan". Living in Taiwan has made me more sensitive to race issues, though I don't think Italian is a "race". It is common in Taiwan to try and be as white as possible. I know in India, men advertise their daughters for "sale" in context of how fair skin they are. I had a Taiwanese guy send me a resume last week in which he indicated his blood type, as the Japanese identified the "feisty" Taiwanese by blood type during occupation and some companies still follow this biggoted practice.

So if identity crisis isn't enough of a problem we now have to worry about exactly how white white people are? I tend to think Germans get a bad rap because of things that happened 70 years ago and then this knucklehead at the bar enforces a "told you so" mentality.

In my fantasy world where people ask me what it is like to be a blogger I confess that blogging involves maintaining a personality that is an exaggerated form of yourself. One where I take real situations and embellish them with wit and sarcasm such as to make it entertaining to the reader but not a total abomination of the truth. I had such a post evolving at Antonio's tonight that then recoiled into a sense of true reality. I watched the line cook put out a plate of salmon and thought a good blog punchline would involve, "Only a douchebag orders the salmon at Antonio's" but the true wisdom in this post is: don't be a racist douchebag when a bartender who is slightly less white than you jokes about you not taking his suggestion, because in the end, he is faking like he's watching football in the back room when he is really stirring your Rumple Minze with his schwanz.

The name game

Even before coming to Taiwan, I found it fascinated to meet a Chinese guy named "Wesley". Suspecting that, of course, his name wasn't really Wesley, I'd just figure that maybe he's a big Mr. Belvedere fan. But even the biggest fan wouldn't name himself after that little douchebag Wesley.

I've come across my fair share of slightly strange names in the past few months. By that, I don't mean Steven, Frank, Jason, Sharon. I mean names like Lester & Simon, stuff that's not really odd, but a little bit outside of the mainstream. I wonder how they come to pick their "Western" names. At first I thought, maybe it sounds a lot like their name in Chinese, but that's not the case, I checked the database, no resemblance, not even close.

I had a Ghanese friend who's name was "Harrison". When I asked about the origin, I had hoped to hear that his family had some link to someone in the UK with the surname, "Harrison" but my greatest fear was true: as a kid he watched Raiders of the Lost Ark and was instantly smitten by the hat and whip and decided he wanted to be known as Harrison. I met someone last week who had a coworker named "Maverick". I bet Maverick was 5 years older than Harrison. Nevertheless, Maverick is a pretty cool name. I really want to meet this guy; I wonder how much like his Top Gun namesake he actually is. I think I know the answer to that.

I've started to amass this inventory of stupid jokes that I tell to the Taiwanese to gauge whether or not they "get" my stupid sense of humor. We had the pleasure last week of meeting up with one of Shirley's former high school students from the States who is visiting her home  in Taiwan. We were out with her and her brother and I thought I'd put my witty personality to the test. I guess under certain circumstances, Westerners here sometimes choose a Chinese name much like Maverick chose his Western name.

I explained that if given the chance, I would pick a name that means a lot to the Chinese people. I would name myself after the most famous Chinese hero, someone powerful and loved by the people, someone who personified Chinese culture and delivered it to the rest of the world. A name that would instantly bring me honor. My Chinese name will be "Bruce". Their puzzled response was, "But Bruce Lee's real name is Jun-Fan."

Tough crowd.