Drive Like an Egyptian

There seem to be only two rules for driving in Cairo: 1. Every square inch of available road must be occupied at all times. 2. You must be able to prove you have a functioning horn -- every 15 seconds.

There seems to be an intricate code here expressed by honking. One honk means, "don't get in my way." Two honks means, "get OUT of my way." And three honks means "I owe you a new cat."

There's also some code involving flashing the headlights but I can't figure that one out yet.

As much as I hate to say it, I think during this entire trip so far, above everything else - the amazing sights, the interesting people and the incredibly strange food - the one thing I've gained more than anything else is a real appreciation for traffic laws. Really, it's one of those things a person doesn't appreciate until it's gone. At this point, if I had to pick the three things that define a civilization, it would be possessing a written language, a legal system, and crosswalks.

Crosswalks are wonderful. If you haven't appreciated a crosswalk lately, take a moment the next time you are crossing the street to say thanks for the little green man.

One Night (Plus Two Other Nights) In Bangkok

The song says that one night in Bangkok makes a tough man humble. What the song doesn't mention is that's because it's so damn hot. Thailand has three seasons - cool, monsoon, and hot. In a choice demonstrating a certain lack of planning on my part, I chose to visit during the hot season. The "cool" season here averages around 80 degrees, so that gives you an idea of what the hot season is like.

It's hot.

If you can get past the constant sweating, however, it really is a fascinating city. It's fascinating because of the sites (temples, Buddhas, rivers choked with ferry boats), but more so because it's so completely foreign. It's really the first non-Western city I've visited and however Westernized Bangkok actually is (and I have no illusions because today I saw a Buddhist monk wearing an iPod), it seems to me like another planet.

Case in point - I almost walked into an elephant yesterday. Literally. I was walking down the street, and I looked over my shoulder (trying to figure out what sort of food was on the cart I had just passed, and honestly it looked like a fried rat) and when I looked frontwards again, I was staring at an elephant, standing in the middle of the sidewalk.

Admittedly, I think he was there for tourist photos (for a small gratuity), and he was a small elephant (as they go) but it's still not something that's going to happen to a person in San Jose. No matter how much you want your picture taken with an elephant in San Jose, you're probably out of luck. Not so in Bangkok. Elephant photo opportunities, apparently, abound.

I felt sort of bad for the elephant. He obviously didn't enjoy standing there in the crowd, and he gave me a look that said, "You think YOU'RE out of place here, buddy? Try being an elephant on the sidewalk."

I could identify with him. I feel like an elephant on the sidewalk here, myself. I spend a lot of time either lost or getting lost; large, out-of-place, graceless and slow-moving. Throngs of Thai people flow around me like a fat, guidebook-toting island as I stare at the map, again, in confusion.

Bangkok, for all it's wonderful, humid, thronging, elephanty-ness, must be the least pedestrian-friendly city on the planet. Or if there's worse, I don't think I want to visit. First of all, there's no street signs. Second, there are no crosswalks. Crossing the street here involves eyeing oncoming traffic and leaping in front of vehicles that are the least-likely to do serious harm if they hit you. The best are the three-wheeled taxis (tuk-tuks) because not only are the easily maneuverable and can probably swerve around you, but also because if they run you down, they will probably do a lot less damage than, say, a bus. Still, I often stand at a corner and wait for some Thai people to show up and cross with them. I figure a) they probably know what they are doing, and b) drivers may be less-likely to run down a local. But largely, it seems to be a crap shoot.

Getting over the Land Down Under

I'm writing this from the airport in Seoul and everything on this computer is in Korean except the keyboard. I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to post this or if I'll end up accidentally launching missles at North Korea.

I'm on my way to Bangkok now. I left Melbourne this morning (at 4:30 am) and I will get to Thailand after midnight (which is 4 am Melbourne time). So I'm looking at 24 straight hours of travel today. What's even worse is that yesterday was St. Patrick's Day and the bar in the hostel where I was staying in Melbourne had a band. A very loud band. I suppose they were playing Irish music but I decided that all music sounds the same through the wall when you're trying to sleep.

I suppose total, numbing exhaustion is all part of the adventure of travel.

Yesterday I took a tour down the Great Ocean Road, which is the Australian equivalent of the Pacific Coast Highway. It was spectacular, and it was the first time I've seen kangaroo roadkill. I tried to take a picture out of the window of the bus but we were going too fast. My conclusion, however, was that they aren't as cute when they are flat.

I also saw a koala. It was presumably alive because it was still in a tree, but they sleep 22 hours a day so it's hard to be sure if it wasn't stuffed and put there by the tour company.

The most famous natural wonder along the Great Ocean Road is the Twelve Apostles, which are rock formations along the coast. The name is a little misleading, though, because thanks to erosion there are only nine left. But I suppose it would be too expensive to change the signs every time one fell over. Even though there were only nine left, however, it was one of the most spectacular things I've ever seen. I wore out the batteries in my camera taking pictures, but they'll never do it justice. I was sorry to leave Australia so soon.

Didgeri do's and don'ts

If you ever decide to take a trip around the world, my first bit of advice to you is to buy one of those little electric carts you see fat people driving at the mall. My feet are reaching levels of truly exquisite pain. I don't know why anyone would bother with bamboo under the fingernails. Just send your prisoners on three walking tours of Sydney in two days and throw in a musuem on Aboriginal history. Right now, I would admit anything just for a chance to sit on a bench.

"Yes, I have blueprints for nuclear weapons stuffed in my pants. I admit to everything. Please, just don't make me look at the exhibit on didgeridoos."

I keep telling myself that whatever doesn't kill me can only make me stronger. My feet can't hurt this much for five straight weeks. They will either get used to it, go numb completely, or fall off. In any case, they will stop hurting, and if they fall off, I can justify getting a little cart.

Last night I took a "ghost tour" of the oldest part of Sydney, called The Rocks. It's where the first convict settlers lived, and is obviously the site of many ghastly stories involved murder, mayhem and overall bad manners. It's a natural place for a ghost tour, and it was interesting hearing the sordid past history of the city and all its supposed spirit inhabitants. However, I came to the conclusion during the tour that, try as they might, Australians cannot be scary. It's something about that accent. They always sound so jovial. So my poor tour guide, bless him he was trying so hard - flashlight under his chin and the Shakesperian English and everything - and it was just impossible to take him seriously. It was sort of like watching Paul Hogan hosting Masterpiece Theater.

Well, tonight I leave on a flight for Melbourne. I'm looking forward to being able to sit down for at least 90 minutes. I'm hoping for one of those nine-hour delays where the plane is stuck on the tarmac. That would be great.

Paul is Dead

I've been very disappointed by the toilets in Australia. Despite what I've always been lead to believe, they do NOT flush in the wrong direction. I spent several minutes flushing yesterday with my digital camera at the ready and never once was I able to gather photographic proof of the supposed clockwise flush. I got some strange looks doing this, so maybe I shouldn't have been using a public restroom.

After spending several days staring at the Abbey Road poster in my hotel room, I suddenly realized that, encoded within it is a secret message. Brace yourselves. I think Paul is dead! See, he's got bare feet. And also, George is dressed like a gravedigger. This is all very significant, especially when you're jet-lagged. It's such a tragedy. He was so young...

Lest you think Australian popular culture starts and stops with the Beatles, however, I want everyone to know that the American influence can be seen here, as well. Just yesterday I saw a gift shop selling "Vote for Pedro" t-shirts. Everyone in Utah will be happy to know that, once again, you are setting the international standard for campy hipness.

In another odd discovery, I have found that Detroit Tigers hats seem to the be latest fashion craze here. I see them in the windows of clothing stores all over town. I wonder if most people in Australia even know where Detroit is. Also, I want to know -- why the Tigers? Why not the Red Wings? I would think Australians would have a lot easier time identifying with hockey than baseball. After all, this is a nation founded by convicts, and I think 80% of the players in the NHL have arrest records.

I recently developed a blister on my left foot approximately the size of a grapefruit half. Due to this, I have been spending a lot of time today lying in my room watching TV. After several hours of this, I am lead to the unavoidable conclusion that Australian television is the worst on the planet. I thought British television was bad (four channels, all cricket), but it is nothing compared to the television here. Here it is four channels, but they show nothing except quiz shows involving fifth-graders. You might think this was national pride, a public demonstration of the highly educated nature of Australia's youth, but they seem to get most of the questions wrong. Australia may actually have stupider schoolchildren than the US (47% of whom, I read in a recent study, think Abraham Lincoln was the lead singer in REM). I vote we invade them now, while we are still smarter than they are.

Hemispheric Atmospheric

Sydney looked exactly like it was supposed to. My plane from Seoul descended through a layer of clouds just as the sun was rising and my first view of this continent was the Sydney Harbor Bridge and the Opera House sitting on the water in all their iconic splendor. I said to myself "my God, there it is" and the words just popped out of my mouth without any premeditation. It's one of those views that elicit almost a reflexive response of awe.

My hotel, also, elicited a similar reflexive response. In that case, it was "my God, this is it? For eighty dollars a night?" I won't go into too much unpleasant detail, suffice it to say that it features a bunk bed and an Abbey Road poster covering some mysterious stains on the wall. It looks a lot like a dorm room, only not as clean. Sort of like you might picture the dorm at a college that granted degrees in, for example, crack dealing.

Still, after 22 hours on a plane, I was just happy to have access to a flat surface, and I fell quickly asleep. Only later did I wonder if I should have checked first for fleas. I am sure the fleas in Australia can spit paralytic venom over 30 feet. Everything in this country is deadly. Even the cats here are venomous.

After I woke up (thankfully, flea-free) I stumbled out onto the street and walked in ever-widening concentric circles until I located some coffee. I drank two cups of something they call a "tall black", which I later found out was straight espresso served in a cup the size of a washtub. So after that I was able to cross many, many items off my itinerary at high speed, although they were all slightly blurry because my eyes wouldn't stay still. But now, the caffeine has worn off and I'm ready for bed.

Pills, pills, pills!

I was packing tonight and I realized I am taking eight different prescription medications with me on this trip. I have an entire bag devoted to pills. At my doctor's recommendation, I have anti-malaria pills, pills for altitude sickness (Cusco, Peru is at 11,300 feet), antibiotics (for some reason he tossed those in when he found out I was going to Bangkok), pills in case I get typhoid, pills in case I drink the water (if you know what I mean)...I can't keep track of them. For all I know, there are some pills in here that make me invisible and let me see through time.

My primary concern is not that I am going to get sick, it's that I'm going to get arrested for walking around with 65 pounds of pills in my suitcase. I don't want to end up like the guy in "Midnight Express". It's not that I'm too pretty to go to prison, I just hate having a roommate.

I wonder if this is what people mean when they talk about "adventure travel". Can you measure adventure in number of prescriptions? If so, where do I rank having 8 of them? I can't imagine what ailment could befall me that I do not already have a pill to counteract. Maybe there's some disease in New Guinea that makes your hand take on a life of its own and try to strangle you. I don't have a pill for that one. But what good would a pill be when you couldn't even open the child-proof cap because your hand is trying to kill you? I leave it to medical science to address these questions.

I feel a certain amount of embarrassment having all these pills because each pill is physical evidence of my weak, Westernized immune system. Do the Cambodians walk around popping anti-malaria pills all day? No, they don't. They just get malaria. And I bet they don't bitch about it, either.

I wonder if growing up there it's similar to the West, when the neighbor kid gets chicken pox and your parents send you off to play with him. "Why don't you go play with Phirun? He's got malaria and that disease where your hand tries to kill you. Take a sweater."

There's no doubt about it -- my immune system is a pansy.

Advanced Preparations

The closer my departure date creeps, the more sure I become that I am going to forget to do something vital before I leave, and when I come home I will find that I have somehow managed to black out the entire city of San Jose by leaving the iron on, or lost my citizenship, or had my car repossessed.

It's not until I tried to plan a five-week absence from the country that I realized that life really isn't easily put on hold. PG&E doesn't care if I'm on vacation and people are just going to keep sending me mail.

I've done what I can to prepare, but I know that when I arrive home, something will have gone wrong. The lights will be shut off or the fish will be dead. Except I don't have fish. But what if I come home and find someone has MAILED me fish? THOSE fish will most certainly be dead. I don't need that kind of bad karma.

So whoever reads this, don't mail me any fish for the next five weeks.

Anyway, I decided finally that all I can do is try to cross everything off my To Do list and then hope for the best. And remember to throw away the leftover Hamburger Helper.

A few thoughts prior to leaving

I decided to take a trip around the world for three reasons. First, I have a deep fascination and respect for the various cultures that make up the great human experience. Second, I had a lot of frequent flyer miles. And lastly (and perhaps most importantly) I wanted to explore dysentery as a potential weight-loss program.

Therefore, when I realized I had saved up quite a bit of time off at work and double-checked to confirm I was still unmarried and had no children, I decided to cram an extra pair of socks in a sandwich bag and hit the road.

Ha ha. Just kidding of course. It wasn't that easy. A trip around the world requires a surprising amount of advance planning -- things like finding the suitcase that the cat hasn't peed on, buying shoe inserts and doing lots of Google searches such as "tourist shootings at an all-time low in ". Don't forget the quotes.

Some would say that you shouldn't over-plan these things. Some would say let the road rise up to meet you. Some would say let the Earth be your guide. Let the dust of ancient civilizations soak into your pores until you become one with the great, unending cycle of human history. Those people are dumbasses.

The problem is that we've all been sold this idea by today's media that travel isn't really travel unless you end up sitting in some malarial swamp eating stew made from toad scrotums and spit and picking ticks the size of cantaloupes out of your hair. People aren't allowed to say "I went to Paris and stayed at the Westin" anymore because that just elicits a round of eye-rolling that implies you might as well have stayed home watching CHIPs re-runs and eating TV dinners.

Apparently, the theory goes, the rest of the world has now been so Americanized that unless you have to be inserted into your vacation spot by green berets, your trip overseas doesn't count. To me this seems like the ultimate irony because thanks to Netflix and pizza delivery, most of the time the only thing that gets the average American out of his or her home is a gas leak. In other words, it's easy to criticize someone else for not taking enough travel risks as you wedge another handful of Cheez Its into your mouth.

I, for one, don't want to hear it. Yes, admittedly, there are lots of places in the world where the influence of America is felt, where people cater to tourists and where toilet seats are sealed with "For Your Protection" wrappers. But I say, don't discount these places. I say, embrace your sanitized toilet (not literally) and your bottled water. For God's sake, at least you're leaving the house.