On an Autumn Night in Hawaii

"I haven't danced since Mexico."

Hawaii: day one

another long travel day. Left hong kong international after a 4 hour delay, layover in Korea then an 8 hour plane ride to Hawaii.

Hawaii is okay. The weather is pretty nice, I didn't get to see much because I arrived in the night. The airport employees weren't very competent (or nice). The place I'm staying in is pretty good, a bit on the expensive side but at least it comes with hot water and a full kitchen so I can't complain, the place is dirtier than I thought it'd be though. If I can find a place that rents boards for cheap, I'll probably trying surfing tomorrow. I've always wanted to do that. How many people get to say they've been to hawaii and surfed in hawaii? not many. What a long strange trip it's been.

Idiocracy

Goddamn it. I'm going back to Central America. Fucking evangelical in-bred fucktards eagerly bending over and lubing themselves up for another round of penetration by the corporatocracy. Knuckle-dragging neanderfucks happily guzzling the trickled-down ejaculate of rich, old, white bastards and saying "thank you" aftwards. Cockgobbling herp-derpers taking big bites of the giant republican shit sandwhich while verbally abusing the waiter and complimenting the chef. Ignorant camel cunts on their bruised knees deepthroating Bush's big cock, choking on his hot jism while gagging through their noses and fighting back the tears. Idiotic cuntscabs holding the pocket of the Illuminati like a right bitch. God-dicking sons of rats shitting in our milk. Niggerfaggots offering their virgin daugters to be torn apart for sport by their corporate slave masters. Hypocritical closeted cock sucking child molesters declaring their love of god, freedom and country while their dicks are six inches up a choir-boy's love hole. Dick-less daughter-fuckers contentedly blind after the military-industrial-financial complex jizzed right in their eyes. Twat waffles too busy spooning with O'Reilly in Palin's cold rancid maggot-infested meat hole to notice the stench of their stupidity. Motherfucking youth too fucking busy fapping to interracial-pregnant-bestiality-transgendered midget porn while facebooking to fucking vote. Semen gargling fucknuts screeching their infantile rhetoric. Dick-juggling dumb-as-cockroaches douchebags voting against their own pox-ridden interests. Self-deluded self-proclaimed patriots cluster fucking at the altar of Beck. Mob of politically-illiterate swine circle-jerking on the bloody corpse of Lady Liberty. Fucking disingenuous savages curbstomping Lady Justice's face to a pulp and saying "you're welcome". Sorry excuses for failed abortions going around and pooping on everyone's party. God damn it.

Goddamn it I say.

Andy Irons dead at 32. weird.

Update: sleeping pills are for the strong.

Hong Kong II

Soundtrack for Hong Kong:
Big City: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7BakKHwXOg
The Crowd : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USgXfkkxnLE





Hong Kong has some nice lines too. HK is like SF but more. More grittier, more people, more shops, more restaurants, more (luxury) cars, more taxis. But mostly more grittier.

Hong Kong

Eating and shopping. That is all.

Indian Food at Chunking

Ate at an Indian restaurant. They had a TV on the wall. But they were not playing Bollywood dance musicals. They, in fact, had the BBC on.

This is probably the most unusual thing I've ever seen in my entire life.

The previous sentence is probably the most hyperbolic thing I've ever written in my entire life.

Fear me, for I am cultured

I went to a Picasso exhibit at the Seattle Art Museum where I learned a lot about life, art and their imitation of each other.

I was excited to hear that my favorite Picasso painting was going to be on display. Alas, I had gotten the titles of the pieces mixed up and instead of my favorite piece (called Old Guitarist), what was on display was his famous Man with Guitar. So, that was disappointing.


My favorite painting ever, Old Guitarist. I had a small print of this on my dorm wall when I was going to school at UW. When I left UW to return home to hawaii I gave the print to my brother (he says it's somewhere in his garage). I would sit at my desk and stare at this piece for many hours, usually while procrastinating in doing my homework.


The Scene: Sunday afternoon, cold Seattle afternoon, extra-ordinary Picasso exhibit, very crowded galleries full of yuppies, older ladies and gentlemen, art students, hipsters with tattooes, families with kids, and well dressed gay black men. Then there were the people like me, those with $23 and a desire to say, "Yes, I've seen Picassos". The gallery was noisy with people trying to be quiet.

The Point:
What is art? What is life? Which one imitates the other? does it matter? what is art? what is the meaning of this or that painting? What is the meaning of this or that life? These are the heavy, deep questions we humans have struggled with since time immemorial. And these were the questions I was pondering when I watched a little girl-child toddle up to a large Picasso painting, point up to it and say, "I can see her boobies!".

Leave it to a beautiful, naive, innocent girl-child to put everything in perspective. Because, isn't all of life and all of art, really, just about seeing the boobies?

The Lines, The Beautiful Lines

bus lines, streetcar lines, intersecting lines, perpendicular lines, pick up lines...so many aesthetically pleasing lines.

Night on Earth

San Francisco

Yeah, I think I am going to stay here and open up a little coffee shop/bakery.

random thoughts

When the air temperature is in the 50's and the wind is blowing through the city canyons, what does it feel like to be a woman wearing a short skirt?

The greyhound bus is luxurious. no joke.

Why is there a crack pipe in my pocket?



This pool table, is the story of my life.

Bizzare Love Triangle

I fell in love in Los Angeles. Her name was Book Soup. Then I met Citylights Bookstore in San Francisco. I loved them both so much I bought their books at retail price, something I never do. I wanted to give them my money.

Throw Amazon.com into the mix and you have yourself a sordid love square.




He was the "doctor de amor", I was "right bar corner guy". But, oh! how I made her laugh

In-N-Out Burger

Finally had the In-n-Out burger I've been looking forward to for years now.

I didn't realize how disappointed I could be until I finally got what I always wanted.

LA

I see now the appeal of living in a place Los Angeles and to be a part of the Melrose, Hollywood, Sunset, and Santa Monica scene. It's all so...hip.

I also see now the appeal of iPhones. It saved my life ten million times in the 3 days I was there. Don't leave home without it.

I may have diabetes.

Waited for Bill Clinton to appear at a UCLA political rally, but had to leave early to meet my sister for dinner. As cool as it would have been to see Bill, he's no Noam Chomsky.

26 and three fifths

I should have done this sooner.

Beautiful Poetry

Uninspiring cliche lines magically become poetry when written in chalk on a foreign sidewalk in front of a local high school:

estoy enamorada

eres mi vida

The Yeah Yeah Yeah's Acoustified

Listen to this. Or don't. I don't care.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJf2FQDl8Ig

random pics

If the graffiti at the hostel in Pavones is to be believed, Kelly Slater stayed there and Joel Parkinson stayed in the same room as I was in. I don't know why pro surfers would stay at that not particularly nice hostel when there are better options around. Also, Ivan de la 808 representing. look at top right of pic.


cool pic i took of a stingless black bee eating jam.


I met a gay botanist in Dos Brazos. The gay botanist had a nice little garden around his house. Marlon might recognize this vine he had growing in the back. The gay botanist was cool. I just like saying "gay botanist". If you saw a pic of him, you'd realize how fun it is to refer to him as the gay botanist.

Recap: Pavones

Pavones as a surf spot, was disappointing. Pavones as a postcard perfect beach town was pura vida. I was there four full days. The first day I rented a bike and rode down pura vida. The second day was completely rained out. The third day I rented a 7'10" and showed the local kooks how it's done, I was shredding it. Day four, was spent taking long walks on the beach and watching the sunset. Pura vida.


A picture of me looking particularly skinny sexy.


The I-thought-it-only-exists-in-postcards country road separated from the beach by a thin strip of palm trees.






pura vida.

Catching up: Bolita

This was the house I lived in for two weeks in the mountains. Yep.

Bolita is a lodge. People can pay 10 dollars a night to stay there and hike the 14 km of trails on the 61 hectacre mountain property. It is beautiful there. It was an experience. This was the place where I had beans all day every day, woke up to roosters, gotten eaten alive by sandflies, stepped on snakes and stuff like that.


Stupid chance is the only reason I did not step on this gi-normous snake. It was easily at least five feet long.


Crossing the river with an empty propane tank. Then going back up the mountain with a full one. I felt like a Chinese peasant.


View from my balcony. This was sunset.

Recap: San Isidro Del General

I was walking with a goat. I said please. Please don't insist. Ever hear the expression, "stubborn as a goat"? Expressions like that come from goats like Lief.

I learned that I hate farm animals. Fuck goats, fuck sheep, fuck geese, rabbits are cool, fuck chickens. Those fucking goats.


The admittedly delicious and enjoyable breakfast I had everyday. Missing from this picture is the fresh, homemade Mennonite cheese I devoured daily. Other than the cheese, my time at Noe's farm was an ordeal.


The house i stayed in. It may seem charming and eccentric at first sight, but it becomes loathsome after two weeks.

Travel Day

Another long travel day yesterday, it was an 18 hour day. Woke up at 4:30am after a sleepless night. Caught the 5:30am collectivo for 1200 colones. endured a painfully bumpy two and a half hour ride from Pavones to Golfito. From Golfito caught the bus to the "duty Free area". had breakfast with coffee there for 1,900. sat around for a couple of hours, had lunch there for 2,300. caught the bus to the bus terminal and bought a ticket to San Jose for 6,000. waited in an uncomfortable sunny park for a few hours (where did I get the romantic idea that laying on the grass in a sunny park is an enjoyable activity?). Got on the bus at 2:30pm and rode for 7 hours. stopped once to eat rice and salsa dish at a rest stop for 1,600 (saw a girl who was too beautiful to be working at a highway rest stop cafeteria). Arrived in sketchy downtown san jose bus depot at 9:30pm, talked to a hooker for a minute, caught a cab to my old hostel for 1,800.

home sweet home.

The Beginning of the End

Sitting on the black sand beach at sunset waiting for the epiphanies, but the epiphanies won't come.

Damn it, I need closure!

October 5, 2010

How do I know I am living on a mountain in costa rica? Ants in my lemonade, wild animals eating my food, eating beans everyday, rooster crowing next to my head at dawn, walking around topless in the rain chopping things with a machete, stepping on snakes, etc...

updates depending on whether or not there is internet at Pavones.

had to catch a $20 cab from farm to Puerto Jimenez because we missed the morning shuttle, in PJ had breakfast and got money from the bank, then from PJ took a $5 ferry to Golfito. from Golfito, going to Pavones by bus at 3pm.

Beans for dinner,
beans for lunch,
beans for breakfast,
beans for brunch,
beans for every single meal,
why can´t we have some rice!?

Itinerary: Getting out of Puerto Jimenez and going to Golfito, from Golfito catching a bus to Pavones. Pavones, one of the world´s longest lefts. Hell yah.

No updates for a while

Why?

Because getting to the internet and supermarket requires a 45 minute hike down a mountain, fording a river, and a three dollar 45 minute twice daily shuttle ride on a gravel road of potholes. That is why. And that´s just one way.

Protip

Protip: Do NOT travel on Sundays

I learned this early on in my backpacking trip, but for some goddamn reason, it seems circumstances always force me to travel on Sunday, and it seems like everytime I arrive in a new city, it is storming rain.

On sundays, nothing is open. Banks, internet cafes (except this one i'm at), restaurants and bus lines either don't run or run on limited schedules. So I am stuck in Puerto Jimenez for a day or two now. I am annoyed but the diazepam I took is kicking in so I feel a little better now.

I'm just glad I got away from Noe's farm.

So tomorrow afternoon, i will head to Ron Engel's farm in a small town called Dos Brazos. I don't know what the internet situation is like there, so maybe no updates.

San Isidro Del General, Costa Rica

oh lawdy

Supposing that I should have the courage

To let a red sword of virtue

Plunge into my heart,

Letting to the weeds of the ground

My sinful blood,

What can you offer me?

A gardened castle?

A flowery kingdom?

What? A hope?

Then hence with your red sword of virtue.

A youth in apparel that glittered
Went to walk in a grim forest.
There he met an assassin
Attired all in garb of old days;
He, scowling through the thickets,
And dagger poised quivering,
Rushed upon the youth.
"Sir," said this latter,
"I am enchanted, believe me,
To die, thus,
In this medieval fashion,
According to the best legends;
Ah, what joy!"
Then took he the wound, smiling,
And died, content.

Love walked alone.

The rocks cut her tender feet,

And the brambles tore her fair limbs.

There came a companion to her,

But, alas, he was no help,

For his name was heart's pain.

What a long strange trip it's been

Itinerary

Gonna go farming tomorrow.


THAT IS ALL.

Krav Maga

You want to watch me Krav Maga?

The last clip in the video is of my class and of me training. Starts at 6:30.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxhLpQdnFys

What do you think?

I got a haircut today, do you like it?


The woman who cut my hair was hot, she was old but attractive in that aging-but-still-hot-only-because-she-tries-hard kind of way. She was wearing dark brown tights and a matching braissere-like top that showed off her fine bosom. As I sat there and watched her mirror reflection cut my hair, I thought about her life. She owns a small, one seat beauty salon in front of a busy road, does everything from manicures to facials to haircuts. She eats fruit (as lunch?) purchased from the chain convenience store on the corner. I didn't see a wedding ring so she is probably single . Is she happy with her life? I don't know. To me, she looked sad. I liked her, partly because she asked me lots of questions about how I wanted my hair done in broken spanglish; it shows she cares about doing a good job and ensuring her client is happy. She looked like she might have been a stripper at one time. Or, maybe she hooks on the side to make rent when business is slow (since prostitution is legal here). She made me think of this line from a Bukowski poem:

...you boys can keep your virgins
give me hot old women in high heels
with asses that forgot to get old...

She charged a mere 2,000 colones. I tipped her 1,000. The other salon I asked charged 4,000. The total cost of this haircut ($6) was almost as much as the amount I tip my hairstylist in Hawaii. So it goes.

Out

I think I'm forcing this.

Until I have something to say.

sweet, sweet nostalgia

Sometims, I miss the 90's

the music, at least.

Book recommendation:

Buy it on Amazon

random pics

The delicious chicken soup that has kept me alive for weeks.


Dim Sum lunch at a restaurant called Restaurant Wong's in downtwon. it was okay, not great, not terrible, okay. It was cheap though. all that including tax and tips was about nine bucks.


I had to go to the hospital. after months of traveling in central america I got really sick. The doctors diagnosed me with a serious case of Latin Fever.

Once I saw mountains angry,
And ranged in battle-front.
Against them stood a little man;
Aye, he was no bigger than my finger.
I laughed, and spoke to one near me,
"Will he prevail?"
"Surely," replied this other;
"His grandfathers beat them many times."
Then did I see much virtue in grandfathers-
At least, for the little man
Who stood against the mountains.

I saw a man pursuing the horizon;
Round and round they sped.
I was disturbed at this;
I accosted the man.
"It is futile," I said,
"You can never-"
"You lie," he cried,
And ran on.

There was set before me a mighty hill,
And long days I climbed
Through regions of snow.
When I had before me the summit-view,
It seemed that my labour
Had been to see gardens
Lying at impossible distances.

In heaven,
Some little blades of grass
Stood before God.
"What did you do?"
Then all save one of the little blades
Began eagerly to relate The merits of their lives.
This one stayed a small way behind, Ashamed.
Presently, God said,
"And what did you do?"
The little blade answered, "Oh my Lord,
Memory is bitter to me,
For, if I did good deeds,
I know not of them."
Then God, in all His splendor,
Arose from His throne.
"Oh, best little blade of grass!" He said.

poetry beautiful poetry

her: "can you choke me one more time please?"
me: "I'd love to."

Upon the road of my life,
Passed me many fair creatures,
Clothed all in white, and radiant.
To one, finally, I made speech:
"Who art thou?"
But she, like the others,
Kept cowled her face,
And answered in haste, anxiously,
"I am good deed, forsooth;
You have often seen me."
"Not uncowled," I made reply.
And with rash and strong hand,
Though she resisted,
I drew away the veil
And gazed at the features of vanity.
She, shamefaced, went on;
And after I had mused a time,
I said of myself,
"Fool!"

The sage lectured brilliantly.
Before him, two images:
"Now this one is a devil,
And this one is me."
He turned away.
Then a cunning pupil
Changed the positions.
Turned the sage again:
"Now this one is a devil,
And this one is me."
The pupils sat, all grinning,
And rejoiced in the game.
But the sage was a sage

What is it about 20-Somethings?

What is it with us?

Just as adolescence has its particular psychological profile, Arnett says, so does "emerging adulthood": identity exploration, instability, self-focus, feeling in-between and a rather poetic characteristic he calls “a sense of possibilities.” A few of these, especially identity exploration, are part of adolescence too, but they take on new depth and urgency in the 20s.

I thought it was just me, but apparently, other people feel the way I do. <sarcasm> How reassuring </sarcasm>.


The stakes are higher when people are approaching the age when options tend to close off and lifelong commitments must be made. Arnett calls it “the age 30 deadline.”

There's an age 30 deadline?! I haven't even started yet! FML .


The issue of whether emerging adulthood is a new stage is being debated most forcefully among scholars, in particular psychologists and sociologists. But its resolution has broader implications. Just look at what happened for teenagers. It took some effort, a century ago, for psychologists to make the case that adolescence was a new developmental stage. Once that happened, social institutions were forced to adapt: education, health care, social services and the law all changed to address the particular needs of 12- to 18-year-olds

Damn it. I just missed out on having an entire institution dedicated to helping me figure things out. It's too bad, I need it because this backpacking trip is doing nothing for me. I am having too much fun to waste time trying to figure life out.


gradually broadening his sample to include New Orleans, Los Angeles and San Francisco. He deliberately included working-class young people as well as those who were well off, those who had never gone to college as well as those who were still in school, those who were supporting themselves as well as those whose bills were being paid by their parents. A little more than half of his sample was white, 18 percent African-American, 16 percent Asian-American and 14 percent Latino.

A sample with 16% Asian-Americans? Thank you!


The more profound question behind the scholarly intrigue is the one that really captivates parents: whether the prolongation of this unsettled time of life is a good thing or a bad thing. With life spans stretching into the ninth decade, is it better for young people to experiment in their 20s before making choices they’ll have to live with for more than half a century? Or is adulthood now so malleable, with marriage and employment options constantly being reassessed, that young people would be better off just getting started on something, or else they’ll never catch up, consigned to remain always a few steps behind the early bloomers? Is emerging adulthood a rich and varied period for self-discovery, as Arnett says it is? Or is it just another term for self-indulgence?

Answer: Self-Indulgence*
*see rest of blog fo references

Arnett says that young men and women are more self-focused than at any other time of life, less certain about the future and yet also more optimistic, no matter what their economic background.

No, Yes, Sometimes, mom please deposit another $1,000 into my account when you read this.



Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/22/magazine/22Adulthood-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1



Update: I thought about this mid-20's life crisis of mine and realized there is only one thing I can do, start a Fight Club.

Update 1: Free Assange!!!!

Sweden has cancelled an arrest warrant for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange on accusations of rape and molestation.

The Swedish Prosecution Authority website said the chief prosecutor had come to the decision that Mr Assange was not suspected of rape but did not give any further explanation.

Learn2 follow-through, CIA.



Update 2: Colbert interview with Assange. Articulate, smart,unapologetic, fearless, irreverent, insightful... Assange is a bad ass. He makes me happy and hopeful. Someone needs to make the famous Obama Hope poster with Assange's face instead.

FREE ASSANGE!!!!

Swedish authorities have issued an arrest warrant for Julian Assange, the founder of the whistleblowing website Wikileaks, following a sexual assault complaint aginst him.

Assange denied the allegation on Saturday, saying via Twitter that the charges "are without basis and their issue at this moment is deeply disturbing".

The prosecutor's office in Stockholm said the arrest warrant was issued for the 39-year-old Australian national late on Friday

Learn to subtle, CIA.

The wayfarer,
Perceiving the pathway to truth,
Was struck with astonishment.
It was thickly grown with weeds.
"Ha," he said,
"I see that none has passed here
In a long time."
Later he saw that each weed
Was a singular knife.
"Well," he mumbled at last,
"Doubtless there are other roads."

Untitled

I think
that bitch
robbed
me
last night.

There was a man with tongue of wood
Who essayed to sing,
And in truth it was lamentable.
But there was one who heard
The clip-clapper of this tongue of wood
And knew what the man
Wished to sing,
And with that the singer was content.

In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, "Is it good, friend?"
"It is bitter - bitter," he answered;
"But I like it
Because it is bitter,
And because it is my heart."

random pics

Picture of Matilda looking for support before she jumped. There is no picture of me standing in that same spot, the guy who took pictures for me, didn't do a good job of it. But there is a DVD of my jump. I have yet to watch it cuz I hate watching myself on video. Maybe I will upload it if I can bring myself to watch it.

The view looking down.


lol, get it?


Windmills in El Salvador. who would have thought el salvador would be so progressive?

LOL

Oh, internet. I love you so much.



On Thursday, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange told a gathering in London that the secret-spilling website is moving ahead with plans to publish the remaining 15,000 records from the Afghan war logs, despite a demand from the Pentagon that WikiLeaks “return” its entire cache of published and unpublished classified U.S. documents.

“The United States has the cyber capabilities to prevent WikiLeaks from disseminating those materials,” wrote Washington Post columnist Marc Thiessen on Friday. “Will President Obama order the military to deploy those capabilities? … If Assange remains free and the documents he possesses are released, Obama will have no one to blame but himself.”

The U.S. government has other, less legal, options, of course — the “cyber” capabilities Thiessen alludes to. The Pentagon probably has the ability to launch distributed denial-of-service attacks against WikiLeaks’ public-facing servers. If it doesn’t, the Army could rent a formidable botnet from Russian hackers for less than the cost of a Humvee.

"There have been unreasonable statements made in private by certain officials in the US administration," Assange replies. "How would you define 'unreasonable'?" "Statements which suggest that they may not follow the rule of law."

A 1.4-gigabyte encrypted file labelled "insurance" on WikiLeaks, prompting speculation that it contained the full, unedited War Diary, and that the pass code to access the files would be released if any action were taken against the site by US authorities.

Source: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/08/cyberwar-wikileaks/comment-page-1/#comments (hilariousness in comments/flame war section)


update: Oh Keith Olberman, I love you so much too. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/38731398#38731398

Still alive

We do what we must, because we can http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6ljFaKRTrI

Bungee jumping was one of the scariest things I have ever done. Possibly THE scariest (and hardest) thing I've ever done. There's something grossly masochistic about stepping to the edge of a rain slicked bridge and jumping off; especially if you do it for no other reason than getting your rocks off.

After a short shuttle ride with a nice Swedish girl, we got to the bridge. When I looked down at the river 265 feet below me, I suddenly had second thoughts. That shit was high. We were given a two minute briefing then strapped up. Matilda wanted to go first, so like the gentleman I am, I let her go. She hesitated only for a little while before charging it. She didn't make any noise at first, but halfway down she started to scream. I did the same thing, for some strange reason, you don't start screaming until halfway down.

I was pretty calm until I stepped onto the platform. Up to that point, I had done a really good job of not thinking about what I was about to do. But once confronted with the reality of the situation, I felt the intense fear and hesitation I was expecting. I made the mistake of looking down. The operator told me to look up and I did, which helped a lot. Then the operator gave me a countdown. I passed on the first "5, 4, 3, 2, 1, jump!" But I did it on the second try.

The hard part is overcoming the fear and making the leap. Once you're in the air, it's cruise, there's no fear. You don't think in the air, only a sense of exultation that you actually did it. I thought I would be scared until I felt the bungee rope holding, but once I was off the platform, I only felt relief and exhiliration.

There was a Zen lesson learned here, but I know you guys aren't interested in that.

Good times. It was one of the scariest and funnest things I've done. I want to do it again. There's a guy at the hostel I've gotten to know named Eric who is also in San Jose for a long time. He said he wanted to do the bungee jump too, but he had plans to visit friends this weekend. So I think I will try to convince him to do it next weekend and I'll go again if he goes. The second jump is only $30. Half off the first jump price.


Protips:
1. Use the countdown. The operator said that having a countdown prompt is a very effective pyschological aid for making people jump. And it's true, I don't know how long it would have taken me to jump without the countdown.

2. operator said about 2-3% of people totally back down and completely refuse to jump. These people still have to pay 50% of the price. So don't back down.

3. Don't look down. cliche advice, but it's true. Looking down makes it harder. If you don't look down, you can pretend there isn't 265 feet of empty air below you.

Random Pics

One of those women who sell refreshments and snacks to bus riders.

Me at that volcano during the volcano surfing trip.

Hobo-Jenga, I call it. Giant jenga game with pieces of 2x4's.

A nice, calm and respectable lady went into the pharmacy, walked up to the pharmacist, looked straight into his eyes, and said, “I would like to buy some cyanide, please.”

The pharmacist asked, “Why in the world do you need cyanide?”

The lady replied, “I need it to poison my husband.”

The pharmacist’s eyes got big and he exclaimed. “Lord have mercy! I can’t give you cyanide to kill your husband. That’s against the law. I’ll lose my license! They’ll throw both of us in jail! All kinds of bad things will happen. Absolutely not! You cannot have any cyanide.”

The lady reached into her handbag and pulled out a photograph of her husband in bed with the pharmacist’s wife.

The pharmacist looked at the picture and replied, “Well now, that’s different. You didn’t tell me you had a prescription.”

Last Will and Testament

If you are reading this, it means I really did die doing that bungee jump. I can posthumously say I regret doing it. I also have many regrets in my life, many of them pertain to the friends and family who read this blog. I have closure-bringing things to say to all of you, but I am taking them with me to the grave.

Give all my possesions to the two people I love most in the world, Tegan and Sara. Just kidding. I don't care what you do with my stuff because I'm fucking dead.

I wish for my remains to be cremated, then I want the ashes to be flushed down the nearest toilet. Seriously.

Don't look in the brown bag in the bottom drawer of the desk in my bedroom. Seriously, don't.

Tell my mom what she wants to hear. Tell Ray, my property manager, I'll see him in hell. Tell George W. Bush I called him a fucking cunt with my dying breath (because there is a 50% chance I actually did).

Tell her I love her.

Please smack Justin Bieber in the head for stealing the title of Most Watched Video on Youtube from Lady Gaga.

I want a big party thrown in my honor, I want everyone to get super wasted and have a good time. I want people to eat, drink, dance, do drugs, vomit, get arrested, suffer moderately serious injuries, and commit hilarious felonies and misdemeanors with Seth Rogan. Don't drink and drive. Unless it's inconvenient to walk or take a taxi, in which case, go ahead and drink and drive.

If you are reading this, it means I really did die doing that bungee jump. Or, it just means I forgot to delete this automatic post before the post-date . But either way, don't look in the brown bag in the bottom drawer of the desk in my bedroom. Seriously.


Until we meet again on Dec 13, 2012,

Last words

Let my tombstone read: "No Sympathy for the Devil".

If I die in a gruesome, freak, closed-casket-funeral bungee jumping accident tomorrow, remember one thing: No sympathy for the devil, you buy the ticket, you take the ride.

In this case, a $65 ticket to jump off a 265 foot bridge (price includes transportation, DVD and certificate, second dive is only $30!). For some reason, I am more nervous about this bungee jump than when I went skydiving. With skydiving, you are attached to the instructor and don't have much choice when he decides to jump out the door. But in the bungee jump, you have to take that big step. Just thinking about having to willingly jump off the edge makes my dick tingle.

Random Thoughts

Okay, okay, I got another one: What kind of bees make milk? (answer at botttom)

I nostalgia'ed hard after watching a Red Vs. Blue video for the first time in 5 years. The theme song was what did it, brought me back to those old carefree days at UW.

The most interesting thing to happen to me today was the mouse I saw squeezing itself into a crack in the sidewalk. I stepped outside of the hostel and saw this fat mouse, as soon as it saw me it dove into this hollow crack in the sidewalk. The crack was a half inch wide and maybe two to three inches long (that's what she said). It was funny cuz the fat mouse tried to run away but got stuck halfway through, so it's furry ass was sticking up and it's little legs were kicking in the air, until it finally wiggled it's way through. It was hilarious. It totally reminded me of that little hamster character in the movie Spirited Away. I threw a piece of a cracker down the hole as payment for the amusement.

Apparently, my krav maga teacher is ex-Special Forces and does intelligence and private security work on the side. He has shrapnel scars from Somalia... anyway, he says that intelligence says latin america is going to blow up in next year or two. Between Venezuela, and Nicaragua(!?) and the resource rich south american continent, shit is going down.

Ship cats: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship%27s_cat


answer: boobies.

An Alligator walks into a bar...

This alligator walks into a bar and grabs a seat. The bartender approaches and tells him to "GTFO, we don't serve your kind here." The alligator's all like "WTF yo! Look, you better give me a drink or...you see that blonde over there? I'll fucking eat her. Right here in front of everyone." And then the bartender's all like, "Pssh...go ahead motherfucker, I'm still not serving you." So the alligator goes up to the blonde and swallows her in one big gulp...a half hour later, the alligator wakes up passed out in his own vomit outside the bar. Confused, he gets up and goes back in, sees the bartender and demands, "You drugged me! What the fuck did you do to me!" The bartender says...(drumroll please)... "Hey buddy I didn't do a thing...it was that bar-bitch-u-ate. Lol.

Krav Maga IRL

Yesterday in class we did a really fun excercise. The instructor took us outside one by one, and did a real life simulation excercise. It was dark and we were told to walk towards our car in the parking lot. We were then attacked by one of the other students who was hiding somewhere and depending on the type of attack, we had to defend ourselves properly. The second run through of the excercise, you already expect to be attacked by the student who is hiding somewhere in the parking lot, but in the second run, the instructor was walking behind me and instructing me when he suddenly attacked from behind. The whole thing was really fun and a good learning experience.

Watched penelope cruz and scarlet johannson making out.

"more violence!" he requested.

Everything Shirley Manson touches turns to gold: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=690k85FQNXs&feature=related

Caught the wrong bus again.

Played chicken with San Jose drivers on a sidewalk-less highway.

Got hot and sweaty with a woman who was really into being choked.

If you love me...

If you love me, you will watch these three short videos with an open mind.

1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3PcVHDZZquI
Slight variation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mP2VzDlL8Mg

2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWLW3yUV6wA&feature=related

3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdso1S76zn8&feature=related

I have everything I could possibly want, i.e. a backlog of 6 months of Tegan and Sara interviews and videos to slowly digest whenever I want. A pig in shit has nothing on me. They have an interview with Motherjones.com that I am saving for a special occasion.

Size Matters

I've noticed that my backpack is smaller than those of almost every other backpacker I've seen. Everyone else has these giant backpacks that probably have twice the capacity of mine and they're often stuffed to the brim. I am quite proud that I can live out of my small backpack. And my pack would have been a lot smaller and lighter if it weren't for first-timer inefficiences.

Inefficiencies such as carrying a large beach towel as my travel towel. From previous experience, and on the wise advice of Douglas Adams, I knew a good towel is absolutely necessary for travel. But the towel I had was too big and didn't really serve any other purpose than as a bath towel. So, I am quite happy to have picked up a traveler's towel (really thin and absorbent material) that somebody had left behind. I mentioned before how it's really cool to see what kind of loot people drop at hostels and this is the best example of it. I've been wishing I had one of these towels for a long time, and now I have one, so I can get rid of the beach towel. This hostel is great for getting free stuff and food. A lot of people fly out of San Jose at the end of their trip, so a lot of people leave behind toiletries, equipment, food, etc.... here.

Another inefficiency is all the books I'm lugging around. I still have the guidebooks of countries I've already been to. My plan was to sell them (or exchange them for other guidebooks), but I haven't found a good bookstore that would buy them or exchange them at a good rate. It's always two-for-one exchange or a really bad price offer. So, they may end up being really bulky and heavy souvenirs. Plus, I have my spanish textbook that I haven't had the heart to get rid of because I keep telling myself I'll study it and teach myself spanish though I haven't opened it since Hawaii. And I have a fairly large spanish dictionary that I keep thinking I will need, but again, I haven't used it since Guatemala. Plus, I have the bulky sweater/poncho I bought in Guatemala. On the one hand, it is a cool souvenir poncho. On the other hand, if I had known, I would have brought a thin, warm rain jacket instead of that heavy cotton poncho to save a lot of space in my backpack.

So, If it weren't for the excess guidebooks, the too-large towel, the bulky poncho and the unnecessary spanish reference materials, I think I would actually have a lot of extra space and a much lighter pack. But even though my pack is kind of bulky and heavy right now, it's only a problem for those short times when I am going from hostel to bus station and bus station to hostel.

Update 3: old news

The modern US military and the wars it is fighting is logistically maintained and physically fought by private contractors. Mercenaries and private contractors get paid by the US government to do what US soldiers and the military used to do in-house (but with mark up paid for by US taxpayers) . In 2007 there were more contractors than combat troops in Iraq. Transportation and trucking is contracted out, meal preparation is contracted out,

maintenance and repair of equipment is contracted out,

laundry is contracted out, everything is contracted and then subcontracted to for-profit corporations, which is why we spend over half a trillion dollars a year on the defense budget (all deficit spending). In ten years, we will have spent well over five trillion dollars on war. With half that amount, we could have universal healthcare for all of America with money left over to build a few wind turbines; this, while Iraq's constitution (that the Bush Administration wrote in 2005) guarantees universal healthcare for all Iraqi citizens.

"The frontline FOB where I landed and its soldiers, by contrast, are spic-and-span. Credit for this goes largely to the remarkably inexpensive labor of crews of Filipinos, Indians, Croatians, and others lured from distant lands by American for-profit private contractors responsible for making our troops feel at home away from home. The base's streets are laid out on a grid. Tents in tidy rows are banked with standard sand bags and their super-sized cousins, towering Hescos filled with rocks and rubble.

The tents are cooled by roaring tornados of air conditioning, thanks to equipment fueled by gasoline that costs the Army about $400 per gallon to import. It takes fuelers three to four hours every day to refill all the giant generators that keep the cold air coming, so I felt guilty when, to prevent shivering in my sleep, I stuffed my towel into the ducts suspended from the ceiling of my tent."

"Many young soldiers told me that they actually live better in the Army, even when deployed, than they did in civilian life, where they couldn't make ends meet, especially when they were trying to pay for college or raise a family by working one or two low-wage jobs. They won't mutiny. They're doing better than many of their friends back home. (And they're dutiful, which makes for acts of personal heroism, even in a foolhardy cause.) They are likely to reenlist, though many told me they'd prefer to quit the Army and go to work for much higher pay with the for-profit private contractors that now "service" American war.""All this helps explain the annual cost of maintaining a single American soldier in Afghanistan, currently estimated at one million dollars."

Update 1: New News: Former Senator Ted Stevens in a plane crash. Traveling with an executive from European Aerospace firm EADS (revenue of $26 billion in first half of 2010). The plane and summer lodge it was flying to are both owned by GCI, the Alaskan telecommunications company (second quarter 2010 revenue of $162 million).

Update 2:

"Defense Secretary robert gates said the Pentagon needs to save money by further reducing a “cumbersome” U.S. military hierarchy, setting up potential battles with members of Congress who support targeted programs.

Gates announced plans yesterday to lop spending on support contractors by more than one-quarter over three years and close a military command in Norfolk,"

Update 3: "Paved roads, historical emblems of American achievement, are being torn up across rural America and replaced with gravel or other rough surfaces as counties struggle with tight budgets and dwindling state and federal revenue. State money for local roads was cut in many places amid budget shortfalls."

"In Michigan, at least 38 of the 83 counties have converted some asphalt roads to gravel in recent years. Last year, South Dakota turned at least 100 miles of asphalt road surfaces to gravel. Counties in Alabama and Pennsylvania have begun downgrading asphalt roads to cheaper chip-and-seal road, also known as "poor man's pavement." Some counties in Ohio are simply letting roads erode to gravel."


Well, it was good while it lasted.

First, for context: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVWFgh8iocI&feature=related
then, (listen don't watch): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztvJdAIGk54

finally, for awesome twisted 90's awesomeness: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oirtBNejdr0&feature=channel

I went to the mall yesterday and bought a pair of bright pink headphones (for 2,100 colones) so I could listen to music on youtube. I have too much free time here. The mall, Multiplaza Escazu, was huge. There was no brand or store you couldn't find in any American Mall that wasn't represented here. Everything from Calvin Klein to RadioShack (where I got my 'phones).

"...take time to do the little things
which leave the satisfactory thought,
when other joys have taken wings,
that we have labored as we ought;
that in a world where all contend,
we often stopped to be a friend."

Update 2: Should I join facebook

actually, it was a fleeting desire because I randomly looked up this girl I fancied years ago and she was on it and I wanted to "facebook stalk" her, like all the kids are doing nowadays. Fortunately, that momentary insanity passed.

Fuck Facebook, I burn bridges, I don't build them.

The Italian Girl In Algiers

Scene: Two americans, on a bus in Costa Rica, talking in Chinese, on the way to see an Italian opera.

Last night, I went to see an opera called The Italian girl in Algiers at the National Theatre. It was fun, the old historic theatre was beautiful (the president of Costa Rica was in attendance and his car worked perfectly fine afterwards).

The experience of going to an opera was really funny. There were lots of well-to-do looking ladies and gentlemen with jackets and suits. At intermission Cecilia and I were walking around the beautiful foyer and there would be these groups of well dressed intellectual types with glasses of wine in their hands and it looked...cliche, and you know how much I love cliches.

There was a guy sitting next to me during the opera that was incredible. He was caucasian, skinny, intellectual type, fairly young, in a dressed down jacket and shirt. He had intellectual wire framed glasses and would occasionally fan himself with the program pamphlet. He had very proper posture and would sit with his hands clasped on his lap. He frequently laughed a kind of "breathy chuckle" at humorous parts of the play, but he'd laugh at parts no one else did. I guess pretentious is the word I am looking for. I'm sure he's a very nice and interesting guy once you get to know him, but man, he was being such a pretentious asshole at the opera. And for that, I love him.



Me with a cigar in the stairwell during Intermission. I knew I was carrying that long sleeve dress shirt around Central America for a reason. It was a good thing I decided to dress up for the occasion (as dressed up as possible for a backpacker anyway). You can´t see it, but I am wearing running shoes.


The stairwell. The pictures are blurry because of inappropriate camera settings, apologies.


The historic sitting room where officials and elites would hold events.

The Teatro Nacional during the day.


End of the show when we were allowed to take pictures.