jambo!

we left turkey for dubai in the middle east by plane. and lets just say that life in an emirates jumbo jet is peachy keen by my standards. the in-flight entertainment is about as good as any satellite TV, the radio had me jumping and singing in my seat, the booze... well, there was whatever you needed. hell, even the food was good. to top it all off-- they were serving BUDWEISER beers on the plane. ohh dear, a taste of home.

we landed in dubai and it was in the late evening. we managed to find a really cheap hotel and we crashed pretty early.

the next day i stepped outside and the heat hit me like a ton of bricks. i kid you not, it was like a goddamn inferno out there. i mean my fingernails were sweating i was so hot. it was nuts though, men still wore the full on traditional muslim cover-alls. women would, in some cases, be covered from head to toe. somehow, some way this was all ok amidst the heat. we were drinking water in quantities unforeseen.

we took a much needed break and took a leisurely bathing session in the persian gulf. HAH! the persian gulf. try that one on for size. the water was nearly as warm as the heat outside, but it was still refreshing. i swam out about as far as my straggly arms could take me and then i turned back around. as i swam in, i damn near pooped myself in the water as a jellyfish whiz-banged right beside me.

see, im not so hot when it comes to all these crazy sea creatures. fish i can handle. jelly fish? forget it. i was out of that damn water faster than a speeding bullet.

the heat no longer mattered, i was not setting foot in that water again with that monster jelly fish on the prowl.

now dubai-- its a city of near ruthless development: playground of the rich and employment agency for the poor. it truly is the beverly hills of the desert. the city has really come in to its own for for its location efficiencies being the gateway to the middle east. development started back in the late 70's and early 80's. now, companies are setting up shop in dubai, shopping malls are a dime a dozen (ENORMOUS mind you), western food attractions are rampant (even the dairy queen for christs sake!) and half the living population is now composed of ex-pats. good lord!

but this sort of ruthless development i was speaking of.. i wont forget to back that one up. heres a few examples.

1) ski dubai: thats right folks, its 110 degrees out there but they have a facility for indoor skiing attached to the mall of emirates. kids are sledding down hills while parents hit the slopes. thats right, a full on ski hill in the middle of the desert. they call it an example of "incredible engineering" i call it unneccesary.

2) the world islands: they have built islands in the middle of the persian gulf for people to buy. each island is a county in the world and the collective of them all shows an entire globe from an aerial view. from an airplane you would be able to see each country and the arabic script that surrounds them. kind of incredible to look at-- but seriously? what purpose does it serve?

3) the dubai "business marketplaces": towering skyscrapers are popping up to form these business centers. they look cool on paper, but really it is just a glorified way to have a game of "lets see who can build the tallest building."

this is seriosly only a few of the examples.

so needless to say dubai isnt exactly the middle east that we are seeing on TV right now. certainly you get a lot of middle eastern culture in the way of traditional dress, VERY little alcohol is served (only at hotels), the food is all cooked in the halal method, etc.

getting back on the emirates jet to take off for africa didnt sound like such a bad idea when it was time to leave dubai. all i could think of was the endless amount of food and hospitality. hah! certainly enough we had to get through a bit of shit before we were actually sitting in those posh seats.

first, bryan and i are carelessly perusing through the airport in dubai-- browsing for souvenirs, taking some photos, hell-- even checking our email at the free internet booth. shit hit the fan when over the loudspeaker we hear "ladies and gentleman, final boarding call for emirates flight 717 service to nairobi."

we hopped on our horses hurdling everything from small children to peoples luggage that they were toting around. needless to say we made it. phew!

when we got the to the gate, the airplane wasnt there-- we had to take a bus to get out to the area where the plane was. no problem, right? holy mother of god, that was some of the toughest 10 minutes i have had in a while. two gentleman standing to me right had perhaps the worst body odor i have ever smelled. scrreeeeech goes the record.

im talking worse than any china man's stinky feet on the train and worse than any russian's polyester induced sweaty train stench.

i had my head buried in my shirt. i was beginning to feel nautious (sp?). young children were clinging to their mothers for help. i began to get light-headed. i tried to mouth the words "take a shower" to these stinky men but the words couldnt leave my lips (ok, that was an exaggeration)... but still. the smell made me really want to vomet, and i feel like typically i can handle that crap. i was a bit frustrated.

uh-oh.

so then we pull up to the airplane and there is a mechanical failure. BAD NEWS. we now have to ride back to the terminal in the same bus-- and thats right-- with the SAME stinky men that we there before. oh man, just get me out of here.

eventually we got on the plane. excellent. we chatted up the flight attendants for a while and demanded a cold beer. and thats about the time when things started to get cool...

first, the beer she happened to bring out was a victoria bitter (an aussie beer i happen to quite enjoy). that was just a peach of a surprise really. i definitely did not see that one coming! i enjoyed that, and then another, and another, and another..

and then the flight attendant comes racing over and asking us if their is an emergency... "uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh (i had to think for a long time) NOPE. no emergency here. we just rang the bell to get another beer."

she replied, "ok, well stop ringing the bell every two seconds. we really thought someone was in trouble."

"nope, no problems here.. just a beer would be great."

minutes later she comes back with two beers and still a bit perturbed that the bell for the flight attendants was STILL ringing.

"ok, is there an emergency now?"

"most definitely not. everything is just fine. the beer tastes great" ( meanwhile i have managed to spill half the thing down my shirt as i sipped it.. really looked like a fool).

turns out we discovered that the button on our seat that you push to signal for the flight attendant was stuck. that thing had been ringing for a looooooooong time. no wonder they were always checking on us. we just thought the emirates service was once again fantastic..

as we landed in kenya, mariah carey was playing on the stereo. such a welcoming sign really. we gathered our bags and staggered over to catch our ride. i sang along to the music and people laughed.

my first whole day in africa was today. first impressions: holy crap! i mean life here is so much different than i have seen anywhere. people can be extremely poor, little children beg on the streets-- but yet this country holds the worlds most optimistic people. i forget where i read about that, but it was actually a measured study that africans are some of the worlds most optimistic. the glass is half full in these parts and i absolutely love that. its infectious and amazing really. the people as i have experienced so far are incredibyl friendly. then again there are also some that just want to take your wallet-- but overall, just a beautiful place. i feel like i cant really write too much on this continent just yet though-- there is so much more to experience.

here in kenya, hello is "JAMBO!" its swahili-- the language spoken mainly here in kenya and also in tanzania. i love it. such a cool word to say! JAMBO! JAMBO!

things get pretty exciting from here on out. we begin our big overland excursion down to victoria falls in zimbabwe tomorrow. like i said last time we traverse through tanzania, malawi, zambia and zimbabwe. we camp the whole way through with the exception of our time in zanzibar. we end the journey on 4 june in zimbabwe at which point we skip down to south africa for the grand finale of the whole trip.

now THAT seems pretty crazy-- even talking about the "grand finale."

road snaps

well, i really havent posted any pictures recently.. and one of the local internet cafes had some pretty decent upload rates, so here we go:

hookah nights with emily and the boys.

turkish women enjoying a day in the sun.

men playing music for a local turkish festival

men and women washing their feet before entering a mosque

perhaps my favorite part of istanbul-- the beloved kebab.

GO GO GO africa! we fly in to nairobi on 12 may (we are staying in dubai for a day.. more on that place im sure) and hit the road southbound hugging the eastern coastline through tanzania (serengeti, dar es salaam, zanzibar), malawi, zambia and zimbabwe. from there we catch a flight to johannesburg in south africa where we are planning to b-line it for cape town to relax for a week before heading home.

given the sort of infrastructural issues in africa, blogging prior to south africa may be a tall order. in which case, ill be back posting around the middle of june.

certainly enough the thought of home has been poking at me for the last week or so. i will be ready when the time comes. i am excited for all the new experiences that africa will bring-- ecstatic in fact-- but feel that when june 20 or so rolls around i will be ready for this thing called "home." and thats about all there is to that.

i'll say hello to some rhinos for you!

turkey time and some fireside chatting

so when i was in the planning stage of this trip, a good handful of my backpacking friends spared no time in telling me i was crazy for hitting the road on this trip. not so much the 6 months being away or really even the places i am visiting-- more the less the speed with which i am traversing the globe.

"you're crazy mate" were the words of an aussie friend.

and well, i wouldnt succomb to the fact that i am crazy just yet-- but the whole "speed" thing caught up to me right around the day i stepped in to budapest. months of sleeping in the backseat of cars, overnight trains and mattresses that most closely resembled concrete had finally caught up to me. i was pooped.

and poof! in pops little sister emily. immediately you think "disaster" when her raring-to-go mentality clashes with my tired body. but our time so far has been nothing even remotely close to that. in fact, it has been just delightful really.

its nice having emily around. haha its like clockwork-- people (guys in particular) just want to talk and be friendly when there is a nice girl in the group. seriously, the amount of guys that want to get to know you or just have some friendly conversation increases exponentially as you have more females in your group. all these dudes all of the sudden love america, they want to visit, etc. its quite amusing, honestly.

this whole "friendliness" i speak of was at its best the night we met the old italian stallions. we were out for dinner one night and up pull some young italian stallions asking us if we knew where the local "discoteque" was. i was perhaps the worst person in budapest to answer that question, but we got to talking to them about other things for a while. long story short, they invited "us" (haha i was nearly the 3rd wheel at this point) to their apartment in budapest for pasta the the following night.

i was getting a good kick out of all this.

we ventured over to their place the following night, had some pasta, and then ended up mixing things up that night at the "discos" with them. dear god, was i ever out of place. i had my 4 week old without-a-solid-washing pants on with the nicest shirt i could find in my backpack. it was even funnier when emily told me i looked nice to make me feel better. the italians were adorned in the finest of shiny, dancing apparel. watching these dudes rip out of the gate was like a flashback to "a night at the roxbury"-- these guys were animals.

soon they brought over a round of absinthe (hungary is apparently the absinthe capital of eastern europe-- the real stuff that is, worm wood and all). my goodness, i am reasonably sure that taking a shot of that death water was about the closest thing to satan's handshake as you can get. the 5.3 seconds of fury that followed as i thought my esophagus (ouch, sp?) had just disintegrated was painful to say the least. i felt like i was back in college taking shots of cheap vodka in the dorms. it was like nothing could take that fiery taste out of my mouth.

a good night in all, very very amusing with the voracious italianos.

i caught word that there was a travelling historical spanish art exhibit of goya, velazquez and el greco on at the museum of fine arts. i was quite keen to check it out, but clearly emily was a bit hesitant. i ended up dragging her in but i think in the end she was mildly content with having spent the time checking it out.

the whole "heroes square" area-- just adjacent to the fine arts museum-- in budapest is really something else. it seemed every walk of life congregated there for small talk, tea, just some sitting or family time even. it reminded me of trafalgar square a tiny bit, but much more atmosphere was present.

amidst everything, emily was really helping me out in getting re-cooperated. its amazing how much the comfort of a close friend or loved one halfway around the world helps your whole mental state. all of the sudden, things were just fine.

now it was time to get to istanbul for part two of our little adventure. i looked in to renting a car for a little overland adventure. i thought the idea was great-- scenic countryside, travel at our own pace. no problem. i went to check out some prices and such and about 10 places basically laughed in my face at the thought of driving from budapest through romania and bulgaria to istanbul. some highlights:

"well, you know you must drive through bulgaria, right? certain parts you are good as dead there"

"well.. see... with.. ehhhhh... bulgaria. you....ehhhh... check in to a hotel and in the morning you... ehhh...have no car. gone. crazy people have your car... ehhh.... not you"

"to istanbul? thats crazy"

needless to say, the car idea was a no-go. we hopped on a flight instead-- much more tame i suppose. i have to admit it was quite nice to make that nice little puddle jump in just under 2 hours instead of days on a bus or what not.

getting to istanbul didnt come without a hitch. the day we got on the plane i was waiting to eat until we boarded the plane. naturally, i was starving by the time we got on because i had refused to buy a meal that day in full knowing i would get one on the plane. and well, we did in fact get a meal... BUT, it closely resembled the sort of meal you may feed your pet hamster.

strike 1.

we landed and i had to get some local turkish currency. well, in 2005 turkey switched from the old turkish lira to the new lira (YTL) and so the guidebook that we had didnt give an official answer on what currency to use in the country as of 2006. great. i went with what i thought was the sure-fire euro (i knew it wasnt the local curency but a lot of times you can pay for just about anything in euros). we left the airport for the metro. welp, we got there and as i stood in line to get two tickets for emily and the guy wouldnt accept euros. "turkish lira only." super. and of course there were no other ATM's in site, so we walked all the way back to the airport and then back again to the metro. i was beginning to sweat, my backpack felt like it weighed about 659 pounds and frustration was grabbing a hold of me. i was probably scaring emily.

strike 2.

we got on the metro and got to our stop. the directions to the hostel said that i needed to get on a new city tram that serviced the area we were staying in. lord knows that with my cunning directional skills this was going to be a task. about 29 minutes later we boarded the tram. the thing was so crowded i could barely breathe. sweaty people were rubbing all over me.

strike 3.

once off the tram, actually finding the hostel (or someone that could give directions) was damn near impossible. about 33 minutes later i threw my bags down in the hostel lobby and belted out "well holy shit, we found the place." a stunned attendant at the front gave a frightened "welcome."

strike 4 (sort of).

so turkey wasnt exactly top on my list yet, and most of the time three strikes and you are out, right? well that couldnt be any further from the truth for this incredible city. the place really took my by surprise. i wasnt expecting much. a friend had talked the place up for a couple years and that was about the only thing i was going off of. but this city is truly something else. turkish people are some of the most friendly, the food is unreal, the historical elements and cultural relics present are second to none. how the hell could you not like this place?

we floated the bosphorous river on a ferry boat and that was delightful amidst the blustering winds that damn near threw me overboard. it was funny, it took us about 45 minutes to figure out there was a reason that we were the only ones on the top deck-- most others were comfortably sitting in the indoor lower deck. down we went! the views were nice and being on the water is always nice.

the markets and grand bazaar are amazing. you can get everything from rugs to turkish soccer jerseys to old crumbled remains of ruins. i personally have taken a liking for the incredible availability of arguile socks in a wide assortment of colors. dont worry, i picked up about a half dozen. i know, kind of sick.

the food.. dear god. the food is just brilliant.

i have eaten at least 55 kebabs in the past 5 days or so. emily has even taken a liking. she will admit that my penchant for the little guys is borderline disgusting, but i simply cannot resist. turkish blend coffee is incredibly tasty. it tends to be a much stronger blend of coffee than we are used to in the old US of A. i happen to really enjoy it, even with its gritty consistency and pungent flavor. similarly, the turkish tea and its infinite assortment of flavors will never let you down. i have taken a liking to the lemon mint variety. börek-- a sort of pastry with turkish cheese in the middle (or meat if you please) is excellent for a little mid-day snack. all the pide (closely resembles pita) is fantastic dipped in the crazy sauces. and i think i havent missed having some fresh baklava after most meals. amazing!

the mosques truly are breathtaking. at first sight of the blue mosque, i really did have to pick my jaw up off the ground. the spectactle in front of me was jsut breathtaking. the sheer size is part of it, but all the intricate design and architectural elements are the icing on the cake. these mosques are incredibly old as well, you can really feel the power. looking at the 4 "elephants feet" in the middle of the blue mosque (they are the pillars that support the entire structure) makes you wonder how in the world these things were constructed and moved so many years ago. naturally, something that is so foreign to my eye balls gets that bit of shock factor thumbs up.

and the people like i said are just incredibly friendly and caring. emily and i had the pleasure of talking with an old turkish man. he talked endlessly about leading a simple life-- a life devoid of complexity (or monkey business as he liked to put it) so as not to get in the way of your true intentions. for him, it was keeping himself happy and doing "good things" in life for others around him. he talked about taking care of yourself, making YOU happy, to truly take care of your internal needs.

now when someone sort of gives me a thought to chew on, i tend to chew tirelessly for probably too long. i like to get lost laboring over what that "higher meaning" is. so naturally, the old man got me thinking for quite a while. his simple lines were infectious really, it had my brain racing about this idea of living a fulfilled life. his sort of "aged" outlook was making me think. but why? he had this grandiose scheme of how the world could work on such simple terms. it seemed his "plans" (both past and present) were far greater than the average bear. he seemed to have so much going for him by virtue of the way he allowed his thought processes to work. at first glance, you wouldnt see how lucky this guy was, but it was so evident that the power of his mind was something that many people do not have.

again, i couldt stop thinking about the old man and his thoughts for a few days. and in full cheesy fashion, this particular quote just kept poking at me in my head:

"make no little plans, they have no magic to stir men's blood and probably will themselves not be realized." daniel burnham said that. he was the lead architect for the world's fair in chicago in the early 1900's. he was in fact very responsible for so much of chicago's beauty and success as a modern city today.

now i understand there is a bit of cheese factor there, lets be honest.

but this plan! it kept sticking. what was my plan? what was my scheme? what were my thoughts for crying out loud!? surely i want to "stir mens blood" with my actions in life. who doesnt? i would like to open peoples eyes a bit. but how? this idea of harvesting our power as individuals to create that chanelled mental energy to indeed make "plans" that stir the blood of those around us is truly possible (hmm run on sentence? screw it). i do in fact believe that when we take our powers as human beings and project that energy in a focused manner we do in fact have the ability to write our ticket to whatever it is that we strive for.

so i have been thinking about that "plan"-- about that mental energy-- about putting yourself in a good spot upstairs to allow for you to do things in life that are in fact truly meaningful. acts that are worthy of helping you to lead that "fulfilled life." i mean, you only get one shot. here the old man talked of a simplistic scheme of countryside living and doing good. mine.. well, im working on it. you got to!