Rolf Potts's Blog, page 23

Family travel: 4 strategies for waiting with kids

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

We spend a lot of time waiting on things:

Planes, trains, buses and more. We’ve gotten good at waiting over the years. Our secret weapon? Games. We play games while we wait. We always have.

When the kids were little we played “I spy” and sang nursery rhymes and told jokes while we waited. We counted things and looked for patterns and we read stories and made shadows with our fingers.

When they got a little older we went nowhere without our chapter book. We plowed through Ben Hur and Watership Down, the Narnia series and the Jungle Books while we rode in the car and waited at doctor’s offices.

Since we’ve been traveling full time we’ve elevated waiting to an art form. If you’re looking for a few activities to fill the long minutes that stretch into hours with kids as you wait, we have a few suggestions:

Play Cards

We play a lot of cards in our family and we have for generations. I remember learning the fine art of bluffing over the euchre table from my grandfather and uncles as a small child. We play Five Crowns, War and even travel with a little fold up cribbage board. The kids learned a little Poker from their cousins last time we were in Indiana. I much prefer euchre. Last month we spent a few minutes between pick-up truck rides explaining the finer points of the game on a dirt floor patio on the banks of the Mekong in Laos.

Reading

If you’ve been paying any attention at all, you know that our family reads aloud a lot. Since the kids were little we’ve read aloud over meals, sneaking in much of their history and literature study while they chewed. Tony always has a “fun” book going, and he’s the kids’ favourite reader, because he does voices. We’ve had whole train cars full of enthralled listeners as Daddy plows through the next chapter of The Princess Bride on a train in the Czech. Carrying books and reading individually can be a great way to pass the time, but reading aloud to, and with, your kids is a great way to bond as a family and to pass on a rich culture of literacy from generation to generation.

Nature Drawing

Charlotte Mason introduced me to the concept of Nature Notebooking when my kids were small. I loved the idea of studying science in the early years by drawing things from the natural world that interested each of us individually. We’ve long made a practice of finding something small to draw: an acorn, a slug, paying particular attention to it’s breathing pore, a squirrel. It doesn’t really matter. I carry a pad of tiny blank papers, 3.5 X 5 inches, and water colour pencil crayons at all times. The best nature drawing we’ve done recently: painting the sunrise over the main temple complex at Angkor Wat last month. Stunning.

Something To Share

My kids are big now. A 14 hour bus ride doesn’t phase them. No one asks when the bus is coming or if we’re there yet. They just ride and find ways to pass the time. But they were little once, and they remember what it’s like to feel tired and bored to tears. Time always passes more quickly with friends and we learned early to pack a few things with “share potential” in our bags: marbles, cars, an inflatable ball, balloons, and plastic animal toys are all examples. Our kids still do this. Then, they look for little children who are struggling with the wait and they offer to play and share with them. Everybody wins! Elisha is the best at this, he is never without a pocketful of treasures for newfound friends!

Do you have strategies for passing the time? What do you do while you wait?

Original article can be found here: Family travel: 4 strategies for waiting with kids

Elizabeth Becker on the economic contradictions of tourism

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

“Since the end of the Cold War and the opening of the world for travel, tourism has become an important source of foreign exchange for the world’s poorest nations, often the only one. While tourism requires some infrastructure, from airfields to modern highways, it is less expensive than building factories. In theory, poor countries should be able to use the new revenue from the tourism industry to pay for the infrastructure whole raising standards of living and improving the environment. One hundred of the world’s poorest nations do earn up to 5 percent of their gross national product from foreign tourists who marvel at their exotic customs, buy suitcases of souvenirs and take innumerable photographs of stunning landscapes. * But just as tourism is capable of lifting a nation out of poverty, is it just as likely to pollute the environment, reduce standards of living for the poor because the profits go to international hotel chains and corrupt local elites (what is called leakage), and cater to the worst of tourism, including condemning children to the exploitation of sex tourism. Like any major industry, tourism has a serious downside, especially since tourism and travel is underestimated as a global powerhouse; its study and regulation is spotty at best. Tourism is one of those double-edged swords that may look like an easy way to earn desperately needed money but can ravage wilderness areas and undermine native cultures to fit into package tours: a fifteen-minute snippet of a ballet performed in Southern India; native handicrafts refashioned to fit oversized tourists. What is known is that tourism and travel is responsible for 5.3 percent of the world’s carbon emissions and the degradation of nearly every tropical beach in the world.”

–Elizabeth Becker, Overbooked: The Exploding Business of Travel and Tourism (2013)

Original article can be found here: Elizabeth Becker on the economic contradictions of tourism

When is it ever ‘the right time’?

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

“Last night while I lay thinking here, some WHAT IFS crawled inside my ear and pranced and partied all night long and sang their same old WHAT IF song: WHAT IF I’m dumb in school? WHAT IF they’ve closed the swimming pool? WHAT IF I get beat up? WHAT IF there’s poison in my cup? WHAT IF I start to cry? WHAT IF I get sick and die? WHAT IF I flunk that test? WHAT IF green hair grows on my chest? WHAT IF nobody likes me? WHAT IF a bolt of lightning strikes me? WHAT IF I don’t grow talle? WHAT IF my head starts getting smaller? WHAT IF the fish won’t bite? WHAT IF the wind tears up my kite? WHAT IF they start a war? WHAT IF my parents get divorced? WHAT IF the bus is late? WHAT IF my teeth don’t grow in straight? WHAT IF I tear my pants? WHAT IF I never learn to dance?

Everything seems well, and then the nighttime WHAT IFS strike again!”

                                             –Shel Silverstein, Where the Sidewalk Ends

My sister and I read this poem over and over again when we were little. Although at the time we felt it acknowledged some of the fears with which an eight and twelve year old might struggle, it seems to have a greater meaning than at first I thought. What if we don’t have enough money? What if we get rid of the apartment? What if we can’t find a storage unit? What if, what if, what if? No matter the age or stage in life, the ‘What Ifs’ have a way of striking. How do you quiet the whispers?

We’ve thought about and heard it all before-when is the right time to have kids, to get married, to change jobs? Seems most of us don’t have an exact date or time and often, the best answer is – ‘it’s never the right time’. The minute you buy a house, you’re offered a job transfer in a new city that you can’t pass up. Wait to take that much-desired journey to a far off land and there’s bound to be a travel warning to the exact place you planned on going. Trying to know when the ‘right’ time is to make that life change is never easy. Do you cannonball into the deep end or wade with trepidation at the top step in the shallow part of the pool? How on earth are any of us supposed to know when the time is just right?

After countless hours of negotiation with the voices both inside and out of my head, I can honestly say I have no idea when the time is right. But, I do think that when it is at the closest level of right for you, you’ll know. One of my best friends jumps into life. When she wanted to try life on a new coast it took her less than a day to make the decision. When that coast didn’t work out and an overseas offer arrived, she was gone within a week. She knew the instant she met her husband and married shortly after and has tackled other life decisions with continued intensity. Me, I’m the opposite. It took me till twenty-five to finally buy the gift my parents wanted to give me at twenty-one. I cried when I went off to university and although immensely excited, struggled with the idea of moving overseas. There were things I ‘needed’ to be able to make the leap, but after leaping once, twice and a third time my comfort zone has been blown open and the needs seem less and less. Everyone has his or her own process. Sometimes you’ll know deep in your toes that it’s right and other times ‘the right choice’ apprehensively knocks on your door and it takes quite awhile to hear it, answer it and let it in.

The process, decisions and choices are yours. Although, sometimes, life makes a few of those decisions for you but for those that are left to your own accord, listen to the message the world is sharing with you and leap when you’re as close to ready as you’ll ever get. John Lennon said, ‘life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans’. Time doesn’t stand still and there are only so many do-overs in a lifetime. Find your do-over and take the plunge. Just because we don’t all openly embrace change, doesn’t mean it’s bad. When the signs of the universe finally become clear or as un-fuzzy as they can to you, do it…..the time is right.

For more of Stacey’s travel musings, check out her blog.

Original article can be found here: When is it ever ‘the right time’?

Vagabonding Case Study: Ellen & Elmar van Drunen

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

Ellen van Drunen & Elmar van Drunen

fietsjunks.nl & traveltheworldbybicycle.com

Age: 39 and 40

Hometown: Ridderkerk, The Netherlands (small town near Rotterdam)

Quote:  “Live the life you love, love the life you live!”

“Stay hungry, stay foolish.” – Steve Jobs

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.” -

Steve Jobs

How did you find out about Vagabonding, and how did you find it useful before and during the trip?

Through Facebook, but I haven’t yet used it, sorry.

How long were you on the road?

We are now a little over 8 months on the road and plan to cycle on for another 1.5 years or maybe more. Depends if we are still having fun and of

course money to live the dream.

Where did you go?

We started our trip in Sao Paulo, Brasil and then cycled to Ushuaia in Southern Argentina. From here we are heading North to probably Alaska.

After that we don’t know yet, but we don’t want to fly directly back to the Netherlands. We want to cycle our way home. Actually, we don’t have a

home anymore in the Netherlands, so we are free to end up where ever we want. Only time will tell.

What was your job or source of travel funding for this journey?

We have no kids and have been saving ever since we started bicycle touring on holidays. 10 years ago now. In the mean time we did a lot of short

travels on our bikes, that’s why the saving may took a little longer. Elmar (my husband) used to be a bicycle mechanic in one of Netherlands

best bicycle travel stores. I (Ellen) earned my money through some photography and working as an internal communication adviser for a Dutch

insurance company.

Did you work or volunteer on the road?

No, not yet. If we run out of money and still feel the need to continue cycling, we probably will.

Of all the places you visited, which was your favorite?

That’s a tough one! With still many miles/kilometers to go…

So far, the Indian Himalayas are top on our list, but during this trip we had so many great places. And we met so many friendly people. We’d really

liked the waterfalls of Iguazu and the volcanic area in Southern Chile.

Was there a place that was your least favorite, or most disappointing, or most challenging?

Least favorite: hmmm, difficult. We don’t really know. The fact is, when we don’t like it, we just leave! That’s freedom.

Most disappointing: Carretera Austral. Not that we didn’t like it, but our expectations were a little higher I guess. Maybe in time we probable

remember only the good stuff! But it was a lot dustier and dryer than we expected.

Most challenging: Patagonian winds.. man oh man, we’ll never complain about the wind again! And of course the high Andes passes were

challenging, because of the altitude and the long distances between water points and because it’s freezing at night!

Which travel gear proved most useful?  Least useful?

Most useful: our Santos Travel Lites bicycles, no problem yet after over 11.000 kilometers and our Cumulus sleeping bags.

Least useful: Don’t know actually. After 10 years of bicycle touring I guess we’ve got our gear in place.

What are the rewards of the vagabonding lifestyle?

The freedom. Nobody tells us what to do, this is our life, our choices. No obligations tho whom whatsoever.

What are the challenges and sacrifices of the vagabonding lifestyle?

Leaving the people we love behind. When a close family member or friend is in need, we are far away… I sometimes miss the spontaneous visits or the

homely lifestyle.

What lessons did you learn on the road?

Take your time! Be patient! It’s not a race!

How did your personal definition of “vagabonding” develop over the course of the trip?

I don’t know, difficult question.. We definitely don’t want to be ‘tramps’, we’d love to camp in the wild and it doesn’t matter if that are

many days in a row, but every now and then we do like a nice little hotel with a good bed and a hot shower. Maybe it’s our age (39 and 40), we are

just not the hippie kind. And we like our privacy. I guess this doesn’t really answer your question.. I just don’t know.

If there was one thing you could have told yourself before the trip, what would it be?

What’s with all the photography gear!! Do you really need it?

Any advice or tips for someone hoping to embark on a similar adventure?

The first step is the hardest. If you really want to do this, set a specific date, don’t say: someday. Someday never comes! Better have tried

and failed, than not have tried at all.

When and where do you think you’ll take your next long-term journey?

Well, this one is still going on. I really don’t know, but our Bucket List is a long one…

 

Read more about Ellen and Elmar on their blogs, Fietsjunks & Travel the World by Bicycle , or follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

 

Website: Fietsjunks & Travel the World by Bicycle
Twitter: @TTWBB





 

Are you a Vagabonding reader planning, in the middle of, or returning from a journey? Would you like your travel blog or website to be featured on Vagabonding Case Studies? If so, drop us a line at casestudies@vagabonding.net and tell us a little about yourself.

Original article can be found here: Vagabonding Case Study: Ellen & Elmar van Drunen

Should you volunteer abroad?

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

Most travelers consider volunteering at some point. We see a need and we know that we have the time, energy, or money to be able to lend a hand and be a part of creating change. Helping people feels good. Working on environmental issues and seeing results is exciting. We don’t just want to talk about problems, we want to do something about them.

Most travelers also know that there is a strong push within the traveling community not to volunteer while abroad- ever. Volunteers often do more harm than good. Children get attached to a revolving door of volunteers and develop attachment issues. Foreigners create environmental systems and forget to train locals so that when they leave, it all falls apart. And then there is the endless discussion about the harm that comes from middle and upper class Westerners descending upon a developing nation to “save” or “empower” the people there.

So what is a traveler to do? Put their money where there mouth is and actually do something about the problems they see or stay away from the volunteer complex for fear of being labeled as one of “those people” who doesn’t recognize the harm volunteering can do?

I will be the first to admit that even the most well-researched volunteer opportunity can dissolve into a lesson on why so many people are against volunteering. Not too long ago, my husband and I found ourselves pulling away from a volunteer opportunity working with sea turtles when it became apparent that the founder and his assistant had very little respect for the local community. No amount of research into their organization, practices, or beliefs could have prepared us for their level of distaste for the local population or for some other unethical practices going on that had nothing to do with sea turtles or the environment.

I could use this experience to highlight exactly why no one should ever volunteer abroad. I could, but I don’t. That’s because I believe that the potential pitfalls are not enough to outweigh the potential benefits. I also do not think for one minute that any amount of negative exposure on the volunteer industry is enough to make everyone stop volunteering. The drive to do something positive, the belief that things can change, and the need to feel connected in meaningful ways to other people is not going away any time soon. Unfortunately, neither is the “savior complex” that too many volunteers root themselves in. Instead of debating whether volunteering is “good” or “bad” as a whole, a better use of our efforts might be in facilitating real conversation, especially with new volunteers, about how to best research opportunities and combat the “savior complex”.

Before making the decision to volunteer there are three huge questions I think volunteers should be asking.

1) Does tho volunteer opportunity perpetuate the need for more volunteers or does it foster local, sustainable growth with the aim of eliminating the need for outside volunteers? An organization that has plans to utilize foreign volunteers for the length of its existence is a red flag because it means the organization is either choosing to not training community members to do those same jobs or it has a belief that community members can’t do those same jobs. Either way, red flag. Your skill set or knowledge should directly relate to a need and, ideally, you should be sharing your knowledge with a local or locals who want to be able to carry on the work when you leave.

2) Is the organization working in meaningful ways with- not for- the local community? Working to strengthen a community and get to the root of a problem involves working with community members, not doing things for them because the organization “knows better”. This requires mutual respect and open dialogue.

3) Have cultural and community needs been taken into account and does the work reflect this? An organization that invites foreign volunteers but does not educate them on cultural norms, needs, and beliefs is an organization that is asking for conflict and resistance from the community. It’s also a sure sign of an organization that has at least a bit of a savior complex.

There are many other valid considerations as well but these are the three that I think get overlooked the most. Look at the language on the website or paperwork of the organization. How do they talk about the local population? What words do they use to describe the culture? Do they have a clear plan for working with community members? Red flags are not always in plain view, sometimes you have to be a bit of a detective to figure out what’s really going on. Even then, as in our experience, sometimes the evidence just isn’t there until you are on the ground. Don’t be afraid to walk away and don’t be afraid to share your experience with others.

As a final thought, it’s also very important that volunteers, as well as those who choose not to volunteer, hold ourselves accountable to the words we use to describe our experiences. We are not “saving” anyone. “If it weren’t for us” should be followed up with “someone else would fill the role”. And, I know this may seem radical, but the words “poor”, “uneducated”, “simple”, or “backwards” need not be employed to evoke pity for the communities volunteers work in. Treating the recipients of our volunteer hours as human equals goes a long way in avoiding the perpetuation of that “savior complex”.

There are very real concerns when it comes to volunteering abroad. There is also no doubt that changes need to be made in the way we view volunteering and how we go about it. However, there are many small, locally focused organizations in true need of foreign volunteers to get the ball rolling, get a specific project off the ground, or to share specific skills and knowledge with the locals ultimately running the program. Connecting with people and lending a helping hand does not need to be viewed as a vice when partnered with the word “volunteering” nor should we be glorifying any and all things volunteer related. There is a very real balance to be achieved when it comes to volunteering, no doubt about it. The question for everyone is, how do we do that?

Original article can be found here: Should you volunteer abroad?

Vagabonding Case Study: Karin-Marijke Vis

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

 Karin-Marijke Vis 

landcruisingadventure.com / notesonslowtravel.com

Age: 45

Hometown: Apeldoorn, the Netherlands

Quote: “If you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.” ~Lewis Caroll

 

How did you find out about Vagabonding, and how did you find it useful before and during the trip?

Somebody gave me Rolf Pott’s book, which subsequently made me check out this website. I didn’t use either as resources for my own travels since I have been on the road for 11 years but I read the book out of curiosity, to see how somebody else looks at vagabonding and found myself agreeing to many of Rolf’s ideas.

How long were you on the road?

My partner Coen Wubbels and I left the Netherlands in 2003 in a 30-year-old Land Cruiser. We took 3.5 years to travel to Vietnam and have been exploring South America since 2007. We are currently in Peru.

Where did you go?

2003-2006: Greece, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, northwest China, India, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Yunnan (China) and Tibet, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam.

We shipped the vehicle to Buenos Aires and from 2007 – today we have been crossing borders between Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia, Brazil, French Guiana, Suriname, Guyana, Peru and Ecuador.

What was your job or source of travel funding for this journey?

Before leaving we sold our belongings and for the first three years on the road we lived low budget on our savings. Around the time we concluded that we wanted to continue this nomadic lifestyle but also realized we would need to find a source of income, we were approached by four-wheel drive magazine with the request for stories and photos. We took up the opportunity and have been working as a freelance duo since: Coen is a photographer and I am a writer. We have done a variety of projects and our articles/photos have been published in numerous four-wheel drive/car magazines and a number of travel magazines.

Did you work or volunteer on the road?

We have never signed up for volunteer work as this naturally asks for a bit of planning, which is not something we are good at. We prefer living day by day and being open to whatever opportunities present themselves, which sometimes happens to be giving a helping hand. As a result we shoveled dirt after the big earthquake in Bam (Iran, 2003) so people could rebuild their home, and helped distributing relief goods in south India after the Tsunami in 2004.

We are always ready to help when and where we can. For example, Coen, who besides being a photographer is also a graphic designer, has designed numerous logos and given advice on website designs for restaurants, guesthouses and other businesses or organizations whose owners were in need of professional help.

We never ask money for this as we love a world in which we share knowledge and help each other out, and this doesn’t have to be on a reciprocal basis. We receive a lot from local people, whether this is a meal, a bed, or getting our car fixed and we love to give back in any way we can.

Of all the places you visited, which was your favorite?

Iran and Brazil are high on our list because of the extraordinary hospitality we received there. North Pakistan ranks #1 for its mind-blowing mountainous landscapes, which are fantastic for hiking. We will look back at Patagonia with good memories of rough camping, and we loved India for its madness in the good sense of the word.

But that doesn’t answer your question.

If I could pick only one place to go back to, I’d say: Iran.

Was there a place that was your least favorite, or most disappointing, or most challenging?

Interestingly enough Iran was simultaneously my most challenging country to travel. We visited it during the beginning of our journey, when everything was still new and at times intimidating, and it was the first Muslim country where I had to make major adjustments in various ways (wearing a headscarf, changing my interaction with the other gender, etc). It took a while to adjust before I actually liked traveling there. It is a long story, but after three weeks I fell in love with Iran and as I mentioned above, it has become my favorite country, loving the people whose religious way of living I still find hard to comprehend.

Our three-month stay in Iran taught me a lot, one of it being that you need to give a place time to grow into, to appreciate, to know, to connect with. You’ll miss out by judging a place just because of one (negative) experience. Of course that is no revolutionary thought but the realization of it hit me hard there.

Which travel gear proved most useful?  Least useful?

I’d say our pressure cooker has been our best investment. We bought it in India after having spent months in the mountains where it would take ages for potatoes to cook, if at all. A pressure cooker needs little fuel and water to cook, plus the food taste so much better. We love it. Obviously this is not a backpacker’s choice, but as far as we are concerned a pressure cooker is a ‘must’ for overlanders with a car.

Least useful: We bought a 70-dollar, stand-alone heater after people drove me crazy about stories of -4 degrees Fahrenheit on the Bolivian altiplano. We didn’t, and still don’t have, a working heater in the car. However, despite those temperatures our car turned out to be so well insulated that we never used that heater. Wearing an extra sweater and putting a sleeping bag over our lap has been sufficient.

What are the rewards of the vagabonding lifestyle?

Freedom. Living outside society with its norms and values, especially the unspoken ones. Each society has them: you should dress X or Y for your job, work at A,B, or C for your career, do X,Y,Z to keep your friends/family happy, etc. I’ve never liked that and pretty much did my own thing, however, I could never escape some elements of it.

Mind you, we will always read up on the country we are about to visit to understand the norms and values, and, of course, we will learn the language – or at least the basics. It is not as if we walk around ignorant of local customs. But by living a nomadic lifestyle makes it much easier to live our lives to our own rules and desires without that outside pressure (bureaucracies withstanding).

What are the challenges and sacrifices of the vagabonding lifestyle?

Missing family and friends in the Netherlands and the social life that comes with it. Of course we make friends on the road and we have been fortunate to have been taken in by many families, but these are always a short-term relationships and can’t replace the love and long-term friendships from home.

What lessons did you learn on the road?

To let go of fear, to live today, and to have faith in myself.

I come from safe and pretty predictable surroundings, simply summarized as a “I finished highschool, got my college degree, worked for a company, and saved money for my pension” kind of lifestyle. I enjoyed that life for many years until I found myself running around in circles and didn’t know how to get out of it. I was caught in that vicious circle of wanting to make changes but didn’t dare making them because of (false) securities: a job with good employment benefits, insurances, pension.

Going on a long-term journey (we had no idea it would become our way of life) was a way to finally step out of that circle by simply giving everything up. It was on the road that I learned what I said above: To let go of fear, to live today, and to have faith in myself as well as in my neighbor.”

How did your personal definition of “vagabonding” develop over the course of the trip?

Truth be said I’ve never given it any thought until I read Rolf Pott’s book. We grew into it. It never was a matter of making major choices or making long-term decisions. I see there is a difference in what Rolf describes as vagabonding – taking long-term trips and going home in between – whereas I would more describe our way of life as nomadic since our car is our home and traveling is a more permanent way of life.

If there was one thing you could have told yourself before the trip, what would it be?

Well, it would have saved me a culture shock (Iran), quite some suffering as well as arguments with Coen had I been able to let go of that fear I talked about earlier, to live today and have faith in myself before we left.

If I had to chose one: letting go of fear, because by letting that go the rest will follow.

Any advice or tips for someone hoping to embark on a similar adventure?

Don’t prepare too much, don’t delve too deep into too many websites / blogs telling you what you should or should not do. They will drive you nuts. Follow your instincts and common sense. Most of all, enjoy every single step of your preparation as well as your journey.

When and where do you think you’ll take your next long-term journey?

I’m living it right now.

 

Read more about Karin on her blogs, Land Cruising Adventure / Notes On Slow Travel , or follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

 

Website: Land Cruising Adventure / Notes On Slow Travel
Twitter: @Karinontour





 

Are you a Vagabonding reader planning, in the middle of, or returning from a journey? Would you like your travel blog or website to be featured on Vagabonding Case Studies? If so, drop us a line at casestudies@vagabonding.net and tell us a little about yourself.

Original article can be found here: Vagabonding Case Study: Karin-Marijke Vis

On returning: Things change

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

My Dad’s photo of Lago de Atitlan, 1973

It seems the nature of humanity to freeze a moment in time. 

We remember a person, a place, an experience, as it was when we were last present with it. It is frozen, forever, in our minds; like the fading koda-chrome slides my parents took across the north of Africa forty odd years ago. We return to these places often, in our memories; the tastes, the smells, the sensations in our bodies as real as they were years ago. The characters remain eternally young. The buildings never deteriorate. The music in our minds never changes. Until, we return.

It’s a funny trick our minds play, allowing ourselves to remain fluid, to move forward, to constantly evolve, and yet expecting, somehow, that the places and people of our past experience remain the same. It takes a great deal of presence as a traveler, to remain conscious of this ongoing illusion, this magic trick that we play on ourselves. Returning is dangerous business.

There is a witchcraft in some places that weaves a web that continues to draw us back. When we return the spell is often broken and we find ourselves living in the past, wishing for people, or experiences, or a particular vibe that has come and gone. I’ll admit that there are place to which I refuse to return, simply because I love my illusion too much. The memories made on the first pass are so powerful that I wish to preserve them just as they are.

When we do choose to return, we must do so with an open hand, not grasping at what was past, an open heart, ready to receive what is new, and with open minds, allowing for the growth that has occurred in our absence. It isn’t fair, to a people, or a place, to expect it to remain locked in some eternal nostalgia that we’ve created around it. Of course it’s not the same; progress is the nature of things. Roads will replace foot paths, cell phones will be tucked inside native dresses. Nikes will replace woven sandals, electric lights crowd out the daily use of candles. It would be usurious of us to expect a place to exist at a lesser stage of technological development because it fills a particular emotional need or provides us with a sense of the exotic, or an escape from our real world.

The world changes, so do we. Just as a place will change in our absence, so does the person we bring back to the location. The eyes with which we see now are not the same as the lenses we experienced the spot the first time, or the last time, we attended it. It’s worth considering that for a while as we prepare to return.

My Dad and I had this chat four years ago, as we were settling into our favourite little spot on Lago de Atitlan, in Guatemala for the winter. We were returning for the first time, following a 10 month absence. He was returning for the first time after a 36 year absence.

“You can come, Dad,” I said across the crappy phone connection between ends of the continent, “But you can’t complain about how much it’s changed. It won’t be the same, but remember that for the children this is all it’s ever been, and they get to experience it in their own way, without our biases.”

I could hear him nodding his head in his office in our log home at the edge of the fall snow in Canada. And so, they came, the people who brought me to this lake for the first time in-utero just as the country was beginning to descend into a decades long civil war. It was as much of a joy to watch my parents rediscover the lago they’d long loved as it was to watch my children come alive to the Mayan culture for the first time.

This winter we’re back, all three generations of us. The lake has changed. The people have changed. The village we love the most has changed. We have changed. And yet, the magic remains, so long as we allow the world, and ourselves, to be as we really are.

Lago de Atitlan- 2014

Original article can be found here: On returning: Things change

What makes us blind is that we think we see

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

“This is a truth about leaving the culture that raised you and crossing into another: We leave home with an arsenal of things we know about the place we’re going. There is no disarming all of what we know, no matter how much touching and kneading and feeling we do, no matter how much we think we’re trying. What makes us blind is that we think we see.”

–Alden Jones, The Blind Masseuse: A Traveler’s Memoir from Costa Rica to Cambodia (2013)

Original article can be found here: What makes us blind is that we think we see

Two Places to Rock to in Malaysia

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

Travelling might be all about discovery and abandoning our comfort zones. But at times, when your comfort zone is a club with some loud music, well, it’s nice to know where to find it when you are abroad.

As a resident of Malaysia, I feel it is time to give justice to my acquired home talking about two places that host a plethora of local and international touring bands. They are both prominent Malaysian homes for the loudest kinds of music, and as such might not be ideal for everybody. But again, if it’s about going in and out of “comfort zones”, it might as well be great to get out of yours and discover some Malaysian loudness, after all.

 

Soundmaker – Penang

Literally hidden at the second floor of a tattered building along Pengkalan Weld, about half a mile down the road from the main Jetty and facing the entrance of the Lee Jetty, this is the place to rock in Northern Malaysia. Check their show listings before you go because although they have a bar, it is not open every day. It’s a real, do it yourself underground venue, where heavy metal, punk, death metal, alternative rock and heavy derivates spray the walls with sweat. The show room is decently sized and the PA quite OK for an underground enterprise: consider that in Malaysia, a country who forced a ban on black metal music in 2001, and whose Islamic party has given a hard time even to Elton John because he is openly gay, you cannot really get much better than this. Soundmaker is the place to rock away your early nights, as shows usually end by 12 am.

Soundmaker is also a recording studio and jam room, and recently opened a small hostel room. The novelty is, it welcomes travelling bands and musicians to stay and record their music at a fraction of western prices.

Rumah Api – Kuala Lumpur

In a place called the “fire house”, you may only expect amplifiers to burst out sparks of white heat, and set your own eardrums on fire. If you know what a real punk house is, and I mean an independent space where DIY is the law, the ceiling is about to cave in, and sitting on torn car backseats slung on the floor a common practice, well,  welcome to Rumah Api then. The only place in Kuala Lumpur that dares to object the city’s rampant, over-constructed technological wealth and high-class-loving youth. A stone throw away from the Ampang LRT station in the northeastern part of the city, Rumah Api stands to KL as the CBGB’s stood to early New York punk. Catch a dose of local and international punk, hardcore, crust, thrash and grindcore bands sweating – literally, as the only wall fan provided resembles a World War II airplane’s engine – on the low stage, and mingle with the most alternative youth in the capital. This place has plenty of character, but you gotta have some too to enjoy it. Otherwise, this could come as kind of a shock.

MARCO FERRARESE is a metalpunk guitarist who travelled extensively and lived in Italy, the United States, China, Australia and Malaysia. Since 2009 he’s been based in Southeast Asia as a writer, hardcore punk musician and researcher. He travelled from Mongolia to Australia in 2009, and hitchhiked from Singapore to Milano through Silk Road routes and the Middle East in 2012. He blogs at monkeyrockworld.com. Marco’s first Asian pulp novel Nazi Goreng  was published in November 2013 on Monsoon Books. Follow him @monkeyrockworld

Original article can be found here: Two Places to Rock to in Malaysia

On Baksheesh

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

Photo Credit: walidhassanein via Compfight cc

I’m riding a second-class train up the Nile valley when a boy in an official-looking blue jacket beckons me to the other side of the carriage.

“Look,” he whispers, pointing outside. “Beautiful!”

I look out the window to see a red sun streaking the sky with bands of pink and yellow. Beyond the train tracks, the mighty Nile glitters with orange spangles of light. It truly is beautiful.

As I soak in the colors, I wonder why the boy has taken the trouble to show me such a simple moment.

It’s not long before I get my answer.

“Please,” he says giving me a solemn look. “Baksheesh.”

For a moment, I’m not sure how to react. After all, baksheesh may be an accepted Eastern form of tipping — but this is the first time I’ve been asked to pay for a sunset.

When Mark Twain visited the Pyramids in 1866, he reportedly suffered “torture that no pen can describe” from the various Egyptian pleas for baksheesh. One hundred years before that, a French visitor complained bitterly about the amounts of baksheesh it took just to dig up and steal a decent mummy.

These days — while its no longer legal to climb the Pyramids or rifle through mummy pits — baksheesh is still a thriving racket wherever tourists are found.

Take my recent visit to Luxor. Whenever I took out my map, some enterprising soul would hustle over and offer me directions. Whenever I entered a tomb, children would fight over who got to fan me with a piece of cardboard. Had I been eating corn on the cob, I’m sure one of them would have produced some dental floss.

If there is any saving grace about baksheesh, it’s that Egyptians use it among themselves as well as on tourists. Most Egyptians earn low wages, so tips and payoffs are seen as a way to provide incentive and supplement an income. Nobody in Cairo, it is said, can get basic services such as mail or electricity without slipping a little baksheesh to the right people.

So, as with any local custom, the best way to get the hang of baksheesh is to watch how the natives do it. Thus, I no longer hesitate to plunk down a few piasters when I get fast and friendly service in a coffee shop, or when the baggage-handler climbs on top of the bus to fetch my bag.

In the end, the baksheesh ritual becomes a matter of trusting your instincts and acting like you know what you’re doing.

And this is why I reach into my pocket and give the boy in the blue jacket 50 piasters.

After all, 15 cents isn’t such a bad price to pay for a sunset — and I might have missed it otherwise.

 

To hear the audio version, read by Rolf, visit Savvy Traveler

Original article can be found here: On Baksheesh