I have long adored hotels. I love the airiness of a grand lobby, the employees who greet you at every turn, the smartly ironed clean sheets, and even the pool, though I rarely use it. I take my time in the lobby, browsing the local paper, sipping on coffee, in no particular rush to explore whatever city I’ve managed to land in.

A stay in a nice hotel is a reprieve from the angst of daily life. It provides restaurants and bars to take care of hunger and thirst, a gym for physical activity, and maid service so I never have to think about making the bed. 

If there is an afterlife, I’m convinced it looks like a Hilton — a really nice Hilton resort for the good people, a Doubletree for the average folk, and a Hampton Inn for the sinners, because I don’t believe in Hell but I do believe in Hampton Inns. 

I have criteria that determines the overall quality of a hotel stay.

1. Cable. Specifically, Asian cable. Asian cable is the bomb. For one, I get Asian MTV. It’s like American MTV, but from the 1980’s, when it was full of these things called “music videos.” Ever wonder what happened to all those video music directors? They started working for Asian MTV. Music videos still exist, and they are awesome. They also run this show called OK Danceoke. YouTube it. I just stole three hours of your life. You’re welcome. Also, Asian cable has about 100 movie channels. Most of those channels run movies from the last three decades I’ve been meaning to watch forever, but life got in the way, and also, I don’t have Asian cable at home. While you’re busy Netflix binging on the latest season of Broken Mirror, I’m in this hotel, watching “Freddy vs. Jason” and “Another 24 Hours.” No commercials, either. Not sure how their business model works, but it works for me. 

2. Million billion thousand hundred thread count cotton bed linens. I’m not much of an IKEA man, but I know good bed sheets when I’m in them. Some folks are really into the hotel mattresses, but I live in the developing world where mattresses are basically just chewed up newspaper stuffed into a burlap sack, so I’m cool with whatever, far as mattresses go. But bed sheets? I want bed sheets that swaddle me like an infant. I’m kinky like that. 

3. Things work. This should not be a tall order, but I’m often surprised. At the time of writing, I’m in a hotel that’s rated four stars, but there’s a small lake pooling beneath the air-con vent and the internet disconnects if I turn on the coffeemaker. I don’t know what the light switches do, but they don’t seem to have any relevance to the lighting in this room. Maybe they work for the lights in the room downstairs. The remote batteries are nearly dead, so the TV powers on, but it won’t power off, and I can’t find the archaic power button on the box itself, so I guess it’s Asian MTV all night long for me. 

4. Things that should be free are free. Water, mainly. Come on guys. Water. In America, outside of Flint, Michigan, tap water is fine. Europe too, I guess. But the rest of the world, people need to stay hydrated, and you’re a terrible company if you charge minibar prices for a bottle of semi-filtered dookie water that costs 30 cents at the neighboring 7-11. 

5. Things that put me at ease about my loud Western footprint. I like hotels that don’t automatically refresh your towels every day. Even better I like hotels that refill things rather than burn through endless tiny plastic containers. Bonus points if the hotel contributes to charities, uses fair trade products, or sources local sustainable food. 

6. Rooftop bar. Don’t need to say much more about this. Bonus for a rooftop pool.

7. Room service that’s worth the 50-100% markup. When visiting a new place, the best food is found outside the hotel… usually. However, when I’ve just come off an insane 14-hour trans-Pacific flight, starved and half-drunk, and none of the signs in town are in English, or if I’ve just landed at the airport hotel by Dallas-Fort Worth and it’s 10pm and the only nearby eatery is a Denny’s, I’m opting for the hotel food. Denny’s wants $8 of my money for that cheeseburger basket. The hotel wants $15. It had better be a damn good hamburger. 

8. Staff that treats me like George Clooney. I’m thinking of George Clooney’s character Ryan Bingham from “Up in the Air,” but any incarnation of George Clooney, including George Clooney himself, I’m cool with that. Now that George Clooney stuff isn’t going to happen unless you’re either a regular Joe Businessface who checks into the same Kansas City Radisson every Tuesday to make sure his subterranean Bitcoin servers are still running, or you’re someone with a shiny card that bestows upon its holder added value as a customer… like George Clooney’s character, Ryan Bingham.

All about the shiny cards

I have a shiny card that skips me past the Chinese tour group at the check-in desk. Sometimes the shiny card can summon a bellhop to seize away my bags and escort me onto a special elevator that goes up to a special floor where  people say “Hello Mr. Campeau,” and ask, “How was your flight?” Their name tags say words like “Tar” and “Pretzel” but I don’t ask questions because this is Asia. 

Pretzel invites me to sink into a velour-upholstered sofa or a studded leather armchair while she takes care of my paperwork and sends my bags up to a room that looks fancier than what I should be able to afford. I enjoy free coffee and scones and read the paper. I’m informed that cocktail hour starts in an thirty minutes, so I can head up to my room now and freshen up, or take my time with the paper while they ice up the booze. 

I go up to the room. I’ve been upgraded. It’s a corner room, far from the Chinese tour group. It’s on a high floor overlooking the high floors in other buildings. The bathtub is fit for two William Tafts. There’s a box of chocolates on the bed. All because of the shiny card. 

Back down in the lounge, a guitarist strums Gilberto Gil while the smart casual crowd gets business drunk on complimentary highballs. This goes on for two hours. Hors d’oeuvres are available, so that’s dinner sorted. Seven PM, time for some Asian cable and free internet. Alternatively, I can throw my feet onto the chaise lounge and watch the city skyline. 

Come morning, any fogginess from cocktail hour is absorbed by a gratis continental breakfast that actually spans the continents. Every country has a sausage, I’ve learned, and they all go well with eggs and toast. While I’m at it, how about that dim sum corner? Or the miso bar? Or the fatty grilled pork with noodle soup? 

All this is Perfect World Scenario. Shiny Card Scenario. This is the standard by which I now judge hotels. I’m not sure if that makes me a pretentious prick — I’m pretty sure it does — but whatever man. I donate to charity every month and have a rescue dog and I think that goes a little further than thoughts and prayers, so I’m going to enjoy my shiny card benefits. 

Let’s talk about that card some more. Yes, it has an annual fee, and it’s not a small fee, but it’s easily counterbalanced by the cool stuff I don’t have to pay for. Like the George Clooney treatment for one. All this this “Mr. Campeau” business, the executive lounge access, the room upgrade, this all comes with the shiny card.

I also get into airport lounges, where I can sit on a couch and drink complimentary wine and eat noodles and watch the Blazers play basketball and think about getting a free massage while other flyers are sitting in plastic seats that they can’t take a nap on, watching the same Samsung ad run over and over on a loud, angry, 70-inch plasma screen, surrounded by nose-picking toddlers and sweaty bald people. 

In the US, I get to stroll past the morose immigration officials who struggle with anger management, blip my passport, and clear the gate without untying my shoes. 

Upon landing, a Hertz guy walks me to the spaces right next to the office, not the spaces across the parking lot. “Mr. Campeau,” he says (I like that part), “That Ford Festiva you ordered is not available. We’d normally substitute a 1990’s Geo Metro, but you get a Jeep Cherokee. Enjoy.” I never much cared for SUV’s. Then I drove one. I still don’t like them… but I like to drive them. 

I do pay for the base rate on hotels, flights, and rentals, but even that is subsidized by points earned just by using the shiny card. I never thought I’d be one of those people who uses a shiny card, but I’m glad to be one now. 

For more information on shiny cards, I recommend you visit The Points Guy. It is an obsessively comprehensive website that analyzes and evaluates the cards out there. Never a better time than the present to get yourself set up for the George Clooney lifestyle, if only while traveling.

I’m already doing that thing I do when I write. Think about what this will look like in a year, three years, ten… and so on. Will this entry sound foolish and naive, like my earliest overseas writings? Will I be surprised at the wit and insightfulness and honesty, like when I came across all those folded up letters from high school? Will it seem trite, or timeless?

It is probably fitting that this experiment begins at 3am, on an insomniac morning of the risen Christ. Maybe that’s all his deal was. He wasn’t dead, just tired. But he couldn’t sleep, so he went for a little wander.

But I digress.

It’s 3 am on Easter Sunday morning and a few hours ago I deleted my Facebook account.

I made the decision based on a few factors. For one, there’s been the news: the data harvests, the bots, the manipulation of elections. Furthermore, there’s the wasted time. Wake up in the morning, time for the Feed. Breaks and lunch, check the Feed. Afternoon Feed and evening Feed and just before bed Feed.

Sitting in a cafe waiting for coffee? Feed.

Out with the lads and they start talking about soccer? Feed.

In a taxi by myself? Feed.

In a taxi with companions? Feed.

Thought of something actually important to broadcast, like an announcement for the pub quiz I host? I might start with the intention of writing that announcement, but then comes the Feed and I forget.

By my math, I would sometimes spend hours per day on the Feed. Not just Facebook, but sometimes Twitter, occasionally Instagram. As with any habit, I rationalized.

This is the 21st century. This is how modern humans spend their time.

What if I miss a world changing event? I don’t want to be last to find out.

How will people know I’m still alive?

How will I know about the latest meme everyone at work talks about?

How else can I get people from high school to marvel at my perfect, exotic overseas lifestyle?

Perhaps the most terrifying of all: what do I do if I get bored?

The answer, I propose, is writing. Not just one- to two-sentence blurbs about something funny I saw, or a dish I ate. Actual, meaningful writing where I bare my soul. Or not. Whatever I feel like doing that day, really.

Those who know me well, know this is not the first time. After my wife left the country in 2016, I dropped off for awhile. A few months I think. Then it was, “I’ll just post the odd tweet, but I won’t engage in the Feed.” Then it was only Twitter content, but no Facebook. Then it was Facebook, but only for promoting events. Before long, total relapse.

The pattern repeated over the last few years. Cold turkey for some days or weeks, then back to the Feed, harder than ever. Just like relapse of other vices, every time I returned, it felt a little more shitty. Less content I cared about, more petty bickering from the political chasm. Fewer dopamine moments, more cortisol.

I found myself mentally muttering “shut up shut up shut up” as I scrolled through all the pettiness. The Right: ranting ad nauseum about guns that don’t kill people, about Europe’s no-go zones, about Her emails, and about the Jesus. The Left, about niche gender identifications, about white male privilege (and what I ought to do with mine), about the cultural appropriation in Hollywood and the Brooklyn food scene, and about Donald Fucking Trump.

Every post was a potential rabbit hole. Do I comment on my cousin’s post to say that guns are in fact the number one cause of gun violence? Or should it be this thread, posted by a friend of a friend from Portland, whom I’ve not seen in a decade? Xi (non-binary pronoun here) says that the white guy who founded Pok Pok has no right to cook that cuisine because he’s not Thai. Do I point out that all recipes in the history of humankind are a result of cultural convergence?

Do I pinpoint their logical fallacies? Their inaccurate data? Their confirmation bias? Their grammar mistakes? Or do I retreat to my mantra?

Shut up shut up shut up.

Articles and podcasts linking social media to depression, these tidbits keep dropping into my life. I’ve been thinking about my choices and my vices. I’ve been thinking about life changes. With my time in Katmandu, the years now, drawing to a close, I think about fresh starts. I feel like it’s going to stick this time. I’m done with the Feed.

A dream woke me, just before I began to write. A bluegrass troupe was visiting the school. I’d been asked to session with one of the pickers. I flaked on the time. Dude was pissed. I found him later and apologized. Oddly, he was married to the actress who played Counselor Troi on Start Trek. They had two kids. The five of us got to know each other and after some friendly banter he asked if maybe I’d like to do some strumming right there. I felt honored, but as I looked for my banjo I realized I’d not practiced playing it in two years. I started to feel embarrassed and ashamed. That’s when I woke up.

Reading about my dreams is about as interesting as reading about anyone else’s dream. At best, it’s boring, at worst, it’s awkward because it starts with something like, “I had this dream about you last night… Oh but it wasn’t sexual…”

Despite that conventional wisdom, I shared this dream to make a point. The dream shook me. I realized I’m not doing much to change the things about myself that I don’t like. I’m not pursuing passions like I once did. Maybe this is a cliché midlife crisis, but whatever it is, I don’t like it and social media’s not doing me a lick of good. Yes, WordPress is still social media, but at least there is no compelling Feed that demands my attention. And I used to write. A lot. So let’s see if I can take all this angst and doubt and struggle and turn it into something that’s actually worthwhile. Rather than hours of scrolling and trolling, let’s use those down times for punching some words into a screen, words that will be read not by 417 friends, family, and friends and family of those friends and family, but by 7 people, according to the WordPress data. Let’s see where this goes.

As I’m back home this month, the inevitable question comes up time and time again.

So when will you come back to teach in America? 

Listen, I’ve worked in America. Do you know what it’s like, working in schools here? I mean, yes, my body absorbs a daily onslaught on airborne contaminants and waterborne microbes, I’m surrounded in dust and poverty, and I have to shower with my eyes shut, but even still, this is way preferable to teaching in the US.

As one point of evidence, I present here a series of haikus I wrote while invigilating exams at my last public school. I have to sit on my ass for hours, so do the students. The test takes forever. The school spends months on test preparation (as opposed to you know, teaching and learning). Yet my state is still on bottom for testing, nationwide.

These haikus say it better than I can.

Barren walls cry out

To students and visitors

Learning stops this week

Once taught in wartime

Mortars, car bombs; but no test

Kept kids from learning

Rules say no food or drink

Because apparently no one

Here is a grown-up

Accreditation

The report that disappeared

Like all the others

Minutes tick on by

Make me wish for a razor

To slice out my eyes

In case you’re wondering why I left, here’s one final haiku:

“Keep up the good work.”

Said the evaluation. 

On page two: “You’re fired.” 

Nowadays, I enjoy a fulfilling classroom position with professional colleagues and managers. Things are better.

I was doing some digging and found some great old stuff from my year in Indonesia, 2008-09. Enjoy.

You Just Wish You Were Balinese

It’s not that I hate white people.  Some of my best friends are white people.  Regular readers know that from time to time, I indulge in white people things like parasailing and say white people things like “gosh.”  Overall, I don’t approve of many things white people choose to do here in Bali — say, women who sport lime green Crocs, or men who not-ironically wear sarongs), but I tolerate it, so long as they do it in the privacy of their hotel rooms and domiciles.

However, after this weekend in the sleepy mountain tourism center of Kintmani, my policy of lenience turned to one of narrow-minded fanaticism that will require weeks of workshops on political correctness to repair.  You see, this weekend Kintimani was the venue for the Aware-Dance Festival.  I should have smelled trouble all over this thing when the esoteric drivel on the website forecasted things like “spiritual awakening” and “connection with the Earth Mother” and some stupid crap about Mayan calendar prophecies.  Don’t get me started on Mayan calendar prophecies.  I should have detected the subtle notes of cynicism in Watu’s voice when she delicately asked, “You’re still wanting to go to that thing?”  There I go, not listening to my woman again.  But I was sold a convincing bag of goods by a guy I’ll call “DJ DJ.”

DJ DJ is one of those guys everyone in a scene knows.  In this case, I refer to the Bali ex-pat scene.  He’s at all the local events, typically promoting another local event.  In many ways, he’s a great guy to know.  For example, he introduced me to the Philly cheese steak sandwich at Devilicious, which is a far cry better than the hopeless imitations found at most American eateries outside of Philadelphia. But often, DJ DJ can be the “Wikipedia of Bali,” meaning that you can never be completely sure if his information is right on or way off. 

On this occasion, he told me all about the upcoming Aware-Dance festival.  His diatribe went something like this:

“Dude, this thing is gonna be off the hook.  I mean, we’ve got DJ’s from all over the globe coming to spin.  I’ve been helping the crew get this gig set up.  We’ve got campgrounds, we’ve got security, we’ve got plenty of beer or water depending on how you want to party… yeah man.  Tight.  Oh, and it’s on a volcano, so you know that will be sweet!  Have you ever seen the sunrise from Mt. Batur?  No?  Then dude, you should definitely go!”

A rave on an active volcano?  How could I refuse?

Watu secured a rented jeep and we set off immediately after school, camping gear packed in the back.  As a compromise, we reserved a hotel for the first night and would camp the second night.  We followed the route taken by Sayulita and me last December, this time without running out of gas.  As soon as we arrived at the Surya Hotel, a heavy weight of doubt began to sink in. Generally, if you pay more than 100K rupiah for a room (that’s about $10) you can expect to get, at minimum, a decent room with a nice view and perhaps even air-con and television.  Remember the “Happiness Hotel” in The Great Muppet Caper?  This place was worse, and the Muppets there were not nearly as friendly.  Rather, the people were downright horrible.  

We walked up to our door and noticed our neighbors sitting outside, about to enjoy a bottle of imported spirits, no doubt purchased from the duty-free shop at the airport hours before.  I gave a friendly hello, which is generally met with an equally amicable hello back.  Without a word, they muttered something in French and filed into their room.  Okay, so maybe they didn’t want to share.  Or maybe it’s just because they’re French.  I don’t know.

As soon as we plopped down on the bed, we heard the throb of repetitive trance dance music.  I thought it was the French.  After an hour of this, we came to learn it was the Italians… three doors down! The walls in this place were paper thin and the ceiling sagged as though it would collapse with the next season’s rains.  Not only was there no hot water (as they’d promised in the reservation), there was no running water.  The room had all the ambiance of a crime scene.  We caught a quick nap, but didn’t linger much longer.  Time to get out of this dingy place and hit the volcano.

If your clothing sports a swastika, and you are Balinese, it probably means you are Hindu.  If foreigners take offense, it is because they do not understand the history of this symbol in Eastern culture.  If you are white and your shirt sports a swastika, you may think it makes you Hindu, but you look like a neo-Nazi.  I don’t care if you know the true deep meaning of this symbol in Eastern culture.  You know very well that in Western culture it represents Nazi Germany so if you are wearing it on your hoodie it doesn’t make you cultured.  It makes you an asshole.

This is just one of several casual observations made at the festival.

I made several more and recorded them in a letter to the organizers, reproduced here.

A few words of advice for future events:

1. Bali is not Amsterdam.  Bali is not Stockholm.  Bali is not Chicago.  Therefore, unless your event is held in a place with a rail station or other mass transit stop (of which Bali has none), assume that guests will DRIVE. Knowing this, provide advice on how to navigate up the last 2km of off-road action in their rented Yaris (or other vehicle lacking mud tires and 4-WD capabilities) without losing an oil pan. Successful festivals often provide a shuttle of some kind, which makes more sense than an army of local guys on motorbikes offering to bump people up a rutty stretch strapped with camping gear. 

2. Ensure that spaces have been cleared for parking said vehicle. Know that large volcanic boulders and walls of lemongrass thistle can make parking prohibitive, even with modified suspensions and Bigfoot wheels. Especially in the dark. 

3. Ask that the volunteers manning the welcome station are WELCOMING. Smiles help.

4. Attention all staff, volunteers, and guests: When somebody says hello to you, they are trying to be friendly. You can say hello back. It is something that humans do.

5. Back to those festival officials: If a patron is going home early because they are sober and bored and tired of watching that French couple scream at each other because they’re having a hard time handling the local mushroom tea, and they ask for your help when their non-4-WD vehicle is spinning tires in the volcanic sand, a good response is empathy or aid. Not walking away, saying “good luck with that.”

6. More on point #5… we did get our car unstuck, but no thanks to you. A team of local Balinese guys eagerly volunteered to help us out. Because that is what you do when a fellow human being needs help.

7. Mandalas for your promotional materials?  SO 2003. 

8. Just because you browsed a website about numerology or watched both Stargate movies, that does not make you an honorary Mayan.  Unless you hold a Masters or Doctorate in Central American Studies, you probably don’t know squat about the sacred calendar.  So stop trying to make it into a theme party.

9. You named the festival Aware-Dance.  First off, sappy name.  If your intention is hipster irony, you failed.  If your intention is to “raise spiritual awareness” or some other form of feel-good nonsense, please read on to my next point. 

10. Maybe you believe that heightened awareness comes through meditation, yoga, hallucinogenics, or some kind of crystal fairy magic.  I’m no authority on the subject, as I have enough trouble staying aware of the empirical world all around us.  That is, observable phenomenon such as suicidal dogs running across my path on the roads or bugs that sneak into my coffee.  You should try it.  If you spent less time fretting about your sixth sense and focused on the other five, you might realize that your festival is poorly planned and no amount of esotericism will fix that until you address the realities listed here.

I sent DJ DJ a text at some point that night.  “Where are you?  This event blows.  What the hell?”  His response, “Yeah I bet it sucks. Man, glad I’m not there.”  Last time I use Wikipedia as a reference. 

We returned to Earth from the ill-fated 20 hours in the clouds pretty much unscathed but desirous of fun found closer to home.  Lucky for us, the Mepantigan performance was on for this fully moon lit night. For the uninitiated, Mepantigan is not a Transformer.  However, it would probably be a fair match against any robot in disguise, be they Autobot or Decepticon.  It is a martial arts style combining several forms from throughout the world.  Mepantigan founder Pak Putu Witson (his family name means “Victory”), an active member of the Green School family, explains it this way:

“When I was young, I decided I was getting tired of getting beat up, so I got good at fighting instead.  I really liked it.”

Pak Putu did not stop at the art of fighting, however.  Like any one of us who’s ever attended a martial arts performance in a dojo or mall or what-have-you, he realized one component was missing – the art of performance.

Sadly, Karate Kid is probably the most exciting tournament any of us will ever see.  For the spectators, watching a tournament is exciting for all of what?  Ten minutes?  How many parents walk out of the stadium after they see Little Johnny earn his blue belt?  Many, because the real thing is not like Karate Kid.

Considering this, Pak Putu created a show for every kind of spectator.

Every full moon, fans gather at the Mepantigan stadium, which encircles an enormous mud pit.  Incorporating martial arts demonstrations with satirical drama, lots of fire, and other surprises, no two shows are ever the same.  The whole production rolls out like a Steven Chow film.  The skits tend to address typically sober Asian perceptions of spirituality, virtue, and philosophy with a high degree of snarkiness (a welcome relief from all those Europeans on Mt. Batur who seemed to believe they were saving the world through their mantric chanting and Sasha remixes).  Dialogue is usually Indonesian, but the role plays are easy enough to follow, even without subtitles.  Bear in mind, all this takes place in a giant pool of thick mud.  Don’t wear your cotton whites if you sit in the front row. 

This particular production was the biggest yet.  Hundreds of spectators showed, Green School’s newly opened warung, normally a canteen during school hours, provided bar services.  After an hour of dancing, dueling, and drama in the mud, the entourage led the audience across the campus to the landmark bamboo river bridge.  Before us was laid out a spectacular sight:  torches had been lit all along the holy Ayung River.  Candles placed in small banana leaf boats floated downstream.  Meanwhile, a crew of young Mepantigan fighters, dressed as demons, fought along the edges of the surrounding river banks. Other fighters blew fire at each other.  In all, this was a far more spectacular show of talent than that lousy Kintimani event. 

*****

What’s in Terry?  Dysentery.

For weeks, something uncomfortable was churning in my abdomen.  When it first hit, I had to take a day off and ride up to the local clinic. The practitioner (not a doctor, methinks) tapped my belly in a few places, determined it to be an imbalance of some kind, and gave me a bottle of probiotics.  The symptoms disappeared in 24 hours.

A few days later, the symptoms returned – mild at first, but eventually building to a frenzy of raucous gastric activity in places where such activities are discouraged.  By the time I schlepped back to the clinic, everything inside me felt incredibly wrong and queued to exit through whatever orifice would allow them passage.  There, I was greeted by the same receptionist and handled by the same practitioner. They tried to prescribe me the same bottle of meds.  I told them I’d already finished the first bottle and it was not fixing the problem. They insisted I had not been prescribed any such thing.  I demanded to see my dossier.  They read the file and realized I was right.  They suggested I just “wait it out.”  I said I would sooner carve out my own viscera with a dull junkie spoon in Hell than wait out this horrible organism living in my abdomen for free rent and no deposit. 

My message may have been lost in the translation.

Thus, my ambitions for a weekend of surf and cold beers mutated into a weekend of medical crisis.  I went to SOS, which is known island-wide as the only reputable clinic, one which hires actual doctors.  There, a doctor requested the sort of sample which is acquired only through awkward positioning of the body.  Sometime later, he sternly grimaced at the lab report with the sort of furrowed brow only licensed to medical professionals.  Then, with a somber tone and Jakartan accent, he reported “amoebic dysentery.”

Oh dear God.  Isn’t that what wiped out the American Indians?

Yes it is, but fortunately Western medicine has replaced those free blankets on the reservation with a wonderful green pill called Flagyll.  By the next day, I was feeling 80% better.  So it made sense to accompany Watu to a soiree hosted by a potential future employer. The party was lovely, and set in an affluent Ulu Watu neighborhood in which the proprietors of Quicksilver and Surfer Girl (to name a few) own their homes.  The host’s residence was modeled in the style of Fantasy Island, with a tennis court by the gate.  I was engaged in conversation with a group of Peruvians about the benefits of retiring in a shack on the beach far from civilization when I looked over at my date.  Despite her Javanese complexion, she was greener than Al Gore at a global sustainability conference.  Rather than wait for her to expel her gastric demons into the courtyard fountain, we made the long, dark drive back to our hotel in the comparably bustling city of Kuta… barely.  Thankfully, hotels in Kuta, unlike certain other places, are without exception clean, cheap, and include running water. 

A good thing, because she was two seconds away from losing it all over the side of the car.  Lovers share many things.  Amoebic dysentery should not be one of them.

Presently, we’re both back in good health (so long as you don’t include the thick mold in the walls of my bungalow which I freebase all evening long).  But the whole episode got me to reflecting on the benefits of living in the modern Babylon of an urban metropolis, as opposed to a Eurotrash raver mountaintop utopia or that dream shack on the beach, miles from anywhere.

The Man Walks Alone

After two weekends of questionable fun factor, we were long overdue for a good weekend.  However, we decided this time to do it on our own terms.  My brother-in-arms, Panic, is due to be married in a matter of weeks.  With his fiancée due to arrive so they may begin their ceremony preparations, an early bachelor party seemed appropriate. 

Chief Hobbo made all the arrangements.  We would do it Bali style,with lots of good eats, cold drinks, and surf, surf, surf.  As per bachelor party tradition, it was guys only.  Watu elected to book a nice five-star for her and a girlfriend to occupy, so as to do “girl things.” 

The party was everything we hoped for.  Nearly every male from the Green School family showed – Quiet Ivan, Pak Putu, Widi Wifi, and a few other notables.  We threw down accordingly.  By night’s end, I was sitting in my favorite island bar, The Streets of Kuta.  From this curbside, one can witness the depravity and fearlessness of swarms of highly intoxicated Australian tourists.  Such glamour!

By the next morning, Panic and the Chief were dead to the world, having done a proper job of bidding farewell to Panic’s career as a freewheeling male.  Quiet Ivan missed his lady and his yurt back at the school and prowled for a ride home.  The Indonesians, in typical Indonesian fashion, had vanished without a trace at some point in the night.  Absent my fully inoperable cohort, I enjoyed a leisurely brunch of poached eggs and hollandaise over potato latke and very nearly completed the Saturday crossword.  The lot of us had made plans to surf Canggu; now it seemed I would be the only one going.

The idea appealed to me.  As all of us seasoned romantics know, when you couple with someone, you trade in a degree of personal liberty for the joys of sharing your life’s passions with a significant other. You can’t just go bowling with the lads anymore, not until coordinating your plans with your loved one.  And your lads will ridicule you for this mercilessly, despite their similar circumstances (or the bitter alternative – spending the majority of nights alone with a lukewarm beer, watching the last season of Lost on DVD).  This weekend was mine, a free bird with a wailing guitar crescendo.  First stop Canggu, last stop DESTINY.

I’ll admit, managing to get lost and drive in a complete circle during the first hour of my adventure made me miss Watu as a travel partner. But on the same note, I was able to fail in private.  I felt like a man, and damn if I wasn’t going to get myself as lost as manhood entitles a man to get.

My lack of direction found me in some unexpected places, which made all the turnarounds well worth the time and petrol.  In one case, I had traveled a lonely, thin, badly pockmarked road for a couple miles, all the while considering the sensibility of my route.  The only thing urging me forward was the scant trace of salt in the air.

“I must be getting closer!” conjectured my nostrils, and if Neighbor Wilson from Home Improvement taught me anything, it is that the male proboscis contains a small deposit of magnetically charged iron which acts as a (sometimes deceptive) compass.

Very suddenly, the horizon opened to the familiar vibrant blue of the Indian Ocean and the road came to an abrupt end, in a state of slow collapse before the sand which was slowly reclaiming its rightful territory.  The beach was completely empty as far as the eye could see, save for a lonely vendor selling cold drinks and renting surfboards.  He told me it was not Canggu Beach (I was off by several miles), but who cares?  The waves looked ideal, so I took a dip to test the waters.  A rip tide immediately pulled me nearly half a kilometer down the beach.  Remembering my desperate fight for life at the Double Six beach last month, I decided not to test the frivolous nature of the surf and declined the board rental.  The water was pleasantly warm as I enjoyed some time in the relative safety of the inland stretch.

Plenty of light left in the day, I remounted my trusty steed and set out once more to find the fabled Canggu.  Checking a few times for directions, my efforts paid off.  Canggu was populated, but only sparsely.  Most of the crowd consisted of surfers.  I watched their motions from the sea wall for awhile before renting a board, monitoring for drowning souls.  It seemed pretty safe, and a lot of fun.

Once in the water, the waves did all the work for me.  I barely needed to paddle at all before the surge took control of my Cadillac-sized McIntosh board and sent me wailing along.  The only detriment of Canggu Beach is the solid slab of rock which dominates the inner shore.  Come in the wrong way and you’re fish meal.  The mix of bliss and fear wore me out quicker than a typical surf session so I called it an early day.

I had noticed signs for Tanah Lot on the way up to Canggu.  I had meant to hit this spot for a long time, as it is considered the holiest of the Hindu temples on Bali, but the opportunity never presented itself until now.  So with my internal GPS navigating me like a drunken sailor, I completed my adventure of man-dom.

The “Lot” in Tanah Lot must refer to the parking, because at no other time in my life, no amphitheater concert, no theme park, no Baptist tent revival, have I experienced such a chaotic mishmash of super-sized tour buses, crowded rented SUV’s, and traffic cops dancing like they were at an Irish funeral.  Thank Ganesha, the Remover of Obstacles, for the motorbike which allowed me to bypass much of that crowded silliness.

Once in, I found the temple to be center ring for a literal parade of local talent.  Every village from around the island had sent its best dancers, percussionists, and performers of the barong, a sort of ballet in which the actors fall into a deep trance and replay scenes from the Ramayana, a holy book of the Hindu faith.  While in this trance, the participants attack the villains from the story.  The villains are dressed in ornate, larger-than-life costumes.  No matter what your take on the supernatural may be, to watch the barong performed by men with their eyes full of spiritual ecstasy and fear is to witness something not of this world.  But don’t worry. I’m not joining any Mayan cults in this lifetime.

The temple itself is not only the holiest on Bali, it is also the most expansive. Just to walk the grounds takes a good hour, not including the time needed for studying the marvelous Balinese architecture, smiling under the hanging floral gardens, photographing the sun as it sets over the long volcanic beach, and receiving the holy water blessing from the temple priests, which is why you see rice stuck to my forehead in the photos.  Add to this the time needed to peruse the souvenir stands with their wide variety of oleh-oleh (I got some sweet prezzies for my cuzzies) and the food vendors with their meats all goreng and bakar (if it’s on a stick, it’s fair game). At the end of the evening, a full belly and tired legs. 

My man-venture was man-errific. If I gave it a grade, it would be straight man-A’s (get it?) and if it were a woman, I’d name it Man-dy.  

Watu reported an equally well-spent woman weekend, as she and our tall friend Ellen took advantage of all their five-star amenities from the meticulously landscaped and primmed beach to the shameless patronage of room service.  They were instant celebrities, two Asian women, one Indonesian and one Chinese, without a single wealthy bule boyfriend in sight.  Once we were both back at my bamboo bungalow, we did what any hot couple does after being separated for more than a day, away from their love nest.  We played computer games all night long.

Hey, we can’t be rock stars all the time. 

Ever stumble upon an old email, and with it, a flood of memories? The Corn Cart Mystery is one such mail. I cannot believe this was nearly 10 years ago! Plenty has changed in that time, but ironically, I find myself once again teaching fourth grade in a country with corrupt politics, crummy police, and shit that falls apart. 

I’m trying to figure out this most peculiar mystery. It reads just like the title of one of the novels that is so popular amongst my fourth graders: 

The Mystery of the Fugitive Corn Cart

Every other night, when I go out for a gelato down the street, or tasty zata’a manouche with the works from Snack Faysal, I notice a corn cart in front of the police station. It’s not so odd that a vendor would have a wheeled cart just for the sale of corn, or that it would be parked in front of the police station most nights of the week.  What’s weird is this:

a.  There’s never a corn vendor at the stand. The stand stands alone.  

b.  It is a different corn stand every time.  

c.  If I walk by the police station after a certain late hour, usually 3 am or so, the corn stand has been smashed to bits. Cobs, kernels, bits of wood, and a large, slashed umbrella lay scattered across the street as taxis speed around its sad remains.  

 d.  By the next morning, all evidence of the corn stand’s last stand has disappeared. No trace left behind, not even the trampled sludge that one would expect to see underneath a desecrated corn stand.   

So here’s what I envision:  

The corn mafia is alive and well within the ranks of the Beiruti police. I picture some cop coming up to a poor schmuck selling corn on the Corniche (see what I did there?) and giving him the shakedown.  

“We run the corn racket in this town, pallie. Pay up, or you can kiss your sweet corn goodbye. We can be downright salty people to deal with, so don’t try to butter us up. I swear to god we will pop you.”  The vendor tries to reason with the officer, but he brushes off the pleas.

“Sorry, it’s strictly business. I work for Don Corn-leone.”

I then picture one of their high powered SUV’s barrelling down the Corniche, lights flashing, corn stand in tow, bouncing along behind it, all the way back to headquarters. Once there, they leave it on the curb for public shaming, then invite belligerent AUB college kids over to lay waste to the corn shack. The remains are “disappeared” by dawn.        

Sorry for all the silly puns, but I thought the politics of this country needed some comedy. Everything you just read is true, except for the parts I made up.  

There’s been a lot of talk about the elections. From the suits in government to the street sweepers outside Burger King, nobody at any level of the social ladder knows what to expect. For those of you in the US that don’t listen religiously to Al Jazeera, the Lebanese elections are upon us, but it’s a far cry from what we see in America. An elective board makes a decision on the behalf of the people to determine the next leader of the country. The whole process is greased to a nauseating degree by money, religion, and empty promises. Hmm…. actually, I guess it’s pretty much how we do it in the US after all.   

The notable exception is how this election has been delayed and delayed and delayed, leaving everyone pretty nervous. The delay comes because there is no Parliament assembled right now to finalize the process. They’re either boycotting themselves (you read that correctly), or hiding out, since certain anti-Syrian members tend to encounter some rather nasty accidents that involve exploding cars. The head-in-the-sand policy has been working for about two months now, but the deadline is approaching. After Nov. 24, I believe, if no leader is elected, there will be a military coup, as dictated by the national constitution. Not the sort of coup you see on CNN though, with the shooting and the mortar shells, but more like what we’ll see in the US around 2008. One party replaces another, and everybody goes to work the next morning as usual. The only difference is the new leader of Lebanon will wear military fatigues.  

If my language seems unconvincingly confident there, you’re right. This is the pitch I’ve been given by the admins of my school, as well as the locals who’ve lived here for years. They’ve had military coups before. I do believe that in the short term, we won’t see any significant developments. But in the long term, no telling.  And the locals do tend to have more pessimistic predictions for the long term. 

 So in the meantime we wait. 

I had my head tied around this stuff on the way home today. I was walking up the 379 steps from my school to the flats, mind clouded with thoughts of a guy announcing his presidency with victory shots fired into the sky, when I approached Bliss Street. Absently checking to my left for oncoming traffic and right for scooters driving against traffic, I stepped into the road and came within a hair’s breadth of a taxi driving 30 mph in reverse.  Must say, never in my life suspected I’d need to watch for reverse cabbie hazards, but now I will check every time. 

Just goes to show, just when I think I understand this place, I’m reminded that I really don’t know jack.  

I have adjusted pretty well though. I wake up around 5am with the call to prayer. I get some Arabic coffee on the boil, then take a nap in my shower for awhile. Then it’s off to school, where I’m still learning much about the craft every day. More on that sometime in the future. I have a student teacher now. He just sort of showed up, and now follows me around everywhere. Stay at school for 12 hours or so, then trudge home, where I nod off to some juvenile fiction.  

Right now, the marching band of IC is playing their field, as they’ve entered the regional championships for fütball.  They may suck as our academic rivals, but they have a hell of an athletic program.  Meanwhile, the drums are drowned out by the evening call to prayer. It’s like a surreal version of my childhood… hearing the drum majors practice from Greenwave Stadium, while the church organs from St. John’s shared the air.  

Well, that’s about it from my end. Thanksgiving parallels with Lebanese Independence Day this week, so we’re going to shoot some really fun fireworks off the roof… the kind that are probably illegal even in Mexico. If I don’t get another one of these emails off by week’s end, I wish you all a happy Turkey Day. I’ll be travelling to Syria for the holiday, so if you don’t hear from me in two weeks, call the State Department.  

It was painful to read the second half. I knew so little about the international education game back then, so little about how to be a sensible foreigner. I had no idea that my days in Lebanon were numbered. No idea that the people I met in Lebanon would remain as some of my dearest friends today. Or that I was falling in love with one woman and falling out with another. Or that my trip to Syria was the last time I’ll ever be able to see that country the way it used to be. 

And if you told me that a man named Barack Hussein Obama would soon be president, I’d have assumed we were still talking about Lebanon. 

That last paragraph is a classic “Hey y’all, watch this!” moment. How did I not know that launching military grade fireworks from the roof of our apartment building at the peak of a volatile political crisis was a foolish idea?

“Name?” asked the soldier, head-to-toe camo garb, body armor, birch cane at the ready.

“Sorry?” I responded, ready to stagger into my Stupid Lost Tourist persona.

“Name. What is name?” demanded the soldier once more.

“Who, me?” I felt my confidence slipping. It always starts with a name. Next, you’re in a dark room signing confession papers written in a foreign language. What the hell does this guy want from me?

“Ha ha. No. Name of dog.”

He was grinning now, the soldier. He wanted to hold Floyd, have a cuddle. Soldiers need love too. Chihuahuas like Floyd have that effect on people. Especially in this country.

It’s been a month now, here in Patan, Nepal, the quiet, relatively liveable burg adjacent to Kathmandu proper. As it’s been in all of my overseas work (not including boring Qatar, with all its sand), every day is something new and surprising.

Patan is not a place for people who sleep. My earplugs only mildly dampen the cacophonous circus that dominates the night air. Ten o’clock is when most neighbors have turned down the hauntingly catchy Nepali pop music. Also around this time, traffic noise from the nearby ring road mercifully dies off.

Lest we overindulge in the sounds of silence. At 11 pm, the dogs begin their ode to the moon. On a good night, the dogs tire and revert to their normal job: laying about in the street. Most nights though, they feel a three-set jam coming on, and need everyone to know it. Sometimes our dogs like to join in.

Midnight, the last redeye from Delhi soars overhead. Sometimes the windows rattle a bit.

We grow up hearing farm folk talking about waking with the roosters at dawn but that is a lie. Roosters are contemptible creatures that wake whenever they please, usually while it’s still dark outside. Then the demented ice cream truck horns of the three wheeled buses begins, hauling away less fortunate people who leave for work much earlier than me. By now, our dogs have finally gone to sleep, and it’s time to rise.

My day kicks off at dusk with a ponderous sit on the toilet, managing the previous day’s affairs in the special way only my vegetarian friends in developing countries will understand. Courtesy our solar heaters, I might have a warm water shower but if not, they say cold water showers do wonders for your endorphin gland.

Then some yoga. One window faces the city, another the mountains, the third window faces the guard at my gate, who’s always waving hello to me as I’m mid warrior pose. When the weather cools, I plan to take my yoga to the roof, because the local people expect to see loony antics from their foreign neighbor and I’m the man to deliver.

Put the kettle on the gas. Needs to boil rapidly a couple minutes to kill everything. Grind down my dwindling supply of Sexy Seven coffee, but no worries. They grow and roast excellent coffee in Nepal. I even have coffee berries in the orchard outside my door, between the avocados and mangoes. Give the milk a quick sniff. You can’t get it much fresher anywhere else, and yes it’s pasteurized, but lacking all those lovely preservatives we enjoy in America, milk turns pretty quickly. Yogurt to replace the probiotics I wiped out with the last regiment of anti-diarrheal meds. Add some local honey, granola, and pomegranate seeds. Fiona drinks her farmer market tea, if the dogs are lucky they get a walk, and out the door we go for work.

I won’t talk much about my job in the coming months, but suffice to say, I’m in a place where the hard work and extra hours contribute towards something great. .

And when the day is done, it is done. Nothing comes home with me, even if that sometimes mean I don’t leave until late. I’m not counting the occasional “collaboration” that happens over a couple beers.

Like Mr. Rogers, I swap my Oxfords for my sneakers (or Timberlands during the monsoon rains) and trudge the 25 minute hike home. I’ll have a bike soon, but when that time comes, I’ll miss all the things I notice on foot.

The high school soccer coach who runs his boys down the chaotic rush hour streets with increasingly more intense exercise regiments — last week they carried teammates on their shoulders. The buses with their horns that sound like miniature melodies, festooned with hand painted patterns across the panels and eyelashes on the headlights. The family of monkeys that races across the bird nests of power lines every Thursday morning during my coffee at Top of the World Cafe. The cows that dominate the roads like soccer moms in SUV’s. The SUV’s that get strong armed off the road by said cows. The soccer moms who… well, I’ve learned not to say anything about soccer moms when in a new country.

The three old ladies selling produce on the curb. The really, really old lady baking ears of corn on a smoldering log, plumes of smoke engulfing the road. That one goat, who might be “mutton” come tomorrow. Rusty the Dog. Grumps the Dog. Japanese Tracksuit Guy. The Overly Nice Korean Family. The Bangladeshi shopkeeper who insists my wife needs a bindi. The Negotiating Space Dance I perform with other pedestrians, where I repeatedly step off then back on the sidewalk whilst trying to dodge meandering motorcyclists, bossy taxis, and of course, random cattle.

Actually, that last thing I won’t miss at all.

A place is defined by its people. Patan has some of the best. Last week, little Floyd bolted from the gate, no doubt to chase his personal dragon, a toad venom addiction. The escape happened at noon, as we were informed by our housekeeper, who was in a right state. Being at work, there was little we could immediately do but print out LOST flyers. I received regular updates from our housekeeper and gardener, who had fanned out to all the nearby homes and shops, making inquiries. When we finally started our canvassing efforts, everyone showed genuine concern, even if language was a barrier. Almost all the shop and cafe owners agreed to post our flyer, which was written in English and Nepali. The local animal shelter helped us out with tape. We searched for almost two hours after work. I was nearly back home when I ran into my landlord. He too had been on the search, after our guard informed him of the problem. More than I could’ve expected from any landlord back home!

At long last, Floyd returned home more than 12 hours after his prison break. He was high as a kite on toad venom. An intervention is planned.

Since that difficult evening, people all over the neighborhood still ask about Floyd. Did he come home? How is he? Was he hurt? We are so happy you have now back your dog.

Love this place.

Here, locals consider me a “Good American.” It’s unlike other places, where my nationality was met with nonchalance (which I prefer), overly jubilant praise (usually from Arabs, which felt weird), or on rare occasions, spite (usually from British people). The Good American conversation usually sounds like this:

“Oh. You’re from Am-ERR-ica. I am surprised. I thought you were Canadian. I mean, you’re so… normal. And nice. And you haven’t offended anybody. And you said you don’t very much like war or guns or bigotry. Yes. Surprising. You are a Good American.”

Jeez, Americans! What have you been doing in Nepal these last few years?

The expat scene here is something completely different than what I experienced in other countries. In Lebanon, diplomats and UN staffers hunkered down behind barbed wire and cement walls, far and away from the joyous, frenetic, occasionally life-threatening hustle of the glorious city life. Bali was pretty much a summer camp for over indulgent grownups. Sweden, there was an unspoken climate of anxiety amongst expats, a cloud of shame that followed every person who didn’t blend, every person who failed to put forth a concerted effort to speak the language. Probably a word for that in Swedish, but I’ll never know.

Here in Kathmandu, it’s a combination of all those things. There are more NGO’s on the ground than the alphabet can handle, and everyone is very serious about their work. At least until five o’clock hits. At that point, the bars fill with boisterous conversations, fueled by local spirits of questionable origin. And yet, there’s a “face” that expats wear. A face that advertises “Don’t mess with me, I’m (practically) local.”

Maybe it’s the women who so readily don scarves and saris. Or the men with their locally tailored (read: super slim cut) suits. Or the one-upmanship of local food knowledge — tongue and guts are fine dining here (for some).

I don’t hate it. In fact, I cannot wait to immerse myself in it.