The Historian

 

I’ve read lots of essays about why people write and they often start with something about how the writer couldn’t survive without writing, how it’s what keeps their soul alive and that they’ve been a writer as long as they can remember.

When I read stuff like this I feel like an imposter. As a kid, I wrote because teachers made me do it. Luckily I was good at it without trying, which boosted my not-so-great confidence and I grew to like writing.

I fell into my writing career almost by accident. After college I went through a phase of wanting to ditch the over-intellectual life and learn to use my hands. This (and some romance) lead me to a black pearl farm on a very remote atoll in the South Pacific where I spent days scraping sea goo off of oysters or cooking meals for up to 20 hungry men. I got pregnant, had babies and devoted all my waking energy beyond farm work towards raising my kids. 

I kept a journal through this time, logging my adventure but unfortunately its contents would never make it beyond the atoll. In a very dramatic, small-island crazed turn of events the farm manager stole my journal and burned it which, paired with other equally deranged events, made my family realize it was time to move on. It wasn’t until I lost my writing and the details of my five years of experiences, that I realized I was a writer. The second we moved to Tahiti and got an internet connection I started sending out articles. When I told my stories and published them they would stay safe and alive  -- I didn't want my history or anyone else's to go up in smoke again, so to speak.

I’ve now been a full-time professional guidebook and travel writer for nine years. I officially have the writing bug but I’m still not that person who would die if I couldn’t write. Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and need to write something that’s brewing in my head, but if you took writing away from me for a month I’d see it more as a vacation than anything else (I work too much!). It’s important to me to have correct grammar but I care far more about creating a unique metaphor that instills a sense of place than about details like the Oxford comma. I can’t spell to save my life.

I write because it’s my vehicle to tell stories and to share information that I’m passionate about. The art is lovely but to me it’s secondary. Research and discovery excite me more than getting it all on paper, but once I get to the writing part, I take pride in doing it well. When I’m in the groove I dote on the shape of words, the cadence of a sentence and how the mix of it all can run away until it disappears into a dream world. So I guess, in a way, art follows the adventure and I appreciate the time it gives me to process information and to look for the stories hidden within it all.

Sometimes I feel like more of a historian than a writer. I don't "sit at the typewriter and bleed" (who said that?), I sit and and I recreate the places I've been and the characters I've met while telling an honest story. I come out of it with a stiff back and if things went well I'll have that same glow one gets when reading a good book.

In any case, I’m writing this because my friend Annika Hipple asked me to take part in a “blog hop,” where writers answer a few questions about their writing life. I am being a terrible blog hopper firstly because I’m not going to answer any of the questions beyond this first part and secondly because I’m not handing over the baton to another blogger. I blog for fun and I just got past the fun part.

But you really should head over to Annika’s blog, see what she wrote and find more links to why other writers write and what their writing process looks like. There’s an amazing range of stories.

You can see Annika’s post here.

And here's Annika's Bio -- she is very cool and has a diverse and flourishing freelance career (a rarity in this business):

Annika Hipple is a freelance writer, editor, and photographer specializing in travel, adventure, environment, sustainability, and history. She has contributed to a wide range of magazines, newspapers, and online media both in the U.S. and overseas. In addition, she helps travel companies and nonprofit organizations tell their stories through newsletters, website content, and other materials. A lifelong traveler, she grew up bilingual and bicultural, with two countries (the United States and Sweden) to call home. She has ridden a camel in the Gobi, braved the winds at Cape Horn, snorkeled with sharks in the Galapagos, ventured into ancient Egyptian tombs, tracked cheetahs on foot in Namibia, camped on a beach in the Ecuadorian Amazon, tubed through a cave filled with glowworms in New Zealand, and stood face-to-face with the massive moai heads of Easter Island. She blogs her travel photography on her website, www.annikahipple.com, publishes the Scandinavia travel website RealScandinavia.com, and is currently developing other blogging projects related to sustainable travel and history. Alongside her creative endeavors, Annika leads trips throughout the world as a tour manager and guide for a variety of travel programs.

My Dinner With Excellent

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Excellent Zhan invited me to dinner at his favorite restaurant in Shenzen. It was my second day in China, I was there on pearl business and keen to try some authentic cuisine, so of course I agreed to go. I also got a kick out of dining with a guy who had a name like a Klingon warrior.

Although I’d heard lots of horror stories about Chinese dishes involving strange animals and internal organs, I thought I could probably handle anything they served me. I’d eaten grasshoppers, bat and snake so it was unlikely the Chinese could challenge me much more.  I hadn’t actually liked eating bugs but if the situation calls for being polite, I’ll chew up almost anything. And if it happens to taste good, I don’t really care if it’s something I’m not used to eating (I do however draw the line with rare or endangered animals). I would soon find out that I just wasn’t thinking creatively enough.

Excellent was a stocky pit-bull of a man with a greying, tall flat-top haircut that stiffly gave the finger to gravity. He didn’t speak a word of English, nor I Mandarin, so our conversations were parlayed through Candy, his young, delicate translator. Also along for the ride – or actually giving us the ride – was Excellent’s chatty driver Amy who admitted to me (in better English than Candy’s) that she had had her driver’s license exactly one week. Excellent’s nervous-looking wife squeezed in the back seat with us, turned her head to look out the window, and didn’t say a word to me the whole evening.

We reached the restaurant safely and got out  in front of a large red door with a giant bronze gong-shaped knocker. The man guarding the entrance knew Excellent and they fretted their hellos.  Once inside we were led past a busy dining area to a private room with red walls and a rectangular dark wooden table. Here we sat. Once he had ordered, Excellent looked at me and began delivering a short welcome speech in my honor.

“Excellent say this he favorite restaurant,” said Candy. “He say happy he share with you food from he home in northern country. He happy you here and hope we can do many good business. You like spicy?”

I assured her I liked spicy food, which I do.

Soon the first dishes arrived with the wait staff that brought the platters around to each of us. Every time something new came, our small crowd chattered and whooped in admiration. Apparently we were getting all the best stuff. And it really was fantastic. I don’t remember most of it specifically except it was predominantly in red-orange sauce and had 1000 times the flavor of any other Chinese food I’d ever eaten. There was a huge variety and everything was exceptionally good.

Then it arrived. From afar, the knuckle-sized bits of what I assumed was some kind of meat didn’t look very interesting, but when everyone else in the room realized what it was there was a surprised silence then near applause. What ever this was it was the piece de resistance.

The server offered me some of the mystery dish and I cautiously took two for my plate. They looked like small rubbery tubes, tightened through the middle and filled with some sort of soft, mustard brown goo. Unlike everything else we’d eaten this night, it did not look appetizing.

“What is this,” I asked Candy who was sitting next to me.

Candy thought for a moment.

“No know how to say English,” she said.

By this time everyone was looking at me, waiting for me to try this special dish and so I had to. I lifted the first one into my mouth with my chopsticks.

It tasted just like it looked. The outside was a chewy, rubbery sleeve which squirted out the slightly gritty, rotten banana-textured insides. The overall flavor was bitter with a tinge of old-garbage odor. I chewed and chewed and swallowed until I had cleared my mouth out enough to politely smile.

“Very delicious,” I said. Everyone around me was elated.

I looked at the remaining morsel on my plate.

“Candy, can you give me at least an idea of what this is?” I asked.

“Hmmm,” she said pensively. “It’s. . . inside of pig. Like leeva but not leeva.”

She added a slow “no” shake of the head to emphasize that this was definitely not liver.

So, I thought, thinking logically with what I new about mammalian anatomy, I am eating buttholes. Perhaps they weren’t buttholes, maybe they were gall bladders or bile ducts, but whatever they were they were still full of gall, bile or poo and tasted accordingly. I took the second one with my chopsticks and tried to look enthusiastic as I popped it in my mouth while my hosts watched me, proud of how they spoiled their foreign guests.

As I chewed, trying not to get too hung up on the texture of the pig-generated substance inside the calamari-like part, the serving plate came my way again. There were still a few pieces left.

“Take them all,” said Candy, generously.

I took one more.

“I don’t want to be too greedy,” I said. Candy translated this and it met with nods of approval. The plate was brought to Excellent and his wife who hungrily ate the last of the precious sphincters.

I didn’t feel sick per se but I really didn’t want to eat a third putrid, mysterious pig part.

Looking around I wondered if I could possibly slip the last anus into my purse. There wasn’t much sauce so it wouldn’t make too much of mess. I slid it to the edge of my plate and vigilantly watched my dinner companions. It would have been pretty easy except for Candy sitting next to me in my blind spot. When I saw her turn her head away from me, I went to shove the meat over the side of my plate with a chopstick but it was too late, Excellent looked over at me with a well fed but business-like expression. I picked up the last organ and, trying not to dwell too much on the now all familiar taste and texture, chewed it, chewed some more then swallowed it.

At this point I almost expected my host to stand up while a Chinese reality TV host to popped out from behind a curtain to tell me that the buttholes had been a really hysterical practical joke, but no. I think we may have had a digestive beverage, I don’t remember what. And then I was taken back to my hotel. I never got sick from eating pig butts but I brushed my teeth really well that night.

Fast forward several years to when I write this blog post. While looking for images I have discovered that pig anuses are actually quite popular in Asian cuisine.  From the few photographs I could find however, I now think I may have been served pig fallopian tubes. No matter. In early 2013 there was a scandal, soon discovered to be a hoax, that a product called imitation calamari was made of pig anuses. From the descriptions of the rubbery nature of pig rectums, it doesn’t seem like a stretch to me.  I came across all sorts of fun facts -- such as that a deboned inverted pig’s rectum, sold at Asian markets averages two feet long and two inches wide. I’m not sure why I’m telling you this now but for me at least this puts a sort of closure on my story.

In conclusion I’m afraid the tale is not much more than this: I ate something really gross with a guy with a funny name and I still don’t know what it was.

How I learned to never take rides from strangers

I just read an article that made me wince, not because it was bad, but because it so eloquently explained ideas I've wanted to write about for years. The article was "Dangers oftraveling while female" by Tara Isabella Burton on Salon.com and yes, the title is terrible. Burton doesn't talk about the dangers women encounter in foreign countries; instead she expertly shows how female travel writers and adventurers have to give up many possibly amazing opportunities in order to avoid becoming sexual targets. But the kicker is the last half where the article winds into what I wish I could shout at the entire travel world: women's travel experiences might not be the same as men's but we see another angle of the world, the female angle, that makes up about 50% of the complexity of the human experience.

So what does this have to do with taking rides from strangers? My first solo travel adventure was to French Polynesia when I was 19 years old. Like Burton I imagined myself as the classic Indian Jones-type character, chugging off into the sunset on supply ships, swimming with sharks and living off of raw fish. Actually I did all these things but along the way I made one terrible mistake: I forgot that I was a woman. Because of this, the scariest experience I've ever had when traveling happened on this first trip. I still often forget that I'm a woman and then, before I do anything too stupid, I remember this story.

Here's what happened:

On a cloudless, perfectly tropical day I was waiting for Le Truck (the local bus) from my Tahitian hostel into the capital of Papeete. I'd been waiting maybe 10 minutes, enjoying the cackle of voices from a nearby fruit market and the smell of burning leaf piles in the air, when beat up Pugeot with a bunch of windsurf boards tied to the roof puttered up next to me. A smiling, slim but strong Polynesian face asked me if I wanted a ride. I recognized the guy as the sun-weathered windsurfing instructor of my hostel.

"Je t'ai vu sur la plage," he said [he'd seen me on the beach], after his offer for a lift.

My 19 year old self didn't see this statement beyond that I had in fact been on the beach and it was normal that he would have seen me there and thus recognized me at the bus stop. In my head I was a swashbuckling voyager, not a bikini babe so instead of seeing this guy as a person who may have been hitting on me, I imagined it as a possibility for an authentic connection with a local.

I hopped in.

I can't remember what his name was so let's call him Teva. Teva spoke no English and at the time I spoke minimal French. We clacked along in his low-to-the-ground car past giant mango trees, small waves crashing against the black lava shoreline and plump women in colorful pareu herding children along the slim shoulder of the road. Teva chatted with me the whole time, even though I only understood about 20 percent of what he was saying, and often took his gaze away from the road to try and look me deeply in the eyes. By the time we reached the traffic-filled market area of Papeete I wasn't sure, but it seemed like he had invited me to go to Moorea with him and I had agreed. I had no intention of going to Moorea with Teva however since, after all the leers and what seemed to be flattering comments about my appearance, my instincts told me that Teva was not going to provide the type of authentic local experience I was hoping for.

Still, when Teva suggested that we both run our errands then he'd drive us both back to the hostel, I agreed.

Our meeting place post-errands was a busy French bakery with outdoor cafe-style tables and chairs set up in the main walking area of a small indoor mall. When I got there Teva had already bought me a plate of fancy pastries and ordered me to eat them. I like pastries but his aggressive tone put me on edge. I ate one and pushed the rest aside. He knitted his eyebrows together, gave me a look like I had just broken his favorite toy and brusquely said we had to go. This was fine with me, I was ready to be back at the hostel and rid of Teva.

When we got in the car parked along a dirty curb, he had several wrapped gifts waiting for me and told me to open them. Especially after the weird bakery scene I had not expected presents so this caught me off-guard. I opened them - one contained two cheap tourist T-shirts and the second was a Tahitian pareu and a book on how to tie it. I thanked Teva for the gifts but he was obviously still angry about the pastries and would hardly look at me.

Off we went, taking a freeway that led over a small hill with a beyond-my-dreams view of the geometric silhouette of Moorea, which I had never seen before. It was then I realized we were going the wrong direction.

"Where are we going?" I asked, trying not to sound too alarmed.

"To the most beautiful place on the island," he said in French. Suddenly he was no longer angry, his voice was soft, nearly patronizing.

The most beautiful place on Tahiti for Teva was the Maeva Beach Resort just outside Papeete. It was a block-style waterfront resort on a small white sand beach with that same outrageous view of Moorea. Why at this point I didn't bolt out of the car as soon as we parked I have no idea. I think I needed things to get really bad to learn this lesson. And so, we went in to the hotel and out to the beachside bar on a patio a few feet from the fine white beach. Caucasian tourists, mostly aged 40 and up looked at me with that surprised look of disdain that's only given to a white woman who looks like she's bonking a non-white male. I would experience this a number of times later in life but this was my first experience with an icky racism that prevails in all cultures and skin colors around the world; it made me feel dirty.

Teva ordered himself and me a beer without asking what I wanted. Beads of condensation dribbled down the sides of the glass, reflecting the glare of the sun off the sand. I immediately told him I wasn't going to drink a beer. At first Teva really looked like he was about to hit me but he took a breath, then sat sulking, taking long sips of his beer.

"It's expensive here," he said. "You're wasting my money."

After maybe 20 very uncomfortable minutes Teva had finished his beer. Mine sat warm and flat, no longer attracting luscious tropical flashes of sunshine. We got up and walked towards the hotel. Teva's movements were fast and stiff and I had trouble trying to keep up with him.  There was an elderly American couple in the elevator that took us up to the lobby floor that accessed the parking lot. I looked at them and thought that maybe I should tell them about my predicament, that I was scared of Teva and didn't want to get back in the car with him. I also didn't know how I would get back to the hostel at this point without him. A very stupid blend of politeness, shyness and the inability to raise a scene stopped me from saying anything and I continued, with Teva back to the car.

This is where my memory gets blurry. I think we drove out of the parking lot and got on the freeway. Teva was proclaiming some sort of love for me before pulling over to the side of the road, grabbing me, cramming his face against mine and sticking his tongue down my throat. I wish at this point I had kneed him in the balls or gouged his eyes out but no. I did however manage to get loose, open the car door and escape, I don't remember how. Teva yelled some Tahitian explicatives at me and screeched away leaving me alone on the side of the freeway with two T-shrts, a pareu and a book about how to tie them (how I managed to end up with these I have no idea. Maybe Teva threw them out the window at me?).  How was I going to get back to my hostel? Again, my memory here is blank but somehow, I got back.

Later when I told the cranky, chain-smoking ex-pat American owner of the hostel what had happened she said in a loud cracking voice, "Oh Teva's OK, just don't sleep with him."

Not surprisingly the hostel closed down a few years later after several women complained about being harassed.

My biggest take away from this experience is that it could have been far worse. Teva was a scum but I was lucky that he was a soft scum who would warn me about the greater evils in the world. Now, not only do I never take rides from strangers but I would never agree to go to Moorea with someone to be polite or hang out with them a minute longer if they even suggested this. I wouldn't accept an inappropriate gift, I would insist on at least splitting the cost of pastries and I can firmly say "no" without feeling rude. The list goes on.

But far worse is that, when say a guide offers to take me out alone at night and for free to watch sea turtles nest on remote Malaysian beaches, I turn him down. When I'm about to pass out of heat exhaustion in Thailand and a big van with two men inside offer me a ride, I choose heat exhaustion instead. This is the bad deal we have as women.

The flip side is, as Burton writes, that I get to see into women's lives and experience a world that men will never see. Instead of seeking out authentic experiences with surf instructors, I try to befriend local women, hold their babies and maybe learn to cook a local specialty. The travel world has not caught on that these types of experiences offer adventures that can make for beautiful and exciting stories. Women's worlds are as interesting and rich as men's and yet we know so much less about them. In fact, this is a whole other story that's longer, greater and closer to my heart than I may ever be able to condense into a single blog post. This is what I want to write about, now and for the rest of my life.

The Myth of Paradise

 

A few days ago I tweeted " I love you Tahiti but I gotta say that coming back to a sunny Portland is no bummer." I instantly lost around 15 followers. I'm not too concerned about losing that many Twitter fans but this made me think about something that I've encountered since I chose to move from Tahiti to Portland, Oregon about three years ago: people want me to live in (or at least revere) "Paradise" because it helps them believe in a better place. 

The chance of any of these people ever packing up their lives and living on an island or even visiting that island on vacation is small at best, but when I say that I currently prefer a US city to their image of vacation land, it's like telling a child there's no such thing as Santa Claus. That tropical island is like Dr Seuss's Solla Saloo "where there never are troubles, at least very few," but like the place in that story, one set of troubles is only replaced by another. This is life, this is planet Earth and I hate to be the one to burst people's bubble but after the glow of first love fades nowhere is perfect unless you have personally achieved some kind of Nirvana.

Here's the thing: wherever you go you will probably have to work to survive and if you grew up in the US, Europe or anywhere else brimming with action it will be hard for you to slow down to the point where gazing at the sea (or road or palm trees in the wind) for a few hours will fulfill your activity needs. Not to say I don't love doing this in theory. Right now as I sit on my deck writing to deadline to the sound of traffic, hanging out and watching hermit crabs make trails in the sand sounds awfully nice but years of this with little else going on? Not at this period of my life, thanks. 

It takes approximately 3.5 hours to drive around Tahiti. Think about that for a minute. Nearly every inch is surrounded by a gorgeous, tepid lagoon and the mountains hold lush plantations of bananas and papayas, as well as tall cascades gushing into crystal clear pools. I love all these places and really I don't tire of them, but over the 15 years I lived there I have been just about everywhere, dozens of times. As much as I enjoy swimming and hiking I am too complicated a person to be able to be happy doing only that, in the same places, over and over again in my free moments in between work (because wherever you go you still need money to survive). Life here in Portland means pubs, restaurant, skiing, beaches, berry picking, varied live music any night of the week and, most importantly, the ability to drive for hours to get to a multitude of other places. Right now this is what I want. Maybe as I get older I'll tire of this and want to settle back down to slow island life but I'm not done with the continent-based lifestyle yet.

Also, your shit is your shit and no matter how balmy the temperatures or blue the lagoon, it will be with you, always. Other people have their shit too and you will have to deal with it anywhere there are other humans. 

Example: Last week I returned to my village, Teahupoo for the first time in 2.5 years. A few years before I left, one of the area's biggest families put up a gate blocking the area's other biggest family from being able to access their homes, land and fishing grounds without paying the first, road-owning family around $375 a piece for gate access. The whole town is in turmoil about this and guess what? After all the time I've been gone nothing has changed other than a few fists have swung. 

On a more personal level, half the village comes into my yard and steals my lemons, a "friend" went in my house when we were gone and stole my kid's bunk bed and a local woman threatened to go in my house and "break everything" because we fired her as a house cleaner when she began working hours we never asked her to and then demanded money from us. None of these things are a big deal on a grand scale but to me they equal out the lonely anonymity of city life. Island problems are more personal and they'll get to you if you don't adopt a very Zen state of mind. Are you ready for your house and property to be communal areas? Do you mind having things you do meld into conversations that get warped into gossip via the "coconut radio?" If so, go try living in Polynesia.

At the end of the day for me, I'm taking a break from both the intensity and calm of island life. It's something I'm not sure anyone who has never lived on an island can understand. Tahiti is a wonderful place that I love with all my heart but for now I need more. If that works against your faith in a perfect world I'm sorry, but I suggest you try meditation.

My first travel adventure: Baja 1977

I'm guessing it was 1977. I was about six years old and my parents decided we'd caravan down to Baja in our 4WD for an off-road adventure with some good friends who had three kids around my age. We lived in the San Francisco Bay Area where we'd just moved to the year before from Brighton, England. Traveling half way across the world by plane had been long and boring - I was told that this car trip would be about as long but with lots of fun stops on the way.

Of course my memories are hazy.

We drove a big green Chevy Suburban. It was used when we bought it and already pretty beat up. The back lacked cushioning but had lots and lots of green-painted, cold metallic space. The truck's name was Emmylou II.

Emmylou II had a tape deck and this seemed really high tech to us. We had two tapes for the trip: Stevie Wonder's Greatest Hits and the Star Wars Soundtrack (as in the whole movie on tape). The trip from San Francisco to Baja is around 10 hours so you do the math. To this day every time I hear Stevie Wonder I think about that trip to Baja.

I remember stopping at a rest stop somewhere in Southern California and climbing a tree that had brush-like red flowers and cylindrical nut clusters. I hid in the tree, most likely running away or to Marcus who was my age and who I adored in a bratty, teasing, six-year-old-girl sort of way, and picked off all the round, berry-sized seeds off one of the clusters. Then I probably threw them at Marcus. It was incredibly satisfying. I still love these types of trees. There are lots of them in Southern California.

Then we were in Mexico on the beach. I had a pair of swim fins that I was really excited to try out even though I couldn't swim. My mom helped me put them on and we waded out into the warm brown water. I can still remember how silky and bathtub-like it felt up to my knees. But the sand was more like mud and soon one of my fins was stuck. I had to pull my foot out but the mud just ate up the fin. My parents dug and searched for the fin but we never found it. I was sad about the fin but more than anything I was awed that mud could just swallow something like that. I gained respect for mud.

There were fishermen selling small sharks on the beach and I think we bought one then cooked it on a fire maybe. I doubt I liked it. I was an extremely fussy eater. I remember that urine-like shark flavor a little bit.

There was a small shop near where we were camping and a rotund Mexican woman shopper took a liking to me and fawned all over me. No one in the US did this much so I loved it and my parents did too. While my dad was chatting with her in Spanish I wandered through the aisles of the store and found an open package of . . . Skittles maybe? My parents didn't let me have candy that often so I grabbed the package and slipped them in a pocket. Later my dad asked me where I got the candy.

"Oh that Mexican lady must have given them to her," my mom said.

This worked fine for me so I silently let them believe it. Still I was a little scared eating the candy since in the US at that time there were all sorts of scares about kids getting poisoned by candy given to them by strangers. I hoped the Skittles weren't poisoned but felt they were worth the risk.

Everyone camped on the beach but little girl Jessie, who was two years younger than me, was afraid and wanted to sleep in our truck instead. I said I'd join her because she was the person I liked sleeping next to the most. The first night went well but the second night Jessie got bit all over her face by some sort of bug. The bites were small, red and they itched. Somehow they didn't bite me or maybe I just didn't react to them. Jessie was really little so she kept scratching and eventually she ended up with scabs all over her face. I felt bad for her and was really thankful those bugs didn't get me.

We drove inland over all kinds of crazy 4WD roads with cactuses all around and up and over dry, bristly hills. Near dusk we descended a hill and there it was: a motel. Maybe we all needed a shower or maybe we were lost but the parents decided to splurge to stay there the night. I had never stayed in a motel or hotel before so this was very exciting.

I don't remember the rooms beyond a sort of mildew smell, but there was a swimming pool that was full of frogs. They were so loud we couldn't sleep so my dad had all us kids go out and yell "Campbell Soup!" at them as loud as we could. I don't think it worked (it never has) but I still yell Campbell Soup at noisy frogs.

My last memory is crossing back over the US/Mexican border. We had to wait in a very long line of cars to get to the immigration checkpoints but there were vendors everywhere selling food and colorful souvenirs like piñatas and ceramics. My parents never bought me much stuff, or at least I didn't think so, but here they bought me a big, cartoon-looking ceramic piggy bank. I can't remember anything more about it so it must have broken not long after we got it home. It was brightly colored and would have really stood out in my room.

Overall the way I remember the trip is the sense of freedom. The beach was huge and safe and the other kids and I were probably left on our own to roam around quite a bit. Mexico was warm, salty and had a light sour, flowery smell to it. I think my parents must have given me lots of Cracker Jacks because they too remind me of this trip to Baja. Back home things were still pretty free - this was the 1970s and we lived in the suburbs - but the feel of a different type of air against my skin, exotic smells and the warmth had me hooked. Aside from a few family trips to England my next trip wouldn't be till I was 13 years old and mature enough to enjoy that sense of freedom even more.

Passports With Purpose Round Four

 

It's mind boggling that it's been three years since the launch of Passports With Purpose and the first time that I, in collaboration with Kamoka Pearls, have donated a Tahitian Pearl (or more) to the cause. And what's amazing is that every year the wonderful folks who organize this fundraiser seem to come up with even more vital causes and raise significantly more money.

This year to me is the best yet: clean water. There's not a more basic need than that. And the location, Haiti, is where this should happen. With donations towards the unusually special array of blogger prizes (tours, gift vouchers for flights and hotels and even a ukulele) PWP hopes to raise $100,000 this year and proceeds will go to Water.org to dig wells for clean water in Haiti.

I have never been to Haiti (I lived in Tahiti for 15 years and I cannot count the times that people have mixed the two up and asked me about the earthquake) but I'm fortunate to have a colleague Paul Clammer (@paulclammer you should all follow him) who wrote the Haiti guidebook for Lonely Planet and has more recently written a very comprehensive Haiti guide with Bradt publishing. Through Paul's tweets and Facebook I've followed photos, stories and snippets that have made it clear how desperate things are over there.

Throughout my travels I've met heaps of aid workers and villagers who have things to say about aid workers and I've never heard more glowing reports than of a Peace Corps volunteer in Vanua Levu, Fiji who almost single-handedly brought clean water to a remote corner of the island. The villagers told me that within the first year they noticeably saw their children become, bigger, healthier and more thriving. I can't imagine how it would be to raise a family while constantly getting parasites or worse, and hoping that whatever came along wouldn't be strong enough to kill. Eradicating that fear and seeing the whole community thrive has got to be the biggest game changer there is.

So there it is. In hopes of helping this year's drive reach it's goals (I have no doubt it will so let's go for way past those goals) my husband Josh at Kamoka Pearls and I have donated a truly spectacular pearl. It's dark and bright with a liquid-y, deep orient that makes you want to touch it, hold it and wear it against your skin. It's mostly green with hues of purple and pink. We decided to mount this pearl with a very simple loop to show off how gorgeous it is, in no need of extra fanfare. If this were in our online shop we'd price it at $430. It's a gem.

So go over to Passports With Purpose and donate! We always donate too and last year we won a fabulous wine tour of the Walla Walla area of Washington State. Not bad for a donation that felt good anyway!

How I Packed For Five Weeks in South America in a Daypack

OK so it was a big daypack but, even though I usually carry a small-ish travel pack, this was the lightest I've ever traveled.

Why I did it

I had been through the Guianas (Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana - all on the Caribbean coast of South America) once before so I knew it was going to be rough going in beat up 4WDs or minibuses, over pot-holed muddy roads and I'd perhaps have to hike some distances with all my stuff. I also knew it was going to be hot as hell.

Why I was happy I did it

What I didn't know prior to my trip was that packing such a small bag would allow me to travel quickly and cheaply through southern Guyana via motorbike. This was only possible because my bag was small enough to strap on the back of the bike, thus sandwiching me between my stuff and my driver. Even if I'd had my normal travel pack it would have been too big and I'd of ended up having to pay hundreds of dollars more to charter 4WDs. Packing light gave me freedom, saved me money and let me enjoy some of the most beautiful country I've ever seen in it's full glory.

How I did it

I'd like to tell you that my packing process is highly refined, organized and detailed, but that would be a huge lie. In fact, I was working to deadline on two other Lonely Planet books and finishing up my taxes until the point I walked out my door to the airport. I don't do any of that "pack everything you need then remove a third [or half or whatever]." No, I just very logically think about what I need - not what I romanticize myself needing ("Teach Yourself Dutch" book? Disco shoes? Uh uh). This of course all depends on destination - if I was going to Italy for example and eating out at nice restaurants in a relatively wealthy country where people take fashion seriously, my packing list would have been much different. The Guianas are poor countries where looking too nice makes you stand out and become a mugging target.

What I packed

Clothes:

1 pair lightweight, wicking safari pants that roll up to capris

1 pair more city-friendly capris

1 pair long cotton pants

1 pair lightweight nylon shorts

2 T-shirts

2 wife beater-style tank tops

2 spaghetti strap fitted tank tops

1 nylon wicking long-sleeve button-up safari shirt

1 long sleeve cotton shirt

1 lightweight casual cotton dress

1 bikini

6 pair undies

2 pair socks

1 headband

1 hat

1 sarong

1 lightweight jacket

1 pair hiking shoes

flip flops

Gear:

 

Compact, nylon, mosquito netted jungle hammock

small binoculars

Canon G12 camera

Swiss Army knife

small sewing kit

iPod

Netbook

sunglasses

small travel lock

flashlight

plug converter

chargers

Toiletries

 

Everything I needed for showers/personal hygiene I carried in travel-sized bottles to fit in an 8-inch toiletries case.

Big tube o' sunscreen

2 tubes of insect repellent

First aid kit (my own compilation)

Individually packed wet wipes

meds

Tide to Go

Food & Drink

6 Luna bars

water purification tablets (because my Steripen filter is on the fritz)

Tea bag

Emergen-C packets

Books

 

2 guidebooks (I was there to update a guidebook so had to bring these)

3 ripped out portions of 3 other guidebooks

A big hardcover reading book I promptly lost and replaced with a small paperback

And this was too much stuff. I never used the hammock (I showed it to one of my guides and he laughed at me) so sent it back with a friend after two weeks. I could have done without one of the T-shirts, never used my binoculars and only wore one pair of the socks (I usually hike in flip flops). But otherwise I used everything and was glad I had it. I never wished I had anything more.

How did this differ from how I usually pack?

When I go to countries that have beautiful oceans I pack a mask, small swimming fins and a snorkel. Also, many countries I visit are Muslim, which means I have to cover up more and can't get away wearing my favorite tank tops. I usually pack a pair of ballet flats for nights out and the plane. But otherwise this is pretty much what I bring, just stuffed into a smaller bag.

Mamasa To Toraja Part 2: Christian Politics in a Muslim World

Our trekking guide from Mamasa to Tana Toraja was a Mamasan man named Domingus, which he told us is derived from the word Sunday, "Domingo" in Indonesian. The Mamasa region is known for being staunchly Christian, but because Indonesia is a very Muslim country and this is what both Emre and I were used to, we were more drawn to the fact that "Domingus" sounded Latin, not necessarily religious. Our guide however proved to be much more of the latter.

Domingus was as clean cut a guy as you could ever hope to lead you on a trek. He had a big, round, smiling clean-shaven face, perfectly trimmed short hair with a few strands of distinguished grey and he wore brown dress slacks, a long sleeve button shirt and a guide's vest with an official looking emblem on it. Over the next three days he would wear this exact outfit every day and never get so much as a smudge of mud or a wrinkle in it. He never smelled bad or had a hair out of place. Emre and I would come out the Toraja end of the trip covered in stains, feet encrusted with dirt and hair flying in every direction. I have no idea how Domingus stayed so well put together.

On our first night we saw him put up some political posters around the village we were staying in. He explained that he was a major supporter of the Indonesian Christian party and while he was on our trek he was going to spread the word about his favorite candidate to all the small villages who didn't get much news. That emblem on his jacket - ends up it was for his political party, not a guiding organization.

It's interesting to visit Christian areas in Indonesia because the locals immediately assume that white people have the same beliefs as them and therefore, they feel a certain kinship with them. Domingus and all the families we met made this assumption with me. As minorities in their own country (where they often feel discredited and mute) this kinship can be stronger than you might expect. Our group however was a little off kilter because Emre is Turkish and was brought up Muslim. I wasn't brought up anything but because I'm American no one ever bothered to ask me about my spiritual leanings and just assumed I was as Jesus loving as the Mamasans. This suited me fine. Domingus however was immediately a little suspicious of Emre and quietly brought me aside a few times to ask me about how strong a believer she was and if this was going to cause us any problems. Everything ended up happy and peaceful but it was interesting to feel what in Indonesia would be considered a sort of reverse racism. Here I was sticking up for my "Muslim" (Emre is slightly more Muslim than I would call myself Christian) friend in a country where most women wear veils. Emre later confided in me that as a Muslim she often gets preferential treatment in Muslim countries, even getting offered special discounts etc. This was the first time it ever really hit me how different we all get treated in foreign countries because of our perceived religion.

It soon became clear that even though Domingus was a perfectly good guide and knew the area well, his main goal was to spread the word about politics. Luckily, the Mamasans seemed happy to get any news or visitors at all and welcomed the news by promptly posting Domingus's posters all over the place. In fact, they seemed to genuinely respect our guide for bringing them this information. There were a few earnest conversations about the exceptional nature of the Christian candidate but for the most part the villagers were more interested in hosting two exotic white people in their homes than talking politics.

The children had no interest in politics and followed us everywhere. From our first homestay two kids followed us a good half our before the returned home. At the second homestay kids came from all around and hung around trying to keep our full attention from the time we arrived (about 5pm) to nightfall. It was pretty exhausting trying to entertain all those kids after trekking all day uphill through a jungle but they were so sweet and had such good senses of humor that it was well-worth it. Plus we got some great photos and this video:

That night we stayed up till the un-Godly hour of about 10pm in our one room shack drinking sour-sweet palm wine with Domingus, the owner of the house and our horseman (who is worthy of a whole other blog post I'll probably never write). Then to bed on our thick quilts that were supposed to be mattresses but fortunately some warmer blankets this night. We slept well.

Then the next morning it was off again but this time downhill through rice fields, tiny one-room churches on ridges and villages of small wooden shacks on stilts.

Mamasa to Tana Toraja Part 1: The Long and Winding Road

I move around fast when I'm researching for Lonely Planet but every now and then there's something I want to do so badly, I'll slow down and make time for it. The trek between Mamasa and Tana Toraja on the culturally-overloaded island of Sulawesi in Indonesia, was one of those things. There are two ways to get to Tana Toraja from Mamasa: a 13-hour barf-inducing bus ride over pot-holed mountain roads, or a three-day hike through a region of boat-shaped roofs, terraced rice fields, isolated villages and jungle mountains. Walking it seemed like the obvious choice.

Traditional Mamasa houses

Unfortunately for my travel buddy Emre, the long, long trip began straight from the airport. Her flight from Turkey arrived in Makassar, Sulawesi's capital, in the early morning and I hadn't been able to reach her via email to tell her the plan, so at 5am I met her at the gate, explained what we were doing (in hopes she was OK with this which fortunately she was) and took her directly to a bus station. The minibus from Makassar to Mamasa was a rickety, non-air-con tin can of a rumbler that was soon jammed packed with clove cigarette smoking locals, big boxes stuffed with food supplies and two giant television sets. It took over 14 hours to get to Mamasa, and half that time was spent bumping over the last 60km on a rutted dirt road that wound like a coil up into the mountains.

It was dark when we arrived so it wasn't until morning that we awoke to the green-hills and cool temperatures of Mamasa Village where we had a day to explore by motorbike. The traditional roofed houses here are similar to the famous, dramatically arched ones of Tana Toraja but are less curved and shorter so they don't pack such a punch. The biggest difference however between these oft-compared regions is that Mamasa has hardly any tourists. So while popular Torajan villages are swarming with photo-snapping visitors and insistent hawkers, in Mamasa families invite you in for tea and everyone wants to chat. We saw no other foreigners and were welcomed everywhere like royalty. It was magic.

The lunch crew - near Mamasa Village

We spent the night before our trek began in a traditional house where we soon discovered the reality of what we were in for. There are no mattresses in Mamasa, just thick quilts on the floor and a synthetic blanket to cover you. It was so freezing that first night that Emre and I ended up under the "mattress" to keep warm. The floor with or without this light padding felt equally hard. Dinner had been noodle soup with hunks of home-butchered, gamey-tasting pork floating in it, that tasted as if it had been sitting in storage (no refrigeration) a bit too long. Emre puked hers up in the middle of the night. Dogs howled and a mosquito kept buzzing in my ear even though it felt far too cold for them to survive here. Neither Emre or I got more than a few hours of sleep.

Our house the first night

But rest or no rest, we were up by six, breakfasted on sugary tea and omelets, said good bye to our smiling hosts promising we had slept marvelously, and were off to theoretically walk up hill until the end of the day. We had no idea what we were going to encounter and that was just fine.

Top 5 clothing picks for women traveling to hot, conservative countries

If you're worried about looking like a dork abroad, know that not dressing appropriately in a conservative country is worse than looking silly, you'll also be acting like a jerk. I'm talking about most of Southeast Asia, the South Pacific, Asia, Morocco, Tunisia, small villages in Central and South America and more - in other words, those parts of the world that maintain a modest dress code without requiring something more hardcore like a burqa.

Figuring out what to wear while maintaining some style dignity can be hard for travelers, especially women, who have to cover up much more than men and who are more closely scrutinized. The question is, how does one dress conservatively, look a little nice and avoid overheating at the same time? After over 20 years of travel in these parts of the world and looking pretty awful through most of it, I've finally acquired a few key pieces that I feel keep the balance between comfort, appropriateness and fashion.

Here are my top 5 essentials:

The peasant top

Try to find one in a feather-weight, crinkly cotton that's not too see-through. Three quarter sleeves are best and make sure if there's a tie at the neck the keyhole part doesn't show any cleavage. Avoid mid-weight or heavy fabrics and any tight elastic. Think, breathable and keep it simple without a lot of flamboyant embroidery or other standout features.

Here's a current favorite of mine from Old Navy.

T-shirt

A good cut here is key. I hate boxy shirts that add a few pounds to my look but too tight is a no-no. I go for the lightest cotton possible that's still opaque, sleeves that are longer than a cap sleeve but shorter than three-quarters and loose enough to breath. Also make sure it's long enough that you're not going to bare any waistline when bending over etc. I personally like a mellow-colored print like ikat or tie-dye stripes to hide stains.

Capri pants

If these go out of fashion again I may die. Mid-calf in a lightweight sturdy fabric is a must. A drawstring waist is another plus since you'll be able to adjust them so they'll stay up properly without a belt through all the stretching and washings and un-washings they will surely go through - as well as any waistline changes travel may bring to your midriff. I have a pair right now that are my all-time favorite: they have good button cargo pockets and are made of a fabric that looks like cotton but is actually a 100% silk weave that's cool, soft and sturdy. Go for dark colors. I like fairly low-waisted styles because these look better on me, but if you can pull off the "natural waist" look without looking like you were on a $2 budget at Goodwill or got a bitchin' Christmas gift from your grandmother from Royal Robbins, then go for it.

Here are my favorite capris from Hei Hei but unfortunately they don't make them anymore.

Mid-calf length skirt

I actually don't pack these anymore since I find they're not practical for anything remotely active but if you're going to be hanging out in a city a lot or plan on needing to dress nicely at night, this can be an essential. Again, find a lightweight fabric that won't need ironing and don't get a skirt so full that it may get blown up by wind and give the conservative world a peek at your underpants. Length should be mid-calf.

Long pants

In general, I only wear long pants for insect protection, cold or because they're the only clean thing I have left to wear. I also wear them on the plane so they need to be stretchy enough to sleep in and look nice enough that if by some miracle of fate I get upgraded, I won't look too sloppy to sit in business class. I like light, soft cotton or Tencel with something elastic-like in the waist that won't pinch or stretch. Again, I think "natural waist" is a sin, but that's a matter of taste. Straight leg works best; anything with a flared leg will get caught in stuff and provide a tunnel for bugs to crawl up and skinny pants will be too sexy and cling to your humid skin like soggy plastic wrap. Go for dark colored. I'm partial to slate grey.

Bonus Piece: Silk scarf

Find the biggest one you can find that can compress into the smallest folded square. I keep one in my purse at all times on the road in case I need extra arm coverage or something over my hair for religious temples or particularly conservative places. It also can be used as a real scarf to add a little flair to your outfit (think: business class) and can provide warmth in unexpected air-con disaster areas like buses and cinemas.