Are you familiar with Murphy's Law? I used it several times in my Watson interview to illustrate how I understand things can go wrong under the worst circumstances. I thought I understood such a scenario having had some hard times before. That was until June 26, 2008 and the following six days in India. Let's see, in that week my bike has broken badly three times forcing me to hitchhike though rioting Kashmir, rode in the back of rickshaws with my bike and a small army of Kashmiri, Pakistanis and Afghani staring at me for a combined total of 100km, riots in Srinigar and Kashmir making me a hostage in the city while awaiting my bike repair, found myself between the rioting mob and police barricade just like out of a climatic movie scene, my travel agency mysteriously closed with flights in a mess, favorite sunglasses finally broke after 11 months of travel, and had to sell my beloved bike, Chibuku, for spare parts to a mechanic in order to make my flight from Delhi to Hong Kong. I like to call this a Beautiful Nightmare orchestrated to perfection turning my last week in India into a comedy rather than a tragedy. R.I.P. ChibukuI then headed to China for a brief tour with my brother before coming home. I was curious to visit my first "communist" country of the trip, but my fears soon disappeared once I arrived to find a KFC on every corner with McDonalds, Pizza Hut and Subway on the adjacent corner. And if that wasn't enough, I somehow found myself in a lesbian bar in the middle of Chengdu, a city you have probably never heard of that has 13 million people and a solid blanket of smog covering it. The hot pink walls with yellow and tin foiled honeycomb design should have given me a hint that it was a gay bar but I kept telling myself. "This is China not San Fran...There are no gay bars in Communist China." I sat down at a table, ordered a beer, and started to notice my fellow short haired customers had unusually large chests...no..ok..they are girls. But these girls were very touchy-feely with their longhaired female companions. What's the deal? Finally, a short haired Tom Boy comes over with a dolled up long haired feline in tow to talk with me in broken English."What you doing here" she asks"Traveling""No, no, what you doing here" pointing around the bar, "You not lesbian...this lesbian bar!""Yes it is..and...well...I don't know what I am doing here?"I decided to stay for a couple beers to check things out. The girls that called me out for not being a lesbian soon became my friends. They tried to answer several of my questions about the bar: "How long has this bar been open?" "Is there a big gay scene in China?" etc. The conversation didn't get very far due to the language barrier and my curiosity was not satisfied. I decided to leave once my newfound friend got up and declared, "I love Hitler!" I spit out my beer yelling, "What!” She yelled again," I love Hitler for his passion!" I tried to tell her that Hitler's passion was directed directly against her, but she didn't understand. I decided to leave. It was getting weird. The first person I met at the next bar was from West Virginia. Needless to say, it was yet another bizarre night.I left from NYC July 21, 2007 making it an even year on the road living out of a backpack. The clothes that have made the entire journey with me don't really fit anymore: falling straight of me without a belt. It is not like I really want to wear them anyway because they smell like they have been in a backpack for a year! I have one week left before I return to the States: broke, tired and in desperate need of some home cooking. It is strange what you miss when you are on the road. I have thought about it a lot, and I miss biscuits the most. Biscuits, as we know them in America, don't really exist anywhere else.
August 28, 2008
Wrapping it up...
