I FEEL A CHILL, LIKE A LONG, WHITE VEIL

Our hostel in Bangkok was located in what is apparently Thailand's Wedding District. Did you know they have wedding districts? The female portion of our readership need not answer, pursuant to the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. There were literally wedding shops on every corner, upstairs, downstairs, across alleys and over little bridges. There was no getting away from them. There were so many of them that the only way to tell if one was nearby was that Mark always turned pale beneath his sunburn and his hands started shaking. Uncanny. It was kind of like having Sting around to warn of Goblins and Orcs.

By the way, I am officially declaring the Great Facial Hair Experiment a failure. It's not so much that my sideburns totally let me down in the deal by coming in really patchy and unevenly, which could be fixed by simply omitting them altogether, but because my mustache simply failed to come to the party. It's hard to actually describe how bad it looks, but knowing Seth, he'll take a picture. I'm only keeping it because it keeps the touts at bay. They think I have mange.

We spent our first day in Bangkok in our usual way: walking the city until our feet fell off, seeing everything within walking distance. We had some quite interesting times down in the city center at the Royal Palace and Wat Pho, a massive Buhddist Temple. We ended up taking an extremely crowded river ferry down the river to the business district, where we had dinner up at the top of the Baiyoke Sky Tower, which is the tallest building in Thailand.

Awesome view of the city, and we (Seth and I since Mark is indisposed to fine seafood) were enjoying some really great sushi when a live band started up around the corner of the circular dining room. We listened for a while, trying to figure out the style of music, but like most of the cover bands we have heard on this trip, the style is schizophrenic to say the least. For a while it was Thai pop, then they tried a little metal, and eventually settled into re-makes of American oldies. However, our curiousity got the better of us when they launched into "Jumbalaya" and we just had to have a look. We went round to the stage to discover three very short Thai men playing like mad on drums, guitar, and bass in the background and three leggy Thai girls in go-go outfits singing their hearts out in the spotlights. "Jumbalaya, Jumbalaya......." I have no words for the weirdness. I think we laughed the entire 83 stories down to the ground.

If I ever decide to become an Ex-pat, Thailand is the current leading candidate. We talked with our driver to the Bridge Over the River Kwai, and discovered that if you wanted to live in Kanchadpuria, the nearest city to the bridge, you could do so quite comfortably on around $2,200 per year. The food is great, the people are very friendly, and it's really a beautiful country. In fact, the hostel we stayed at was run by an Aussie ex-pat called "Big John" who had lived in Bangkok for 10 years and loved it. In fact, that led to one of the more interesting stories of the trip. We were up late one night, discussing world politics with John and an ex-pat liberal from Utah, when he stated, appropos of something, "She was my first wife--or actually, my first Thai wife." Turns out his first Thai wife lives in Australia, while he lives in Thailand. She liked Australia more, and he liked Thailand more, so they switched countries and have been happy ever since.

We also got introduced to the wild world of Australian Rules Football, which is a hoot. Not as blatantly violent as Rugby, but more more demanding physically than American football, the games last 100 minutes, and speed, strength, reach, endurance, and jumping are all demanded of the players. It turned out that the next day was the Aussie Rules championship between the West Coast Eagles and the Signey Swans. The whole hostel turned out for it in the downstairs restaurant, as well as any Aussie ex-pats who needed a satilite uplink to the game.

As a side note, we met a lot of nice Aussies while climbing the Great Wall, and it was rather odd to be exchanging "Where did YOU watch the game?" stories with them from the top of one of the great wonders of the world. Airports won out by a narrow margin, but the other American guy with us had seen it in a bar in the Blue Mountains during his tour of the Australian prison system. You can't say you don't meet interesting people while traveling.

Beijing started out as a complete mess. After yet another red-eye flight, Seth's bag got lost on the way from Bangkok, we lost the directions and address to the hostel and had a shady taxi driver try to take advantage of the whole thing. We just wanted to get to an internet cafe to look up the address, but he took us into town and dropped us off at a random spot and demanded big time $$. We settled for a fairly stiff amount based on the fact that he had the ability to communicate in Mandarin with any police officers who might have happened to be around, and my Mandarin is pretty much limited to saying things like, "He's a vegetarian. Bring him no more rat." We ended up getting there in the course of 4 hours, two buses, two miles of walking, and some help from some friendly university students who wanted to sell us paintings.

The Forbidden City is the largest Imperial space we have yet seen. It goes on for palace after palace, courtyard after courtyard, bridge after bridge, and stairway after stairway. We walked as quickly as we could, and it took as 30 minutes just to get through the main palace complex. Tianamein Square is equally as large, as is the complex for the Temple of Heaven, where the Emporers went to receive affirmation of their status as the "Sons of Heaven."

Capitalism has definitely hit Beijing. They have defunded the Universities to some extent, and made the students and teachers responsible for raising funds. This has led to a proliferation of little basement "student" shops for artwork and painting. The students sell their paintings there with no tax or duty and no interference from the government. The professors, in order to raise more money, contribute some amazing pieces that are unsigned. If they signed the works, they would be labelled as national treasures, and purchasers would not be able to take them out of the country. The result is that you can buy some fantastic works at a great discount while making the entire art department of a major university greatful. We found three that we really liked and worked out a deadl for them. They even threw in a free Chairman Mao portrait! Mark is going to keep it in his room, next to his Ronald Reagan Stamp picture. We got through Chinese customs with them all right, but I'm a tad worried about returning to the US.

The Great Wall. Not much to say about it, actually, except you really need to see it. Our "discount" tour consisted of a bus to the Wall, and then 4 hours to climb around on it. Great fun. They gave us a massive expanse of wall to walk on, and we got over most of it, at the expense of our legs and feet.

We left Beijing at 5am and hit the airport where security was the tightest we've seen yet. They searched the bags exhaustively, and by the time we were done, we were on the run to get to the right terminal. The end result was that we ended up at the gate with 20 minutes to flight time, and $120US in Chinese Yuan, which cannot be changed outside of China at the moment because of the way they peg their currency against international value. (It's complicated, and likely to get more so). End result: 20 minutes for three tired, jetlagged guys to have a mad shopping spree in perfume stores! I parked Seth in a little cafe to drink orange juice, and embarked on a mad search with Mark for Something To Buy. The only thing we could find in our gate area was a mostly Chinese language book shop that had a few things we could recognize. Mark dropped out partway through, citing boredom, tiredness, and covetessnous of Seth's orange juice, but I manage to buy a very motley assortment of random things, including a movie called "The Seven Swords" and a 10-disk Jackie Chan extravaganza that we are hoping will have English subtitles even though there's no English on the box, a thriller written by an ex-NFL lineman (for Mark), two Chinese folk music CD's, a CD by a Chinese girl-group that nobody recognized, a map of Beijing (for next time), a book of anecdotes about the Emperors, and two 4 volume translations of the Chinese classics "Outlaws of the Marsh" and "Journey to the West." That's what you get when you force a guy to go shopping in an airport with money that has become as worthless to him as monopoly money.

Next up: Last Stop, Tokyo-the Tale of Mark in a Sushi Bar

JS®

'ROUND THE WORLD BOOK CLUB

One of the interesting things about traveling light is that you can't afford to have too much weight or space in your pack taken up by books. But books are absoluately indispensable to the traveler, including travel books and reading material for planes, trains, busses, and taxis. The upshot is that everyone reads everyone else's books, which usually means that everyone reads MY books since I'm the one who thought to pack them. This leads to interesting statements such as, " I'll trade you the "Foreign Affairs" magazine and the "Clash of Civilizations" for your "Rising Sun." We have multiple forms of bookmark in everything we have, from ticket stubs, napkins, and turned corners to empty rice cracker bags and the occasional passport or customs form. I had to resign myself to the inevitable destruction of the books, which is quite hard for an Obsessive Compulsive person, and they are slowly deteriorating.

So far we have all shared the above mentioned books, as well as Til We Have Faces, Pilgrim of Hate, The Motorcycle Diaries (which Mark read whining and complaining about reading "communist" propaganda), a set of Ray Bradbury short stories (I Sing the Body Electric), and all of our well-worn tour books.

Coming soon: The Round the World Book Club's Quiet-Nearly-Exhaustive review of Til We Have Faces.

.........AND POKER CLUB

The Poker Club got started in Kathmandu, when the plane we were supposed to be boarding developed a problem, and they shooed us all into an enclosed waiting room. Mark was already kind of annoyed because he'd got frisked by the same guy three times in the course of getting through security, and another delay inevitably meant another search, so we distracted him by getting out all of our money and the deck of cards to play poker on the floor. Nothing like a 4 hour delay while playing poker with random currency. The paper was easy, since everything just got face value, no matter the actual worth, but the coins were too varied to figure out (and it really does not matter since we were not playing for money) . We ended up doing them by size. Small coin for little blind, big coin for big blind, and we were off, throwing around 100,000 Lira coins like they were nothing. (Well, they actually are nothing, but that doesn't sound very impressive. It sounds terribly better to say, "I'll see your 200 Rupees, and raise you 100,000 Lira.")

Had a good game, with a lot of people coming over to watch and laugh, although I think Mark got distracted whenever the frisky security guard walked by, especially since we were playing with about 1,000 in Indian Rupees right beneath the sign saying, "It Is Offence Some Serious To Have Indian Rupees More Than 100." They'd probably have fined us Seventy Billion Lira and six Mark friskings if they'd noticed.

At the beginning of the trip, I had this idea that we would keep a running clock of the amount of time we spent lost on the trip and report it with each blog. Didn't work out, though, because it turns out that we are better navigators than I thought. We got lost of the first time in Kathmandu, about 3 weeks into the trip. Not really lost, it was just that we couldn't find our hotel in the twisting, narrow little streets. Kathmandu is great. It's basically a quiet little town of 20-some million, except with soldiers with AKs. They have that whole civil war with the Maoist rebels going on, so they are kinda uptight. We spent a lot of time threading through the winding streets, eating at random places with Seth and I hoping they were serving us Monkey.

Got interrupted at one point by a tour of the city by King Gyanedra and his wife. Quite a show! Like any dictatorship, they had bused in kids and peasants to the city squares, and the place was packed. We jostled with the crowd and caught sight of Something Going By, which I think was the King, but we didn't even know what was happening at the time, so we just jostled extra hard and squinted like everyone else. Found out later that the next day there were quite a few protests in the square and that the residents were particularly mad about a Kathmandu man who had been putting up a triumphal arch and had been killed when a passing car snagged a dangling rope and pulled the whole thing down into the street.

We got a chance to take a flight up to the Himalayas for a veiwing, which turned out to be pretty interesting. Spurning such clearly inferior choices as "YetiAir" and "Spice Airlines" (Is that where the Spice Girls went? I mean, seriously, did the whole part of the group that didn't marry David Beckham decide to invest the funds from their 20 minutes of fame, and someone suggested, "Hey, let's start an airline!," and then only later did they discover it only operated in parts of the world where they don't have people who can vaguely remember what their music sounds like? Anybody have any inside info on this?) we jumped on a Buhdda Air Beech 1990C and took off for the mountains. Descriptions in travelogues are always boring, so suffice it to say that the Himalayas and Mt. Everest knifing through a thick cover of pure white clouds ranks up there with the sights that will always remain in my mind.

We also went to one of the oldest Hindu temples in Kathmandu. I wanted to see one from the inside, but disappointingly, they won't let any non-Hindus into the actual temple-proper. I'm guessing their altar-calls are pretty awkward. The rest of the temple was pretty interesting. Imagine something out of Indiana Jones, but totally overrun with monkeys and other primates. The smell was something else.

Coming soon: Tiger doodoo, the Bridge, Floating Chaos, and Sushi With a View and an Asian Go-Go Band

JS®

SEVEN DAYS RECAP

For those of you confused by the wanderings of the Legal Pad, here is a synopsis of our last seven days.

Day 1: Caught an overnight flight from Hungary to Egypt. Took a tour of the Pyramids, Sphinx, and Museum of Antiquities, etc, etc.

Day 2: Went to see the Suez Canal and the Red Sea (went swimming, got escorted all day via police) and ended up on a cruise down the Nile River with a bunch of really horrendous musicians (I will never think of Stevie Wonder’s “I just called to say I love you” the same again).

Day 3: Left for India. Had a long stay over in Jordan so rented a driver and went to see the Dead Sea (ten kilometers from where John baptized Jesus on the Jordan and we drove within sight of Mt. Nebo as well) the lowest place in the world within a stone’s throw from Egypt. Arrived in India, ordered room service and had 75 cent omelettes (we were robbed).

Day 4: Bummed around in India and saw numerous dogs, pigs, cows, chickens, and people. We have it good in America. Did you know that most people in the world still do not use toilet paper? Saw some temples and stuff. Used public transport.

Day 5: Visited to Taj Mahal. It's a long ways from Delhi. Back to Dehli and on a plane to Nepal.

Day 6: Nepal gets Legal Pad visit despite State Department warning that American's should not visit here because they will get no help from their government. Ronald Reagan's most feared phrase in the English language "We're from the government and we're here to help" do not apply to state department situations, however, Nepal rocks!
Saw some temples. Lots of monkeys. Buddha, Hindus, but no Maoist soldiers. Seth was disappointed.

Day 7: Took a little plane ride around Mt. Everest, the highest land in the world, just four days after visiting the lowest land in the world. What a life. Mt. Everest and it's tall neighbors are awesome. Flew on Buddha airlines. Where's the peace? Where's the joy?

MB

Traffic: Turkey, India.

Taxi. Turkish. Turkish Taxi. Not for the faint of heart. Actually, I think that those cabs should have one of warnings that really crazy rides at amuzement parks carry: "Do not use this ride if you are under three feet tall, pregnant, have back problems, high blood pressure, any types of phobias, any nervous condition, or are in danger of having a stroke." Actually, it might include some further governent warnings such as those commonly found on tobacco products sold by Phillip Morris.

Come to think of it, certain religious bodies might also encourage the placement of some certain warnings on those cabbies as well. They might include a warning against travelling in them if you have any moral compunctions about a complete disregard for all sorts of civil authority and a basic, if not complete disregard for the sanctity of pedestrian life.

We've all seen law enforcement vehicles responding to some sort of emergency with their lights and sirens blazing. They have these tools for the general purpose of allowing them to move through traffic faster than any other type of vehicle. It also gives them the ability to properly disregard normal traffic control devices. It would seem that Turkish Taxis have been endowed with both of these privileges. However, they have not been given the lights nor the sirens. Their horns do work though.

Through experiencing Turkish taxis from both the pedestrian and passenger vantage point, I learned something. Turkey is not Rome. Sure, you can cross the street whereever you wish. The catch is, the traffic doesn't stop. Cars, taxis in particular, might give you a mild swerve for sporting purposes but they sure aren't going to stop.

That horn - just one small beep is all that is given. If you are walking, and you hear that beep behind you, best jump to the side of the road because something is rolling up on you fast. On a city street, where the speed limit was 30kmph and the street was actually shared with a trolley one taxi took us to our destination, after very mild hints that there was a hurry involved, at speeds hitting up to 120kmph.

In fact, in heavy traffic, we saw a police vehicle, using all of its special equipment to cut a swath through traffic get straight up passed at double speed by a taxi who had to play chicken with oncoming busses to do it. The only reason we could find for that was that the cabby had a fare. Not to mention the time that in a mini bus we ran a redlight at a 100kmph. Oh, wait, the driver did blow his horn as he went through. (I guess in Turkey that makes it all better.)

So, the bottom line is this: First, I don't think deaf people can survive as pedestrians in Istanbul - they should always be on the passenger side of things. Second, horns - not brakes - seem to be the most important safety feature of almost any vehicle. Third, and last, please make sure you're right with God before you walk or ride in that wonderful city where East meets West. Theologically it's a good idea anyway. Best take care of it now.

Don't worry . . .coming soon: Traffic and cabby report on Cairo, Egypt.

Language Barriers and the laws of unintended consequences

I have truly learned that there is more to a conversation than the conversation itself. There are many things happening (And that is true even when both people are actually paying attention to the conversation and not wandering through it on auto pilot.)

Even when speaking the same language, there is what I said, what I meant to say, what I should have said to convey what I meant, what the other person thought I said, what they thought I meant, what they said, what. . . et al. You get the point. This little minor part of communication is very pronounced when crossing large language barriers. I mean languages that don't have much in common. Sort of like Turkish and English, for instance.

Turkish Delight. Good stuff. (Just read the Chronicles of Narnia.) We bought some in Istanbul. We ate some. We were going to buy more. So, walking along, we attempted the purchase along the side of the road. (That is where most purchases occur there.) The long and short of the story is that all three of us turned out to be trying to purchase Turkish Delight from a stand that pretty much only sold contraceptives. . . .(They should pass legislation prohibiting all the colorful packaging. Its confusing to the language impaired.)

Actually, English and Nepalese don't mix well either. Last night, while Mark steadfastly did his best to find all the American TV and news stations he could in his room, Jeremy and I ventured to the lobby of our temporary abode in search of sustenance. Basically, it seemed that what we wanted could not be had. Then we agreed to just have whatever was on hand but I asked if I could just look at there food and drink and pick out what I wanted. This was agreed upon, or so I thought.

The man took us outside, into the pouring rain, and about a half mile through rising run off water. We ended up at a store. It was closed. So was the second one. I was thinking to myself that it was awefully funny that they would trek a half mile in the rain to get food. Wouldn't they have some at the hotel? (Hostel, whatever.)

In the end, it turned out that the man thought we weren't happy with his described selection and had taken it upon himself to try to find us a better selection at about 11:30 at night, even if that did mean running arround for a mile in the rain. He even refused a tip for his trouble saying it was his duty to try to help us. Jeremy and I upon conference, chose our food from his selection and forced a 100 rupee tip into his hand for his troubles. He was infinitely pleased and thankful. All said, the food drink and tip cost us one rainy mile of trekking and about $6 US.

Then there was the guy in Egypt to made a comment that he would find an Egyptian girl for me. . .that went about as far as my subsequent comment that it would only work if he could promise me that her father wouldn't try to shoot me with an AK when he found out I voted for Bush. No real language barrier there.. . . . we ended up that day with an armed police escort "for our safety". But hey - we still swam where the Red Sea meets the Suez Canal.

I would just hate to see what happens when the law of language barriers and unintended consequenses crosses a Turkish Taxi ride. . . . .

SNO

"YOUR HOME OUT YOUR COURTRY"

So we have seen the Pyramids. They were interesting. Big and impressive. We have seen the Sphinx. Also big and impressive. We have seen the Nile. It's like football in mud--dirty and brown but kinda fun. We have seen the Egyptian Museum, and it also big and very easy to get lost in. But the lasting image of Egypt that I have is the band on the Nile dinner cruise, warbling out-of-key renditions of old Stevie Wonder songs with only a bass and synthesizer to back up the enthusiastic, if tonally disadvantaged singers. I gotta say, the Japanese tourists ate it all up......

So the English language isn't really that hard, but some of the mistranslations can be hilarious, such as the one up above. A hostel had clearly gone to great pains to make their setup more American, including naming it The Big Apple, and placing pictures of New York City in the windows, but it sort of broke down with the motto on the sign apparently trying to say "Home Away From Home."

Suez is an interesting place, mainly for the fish and the great logic bubbles that apparently exist there. We started out for our tour by having the tour guide tell the security checkpoint that we were Australian. We generally considered this to be an insult to Australians everywhere, including any still in Australia. But since the option of telling them we were American involved a 2 hour wait for an escorted van to come take us to our destination, we went along with it. Apparently they think the general populace is a little bit touchy about the whole Iraq issue. So we merely got the motorcycle escort into town. We were assigned a chubby motorcycle policeman, who clearly expected to be one of the party. He did what we did, ate what we ate, and happily wandered through town with us, taking bribes wherever he could get them. He clearly enjoyed his celebrity and the free food even more.

But the most funny part about Suez is that they wouldn't let us actually see the locks. Which is strange, because they cited security reasons. Now, that I would understand, except they let, and get ready for this part, but they let SHIPS through the locks, and I have it on good authority that some of the ships have people on them. Cruise ships even! So we may need to let them know that they have a major security breach. If anyone's Aunt Margaret gets arrested for looking at the locks on a Red Sea Cruise, don't say I didn't warn you. Seth and I did have good fish, though. They have a saying in Suez, "If you've been to Suez, and haven't eaten the fish, you haven't been to Suez." I haven't seen the locks, but I've clearly been to Suez because I had a lot of fish, and it was good. We settled for swimming in the Red Sea where it joins the Suez canal, but the policeman didn't come. Something about not knowing how to swim and being afraid of accidentally seeing the locks, but I think he just wanted more free fish. Did you know that they nationalized the Suez canal about 20 years ago, taking it from the French and British companies so they could use the fares to finance the Aswan Dam? It's known as Anti-Capitalism, and you can find it in Egypt, just left of the Pyramid of Cheops.

By the way, we were at the Citadel of Cairo, built by Saladin during the crusades to protect Cairo, on the Islamic holy day (Friday) at the time of the main call to prayer, and we had a fantastic view of the city. All of Cairo, with its 16 million in the greater area, was visible, with the thousands of minarets poking through the afternoon haze. When the call to prayer went out, each minaret picked it up with their own Imam making the cry from loudspeakers attached to the towers. The entire city was alive with it. It's hard to describe a feeling from a moment like that, with the cry echoing and re-echoing across the city, and I'm not sure whether it was really a good or a bad feeling, but it was unlike anything I have ever experienced before. There's a random thought for you.

By the way, they made a serious mistake in our flight bookings. They accidentally got us on a good airline. After losing contents of bags, having electric items carefully padded in the center of the bag broken, being charged for water, and getting neckaches from rough landings, we were mistakenly booked on Royal Jordanian. Now there is a airline. They stuff food and drinks down your throat from beginning to end, and when we discovered that we had a 10 hour layover in Amman, we didn't even suspect that we were going to get a hotel room and a bus for the interim, complete with a buffet lunch. Nice. So we abandoned our plans of trying to sneak out of the airport to see a little of the town, and instead booked a full city tour complete with a trip to the Dead Sea.

I have some advice for you, if you're ever at the Dead Sea. Don't try to drink the water to see what it tastes like. Amazingly nasty stuff--just unbelievably salty. Amman is a somewhat interesting city, mainly because there is an edict out there that all buildings must be built with white stone. Makes the city strangely homogenous, and I was not left with a strong impression of the city or the people. Not really a friendly bunch, to be honest. We pestered the tour guide with all of our usual questions, but he could give a clam lessons in shutting up.

"DEHLI: A GOOD PLACE TO PEE"

I am proposing the foregoing motto for the city of Dehli. I apologize for the apparent crudeness, but really, try the alternatives: none of them work well in a motto, and most of them are much, much cruder. I have a problem with a city where you can relieve yourself whenever, and wherever you like. They do have interesting taxis, though. They replaced the hand-pulled cart with motortrikes in the last few years, and man, they can fly for tricycles with a riding mower engine strapped on the back. They also have the microbus. You can picture one like this: Take a Toyota minivan, vintage 1985, and shrink it by about 40%. Then stuff the same amount of people in it as a normal minivan, and give it a louder horn, and you've got your average microvan. Also, the idea of a family car is a little bit different here. In America, if you have two kids, you're thinking about a fancy minivan or a large SUV. Here they think: Motorscooter time! You can actually get 4 people on one, provided two are kids. The signs on the trike-taxis are good, too. They say, "Horn Please," and "Stay Back." They got the horn part down, believe me, but there's a better chance that a Hollywood marriage will last than of anybody staying back.

"PLEASE SIR, MAY I SHINE YOUR HYUNDAI?"

I had a real moment in India. It happened like this: we were driving back from Agra, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a car come past. It was a Hyundai Acccent, new model, tinted back windows, nice rims, and an arm out the passenger side window. It passed everyone with ease, and shot away, music blaring, and my actual thought was, "Man, that's a nice car!" I really need to get out of central Asia......

India is weird. We were greated by signs advertising "Cheap Local STD'S!" I was thinking that truth in advertising had gone a little too far, but then we realized that it is some sort of telecommunications service. The signs are everywhere. They also, in actual fact, do let animals roam free everywhere, and no one touches them or shooes them away. Cows in the road, cows in the street, cows laying down in front of shops. Dogs everywhere, pigs running in herds--it's all there. They even had a herd of cows and bulls docily walking down the highway to Agra and the Taj Mahal.

By the way, the Taj Mahal is beautiful. Big surprise, I know, but it is. They have actually banned cars in the near area and polluting industry within 50 kilometers because the pollution is staining the previously snow-white marble. Because of time restraints, we didn't really eat anything the whole day we were going to the Taj, and I think our driver thought we were nuts. I considered explaining to him that in OUR country, the Taj Mahal is always a restraurant, so we just assumed we'd eat there, but his English was a little sketchy and my Hindi even worse. In any event, there was no Taj Mahal Special for us.

It appears that just about everyone wants to get out of Dehli. We were approached by a waiter, a very nice guy, who was just desperate for us to fix his Visa for him, which had been canceled. What he really wanted to do, and I am not making this up, is to move to New Jersey to work with his brother at a gas station. He might have been a little confused, though, because he'd never heard of a 7-11. He was very disappointed to find out we couldn't give him a job at OUR gas station.

JS®

"YOUR HOME OUT YOUR COURTRY"

BATHING IN BUDAPEST

No trip to Budapest is complete without a visit to some of the famous natural springs that the health conscious (in regard to famous natural springs) people of Budapest love so much.

After walking many, many miles in search of the famous natural springs, we came upon some ministry of health thing in the general area. Evidently they use the same natural springs in an attempt to cure some of the problems native to Hungary: no ability to tan, obesity, and 50 years of communism.

After our entrance fee was safely paid we entered into the indoor facilities of the bath to find a really, super cold pool of water. This is supposed to make you appreciate the lukewarm water contained in the next pool and then really love the large hot tub like pool after that. Super cold water did its job well.

To be perfectly frank, the overall experience seemed like a letdown at that point. But we discovered a smooth flow of people going outside and found where the real action was (uhm, outside). Three absolutely huge pools fed by the natural springs and designed so that people can stay in there all day. One pool (and this may seem hard to believe) was actually designed for swimming, the second was an oversize hot tub of sorts and the third one had a really nifty current that you could get in and be swept around in the current like you were in a river above some falls.

Children playing, tourists eating food at one of the pool side tables, old men playing chess (built in chess boards in the pool), teenagers dunking each other in the pool, and the ever present problem of the European Speedo wearing middle-aged male (in the baths, hanging out at parks, they lurk while seeking the ever elusive tan).

Yes, this is a problem of great magnitude. Evidently in Europe they face a mid-life crisis through clothing rather than cars. While this may save money, a Corvette driving American beats a Speedo wearing European man any day of the week when it comes to taste.

Here's to signs that say "No shoes. No Shirt. No Service."

After surviving the baths, we hit Margaret (sp) Island. Actually, Seth and Jeremy decided to hit a cafe and read for awhile, so I rented a bike and set out to see the sights. The most remarkable thing about the island (most of which was arranged for athletic training, with biking and jogging trails, swimming facilities, kung fu lessons, etc) was the fountain.

They actually had a fountain that would spout forth different water patterns in time to classical music. Very cool. And no mid-life crisis goers in sight.
MB

"DOES YOUR DOG HAVE A TICKET, MA'AM?"

I need the help of all you out there in TVland. Can someone please check on Australia to see if they have any people left in the country? I think they might all be in Europe for the summer, because I met 1/2 of Melbourne in Istanbul, half of Perth in Budapest, and Sydney seems to be spread pretty much everywhere. I suspect if someone checks on Parliament, they'll find two janitors and a maid, playing parcheesi on the lecturn, and all the rest of the folk on holiday in Bermuda. You might check on Ireland as well--I think they may be running short of Random Irish Guys. They seem to appear just about everywhere, always traveling alone in a weird place, always having just finished up exactly three pints at the local pub no matter the time of day, and often with no pack, no money, and no map, trying to find their way to the Irish embassy to get home after having been, allegedly, "slipped a Mickey before they robbed me of me tote."

Well, we have left Istanbul, and we weep for the parting. You treated us well, Fair Constantinople. Before we left, however, we went to see the Basillica Cistern, which is a neat place underground. Justianian built it around 532 a.d., and it is a massive underground water storage vault, completely sealed and arched, like a giant underground temple. When the Turks finally took over the city in nearly 1000 years later, it was still functioning, but the Turks did not know about it, and apparently, no one thought to tell them. It stayed there, beneath their feet for 100 years, until apparently one day some bright young Turk wondered why the heck the local people were fishing in their basements. Having conquered Central Asia and major parts of Europe and Africa, the Turks are somewhat quick when given a super-obvious hint, and decided that Something Was Fishy, and it was probably carp. One thing led to another, and the next thing you know, they had a thousand year old fish-filled cistern on their hands. You can now wander down its arched halls looking at the water and the fish and listening to soft classical music. It would have been quite romantic if Mark and Seth had showered and hadn't smelled so rank.

Seeing as we were about to embark on another hair-raising plane ride, we decided to go to the Turkish bath to relax. This is basically a time-honored Turkish tradition where they heat you up for an hour in a sauna-like room made all of marble until you want to die, think you are going to die, and in fact, actually start to expire. Then they unexpectedly thrown buckets of cold water on you, and the massage and bath begins. You lie on marble slabs, and the massage basically consists of mashing you into the marble slab until you melt. Then they throw more cold water on you, and rub heck out of you with giant loofah sponges. I don't think I've ever been so clean in my entire life. The baths were designed by Sinan, the architect of Sulyemain the Magnificent, and have been in continual use for 455 years.

Just for those of you wondering, what with the current spate of plane crashes in little countries on little airlines and all, no, we are NOT flying on any of those airlines in any of those countries. We are flying on airlines almost exactly LIKE those airlines in countries almost exactly like those countries. So to get to Hungary, we got on a Malev Hungarian Airlines airbus without a worry in our heads, and, in the time-honored tradition of travelers everywhere, promptly fell asleep until the plane slammed us awake against the runway.

Hungary is an interesting place. It's a little disorganized, and has a few too many communist-era housing developments on the outskirts, but overall it's lots of fun. You can even take your dog on the subway in Budapest! But you have to muzzle it, and it has to have its own ticket. They're most particular about the ticket--not so much about the muzzle.

They also have this cool place, overlooking the palace complex, called Gellert Hill. It is completely surrounded by random parks, in which maintenance seems to be frowned on, and it is prime real estate with stunning views of the river and city below. The hill was named Gellert Hill long before the current city was built, and the story of the hill goes like this:

There once was a heathen town located on the Buda side of the river, before it had joined with the town of Pest located across the Danube, to form the modern city. They lived on the hill, and seeing as they were heathens and all, Bishop Gellert set out to convert them. However, being heathens, they rather resented his efforts, and one day, being a little bit fed up and never having managed to learn the Ten Commandments or the Virtue of Patience and Longsuffering, they corked him up in an old wine barrel and bunged him off the steepest cliff on the hill. However, they eventually felt bad about their disrespect and devaluation of a good wine barrel, and named the hill after the deceased bishop.

As a side note, we are now completely disoriented. After too many overnight flights and time changes and currency changes, we now no longer know what day it is, what time it is, what city we are in (some of the time) and how much a million lira is. A million lira is like 160 Forints, which is like 80 cents, which is like 5 Egyptian Pounds, which is like two-thirds of a Euro, and I think it is Friday at 7 p.m. I am not sure of the calendar date, but I'm pretty sure it's somewhere in the September teens.

Coming soon: The Budapest Public Baths (Subtitle: do speedos beckon the Apocalypse?), and Driving in Europe, Asia, and Africa (Subtitle: We're All Going to Die Before We Reach the Speedo Shop).

JS®

Eight is Enough

Upon our arrival in Budapest, we took several forms of public transportation (there's more than one way to transport dirt and debris and incidentally, some people via public transport) until arriving near St. Stephen's Basillica. Practically in the shadow of St. Stephens was our youth hostel. Inside of our youth hostel was our room, and inside of our room was 8 beds.

Oftentimes, this sort of housing arrangement leads to uncomfortable situations where some roommates want to stay up until late and disturb everyone else, etc. However, intelligent, sensitive people realize that there are ways around this problem without the dreaded "just go to bed" option being activated.

Of course, I am referring to inviting everyone out for a night on the town.

Genuis struck. A group was formed. 7 of the 8 roommates were recruited (the other was no where to be found) and Budapest was now under seige.

A word on the make up of our group. Out of seven people, 5 were trial lawyers (The Legal Pad plus 2 jolly Irishman), 1 was in international finance (taking the year off. What a jolly idea), and the last one was a college student from England studying Embryology.

The night started off innocently enough with a conversation about public health care and capitalism from the English point of view. Then it moved into the irish situation, their economics, Roman Catholic theology and how it relates, their policing habits and how it differs from ours and why, traditional European power, the rise of China and how it relates to international finance, trial courts here, in Ireland, and other parts around the world, great literature, and of course, "The Simpson's."

More facts and figures were thrown around the room than mentioned in a month's full of stateside conversations and the next thing I knew, it was 5 AM and "welcome to a Budapest sunrise!" It really didn't seem like 5 AM. Actually, maybe it was only 4.

But it just goes to show that put a bunch of entertaining people together and the dullest place in the world becomes a vacation wonderland.

Yes, Budapest could very well be the dullest place in the world.

MB

The Miserable Existence of a Small Little Turkish Man

Sunday the traveling entourage from the Legal Pad got out to see the country folk and some of the sites. This is a highly recommended experience.

We started off our day at 5 AM with our driver picking us up (after a blissful two hours of sleep. At this point in my life, I have absolutely no biological time clock) and driving us to the ancient city of Troy.

The typical American College Student knows several things about the historic city of Troy:

(1) Orlando Bloom decided to prove he was straight by stealing some girl from her husband, who had really bad breathe, and taking her back to Troy.
(2) This caused a really cool war that took approximately 3 hours according to Hollywood
(3) Orlando Bloom hit Brad Pitt with an arrow in the ankle when BP was vacationing in the City
(4) Orlando Bloom lived and everyone else died

Much to surprise of everyone I'm sure, Blogger is here to inform you that this is an innaccurate description of Troy.

Here's the short recap:

Paris, played by Orlando Bloom in the Hollywood version, was called upon to settle a dispute. The dispute occurred when a bunch of god's and goddesses were having a dinner and one of the goddesses was annoyed. She threw a golden apple through the window and into the dining room. The apple said on it that the most beautiful woman of the land had the right to possess it. A beauty pageant commenced, and Paris, who as Orlando Bloom would have made a fine female contestant himself, was judged to be the judge.

A short aside. If this is making sense, please excuse me because it's not meant too. Greek legend/history should always be wildly confusing. Only the elite should pretend to understand it. It's much too hard for the common man to go to that much effort over something so trivial. They have work to do.

Back to Paris. The princely Paris. Or whatever.

All the contestants offered him bribes. Examples of the bribes include rulership of his country, rulership of the world, and love of the most beautiful woman in the world.

If Paris would have waited around for a few thousands years Machiavelli would have told him that it is better to be feared and loved, he would have ruled the world with an iron hand and in the tradition of the absolutely powerful, taken for himself whatever he wanted and been been absolutely corrupted.

But he was a little lightheaded from having a bunch of really hot women offering anything he wanted, so he decided on taking the very vague option of the love of some woman that he had never even met and had no idea who she was.

Very rational.

I'm sure that back in the day, Paris had his own daytime soap opera.

Short and sweet, he goes and visits a neighboring country, sees the queen is the bomb, sweeps her off her feet and makes a dash for home, and waits for the impending wrath of the jilted husband and his horde of men.

They came.

The battle went for ten years outside the walls of the magnificent city of Troy (first place with a sewage system. What more can I say?). Paris stayed holed up in the fort with his woman, who most likely looked like Alice, the housekeeper on the Brady Brunch, before the fighting was over.

Hector, Paris' brother, did all of the hard work, bravely fighting off the hired warrior Achilles for a long time, until they finally decided that enough was enough and had a little man to man match that ended badly for Hector, as so often happens when your opponent was blessed by the gods to be played by Brad Pitt in a Hollywood movie. So Hector was dragged behind a horse around the city six times until Achilles had made sure he was good and dead and that his own mother would not recognize him.

The status quo of besiegers and besieged resumed.

Ten years went by. A big wooden horse was given to the city of Troy and Achilles and his merry band of beach bums (oh, did I mention that Troy is near the beach?) apparently decided to call it a day, but instead they waited until night, and when the stupid people of Troy brought the wooden horse inside of their gates because they thought the gods would be made at them for leaving a horse outside, unprotected from the elements, they came charging in and killed everyone.

Darn cool.

Especially because in the real version, the dead included Paris, who started this whole mess anyway and should have died a slow and painful dead as befitting a lech who (1) judges beauty contests, (2) judges beauty contests based on personal favors, (3) stupidly gives up world domination because he is a lech, (4) is a wife stealer, (5) cowardly makes his brother, a stand up guy, do all of his fighting for him, (6) was played by Orlando Bloom in a Hollywood movie.

Oh, some guy got away with his family through a tunnel and started up the civilization of old Rome.

Anyway, that's the story. The ruins were awesome and we visited them and our guide was great. More on that later.

After Troy, we visited Gallipoli. This is where Winston Churchill suffered a great defeat in World War I at the hands of the Turks.

The battlefields were awesome. It was a truly great experience to see the suffering gone through by both sides. The allied forces consisting of the Anzacs (New Zealanders and Australians), French, and English tried to take Gallipoli so that they could attack Istanbul and open up the straits to supply Russia with arms. The turks held them back after fierce fighting.

In retrospect, this may have been good.

Kemal Ataturk was the hero of the Turks at Gallipolli and subsequently led a revolt that ended the Ottoman Empire. He's still the bomb here in Turkey, pictures of him everywhere even though he's ugly, and rightly so.

Turkey is the most liberal muslim nation because Ataturk decided that Turkey needed to westernize. There is a fair amount of freedom here that probably never would have occurred if it was not for Gallipoli. The Turks ended up being crucial allies in NATO during the cold war and it can all be traced back to the western defeat at Gallipoli.

Which leads us to our guide.

He was awesome, a retired navy submarine Captain, Ali was the epitome of Turkish Patriotism. He spent the 1980's in his American-made submarine "playing cat and dog with those _____ Russians in the Black Sea."

He does not do very many tours. His pension takes care of him. So he gave us all individual gifts, bullets that he had picked up on the battlefield of Gallipolli as a boy.

At every stop he would hurry us along as much as possible stating, "I have an engagement this evening. It is my turn to cook dinner in our little kitchen. It is a sad, sad existence of a small turkish man." Then he turned to us and said "If I come back again, it will be as a big man like you. Then I will fight for my rights. Fight for my rights with my wife, and live a little."

All in all, he was quite a character. The trip was memorable. The scenery absolutely beautiful. The company (our Australian friend Charmella was along, as was Teresa), superb.

We arrived home at 11 PM and promptly went upstairs to the roof to finish the night up the way you should in Istanbul; overlooking the Bospheorus Strait with the stars gleaming over head.

Ten Day Drought Ends

Ten days after leaving the states, after seeing thousands, if not hundred of thousands of little shops, visiting cities totaling in population about 20 million people, eating at cafe's, walking by dozens of McDonald's, drinking French coffee, Italian Expresso (and Cappucino, since it was named in Rome), and Turkish coffee (arguably the bitterest coffee in the world), Blogger spotted his first Starbucks.

The drought is over.

Commercialization is officially in Istanbul.

Green rules the world.

A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO FIXING THE TOPKAPI PALACE HAREM

In Topkapi Palace in Sultanahmet in Istanbul, there is a Harem, which was once one of the most famous in the world. There is a story of the Tulip Festival held every year (tulips came from the Asian steppe, and were popular in the Ottoman Empire long before Holland took them over) that the Sultan would hold two separate days of viewing of his tulips from the Palace gardens. The tulips were arranged in huge viewing rooms and tents on racks and lighted with candles in colored glass bottles in such a manner that they light appeared to be coming from the tulips themselves. The public was allowed in the first day of the festival, but the second was reserved for the Sultan and his Harem. It was traditional to place candles on the backs of turtles, who wandered the grounds, while the women of the Harem searched in the racks of tulips for little gold trinkets and gifts which the Sultan had had hidden amongst the flowers. The only people allowed in during that evening were the Sultan and the Harem. As they say, it is Good to be the Sultan ("they" left out a lot of the more uncomfortable things from the overall domestic picture, but we get the point).

The Harem, unforunately, is not like that anymore. You can visit it while you are at the palace for an extra fee, but there are no beauties hidden in the harem, and the place is empty. Quite a disappointment for your average tourist. Therefore, we offer the following solution for revitalizing the Harem of the Topkapi Palace, in the form of an open letter to the Palace Administrator.

Dear Sir:

Please accept this suggestion for the improvement and betterment of the Palace and the Harem, as humbly submitted by those who have spent time in your lovely city. The following steps should be immediately taken:
Every day, early in the morning, the Palace Administrator would hold open auditions. All visiting young women would get a chance to audition for a special chance to view the harem from the inside. Only the finest from all around the world would be chosen, according to a quota system. In this way it would be just like the Harem of olden times, with a variety of looks. Then, the special few would be allowed into the Harem and given traditional garb, after which they would participate in a historical reenactment of every day Harem life. They could easily quadruple the fee they charge to view the Harem, and it would engender a healthy competition with the aspiring models and actresses of the world who wish to prove their mettle in the testing by fire that would be The Harem Experience. It would also start a whole new ranking system. Because of the quota system, some days would be harder to get in than others. For instance, a Saturday Quality girl would be much higher than a Tuesday girl, etc. Certain busy holidays would be like the World Series of Harem days. One can only imagine the administrator saying to a applicant, "Actually, today isn't good-why don't you try back on Wednesday morning-we aren't so busy then."

So, Administrator of the Topkapi Palace: listen to our grand idea! We personally guarantee increased revenues, more tour buses, and a better, and more scenic city. Besides, with your new duties, you too will learn to appreciate that It Is Good to be the Palace Administrator.

Sincerely,

Your Traveling Friends
JS®

BLOGGERS GET LOST IN BAZAAR; MARK ACCIDENTALLY TRADED FOR 1.2 KILOS OF PEACH TEA

Apparently a lot of people on the Istanbul City Council have heard the song by They Might Be Giants that goes, "It's Istanbul, now it's Constantinople, now it's Istanbul, on a moonlit night, wıth Turkish Delight," because every 500 feet ın the downtown area there's a sign saying "WELCOME TO ISTANBUL!" No room for confusion there.

So they do the hostel thing here a little differently than in other countries. They have a 5 story building with a tiny winding central stair to the 4th floor, where the dining room overlooks the Bosphorus. The rooms are tiny and cramped, but no one spends any time there anyway, because the roof is where all the action is. They breeze is great up there, and it is covered in random chairs, turkish divans, and tables. Everyone goes there at night to eat and talk, and there was also a party of French students (mostly girls, and one really effiminate guy, collectively referred to hereafter as "French girls"), who had spent all their money, sleeping up there for a few Lira per night.

Sar is one of the hostel workers, and a real capital guy. His only real defect, aside from a lip ring to go with his ultra-curly hair, is that he apparently learned his English from sailors on shore leave. This tends to produce hilarious yet totallyunprintable sentences. Oh, and also the fact that he has an advanced form of ADHD, which isn't always convenient in a tour guide. He gave us our first day tour as a walk and then metro ride around Istanbul, followed by a water tour of the Bosporus and the Golden Horn. The Bosphorus is the part of the Sea of Marmara dividing Europe and Asia, and the Golden Horn is the narrow, horn-shaped bay that splits the city in half. The problem is that Sar spent most of the night fighting with the French girls (more on that later) and was very sleepy and very hungry. So we wandered down the hill of Sultanahmet stopping about every 10 minutes for Sar to grab some food from nearby street shops. The problem was that he bought little teeny snacks in each place, saying that he wasn't very hungry, until he saw the next shop, and had to stop in there too. Then there was the problem that he'd forget where he was planning to take us, drift off to buy something, and then return to our seats on the boat to ask frantically where the boat was going. He also has a girlfriend who recently moved to France, and since she does not speak Turkish, he had to send her text messages in English, necessitating questions like, "How doyou spell 'crystal.' Do you think she will like it if I tell her she is like a melted crystal in beauty?" We told him "of course!" and spelled it for him.

Monuments are different in different countries. You see, in Rome they make monuments to celebrate the conquering of civilizations. The Arch of Titus, for instance. Then in Istanbul, they build mosques to celebrate victorious campaigns against the Persians or the allied forces of Europe. Now, in France, it is all very different. They have a different scale for victories there. For instance, try to find someone, even a French person, who can tell you what the Arc de Triomphe is actually about without consulting a history book or a tour brochure, and you may spend awhile looking. I swear we ran across no less than than three obelisks dedicated to, "the seven brave French gendarmes who put to flight two Irish rogues without calling for backup when they were discovered relieving themselves on the Metro." This brings me back to Sar and hıs defeat by 70 lb.French girl over some forgettable slight that she received, probably in the area of unmentionable language. She, apparently enraged, assaulted him with a hand-thrown bottle cap, and he took off running, puzzled by a retaliatory attack over a simple ultra-offensive comment. We are still waiting for the monument.

The situation was finally resolved when Seth translated for them, the French girl saying, "I am trying to keep an open mind, but I do not understand. Where I come from, that is very, very bad" in a childlike voice. I do not think that Seth translated either the content or the meaning of their conversation, but that was actually good, and now Sar and the French girl are friends again. Of course, her comment made one wish to ask where the French are actually from, since normally that type of language is followed by the aside, "Pardon my French."

The Bazaars here are really something else. There is the Grand Bazaar, the Spice Bazaar, and a local Bazaar that I forget the name of, all within easy walking distance. You can buy anything and everything there, in long, crowded, arched passageways. We indulged in some Turkish delight and wandered until even Mark was tired of shopping, bless his heart. We officially made Seth the bargainer for the day, since he is hands-down the best at it, so whenever we wanted something we went to get him, and then just let him go nuts. It was quite a sight, and Seth had usually made a new friend by the end of the mammoth struggle.

Coming soon: Wrong-way taxis, Troy, and a Turkish naval captain.

JS®

HOSTEL LIFE

Take a building. Make it an old one. It if has a one of a kind elevator that 
looks like it has not had any maintanence for the last 30 years and only fits 
2.5 people and one shopping bag, all the better.  Then open it up for really 
cheap dorm room style accomodations with common areas and about one bathroom for 
every 45 people.

Essentially, you could wind up sharing the room (full of bunk beds) with people 
from Germany one night and Iceland the next. It is the international cross roads 
of all those who believe that travel is a worthy goal unto itself. 

Someone is always up in the common room. Talking, making friends, tapping out a 
communication to some distant land on the computer that has seen soo much in the 
way of wear and tear. 

One night at this most auspicious hostel in Rome has seen a friendly game of 
Texas Hold'em where the money is really torn up pieces of a scrap paper (only 
two sizes, please) and the winner has to take his earnings to the trash can. 
(Players of Oregon - two girls. Players from Connecticut - one weird guy. 
Players who weren't sure where they were from - 2 guys. Players from CA - 2 
guys.) 

The next night saw people discussing the discussions of the ancient forums and a 
lively conversation with a rather gregarious Icelander dude who, by turns, 
engaged everyone in the room in a conversation about something. Mostly about 
law, phsycology (his major), immigration in CA, Dr. Phill, Iceland, lawsuits in 
America, the friendliness of Rome, the snobbish arrogance and useless nature of 
the French, etc. 

All this taking place in the sort of dim light beside a semi operational vending 
machine that dispenses peanuts, water, fruit juice squeeze boxes, and 7 kinds of 
a beer. The front is broken, of course, with the glass taped together with 
packaging tape, and naturally it gives no change.

Actually, if you get it to give you anything at all, you are doing very well. 

Now, I am going to toddle off before I get involved in a conversation with 
someone from a country I have not yet heard of. . . .and God bless the man who 
founded hostelling.

SNO

MINE EYES HAVE SEEN THE POPE, AND HE IS A LITTLE WHITE DOT

Rome is like a giant fitness gym. We have walked and climbed most of Rome in the last two days, and it is really the only way to see the city. Rome is old, as some of you may have heard, and it has a lot of ruins, which were mostly constructed as sets for the movie Gladiator. The downtown section is completely filled with them, and it is easy to see how Rome was once the most impressive city in the world. Between the Coleseum, the Pantheon, and the Palantine, it must have been quite a sight back in the day. But I'll skip most of that today, and get right into the good stuff.

So Mark was supposed to plan the walking tour yesterday, but that was slightly hampered by the fact that he didn't know where anything was. If Mark wrote the popular saying, it would go like this: "When in Rome......get lost a lot." In addition to being an awesome navigator, Mark is also a spellbinding tourguide. He helpfully pointed out that we really needed to visit a particular island in the Tiber river. Knowing Mark's nose for good places, I led us there, and we had this informative conversation regarding the history and architecture of the island:

Teresa: "Mark, what are we looking for here?"
Mark: "I don't know."
Seth: "Is that a wedding? Cool!"

(Please note that the above is given in defense of Mark's mean comments about my detailed tour information.)

So we dragged Seth out of the wedding party, where he was taking pictures and posing as a photographer, and went to go eat, which we ALL were good at.

So we showed up at the Vatican today, and it turns out that the Pope was going to be leading a service on the steps of St. Peter's. Since this meant that the rest of the place was completely shut down, we had a seat to hear what the Pope had to say.

He arrived in a modified version of the popemobile, which was an open-air car with oversized tires and a railed platform. The crowd went nuts as he circled the crowd several times. We couldn't really see him, being seated in the center, but they did have largescreen monitors to help us out. Then he ascended the platform, where the popemobile proved its worth by driving straight up the steps. From his lofty perch, he addressed the crowd, and I heard his message loud and clear: Learn Latin, you nuntz! I can't swear for sure, because of the distance, but I think he liked me.

St. Peter's Basillica left me with one major thought: The Catholic Church is ungodly wealthy. (Pardon the pun.) St. Paul's in London? Poor little country church. Notre Dame? Tiny crusty relic. St. Peter's is huge, with gallery after gallery, alcoves and wings and chapels beyond counting, all paved and walled with multicolored marble that puts the palaces at Versailes to shame. They have huge monuments to departed Popes, statues, frescos, and paintings. Truly a dumbfounding place. We climbed the stairs to the inner dome, and then took the winding passages up to the top, where the city view was amazing. Never seen such tiny stairs that wound around in such a crazy pattern. On the way down, several people had to stop because they got dizzy going around, around, and around. The whole time we were in the church it was raining outside in a blasting thunderstorm, with thunder, lighting, and just torrential rain.

As a side note on other international news, the United States qualified for the World Cup soccer finals by beating their arch-rivals, Mexico. After a 2-0 beating, the Mexican coach showed that Mexico can accept defeat graciously as well as savor the fruits of victory, by stating, "They play like small people. They play like my mother, and my daughter, and my aunt." Tune in for the grudge match in 2006 if they meet in group play.

Coming up next: Istanbul; or is it Constantinople? And why won't they stop playing that song??
JS®

From France to Rome; playing Frogger in the streets

Rome. Birthplace of civilization. Seat of world power for centuries. Home
of one of the world's most efficient and effectively organized military system.
Mother of creative artisans and architects. Totally lacking any recognizable
traffic laws.

I have to say, Mark Bigger is a good man. He has a heart. A heart that cares
about his friends. Somewhere in the deep recesses of my memory I think I can
hear my mother tell me to not wear dark clothes and walk along the street at
night. Something about the drivers not being able to see you cross the street.
But I really have trouble keeping those sorts of things all sorted out when I am
on a mission to get from point A to point B.

So, last night, we finally decided that the wonder and awe of Rome had given us
enough to think upon and we started to head home.
During the course of the time here it was discovered that the only way to cross
a street is to just step out into the street and start walking. Any cross walk
light is very rare. The drivers of scooters, cars, mini-cars, micro-mini-cars,
and huge buses will all come to a screeching stop as you walk by. They may try
to sneak in front of you by taking an angle or just wait until you are half a
step past and then gun it by behind you.

Last night proved how theology affects your life. I believe that God has a time
for me to live and when that time has come to an end, I will die. Until that
time, I'm ok. Without really getting into the details, if it is your time to go,
it is your time to go. Apparently, this concept is one that, as a practical
matter, Mark is not as comfortable with as I am.

(BLOGGER NOTE: AS THE CREATOR OF THIS BLOG IT IS MY PRIVILEGE TO SAY THAT WEARING
DARK CLOTHING AND STEPPING OUT INTO ONCOMING TRAFFIC LATE AT NIGHT WITH A BUNCH OF
DRUNK ITALIAN DRIVERS BEARING DOWN ON YOU SEEMS LIKE A VERY FOOLHARDY
APPLICATION OF THEOLOGY. SO THERE.)

So, with my mind on the mission and my heart relaxed by the knowledge that if
its my time, its my time and if not, then not, I led the mission toward home.
(There were a couple diversions to see one more great ruin, et al) As scooters
swerved, buses tested their brakes, and cars tried to gun past, I was happy to
make crosswalks in new places all across the city.  Apparently, when it is
night, and you have on dark clothes, it takes a couple seconds longer to see you
as you step out into the traffic. Mom was onto something afterall.

But hey, these are the people that gave us the Ferrari, right?  With all they
have done, I learned why they don't need rules - they are really good drivers.
Crazy, sure. But great reflexes and a good sense of spaitial relationships.

And so, we eventually arrived home and went straight to sleep - with the
exception of Mark. He had spent so much time praying and worrying about me as
I crossed and re-crossed the streets of Rome (stopping traffic with an
outstretched hand for him to make it) that he was wide awake and could not sleep
a wink all night long.

So, we've learned some things: Mom was right. Rome is magnificent. Mark has a
great & caring heart. They might be crazy but Italians sure know how to drive.
And finally, theology at least got Jeremy and I a good nights sleep.

SNO

 . .

When in Rome . . . driving crazy, eating well, talking fast and loving life

The adventure of Rome started with trying to get there. Ryan Air, the self proclaimed" low priced airline", was our means of transportation, and boy did their name barely scratch the surface.

Upon boarding the plane, we discovered that SouthwestAirlines back in the states offers spacious cattle car accomodations compared with the sardine can like quality of the stuffy space given to you by your friendly Ryan Air representative.

Coffee was two and a half euro. Water was two and a half euro. I suspect they probably would have put the vice on us and charged us to use the toilet as well if it weren't for the large clean up costs associated with the venture.

The first glimpse of the friendliness of the italian people came when a large amount of them turned around in their seat and spent the flight talking to the person behind them. Seatbelt use was obviously something only grudgely complied with at landing.

Upon landing, the whole plane erupted in cheers and clapping - a sign of the deep held faith in Ryan Air and it's commitment to passenger safety. Everyone seemed happy to be safely on the ground.

Before I let JS go into a long explanation of the different historic landmarks of Rome, what they should mean to you, and how you are a stupid person for not knowing everything single little thing about them like he does, I thought it best to give a short discussion on what Rome is like today. Since it's so important to me, I thought I would start with one of my favorite topics. Of course, I'm referring to food.

For those raised on the belief that Italian food and good times were inseparable, Rome is a glimpse of culinary heaven. Blogger is happy to report that miles and miles of walking each day have kept him from mushrooming into a new dimensionm, but he still has noticed an alarming tendency to think in terms of meals instead of time.

For instance, "Ah yes, we saw the Pantheon right after the fettucine alfredo with olive oil and parmesan meal" has long since replaced any designation of time.

Food in Rome is not just a way of survival. It's the reason to survive and you can tell by the fact that every fourth person walking down the street has the jowls of an extra in one of the restuarant scenes from "The Sopranoes."

Food is also Italy's way of catching up. Husbands do not read their newspaper during dinner. They are way too busy eating while talking with their mouth full. It's quite charming if you don't watch too closely.

On the other hand, Italians also seem to have a truly friendly attitude toward life and those who share it. They are refreshingly nice and helpful and I suspect, being somewhat biased, that the good food has something to do with it. Afterward, if your meals are good, why not treat the rest of mankind a little better? Your cup runneth over.

Driving in Italy is a blast. Mainly of horns. Mopeds and motorcycles run everywhere and their riders risk death like the high cost of living has finally got to them.

Tiny little vehicles are all the rage. They look like a smaller version of Fred Flintstone's vehicle and I expect they get even better gas mileage than good old Fred. They should come with a sign that says "in case of collision, your body will be taken directly to the funeral home to avoid the high cost of possible hospital bills."

The small little cars are extremely cute. The car equivalent to a puppy.

But with bite.

Particularly cabs. One of our greatest joys was hiring a cab, then holding on for dear life as they sliced through the traffic with motorcycles on both sides (with no particular lane) not using their blinkers and generally running over everything that gets in their way. It truly is survival of the fittest, but amazingly, I did not see a single fender bender the whole time.

Italy rules Formula I.

Pedestrian life is somewhat short. No self respecting Roman will yield for a ped unless they are already in the crosswalk. Then they will see how close they can get to running you over without spilling their coffee.

Seth views pedestrian crossings as a sport. He nonchalantly steps into oncoming traffic and waits for them to all hit their brakes or slither past him. Then he playfully slaps the worst car offenders on the fender as they go by. In fact, he enjoyed the activity so much that he has prepared a complete blog post on it.

Blogger prefers basketball.

Or football.

Or tennis, or golf. I'd even prefer synchronized swimming.

Rome is not the cleanest city in the world - I think I could walk across the Tiber river on the sludge - but it certainly takes the cake for most preserved. They actually have to use "A.D. " to make sure you don't tack on an extra thousand years or so to the age of a building.

There are tremendous opportunities for furniture salesmen in Rome. There are huge buildings with absolutely nothing inside (except for paintings and statutes and stuff). Big buildings with huge drafts seem to the the order of the day. But tastes can change. Put couches and chairs and tables in there!

All in all, Rome was a fine place. The people were great and the way they drive makes you appreciate life. It's like skydiving with a group of Waffle House hostesses. Except the people have teeth here.

BLOGGERS LEARN HISTORY FROM 11TH CENTURY CARTOONS

The French have this little town near the Normandy coast, which they call Bayeux, after a tapestry called the Bayeux Tapestry which they named after the town. It's also the hometown of William, who figures in later, so remember his name.

The Mont St. Michel is a mound of rock rising out of the ocean on the Normandy coast, somewhat southwest of the Normandy D-Day beaches (see here http://www.tourdfrance.com/Images/msm.jpeg). The Coast there is pretty flat, so the island looks like something out of a fairytale, just rising from the sea. The bay extends around the island and beyond, and it is also flat. When the tide comes in, the island is cut-off from the mainland. When the tide is low, you can reach it by foot or hoof if you can avoid the quicksand. During the Hundred Years War the English tried to attack the Mont, but lost companies to the quicksand and the incoming tides. They learned faster than the tourists, however, because they stopped trying to attack the Mont, whereas tourists get caught and drowned ever year. It was first used as a priory (smallish version of a monastery) in 708 a.d., and was reestablished in the 1100's by the Benedictine order. They built a cathedral and town that encompased the entire island, giving it the distinctive look and profile that it has today. The spire has a 12-ft gilded statute of Michael the Archangel on the peak. The founding bishop was a literal kind of chap, so in many key places in the cathedral you can see bare rock of the Mont sticking through the stone walls. This was because the Bishop wanted to symbolize the "on this rock will I build my church" by letting folks see the rock of the island in strategic spots.

Now, the tapestry. See, it turns out, the common people have always needed the help of propaganda in simple forms to help them understand What Just Happened. After William the Bastard conquered England and became William the Conquerer in 1066, his supporters in Hastings commissioned a 73 foot long tapestry, essentially a giant comic book, except it was very expensive and took five years, showing scene by scene the conquering of England from the French persepctive. It shows, in vivid embroidery, why Harold was a futz and a liar, and why William had to go and conquer England on principle. Lots of chopped off heads along the borders help you understand what happened to the English for their evil deed of not making William the King. It was actually quite enlightening.

So William lived in England and became William the Conquerer, leaving behind a contingent of French in Normandy. It all got complicated when the French in Britain who had followed William there decided that they were happier being English, and defected. The French in Normandy got furious at the French in England, and so they all fought the 100 Years War. They had different strategies, of course, as befits French living on different shores, with the English trying to Conquer Stuff, while the French made omelets. History has not yet decided the victor of the military side of this epic contest, although it is clear that the English won on the economic front as the whole affair has now been exposed as a brilliant and cunning plan to set up a historical background for the Patrick O'Brian novels.

So I can now say that my understanding of English history is based on a 73 foot cartoon embroidered over five years by monks in Hastings and sent back to Bayeux so that the poor town would have a name.

On a related note, I have now touched deep into my family roots in Paris and connected to a time when I was growing up. No, I am not French. Don't be mean. I have connected with my inner child, and he likes escargot. You see, when I was 2 or 3, I loved to go to the backyard, find a nice, crisp snail, and just go nuts with it. I am told that I said I liked the way the shells crunched between my teeth. My mom was a little spooked by the whole thing, so my brother Tim was assigned the duty of pulling the mangled remains from my resistant mouth. So naturally I had to try some escargot, but don't worry! I am not experiencing a regression. I find that my tastes have been merely refined and aculterated, and it is now the flavor that is desirable. I only ate the shells on two.

JS®

Coming up next, all roads lead to Rome, but where does RyanAir end up?

Paris struck by Bakersfield

Did you know they charge to use the bathroom here? I forgot to include that in the budget, but Jeremy plans for everything, so he's been covering (says it's important and he doesn't mind considering the circumstances).

The amazing thing is that the French claim that us American's are the Capitalist Pigs. Really, don't you think there should be some limits?

I will say this, I have not seen any bums with a sign that said, "Drank Beer. Need change to get rid of it." Which just goes to show that the bums here aren't that enterprising.

We're staying at the Le Montclaire Hostel. Actually, it's not so bad. In fact, I actually quite like it. The bunk beds make me nostalgic for the old days back in Illinois when 9 were packed in one room and I had one of those old fashioned alarm clocks that could wake the dead. I was extremely popular.

After arriving on Saturday morning, we dropped off our stuff at the Hostel and ran down to see Notre Dame, and the Chapel le Saint Chapelle. Both chapels would be considered antiques. Actually, by American standards all the buildings are antiques around here. I guess all of their architects died off before the American Revolution.

Chapel le Saint Chapelle was actually built around the same time as Notre Dame to store church artifacts. The crown jewel of the artifacts stored there was actually a real crown, a crown of thorns, believed to be the actual crown of thorns that Jesus wore back in the day.

After walking around for a bit, a nap was in order because a lack of any real sleep since the three hours obtained two nights before. At 11 PM, we hit the town and walked up to a hill overlooking the city. Everyone in France seemed to be there, probably so they could look down on the rest of the city. I have to admit, at night the Paris skyline has a lot of character.

After finding a place to eat and walking around some more until drifting home around 1.

A Saturday well spent.

Next up, a trip to the country.

World in for treat: Legal Pad residents to pay them visit

The world is bracing for a visit from Legal Pad residents Mark, Jeremy and Seth. Tomorrow they embark on a ten country, three continent tour that will take the entire month of September and turn it into October before productive work is revisited.

Blogger has also announced that he will be sharing blogging responsibilities with Jeremy to give readers a glimpse of what sort of fun they are having, how the locals are handling it, local law enforcement tips for traveling abroad, cuisine suggestions for eating food prepared by people who consider rat to be a delicacy, and just about anything that enters into our fertile minds.

If an over abundance of caution is absent, Seth may even be allowed to blog.

Stay tuned for developments.