I Heart Trees

(You may remember this poem as the one my shop teacher made me memorize and recite for too many tardy arrivals to his class. But I never forgot it.)

I think that I shall never see a poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest Against the sweet earth's flowing breast

A tree that looks at God all day, And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain; Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me, But only God can make a tree. -Joyce Kilmer

And Hal, my dad.  My dad makes trees.  In fact he's kind of obssessed with them.  I call him Johnny Appleseed, because he's constantly planting trees.  Sometimes he just cuts off a branch of one tree and sticks it in the ground, and voila!  A new tree!  A tree that you better not accidentally scrape with the lawn mower because then you pretty much killed the tree and he'll never forgive you.  I often wonder if he would be as mad if somebody scraped ME with a lawnmower.  Probably not.  He'd probably suggest it was somehow my fault because, stupid, I got in the way. 

Remember this old Hal-ism? "I don't mind killing animals, but I hate killing a tree...unless it's already dead and I cut it up to burn it."

Maybe this is where I get my love for trees.  I love them.  I love taking pictures of them, and seeing their silhouette against the sky.  This year I have seen so many amazing trees.  Here are my favorites:

Bali

Australia

New Zealand, South Island

New Zealand, North Island

Cambodia

Laos

Korea

Panama

Samoa

Singapore

Thailand

But my favorite? My absolute favorite tree in the whole world? This little momma, located in International Falls, MN, on the way up to my job at Island View Lodge. I got to drive by this tree almost every day this summer. I kept meaning to take a photo, but never got around to it. You can't really see it in this shot, but there is a huge crook in the neck of this tree.  I can't get enough of it.  Finally, when I went to dinner with my parents at Island View, I made my dad pull over the car so I could take this shot in the rain. Me and dad and my tree.



"Eat, Pray, Love, man...Eat, Pray, Love"

Yes, I know the similarities.  I'm single.  I'm traveling the world for a year.  Julia Roberts looks just like me.  But come on!  When I was in Singapore, I went to the botanical gardens.  A couple ladies from San Francisco gave me free entrance into the Orchid display and we got to talking.  Inevitably you tell people where you're from, where you've been, where you're headed, how long you've been on the road, how long you plan to be on the road.  It's the same old story, day after day.  I get sick of it actually (hearing myself tell the story). 

These ladies though, they were SO into it.  And when I was done talking, one said, "Eat, Pray, Love, man...Eat, Pray, Love."

It sort of reminds me how when I was in Australia with Teri and people would find out that we were single and not in our twenties...they called us "Cougars".  Come on!

Travel's Seedy Underbelly. And if not Seedy, at least Inconvenient.

So there is an unglamorous side to travel. And that unglamorous side is actual travel itself. Getting from A to B. The days when you have to repack your backpack and suitcase for the thousandth time, strap it on your back, get on a bus or train or hail a taxi cab, get to the airport, carry your stuff up to the impossibly long check-in counter line, wait, wait some more, and then carefully negotiate boarding with the check in counter representative.

Malaysia Airlines for example allows (per their website) one checked bag at a maximum of 20kg. I have two checked bags at approximately 16kgs each. That puts me at a total of 32kgs. When I checked in at the Bali Airport, the woman told me that I was 5kgs over the limit, and that it would be $7 US for every kg over, or $35. I expected this because I have two bags and not one. But then I got real cheap and decided there was a bag inside my backpack filled with chargers and adapters that is quite heavy and so I pulled it from my checked luggage and moved it to my carry-on luggage. It couldn't have weighed more than 2kgs. But I figured that was $14 saved. Once I took it out, surprise! No more being overweight and she didn't charge me anything. It's so confusing and arbitrary. Like since when is 32kgs only 5kgs over the limit? According to what information source are you allowed 27kgs? ARGHHHH...

So today, I am flying from Singapore to Bangkok, via Kuala Lumpur. I was fully expecting to be hassled at the counter and pay excess weight fees. This time, nothing. No mention of excess weight, or excess baggage.

But I'm getting a tiny bit ahead of myself. You'll recall that I bought a suitcase in Melbourne because I was having trouble zipping my backpack shut? Well, it was pertinent at the time, and I appreciated it in New Zealand where I ended up having to buy long johns and a sweater, and borrow woollen hat and mittens. But now that I am heading into SE Asia to meet my most miserly friend, who is only bringing carry on luggage, it's just not going to be possible to lug it around on 10-hour bus rides and bring it to the hostels we plan to stay in. So, my mission in Singapore besides finding good food was to repack my bags in such a way that I could drop one in Bangkok. The plan is that I will bring it to a storage facility, pay $3 US per week until my friend goes back through Bangkok 7 weeks later on her way home to Vermont. She will pick up the bag, fly with it, and then Nancy will bring it from Vermont to Minnesota for me. Brills, eh? *IF Bangkok doesn't go supercrazy and decide to shut down the airport due to rioting and whatnot, but that's a whole different story.* So I loaded up the suitcase with more than 75% of what I brought on this trip. I just didn't need most of it. Add to that the fact that I got sick of my clothes. So sick that I went to Chinatown in Singapore and bought 4 dresses and 3 shirts for less than $100 US. I wore one of the shirts out of there and asked the shopkeeper to throw the one I was wearing away. Ew.

So, because I have decided to store my suitcase in Bangkok for 7 weeks, and because I can't be bothered to figure out how the built-in lock works, and because I'm more than a little concerned about the safety of its contents, I have to become one of those people that I hate. You know, the ones who shrink wrap their bags at the airport? So the taxi cab drops me off at Terminal 2, which is where I am flying from. But I can't find a shrink wrap machine. Lady at info counter says shrink wrap is only available at Terminal 1. Where is that? I ask. You can take Sky Train, she says. So I stop at snack counter, buy curry chicken rice and iced coffee for $6, eat all but the chicken (suddenly I'm a vegetarian) and then head towards the Sky Train for Terminal 1. But the sign says the Sky Train is not operating. So I find the walkway to Terminal 1, which is basically through a car park, and is not a "walkway" at all. It's a 600m walk, in the hot 37 degree (approx 100 Farenheit) weather. When I am halfway there, I look up and notice that yes, the Sky Train is fully operational. By now my back is wet with sweat under the backpack, my right bicep is going to explode from being fully engaged pulling/pushing my suitcase on wheels, and I have to go pee really bad. But, I got my bag wrapped! For $10 US. Then I took the Sky Train back to Terminal 2, checked it all in, did NOT have to pay any excess baggage fees, and then finally went to the bathroom.

I had $33.85 left in Singapore dollars, and was planning to go to the money change, but on my way I stopped and checked out the book store. I'm kind of desperate for a new and very good book. My friend K. mentioned the Scarlet Pumpernickel wait Pimpernell, yes the Scarlet Pimpernell on facebook and that is what I wanted to find, but of course they don't sell that kind of classic literature at the airport book store. So I scanned the shelf through Jennifer Wiener and Sophie Kinsella, and that's when I spotted this guy:

*And yes, that is me, sitting in a reclining airport lounger.

I LOVE Dave Eggers. I didn't even know he had a new book out. Or maybe it's not even new. I don't know. I haven't seen it before. I was so excited I ignored the price tag. Books are crazy expensive here. I got it up to the counter and the total cost was $33.35. I gave him all the rest of my money and pocketed the 50 cent piece as a souvenir for my nephew Miles. Oh well, at least I didn't have to go to the money changer. If you're interested in a book suggestion, read What is the What? by Dave Eggers.  Remember I read it back in 2008.  I'll let you know how this one turns out.

And now, it's time to get on a tiny little tube whose ventilation is such that only recycled fart air will enter my lungs for the next 4 hours, a tube that will hurtle me through space and time to a city called Bangkok, where at least five explosions happened this morning and one Western woman was killed.  But that might not be true because there are also reports that it was two foreigners and they were only injured.

Who knows?  Love you mom and dad!

More Singapore

So this will probably be pretty deep for some of you, but today I came to an obvious realization.  One that is so obvious we forget to remember it all the time. 

People in other parts of the world aren't so very different.

I decided this today on the public transportation system.  I was staring at a little girl of Indian descent, dressed in a pink little dress with Dora the Explorer shoes on.  She was gab gab gabbing at her dad, and repeating everything the announcer said.  She reminded me of my little niece Miyo, and a thousand other little kids I know back home.  So then I started staring at other people.  There were grandpas and grandmas.  There were teenagers on the way home from school.  There were pregnant ladies; emo early-twenty-somethings with their headphones on so loud I could hear the music; old dudes picking their noses; business people on cell phones. 

Singapore is not so diverse a city as, say New York City.  It's people are mainly of Malay, Indian or Chinese descent.  There's not a ton of Western folks, but there are a few.  I know, Deep Thoughts, by Jack Handy.

It's true that lots of things are illegal here.  Meaning, you can be fined for breaking certain rules, like chewing gum, eating or drinking in the train, spitting on the sidewalk, not flushing the toilet (seriously).  Today I bought some rolls at a yummy bread place.  I was totally eating them in the train station, up and down the escalators, up and down the corridors.  Later I heard an announcement that it's not allowed to eat or drink in the trains or in the stations.  Oops. 

There's a magnet that has all of the illegal things, and then under it, it says: "Singapore, a 'fine' city".  I didn't get it for a whole day.  Get it?  Fines for everything. 

Oh, and yesterday, I went to Chinatown. I walked around this indoor shopping area for a while and then decided to leave, cross the street and explore a little bit and that's when I ended up meeting those girls who were stuck here in Singapore until the Ash Cloud over Europe blows over. Anyways we were having some Tiger Beers and chatting and then this terrible burning smell blew by. We got up and looked over and the whole shopping center was billowing black smoke. Apparently one of the storage units on the top floor caught on fire and it even made the news here in Singapore. I'm going to add this entry to my 'near death' experiences, because, well you never know.

How Low Can You Go?

In case you ever have to use an Eastern squatter toilet...this is how low you should go.  I met these ladies after shopping in Chinatown.  They were both stuck, along with husbands/boyfriends because they couldn't get a flight back to the UK.  Apparently a volcano erupted and is causing all kinds of flight delays.  Anyway I'm not sure who suggested it (me) but we decided to pose like this.

This was $2

Like Anthony Bordain suggested, I went to the fast food stalls, which are healthy yummy fantastic food stalls that just happen to be fast prepped.  He suggests going to the one with the longest line, but I hate standing in lines, and ordered from a medium sized line.  Delicious.  Fantastic.

Also, I had sugar cane drink.  Yummm. 

Obsessed

Sometimes I become obsessed with an idea or more accurately fascinated by it, and one of those things is hanging laundry out to dry.  In Singapore at least, one of the first things I noticed is that most people live in a highrise of some sort and there are just a zillion highrises everywhere, and out of the apartments of those highrises hang loads and loads of laundry, which brings me to my fascinating point:

The same sun that tans the skin of the party girls in Bali, and fades the bikinis for sale in San Diego, and bleaches my hard wood floors back in Minneapolis is drying the clothing of millions if not billions of people all around the world.  Trippy huh?  The sun. 

So why hasn't the U.S. picked up on the availability of this free clothes drying service?

Remember This?
And This?

Singa-Poor

At least that's what you would be if you wanted to buy a car here.  Before you can even buy the car, you have to bid for an win a "Certificate of Entitlement."  These can go for around $28,000 US.  There are a limited amount of Certificates available, because they are based on how many people scrap a car and turn in their Certificate.  You can only own a car for 10 years here, and once you have, you turn it in for scrap and return your Certificate to the government, who in turn place it up for auction.  If it was yours you have to bid for it again, in a sense. 

Then you have to buy the car, and the government taxes them by 250%.  So if a fair market value of a Toyota Camry is $30000, the dealer has to pay the government $75000 to sell it to you for maybe $80000.  You pay $98000 for the car and the Certificate.  The dealer makes $5000, the government makes $73000, and you only get to keep your car for ten years.  On top of this there is road tax of approximately $2000 per year. 

This is an effort to keep cars off the road.  I think it's pretty brilliant.  If you have an excellent public transportation system, and a ballooning population (currently at 5 million), you kinda have to take car-reduction measures.  What would we do if it became this difficult to own a car in the US?  Oh, also I just read a website with stats from 2006 and it was reporting that 70% of all cars on the road were less than 5 years old.

Laundry, Meet Singapore

This is a first.  Seven stories up, holding a stick out the window, weighted down with jeans, etc., hoping you don't drop it on those pigeons down there, taking out all of the downstairs neighbors' sticks in it's path.

What to wear when you're doing laundry. And you hope nobody comes home, or sees you.

Malaysia - In the News

Volunteers picked up rubbish along the seafront off Penang's Gurney Drive in conjunction with Earth Day.  6.4 tons of rubbish from a refrigerator to a bulldozer tire were collected from the island's beaches.  Volunteers also picked up 51 condoms, 128 diapers, 222 tampons and 53 syringes during a four-hour clean-up.

I love that they counted the condoms, diapers, tampons and syringes.  Do you think there was a special tampon bucket, diaper bucket, etc?  Or do you think they just mentally took a tally?  Or do you think at the beginning of the day, the organizers said, "now remember to note how many condoms you pick up today."

Also, there were allegations that candidate Datuk Zaid Ibrahim had, in his past, drank.  He owned up to the mistake made in the past, but said that his drinking days are over.  He also said he knew of leaders who had done this and that but he would not name names.  "If the Hulu Selangor people punish me for being sincere, then I will accept the punishment," he said.